by G Scott Gray
There were a few coughs from the congregation.
“…for you are all sinners and are all going to hell unless you repent. Drinking intoxicating liquors, smoking tobacco, using profane language. These are all grave sins but there is one above all for which you must repent. I mean of course, pleasures of the flesh.”
Mrs Collins looked at him glumly. There was a certain amount of rubbing of flesh between her and her husband, but it rarely involved pleasure, not for her at least. Still, she comforted herself, at least it was usually quick.
The sermon went on. If Mr Collins had expected his parishioners to be frightened and immediately persuaded to mend their ways and repent their sins and sin no more, he would have been disappointed. They either yawned with boredom or snickered with amusement at his fiery words.
As Collins spoke, Mr Darcy allowed his mind to wander. He had a pleasant few minutes thinking about he and Lizzy in the bedchamber that morning. He stopped himself from thinking about it when he realized he was wearing tight white trousers and the result his thoughts would be visible to all. Instead he thought about their wedding day, right here at the church with Mr Collins presiding. The honeymoon had been short due to urgent business matters on the estate. He had always promised Lizzy that they would go away somewhere, just the two of them to some fine location. In some quaint little cottage perhaps where they would be alone and would live on love and strawberries and sweet wine for a few weeks. It was a very pleasant thought.
After the service the congregation filed out of the church. Mr Collins waited beside the door and shook hands with everybody who did not manage to avoid eye contact in time.
“Excellent sermon, Mr Collins,” said Mr Brandon who had managed to seat himself at the back.
“Your eyes appeared to be closed, Mr Brandon.”
“I was merely resting them for a moment, Mr Collins.”
“I see. And did you enjoy my sermon, Mrs Brandon?”
“The sermon, Mr Collins? Oh, yes, I enjoyed it very much. You mentioned something about sheep, didn’t you?”
Mr and Mrs Brandon hurried home.
Darcy and Lizzy were wise enough to avoid Mr Collins. They climbed into their carriage and returned to Pemberley.
“I was thinking in church,” said Darcy
“Yes, so was I,” she replied drily. “Though my thoughts were not very Christian, for I find Mr Collins an odious little man.”
“We all do, Lizzy. No, I was thinking about us.”
Lizzy nestled close to him and looked up at him coyly.
“About us, darling?” she said. “Were you thinking about this morning in the bed chamber? You were wonderful, my love. I never thought relations between a man and wife could be so beautiful.”
“Indeed. For the right man and the right wife of course.”
“Yes, that’s very true” she said happily.
“I confess I was thinking about us this morning, at first at least. I had to stop though because my tight trousers were becoming even tighter. If you know what I mean.”
“I know exactly what you mean,” she said with a smile.
“So I had to think of something else. If I had stood up it could have been most embarrassing.”
“Yes, I suppose it could,” she said with a little lick of her lips. “So, what did you think about after that?”
“About us still. I was thinking of our honeymoon and how we had to cut it short. So I thought it might be pleasant if we went on a trip. Just you and I?”
“Oh, darling, that sounds marvelous. Where shall we go? France?”
“Regrettably it is unsafe to visit the continent at the moment due to that fool Napoleon. I was thinking we could visit Brighton.”
“Brighton? Oh, how wonderful. I understand Brighton is very fashionable at the moment. Even the king visits there.”
“So I understand, and his large son too I believe. Then it’s settled? We’ll go to Brighton for a few weeks?”
“Yes, I’d love it.”
“Excellent. I’ll get my staff to start making arrangements as soon as we get back to Pemberley.”
Once the entire congregation had left the church, Mr and Mrs Collins went back to their little cottage.
“Now that the service is over,” said Mrs Collins, “would you like to retire to our bed chamber for an hour or so?”
“That’s a splendid idea, Mrs Collins. I would very much like to retire to our bed chamber for an hour. Perhaps longer.”
Mrs Collins’ hopes were raised. Perhaps he had been excited by the delivery of his fiery sermon. Perhaps he would take her in his arms and make love to her with real passion. Perhaps he would satisfy her and make her feel like a woman.
“Really?” she said. “You’d like to retire to bed?”
She took his hand and took the first step to the bed chamber.
“Yes I would, Mrs Collins. I think I would enjoy a nap for an hour. I’m feeling rather weary after delivering my sermon.”
Her hopes died at once.
“Perhaps you’d like to come up a little later,” he said, raising her hopes once more.
“You want me to join you later?”
“Yes, you can bring me some tea. That way I can begin next week’s sermon at once.”
He crushed her hopes once and for all. He kissed her on the cheek, took his nightcap from a hook on the door and went upstairs to bed leaving his wife quite alone, not only physically but in a sensual and spiritual way too.
Mrs Collins sat at the kitchen table and sighed. Was it too much to ask to have a strong, handsome man take her in his arms and make love to her the way a handsome, healthy woman should be made love to? How she envied Lizzy Darcy. Darcy was the sort of man, she imagined, who would keep his pretty young wife happy and satisfied. Sometimes twice in the same morning.
She idly looked around the kitchen until her eyes fell on a little pastry brush, left on the side after baking pies yesterday. The hairs were white and stiff, but the handle was made of smooth polished wood, rounded at the end. She picked it up and examined the end. She rubbed it against her hand and found it quite pleasant. She wondered idly where else on her body it might feel pleasant. She stroked it against her thigh and, quite by accident, let it brush against the soft citadel of her womanhood. She gasped, quite taken aback how good it felt. She tiptoed to the door and listened. From the bedchamber she could hear her husband snoring loudly. She bolted the door and sat on the kitchen table. She pulled up her dress and took off her undergarments, letting the white silky panties drop to the floor.
Seated on the table she opened her legs wide and placed the rounded end of the brush on the delicate folds of skin betwixt her legs. It made her cry out a little. She changed the angle slightly so that she could push the handle inside herself, thrusting it in and drawing it out again. She was amazed and delighted too that It had gone in dry but was drawn out wet and covered with her musky juices of love. She wanted to cry out, long and loud but was afraid she would wake her husband.
“Oh, my aching flower,” she whispered to herself as she thrust the handle in deeper, loving herself with hard quick strokes.
She took the handle out and sucked it clean, relishing the perfumed taste of the juices of her sex. She inserted it once more inside her wet, aching pussy and cried out, a little louder this time. It felt so beautiful as she eased it back and forth between the lips of her aching wetness that she was quite oblivious to anything else in the cottage. All she heard was the rhythmic squishing sound as the handle pressed against her velvet walls. She pulled down the top of her dress to release her fine breasts and pushed them up so that she could take a nipple in her mouth, making it hard and erect and making the pleasure betwixt her legs even more intense. She could feel her climax approach but tried to hold it off, thinking about her husband’s sermons to make the ecstatic pleasure last longer. She could bear it no longer and gave herself up to her apotheosis which, like a wave on the shore, broke and engulfed her body with joy.
&n
bsp; With a little groan her head drooped. She put the brush back on the table and looked around for her undergarments. She put them back on and adjusted her dress. She put the kettle on the stove and boiled water. She prepared a cup of sweet milky tea and took it up to Mr Collins. He was still snoring, so she shook him awake and told him she had brought him some tea.
“Eh? What? Tea?” he said, barely awake.
“Yes, dear, I brought you some tea as you requested.”
“Thank you, my dear. I think I slept a little. What did you do while I slept?”
“Just myself,” she thought sadly.
He did not kiss her or take her in his loving arms. Instead he propped himself up with a pillow and asked for paper, pen and ink. He then set about writing his next sermon while she returned to the kitchen. She sat down and rested her chin on her hands. How she would love to get away from here, she thought. Just one short week or a mere few days in some warm and sunny place near the sea.
Over the next few days Darcy and Lizzy made preparations for their sojourn to Brighton. The finest rooms in the finest hotel were reserved. Comfortable chambers in excellent taverns running from Derbyshire to Sussex were duly booked and stage coaches ordered to transport them on their long journey. Both of them were looking forward to an enjoyable holiday, alone and undisturbed by family, friends or associates.
Lizzy, however, made the cardinal error of writing a short letter to her mother informing her that she and Darcy would shortly be staying in Brighton in order to make up for their honeymoon which had previously been cut short. She assumed her mother would be pleased for her and her husband. Mrs Bennet was pleased but not in the way that Lizzy had hoped.
“Mr Bennet,” she said, “I have received a letter from Lizzy.”
“A letter?” he said, looking up from his breakfast, “From Lizzy? How is she? What does she say, my dear?”
“Very little, really. She says that she is well and that Mr Darcy is well.”
“Is that all?”
“She also says that they will be taking a short trip to Brighton.”
“To Brighton? Well, I’m sure they’ll have a very enjoyable time.”
“I’m quite sure they will.”
“I imagine,” said Mr Bennet, “that they wish to spend some time alone, away from the cares of running a large estate and tending to his tenants’ needs. I’m sure they intend to spend time together as husband and wife. I understand their honeymoon was cut short due to urgent business matters.”
“That may be so, Mr Bennet, but I think they may become bored if they are alone together in their bed chamber.”
“I doubt it,” said Mr Bennet with a chuckle. He remembered his own honeymoon all those years ago with his plump new wife, innocent and virginal but eager to learn, very eager to learn.
“In any event,” she continued, “they may be glad to have other people don’t you think?”
“What are you suggesting, my dear?” he said.
“Nothing, except that they may be pleased to have a few more people with whom to talk and walk along the beach.”
“Who, for example?”
“Why, you and I of course,” said Mrs Bennet.
“The letter says they are visiting Brighton alone. And you believe that we should join them without invitation?”
“Yes,” she said firmly.
“Why leave it there?” he said. “Why not bring Mary and Kitty along too?”
“What an excellent idea, Mr Bennet. If two of us would ease their boredom, just think what four of us would do.”
“I was jesting, my dear.”
“Well don’t. You know how I hate it when you try to be funny. Now I think it’s a capital idea that we all travel to Brighton and keep them company. And if you don’t agree then I won’t do that thing you like in the bed chamber.”
“With your fingers, you mean?” said Mr Bennet.
“That’s exactly what I mean, Mr Bennet.”
Mr Bennet thought deeply for some time. Eventually, as she knew he would, he gave in to her request.
“Very well, my dear. Perhaps they would like it if all four of us joined them in Brighton.”
“I thought you’d change your mind, Mr Bennet,” she said, holding up one, then two, three, four fingers and wiggling them suggestively.
“I suppose we ought to inform Mary and Kitty,” he said.
“Mary! Kitty!” roared Mrs Bennet.
“Yes, mama?” they said in unison as they hurried into the sitting room.
“Your father has decided we need a holiday.”
“Father decided?” said Mary.
“Something like that,” said Mrs Bennet. “I think he believes it will calm my nerves. We plan to go to Brighton. Would you like to join us?”
“Yes,” said Mary.
“No,” said Kitty.
“You don’t wish to visit Brighton, Kitty?” said her father a little disappointed.
“No,” said Kitty.
“You’re sure?” said her mother, a little relived that it meant one less mouth to feed.
“Quite sure, thank you. I wish to spend a little time with Miss Bingley. I may stay with her at her cottage while you are away. We could decorate our bonnets or gather berries or press…er…flowers together.”
The thought of spending a few days at Miss Bingley’s cottage made Kitty feel warm and fuzzy inside. Miss Bingley had introduced her to the joys of Sapphic love. She wanted to explore (and be explored) those joys further. The thought of spending time with Miss Bingley, undisturbed while her family were away in Brighton, making love all day if they wished, made Kitty feel somewhat moist betwixt her legs.
“Very well,” said Mrs Bennet. “According to Lizzy’s letter they leave in a week. We will begin to pack our things forthwith, because I know how many things your father will pack.”
Mr Bennet smiled at Mary and gave a little shrug.
The Bennet family, Mr Bennet, Mrs Bennet and Mary, packed their trunks. Mr Bennet and Mary had finished packing a little case each on the first day. Mrs Bennet on the other hand packed an enormous trunk on Monday, unpacked it and repacked it on Tuesday, added more clothes on Wednesday, unpacked it and started again on Thursday and burst into tears on Friday, informing Mr Bennet that she had not a stitch to wear. And, she added, her nerves were in a most perilous state. Mr Bennet said nothing but disappeared to the cellar where a few bottles of choice gin were kept, having taken the precaution many years ago of informing Mrs Bennet that the cellar was full of spiders and to go down there would be bad for her nerves.
The day of departure arrived at last. Mr Bennet and Mary climbed into the stagecoach, each of them carrying a little suitcase. Mrs Bennet climbed in and sat next to Mary while four servants struggled to lift her trunk onto the coach. The driver gave a toot on his long horn and the coach set off down the bumpy road to Brighton. Mrs Bennet found the bumps and jolts from the uneven surface rather uncomfortable. Mary found them most pleasing.
Unlike Darcy and Lizzy, they stayed in mean little taverns and roadside inns. Mrs Bennet complained at every staging post but consoled herself by eating enormous meals whenever the opportunity presented itself. Fortunately, the journey from Hertfordshire to Brighton was somewhat shorter than that from Derbyshire to Brighton and as result Mrs Bennet arrived at the famed seaside town disheveled to only a moderate degree. Mr Bennet was grateful for the fine selection of ales and wines at each tavern. Mary was grateful for the bumpy roads.
Mrs Bennet climbed out of the coach in some discomfort. In front of her stood the most magnificent and luxurious hotel facing the English Channel.
“Why, Mr Bennet, is this our hotel? It’s called ‘The Grand’, how marvelous. It is magnificent and quite appropriate to a lady of my standing.”
“I’m afraid you are mistaken, my dear.”
He pointed to a mean little hostel, a mere twenty yards from The Grand. It looked shabby from the outside and was, no doubt, worse inside.
“That is wh
ere we will be staying,” he said.
“But it’s called The Slug. How can you expect me to stay somewhere that’s called The Slug?”
“I’m sure we will be quite comfortable there, my dear.”
They took their things into The Slug and were shown to their rooms, which were indeed a little shabbier than the exterior. Mr and Mrs Bennet had a smallish room with twin beds while Mary was given a little room, barely bigger than a cupboard, at the far end of a corridor. Mrs Bennet grumbled as she unpacked her clothes.
“How did we end up in a room like this in a hotel like this, Mr Bennet?”
“It isn’t so bad, my dear.”
“Not so bad? Why even the cockroaches want to leave.”
“But it does have one advantage.”
“What’s that?” said Mrs Bennet looking around.
“Mary is at the end of the corridor. Which means she won’t be able to hear us.”
“Hear us what?”
“Well, my dear,” said Mr Bennet, an awkward smile on his face, “you did hint that if I brought you away to Brighton then you would do that thing with your fingers that I like.”
“Now?”
“There’s no time like the present.”
“Very well, Mr Bennet. Assume the position.”
Mr Bennet breathlessly unfastened his breeches and pulled them off together with his undergarments. He bent over the bed and braced himself with his hands, palm down, on the mattress. Behind him Mrs Bennet took off her gloves and took a little jar of petroleum jelly from her bag…
While Mr and Mrs Bennet were enjoying themselves (Mr Bennet in particular), Darcy and Lizzy were on the outskirts of town. Although they had further to travel they had made the journey much more quickly, due to the fact that they had a better and faster coach and also due to the fact that they did not spend as much time at meals as Mrs Bennet.
Lizzy put her head out of the coach window.
“Fitzwilliam,” she said, putting her head back in, “it’s wonderful. I can see the sea. I can’t wait to go out and swim.”
“All in good time, my love,” he said. “First we need to find our hotel. It’s called The Grand. I trust the driver knows where it is.”