"Babe!" Constance doesn't know whether she's called out in warning, pleasure or command; in any case Babe merely murmurs, "My darling," and kisses her very, very deeply, and Constance decides that the question can wait. She is busy. But the days of the junkie headmistress are numbered--Constance has understood this. Another jolt of molten pleasure shakes her and she cries out again. She looks down to see Babe's blood-wet fingers poke out briefly from between her legs: Blood, she recalls, will have blood.

Constance wants to be headmistress. She would spank Babe before the school every day for a year. She feels as if she's running a fever; she feels as if she's driving a car very fast at night towards some fluorescent goal. With Babe's help, the junkie headmistress is easily put of out the way--then it's on to the faculty. Constance has never known herself to be so strong; she has never known Babe to be so ardent. Babe's desire touches her deeply. It keeps touching her--Babe keeps touching her--Babe won't stop. All at once Constance trusts Babe: she trusts Babe to do what she's told. Constance clasps Babe fiercely to her breast and with a savage cry comes all over her lap.

In the aftermath, they are rocking back and forth. Who is rocking whom? Isn't Babe incapable of rocking Constance? Evidently Babe is changing, for Constance is being rocked back and forth in Babe's arms, and Babe is saying, "Constance, do you think that this time--for me, I mean--but do you think that this time there might be more?"

For once, Constance smiles at the future.