Employing the techniques he had learned from Catherine it was but a matter of minutes before she was writhing to his touch. She held his hand between her legs and, after a crescendo of sighs, gasped as she felt the waves of her orgasm shuddering through her body.
She gave a long exhalation of pleasure.
“Oh, it has been some time since I was touched in that way. But you know how to please a woman. Now…” she continued, with a naughty smile, ”let us see what we can find,” whilst tugging at his buttons and slowly helping him climb out of his clothes until he stood naked beside the bed.
She touched him, wonderingly, running her hands over his muscled body and making admiring noises as she traced his erection with her fingers. She pulled him close to the bed and lowered her mouth, using her lips, tongue and fingers. Hugh threw back his head in intemperate delight at this novel feeling as she knowingly stimulated him in a way he had not experienced before.
She heard his breath beginning to come in gasps and pulled away from him.
“There is somewhere else for that,” she said in a low sexual tone. She pulled him onto the bed and straddled him, guiding him into her and thrusting down on him.
He had not considered it possible that a woman could be the main protagonist in this way. With Catherine, she made it clear that he was to be assertive – usually from behind – but Alice knew what she wanted and how to achieve it.
As she was grinding her hips into him she reached down and took his hands, placing them on her breasts.
She threw back her head as she felt the waves of pleasure course through her. This excited Hugh who rose to meet her with each thrust. It was a matter of minutes before he felt unable to contain himself and, pulling her hips down to him, ejaculated with several pulses deep inside her. This also seemed to be what Alice was waiting for as she lowered her body to kiss him as he throbbed inside her.
Later, dressing to leave as she laced up her dress, she spoke sternly to him.
“You will know that this is just about mingling your pleasure and mine and we must not speak a word of it, nor of love nor any obligation?”
Hugh was happy to concur and they arranged to meet simply to satisfy each other’s lusts from time to time. In parallel, Hugh’s relationship with Catherine de Neufville cooled. Catherine sent coded entreaties to Hugh’s home and contrived to be where he was scheduled to be, but he neglected to respond, confirming the adage he had heard – ‘follow love and it will flee thee, flee love and it will follow thee’. He resolved that he would always be a fugitive.
*
In late August 1778, Hugh was enjoying a bottle of wine alone in his garden. A servant came to announce that Thomas Linley Senior wished to speak with him urgently and had been seated in the French Room. Hugh came in from the garden and greeted Linley Senior who was looking downcast.
“My boy,” he began. “I bring calamitous news. My son, your friend, Thomas…”
He struggled to continue but gathered himself.
“He has been drowned!”
Hugh was shocked.
“Sir, that is most disastrous. Allow me to give you and your family my profound condolences. Please tell me how this tragedy occurred.”
Linley Senior said that his son had been staying over in Lincolnshire at Grimesthorpe Castle as a guest of the Duke of Ancaster, one of his patrons.
“Along with two friends they were boating on the lake there. A great storm blew up and the boat capsized, no one is sure why. My boy could not be found for forty minutes but, when recovered, it was evident to all that he had left this world at an untimely young age.
“We travelled post haste to Lincolnshire but there was nothing to be done but his interment at Edenham Parish Church. The family is returned today. You have been his close friend and I felt it was my duty to advise you directly of this terrible news.”
Hugh once again expressed his deep sympathies and embraced the old man.
“One more thing,” said Linley Senior, pointing to a violin case. “This is his Italianate violin which you know of. The Duke’s family returned it to me with his few possessions. I believe in my heart that he would wish it to go to you. No, please, do not refuse. It would be a consolation to me that something precious of his would be safe in the hands of his boyhood friend. I enclose in the case a kind letter from Wolfgang Mozart.
“You remember the little maestro from all those years ago at the Swan and Harp in London, of course. Thomas and he were fast friends while studying together in Florence. He did me the singular kindness of putting some compassionate thoughts down when he heard of Thomas’s death. I believe he was one of the first to know.
“And now, I must leave you. My wife is inconsolable and needs me to be near. I am sorry to bring this sad news to you but felt you should know before it is noised abroad.”
Hugh shook the old man’s hand as he left. He sat down to think. He remembered their youthful play and their shared confidences. For the first time in his young life, he felt a glimpse of mortality.
He drained the bottle of wine and called for another. His eyes lit on the violin case, which he reverently opened. He turned it over in his hands noting the familiar tiger-striped back and the perfection of its construction. He bowed a few notes and drank in the vibrancy of the tone as it spilt into the early evening still August air. He thought about the brevity and fragility of life. He resolved that he would ensure that he had his fill of earthly pleasures before he became a mournful footnote in time like Thomas.
He raised a silent glass to the memory of his friend.
Looking in the case, he noticed a folded letter.
It read:
Sir, Mister Linley. My heart is broken for you. Tommasino was my age, my soul’s companion and he was my brother. He should have lived to write and play music as I believe he was the best of us. But now that light has been snuffed out like a candle and the world is a darker place. My only consolation is of the memory of the beauty and power of his playing. That music will live on and Tommasino and his God-given talent will echo with me forever. The flowers bloom, the sun shines and the music plays on. But in my heart I feel only Weltschmertz. Bless you and God bless Tommasino. W A Mozart.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Within a couple of years, Hugh was quite the beau of Bath. He had surrounded himself with a coterie of followers – the young, the wealthy, and some minor aristocrats – all single-mindedly bent on pleasure. Appetites, jaded by that corrosive combination of too much time, an excess of money and the ownership of little sense of duty, were slaked in taverns, gambling dens and whorehouses. Like a shoal of fish, they deflected this way and that as if on a whim. They knew that never had such a group of fine, witty, handsome and clever young men ever before assembled. Membership of this unofficial muster of peacocks was regulated by Hugh who invented a set of arcane rules: no eating of victuals whilst drink is being taken; first man out at cards to stand every man a pint of port; non-attendance at club night required the miscreant at subsequent meetings to stand on the table and expose himself to a chorus of ribald cheering; waistcoats were to be worn fancy – the fancier the better with group approval for novelty and colour; talk of women was disallowed with the exception being descriptions of activity with bitches, the group styling themselves the Bath Dog Club. The filthier and more depraved the telling the better. Any infringement of these involved drinking forfeits and braying opprobrium.
Minions whose livelihoods depended on the capricious dispensation of wealth – house servants, coffee shop assistants, inn-keepers, girls and women reduced to whoring to buy their food and pay their lodgings – were all treated disdainfully and dismissively. With his inexhaustible wealth and no parents to discipline him, Hugh had no boundaries to his excesses. Women were his especial pleasure. A day could not go by without some indulgence and pleasure in young flesh.
Catherine de Neufville was but a fading
memory. Alice Winfrey had been useful for a time but had been making subtle entreaties of love. She had been dropped like a hot coal. Her attempts to rekindle their affair had been met with a hint that, surely, her husband would be sorely distressed if any whisper of her misdemeanours were accidentally to slip out?
Now, as befitted a young, handsome, wealthy blade about town, he was entitled to as much new naked skin as his bodily needs demanded. Mothers and aspirational wives of local merchants and professional men advanced the claims of their pretty daughters, agreeing to let them visit, unchaperoned, the fine house in King’s Circus.
Schooled in seduction by Catherine and Alice, Hugh feasted on young firm fruit. An unfailing technique was to invite them to hear him play his violin as they sat admiringly. Then, purporting to give them a lesson in bowing, liberties were taken, pleasure was administered then maidenhoods were willingly surrendered. And fresh meat never tasted quite so piquant if reheated. So very few of these liaisons were repeated or developed. But the silly girls fancied themselves to be in love as a result of yielding their bodies. Hugh delighted in regaling the Dog Club with their letters professing love and eternal devotion to whoops of derision and sniggering. Intimate details were noisily and triumphantly shared to an accompaniment of cheers and tankards thumped on tables.
One Friday evening, Hugh was holding court in a back room of The Pheasant.
“So, she said,” here he put on a falsetto, “‘Oh Hugh, I swore I would never let anyone touch me there until we were wed!’ But in truth, there were no more than thirty minutes between the opening bars on the violin and the opening of her legs on my chaise longue!” Hugh bellowed.
“And, do you know, my fellow Dogs?” he continued. “I do not believe there is a lady in this land, be she ever so high born, beautiful, chaste…” this with a knowing wink to vulgar cheers, “married…” more clamour, “ or God-fearing who will not let me unfurl her pretty little rose petals. If she should like music, why, I serenade her. If it is money that is her goal, then I have an embarrass de riches. Perhaps her heart is turned by a handsome face, well I am certainly more appealing than you ugly dogs—”
There was a crashing of tankards and barking.
“If it is marriage that she aspires to – and let us be honest men, what young woman does not? – then I am all alone in this unkind world and my earnest desire is to find a soulmate to ease my sadness and accompany me through this vale of tears.”
He held his hand to still the noise.
“I do believe, my friends, that we have discovered the secret of eternal youth!”
“Good friends for life!” This was said with a bow of acknowledgement. “Good beer.” He lifted his tankard in salute. “Endless wealth, and finally…” He held up a commanding hand and waited for a staged silence. “… Filthy women!”
Mayhem ensued, more drink was called for and Hugh toasted as arch-libertine and consummate seducer.
*
After a few years of this excess in the early 1780s, Hugh began to yearn for brighter lights, stronger wine, newer faces and prettier sophisticates. The routines at The Pheasant had become more predictable and Bath, instead of being a pleasure ground, had begun to seem confining. He tired of the bourgeois manners, the same old faces, the petty hierarchies. His friends began to bore him. Most of the eligible young ladies about town had been discarded for multifarious reasons: too tiresome, too fat, won’t stop talking, has a mad mother, just to name some.
Even the house in King’s Circus had become, it seemed, a prison. Short projects about the house or garden provided temporary entertainment, but the repetitive rhythms of provincial life had begun to suffocate him. He was entitled to more than this in life.
In the summer of 1785, a family called the Bairds rented a nearby house on the King’s Circus. Thomas Baird, the paterfamilias, was making a fortune in cotton trading and had come to Bath with his family for some relaxation and to take the waters. Hugh soon struck up an acquaintanceship with their son, Johnny, who was an amusing type, a good shot, and, like Hugh, enthusiastic about drink and women.
In a matter of a few weeks, the two young men became close companions, with Hugh introducing Johnny to the delights of strong West Country cider, the town gambling houses, and the pleasures of the whorehouse on Crook Street where pretty and skilful young wenches were available for a guinea. Two guineas if you required more esoteric services. The two friends wasted the entire summer in dissolute pleasures.
As the autumn deepened and the sun’s parabola began to cast longer, deeper shadows, the time came for the Bairds to return to London.
“I shall be mortified to see you go, young Baird,” said Hugh as they walked back from a very fine dinner of mussels and beef at The Old Country House.
“Well,” said Johnny, “you must rent, or perhaps even buy a suitable property up in town. That way you can enjoy the best of both worlds. I know of a fine villa in Beauchamp Place that is available. You are only a short pace from the Baird household. There are so many people for you to meet, so many balls for you to attend and—” with a nudge, “so many beauteous young ladies just longing to be serviced vigorously by a handsome, rich and eligible young man newly in town. No matter—” he gave another nudge, “if he be a bumpkin! What about it young Wortley?”
Hugh thought it the best idea he had ever heard and said he would immediately commission Cawthorne, the family lawyer, to arrange the matter. The two friends parted in early October with a plan to have all in place in time for the Christmas round of parties and balls.
*
In the meantime, a letter arrived from Alasdair Drew, the father-in-law of his unfortunate brother, William. Hugh was invited to the family castle in Cromartyshire for a weekend’s shooting in the moors around the castle.
Out of a sense of family obligation Hugh agreed to attend in late November. As his carriage picked a way through the rutted approach towards the gloomy fastness of the Drew residence, the rain swept across the dismal moor horizontally. Hugh began to regret his decision. He was cheered somewhat after a large glass of whisky was proffered in front of a crackling log fire in a cavernous hearth in the long drawing room. After a parsimonious dinner of fish and potato, punctuated only by the sound of glass, cutlery, plate and the ticking of an ancient clock in the corner, the Mistress and Elspeth, his late brother’s young widow, retired. Mr Drew, a somewhat humourless and gruff man of few words, refilled Hugh’s brandy glass and summoned Hugh to sit with him, each in a wing-backed armchair.
“We are all family here,” began Drew. “And family help family out when necessary, are you with me? Now you are a man with funds, am I right?”
Hugh agreed with a quizzical nod.
“Well, receipts have been pretty parlous the last few years. The price of hemp has hit the floor. The damned taxman is making totally unwarranted demands and this damned castle needs repairs to keep the wind and rain out. Are you with me?” he grumped. “Investment really. Short term. No risk. Business will pick up and you will get any money you invest back with handsome interest.”
“I assume you mean a loan, sir? How much would you be looking for?”
“Couple of thousand pounds ample.” Then, seeing that Hugh had not dissented, he added, “Five to be really safe.”
Hugh did a mental calculation. This was a fair proportion of his realisable assets. And with the impending lease of the London property, not an inconsiderable commitment.
“So, can we rely on you?” enquired Drew commandingly.
Hugh felt out of his depth and simply nodded agreement.
“Good man. Knew you wouldn’t let family down. Now, you’re footsore and the beaters will be here early for a seven o’clock start. So goodnight. The housekeeper will show you the way. Your bags have been taken up. Your room is along the top corridor in the west wing, actually next to Elspeth.”
He followed the padding housekeeper
up a turned wooden staircase and along a dim, dank corridor. He was shown into a room with a fire and a large four-poster bed. After lighting several candles, the housekeeper retired. Hugh lay on the bed wondering how he had been backed into a corner over the money. He acknowledged he was not worldly about such matters, but Drew did say he would get his cash back with an adequate return. The castle and the acres provided surety he reasoned.
A light knock on the door interrupted his thoughts. Thinking it was the housekeeper on some final errand he simply said, “Come in. The door is not locked.”
He was surprised to see Elspeth standing in a floor-length dressing gown and carrying a candle. She looked elfin and pretty in the half-light.
“I… I was just wondering if there is anything you need?” she asked hesitatingly.
Hugh assured her he was content and she looked a little downcast.
“You know, you remind me so of your brother. I do miss him. It is so lonely without him.” She began to cry softly.
Hugh sprang up and put a comforting arm around her.
“Here, let me help you back to your bedroom, poor waif.”
She was small, delicate and fragile and so prettily upset that he felt protective and solicitous. He steered her into her room. She looked at him entreatingly.
“Will you just… stay with me for a little while? I haven’t been held in so long.”
They lay together on the bed and she clasped her arms around him. He stroked her cheek. She calmed. He stroked her arm and back and her breathing became slower and heavier. It had been a week since his last woman and he felt himself beginning to be aroused. He made as if to leave but she held him and said, “Please stay with me.”
She lightly stood up, blew out the candle and, against the glow of the fire, stepped out of her clothes. She lay on the bed next to him and said, “Do as you will.”
He reasoned that, with his brother dead, he was crossing no boundaries. Furthermore, he considered this was, perhaps, more of a duty than a pleasure and so less reprehensible. He set about those delicate ministrations he had learnt from Catherine and Alice and had practised frequently with girls in Bath. He waited for the subliminal signals that told him to move to the next stage.
The Violin Page 11