Mrs Grainger's Gift 12

By Ritchie Moore

(I'll forward it to the author)

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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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Mrs Grainger’s Gift – Part XII

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Monday 8^th June

A colleague and a bath

Matthew was on his knees in a corner of the library when the door opened and Mrs G strode in, accompanied by a short plump man in his forties, with a fringe of black beard and pince-nez glasses. “Matthew! This is Meneer Adriaan de Groot, a scholar from Holland, who has come to look at the books and appraise them, as you suggested.”

Matthew scrambled to his knees and shook hands with the little man, who regarded him with interest and said, with the slightest of accents, “How do you do? Matthew, is that your name? So you suggested the appraisal? An excellent idea, Mrs Grainger, one never knows what will happen to a collection. Habent sua fata libelli, you know. So, Matthew! You and I will be colleagues!”

The boy looked confused. Mrs Grainger explained patiently, “You’ll both be occupied here for a while. Mr De Groot will be examining the books, you’ll be continuing to check the catalogue. I leave you to introduce him to the system.” With that she nodded to her guest and left.

Matthew looked at the other and said shyly, “Mr De …” “Groot,” said the little bookman.

He spelled it out, and Matthew asked “Oh, is that any relation to John O Groat? There’s a place in the north of Scotland called John O Groats, is that the same? Spelled differently of course….”

De Groot laughed. “Yes, I know, people always ask me. You are a Scotsman?”

“Oh no,” said Matthew, “I was just curious. Is there a connection? Or is it a coincidence?”

“Well, my boy, there is, but not related to me. De Groot is a fairly common name in Holland, it just means ‘great, big,’ and so forth. Your place in Scotland is named after Jan de Groote, a Dutchman who ran a ferry from the Scottish mainland to Orkney, over four hundred years ago. And also there is no connection with your old coin, the groat, worth four pence, which some say (in jest of course) was the ferry fare. What is your surname?”

“Raven, sir.”

“That’s a good name. After the bird of course, and you have dark hair, appropriately. Oh, I’m sorry,” he added, “that was impolite. I expect you hear that a lot.”

“Now and again, sir,” said Matthew with a smile, “but it’s all right. Can I ask you, are you an expert at … erotica books?”

“Not totally, Matthew. May I call you Matthew? Thank you. No, I’m just an experienced bookman who has some knowledge of that field. I learned about it via my grandfather Jan Dekker. He had quite a collection of erotica himself. Of course the more background one can get, the better bookman you’ll be. So I’m calling on my specialised knowledge, such as it is, to appraise this collection.” He looked round at the packed shelves with a smile of anticipation.

“This collection,” he said judiciously, “is promising, if it contains a fraction of the titles I’m expecting, and it’s big enough, certainly, to rival the Private Case of the British Museum and several others. But you can’t depend on anything, my boy, unfortunately. I had a look once at a collection in Utrecht, which was rumoured to be extraordinary, with lots of unique copies and so on, and when I looked it over I was laughing in disbelief. The few items that were unique—no other copy known to me—were ridiculous attempts at bawdry, and useless. Not worth describing in a catalogue. The other things were common, two a penny, and worth about that in actuality. So here we have the promise, and only examination will answer.” He began to stroll along the shelves, peering at titles.

“Perhaps you wonder why anyone would collect this material? Ask why one collects anything. Postage stamps, oil paintings, butterflies, birds’ eggs? Why not books? And why not books of a special kind? There are some of course who collect out of a desire to own things others cannot have. Hence the keen pursuit of unique copies. But one gets an interest in books on the stage, on costume, on travel, and pursues that to the exclusion of other equally valuable works. Some have even gone so far as to collect books by size, or binding – I don’t mean fine bindings, either. So one has a human interest in the erotic, very natural. You yourself are interested? Though you are a bit young, if I may say so.”

Matthew coloured. “Oh no, sir, I’m just the one that was told to look after it. But if I’m honest I’ll tell you I enjoy looking at some of these books and pictures. I’m not surprised Mr Grainger collected them. I thought they should be catalogued, and I could do that, though I’m not good at languages. Are you? They’re in French and Latin and—”

“Ah yes, I have a fair knowledge of ten languages,” said Mr De Groot modestly. “Those of Europe, obviously, which help in accessing more outré languages, like Chinese, which I know about through my namesake the late Jan Jakob Maria de Groot. No relative, unfortunately. He died in Berlin just four years ago. A remarkable man, a Sinologist of the first class, to rival Sylvain Lévi and Pelliot. It helps to know languages. I think Pelliot is fluent in thirteen.”

Matthew blinked. “Maybe you’ll help me then, when I’m cataloguing something in a foreign language….”

“Oh yes, my boy! Certainly. But as I was saying, collecting these erotica and pornographica is just as reasonable a way to spend one’s money as lepidoptery or philately. And I presume the collector will read them too. For a while at least. If he reads them at all. Hah! You’ll not have heard, perhaps, of a notorious collector of a hundred years ago, one Reginald Heber. He was the half-brother of Richard Heber, the hymn writer, who wrote ‘From Greenland’s icy mountains’, you know. Reginald was not just a collector, but a bibliomaniac. He bought whole libraries, quite indiscriminately, filled several houses with his hoard in England alone, to say nothing of the continent, and couldn’t possibly have read them all. He amassed about a hundred and fifty thousand books, think of that, Matthew!”

The boy’s eyes widened. “That’s a … lot,” he said weakly. “What happened when he died?”

“Oh, in 1833, that was. The sale was quite an event. It lasted for a good long time, as you might suppose, a few years in fact, and garnered something in the region of seventy thousand pounds, which was enormous at the time. Mind you, he’d probably have spent twice that or more getting them. He did read some of them though, and was very well informed; and was noted for his generosity with his books, everyone got access to them. Sir Walter Scott appreciated that, and praised him in Marmion. – Ah, I’m reminded of Jean Grolier, who had the motto on the binding of his books, what they call a supralibros, ‘Io Grolieri et Amicorum’, meaning ‘This book belongs to Jean Grolier and his friends.’ Isn’t that a grand thing to do?” Matthew smiled and agreed.

“But what I’m saying is that if the collector reads his books, and he should, he may find after a while that they cloy, he becomes too used to them. In the case of sexual topics, which might well have interested Heber (he was a homosexual, evidently) it has I wager a more deleterious effect. One may enjoy, nay, revel in the portrayal of sexual scenes, and for a while it answers one’s needs. And yet how much variety can there be? I admit that when one has a particular picture one loves, one never (one thinks) grows tired of looking at it.

“But you see, Matthew, don’t you, that all this harping on one side of life is in a way self-defeating? Consider: fifty or so years ago, to speak openly of such things as fornication and sodomy was impossible. Even subjects like bastardy and abortion were avoided. One devised subtle euphemisms – you understand me? – for such things. But they existed, as they have always existed, and it is true that one could spend one’s entire life with no contact whatsoever with the ruder aspects of life; yet they were there to take us by surprise. The upper classes maintained their status by pretending unpleasant things did not exist, just as Queen Victoria is said to have refused to believe that women indulged in homosexual affairs, and so would not allow their inclusion in the act of 1885. That’s the Labouchère Amendment, as they call it. It’s the section that Oscar Wilde was prosecuted under in 1895.”

Matthew asked shyly, “Is that true, about Queen Victoria? Did she not allow them – Gladstone, was it? – to include women in the bill?”

De Groot nodded. “M-hm, yes. So they say. But they say a lot of things. And actually, I heard that it was the House of Lords who dropped it because they thought that inclusion would publicise the practice, would give women ideas! Probably increase the ideas of radical feminists like suffragettes!” He laughed at the expression on the boy’s face. “Anyway, what I’m saying is that a few decades can change so much, in public morality as in everything else. But whether or not a gentleman’s public face, the one he shows to the world, and even to his family, is pure and upright, clean and sinless, God-fearing and pious, his other face, that only his true intimates see, if ever! – that face may be as sinful, lecherous, and even criminal, as any in history. (Think of The Picture of Dorian Gray.) So he retreats to his private cabinet, and reads salacious books and drools over scabrous pictures. Yet, after all, what does he find? He’ll find, if he thinks clearly, that all his spintrian fantasies are the same. He desperately tries to regain the delicious thrill he first knew on encountering such stuff, but it’s gone for ever. Once you’ve lost your virginity, it’s gone.”

Matthew swallowed, and muttered “Yes. I think I see what you mean.”

De Groot looked at him keenly and smiled knowingly. “Ah, young Matthew! I see it in your face, you cannot hide it. Yet do not be ashamed, or stammer denials. You are just as ready to enjoy a risqué story as any man or boy, and why not? Just accept that after a while it palls. All these stories are the same. Someone is assailing someone else’s body, either with whip or phallus, aimed at any of the available orifices, and usually the attack is accepted (after a while) as normal, desirable, finally commonplace. And that’s what I am saying: if you read a great deal of these books, you’ll finally toss them away because they bore you. Yes, believe me, they’ll bore you to distraction. Repetition does that. ‘Parit contemptum nimia familiaritas; Too much familiarity breeds contempt’, as Publilius Syrus says.”

“I believe you, sir,” said Matthew with a wry smile, “and I admit that so far I’m still enjoying the … titillation, the excitement, of accounts of sexual encounters, with people using naughty words, that I’ve never seen before in print, and the pictures, with details of the parts of the body we don’t see. Mind you, some of the things I’ve seen here are awful—“

“In what way?” asked the Dutchman quickly.

“Badly done, badly written, not that they’re sinful or anything, though they are, I’m sure, to some, it’s just that….” He screwed up his face.

De Groot laughed fondly. “Oh, dear young boy! You find them aesthetically distasteful! Don’t you?”

Matthew nodded. “That’s it, Mr De Groot, they’re unpleasant, not because they’re immoral, or anything, they’re just … badly done.”

De Groot grinned. “Excellent, young man! I am glad to see the awakening of an artistic sensibility in you. You’ll be able to look on these things and selectively winnow the little wheat from the heaps of chaff. There’s a difference, you’ll see, between pornography and the erotic. A lot of this stuff, you see,” he swept his arm round the room, “was read, gathered, simply because it was forbidden, verboden, as we say, taboo, and not because of intrinsic value. Buried in here, however, there are a few jewels of art, as if you’ll find some pearls amongst mere oyster shells, or diamonds lurking under the paste. Take this magazine, now.” He lifted one from a pile on a shelf. “It’s titled The Cremorne, and it’s named after a notorious pleasure garden in London, a haunt of prostitutes around the 1870s. Its stories concern repetitive fornication and flogging, its poetry is doggerel. Look at this. Or this,” he said in fastidious tones, holding up another. “This preceded that one by a few years, it’s called The Pearl. Something of a misnomer. Just listen.” Matthew listened attentively, and his ears grew red.

“The Origin of Species. Air – ‘Derry Down’. I won’t attempt to sing it, it’s quite a lugubrious tune. Here it goes.

“When Adam and Eve were first put into Eden,

They never once thought of that pleasant thing—breeding;

(That’s not a very good rhyme….)

Though they had not a rag to cover their front,

Adam sported his prick, and Eve sported her cunt.

Derry Down. (That’s the chorus.)

“Adam’s prick was so thick and so long—such a teaser;

Eve’s cunt was so hairy and fat—such a breezer;

Adam’s thing was just formed any maiden to please,

And his bollocks hung down very near to his knees.

Derry down.

Shall I continue?”

Matthew grinned and said “No, Mr De Groot, I see what you’re saying. Somehow that doesn’t reach very high on Parnassus. It’s not even as good as the poetry I’ve read of Rochester.”

“Ah, you’ve seen Rochester’s verse? Is it here?”

“Oh yes, because the English teacher next door, Mrs Cairns, had it. I don’t know if she’s brought it back.”

“It was the so-called Antwerpen edition, was it, of 1680?”

“I think she said that. Wasn’t it Antwerp?”

“No, no, my dear young man! It was printed at London. You see, saying it is printed abroad avoids the persecution of the law, and the accusation of obscenity, you know it’s the naughty foreigners who do this. Just as sodomy was attributed to the Italians, or the Greeks, and the only vice allowed to the English is flagellation.”

“Oh!” Matthew’s brow cleared. “That explains some things.”

“I expect to find quite a few books of that sort here,” said De Groot, scanning the shelves, and with a muttered “Hah!” extracted a thin leather-bound volume from its fellows (how did he know to pick that one?) and flourished it in front of the boy’s startled eyes. Matthew took it in his hands to scan it; facing the title page was an engraving of a victim with bared bum being birched by a young woman, while another looked on, evidently with relish. The title page read “A Treatise on the Use of Flogging in Venereal Affairs: also of the Office of the Loins and Reins … 1718.” He noted that at the very foot of the page the publisher was advertising “The Cases [causes, surely] of Impotency, and Eunuchism and Onanism Display’d”.

“Yes,” said De Groot with satisfaction, “this, it’s not particularly valuable, the British Museum has several editions, but it’s representative. You English are supposed to love flogging each other, and being flogged.”

Matthew didn’t know what to say, remembering the awful exhibition at St Vincent’s. He asked timidly, “What’s … onanism?”

The Dutchman roared with laughter. “Ach, my young friend, forgive my laughing. But while you may not know the word, I wager you know the reference! It’s from Onan in Genesis, the second son of Judah, who ‘spilled his seed on the ground’ instead of spending in the womb of Tamar, as he was commanded. So this has been interpreted as equivalent to masturbation, that is, ejaculation to no purpose. God slew Onan for this, and many commentators have seized on this as a condemnation of masturbation. But you wouldn’t know about that, I suppose.” He grinned as Matthew blushed furiously. “No, of course not. By the way, Onan was punished not for self-abuse but for disobeying God. So don’t worry! Anyway, as I was saying, I expect to find many classics of sadism and masochism here. Besides the run-of-the-mill stories of seduction. I’m looking forward to this project, my boy, and I do hope you’ll help me.”

“Certainly, sir, whatever you want.”

“Well, we’ll actually help each other. You checking the catalogue and creating a supplement, and I translating the title and totting up the appraised value of the work. Ye gods!” He went over to a shelf and pulled out a large tome. “What the devil—.”

“Oh,” said Matthew, “that’s Blue’s atlas. It’s a beautiful book….”

“No, boy,” said the Dutchman, grinning hugely, “it’s Willem Janszoon and Joan Blaeu’s great Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, a later edition called the Atlas Maior, and it’s worth a fortune all by itself. But I thought the library was all erotica?”

“It is really, sir,” said Matthew, “but there’s a few books, mostly big things, that they maybe couldn’t shift when they weeded it out.” De Groot looked a question. “There’s a lot more upstairs in the attics,” Matthew explained. “I think they threw them upstairs when they wanted room for this lot. I think you should look at them too, there may be some nice things among them.”

The bookman’s eyes lit up. “Certainly, boy, certainly! If this is anything to go by. Oh my God, wait ….” He strode over to a corner and lifted out an old book bound in white pigskin, peered at the red printing on the spine, and turned to Matthew. “This,” he said in reverent tones, brandishing the volume like a sacred pyx, “is the famous Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, the Dreamed Erotic Strife of Poliphilo, printed in 1499 by Aldus Manutius. It is one of the most beautiful books ever written, finely printed, with remarkable illustrations, the glory of all the incunabula. And it’s here! My God, Matthew, it’s incredible!”

Matthew saw with wonder that his eyes were full of tears. “Sir,” he said, “are you all right?”

“All right? Oh, Matthew, my dear child, I—I weep because I have never handled this before. It’s legendary, it’s miraculous! Oh, I am going to enjoy this, just looking them over. And I’ll tell you all about them, if you like.” He laid the book down gently on the table.

“Yes, please, sir,” said Matthew. “But how long will it take, do you think?”

“Well, to tell the truth it could be done quite quickly, but I’d like to take my time and savour the books. So we’re talking a few weeks.”

Matthew’s face fell. “But we’ll be going away to France shortly,” he said.

“That’s all right. I can suspend the appraisal for as long as necessary. I got the impression that Mrs Grainger had a rather uninterested view of the enquiry, she really isn’t very interested in how much they’re worth. Though I’ll be able to tell her as of now that she’s looking at a considerable sum. I’ll have to look up auction records and such, Book-Prices Current, and the American one too. Hmm, continental catalogues. Yes, Matthew, it will be a long job, and – who knows? – it may take all summer.” He looked at the boy. “Don’t worry, boy, we’ll take it up again when you return. At the beginning of the school year, I suppose? Right. Well, I think I’ll go to inform Mrs Grainger that she has an incredible treasure here. And I look forward to your company tomorrow.” He shook hands with Matthew and bustled out.

“I tell you one thing, madam, and that is, please don’t bequeath your books to an institution. A private collector may wish to buy them en bloc, which is fine, but if not, I suggest you allow it to be broken up and sold piece by piece at auction. You’ll probably get more that way, and the books themselves are made available to those who value them. I admit that giving them to an institution like the London Library or the British Museum means they’re preserved, not lost. But I often lament the removal of many books from the market in such ways. Besides, books are too often not just preserved but hidden away from the public – particularly curiosa such as these. Besides, the library Trustees may have other ideas. I know the British Museum deliberately destroyed quite a bit of the Ashbee bequest. It’s better if you give people a chance to own them. And although the famous Grainger Library will no longer exist, the ‘Grainger Sale’ will be noted for the historical record!”

At tea-time Matthew was able to tell the girls about the ebullient little Dutchman, and they were amused and slightly incredulous. “I know Mrs G is proud of the library,” said Norah, “but they’re surely not worth an awful lot of money.”

“I don’t know,” said Amelia, “there’s at least a thousand books there, and if they’re worth one pound each, that’s a whole thousand pounds!”

“No,” said Matthew, “I bet you there’s more books than that, and they’re worth more than just a pound each. I think Mrs G has got a fortune there. I think she’ll never need to borrow, and if she needs some ready cash all she has to do is sell something she never looks at.”

“But she doesn’t, you know,” said Jessica, “look at them I mean. She seems to spend all her time reading silly magazines and novels like detective stories. Dorothy Sayers—”

“For God’s sake,” said Norah, “don’t let’s get into the stuff she reads. Besides, I read that thing, Whose Body? and I thought it was clever. Like that other one about the Belgian detective—”

“Anyway,” interrupted Jennie, “she’s kept the library because Mr Henry was proud of it, that’s all. And sometimes people come to look at it, like that professor last year, from Spain was it? Anyway, it’s interesting, and we’ll need to see what happens. So, Matthew, you’ll need to keep us up to date. Now, Abigail, who’s on Matthew Duty tonight?”

She looked around at the grinning faces, then at the downcast flushed face of Catherine. Maybe? But no, that somehow was not on the agenda. Abigail guessed that the girl secretly longed to be one of the lucky pair, to wash the boy she was evidently enamoured with, but it was better to keep her in suspense, if not torment, to think of those other girls who are touching him so intimately. “It’s another pair from next door, I’m afraid. But don’t worry,” she added as their faces fell. “You will all get your turn. He’s going to be here for a while yet. Kate is a big strong 18 year old from the country beyond Heighsham, and Betty is just 17 but has a good arm as well. They’ll sort you out pretty quick, I’d say.”

Matthew goggled at her while the others laughed – except for Catherine, who as might be expected was not pleased at the thought. Later they had a talk, and she unburdened herself to him about the trials of cleaning the toilets, as well as something of her exposure at the skirt fitting discussion. He looked at her downcast face and heaved a sigh. Then he raised her head with his hand under her chin and looked straight into her eyes. “Catherine,” he said, “I know I can’t say, Put it behind you, it’s easy enough to say things like that, but take heart if you can, you know I’m here for you, to support you, to hold your hand, if you like—“

He seized her hand as he spoke, and held it to his chest, then leaned forward to kiss her.

She put her other hand on the nape of his neck and surrendered to the embrace, looking at him in perfect trust, her lips parting to receive his shy tongue. They held the pose for seeming ages before parting with gasps of delight. “Oh, Matthew,” she breathed, “that makes up for a lot.” She turned away smiling, and he looked after her as she left the room with what he was sure was a silly grin on his face.

That night he suffered the ministrations of the two strong-armed girls from the Academy staff, who were as brisk and no-nonsense as predicted. They were actually so businesslike in their approach that he had difficulty in becoming aroused, and when they noticed this they laughed and said “Don’t worry, Matthew, we don’t have to go all the way you know. Let’s just get you out and into your nightie and you can take it from there.”

They said goodnight after tucking him in and left him looking a bit bewildered. Soon however he roused himself to look for the toilet paper under his pillow and coax his reluctant organ into an enjoyable toss-off, holding in his mind the image of Catherine naked in the midst of the boys. Oh, he wished he’d been among them. But then he had been allowed – told – to put the salve on her newly shaven pubis, and then on her bum –. The remembrance brought on a satisfying explosion that left him gasping.

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Tuesday 9^th June

More rude books, and more rewards for good marks

“Well,” said Mr De Groot, “why don’t we start with this shelf here? I can see that there isn’t really much order to the books, so it doesn’t really matter where we begin, no?”

“Yes, sir,” agreed Matthew, “I’ve just got to find it, if it’s there, in the catalogue.”

“All right! Now, what’s this,” said the little Dutchman, pulling a book off the shelf. “Hah!” He read out the title. “This will be under D in your catalogue. Dulcinus, King of the Lombards, or a new way to people a kingdom. Yes, with the poems at the end. Pretty common. Have you found it?”

“Oh yes sir,” said the boy, “it’s here. Is it a history book?”

“No, no, Matthew, it’s a somewhat libertarian romance, shall we say, and the poems are your run-of-the-mill suggestive things. This one, The Microscope, is about two sisters playing with the instrument to augment the size of things – their sleeping brother’s penis, and one of their vulvas, the latter to such a size that the sister declares,” he found the page, “To fill that Gap, and end thy Cares, Would ask more Pricks than there are Hairs.” He looked at Matthew solemnly. “The crude word however is represented by six dots. You see that there is often a reticence in these pieces. Everyone knows what the word is, but it isn’t printed. And there are other ways to be bawdy, after all. See this,” he turned to another page. “This is called On a Lady who shed her Water at seeing the Tragedy of Cato. It’s clever enough, I suppose, but … it’s not very good. See for yourself.” He passed the book to Matthew, who read the poem aloud.

“Whilst maudlin wings deplore their Cato’s Fate,

Still with dry eyes the story Cælia sat;

But tho’ her Pride forbids her Eyes to flow,

The gushing Water found a vent below.

Tho’ secret yet with copious Streams she mourns,

Like twenty River-gods with all their Urns.

Let others screw an Hypocritick Face,

She shews her grief in a sincerer Place,

Here Nature reigns, and Passion void of Art;

For this Road leads directly to the Heart.”

He grinned at the Dutchman. “I think that’s quite clever,” he said. “The road through her … vulva leading to the heart. I suppose that really happened, she pissed herself – excuse me! – at a play?”

“Oh,” said the bookman a little peevishly, “I wouldn’t be surprised at all. If you think about it, emotions can easily get the better of one’s sphincter! The actual occasion, that’s another thing. The book’s dated 1732, and refers to intrigues at the court of George the Second – see those coy verses about ‘Miss V’. The play itself must be Cato, by Joseph Addison. Written about 1712 or so. A tragedy – poor upright republican Cato commits suicide, faced with the approach of his enemy Julius Caesar. Do you know it? It’s quite a famous play. The Americans enjoyed it, I mean the fathers of their revolution, and quoted it quite frequently. But anyway, I suppose this was the only way the bawdy gossip could be circulated. Apart from a graffito of course.”

Seeing Matthew’s confusion, he explained, “The Italian word graffito, Matthew, literally means a scratch. It’s used in the plural, graffiti, to mean those inscriptions you find on walls, scratched into plaster, cut into wood, sometimes etched with a diamond into the glass of a window. And a lot of it is of course obscene. People have been doing it for ages, naturally, there’s quite a few uncovered at Pompeii.”

The boy nodded. “I read about Pompeii and Herculaneum,” he said. “So they found inscriptions, graffiti, did they? And are they … obscene?”

The little bookman smiled. “Some of them are, which isn’t surprising at all. To this day, you’ll find ‘Thomas loves Mary’ and ‘Henry is a big shit’, won’t you? Well, back then the common folk were writing up comments like that. Proud of their love, disdainful of their enemies. That reminds me, we may have here in this collection an amusing little book which collected a lot of graffiti from the taverns and close-houses, the public toilets, of London. Look in your catalogue there. It’s called ….” He screwed up his face in thought.

“I saw something like that,” said Matthew, “but I didn’t look at it, just checked it was there, in the catalogue. I was in a hurry to go for a pee or something.”

“Very appropriate,” said De Groot, enlightenment dawning on his face. “Look for The Bog-House Miscellany. No, sorry, it’s The Merry-Thought, that’s the main title.”

Matthew found the entry easily, and thought back to where he’d have put the book. “Over here, sir, I think,” he said, leading De Groot to a particular shelf. “Yes, this is it.” He pulled out an old book in paper covers, and showed it to the bookman.

“Yes,” said De Groot with enthusiasm, “I remember this well. Edited by Hurlo Thrumbo, yes. See, Matthew, how informative title-pages used to be!”

Matthew looked at it and read to himself, “The Merry-Thought; or, the Glass-Window and Bog-House Miscellany. Taken from The Original Manuscripts written in Diamond by Persons of the first Rank and Figure in Great Britain; relating to Love, Matrimony, Drunkenness, Sobriety, Ranting, Scandal, Politicks, Gaming, and many other Subjects, Serious and Comical. Faithfully Transcribed from the Drinking-Glasses and Windows in the several noted Taverns, Inns, and other Publick Places in this Nation. Amongst which are intermixed the Lucubrations of the polite Part of the World, written upon Walls in Bog-houses, et cetera. My God,” he exclaimed, “it does go on! How old is it?”

De Groot scanned the page. “Third edition, so 1731, if I remember correctly. Well, Matthew, open that up and pick something at random.”

The boy opened it up and found something evidently transcribed “From a Bog-House at Hampton-Court, supposed to be written by a violent Lover.

Oh! that I were a T---d, a T---d,

Hid in this secret Place,

That I might see my Betsy's A---,

Though she sh--t me in my Face.

“That’s violent enough, I suppose,” he said. “I expect the dashes aren’t particularly careful, are they? He’s put two in the middle of ‘shit’, and three in ‘turd’. It’s clear though what he’s saying. Are all these real graffiti?” He thumbed through the volume and read out

“For what did Venus love Adonis,

But for the Gristle, where no Bone is?”

Laughing, he said “That’s a pretty good rhyme. This is better than the stuff in that Pearl you read. It must have been quite a task, to go round all the privies in England looking for it. Maybe someone should go round again, after two hundred years, and compare what they’re writing now! But anyway, we should get back to where we were.”

The little Dutchman agreed, and lifted another volume. “Oh, for goodness’ sake!” he exclaimed in exasperation. “It’s been grangerised!” Matthew laughed at the expression, which he assumed meant that a family member had done something awful to it, but de Groot looked up and said with a wry look, “No, my boy. Not what you’re thinking.” Matthew peered at the thick volume and saw that the pages were covered in pasted-in scraps and pictures, and the original book had been extended by a myriad of inserted pages to many times its length. “Yes, Matthew, look at this. The term I used is nothing to do with our hostess, it comes from the name of a celebrated, or notorious, person who inspired others to augment books by adding in illustrations and other materials to ... illustrate, that’s the word, the original text. If ‘Rome’ is mentioned, then he inserts a picture of Rome, or—perhaps in addition – a map of the city.You’d be surprised maybe how inventive one can be at such a diversion. And think, lad: the added illustrations and poems and so forth had to come from other books.”

Matthew frowned. “You mean he destroyed other books to ornament this one? But that’s terrible!”

“Ay, lad, it is. But we do Granger a disservice. It’s not he, but his followers who ransacked other books like that. He didn’t paste them in either. Still, he gave people the idea. It became something of a fad. And so there’s many a book out there missing pages, torn or cut out to be a sort of visual footnote in another generally worthless book. But don’t you see, it means that the book being extra-illustrated loses its pristine worth as well. Alas, poor Granger! He’s fathered with this monstrous desecration. You see, he published a book of English historical portraits—“

“But who was he?”

“James Granger was vicar of a place in Oxfordshire in the eighteenth century. He was an enthusiastic collector of portrait prints, thousands of them. He published in … 1769, I believe, A Biographical History of England, which was a great success, and started people on the fashion to ‘extra-illustrate’ the copy – there were blank pages left for the purpose – and it was an invitation they couldn’t resist. People would go one better, dismember the book and add pages, bearing these other pictures, and bind it up again, which they’d have to do to make it manageable. Then they turned to other books that were promising. The Bible, for instance.” Matthew nodded and looked enquiringly at the little Dutchman.

“There was a print-seller and bookbinder in London, called Gibbs, if I remember correctly, in about 1860, who grangerised a Pictorial Bible that a John Kitto had published around 1838. It was originally in three volumes, but Gibbs so extra-illustrated it that it finally ran to sixty volumes! It contained thousands of woodcuts and engravings, drawings, watercolours, as well as printed pages from early Bibles. There’s several volumes scattered here and there. Just think, though, of the devastation that caused! Pages removed from hundreds of books, fine old woodcuts, and even if the illustration was single, a separate leaf, it was pasted into the album and … not destroyed, no, but … treated badly. And let me tell you, the cataloguing would be a nightmare! The Kitto Bible was an extreme case, but on the whole the fad caused many a headache for true collectors and bibliophiles. So anyway here we’ve got a grangerised copy of an erotic, or call it a pornographic, classic. The actual poem is quite short, only what, about ninety-odd lines I think. And the other pieces in the volume are even shorter. I think the original book would only be about thirty pages long. But as you’ll see it’s expanded mightily by pasting in other stuff, pictures, particularly obscene ones, portraits, poems from other sources – oh, it’s criminal! But take a look.”

“But what is it?”

“Oh, it’s actually a well-known piece of erotica, called An Essay on Woman, by (or I should say, ascribed to) John Wilkes, the eighteenth century politician. That’s his picture at the front. As I said, it’s a rather short poem, but it’s been eked out to absurd length.”

Matthew opened it and leafed through several of the inserted pages to find a poem that raised his eyebrows and he read it aloud.

“Awake, my Fanny! Leave all meaner things;

This morn shall prove what rapture swyving brings!

Let us (since life can little more supply

Than just a few good fucks, and then we die)

Expatiate free o'er that loved scene of man,
A mighty maze, for mighty pricks to scan;
A wild, where Paphian Thorns promiscuous shoot,
Where flowers the Monthly Rose, but yields no Fruit….”

He frowned. “Is that about a girl’s menstruation?” He looked at de Groot. “I say, sir, this sounds familiar somehow. I can’t have read it before—”

“Ah, Matthew! I think I know the answer. You’re a well-read boy, aren’t you? You’ve probably read the poem by Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man, a fine little piece of philosophy. Well, this is a satire, not on Pope, as you might think, but on some of the establishment figures of the day, 1763 or so. But it imitates Pope rather cunningly, turning every other line to some obscene reference. Like his well-known line ‘A mighty maze, but not without a plan’, or so. It’s not too well done, but it has its own fame. This copy, however, hm, I must say I’m not sure how to treat it. It’ll be interesting to see what it fetches at the auction. I say, look in Ashbee there, volume one, Index Librorum Prohibitorum. He has it, I’m sure.”

“Yes, it’s here, marked ‘in lib.’, like those others. I must say, it’s a bad way to treat a book, even a bad one. And to think of all the other books pillaged to tart this one up!”

The Dutch scholar’s eyes twinkled. “Very good, Matthew! You’ve got the right bookman’s attitude!”

* * *

Philippa, 14 ½, a pretty blonde with bobbed hair, and Marjorie, 12½, who was a chubby girl with brown hair in pigtails, went about their enjoyable task with aplomb, and it had to be a testament to the careful descriptions of his body and their methods by previous helpers that they seemed to know exactly what they were doing, and did it expeditiously, although they disclaimed any experience of bathing anybody, let alone a boy. Their inexperience however showed in the visible glee with which they smoothed their hands over his trembling skin and played with his interesting parts, which they admitted they’d never seen the like of. Which meant, they explained, both that they’d not seen a naked boy before, and that they admired, in the sense of wondering at, the shape and dimensions of his peculiar pieces. Matthew didn’t know how to react and merely grunted, which they seemed to interpret as a thankyou, for they said You’re welcome! and delivered him to his bed with grateful smiles.

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Wednesday 10^th June

Two frigs in the woods

“No doubt you’ll be pleased to hear, Matthew, that the supervision of your baths will be suspended for some time.”

Matthew looked at her in unbelieving relief. “Really?” he stammered, “oh, thank you! I—”

“You are however expected to bathe regularly. We’re going to France very shortly. There you’ll be glad to bathe every day. It gets hot there in Provence, believe me. In fact, it’s advisable to do all work necessary before noon, so one may seek shade thereafter. You’ll see. So I’m saying that you may bathe by yourself until further notice.” Ignoring his intimations of gratitude, she continued, “How are you getting on with Mr de Groot? How’s the catalogue?”

“Oh, we’re doing well,” he said. “There’s a lot of good books there, he says. We’re getting on with listing the books, but there’s a lot of them, and I don’t know how long it’ll take.”

“Well,” she said, “if you’re not finished by the end of term, there’s always another term.” She laughed at the horror on his face. “Come, Matthew, surely you didn’t imagine we’d let you go so easily? There are quite a few girls who haven’t yet had the chance of helping with the bath. Especially the students. Of course it’s only those who attain high marks that get to soap you up, but maybe just for variety we’ll have a lottery. Then they can all get a chance at you. All two hundred and twelve of them.” His face crumpled and he heaved a ragged sigh. “Yes, Matthew! It bears thinking about, doesn’t it?” With another laugh and a wave of the hand, she dismissed him. He dragged himself off and made his way to the lawn outside, then to the woods, where he might find some solace.

Catherine leaned against a tree, feeling a strange sort of melancholy. She’d hoped to relieve a tension she couldn’t explain by coming here to the woods beside the lawn, but it was still there. With a sigh she wandered deeper into the trees, hunching her shoulders in thought, then stopped before a large maple. She looked up to see that someone, probably long ago, had built a little house up there, maybe for a child. Curiosity seized her and she set about climbing up to examine it. Soon she was sitting in a little room, bare but for a tatty heap of cushions and a few dusty children’s books. She looked out into the branches and felt quite at peace. I wonder, she thought, if Matthew and I could come here to be alone together? We could enjoy the greenery and the birds, and maybe a kiss or two…. Absent-mindedly her hand stole to her groin, and she found herself slowly rubbing herself through her dress.

She was beginning to feel quite excited when a sound from below brought her back to reality. She looked down to see Matthew standing at the foot of the tree gazing off into the forest. She was about to call to him when he suddenly exclaimed “Catherine!” Could he see her, could he have known she was busy trying to masturbate? Of course not. Then he spoke again. “Catherine, Catherine! You’re so … beautiful, your … pretty breasts, your whole body….” She caught her breath. The boy continued to catalogue her charms as he deliberately undid the buttons on his trousers and with a sigh lowered them to free a penis erect and proud. Catherine watched with amazed delight as he masturbated himself to sweaty orgasm, all the while invoking her name, He was actually imagining doing it in front of her, and the idea increased his excitement. What would she do if he tossed off in front of her?

She stayed quiet, but her hand started its own movement again, and she thought she reached orgasm at about the same time as he did. There at last was the act she’d often imagined – his erection jerking in his hand, his loins jerking forward, and with another cry from his sweet lips the cock erupted in a stream of white, a wonderful cascade of his seed that fountained up from him what seemed a great distance, and for a long time. He milked his cock dry and wiped the end of it with his shirt tail. “Catherine! God, I want you! Catherine….” He buttoned up and sighed, then squared his shoulders in some sort of resignation and trudged off slowly back to the garden. The girl looked after him with a stunned smile on her face. That was it, she’d actually seen him deliberately spend at last, a bit different from that half-glimpsed manufactured exhibition on the lawn, more private, more personal, and – oh God, dedicated to her. That was it, a wonderful magical moment. But she’d better not tell him she was spying.

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10^th June 1925

Dear Miss Gray,

I’m informed that you were the governess of Catherine Hammond, a young girl whose uncle, James Sutton, died early last year. After his death the girl was despatched to an orphanage, which she has recently left to live at Summerton Manor. I am writing to enquire if you would care to cast any light on Mr Sutton’s death or the circumstances of Catherine’s being sent to the institution. I know this may sound both impertinent and presumptuous, but I have important reasons for asking, and I do so out of a desire for young Catherine’s welfare. I enclose a note from her which may provide some assurance that this is not a gratuitous search for private information. Your early response will be appreciated.

Yours faithfully

Theobald Bryden

---------------------------------------------

Dear Mamie,

How are you? I hope all is going well for you. This note is just to say that Mr Bryden is trying to help me here and I hope you’ll be able to help him. Lots of love

Catherine

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

Thursday 11^th June

Elizabeth’s story

“No,” said Miss Huxton, “call me Elizabeth, please. And I will call you Mr Bryden, as befits your senior status. You’re older and wiser than I, surely! And I can ask your advice, for one thing.”

“All right, Elizabeth,” he replied, “but advice about what?”

“Oh, life, I suppose,” she said. “About what we can do, Eithne and I. How we can plan our lives. For, believe me, I want to— I intend to, be with her for as long as God lets me. The woman who … initiated me, I suppose I can say, who taught me to acknowledge my feelings, was a wonderful person with whom I had the most fulfilling relationship. But it only lasted a short time.”

He looked enquiringly, and she continued. “Her name was Meredith Owens, twenty-two years old, a black-haired Welsh girl from Rhondda. It was a mining area then – it’s only recently started to decline – and very masculine, if you know what I mean. Male choirs and so on. Meredith had a lovely voice, but she only sang in church. She told me she enjoyed being a bit of a tomboy, but she wasn’t popular with either girls or boys. She didn’t fit in.”

“Yes,” he said, nodding. “I can imagine. So when did she discover her … predilections?”

“When she was about thirteen, about the same time as her first period. It’s a traumatic thing for girls, as you can expect, and it concentrated her mind on her sex, her sexual nature, I mean, and she wrestled with her feelings for quite a while, expecting, naturally, to accept her femininity, her destiny, you might say, to be a wife and mother like all the other women in the valley. But it wasn’t like that. She found a disinterest in boys, as sexual partners I mean – she was quite prepared to have them around as companions, comrades, friends, yes, but there it stopped. She concluded that her desires were in another direction.”

Bryden sipped his gin and nodded again in understanding.

“For a while she had to be content with exploring her own body’s appetites and satisfactions – I mean, masturbation, of course.” She looked at him, with a slight flush. “But then when she left school and went into the world she discovered there were others like her, and it was an amazing revelation.”

She looked into the fire and took a cigarette from the packet on the table. Tapping it on the table, she chewed on her lip for a moment.

“So she was sixteen, a very innocent girl – in that she was a virgin who had no knowledge, and especially no carnal knowledge, of men. When she found a woman who took an interest in her she didn’t know what to do to begin with. But her friend patiently introduced her to a whole new world, where giving and receiving joy was not seen as a loathsome sin, but in fact a form of fulfilment, where her own kind of existence, her own needs and desires, were met and accepted and celebrated. That woman, by the way, was a fairly well-known author and a respected member of the community, though some criticised her not going to church. Meredith and she set up house together, and they were evidently very happy for about five years…. Then the woman died, quite suddenly, of some malignant tumour. She left her property to Meredith, who went on living in the house and enjoying the garden and the library.”

She smiled and looked at her cigarette, then lit it and blew out the match. “That’s when I met her.”

Bryden smiled affectionately and nodded, but made no comment.

“I was at school in the town, a place in Cornwall called St Austell. Do you know it?”

Bryden shook his head, She continued, “Well, anyway, I met her when she gave a talk at the school. She seemed to take an interest in me and offered to allow me access to her library, which was quite extensive. It was she who got me interested in the classics, and persuaded me to try for university. We became friends, and then after a time, lovers.”

She regarded him seriously, then drew on her cigarette. “She taught me how to love, Mr Bryden, she taught me that love is the most powerful thing on earth. Love is strong as death, you know!”

Bryden broke into a smile and murmured “The Song of Solomon, yes. But … when was this, really?”

“Ten years ago, when I was a would-be precocious fourteen. Our friendship – that’s what it was – progressed over some months, and I realised one day that I’d developed an amazing fondness for this young woman, who treated me as an equal and let me discuss all sorts of things with her – literature, life, and – yes, sex as well. One day she saw me looking at her with such an expression of love that she came over to me and took the book out of my hands, put her hand to stroke my cheek, and kissed me.”

She looked into the fire for a long moment.

“Do you know that bit in Dante,” she said with a sort of smile, “where Francesca tells her story, about she and her friend reading and then making love?”

He nodded and smiled himself. “Yes, Elizabeth, I know what you mean. They’re reading the erotic story of Lancelot together, then kiss – and her next words say it all. ‘That day we read no more.’ Isn’t that it?”

“Yes,” she said, glancing at him with another flush, “that day we read no more. And then, our passion – that’s what it was – grew, and the friendship deepened, till we both knew we were … soul-mates ? It’s maybe a silly expression, a silly idea. But anyway she took up my education with a vengeance. I mean academic, encouraging me to broaden my ambitions, learn languages, read even more, challenging books, all that, made me promise I’d try for university – almost as if she knew she wouldn’t be around to see it…. And, of course, she educated me in lesbian love. That period was so rich in experience, such a development for me in mind and body, that it seems magic, now. And then she went away to the war, and that was that.”

He leaned over and patted her hand. “But now there’s Eithne,” he said quietly.

She flashed a brilliant smile at him. “Yes, there’s Eithne. Let me tell you, when I recognised those stirrings in me, when I found myself gazing at her a lot of the time, I wondered about stifling my feelings. Let’s face it, being homosexual in this day and age is hardly promising happiness. But I couldn’t help myself. I went to monitor the girls at their swimming in town, and feasted my eyes on her. Imagining her body without the absurd swimming costume. I wondered about giving her little presents, but knew I couldn’t show any favours. And then, oh, Mr Bryden, then one day!”

He was smiling broadly, knowing what she was going to say.

“I’d dismissed the class, but she stayed behind to ask some silly question, and I found myself tongue-tied, somehow. Somehow or other this particular day, no different, you’d think, from any other, was … charged with something. She was close, but she’d been close before. But I found myself looking into her eyes, and she held the gaze as we seemed to run out of conversation. A tenseness, an atmosphere, that we both suddenly were conscious of. And then she seemed to quail at her thoughts, and it seemed she was going to weep. I put out my hand to her cheek – yes, immediately recognising the same act – and she, that wonderful girl, stared at me with such a smile, and said my name. That’s all it took.

“She told me she’d hoped I had the same feelings for her, and she was near despair at the thought of my rejection, but now, now she could say she loved me. And she knew that I loved her. I, I went to the door and locked it. Then I came back to her and gave her her first kiss….”

Bryden let out a pleased sigh. “Thank you for telling me,” he said. “I’m so very glad it worked out for you and her. She’s a fine lovely girl, and I wish you every happiness. Just as I wish that other pair their own happiness. Though they’ve got some more of a problem than you. I imagine it’s difficult snatching a quick rendezvous, watching out for that Simpson woman. You do have a hope though. Surely you’re looking ahead to when Eithne leaves school, goes to university, when she’s over twenty-one and a free agent. Maybe you can set up house together far from gossiping critics, have a nice complete life together….”

“A complete life together…. Ah, Mr Bryden, that sounds so good, so marvellous. I and that dear girl together….”

He grinned at her. “Yes, Elizabeth! It’s a grand thing to contemplate. Catherine—”

“Yes,” she said, frowning, “for those two it’s not the same at all, their future is so up in the air, if it’s not desperate!”

“Let’s agree, you and I, to do all we can for them. I’m trying one or two things myself. There’s not much we can do, but at the very least it’s good for them to know they have friends.”

“Just as it is for us,” she said, and he nodded and finished his drink. “Just as it is,” he said, “for us.”
==================

Friday 12^th June

Preparations for party; Catherine’s bath

The capacious dining room was cleaned spotless, the large long table polished, Wine and other drinks were carefully brought up from the cellar and laid in racks round the walls. The special dresses for the servants were produced and tried on for size, the orphans protesting and feeling ridiculous. Surely Mrs G didn’t expect…? But she did of course. The grand piano was tested, a venerable person with a heavy accent carrying out various noisy repetitive things and talking to Mrs G in what had to be German, with which she seemed quite familiar. The silver was cleaned, candles inserted in the candelabra, the entrance hall swept, and chairs and clothes stands provided. The bathroom was cleaned, the strange play room (as Abigail called it) prepared with chastisement items laid handy: Matthew was horrified to see a large assortment of nasty-looking implements laid out, including several canes, birches, paddles, whips and ropes. Vaseline was placed at strategic points, drugs laid out on the sideboard, and six different brands of cigarettes, besides sweetmeats of various sorts, dishes of fruit and nuts. Dumbwaiters were tested, the ovens inspected, the kitchen a hive of activity as dishes were prepared and sometimes totally readied, being put in the cool room to preserve their freshness. The whole staff were involved, seconding those usually at the school, and Matthew and Catherine had no time to talk.

“Mr Petrie! Andrew!” The boy’s head turned, and he was surprised to see Lydia Grainger waving at him from a car. “Andrew! Come here!” He went over and greeted her, and asked if she was out for an airing. “Yes, just on my way back. Do you want a lift?”

He looked pleased, and said “Actually, I was on my way to the station. I was going to get the 3.05 to Penhurst, to visit an uncle there. There’s plenty time, and I can walk there quite easily.”

“Nonsense! We can take you right there. You’ll have loads of time that way – why not drop in for tea?”

“That’s very kind of you, Mrs G,” he said smiling. “I accept.” He entered the car and they were off. On the way she interrogated him about himself, learning that he would be eighteen in three weeks, was nearly finished schooling at St Vincent’s, was undecided as to a career but thought he’d take a year off, travel about, then perhaps try university. “I’m a great believer in the idea of the Grand Tour,” he said. “I haven’t been abroad at all, which in this day and age is ridiculous. I’d like to see Europe, France, Italy, though I must admit the place doesn’t seem too stable right now. Germany likewise. Perhaps Eastern Europe, the Baltic, Poland? Now that it’s been put together again, a new republic! We’ll see.”

“Hmm,” said Mrs Grainger, “perhaps I should recommend France, where we’re going in July. We have a little estate at a place called Vaulx, by a sleepy little village in Provence. Maybe you can visit us! Yes, I formally invite you to visit. Before you leave today I’ll give you the address, directions et cetera.” He was profuse in his thanks, but she brushed them aside. “No, I mean it. And over tea we’ll talk about other places. I think I’ll take an interest in your education, if you don’t mind, Andrew! I’ve been several places on the continent, and I’m sure I could give you references, places to see, people to visit. Yes,” she said, “I insist.” He thanked her with a smile, and counted himself lucky to have met her today.

They were finishing tea when Catherine came in looking nervous as usual. “You sent for me, madam?” she said, and gave a startled glance at the boy, who was grinning as he remembered the discussion about her skirt. She flushed and looked away.

“Yes, Catherine, I’d forgotten, but now you’re here…. You remember Andrew Petrie?” She smiled thinly and watched the girl’s flush grow.

The boy had risen from his chair and inclined his head politely. “Nice to see you again, Catherine,” he said smoothly. “How are you?”

“V-very well,” she stammered, and looked at her employer.

“Yes, Catherine, I wanted to talk to you about your bath.”

She looked at Andrew in embarrassment, and he looked at her in amusement. “It’s … it’s not time yet …,” she said timidly, “I think ….”

Mrs G looked at her with a speculative smile and said “Ah. Yes. Why not? You can take one today. Tomorrow won’t work. Away you go to the stables.” The girl looked as if she’d burst into tears, but left, and Mrs G rang for assistance. Jessica appeared, and was told to go along to the stables and prepare a bath for Catherine. She bobbed her head and went off with a sigh, and Lydia looked again at her guest. “I’m sorry, Andrew, these things keep cropping up. But anyway, perhaps now you’re here, it does fit in pretty well. Drink up and come with me.” He drained his cup and rose to accompany her out the door, and outside. As they walked along she explained. “I decided that Catherine’s baths should be supervised.” He looked at her in some shock. “Yes, just to be sure they’re regular and properly done. She’s had two so far, and this is the third, which she takes in the bathroom at the stables along here. We’re a day early, but tomorrow won’t do, I’m hosting a dinner party. Usually she has been helped by one or two of the other servants – the stableboys for instance –” Again he stared at her. God, the woman was amazing! “But today I don’t see why we can’t make an exception.” They stopped at a wooden building attached to the end of a series of such, and he could see steam escaping from a vent in the roof. “Here we are.” She pulled open the door to show Jessica testing the water in a large tub and Catherine standing fidgeting by a wall bearing pegs, twisting her hands anxiously.

Jessica turned and said “It’s all ready, madam, just fine for her.”

“Thank you, Jessica,” said Mrs G, “you may go. Clear away the tea things.”

Catherine looked from one to the other, and said “Wh-what about … what about h-help, madam?”

She flushed and looked appealingly at Mrs Grainger, who said misleadingly “Oh, I don’t know about the boys, but … here’s Andrew.”

He looked at her with a delighted grin, while Catherine blushed and said “Oh no! You can’t mean—”

“But of course, you silly girl. He happens to be here, I’m sure he’s willing to help, aren’t you, Andrew?” He gave a nod, looking at the victim with salacious eyes, while she shook her head in a powerless denial and looked at the floor.

“Come now! Don’t waste time! I can leave you to it, I think? Right then. There’s the soap. I’m sure you’ll be thorough, Andrew. Every little bit. Take your time, you still have plenty to go before your train. Fine. Catherine, do as Andrew says. And Andrew, remind me to show you some of the photographs that were taken a week ago or so, of Catherine I mean.”

With that she left, Catherine looking stricken at the thought of her nakedness preserved by the camera, and the boy looked at the blushing girl. “All right, Catherine, we’d best get the clothes off, hmm?”

She slowly unbuttoned her blouse and hung it on a peg, and his eyes followed her every movement. Off came the skirt, off, with some hesitation, the camisole. He couldn’t resist telling her what he thought, bringing more blushes to her cheeks. “God, Catherine! Your tits are great. Not too big, like the other girl. And by golly I bet the nipples are hard, they’re pointing straight at me!” She tried to ignore him as she removed her shoes and stockings, then turned her back and stoically slid her knickers to the ground. “Yes!” cried the eager boy, “you bum is just as pretty as I remember it, nice and neat. And the rest of you … Listen, turn round, let me drink you in. I didn’t have time last time.” She turned round and faced him bravely, holding her chin high, her hands by her sides clenched and trembling, and he looked her over deliberately, concentrating of course on her crotch. The slit of her vulva seemed a little inflamed, and he guessed she was beginning to feel aroused. He’d get there soon enough. “All right!” he put out his hands to help her into the tub, and she squealed as he touched her. She stood upright as he seized the soap and created a lather, then applied it to her neck, her shoulders, her arms, her breasts ….

“God!” he muttered again, “your tits are beautiful, the points, the nipples, they’re hard, just about as hard as I’m getting! Let me tell you Catherine, I’m getting a hard-on you wouldn’t credit, and maybe I’ll show you. But in the meantime ….” He soaped her belly and thighs and then turned her round, to remark on the attractiveness of her arse as he soaped the cheeks, the cleft, her anus. “Hey, Catherine, do the boys say anything about your bumhole? I bet they do, tickling it like this, maybe putting a finger in? Yes, I bet they do!” He poked his soapy index finger into her, and she gasped as he pushed in and out, telling her he’d never done this before, but was highly pleased to have the chance. Next, the front, her groins, her perineum, her mount of Venus, her vulva – and a running commentary from the libidinous boy. “In we go, Catherine, the cunt is asking for it. You’re moist in there, and what’s this?”

He tweaked her clitoris, and she gave a little shriek. “Please, Andrew, enough! I’m clean, for God’s sake!”

“Yes, but you know as well as I do that’s not really what Mrs G wants. This,” and he rubbed her tender bud between his fingers till she panted and said “No, oh God, Andrew, oh, stop –” “You don’t want to stop, do you?” he said wickedly. She shook her head and waved her arms as her belly heaved in and out. “No! Don’t stop! Aaagh! Ah, God oh God oh God!!”

He looked pleased at the effect of his assistance, and rinsed her down before leading her out of the tub and drying her with an immense towel, carefully checking every nook and cranny of her marvellous body and looking into her scarlet face with a pleased grin. “There! Now you’re clean as a whistle, and I’ve still got a hard-on. See!” To her amazement he dropped his trousers and pulled his penis out of his underpants. His erection was sizeable, an inch or two bigger than Matthew’s, she thought, and it seemed … more threatening, a hairy predator, not a sweet worshipper of her vulva that Matthew’s was. Christ, she thought in revulsion, to think of anyone being fucked by that! Andrew took her silence for admiration, and stroked his organ proudly. “Touch it,” he said eagerly, “hold it. Come on! You can, you know you want to.” She swallowed, and it occurred to her that Mrs G would definitely wish it (“do as Andrew says”). So tentatively she put her hand out and grasped the horrid thing, warm to her touch, that quivered as soon as it felt her fearful fingers. “Yes! Come, Catherine, help me toss off!” She gritted her teeth and began stroking him, he pushing his pelvis forward and grunting in pleasure. She began to feel excited, and couldn’t understand why, but closed her eyes and solved her puzzle by imagining it was Matthew she was masturbating. Oh yes, that would be marvellous, to hold his manhood in her hands and fondle it, stroke up and down, pull the foreskin back and forth, feel it throb under her attentions, then seem to explode, as it had in the woods that time – “Ooh! Yes! God! Aah!” The boy gasped as he ejaculated, and she hurriedly dropped the organ before she got come on her hands. He wiped his penis on the towel, and she turned to her clothes, but he insisted on helping her dress, his touch lingering on her body, and his breath hot on her cheek. He led her back to Mrs Grainger, who looked them both over and smiled rather malevolently and nodded in approval.

“I knew I could depend on you,” she said, remarking his slight sweat and conjecturing that he might have masturbated. In a good humour she invited him to sit down and indicated a new pot of tea. “You’ve still got ages to go before your train, Andrew,” she said, “so we can chat. I hope you enjoyed bathing Catherine, she has a nice body, don’t you think?”

He could see that she was determined to be uninhibited, so replied in kind. “She has,” he said, helping himself to a cup, “every bit of her, very nice.” He could see that the girl, who was still standing there waiting to be dismissed, was uncomfortable at being discussed like this, but he gave a small smile as he added “And again I noticed her pubis was shaved. I saw that last time, and wondered about it, even wondered if I liked it, but,” he turned to look humorously at the girl, who had acquired another flush, “I must say it’s good on her. It calls attention to her vulva, and doesn’t attempt to hide it. I imagine also it’s a bit more comfortable for her. Is it, Catherine?”

She didn’t know where to look, and opened her mouth to make some sort of reply, but closed it again in some shock when Mrs G said “I’m sure it is, but there’s always stubble to contend with. She was shaved again recently, though, so it’s all smooth.”

“I didn’t notice when I was washing her,” he said, “But—”

“Then feel her again, you’ll see.” He lost no time in going over to the squirming girl and raising her skirt, and Mrs G watched the scene with open amusement. He put his hand inside her knickers and then, with a nod to himself as he made up his mind, pulled then down to her knees. He squatted down to give her pubis a close look, and passed his palm over it several times. She was beginning to whimper again, but had to hold still as he felt her with gentle fingers. He glanced back at his hostess with a mischievous smile and said “The rest of her too, I suppose? Her … seam, her bum?”

Catherine was twitching in distress, but Mrs G laughed and said “Oh yes, there wasn’t much, but we shaved it all. Go ahead, feel.” He nodded happily and did just that, sliding his hand between her legs to feel her perineum, then further to her anal region.

She made little squeals, but he persisted until he was sure the place was smooth, and said “The barber is to be congratulated. But isn’t there a chance of getting an itch?”

“Oh yes,” said Mrs G, “but we have an ointment for that. It works nicely, doesn’t it, Catherine?”

She gave the girl a meaningful look, and the blushing victim muttered “Yes, madam, it does.” Andrew sat back and looked at the girl with her knickers at her knees, and then at his hostess, with a big grin.

“She’s very pretty,” he said, “every bit of her. I know I can speak frankly, Mrs G, can’t I?” She nodded in amusement. “Well,” he said, “she’s not only pretty, she’s attractive. There’s a difference.”

“Yes, indeed, Andrew, I’m glad you see that.”

“One’s attracted by the face and the figure, but once the clothes are off, then in a way the face doesn’t matter, it’s the breasts, smallish though they be, and especially of course the parts one rarely sees. Her backside, for instance—”

“Hold on, Andrew. Catherine, we can talk about you more easily if you strip. Come on now.”

She gulped but acquiesced and was soon standing naked again just a couple of feet before them, red as a beetroot, panting a little. It was worse somehow when they talked about her without any shyness, no pretence of modesty.

“Yes,” continued the boy, “her arse is neat and firm, and seems to invite a hand to explore.” He fitted action to the word and placed a proprietorial hand on her buttock. She flinched but couldn’t move as he ran his hand over her, caressing the cleft and fingering her anus. “I like the shape of her arse, it’s beautiful in its own way. And then her groin,” he stroked a finger , “her whole shaven pubis,” five fingers passed over her bareness, “and her … slit, the focus surely of every thought. All this is the attractive part, that attracts like pollen to a bee, we home in on this, her slit, that we all want to see and feel and enter. We do, Catherine. Your … cunt is the centre of your beauty.”

He stroked it and pushed a finger inside, and she gasped and shuddered, saying “No, please, no….” He smiled at her and didn’t pursue it, but returned to his chair and drank his tea.

Mrs Grainger looked at the girl. “She’s blushing again,” she said. “Don’t you think she has a sweet blush, Andrew?”

“Yes,” he replied, “and of course it spreads all over her, it seems, when she’s coming.”

Catherine stared at him in misery. How could they talk like this? Lydia Grainger raised her brows and said “Oh, you did manage to bring her to that.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, with a grin. “Thank you for the chance. Of course it’s like an hors d’oeuvre before a banquet, isn’t it? A mere taste of something bigger and better. Is she a virgin?”

Lydia Grainger laughed out loud. “Oh Andrew,” she said, “it’s very refreshing to talk to you. What a pity you can’t come to our dinner party. (I’ll have to give another, for you and the other boys.) Yes, she’s a virgin, but … Catherine, tell Andrew what you told me.”

The girl shook her head in an attempt at avoidance but looked down at the ground as she replied “I’m a virgin, but my … hymen is … broken because it … split when I was riding on a farm.”

“Yes,” Andrew said, “I’ve heard of that happening. So you never knew a man, or boy, in any way till you came here, hmm? This was the first of boys looking at you, feeling you?”

“Yes!” she cried, “why do you say those things, why are you shaming me? Oh God, Mrs Grainger, I’m sorry but I can’t take it any more!” She began to cry and sat down on the floor in a naked heap.

Andrew was rather nonplussed at this development, but Mrs Grainger threw him a glance and shook her head, saying “Yes, Catherine, you don’t think you can, but believe me, you will. Now stand up and let Andrew dress you again, and then off to your room. He has a train to catch.”

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