An apartment located on top of a truncated stone pyramid about fifty feet aboveground. I see that there is an apartment under this one and I can see down an outside stair or ramp in a blue-green light.

Now I am in the lower apartment, in a bedroom with a naked boy who says: "You and I are just old sluts."

He has a strange body, perhaps four feet tall, with white skin and slightly hairy on the stomach, with broad shoulders and thin hips. The face I cannot see clearly. There is an electric element, as if I am trying to activate some very complex device which I don't fully understand.

Someone in another bedroom. When I visit him, he stands in the doorway blocking my way, obviously because he doesn't want me to see who is in the room with him. I don't care, and I say so. He is standing directly in her path, seconds to countdown. As her bowels give way and yellow shit trickles down her legs and splatters on the floor, she emits a wail of distress like an animal's wail. (In fact she had a nervous breakdown shortly afterwards.)

Shitting woman.

Now I recollect Bill Simpson's wife had this unfortunate condition. At any moment she could start to fart and shit uncontrollably and rush from the room, and all the guests were mostly upper-class English faggots and they would all outdo each other at ignoring the incident, going right on with what they were saying, just a shadow louder to drown out the farts--just the right shade louder, and never as much as one raised eyebrow or even dropping the ash off one cigarette.

The only reason anyone tolerated Bill Simpson was that the shitting wife was loaded with it up the ass and he had a big comfortable villa on the Riviera, all stocked with distinguished lunch and dinner guests, why even the Duke and Duchess of Windsor turned up looking like escapees from a Swedish insane asylum, 1920. So the English Edel Fags made a stop there. They were discreetly indoctrinated: "Just pay no attention." And like I say, outvied each in discretion.

It was after lunch, everything quiet, soon they will drift off for a siesta, when it hits. Audrey was more than up to the occasion. He produces a roll of toilet paper from a hidden pocket . . . and a great big boyish smile.

"Can I help you, lady?"

Standing right in front of her, blocking the way, so she turned loose with a stream of diarrhea down her legs, dripping onto the floor.

Then he snarls in her face like a dog: "Uncontrolled slut!" and fetches her a crack across the chops, knocked the spit out of her mouth. And no Colonel there to horsewhip the cad.

Well, to tell the truth, Mrs. Simpson was a real pain in everybody's ass, and some uttered that she did it at times that suited her bitchy purposes, for she hated all Bill's airy-fairy friends. "Oh look what just flew in," she would greet them.

So they just sat there. But Bill had to do something, you see it was HER money, and she wasn't such a fool as to put anything in his name. (If there is any sorrier spectacle than a queen who has married some disgusting dog for her money...)

"Get out of my house, you young, young..."

Audrey shrugged. "Cad, bounder? Doesn't quite make it, though."

Meanwhile she has escaped, leaving a puddle of yellow shit on the floor. Audrey calls to the Arab servant: "Why don't you housebreak the old shit-bag? It's bloody disgusting. She was making a filthy noise."

Spit runs down Bill's chin. He casts an appealing glance at the butler. Audrey throws the roll of toilet paper, hitting the butler in the chest.

"Well, clean it up, you worthless old fart."

The butler is unperturbed.

"Dddddddddddooooooo sommmmething!" Bill stammers.

"I am giving notice, sir. I was hired as a butler, not a lavatory attendant or a bodyguard." He bows stiffly and leaves the room.

Audrey exits after him, emerging two seconds later with a collapsible moped: Sput sput sput.

Bill looks around at his guests, five in all: "Getttt ouuuut of myy hhhhouse!"

"Glad to, old sod."

"Confidentially, it stinks."

"And sucks."

"My best to the old shit-bag."

The fifth man is something special. He gives Bill the finger and ejects his false teeth, which bite Bill on the nose. Bill slaps at them, but they have locked. As the fifth man walks by him, he opens his mouth like a jewfish and pulls in the teeth, which tear loose and snap back into his mouth, leaving Bill alone and bleeding hysterically.

Bill falls sobbing across the sofa as the curtain falls.

Toilet is flushed offstage.

SOURCE: My Education: a book of dreams by William S. Burroughs, 1995, p.115-18. Originally untitled.