Mrs Grainger's Gift 29

By Ritchie Moore

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This work is intended for ADULTS ONLY. It may contain depictions of sexual activity involving minors. If you are not of a legal age in your locality to view such material or if such material does not appeal to you, do not read further, and do not save this story.
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PART 29

Or XXIX

Tuesday 11th August

More talks, and a threat. M and C roam the estate, sunbathe, dip in a pool. Daphnis & Chloe. At night, another visitor for Jeremy

“Well, Jeremy,” said Mrs Grainger rather amusedly, “have you given any thought, any more thought, to what we spoke of yesterday?”

He swallowed and said haltingly, “Mrs Grainger, I repeat what I said, in all honesty and candour. I think Catherine Hammond deserves something more than fifty pounds.”

She looked at him quizzically, and took out her cigarette case. Selecting one, she lit it and breathed in the smoke thoughtfully. “Tell me why I should give her sixpence.”

He took a deep breath and said “Mrs Grainger, I’m out of order here but I’m being honest about my feelings. Catherine has been abused. I bet a lot more has happened than that one episode, when …. When Masterman and I … we put our fingers in her … vulva… and….”

She nodded coolly. “Ah, Jeremy, I detect a gallantry in your remarks. Let me tell you what I’ve been doing to her, and to young Raven too. You’ve met him, what do you think of him?”

He blinked. “He seems a nice chap. He’s my age, isn’t he? Actually the two of them make a nice couple. Did you say you’ve been tormenting him as well?” His eyes grew big.

“Yes, Jeremy. Just imagine, he’s been bathed by my girls, the staff, the two ones here, a few girls from my Academy, regularly, bathed and fondled till he came – ejaculated, spent.” He swallowed and took a deep breath. “And then he’s been exhibited stark naked at a garden party, and in the middle of Mason’s store in town, and to most of the girls at the school, where I’m told he amused them by being made to show orgasm.”

He frowned and his cheeks grew red. “So you’ve been humiliating them both!”

“Yes, Jeremy. Catherine has been bathed in her turn by several boys, who were encouraged to tickle her quim till she came—”

“Stop it!” he cried. “Stop it! You – you can’t do that, shame her like that, and poor Matthew too!”

She looked at him and lowered her eyelids to peer in astonishment. “What! What are you saying?”

He gulped and said “Madam, it’s cruel and shameful to treat them like that. It’s—”

“Jeremy,” she said slowly, “do you realise just how brave you’re being? I can send a telegramme to Mr Barry and tell him you’ve been insufferably impertinent, and he should dismiss you.” The boy looked round in despair, and began to speak, but the chatelaine gave a grim smile and left the room.

When Catherine came out of the pool Matthew was ready with the towel, and lovingly dried that beautiful body very thoroughly, with smirks and smiles as he came across those fascinating areas that reacted to his attentions by stimulating the girl to little shivers of pleasure. Then she watched him undress, with a smile of her own, and sat back on the grass with hands folded to gaze at him with what was, he realised, a proprietary smile. He frolicked in the water for a little while, showing off his body to her with a measure of pride, then came out and held out his arms to her.

“Well,” he said, “where’s the towel? It’s your turn to feel me up.”

She laughed, and said she’d do exactly that, and proceeded to make him as dry as the surrounding rocks, and as aroused as one of Pascau’s goats. But there it stopped, and they sat side by side enjoying their nudity, enjoying the arousal, while Matthew rummaged in his satchel for the fruit they’d brought and that little book he’d got from Elizabeth (bless her!) those weeks ago.

“Here it is,” he said munching, “it’s where they’ve discovered they’re attracted to each other. Bathing has undone Chloe, and the kiss has undone Daphnis. And they’ve had that adventure with the pirates, yes? And then Dorco is dead, and Daphnis escapes from the sinking ship. Remember, he got out of his clothes, to swim easier, so he’s naked when he finds Chloe again.”

“Oh yes,” she said with a broad smile, “and she must have clasped him in her arms in relief!”

“Anyway, they have the funeral for Dorco, yes. Let’s see.” He found the place they’d stopped at and cleared his throat, and began to read in a discursive conversational style. Catherine listened to his voice – like every part of him, she thought, like every other facet of him, his voice is so … attractive, so … lovable! God, how lucky I am!

“When the funeral of Dorco was done, Chloe brought Daphnis to the Cave of the Nymphs, and washed him stark naked with her own hands—”

“Ooh yes! It’s not just a little touch here and there, as before! ‘Her own hands’, touching his bare body everywhere.” She shivered naughtily. He grinned at her bawdy enthusiasm and continued.

“Washed him stark naked with her own hands; and she her self, Daphnis then first of all looking and gazing on her, washed her naked limbs before him; her limbs, which for their perfect and most excellent beauty, needed neither wash nor dresse: and when they had done, they gathered flowers, to crown the Statues of the Nymphs, and hang’d up Dorco’s charming pipe, for an Anathema in the phane. (I’m not sure what that means, maybe a sort of offering, you know?) Anyway. Then coming away, they looked what became of their Sheep and Goats; and found, that they neither fed, nor blated (bleated, he means), but were all laid upon the ground, as wanting Daphnis and Chloe, that had been so long out of their sight. When they saw this, and had call’d, and whistled, as they were wont; they rose up presently, and fell to feed; and the mantling Goats skipt and leapt, as rejoicing at the safety of their familiar Goat-herd. But Daphnis for his life could not be merry, because he had seen Chloe naked, and that Venus of her beauty, which before was not unveiled.”

Catherine’s smile grew, and her eyes sparkled, and Matthew grinned at her.

“His heart was gnawed, as with a secret poyson; and had deep sentiments of grief and anguish: insomuch, that sometimes he puffed and blowed thick and short, as if some body had been in a close pursuit of him: sometimes again, he breathed so faintly, as if he had been quite spent in running. That washing seemed to him more dangerous and formidable, then the Sea: And he thought his life was still in the hands, and at the dispose of the Tyrian Pyrats, as being but a young Rustick, and yet unskill’d in the Assassinations and Robberies of Love.”

He looked at her and closed the book. “That’s the end of the First Book,” he said. “Well! Our lovebirds have seen each other ‘stark naked’ now, and that kiss was just the prelude to some illumination, wouldn’t you say? What hasn’t he seen before?”

“‘That Venus of her beauty’, he says, which has to mean ….”

“Her crotch. Her cunny. He may have seen her breasts before, but now he sees her arse and her cunt. It’s a great phrase that, ‘the Venus of her beauty’, don’t you think?”

“It is, it’s poetical and so suggestive! And it has to mean her cunt, as you say. Her arse too, of course, and they’re just next door, after all.”

He looked deliberately at her crotch and put out a finger to stroke that so attractive slit. She yelped and coquettishly tossed her head. “Sir! So familiar! But— Wait, Matthew. I’ve never asked you. What did you think, how were your feelings, when you saw me naked that first time, hmm?”

He put the book carefully back in the bag and looked pensive.

“Well, I hardly know how to begin. There was I, stark naked, hiding behind a curtain, listening to a girl being undressed. How do you think I felt? I got an erection at once. Then I’m standing there stiff as anything, and by God you come to the window. I saw a girl totally stark naked for the first time, and … and my cock reacted even more. I admit it, the … instinct was to go to you, to … cover you ….”

“Like a stallion, I think you mean,” she said with a rueful sort of look.

“Yes, damnit, it was a natural urge maybe, animal or whatever, but tempered at once by a … conflict of emotions. I desired you, I wanted to fuck you. But overriding that lust, pure lust! Overriding it was an astonishment at what I saw of you – all of you – all of your naked body. Which was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. And then you saw me, and would have screamed, wouldn’t you, at seeing a naked boy – with a hard-on, too! – so I had to hold you to stop you. And I grabbed you and you struggled, probably expecting rape, but then somehow we agreed not to give ourselves away, wasn’t that it? So you went back to your place, only you knew now that there was a naked boy listening to that embarrassing conversation. What did I think? How did I feel? Especially when Mrs G made you go to the window and show yourself to me again! Yes, it was the same as before, only magnified. I had the time while you stood before me to feast my eyes on this sight I’d never seen before, a beautiful naked girl, and admire her in all those aspects, her simple beauty, and also her … hidden places. God, I looked at those breasts and longed to touch them.”

He brought his hand up to caress her right breast.

“I looked at your belly, I looked at your bum, and imagined stroking them.”

His other came over to caress the round of her buttock.

“And I gazed at that amazing slit, the cunt of a girl, and wondered what it would be like to play with it. Put my fingers in? Listen Catherine, I was an ignorant virgin. I had only the vaguest ideas about girls’ privates. I’d seen my sister naked a couple of times, but she wasn’t as … developed as you. Oh, I know Mrs G didn’t think you had developed sufficiently at fifteen, but I thought you were just perfect.”

By this time his hands were in her crotch and she was beginning to get short of breath. It only took another minute to get into a close clinch and start kissing in wild abandon. Thoughts of who might happen to see them were tossed aside as they strove with each other in that delightful wrestling match where each wished to be conquered.

* * *

That night Jeremy strolled about the garden smoking a rare cigarette, pondering. What would Mrs Grainger do, he wondered, about Catherine? Maybe he should persuade her to do something about the boy Matthew, who seemed to be attached to her. God knows if she’ll listen to me. Why should she? I’ll have to apologise for that outburst, and try to persuade her. But she (or her estate) wouldn’t miss another thousand pounds, would it? She probably wouldn’t listen to her priest either – does she have one? Oh hell, I’ll just tell her tomorrow to give Catherine and Matthew five thousand pounds each and be done with it. But how much is going to be left anyway? There’s a lot more. Maybe more scholarships, charities…. Could she fund a chair at a university perhaps?

He shelved his wandering ideas and turned in to his bed. There he lay for a while, remembering suddenly with a flush and a tremble of his penis how Jennie had taken his virginity the night before. Then – oh Lord! – he saw he had another visitor, Amelia in a rather short nightgown, who slipped quietly into bed and snuggled up to him before he could react. But react he did, his penis erecting at her presence and finding itself in contact with her bare thigh. Oh God, he thought, she wants me to fuck her! Like Jennie, she – oh God! This time he thought he was in control, but Amelia had her own determined way. She pushed her body against him, her thirsty vulva against his anxious erection, and manoeuvred him into her. Once there, the rest followed. Soon he was pumping away at her cunt, as he thought, Christ, I’m fucking a girl again! I’m at her cunt! God, what—Oh God! I’m coming, I’m – oh God! He shot his sperm into her with something like a groan, a mixture of amazement and delight. Then lying quietly, recovering the breath, to be kissed and thanked by Amelia, who stole away with a smile on her face to her own bed.

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Wednesday 12th August

M helping Pascau elsewhere. Sex on the lawn. More talks. Remonstrations. Papers signed.

Lydia looked at Jeremy disdainfully and said “You do realise that I have complete control over those poor orphans, don’t you? Catherine is afraid of being sent back to a life of painful drudgery in Cumberland, which by all accounts I’ve heard, and what I’ve seen of it, is a perfectly dreadful wasteland, and the Raven boy is afraid for his family, who have decent employment in Essex, who could be dismissed at a word from me. So they have to accept what happens to them, no matter how painful or humiliating. Just as you, I hope, have to obey your master, and in fact obey your master’s clients. Isn’t that so?” She smiled grimly and swept out, leaving Jeremy in bewilderment, but not for long, for Catherine came in and took his hand, blushing as she looked at the ground and stammered “C- come outside.”

He went with her in some wonder, enjoying the pressure of her hand on his, and they stopped in the middle of the lawn. “Now,” she said, her blush deepening as she put her hands to the buttons of her blouse, “take … your clothes off.” He stared at her. “Please,” she said, “I want you to … get naked with me.” She undid her blouse and dropped it to the grass, then shed her shoes and stockings. He looked at her wide-eyed, then nodded with a strange feeling of inevitability and undid his shirt.

Soon they faced each other, nude and blushing, he trying to shield his groin, but then he put his hands to his sides with a bold sensation of liberation, to expose himself to this beautiful girl – this beautiful nude girl, whom he had seen before, touched before, caressed into orgasm. Did she want to repay the pleasure? Did she want him to know his own shame? If so, he wanted to embrace that shame and experience that pleasure. Suddenly she dropped to her knees and jolted him out of his mad thoughts by putting her hands up to his erection.

He gave a startled yelp as she put a gentle hand to his member, which he realised was throbbing in desire for some release, She was there to provide it, and he gave a pleasured shudder as she put both hands to his thighs and leaned forward to lick his penis. Then she had his glans in her mouth, and was sucking him like a lollipop or a stick of seaside rock, an amazing sensation to which he reacted, his hips moving to thrust his cock into her mouth and heighten his own pleasure. His hands waved about in a sort of aimless delight till they found themselves cradling her head and smoothing her lovely hair. When he came he involuntarily jerked back and his semen spurted onto her chin and breast, and she looked up at him, licking her lips, while he looked down at her red face and stammered “C – Catherine, oh G—God—”

She rose and looked at the ground, muttering “Jeremy, I’m sorry—”

“But I’m not,” he said to her surprise, and his own. “I’ve never done that before, and – oh, you, you’re so beautiful, Catherine, I couldn’t help myself. Thank you.”

She picked up her clothes with a sigh and glanced at him, then gave a half smile. “But you’re beautiful too, Jeremy,” she said simply, and went indoors. He dressed and tried to recover his equanimity. That was an astonishing episode, and he just knew that Mrs Grainger had arranged it, and while he admitted to himself that he’d enjoyed the act, he wondered how he’d look at Catherine when next they met. As for Lydia Grainger, though, he resolved to confront the chatelaine with her shameless exploitation of defenceless children. Of which he, too, was one….

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“Well, Jeremy! We’ve covered all the rest of my testament. So now we can discuss reparations for the tormented children you care about so deeply.”

She eyed him with what seemed a sardonic sort of amusement, then her mouth twisted in what had to be malicious fury. Jeremy gazed at her in dismay and stuttered “B-but m-m-madam, you asked my opinion. And if I’m honest I must tell you that it’s wrong to treat them so. There are right things to do, and wrong things, and – and this is wrong, your cruel exposure, I mean—”

“Come, Jeremy,” she said with a thin smile, “you’re presuming to lecture me on propriety, after seducing both of my servants, after allowing Catherine to suck you off! You take a lot for granted.” His face flushed beetroot red, and he began to stammer. “No,” she continued, “it isn’t really the kind of behaviour that’ll go down well with Mr Barry, I think. Or your family!” His face crumpled in horror, and he stared at her silently.

She returned his gaze directly, and tapped her shoe on the floor. Maintaining a silent scrutiny, she took out a cigarette and lit it, blowing the smoke to the ceiling, then smiling as he dropped his eyes and started to say something, shook his head, looked at her again, seemed to appeal with his eyes, then drew a deep breath and seemed to make up his mind.

The boy spoke slowly as he looked at the floor again. “I can’t help it, ma’am. I have to speak, even if it means you complain to Mr Barry. You asked me to be plain-spoken with you, and I’m being plain-spoken. I think you should make it up to them. And if you ask Mr Barry to dismiss me – well,” he swallowed, “I don’t care, I have to say it. Please, madam,” he lifted his eyes to hers, which were squinting at him in amusement, “please. You can do it, you can afford another thousand. Five thousand, even. You’re a very rich woman, Mrs Grainger, and they are poor victims, poor orphans.”

He stared at her and lifted his chin as if to invite her to denounce him to his employer. His lips trembled and his hands clenched in fear, but he bore her gaze for a minute before dropping his eyes again. Lydia Grainger looked at him for several minutes more, as a slight spasm of pain crossed her features. She turned away, then turned back to see an expression of hopelessness on his face. “Ah, Jeremy!” she murmured, “so there is after all a spirit of selflessness. I can destroy you, young man. I’m going to write a letter or two.”

He heaved a tremulous sigh.

“Madam,” he said in a low resigned voice, “I’ve offended you, and I’m sorry. But please don’t take out your anger on them. They’re not to blame for my insolence….” His voice trailed off.

The haughty chatelaine looked at him with an odd sort of gaze and seemed to shiver. “Well,” she said. “Well! I’ll have things to think about, won’t I?”

He swallowed and looked into her sardonic eyes. “Listen, madam: This testament may be – and I really hope it will – be years before it’s executed.”

She gave a bark of a laugh.

“But still, these young people are here now and being molested – yes, maybe not painfully, but still—”

“And you feel I should give them something now, do you? Otherwise they’ll wait forty years to be recompensed. That’ll hardly do. A silly idea from a silly boy. Whose own morals are questionable, to say the least!

“But,” she added, “I don’t think you need to be so worried. This conversation hasn’t taken place.”

He looked at her astonished, then opened his mouth to voice his gratitude, but was forestalled by her upraised hand and her words. “Relax, boy. Your job is safe. Your reputation also. I can’t be bothered queering your pitch with your family either. Give me those papers to sign right now …. There. Take them back to Barry, and be thankful I have a sense of humour. Now be off.”

He blinked and left, shaking his head in wonderment. She looked after him, pursing her lips. Why was she doing this? Just because she was feeling under par? Had he really made such an impression on her? Perhaps … perhaps she would write to Barry after all….

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Jeremy looked at his suitcase and decided it was ready to go, and heaved it out to the hall. Pascau would be coming by, he’d said, in half an hour or so to take him to the station. Meanwhile, better straighten the bed and leave everything looking neat. He entered his little room and stopped in shock to see Jennie and Amelia there sitting on the bed. “What—why are you here?” he asked, with a feeling of foreboding. Jennie got up and closed the door. He looked at her, at Amelia, who was looking at him with obvious amusement, and stammered “Listen, girls—”

Amelia rose and came close to put her arms round his neck and say simply “We want to say goodbye. In our own way. Like this.” She reached down to his trousers, and he flinched as he saw what they had in mind. Jennie came to his back and helped her friend loosen his trousers, and he struggled weakly as they brought them to his knees. “Hell,” said Amelia, “let’s get nice and naked!”

Jennie laughed and soon stripped the boy, who somehow (Why?) was allowing them to make him naked, maybe hoping (Hoping?) to be assaulted by the two of them (Two of them!) – and then they too were nude, pressing their desirable bodies up against his, which was now trembling in hot desire, his prick reaching up for release – and then onto the bed, and a sweaty medley of limbs and breasts and that impudent prick, straining for a harbour. He found himself fucking Amelia again, and then God, God! Fucking Jennie again! Then….

“Jesus!” said Amelia, “that was something! Jeremy, Jeremy! You’re great! You’re marvellous!”

“Yes, Jeremy,” said Jennie, lying back on the bed and waving her hands in the air. “That was a tremendous fuck, believe me! A goodbye present to us, and to take away too, I bet!”

Jeremy stood up and began to collect his clothes, looking at the pair of them, nude and smiling, and smiled himself. “Thank you, ladies,” he said gallantly. “I’m going to remember you, by golly!” They looked at him lazily as he dressed. “We may never meet again, but this is something to keep, as a … mental memento, maybe. I will remember you both. Thanks.” He straightened his tie and put on his jacket as a horn tooted outside. “Goodbye.” He blew them a kiss, and left.

“God!” exclaimed Amelia. “I didn’t expect it would be quite like that! He had such energy, such … enthusiasm! Such …”

“Such a great prick!” said Jennie, and they burst into laughter.

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Thursday 13th August

Films and fun at Morelli’s; the orphans at the village.

Pascau drove Lydia Grainger in through the gates of the old chateau and stopped in the courtyard. He let her out and was dismissed with orders to return when telephoned. He saluted and drove off as Morelli came out the front door of a charming old-style building that seemed, indeed, to be centuries old. She imagined Rabelais or Montaigne coming out to greet her, and smiled in admiration. Morelli greeted her effusively and escorted her in, and she looked about her in approval. “Yes, signore,” she said, “I can see a difference! It’s cleaner of course, but you’ve rebuilt that, and restored, and … I must say it’s quite delightful, just this part. You’ll have to show me all over. As I said I was quite taken with it five years ago, and I suppose I could have taken on the restoration, but … I was just impatient to get settled in to our own little place.”

“Which is itself charming,” he said gallantly, “as is the chatelaine.” She simpered coyly and met his eyes with an understanding promise.

She was given a tour of the place, and complimented Morelli on the way he had brought the little chateau back to a lot of its former glory. As they sat at a simple snack, served by two handsome young men, she asked him about Matthew and Catherine, and he was profuse in his thanks for their availability, and praise of their endowments. She laughed when he told her he’d christened her “Gloriana”, and asked about a suitable name for the boy.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he said, “I didn’t think about that. I suppose I should. Have you any suggestions?”

“Well,” she answered, “there’s no reason you can’t merely translate his English name into Italian, which would be ‘Matteo Corvino’, perhaps. He could have Italian blood, when I think about it. That colouring. And you saw he was getting a nice tan all over, like our Gloriana!”

“Yes, yes,” he said. “I admit that the general preference is for ladies to be pale, white as alabaster all over – but especially in those areas that others never see—” She smiled, and he continued, “But I find a soft brown skin to be just a little more attractive, and this must of course apply to those secret parts of the body. After all, imagine the effect of the contrast when one sees the lady naked, and those desirable areas are emphasised by their paleness!”

Her smile continued as she said “Well signore, I haven’t got that far yet. Catherine is pretty well done by now – she tans quite quickly actually – but I alas have had little opportunity to lay myself open to the sun, and so would not present you with much of a contrast.”

Her eyes met his, and he smiled in understanding. “Well,” he said, “we shall see, perhaps.”

She laughed. “Yes, perhaps. What did Rabelais call it (speaking of life after death of course) – ‘the great Perhaps’. Well, signore, one can always hope for a perhaps. And then it’s only fair to find out the reaction of the masculine skin to the sun.” She looked at him archly. “You do have the advantage, living down here, as opposed I mean to the so-called temperate climate of England. Most of our population, men as well as women, are pale and classically white.”

“But madam, one must remember that the ancients made their statues lifelike by colouring them. The idea of untouched marble is really a misunderstanding. Besides, remember that white is the colour of mourning in China.”

“Very true, signore, but the Romans, remember, put a fair value on white skin. I think Petronius talks somewhere about a woman, Circe, he considers beautiful – ‘She outshines Parian marble with the whiteness of her chin,’ and so forth. So Luigi—oh, I’m sorry—”

“No, madam, really, I don’t mind the informality. But I ask you to allow me to call you Lydia.”

She smiled a little coyly and nodded. “Of course. Now tell me more about your films.”

* * *

He put out his cigarette. “So that’s what I’ve done with the children. The development will take time, naturally. And I promise to send you copies of them all.”

“Of course, thank you. And as for your other films….”

“Ah yes, Lydia, I do have some extra copies of some of them, and I’ll be happy to send them to Summerton for you. You can project them, I imagine.”

“I can certainly arrange it. That will amuse the staff, the men and boys at least. But don’t make it a gift. No, I insist on renumeration. These things aren’t cheap, I know.”

He nodded gratefully. “It’s true, of course. And it does take money to create these things. I think I have the dedication to the art, but dedication doesn’t pay bills!”

“Another thing I must mention before I forget. When you can, you must visit Summerton. I don’t know how often you can get away – or for how long, but I’d really like to see you, so you must promise to visit.”

He smiled and agreed, and added “Now I must show you some of my creations. Come.” He offered his hand to lead her into a small room with a few chairs facing a cinema screen, and a piano in the corner. “Sit you down Lydia,” he said, showing schoolboyish enthusiasm at exhibiting his work, “and the performance will commence!”

She looked around. “Will you be projecting—”

“No, no, a servant, Alberto, will operate the machine. And here is Marco, who will play the piano. He is extremely good at improvising music, but he’s seen most of these before. And so I can sit beside you.”

He smiled and she detected a sparkle in his eyes, and was not surprised when, after the light was extinguished, he reached over for her hand.

An hour and a half later the boys were released and the adults shared another bottle of wine. Then Morelli took his guest to another room which featured a comfortable-looking bed and a large cinema screen, explained as a lazy sort of viewing room, where one could loll about and even doze while films were projected from another room. Lydia saw the application at once.

“Well, Luigi, I’m sure you want to demonstrate how it can be used. Have you got a film or two lined up?”

“Ah, Lydia, of course! I can see you’re impatient for a showing. So we’ll dim the lights and make ourselves comfortable, and give a signal to Amadeo next door, who will show us another of my little gems. See, the lights … we can just see each other. I think I’ll take off my jacket, don’t you find it’s quite warm in here? Yes, that’s it. Be comfortable, be natural.”

A minute or two later he pressed a button on the wall at the head of the bed, and the screen flickered into life. By its fitful illumination they gazed at each other and smiled. Yes, it was warm, wasn’t it? The images on the screen however did nothing to abate the temperature.

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Friday 14th August

LG indisposed; J & A attend her all day. Matthew enjoys yet another bath at Morelli’s.

Amelia came into the sitting room and spoke abruptly to Matthew. “Today you’re supposed to go to Mr Morelli’s place, for a bath, evidently. Mrs G says so.”

“How is she? She didn’t look well at breakfast—”

“What’s it to you? Her stomach is troubling her, that’s all. But she’s keeping to her room. Jennie and I’ll be attending to her. Catherine’ll be helping Mireio. So you are going to get your weekly bath. You had one last Saturday, didn’t you?”

He grimaced, remembering Charlotte and her bawdy friends. “All right,” he said. “When?”

“That’s up to you, I suppose. But I think he wants you for an hour at least. He’s going to film you.”

He gritted his teeth. Of course. “So maybe I should go over after lunch? And be back by teatime. All right.” She nodded and left.

So here we go again, he thought. That bastard Morelli wants to photograph me having a bath – not by myself, oh no! It’ll be those randy daughters again, I just know it. It was the boys with poor Catherine last time of course. God, I’m tired of that bitch’s doings! She has a sore stomach, does she? After being over at Morelli’s? I bet he fucked her, he thought with bitter relish, and hurt her cunt! Oh God, though, why am I thinking like this? I didn’t use to be like this, hateful and vindictive, did I? It’s this fucking life she’s led me – us – into. And Catherine is probably the same, didn’t she curse Lydia Grainger last time – and she’s usually so kind and – but no, you daft bugger! Catherine is always kind, compassionate, lovable! Ah, Catherine….

His lover saw him off, waving with an expression that managed to convey sympathy for his plight and promise of consolation afterwards. Modestine plodded along and needed no direction, as she seemed to have memorised the route. Morelli’s antique chateau was about five miles from the Grainger place, in the opposite direction from the town, on a slight rise, and had a good view of the surrounding woods. Now that he knew what to expect, Matthew looked at the place with new eyes. Old grey walls, two conical towers at the gate, flowering bushes and trees surrounding the path – it looked idyllic and innocent somehow, yet his prejudice saw it as slily threatening, hugging a shameful secret. God, yes (he thought), it’s full of shameful secrets. Not so secret, either, at least in the future!

His bleak thoughts turned on the ambition of Morelli (and Mrs G) to broadcast his shame, and that of his beloved, the erotic pictures, pornographic moving pictures, broadcast all over the continent, and America too, and South America come to that, and—.

Modestine entered the gateway and stopped, then lifted her head and brayed to inform the residents that she’d arrived. A young man hurried out and clapped his hands, summoning another who was told to take charge of the animal, then beckoned the boy to follow him into the house. An effusive Morelli welcomed him. “Ah, Matthew, my child! Come through here.”

He led him through into what looked like a small sitting room and looked at him with a smile.

“I have great plans for you, Matthew! These cinematic productions will outshine many another. For instance, the works of Fred Holland Day, a veteran of nude photography (he’s about 60, I believe), an American artist, very interesting. His pictures of young boys in particular. I’ll try to emulate them, perhaps with a little more daring, yes?”

Matthew sighed and shrugged. Evidently Morelli would have him posing not just for the enjoyment of bawdy females but for the male lovers of the male body. What else?

“Yes, per esempio, I want to photograph you in a field under a beech tree, with a pipe. Not a tobacco pipe! Oh no, a pan-pipe, or recorder, that sort of thing. Nude, of course. And it will be a grand realisation of that first eclogue of Virgil, do you know it? Tityre, tu patulae recubans sub tegmine fagi silvestrem tenui Musam meditaris avena. A splendid poem. How would it be in English? Let me filter it through Italian…. Hmm. Titiro, tu sdraiato al riparo di un grande faggio, no, perhaps riposando sotto la chioma di un ampio faggio? moduli una canzone boschereccia, una melodia silvestre, sulla umile no, better studi sull'esile zampogna…. Though that’s rather free. All right, in English you would say ‘Tityrus (that’s his name), you are lying under the cover – shade – of a large beech-tree, pondering a sylvan song’, or maybe just ‘creating a woodland melody on your slender pipe.’ That’s it. And you will have your reed-pipe, your zampogna, to your lips. And you will have your unashamed nudity, your penis jutting forth, not necessarily in erection, though we can do several like that, I mean in various stages of arousal, no? That would be good. Perhaps in silhouette, even, plainly showing your delicious cazzo. Yes,” he said, licking his lips, “I think that would outdo those cheerless nude boys that von Gloeden and von Plüschow are so proud of! And we’ll create a whole series of substitutes for all those lost platinotypes of Holland. (A great pity, that – he had a fire, unfortunately.) Ha, Matthew, I really can easily foresee a nice little market for the pictures of Matteo Corvino, as Signora Grainger suggested!”

The boy looked at him miserably. Mrs G had given him a name to accompany the erotic pictures of Gloriana, and he was set to be the favourite eyeful of generations of boy-lovers. All right (he acknowledged), they had a right to enjoy his nakedness too, just as long – yes, yes, just as long as it’s in a good setting, designedly artistic, trying to be beautiful. And so he was beautiful? All those girls seemed to think so. So why not the boys, the men, also? Denys and Aimeric couldn’t be alone in their admiration, their desire! He smiled to realise he was on the way to accepting his erotic allure, the attraction he had for other people. In the meantime, make the best of it, and make the most of it too. He was brought back to earth by the enthused artist talking about Daphnis. Their Daphnis? Did he want to … to debase that lovely story?

“Yes, Matthew, we mentioned this before but now I have the idea of you as Tityrus, why not have you as the Greek goatherd Daphnis, who plays a pipe to divert his flock and also entice the girl into a state of desire? It is an old story that deserves realisation, deserves embodiment, if I may use that term, in a moving picture. I must work that out. For the moment however we have the baths.”

He ushered the boy into the studio, where a large bathtub stood ready. A pile of towels lay on a bench nearby, with a bar of soap and a jar of what looked like oil, or maybe scent.

Matthew screwed up his nose at the thought, and looked at his host. “Have you anything special in mind?” he asked. “I mean, do you just want me to take a bath, with that soap, and you’ll film me?”

“But yes,” Morelli replied, “that is what is to happen to start with. You will enter there,” pointing to the other door, “and proceed to undress completely. Naked, you will then fill the bath with jugs of water, from that tap over there. It’s cold water, but have no fear, the camera will pick up the pouring of the water, and then another shot will be with warm water, and that is when you get in the bath and begin to wash. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” said Matthew. “It seems simple enough. And you’ll be directing me from behind the camera, right? Telling me which part to wash or whatever.”

“Exactly so,” said Morelli, pleased to be understood. “And then when you are finished, you get out and dry yourself thoroughly with the towel, and walk out the door again.”

“I don’t get dressed?”

“No, not then. So then we relax and take a glass of wine and prepare for the next scene.” He looked benignly at the boy, who frowned in unease. He was sure a lot more was planned, a lot more embarrassing too.

Morelli allowed him to throw on a dressing gown once the bath was filled, and told him to go out into the garden for a smoke while the water was changed for the hot bath. “Here,” he said, “try one of these. It is a good brand, better than those harsh French cigarettes. Now go, and I’ll call you when we’re ready.”

Matthew paced along the path, remembering the awful session with the daughters, and shivering in the hot sunlight. As he drew on his cigarette he mused about how his life had changed. A simple footman, then a sexual toy! Now about to become a star of dirty moving pictures! Along (he gave a painful sigh) with his dear girl. Oh, he could see how everyone would love to watch her, and they wouldn’t be admiring her looks, not entirely anyway, they’d be concentrating on her breasts and her arse and her cunny, thinking how nice it would be to touch her there, to enter her, to fuck her! But Christ, you fool, it’s only what you want as well! So why shouldn’t they? You’ll object if they want to do what you want to do, what you do do! Are you so selfish?

He frowned in perplexity. Am I going to allow them that pleasure, then? In fact, am I going to allow other boys to enjoy Catherine’s nakedness? To feel her? To – even – to fuck her? She doesn’t belong to me. She’s her own girl, and – God!—even if she wants to … to make love … with another boy … Christ! How can I object?

But no, he reassured himself. That’s not likely to happen. Still, Raven, be on notice; if you love her, you will let her be herself and act for herself, and love whom she wishes, and you mustn’t stand in her way. God, you idiot, how can you object, when you’ve shagged so many other girls?

His troubled thoughts were interrupted by being called back in, and Morelli showed him the bath now filled with water which steamed faintly. “It is now quite pleasant for you,” he said. “Now you step into the bath and proceed to wash. There is no great complexity to it. I will direct you. All right?”

Matthew nodded, and on signal tested the water and delicately entered the bath. Morelli looked pleased as his new pornographic star began to apply the soap to that attractive body. It didn’t take too long to have a thorough wash, even with minute attention paid to the interesting parts of the body, and then he was out stretching his nude limbs and reaching for a towel. There followed a close examination of his bare skin – and then another stretch, and exit.

“Grand!” exclaimed Morelli. “Very good! Now put on your robe again, and we will film another scene. Alberto!” He clapped his hands, and one of his servants appeared from nowhere. He received voluble instructions in Italian too fast to follow and proceeded to empty the bathtub with a large scoop, pouring the water into the sink in the corner of the room. When it was moveable he dragged it out and returned to look at his master, who was pacing up and down smoking a cigarette in a long ostentatious holder. Matthew meanwhile was worrying about what else could happen, and his host was not telling him anything. He got the impression Morelli tended to make things up on the spur of the moment, but pretended to be in complete command of the situation. The boy sat glumly on a bench and watched another smaller bath being brought in and filled by a succession of containers of hot water, brought in by a bevy of girl servants, who looked over at him and giggled. God, he thought, they aren’t going to do anything to me, are they? They withdrew, however, and Morelli beamed and said “Right! Matthew! Another bath!”

This time Alberto filmed the action, and Matthew was directed to enter the room, take off his robe, and step into the bath. All went predictably till Morelli clapped his hands and yelled “Ragazze!” The door swung open and Matthew quailed as half a dozen teens came in, eyeing him and laughing. He covered himself and looked at them desperately, knowing that Morelli was going to involve them in his bath – he got the idea from Mrs G he supposed – and he just had to submit.

The girls, under the direction of Morelli, surrounded the bath and looked conspiratorially at each other, then seized the soap and lathered up to start on their victim. It was inevitable of course; the pattern followed that of his nightly baths at Summerton, save that there were six girls involved, and they all got a chance at his privates. Ultimately he came in a grand exhibition, and they all applauded, then pulled him out to dry him (again, with detailed attention to his anus and foreskin), before kissing him and leaving, giggling and looking back at him with admiring eyes. Matthew was told to stand by the bath with head drooping, then to hide his face in his hands in realisation of his shame. “Cut!”

Morelli clapped his young star on the naked shoulder and beamed. “That was excellent! Now on with your robe and relax for a little. Out in the garden you’ll find some wine set out. Have a glass, calm down your heart – oh yes, it is beating quite madly, is it not? Wander about a little. I’ll call you when we’re ready.”

He was led quite some distance from the house, the boys carrying the equipment, to where a little stream fed into a smallish pool. There the expected dip took place, this time to an audience of a girl (Lucia, the fifteen-year old), who stood over his clothes and forced him to come out and dry himself in front of her laughing eyes, then run off in shamed confusion. Then there was a repeat of the titillating scene, where the girl fetched her friends – and the red-faced boy was introduced to five of her friends visiting from Bologna.

“This is Maria, she is thirteen, and Bianca, fifteen, and Francesca, she’s fifteen also. Gabriela is sixteen, and so is Violetta. Say hello.”

He mouthed greetings and breathed heavily. He was bothered not just by their gender but by their uniform attractiveness. It wouldn’t be so bad, he thought, if they were ugly or fat or anything, but they’re pretty! Every one of them, in different ways. Blonde and brunette, black and chestnut, God! They’re all so attractive! And my nakedness is going to react, oh Christ!

This time they all stood guard over his clothes and dared him to come and save them. No no, he had to put his hands behind his neck, oh yes, he wasn’t going to hide one inch of his desirable body. Morelli took shots of that body slowly emerging from the water – his breast, his chest, his rib-cage, his belly-button, and lower and lower as the water retreated, to the top of his pubic hair. These enticing views were interspersed with shots of the gleeful faces of the girls, then the loins, the ballocks, and so forth, as well as some shots of his behind, which would also in the background show those faces enthralled and gazing at his middle anatomy. Then he was all there, out of the covering water, and the camera was able to see his penis slowly grow to magnificence. The girls all got a chance to dry him, and arouse him to ejaculation, after which he wearily dressed in front of them, and went off, leaving the girls grinning at each other.

He said to Morelli that this was surely a contrived sort of film, and did we have to do this? Morelli looked astonished and frowned. “Of course! Yes, it is contrived, if you mean artificial, obviously fiction, a realisation or fulfilment of a fantasy. But Matteo, my beautiful boy! Your public will lap it up like a starving cat. Ask the girls!”

Matthew however forbore to ask their opinion, for he knew it would be enthusiastic admiration of his bum and his ballocks, and shook his head. He was coming to accept his status as a tool for self-gratification. Just let me get back to Catherine, Lord, he prayed, let me get back to her arms, where she’ll kiss my melancholy away….

=====================================================================

Saturday 15th

Mrs G came back from Marseille looking thoughtful, as if she’d found something out that didn’t please her one bit. She spoke to Mireio, who nodded with a sullen sort of expression, then to the others. Jennie and Amelia looked bored, but sniggered in a rude way when their mistress turned to “the children”, who had come in halfway through the instructions, and they walked away glancing at each other with a “damn glad it’s them!” look.

“I am going to Paris,” said Mrs Grainger, “as I told the others. I have to see a … an important person, and I’m not sure how long I’ll be. Several days maybe. So I’m arranging one or two things for you in the meantime.”

Matthew looked at her sourly and said only “What? What sort of things?”

Mrs G ignored his insolence. “Baths, at the doctor’s. I’m sure they did you good, those ones you had. And one can never have too many, in a climate like this. So you’ll each have a bath in the next few days, and on my return we’ll think about more of them. We don’t have all that much time to go before we have to return to Summerton, but we’ll make the most of it. So, let’s see. Tomorrow, Sunday, Matthew can go. I know you just had one, but that was at signor Morelli’s, for a film. So this is just a bath. Monday, it’s Catherine’s turn. Tuesday, Matthew again.”

“Again!”

“Yes, of course. Then Wednesday, it’ll be Catherine. Unless, that is, the doctor can’t manage you. That has to be arranged. Actually I should be back by that time, but we’ll see. And it is getting close to Catherine’s period.”

The girl flushed and murmured “It’ll be due on the twenty-third, maybe, madam….”

“All right. Hmm, it does occur to me that it would be instructive for Fauré’s boys to see you with your period. And how one deals with it. I’m sure they haven’t seen anything like that ever, and indeed men seldom do! What’s the matter?”

Matthew broke in. “For God’s sake, madam, you can’t ask that of Catherine! Please, have some fellow feeling! You’re a woman! Surely you know how private such things are….”

She looked at him in amusement. “Yes, Matthew, I do. But Catherine is in an excellent position to help in the medical, sexual education of Fauré’s son and his friends. So we’ll see.”

She strode out of the room and the children looked at each other and sighed. Another humiliation. The awful woman was constantly thinking of new ways to make them blush.

A half-hour later the tyrant returned, calling for Catherine, and Matthew answered, saying she was in the bathroom.

“Doing what?”

He flushed. “She’s … she’s having a … bowel—”

“Come come! What is it?”

He flushed some more. “She’s having a shit,” he confessed.

“Wasn’t that easy? Well, go and tell her to come out to the lawn.”

He drew a breath and muttered “Yes madam.”

She looked after him with a cynical smile. Oh, she’d train these innocent sensitives to be abjectly plain-spoken about themselves, and each other.

When the girl appeared, she approached Mrs G timidly, fearing some new persecution. Lydia looked her over and asked “It’s a while since you were shaved, isn’t it?”

Catherine paled and began to stammer.

“Yes,” said her employer with a cruel smile, “it’s quite some time, I’m sure. I bet you remember it though. The boys will remember it too. Amn’t I right in thinking it was the fourteen-year-old, Jean Folliet, who was keen to accept the task of applying that soothing cream to your backside, and your anus?”

Catherine flushed deeply and nodded, not trusting herself to speak. Lydia kept up her heartless teasing.

“And Pierre, wasn’t it, the sixteen-year-old, I commissioned him to do your front, your abdomen, your groins and your jolie chatte.”

Catherine nodded dumbly, biting her lip.

“Well,” said Lydia, tiring of the game, “don’t look so upset. Though it strikes me you have a secret part of you that wants – yes, wants! To have that again.”

Catherine’s flush deepened and she started to mouth a denial, but the chatelaine carried on. “Hey, Catherine! Don’t worry so much. I’m not suggesting another shave.”

The girl was so relieved she almost cried, but then she saw Lydia still had something to tell her.

“No, dear,” said Mrs G with quite evident false sympathy. “No shaving, with barber’s sons’ keen participation. No, it’s another way of dealing with unwanted hair. I’m suggesting a depilatory.”

“What?”

“Surely you’ve heard the word. It’s a cream (in this case) which dissolves the hair or stubble, and washes off. There’s a certain amount of discomfort, and it is rather messy, perhaps, and even a little smelly with the chemical action, but I’m assured it works very well, and it’s a lot more permanent, if we can say that, than a mere periodical application of a razor.”

“And do you mean I’m going to use this from now on?” Mrs G looked supercilious.

“No, child,” she said, “no. You aren’t going to have anything to do with it. Today you are going to the doctor to receive a supply of it, his latest invention, which he calls for want of a better name ‘Sans-Poil’, which means—”

“I know what it means, madam. ‘No body hair’, isn’t it? But—”

“But nothing. He may show you how to apply it, but you’ll bring it home and it will be used here – and indeed at Summerton too. Now get ready, the cart is at the door.”

Her mind was in a turmoil as the donkey took her into the village. She was relieved about the shaving, with boys looking on lecherously as the razor took off the stubble and the lather to reveal the bare delta – she shuddered at the memory – and God, the barber’s boys wouldn’t be there to push rude fingers into her bum and her vulva. Still, she wasn’t looking forward to some messy smelly process!

Then she was in the street and Modestine was nodding her head as if to say “Here we are again!” The gendarme grinned at her familiarly, and a couple of young men who caught her eye beamed in recognition. Who were they? They weren’t schoolboys. Had they seen her that time standing up nude and paralysed in fright? She cast the idea aside, not wanting to think about it. All right, here they were near the surgery, and she stopped the cart and got down. Modestine looked at her in what might have been sympathy, and settled down to wait.

In the office there was a commotion of some kind, and the nurse turned a harassed face to her, pushing her into the little curtained alcove Catherine remembered with a shiver. She was left, and wondered what she was supposed to do. Not undress, at least! All she had to do was collect a jar of some cream or other and get back to the estate. Right?

Mlle Lefevre bustled in to look exasperatedly at her and snap “Well, why are you not undressed? Quickly! Why are you wasting our time?”

She left with a scowl, and Catherine understood that she was probably going to be given a demonstration of the use of the ointment, so she listlessly started to take her clothes off, listening to the hubbub in the waiting-room through the curtain. Last time she’d been on a trolley, covered (mostly) with a sheet. Now there was neither, and she had to stand there naked hugging herself against the cool air that blew from a fan in the corner.

After a few minutes she felt sufficiently bothered by the breeze that she thought about turning it down, or off, or maybe to face another direction. She looked up carefully and worked out that she could stand on the chair and reach over to redirect it. All went well for a minute or so, but she suddenly found herself overbalancing and falling in an ungraceful curve over the steel track of the curtain rings, over and into the midst of a crowd of youths, then onto the floor. Everyone was stunned, and merely looked at the apparition in amazement. Then Louis, who was there deliberately to witness the affair, yelled out “We must help her!”

“What can we do?” asked a woman. “Well,” he said with a serious look, “I think we should make sure she hasn’t injured herself. So we must feel her all over – oh yes!” And he and a couple of boys proceeded to do this. Then Genevieve came along and suggested they put her on the couch for comfort. Catherine meanwhile was speechlessly hysterical about her exposure, but Genevieve told her to rest calmly, and went to fetch help.

“Calmly! But I’m naked!”

“Yes, Catherine,” said Louis, “and it is delightful as ever!”

She lay there moaning quietly and covering herself, making her body as small as possible, and shut her eyes to avoid making contact with the crowd, who were talking loudly about the event and ogling her. In a short while the nurse came back, to frown at the spectacle, and said in a petulant sort of voice that she’d fetch the depilatory cream. When she came back with a bottle in her hand she spoke to Catherine distractedly. “I’ve no time for this right now. Someone else will have to show you.”

Louis at once suggested he and his friends might do it. Mlle Lefevre looked startled but said, probably without thinking, “Yes, fine. Put it on, wait a minute, wash off. Simple.”

She went off, taking with her half a dozen patients, so there was a bit more room, and the boys arranged themselves comfortably. Catherine looked in terror at the little mob and gave a little shriek when two of them took her arms to hold above her head – so revealing her cunny – and Louis poured some of the depilatory onto his palm, to smooth it on her armpits. She wriggled, frowning in discomfort. “It burns a little bit! But it’s all right, really.”

“I hope so,” said Louis, “for you’ll have this on your delicate tissues! Like this….”

Then her delta, and Louis let another friend do the needful. Another came in, a fifteen-year-old pal, and was seconded to the crew to do her arse. There was great enjoyment all round, and she was told not to move, let it work. They curled up their noses at the odour produced, but that didn’t prevent them staying close to observe. Then Genevieve returned, to laugh at the scene, and tell the boys Catherine had to be washed now. Here, why not? The couch has a waterproof cover, you won’t spoil it. Just get wet cloths and clear away the cream and stubble. Which was done with slow care.

Catherine had shut her eyes so as to avoid the lascivious stares of her audience, but she opened them in startlement when those helpers continued on the cleansing process, beyond what anyone might expect. Of course, there they were, all of them – how many? Oh God – wiping her lower body again and again, some waiting their turn, licking their lips in anticipation, a couple active at her arse and her cunny, and deliberately pushing her into that throbbing emotion that suddenly asked for release, yes, send me over!

And they did, of course. All too soon from the boys’ point of view she was allowed up to be dressed and given the bottle to take away. She staggered out to the grateful murmurs of the crowd, with her head down and her blush permanent. She nearly keeled over as she was mounting the cart again, and the gendarme dashed over to take her arm. She thanked him with a resigned smile and told him she was all right, tout va bien, merci! He helped her onto the donkey-cart anyway and saluted as she moved off. Catherine’s next coherent thought was that someone else was going to apply that stuff, it was the same as that other ointment. God! Would it be one – or more – of the gardener boys? Oh Christ!!

Sunday 16th August

Lydia goes to Paris; the children are left to their own devices, save for the bath

“Well, I’m off to Paris. I’ll take a look at a few of the dressy shops, like Jeanne Lanvin – she has an excellent selection of clothes, and perfume too, very chic and up-to-date. I’ll also be taking a look at Callot Soeurs. What I buy will be sent here, so you can expect a shipment in a few days.”

“Callot,” said Matthew. “Is that the fellow who did those etchings in the library?”

“I expect not, you silly boy. But I hope you liked the etchings. Quite amusing, in a dramatic sort of way, yes. – Anyhow, that’s what I’ll be doing, while you can loll around the estate, but you’ll make time, won’t you, for your baths!”

Matthew ground his teeth, but consoled himself with thinking of the expanse of time free from her sardonic eye, when he and his darling could cuddle. Yes, cuddle to their heart’s content!

His bath went according to plan – her plan, that is, and was the usual leisurely exposure of the boy’s hitherto private anatomy to yet another group of girls, who were eager to experience what all their friends had told them about, a real live naked English boy, whom we can ogle and finger and feel all over, especially those parts – you know which ones – that we all giggle over and dream about!

Of course, he admitted to himself that he enjoyed the blushing stimulation, deep down. He didn’t really understand his feelings, but somehow he realised he didn’t care too much. At the moment, yes, a sweating shivering terminal mortification, but later a reluctant acknowledgement of a craving for the embarrassed excitement and the inevitable welcome release of his adolescent sexual energies.

I’m getting used to this harassment, this exposure. But Catherine, my love, surely you’re not getting used to it too? Shameless? Surely not….

[to be continued]

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