Santa Maria, Calif. ? Michael Jackson went AWOL from his trial Thursday and was nearly jailed before he finally showed up more than an hour late, in his pajama bottoms and slippers, to listen as his accuser described his alleged molestation in graphic detail.

The pop star, wearing a coat over a T-shirt, walked gingerly into court after being treated at a hospital for what was described as a serious back problem. Jackson arrived after Judge Rodney S. Melville threatened to arrest him and revoke his $3 million bail; the judge later vacated the warrant.

Jurors got only a hint of the strange courtroom drama.

“Mr. Jackson had a medical problem and it was necessary for me to order his appearance,” Melville told jurors, adding that he didn’t want the panel to draw any negative inferences from the developments.

Jackson, 46, watched as his accuser described extensive liquor-laced visits with the pop star at Neverland, and of looking at sex magazines with Jackson and of being molested as he lay in Jackson’s bed.

Under questioning by Dist. Atty. Tom Sneddon, the boy said he remembered two sexual encounters.

In testimony that was hushed and sometimes mumbled, the young cancer survivor said Jackson molested him the first time in his bedroom under the covers after they returned from drinking in Neverland’s arcade. It began with talk about masturbation, he claimed.

“He said if men don’t masturbate they can get to a level where they might rape a girl or they can be kind of unstable,” the boy said of Jackson.

On cross-examination, defense attorney Thomas Mesereau Jr. alleged the accuser was making up the story. Jackson’s attorneys have said the molestation claims are an attempt by the accuser’s family to get money.

Mesereau also attacked the boy’s testimony that he did not feel that Jackson had done much for him when he had cancer.

“I didn’t see him much,” the boy said. “He was my best friend in the world, and my best friend was trying to avoid me when I had cancer.”

Mesereau, however, said Jackson called the boy three times a week and gave him gifts.

Mesereau’s cross-examination of the boy will resume Monday; the court plans to handle pending motions today.