We didn't have to ask far, for a brief mention to the landlord downstairs elicited the information that there were two or three potential properties, and all within a mile of the town centre.
'Up Mill Road there's a cottage for rent,' he informed us. 'Belongs to the Tamworth family and was lived in by the old aunt up until just before Christmas, when she passed on, rest her soul. Mind you, she was nearly ninety, so she couldn't complain. Then there's Banks Cottage, over yonder on the far side of the river. Used to be part of the Beasley estate, but that's been split up since the old man died and the two sons are happier living up in the city. I don't think that's been sold yet, but you could check with their lawyer, Bartlett. His office is just up the High Street. He'll also be acting for John Goring, selling off the old mill house. It's not been used these past ten years or more and John's moved down to Brighton now. Place'll probably need some attention, but it's sound enough in construction and it ain't about to fall down.' He looked around at the three of us. 'Thinking of settling then, are you?' he asked.
I smiled my sweetest smile at him. 'My doctor suggested I should find somewhere with pleasant country air,' I replied. I patted the top of my chest. 'I've been unwell, you see, and the air in London these days... well, I'm sure you know what I mean.'
'Indeed I do, mistress,' he replied. 'Only been there a couple of times meself, mind, but that was more'n enough. Dirty, smelly place London. Don't see why people carry on living there. Wouldn't surprise me if they didn't have another outbreak of the plague there, and that's a fact.'
I suppose I had a picture of a quaint little cottage leaning against a larger and possibly now derelict mill building before we set out to view the old mill house, but what we found when we arrived was quite different. For a start, this particular mill had not been situated along Mill Road, which would have taken us past a pub and inn called the Black Rabbit, which is still there to this day, but rather it was on the further, eastern bank of the Arun and more than a mile further upstream. Don't bother looking for it now, however; I've been back since and there's no obvious signs of where it once stood, only the remains of what passed for foundations back then, which are hard enough to find even when you know exactly where to search.
'Wow!' I exclaimed, as I stepped down from the carriage.
Erik, who had already alighted from his seat in front, towered over me as usual, but even he seemed impressed. 'Large it is,' he agreed, nodding sagely.
'Bet it's bloody draughty though,' Andrea/Indira commented from the doorway of the coach.
'Probably,' I agreed, 'but at least all the windows seem intact. Not much in the way of mindless vandalism these days, I'd say.' I pushed open the gate standing in the middle of a low picket fence along the front of the house. It bounded a narrow strip of lawn, in which someone had cut and tended two flower beds, although these currently contained nothing more than the withered remains of some former summer plants and a couple of hardy weeds. I stood and stared up at the three-storey edifice, noting there were even dormer windows in the roof, which effectively added a fourth floor.
'It's massive,' Andrea declared, trudging up behind me. She was still sulking because I had insisted we wear our most sensible footwear for this expedition. 'Far too big for what we need,' she added.
I pursed my lips, my mind stepping up a couple of gears. 'Maybe,' I said half to myself, 'and then again, maybe not. The main thing is, it's cheap.'
'And stuck miles up this god-awful track,' Andrea observed. 'This might just as well be the backend of beyond.'
'Yes.' I smiled. 'It might.'
By the time Anne-Marie led us outside to the car it was already dark, and even through the layers of protective rubber I could feel the drop in temperature. My mind went immediately back to Arundel in the autumn of eighteen thirty-nine, from where I had returned only moments earlier. Incredibly, although this was now February and that had probably only been October, as far as I could make out, it had been far colder there and I marvelled at how the ordinary people had managed to brave the extreme conditions of winters past for so many generations.
From a distance, and away from any street lighting, there would have been little about Andrea and myself to draw the attention of the casual observer, though up close our appearance might have caused the odd raised eyebrow. For although the long rubber capes Anne-Marie had draped about us hid the more bizarre features of our outfits, they did not conceal the extreme nature of our heels, and neither, I suspected, would our rubber faces pass close inspection.
However, once we were inside the car and seated side-by-side in the back, there was little chance of our condition being observed, nor of anyone realising that beneath the capes our arms were bound helplessly behind us.
'What a well-behaved pair of dollies you are,' Anne-Marie enthused as she adjusted the rubber folds across our chests and fastened seat belts over them. 'Now you just sit there nice and quiet and we'll go for a nice little drive together.'
The journey was relatively uneventful, although every time the tyres hit any unevenness in the road's surface I squirmed as the dildo pressed deeper. Alongside me Andrea also seemed to be experiencing some embarrassments, and I assumed her one orifice had been similarly treated. The trip, which was probably not much more than forty-five minutes in reality, began to take on the proportions of an epic voyage, with me struggling to fight against the inevitable, not wanting to have to admit, not even to myself, that I could be so easily brought to orgasm by the combination of an inanimate rubber phallus and a bouncy car seat. Needless to say I lost the contest, not once, but four times, the final three climaxes coming virtually one after the other just after we turned off the main road and began a winding descent along a narrow country lane.
Carmen's house was set back even from this rustic piece of road, but thankfully, after one lurching bump over a rut just across the gateway, the approach was well maintained and offered a mercifully smooth final cruise of a few hundred yards. The building itself was nowhere near as impressive as the approach suggested, a nineteen-twenties or thereabouts structure of two storeys with a single storey extension of later vintage projecting from one end, to one side of which I could make out a double garage, and behind that what was either a large shed or small barn, though the exterior lights enabling me to get a decent view of everything else did not really penetrate that far back.
Anne-Marie drove slowly towards the garage although the open doors showed there were already two vehicles in residence, but at the last moment she veered to the left and negotiated the narrow gap between the side of the building and the end of the house extension. We emerged on the edge of a wide expanse of lawn, the lights from the house windows, and from a moon that emerged conveniently from behind the clouds, illuminating enough for me to see it was well tended and bounded on three sides by cordons of high trees.
'Right then, dolly girls,' Anne-Marie said, switching off the engine and hauling on the handbrake, 'we've arrived and now the fun can begin.' She got out, opened the rear door on Andrea's side and unfastened her seat belt. It then needed quite a lot of effort on both their parts for Andrea to climb out, and the same applied when it came to my turn, but eventually we were standing on the edge of the grassy area, caped, masked and our hands still bound. I looked around, expecting to see some sign of our hostess coming out to welcome us, but if anyone in the house had witnessed our arrival, they gave no indication of it.
I should at this juncture perhaps give a brief description of Anne-Marie's attire, for although it was in no way as bizarre as ours - she had to drive, after all, and might possibly have had to get out of the car, one never knows - she was still striking in tight leather jeans tucked into high-heeled knee-high boots, and tightly hugging her torso was a zipped leather jacket cut to emphasise her generous figure, bosom and buttocks alike. She also wore black leather gloves, so that only her face and head remained uncovered, giving her an aura of power and control that would have remained even had the two of us not been bound an
d gagged as we were.
'Now we have to walk down there through the trees,' she said, clipping leashes to each of our collars. 'Andrea's been here before, but Teenie, go very carefully. The path isn't all that level in places and there are usually bits of odd branch and twig all over the place, especially at this time of the year.'
And she wasn't kidding, I soon realised, for once we had crossed the lawn the trees closed in on both sides, blocking out almost all the light, a condition made even worse by my tinted lenses. I kept my eyes firmly on Anne-Marie's silhouette as she walked just in front of us, my right shoulder rubbing and bumping against Andrea's in the darkness, my feet occasionally landing on dry twigs that cracked beneath them, or stumbling against larger branches that fortunately were not so big they didn't kick out of my way. It was so overwhelmingly dark the only way I knew we were on a path at all was because Anne-Marie had told us we were. I was mightily relieved when, a few hundred yards or so further on, we emerged into a large clearing.
The moon had ducked for cover again during our perilous trek, but it chose to make a second reappearance a moment later, revealing an impressive looking stone structure about thirty yards in front of us. I say impressive because it was solid and high, but a second inspection showed there were several chunks of it missing, not surprising given that I quickly estimated it had to be several hundred years old.
'Welcome to Finton Priory, Teenie-slave,' Anne-Marie said.
I gawped up at the massive stone pillars and the heavily carved balustrade that had largely survived, although of the original roof only a couple of heavy beams now remained silhouetted against the night sky.
'Don't worry,' Anne-Marie continued as if sensing my misgivings, 'it's all perfectly safe. Nothing's fallen off these past few years and Carmen has a builder check it every few weeks. Besides, where we're going is more secure than an air-raid shelter.'
She wasn't kidding, either, for once we had entered through the arched doorway and trotted obediently in her wake up a central aisle that must once have been polished by the feet of generations of monks or nuns or both, we approached a huge carved block at least five feet high and ten feet from side to side. And we saw, as we moved around the side of it, it was at least a good eight feet from front to back. I immediately thought of an altar, but it had been built for more than just that purpose, because at the rear, a section of the stone had been swung away to reveal a doorway and stone steps leading down into the ground, their unevenness revealed by a pale light filtering up from somewhere deep below.
'You'll need to watch your head at the top here, Teenie,' Anne-Marie warned, 'but it's higher once you get down the first half dozen steps.' And it was, but in my towering heels I still felt as though my head was about to scrape on the rough-hewn ceiling. Anne-Marie went first, walking in a sideways fashion so she could keep an eye on my progress, but I didn't fancy her chances if I toppled forward on to her, nor my chances if Andrea, who was bringing up the rear, fell on top of me. Thankfully, however, the steps grew wider as we descended and we finally made it to a level area some twenty-five feet below ground level and maybe even more, for I had completely lost count of the number of steps I had negotiated.
We found ourselves grouped together in a rectangular antechamber, which I guessed had to be about ten feet by eight feet and which was illuminated by electric light units fitted on each of the longer walls. The roof here was higher than on the stairway, but even now it could not have been more than a foot above my head, and the overall effect was therefore quite claustrophobic.
'C'mon,' Anne-Marie urged, gathering our leashes and giving them a sharp tug. 'The best bit is yet to come.' She turned and made her way towards a sturdy looking door set in the far wall, and opened it to reveal a short passageway with a vaulted ceiling. A single lamp hanging from this ceiling burned about midway along its approximate twelve-foot length, showing a second door at the far end. Anne-Marie paused before it and knocked three times.
We waited in silence, but only for a few seconds, then there was the sound of a bolt being withdrawn and the door swung open. Standing close behind Anne-Marie my initial view of what lay beyond was very much obscured, but as she moved forward again and I passed through the door, what I saw was almost enough to take away what little breath my tight corset allowed me.
I realised straight away that my estimate as to how far beneath the ground we had come had been much too conservative, for the long chamber into which we now emerged stretched upwards for what had to be at least thirty feet, with stone vaulting supported by huge pillars set near to the side walls along its length forming natural alcoves at ground level. At the furthest end was a wide raised area like a stage, at the back of which several arches were lit by blue and red lights, giving an eerie backdrop to a scenario that looked as though it had been well underway for some time.
Roughly in the centre of the 'stage' stood a huge wooden wheel, against which a featureless rubber figure was bound in a spread-eagle position, straps securing it at wrists, elbows, shoulders, chest, waist, thighs and ankles, so that as the wheel turned slowly, the figure did not sag with its own shifting weight, but remained stiff and unmoving, like yet another doll. As we came closer I saw the rubber skin stretched over firm breasts and wide hips, but I knew that was no guarantee the victim was actually a female, any more than Andrea's initial outward appearance meant that she was actually a girl.
The wheel seemed to be driven by some kind of motor unit I could see standing behind the support beam on which it spun, and the rest of the stage area was deserted, although to either side there were matching empty pillories I guessed would be filled before the night was over. So engrossed was I at the sight of the slow spinning mannequin, that we had walked halfway along the main hall before I realised that the dozen or so dark recesses formed by the pillars on either side each contained a similarly garbed and equally silent figure.
I shivered slightly wondering just who they all were and how long they had been there, before another thought struck me and I tried to look harder at the next figure. Maybe they weren't real, living people at all. Perhaps they were simply the statues they resembled, placed there for theatrical effect. I peered through the gloom that persisted at this end of the hall, trying to identify and sort out straps or manacles that might be binding arms and legs, but the lenses made seeing clearly difficult enough even in good light, and this low level of illumination most certainly wasn't helping my vision.
'Good evening, girls.'
I recognised Carmen's voice, but otherwise the tall figure that emerged from the shadows as if by magic could have been anyone, for her face was hidden by a black leather mask and hood, the eyes and lips of which had been picked out in white for a truly devilish effect. The leather bodysuit was similarly decorated, the white piping lines emphasising breasts and waist and running down the outside of each long leg. The gloves and boots that encased her hands and feet were, I saw, part of the main cat suit, extensions connected to the end of each limb so that when she moved, Carmen appeared like some sort of dark insect, deadly on her spiked heels with glinting steel talons attached to the tips of her fingers.
Anne-Marie was clearly very impressed with the effect. 'Oh, now that I do like!' she enthused. 'Expensive though, I should think?'
'A present from an admirer,' Carmen replied. She nodded towards the illuminated stage area. 'As you can see, I'm rewarding him this evening for his generosity.' She turned back and appeared to study Andrea and me with a critical gaze, although her actual eyes were barely visible through the slits in her mask. 'The Dolly twins!' she exclaimed at last. 'Very sweet, I must say. Which one is which? No, don't tell me, I'll try to guess, and it'll be such fun finding out later on. Perhaps we could have a sort of competition among the guests? And don't for one moment think I'm going to be influenced by that one's big rubber cock. I know you only too well, Annie. That could just as easily be your idea of a joke.'
'Is anyone else here yet?' Anne-Marie asked, smiling confidentl
y back at our hostess. 'We're a bit early, but I always prefer to be early rather than late.'
'There are a few here already,' Carmen replied. 'I had two mistresses and a master as houseguests last night and they're busy freshening up their slaves just now. Two of them spent fifteen hours together in one of the old penitence cells, so we thought it best to give them a bath and a fresh outfit for tonight.'
I felt the squelching sensation between my toes as I shifted my weight, and glumly wished that maybe someone would think about affording me that luxury, though I suspected it wasn't going to happen, at least not for some few hours yet.
'You want to run a brothel?' The huge brown eyes looked larger and rounder than ever.
I grinned. Well, at least Andy was still back here with me, so we must have made the last hop together. 'Not a brothel, exactly,' I countered, although there really wasn't another description for it. I opened my mouth to speak again, but then paused. 'Hang on a sec,' I said, after thinking for a moment. 'I only just remember being back here and I'm sure I never got as far as making that suggestion. Come to think of it, I'm not sure it was entirely my suggestion. I mean, a sort of idea was forming when we were looking around the house, but then the last thing I remember was starting back in the carriage, and then suddenly we were back with Anne-Marie again.'
'Then how—?'
I interrupted, quickly trying to put into words all the suspicions and theories suddenly doing an impression of a tumble inside my head. 'Angelina,' I concluded. 'She must have some way of knowing what I'm thinking, saying and doing when I'm here, and Indira must be retaining some of your memories and you some of hers. I know I didn't mention anything to you, so Angelina must have said it to her in the moment just before we came back here from the present.'
'You must be kidding,' my astonished lover snorted. 'Angelina prepared to run a bloody brothel? Doesn't sound like her, not from what I've heard from you, anyway.'
Teena: A House of Ill Repute Page 7