by AnonYMous
For as such only would men be used. I would teach.
Now we composed ourselves again. Caroline sat fidgeting a little while Maria removed the tray. She would prepare a meal for Frederick and her husband on their arrival later; I told her. Together with herself and Jenny they would eat in the kitchen.
Maria bobbed and nodded in her going. She saw herself perhaps as the head of a small conclave of servants, but I would know how to split and divide.
“Caroline, you will have a maid shortly,” I said when the door had closed. She looked at me in astonishment. We had lived in comparative modesty before. “I?” she asked.
I smiled and seated myself beside her, rolling her warm and slender fingers in my hand.
“A young servant who at present serves Arabella and her family,” I explained. The idea had come sudden upon me. It would serve to elevate Caroline above the others.
“She shall be unto you as a handmaid. You will train her,” I said. “She will attend upon no one else other than at my bidding.”
“Train her?” Caroline's face was a picture. “Oh! shall I be as you, then?” she asked naively but I forebore to laugh. Her sweetness was apparent. She would lend herself with the seeming innocence of an angel to all that I intended.
“In time perhaps, Caroline. You have been stabled, at least. And cupboarded. Was that not splendid? Did you not enjoy it?”
She nodded, her cheeks suffused. “No one will ever tie us together again,” she said.
“But I may tie you together with your maid,” I laughed. The shyness in her eyes darted with the delicacy of moths. “She is pretty—a perfect body. Pleasures and punishments—did I not tell you?”
“May I . . . may I strap her? Just sometimes?”
The question was as unexpected as Aunt Maude's had been about Frederick. Deep pleasures were in my being at such questions. I had the power to answer or not—to assuage, persuade, refuse, mollify or conquer.
“You wish to? Who else did you wish to strap?”
A knowingly attractive pouting of Caroline's mouth offered itself to me.
“Amanda. She wanted silver stocking bands—did you know?”
“Yes, I knew. What else did she say?”
Caroline's eyes retreated. They appeared to take an immense interest in my corsage. “She . . . she said if they were silver, solid silver, she would let him.”
I breathed lightly, betraying no surprise. Ah, Amanda! the depths of you! But no doubt she had seen no other escape and so sought to make her excuses. Caroline had obviously probed and asked. We know not those we know when they are away from us. Father would lie with women in their bronzeness. He would swish their bottoms with a fly-switch. Langourous they would lie, the sweat between their nether cheeks, up-bulbing, offering—the delicate twitching of flesh as the switch descended. Servants would come and go, bearing tea, blind in their unseeing.
“You may strap her, yes, but only playfully,” I said, recalling Caroline's question. I would draw her into my plans a little, yet leave her always on a fringe of wondering—the last lines left undrawn, a mid-air hesitation. Workmen would come shortly to commence the building of the stables, I told her. I had promises that the work would be completed in two weeks. The main bedroom which Father normally inhabited would become now my own. Caroline would take the room next to it. The stables would have an annexe that would form a caging room.
My plans expanded with every breath—her face a mirror to my thoughts. Withal a question poised itself on her lips as a bird alights and rests upon a sill.
“But when Father returns?” she asked.
My face was a blankness. “And naturally we shall furnish the summerhouse last,” I said as if there had been no pause in my words. Clearly she was about to speak again when the doorbell sounded. Jenny hurried to answer. In a moment she returned bearing a carte de visite on a tray. I took it and read. The name meant nothing to me:
THE REV. HORACE AMES.
“He seeks but a moment and is accompanied,” Jenny said. I did not ask by whom. Such questions tend to indicate some unsettlement of the mind. I waved my hand languidly for her to admit them. Caroline adjusted herself, fanning out her skirt. Her composure at such times pleases me.
In a moment the door opened to admit a gentleman of not unpleasing aspect in his middle years. He was alone. He sought my indulgence, he said. His dark suit and clerical collar gave him a slightly hawkish air. They had travelled from Kent, he explained, to inspect a neighbouring house he intended to purchase in the parish. Alas, the hub of one of the wheels of their carriage had collapsed and the house agent had not arrived with the keys, as promised. They had waited an hour in the gardens. Now with the lateness of the day he sought to find momentary shelter for his daughters. “They are waiting beyond?” I asked.
“In the hall, Madame. I thought not to disturb you overmuch . . . . “
“Oh, but you must bring them in!” I interrupted swiftly. “My sister will see to it. Will you not have a sherry? Of course we shall afford you all that you need. What a hopelessness you must have felt in your waiting.”
Overwhelmed by my reception as he appeared to be, he took the proferred glass and sat as the door reopened to admit two young ladies of apparent exceeding shyness. Both were prettily dressed and bonneted, but their boots had a sad and dusty air of those who have travelled far.
In seconds they were introduced. The taller, Clarissa, was it seemed eighteen. Jane was her junior by three years, but already with sufficient nubility to attract my eyes. Both were brunettes with retroussed noses and pleasing mouths. Their ankles were slender, though mainly hid.
“How were you to return and when?” I asked. I affected a great bubbling, flooding him with words while Caroline attended to the girls with refreshing drinks. By some fortune, Frederick and Ned made their appearance during my discourse. I summoned the latter immediately to the wheelwright who I knew sometimes put carriages out on hire. Within the hour the fellow returned bearing the solemn news that only a small phaeton was available with scarce room for three for a longish journey.
In the meantime, however, I had gathered much. The Reverend Ames was to replace the present incumbent vicar. Yet, it seemed, he had business that very night in Gravesend, where he must return.
“Then the girls must stay,” I proclaimed immediately while both sat darting the most timid yet enquiring glances at me. No doubt like he they wondered at my Mistress-ship of the house in my relative youth.
“Nay—it would be a terrible imposition, Madame. In particular since I shall be unable to return for a week. Is there no hotel or hostelry close?”
“Where they would stay unchaperoned?” I asked. The thought soon mended such objections as he had tendered with obvious civility, hopeful as he had obviously been that I would take them in. They were after all of our own class. The conventions were being observed. The additional presence of Caroline placed a perfect seal upon the matter.
At five-thirty, having partaken with us of a cold collation which Maria had prepared, he was ready to depart. His daughters sat demure as ever, the dutiful kiss imprinted on their cheeks with his parting. Crowned as I was with his gratitude, I saw him to the driveway where the phaeton waited.
Clarissa and Jane would be well seen to, I assured him. His hand received my own and held it rather warmly. He was a widower, I had learned.
“They will be in the best of care—of that I am now certain,” he proclaimed and kissed my hand gravely before ensconcing himself on a rather hard seat.
“The very best,” I assured him, “they will be seen to in all respects.”
“A week, then,” he said and waved his hand. He seemed rather enamoured of my gaze, I thought, as his carriage trundled forward. I watched it to the gates. The door lay wide still—invitingly open for me. Its panes of coloured glass fragmented glittering streaks of light along the wall of the hall where the sun struck. The light brushed my cheek as if in benediction as I walked through and entered the drawing
room.
Caroline had engaged herself more animatedly, it seemed, in conversation with the girls. Perhaps in her knowing, she thought as I. I clapped my hands and smiled, expressing my pleasure at their presence.
“First we will bathe you and refresh you,” I said. They had removed their bonnets. Their hair flowed long and prettily about their shoulders. I reached down and took the hand of Jane. “Come—I will see to you first. Then Caroline may attend upon Clarissa,” I said.
A light flush entered Clarissa's cheeks. “Oh, but . . . she began. I stopped her with a further smile.
“I know,” I said softly. I induced infinite understanding in my voice. “Normally you bathe alone, but in a strange house—and the taps are really so difficult . . . .”
I allowed my voice to trail off vaguely in leading Jane out. She had the perfect air of a Cupid, I thought—an impression that increased as I first ran the water and then undressed her. Her form was exquisite, her breasts the firmest of pomegranates on which the buds of her nipples perked as if beseeching kisses. Her bottom had a chubbiness that my hands sought slyly to fondle in removing her drawers. In stepping out of them she betrayed with many a blush the pouting of her cunnylips which nestled in a sweet little bush of curls.
Tempted as I was to finger them I urged her into the water where she sat with the warm scented water lapping just beneath her breasts. “I shall soap you—may I?” I asked. Seemingly not wishful to escape the admiration in my eyes she sat mute, pinkcheeked, as I passed my soaped hands first over her deliciously firm breasts. Plump and silksmooth as they were, her nipples erected quickly, her lips parting to show pearly teeth as I playfully nipped the nearest between two fingers.
“How pretty you look,” I breathed, “may I kiss you?”
In speaking I passed my free hand up the sleekness of her back, cradling my palm beneath her hair. Hot-flushed as she was, her lips came peachlike to mine with sufficient parting for me to intrude my tongue. For a long moment her own coiled back, but then came timidly to meet mine. My hand passed over the succulent weight of her other breast. Its nipple burned like a thorn to my palm. Her lips moved farther apart in her wondering, but I intended not to spoil her yet. I assumed an air of loving fun and joviality that would disperse itself as a balm to her conscience.
“It will be fun, Jane, will it not?” I asked and received a shy, lisped yes. For the rest I soaped her carefully, fondling every crevice and hillock I could reach without making my further gestures too obvious. The drying took longer—particularly in the gentle, urging motions of my towelled hand between her thighs. Her flush rose considerably then, her knees bending as she clung to me.
I said no more, donating but a light kiss to her mouth before putting her into a robe. In a week I would work wonders with her. And night had yet to fall.
Hearing the opening of the bathroom door from below, Caroline brought Clarissa up. The water lay warm still. It was the custom then for two people to use the same bath, the water supplies being often uncertain.
Clarissa's eyes grazed mine in their coming. I knew her eyes. I would neither fondle nor kiss her in the bath. While Caroline escorted Jane to her room, I led Clarissa within and waited as one waits while she disrobed. In chemise and stockings her figure was similar to Amanda's save that her bottom was larger. Nervously fingering the straps of her chemise, she waited evidently for me to leave. Instead of doing so I gathered up the clothes she had discarded. I did so as by reproof. Then with a pettish gesture she removed her last garment and stood in her stockings. Her mount was plump, her thighs elegant, feet small. Her breasts, though not large, were of perfect roundness.
“Call me when you have bathed and I will bring you a robe—or the servant shall,” I told her.
The relief in her eyes was evident. A smile of assent meandered to her lips. Removing her stockings and stepping daintily into the clouded water, she sat down.
I went out, leaving the door ajar and placing her clothes where she would not find them. Jane would be easy. I knew her kind. Loving, warm and submissive, she would absorb the cock with wriggling wonder. A week was almost too much. With Clarissa it would be different. I had allowed her but one small victory, and her last. The surprise of the strap would come all the more clearly and stingingly to her that night. Maria would hold her.
I moved in my musings beyond, into the lumber room from whence the ladder led to the attic. A sadness of dust was upon the rungs. Beneath me, the water in the bathroom splashed as it would splash upon the prow on the tall ship in its sailing.
And its returning . . . its returning . . its returning.
END
Table of Contents
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY