by Iona Blair
It was Emma.
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Chapter Eight
Since discovering the forbidden photographs of Emma then her shocking journal, Jay had gradually removed himself from the present. He had sunk ever deeper into a nebulous fantasy world of erotic images and fleeting shadows. His obsession with a woman, who had lived over a century ago, had grown stealthily and insidiously, until it filled his every thought and now threatened his very sanity.
Staring transfixed at the woman in the dawn-shrouded garden, Jay felt a strange mix of fear and elation. He knew he had been tampering with forces not well understood and best left alone. Yet, on the other hand, the persistent feeling he and Emma were somehow connected by destiny gave him justification for his actions.
Time and place, with the boundaries they imposed, had ceased to exist. Jay felt exalted and realised at that moment how an explorer must feel, on discovering a new land. He was standing on the brink of unexplored territory where, by sheer force of will and longing, he had brought Emma back to this world.
Only a couple of seconds had passed since he first looked out the attic window, but it seemed to Jay like an eternity. It was as if the raison d'être of his entire life had been arrival at this one exquisitely precious moment, unfettered by the tyranny of aging and the weight of one hundred years.
"Emma ... Oh my God ... Emma,” he cried. Like a madman, as totally naked, he raced down three flights of stairs as if all the demons in hell were in hot pursuit.
But she was gone.
"Emma,” Jay called out in a voice that shook with disappointment. “Emma ... Emma ... Emma."
But there was no answering voice in the still greyness of early morning.
Oblivious of his nakedness, his bare feet wet with dew, he rampaged his way through fern and wood, calling out for the seductress who had so captured his soul, in a voice of one demented.
Finally, as the sun began to tint the eastern horizon, he collapsed exhausted on the forest floor. He shivered spasmodically as the dampness seeped into his bones and made his teeth chatter uncontrollably.
Gladys found him later that morning. He was lying in the hollow of an ancient oak tree, and had made an attempt to cover himself with the foliage of fallen branches.
"Good grief, what happened to you?” she asked, her voice shrill with alarm. “I've been looking all over for you."
She threw her coat around his shoulders and half carried half dragged him back to the Manse.
The sky, which had earlier shown such promise, clouded over. Gulls screeched out their frantic message of a storm at sea, and large drops of oily rain splashed down sporadically.
Gladys held Jay under a hot shower, then towelled him down vigorously, before helping him into clean pyjamas and tucking him into bed. “If it hadn't been my day to clean, God only knows what would have happened to you?” she told him crossly. He had stopped shivering, but his eyes had a glazed, unfocused look, and he hadn't spoken a word.
When she looked in on him a couple of hours later, he was sound asleep with his right arm stretched crookedly above his head.
What on earth, she wondered, drove him into the forest at first light? She felt sure it had something to do with the torrid ménage a trois she had witnessed in the stables, the old fashioned furniture he had placed in the attic, the book he had hurriedly hid from her in a locked desk drawer, and the strange way he had been acting in general.
Gladys was convinced that the mysterious book held the answer. So very cautiously she removed the keys from his trouser pocket and, with slightly bated breath, slipped quietly down to the office.
As Gladys sat quietly reading the old pigskin-bound journal, Morag stretched out on the desk and rolled contentedly amongst the papers.
This Emma, or whatever she called herself, had lived over a hundred years ago, Gladys mused. If this was her only rival for Jay's affections, she had nothing to worry about. But where did the cheap little piece from the stables come into the picture?
Then Gladys cottoned on. It appeared that they had been re-enacting the steamy encounter Emma and Dick had enjoyed in another tack room over a century ago. The celebration of raw sexuality that was cut short by the grim faced Mrs. Biggs. Gradually, the sequence of events that had been perplexing and puzzling began to fall into place.
She stroked the purring Morag absentmindedly as she turned the pages. As far as she was concerned, this Emma person had been cheaper than a dollar store, and to think someone like that could end up as housekeeper to a Minister in this very house.
Gladys slipped Emma's diary back in its place and was about to lock the drawer when she noticed the three old photographs. They were tucked into a piece of clear plastic and concealed beneath a bank statement in the far corner.
"Good God,” she exclaimed aloud, examining the first photograph, in which the bold-eyed Emma looked her straight in the eye as she took it in the ass. Then she turned her attention to the second one, where Emma pleasured herself immodestly with a long, crude-looking dildo while fixing the camera with a brazen stare. To Gladys, the third one was the least offensive. Even so, it showed the woman in the degrading position of having her bottom cheeks spread crudely apart as she rode a hard cock. But at least she wasn't leering directly into the lens.
So this was the hussy who'd written that disgusting diary? Gladys had to admit the woman was attractive in a certain coarse way, but why Jay was so enamoured of her remained a mystery. She also saw the resemblance between this nineteenth century trollop and the little piece who had romped with Jay in the tack room. It was not dramatic, of course, but nevertheless, undeniably there. The long brown hair, fine bone structure, jaunty tilt of the head and of course, the bold appraising stare.
Gladys writhed with jealous resentment. Still, now that she knew what she was up against she could take appropriate action. The philosophical resolve put steel in her will.
Jay had fallen into a deep sleep, the like of which he had not enjoyed since his erotic obsession began. He awoke shortly after four o'clock in the afternoon, ravenously hungry, and none the worse for his chilly ordeal in the woods.
Gladys had prepared a delicious meal, and they ate it together in the cosy breakfast nook off the kitchen. She was relieved that Jay had fully recovered and was doing justice to her culinary efforts. But her attempts to find out why he had been curled up naked in the forest, fell on stubbornly deaf ears.
"Look, I'm indebted to you Gladys, and believe me, I do appreciate what you've done for me,” Jay assured her. “But let's just forget it ever happened, okay?"
Gladys looked exasperated, but sensed that further quizzing on the subject would be met with a stony, if not downright hostile silence. She shrugged her shoulders and poured them both another cup of tea.
* * * *
After she had gone, Jay went immediately to the attic with Emma's journal clutched against his chest. The misty dusk snuffed out the natural light of the day, and the small Spartan room that had once been Emma's was filled with dark shadows.
Jay lit the oil lamp and settled back on the narrow bed with the quilt pulled around him for warmth. He could hear a chorus of birds singing their bittersweet twilight song and a ship's horn boomed out from somewhere on the open sea.
Emma had remained in Mrs. Beecham's brothel for almost two years, before branching out on her own, as an expensively kept mistress of a wealthy financier. His name was Percival Montague, and he was a thin old stick of a man with a pallid complexion and hooked nose.
Percy had difficulty achieving and maintaining an erection. So the intransigent Emma had spent much of their time together on her knees, coaxing his limp old tool to life with her determined tongue.
Her diligence had paid off. And soon, with the generous money gifts she received from the grateful Percy, she was able to open her own house of prostitution. Known as Emma Sloane's Pleasure Palace, it quickly outdid Mrs. Beecham's as the most popular whorehouse in town.
Emma ca
tered to fetishes and kinky sexual practices in a way the other houses did not. And to better promote this highly lucrative aspect of her business, she designed a small theatre room off the main lounge where a sex show, that covered every manner of deviant behaviour imaginable, was acted out each evening.
Spankings, birchings, lesbian and acrobatic sex were all trooped out in a seductive, extremely arousing way. Interest never flagged, as one provocative act after another took centre stage and thrilled the delighted audience down to its bootstraps.
There was the gargantuan black man with a gold earring and shaved head who “raped” the diminutive blonde “virgin,” every night while she screamed at the top of her lungs.
The voluptuous redhead who was billed as the wench with the “miraculous motte.” Because that piece of her anatomy would accept everything from sarsaparilla bottles to a man's fist up to his elbow.
A double jointed man who raised his legs high above his head and sucked on his own cock as the old player piano cranked out, “My Darling Clementine."
Then there were the group sex orgies, a mad rutting tangle of naked limbs and wildly pumping behinds where the excited audience was encouraged to join in.
But the most popular acts by far, were the ones where Emma herself was the star.
It was indeed a merry company that met on that pleasant evening in early spring, and gathered around our little stage with its red velvet curtains, at present tantalisingly closed...
The pungent aroma of good Turkish tobacco permeated through the theatre and filled the air with a blue grey haze of smoke. It intermingled with the strong scent of hyacinths, which had been placed in crystal vases throughout the room.
The gentlemen, no ladies being part of the audience, were seated in comfortable armchairs with small tables at their elbows where their refreshments and ashtrays were placed.
"Come on Emma, let the show begin.” One of the more inebriated members called out, and gained some support from nearby fellows who were also quite far-gone in their cups.
I was putting the finishing touches to my costume, an uncomely long grey dress with a watch fob pinned to the bodice. It was the type of rather grim ensemble currently worn by those in the teaching profession.
"Are you ready?” I asked Fanny, the curvaceous little blonde with the impudent gleam in her eye. She was dressed in an ugly school uniform and looked much younger than her nineteen years.
She nodded and I immediately had the curtain raised to reveal a school room, complete with teacher and pupil desks, blackboard, and of course, a wicked looking cane.
The gentleman cheered on seeing this particular set, for it was one of the most popular amongst them.
In reality, Fanny had been caught stealing from the other girls. She had been pocketing small valuables such as cameo brooches and tortoiseshell hair combs. So, I had hit upon this novel way of punishing her, while entertaining my audience to boot.
"Over you go,” I ordered and watched as the girl bent across the larger of the two desks, her pert little bottom poked up high in the air. I brought the cane down across her behind with a sharp cracking sound. The impact made Fanny cry out as she buckled and almost lost her balance. I waited until she had steadied herself, then I lashed into her again and again, noticing how her bottom bounced and jiggled under the painful chastisement.
I had been punishing the unfortunate Fanny on top of her dress, but now I raised her skirt and tugged down her bloomers. Baring her bottom in this way elicited a wild cry of excitement from the assembled company, and I made her position herself so the marks of the thrashing could be best seen.
Her tender little bum was quite livid and trenched with welts, but I wasn't finished with her yet. “Steal from your sisters would you?” I muttered under my breath and laid on many more powerful strokes until blood began to form, then I stopped.
The audience was in a grand fever of excitement and began to bid against each other for the privilege of swiving the well-thrashed girl. A hefty robust looking gentleman with a shock of unruly black hair won the toss. “Do you wish to take your pleasure in a private chamber, Sir, I asked, but he shook his head. He intended to mount young Fanny right there on stage.
When the coupling began, a loud cheer broke out from the audience, and they egged on and encouraged this most lusty of proceedings.
Fanny bent over the desk in the same position she had assumed for the caning, while her client unbuttoned his trousers and released the longest reddest member I had ever seen. It was thick in circumference too and sprouted wiry black hairs along its shaft.
He entered the girl without preliminaries, ramming his fine musket all the way into her quivering minge, much to her quite vocal disapproval. The impact of his mighty thrustings seeming not only to rock the desk, but the entire stage as well. His excited prick weaved in and out its quarry, while his heavy red bollocks banged against the girl's exposed vulva like battering rams against an unwieldy gate. It was one of the most spirited of fuckings I have ever borne witness to, and the assembled company roared their approval.
When this most lusty of gentleman at last blew his load, he smeared it over Fanny's wounded bottom and massaged it in right handily.
I was feverish with excitement, and at once offered my services to anyone in the audience who had the price which was considerably higher for myself, being at once the owner of the establishment and a well-experienced professional to boot. A daybed was quickly brought to replace the schoolroom desks, and without further ado, I serviced three fine lusty gentlemen all at the same time.
The atmosphere in the smoky room was heavy with a seething sexuality that fairly palpitated. Trousers were hurriedly unbuttoned and the excited members released from their cloth prisons and vigorously strummed.
One gentleman lay on his back across the bed with his feet resting on the floor, an inviting look on his handsome face. Stripped down to only a flimsy pink camisole, I straddled him most eagerly, and he grabbed for my breasts with trembling hands. My nipples stood up keen and erect as sentries, as they thrilled to his touch. Then he feasted on them with a great amount of gusto, while he impaled my notch most satisfactorily with his rigid and throbbing cock.
As I moved up and down its fiery length, the second gentleman came up behind me and thrust his prick into my twitching back passage. This most secret of orifices resisted the welcome intrusion at first, but soon relented under a steady pressure of friendly persuasion. Thus, we rocked together in breath-holding bliss, while I wrapped my hungry mouth around the third member of our lusty group, whose owner stood facing me on the other side of the bed.
With all three orifices filled to capacity, I was mad with excitement and rocked myself to a thundering crisis that abated but briefly, before being repeated again, and again, and again...
"God ... Emma ... you shameless, licentious little hussy,” Jay scolded. He rubbed his hard and throbbing cock. “If you were here now, I'd give you the best thrashing and fucking of your entire life."
But she was not there, and of course, by all the rules of science and physics never would be. And yet, against all odds and rational thought, he had seen her only that morning. She had been standing beside the bird bath in the dawn's inhospitable light, her head slightly tilted as she looked towards the house.
Jay was convinced this was no mirage dreamt up by his feverish mind. He had seemed to stare at her for a very long time, and she had been real, completely three dimensional and solid.
The words of old Isaac, the gardener, came back to haunt him.
"She's most often seen in the garden."
If he could have afforded her, Jay would have arranged an encounter with Emma's substitute, the seductive little prostitute from Never on Monday. But that particular outlet was now out of the question. Bills were piling up, and creditors were getting nasty.
The flickering oil lamp sent bizarre shapes and shadows flaring up the walls to the rafters. This had been Emma's world, and Jay had recreated it as faithfully a
s possible, even to the primitive source of light.
He felt incredibly aroused from her description of the on stage orgy, and his penis swelled uncomfortably in his jeans.
He had already broken his own rule of reading just one instalment of the racy diary per week. And now, he saw no reason for further restraint. He knew that he was nearing the end of Emma's journal, and he was avidly curious as to what had happened to her? She had undergone such a dramatic change of employment, from Madam at a scandalous brothel in the city to housekeeper at a remote island manse.
The next few passages in Emma's torrid story gave him a clue as to why her fortunes had plummeted so dramatically. She had become addicted to opium. And indeed, spoke at some length about reclining in her bedchamber in a drug induced euphoria as she smoked the soothing hookah pipe.
Morag kneaded Jay's sweater with busy paws and butted her head affectionately against his chin. “I love you, too,” he whispered and stroked her sleek white fur.
"I would give you a birching Madam, then enjoy all three of your delightful orifices,” the great, burly giant of a man declared, curling the corners of his magnificent moustaches between a twitching thumb and forefinger.
It was a bitter cold evening close to Yuletide, and my establishment was gaily festooned with decorated fir tree and boughs of holly. Sprigs of mistletoe were hung strategically at the doors where all must pass, and was causing much merriment and even more kissing.
"Would you now good Sir?” I replied, tossing my long gleaming hair seductively and looking at him quizzically through lowered lashes. “But I'm afraid the cost for such an enterprise is like to dampen your ardour."
"And there you would be wrong good Madam. Name your fee and I will gladly meet it."
We settled on ten golden sovereigns, which was indeed a handsome sum. As the owner of this most excellent of pleasure houses, I had a certain dignity and status to maintain, and I would have been slothfully imprudent to undersell my worth.