by D. L. King
I turned from my thoughts to find that Earnshaw had been successful in unearthing the carnal contraption and had set it out upon the rumpled bed. I forgot all my suppositions as I drifted close to examine the find.
“Oh my…”
A selection of softly padded leather straps would affix the device securely to the…victim hardly seemed the correct word. Clearly the engine was a device solely aimed at a woman’s pleasure. A carefully carved phallus of wood sheathed in the softest leather could be cranked by means of a handle to penetrate the one to be pleasured at a speed that suited the participant or employer. There was even a key movement, that Earnshaw ably demonstrated, which would allow hands free use until the clockwork mechanism ran down and would plunder the cunny of the pleasure-seeker with all the regularity of a piston. I found myself blushing hot just to think of it. And neither had the external application been neglected. A small brush of barely stiffened bristles was positioned correctly to stroke the willing participant and encourage the pearl from its shell. I felt wetness start between my legs and rushed to the privy to take care of myself. But all the time I rubbed away my need I was imagining the wonderful and dreadful engine about its work upon me….
By the time I returned my bloomers were soaked. Earnshaw had thoughtfully laid out a pair of Cressida’s clean drawers and I gratefully divested myself of my sodden underclothes and hid them amongst the detritus of the bedroom, knowing full well that the maids would dispose of all when I allowed them access to the crime scene, thus leaving my pilfering and my indiscretion undiscovered.
Earnshaw had replaced the disconcerting device in the hatbox when I was once more able to continue, but she had not closed the lid. She beckoned me over and pointed out a series of markings that I had to squint to make out in the dim light. Until that moment, I confess, I had been thinking of confiscating the device in the name of science and research. But what I saw made me think again.
“Mark VI! Good gracious, do you suppose there are more of them out there?” Earnshaw nodded, her expression serious. “And since the intruder is a member of this household…”
There would be other victims!
And so we began our investigation in earnest. I questioned every female member of the household and every guest. Such proved necessary as our second find was dubbed the Mark V….
“I was in the pantry and the ‘gentleman,’ though I don’t know as I should rightly use the word, came up behind me. I wears them bloomers without a crotch, that just lace onto the garter belt, though I don’t know how he knew! He bent me over the chopping block, flipped up my skirts and gave me a right seeing to with his device. Strapped on himself, it were. Plundered both my holes! I was all fit to scream the house down, only it felt so good. And what with my old man having the trouble with his old fella, well, it’s been some time since I last had the pleasure of being ridden…. He left it behind when he’d finished. The wedgie was hollow like. My husband has been using it to pleasure me ever since. ’Ere, you won’t be taking it with you, will you?”
“My husband was in the smoking room taking cigars and brandy with his lodge mates. He’s grand poo-bah, you know! I had retired to bed, knowing it would be a good many hours before he joined me and had slipped a few drops of laudanum in my nightcap.”
“Nessa!”
“Yes, sorry. Easily distracted, I know. I woke up to find my wrists and ankles fastened to the bedposts and my nightgown raised to my neck. Luckily the night was warm or I could have taken a chill! Anyway, I found a gag in my mouth, so screaming was out of the question. I couldn’t see the fellow clearly; the lights were out, the curtains partly drawn and only a crescent moon outside. He seemed slight and had small, clever hands. He stood at the foot of the bed for quite some time just looking at my nude body in the moonlight, then he produced an ostrich feather from a bag and proceeded to stroke me with it. It was… I liked it a great deal.”
“Nothing mechanical?”
“I was getting to that! Next he produced an ermine mitten and began to rub my breasts very, very gently, paying extra attention to the nipples and the sensitive undersides, while his tongue flickered into my armpits and navel. I was transported with bliss.”
And I was wet again. If this continued I was going to have to start carrying around a bag of clean undergarments. “What happened next?”
“When he fitted little suction manipulators to my breasts I thought I should die of delight. By the time he brought out his device I was sopping wet and he didn’t have to work hard to enter me. The contraption clamped to the bedposts and extended to reach, then after he’d inserted it, he wound the key tight and flicked a switch and I was pounded to ecstasy. It was just as well he’d put the gag on, I’d have screamed for England. When I came to myself he’d untied my hands and left the devices. I’ve used them all many times when I know my husband will be late home. Unfortunately I overwound the spring recently and the main device is ruined, but the suction devices still work and I’m being extracareful with them. I can come now from just them alone, if I’m thinking about the other device. Would you like to see them?”
Lady Vanessa pulled out a rifle case and withdrew the items in question. MARK II, this read. “Binkie would never think to look in here. Hates hunting, thinks it’s a beastly sport. Oh, Earnshaw, you darling! I think you’ve fixed it….”
We found the fourth device in a most unexpected place. Earnshaw’s cousin was the under butler to the Waltham household and she made much of her relative in her written missives, taking frequent side trips when she came to England on her errands for me. I had been apprised of the fact that he had a liking for gentlemen. Since he seemed a likeable sort, it was in no wise my place to judge his proclivities, no matter what polite society thought. Especially since I had spent the last five hours fantasying so hotly about intimate acts with clockwork and mechanical devices!
Wilkins lived in a garret above the coach house, with the coachman, who was of a like persuasion. The tender way they had with each other reminded me of Earnshaw’s careful handling of my person. I put such thoughts from my mind as her cousin’s tale unfolded.
“I would not normally discuss such things with a gently bred lady, but my cousin says you are of broad mind and will not judge me, so, in light of your investigation I shall tell you exactly what transpired.”
I settled myself carefully on the hassock, mindful of the effects others’ tales had had upon my anatomy.
“Jim and I have been together nearly a year and hope to be so for life. Our only sadness is that he could never experience the full joy of total union as he is, if he’ll pardon my saying so, a much smaller man in some departments than would be considered average. While he can gain pleasure from using his mouth on me, or me on him, he could not rod me as I did him, as he did not have the length. All that changed a week ago. We had just returned from our daily labors when he found a package addressed to him on the table in the modest kitchen of our apartments. When he opened it… Well, I’ll let him tell the tale.”
Jim produced said package. Still surrounded with the tattered remains of the brown waxed paper and string that had sealed it against casual gaze, the lid lifted to reveal a harness of straps not unlike a horse’s bridle. Yet clearly it was made to strap upon a hipless man. And fixed where the bit might be was a glorious phallus made of rubber, nearly ten inches in length, lovingly molded in all the particulars and bending in exactly the right way for rear entry. We all of us observed it with some awe, as one might Michelangelo’s David. It was a thing of beauty and artistry. And what is more, there was a mechanical contraption attached to it.
“This pump inflates the inner bladder to hold me firm inside so I can feel everything through the hollow walls as if I were doing the penetrating,” Jim told me as proudly as if he’d invented the device himself. “And that mechanism gently pulls and twists me as I plunge in and out, so that I gain as much satisfaction as from the best hand job. The device is a marvel!”
“They left thes
e too.” Wilkins displayed a pair of gloves whose palms were studded with rubber blobs and nodules. He stroked his fingers over them suggestively. No need to explain their use. While his partner fucked him he could stroke himself with these sensuously surfaced gloves and bring his own ejaculation. The pair were growing hard and excited just talking about their gift. Hurriedly, Earnshaw and I left (having noted the device was scribed MARK I), allowing the loving pair to make use of their windfall in private.
By the time evening fell the wedding was back on and Cressida’s thankful family offered us a bed for the night. By dinner’s end we had interviewed all the female staff and every female guest. We had uncovered nine different devices: I–X though we were missing Mark VIII. We had only found one given to gentlemen. And were no closer to discovering the mysterious benefactor or his or her motivations. I had my suspicions, but did not share them. I had the feeling the whereabouts of the missing device and the identity of its owner were about to be revealed and prematurely spilling the truth might spoil what lay in store.
I helped Earnshaw comb and braid her hair for bed then surprised her when she gathered mine up for the same treatment. “I think I shall leave it unbound tonight.” I put on my satin sleep mask, then she helped me into bed and arranged my hair over my pillow, turned down the gaslights and slipped away to her room. When I was alone, I wriggled out of my nightdress, careful not to disarrange my hair, and pushed it under the bed. Then I waited.
The house was long quiet and I in a languorous doze, when I finally heard the scratch of a diamond stylus on the windowpane and a few moments later the window was unlatched and pushed up against the sash. I lay perfectly still, hardly daring to breath. Only when the intruder was completely inside the room, the window closed against hue and cry, and I sensed the person at the foot of my bed did I speak.
“I have been expecting you. What will it be? The Mark VIII?”
For a moment, my sex crusader froze. This was the culmination of all the experiments. To be found out now spelled disaster. I decided for my uncertain swain.
“I am a woman who has been without intimate company for over six months. I will not turn you away nor expose you. Rather I am eager for what you offer. I submit voluntarily. Uncover me and see if I do not speak the truth.”
The intruder ripped back the bedclothes to reveal my nude body. I heard breath catch, then bags were opened and equipment prepared while I awaited my fate. Silk scarves tied my hands gently to the bedposts. A hand with quick clever fingers stroked the hair from my brow and laid a kiss upon my lips, before beginning to stroke down my body, grazing hard nipples, taunt stomach, quivering thighs. Their touch was more welcome than mink, more delicate than feathers, more knowing than any machine. They knew exactly where to touch, how much and for how long. When my moans of pleasure threatened to wake others, those lips found mine again and silenced me, first with firm pressure, then with the invasion of a fennel scented serpent that jousted with my own for possession of my mouth.
While one hand switched to kneading my breasts, a phallus more carefully molded than that given to Wilkins, more powerfully vibrated than Cressida’s, driven by a precision clockwork mechanism, thrust inside my hot wetness, after those same clever fingers parted my lower lips. My lover rose above me, raising my legs and hooking them over strong shoulders, as the mechanism shook and shuddered and stroked the entire length of the shaft inside me.
Not content with a single penetration, I felt myself opened further and was plundered at the same time from behind, all the measurements precise to me; a questing wet finger tempting my puckered rosebud and rimming it round and round while gently pressing within.
At last, when I thought I should explode from pleasure, when I thought there could be nothing to surpass this, an implement covered with nodules of varying size and stiffness rasped my aching clit. I shrieked out my fulfillment with the name of my nemesis, gushing and drenching my lover as I came.
When they threw open the door, I was properly covered with bedclothes and quite alone. I apologized shamefacedly for waking them.
“A dream.”
“Too much rich food and a strange bed most like,” my mother mused with a sniff, taking herself back to bed.
“More than that surely,” Cressida’s mother disagreed. “It sounded more as if you were being murdered.”
“Or having the best sex of your life,” Cressida said ushering her mother out with a smile for me over her shoulder.
When they were gone, the intruder slid out from beneath my bed, clutching my nightdress.
“So that’s where it got to. Be a darling and lock the door so we won’t be interrupted next time. What, you didn’t think there’d be a next time? Six months is a long dry season and I have an itch you’ve only begun to scratch. Now lock the door then come back to bed. And you’d better have a gag in that bag of tricks, or this is going to be a very frustrating night.”
When I announced I was leaving that morning and had solved the mystery, the women were baffled.
“Who is the miscreant?” Lady Vanessa asked.
“That I cannot tell you. Revealing the culprit would mean exposing all of you. I have been sworn to keep their identity secret, on the understanding that they will never visit themselves upon unsuspecting or unwilling victims again. I think that is the best result we can hope for, given the scandal otherwise.”
At that there were a good many uncomfortable nodding heads.
“And you can look forward to a steady supply of like devices appearing for sale quite soon. I think I have convinced the experimenter there is a market for these carnal engines. All enquiries can be made through me at my laboratoire in Paris. An appropriate city for the commercial production of such devices, I’m sure you’ll agree.”
“But what about punishment? Should they be allowed to go free? They almost ruined my daughter’s marriage!” Cressida’s mother exclaimed.
“Never fear. I have seen to it that they will be punished and the punishment will fit the crime. Now you must forgive me, I have an airship to catch.”
Earnshaw slammed the luggage into the boot of our rented automobile, assisted me to a seat, then climbed behind the wheel. I set a hand possessively on her thigh as we drove away in a roar and whoosh of steam.
“You will be crafting a Mark VIII device to your particular specifications the moment we get home, won’t you, darling?”
She spared me a look, but didn’t take her small clever hands off the wheel for a moment as she nodded. The merest hint of a blush crept up her cheeks toward her goggles.
THE SUCCUBUS
Elizabeth Schechter
In the parlor, there is a portrait of Madame, painted when she was a shy young miss of seventeen. She is looking over her shoulder, and her midnight hair tumbles down her back in a profusion of curls. The uninitiated might think that this house, which has come to be called the House of the Sable Locks, was named for that portrait and for Madame’s glorious spill of hair. But that is not so; Madame’s hair is more silver than sable now, and there is another reason for the name. The uninitiated never go farther than the parlor, never know that there is another world beyond the doors that lead into the rear of the house. They think that Madame is simply a woman of independent means, the widow of a rich, albeit eccentric, inventor. They do not know the truth. They do not know about us.
The House of the Sable Locks is famous, but only in a rarefied circle. Certain men meet at their clubs and whisper to each other about the delights that they find behind our doors. There is the second floor, where those who prefer women can gather. Or the third floor, wherein those who prefer men can find what they seek. And then there is the fourth floor, where I can be found. But I get ahead of my story.
The “Sable Locks” refer not to a woman’s crowning glory, but to the exquisitely wrought and enameled locks that adorn the collars of the men who frequent our halls. They come here at first uncertain of what they will find, knowing only the whispers of their peers. They me
et with Madame in private, and no one speaks of what happens behind those closed doors. But when that meeting is over the gentlemen either leave the house, never to return, or Madame takes them on a tour. It will be the first and last time they walk the halls as free men; when next they arrive at the house, they will be escorted to the servants’ quarters. There, they will be stripped of clothing and jewelry, hooded, gagged and collared. Thus rendered silent and anonymous and wearing only their locked collars, the bearers of the Sable Lock make their way to their chosen rooms and to the pleasures and torments that await them there. They never know who the other men are, or of what station they might be. The man that they pass in the hallway might be a member of the House of Lords, or the son of the butcher, or even their own brother. No one knows for certain except for Madame.
And me.
The fourth floor is usually quiet, with only the hum of machinery and the distant voices from the floors below. The men do not return to the fourth floor after their initial encounter with me. They desire something more familiar, more in keeping with their personal fantasies. More safe. So I wait, alone, and the silent servants tend to my needs. This evening will be different. I know it already. I can hear Madame’s familiar step on the stair, and another, heavier step with her.
She enters first, the train of her evening gown sweeping the floor as she moves to the table and lights the lamp. The man lingers in the door, peering into the gloom. He wears pristine evening dress, and the lamplight picks out the gold links in his watch-chain and the gleam of the ruby on his left hand. The walls have already whispered his secrets to me: the second son of a duke, one who was never expected to take the reins of power. One who came, all unexpected, into an inheritance that was never meant to be his. His older brother was dead of typhoid, gone without a son to succeed him, and so the younger son was now Earl Hathaway. It was no surprise to us that the late, lamented Reginald Warwick, Earl Hathaway had died without issue—he had also borne the collar and lock in this house and had shown a definite preference for the third floor. It will be interesting to see what the new Lord Hathaway prefers. His name, the walls have told me, is Nigel.