Hirst Hall

Chapter 3 – I am presented again

I awoke early the next morning and lay still in the bed recalling where I was. My husband’s warm body was lying next to mine under the covers and the room was cold. A little winter’s light was coming around the drapes. Then I realised what had woken me. The chambermaid had crept into the room and quiet as a mouse was relaying the fire and gentling prodding it back to life. Servants are trained to do this without waking their betters and had I been used to the house I should probably have slept through it. I coughed quietly and when she looked over I beckoned her to me.

“Where is my chamber?” I whispered to her, trying not to wake my husband.

She nodded towards the door to one side of the bed, clearly we had adjoining rooms.

“Find Rose and tell her to draw me a bath there.” She girl nodded and then her eyes widened suddenly as she looked over my shoulder. I guessed that Sir Thomas was now awake. She fled back to the hallway.

“A bath, in the morning?” I turned to see him propped up on an elbow with his wolfish grin on.

“Yes, it is my custom.”  I should explain that while the English bathe at best once a week and then usually in the evenings, I am not entirely English. My father met my mother while travelling in the Baltic as a young merchant and while I have inherited his colouring (for she was fair of skin and hair) I have taken from her Swedish notions of cleanliness.

“Very well then. It will take her a little while to have the bath and water brought up from the kitchens and so we have time together.” He reached a hand out to cup a breast.

“No, sir!” I uttered quickly.

“No?  I am not used to ‘no’.” I could well imagine that he wasn’t.

“No, I must...  I must pass water.” My bladder really was most awfully full.

“Oh, is that all? Go ahead then.”

I slid out of bed onto the cool mahogany floor and reached under the bed for the chamber pot. Looking back I saw him still watching me on his elbow.

“Look away sir, please.”

“No, I like watching you.” And so I squatted with my back to him and in the half-light I immodestly let my water flow. I had no choice really, I was that desperate.  I stood, covered the pot and made towards the nightstand to wash myself.

“Pull back the drapes, my dear.” I crossed to the two windows and one after the other pulled back the heavy drapes and opened the shutters. I view was breathtaking; our rooms looked out over the west facade of the house looking towards the distant Welsh mountains. Before me was arranged a formal terrace with parterres and paving. Beyond the rolling parkland laid out by ‘Capability’ Brown when the house had been built. Artfully designed to look natural it was in fact almost completely artificial, even down to the lake off to one side in the near distance.

I went and washed myself at all times keeping my back modestly to my husband. When I turned he had a distinctly hungry look in his eyes. I returned to the warm bed and slid in next to him. Immediately he was kissing me and when his fingers slid down to my sex his hand stopped for a moment and pulled mine over to his member before returning to its own explorations. He was dreadfully hard and very big. Was he even larger than the previous evening? It certainly seemed that way.  There was no denying that I wanted him and cooperated fully when he moved above me. Our lovemaking went on for a long time and I climaxed twice under his ardent attentions. Finally his seed boiled into me and I collapsed in a state of lassitude onto the pillow. Looking up I noticed that right above my head was a satyr rutting a nymph from behind in perpetual congress.

“What happens now?” I asked quietly.

“Breakfast will be waiting downstairs. I must go over to the mills, where a new crusher is being built.  I shall not be back till late afternoon. You must see Mrs. Jones and discuss the ordering of the house with her.  She is very competent but will want your direction.” While saying this he had slid from the bed and stood in his powerful nakedness passing his water forcefully into his pot. I could not help staring at the size of him even as the liquid flowed. I blushed at my own brazenness.

“But... but how can I run the house when they have all seen me naked?” I could feel tears suddenly in my eyes.

“Ah, is that your concern? The entire staff have been ordered to treat you with all the respect due to Lady Dalrymple, unless it is specifically against one of my own instructions. Failure to do so will lead to a flogging in the first instance and dismissal with neither pay nor references in the second.” And with that he strode towards the door in the far side of the room beyond the mantelpiece and that portrait.

For a few minutes I laid there in bed staying at Lady Anne trying to read what she must have been thinking from the look on her face.  She looked to have been about the same age as I was now when the painting was done. Then, quite nude, I went through the door to my own rooms.

Rose was there holding out a light robe for me to slip on. As I did so I stopped and stared.  What was she wearing? I had expected her to be wearing a maid’s uniform: grey woollen dress with white petticoats, high of neck and decent of cut. Hers was none of the above except that it was made of grey wool. Her dress ended at the knees, leaving her calves quite bare and showing scandalously her ankle boots. The sleeves were entire absent leaving her arms entirely uncovered. Perhaps worst of all the dress had a very low décolletage, leaving almost half of her breasts on display, the cut of the dress pushing them up alarmingly. Only her maid’s cap was completely normal. She blushed as I stared.

“What are you wearing Rose?”

“My uniform, Lady Caroline.”

“You cannot wear that, it’s indecent. You look like a whore.” The poor thing burst into tears at this. I felt so foolish, how could I have said that?  I moved to hold her and comfort her but she backed away.

“No, Lady Caroline.  I must wear this until I have shown them I am obedient.  There is no other way.” She looked at me fiercely through her tears.

“Oh God, Rose, I am so sorry. We must get out of this place.”

“No, Ma’am, that is not possible. You might manage it; I know you are a good horsewoman. I cannot even ride.  And if you leave I will be flogged hourly until you return.”

Flogged?  Hourly?  My head swam.  Surely not?  But if they had been willing to rape her in my sight then perhaps...

“Ma’am, you must obey them.  Please? Or we will both suffer.  They have promised it.  Now you must bathe quickly.  Sir Thomas will be expecting you at breakfast.”

I needed time to think so I lowered myself into the hot bath before the fire and began soaping myself.  It gave me time to look round the room. It was the mirror image to the one I had slept in but lacked the headboard and instead of Lady Anne there hung a picture of Leda and the Swan.  At least in this one the bird was not actually penetrating the queen as on the headboard next door. Here the bird nestled between her legs and stretched its long muscled neck up to between her breasts while she leaned forward to kiss it. The artist was unmistakeably Rembrandt and the effect undeniably to stimulate the baser senses.

As Rose dressed me I mused on a way forward but none appeared clear.  Soon I was ready to face the house.

“Have my bath, Rose.”  It had long been our custom that she would have my lukewarm bathwater when I was done.  It kept her clean and I preferred my maid not to smell.  I knew she enjoyed it too.

“No, Ma’am. Not today.”

“I insist, you must want one after your travelling and last night...”

“No, Ma’am.”

“I insist! Right now!” And I began to move towards her

“All right, Ma’am. I will.” And she reached back to unbutton her dress. As it fell to the floor I understood her reluctance to disrobe.  She was wearing no undergarments at all.

“They have given you no drawers?  How can they?” She began weeping again.

“No Ma’am. I will be given them if I have been obedient for a week.  Please Ma’am, don’t fight them, I do not want to be hurt again.” I was furious but impotent.

“I shall speak to Mrs. Jones. But I shall not fight them till I have a plan for us both. I promise you this: they will not hurt you again.” I saw the bruising round her thighs where she had resisted Hugh. “Are you alright, I mean is it the wrong time of the month, could he have...?”  I could not find the right words.

“Mrs. Shepherd gave me some drink with herbs, Ma’am. It will stop me conceiving.”

“But that is an old wives’ tale.”

“Not at all, Ma’am. It’s well known in these parts.  How do you think Lady Anne didn’t have any children after those first boys?”

I had wondered how she had had two boys, now thirteen and fourteen (and away at Winchester college) and then no other children for so long. “But she died in childbirth...”

“Yes Ma’am. She took it for years, every month, but when she turned forty she thought she was no longer able to have children so she stopped and then became pregnant.  And it won’t help you after it begins.”

I left wondering if it were possible and, if it were, would I want to take some.

After breakfast I spent the day with Mrs. Jones inspecting every inch of my new domain. Each member of staff including the housekeeper treated me with the utmost respect and after a while I began to relax. It was the most magnificent residence.  In the Yellow Salon was the formal portrait of Lady Anne to match the informal one upstairs. The painting was done from exactly the same spot as the nude but here her ladyship was in an elegant, scarlet riding habit.  Her stance was also exactly the same except that the left hand instead of cupping a breast was holding a riding crop. No one having seen the upstairs one could not see this one and not think of its pair.  I wondered where the third one was, the ‘risqué’ one.  I had by now seen the entire house except for Sir Thomas’ dressing room; Mrs. Jones informed me that only James, Sir Thomas’ valet, was allowed in there. I remembered a diffident looking young man from the night before. This one forbidden place and the matter of my maid’s clothing were the only matters where Mrs Jones did not defer to my wishes as they would in those instances conflict with my husband’s.

In the late afternoon Sir Thomas returned from the mills and promptly summoned me to meet him in the entrance hall.  I went with a sense of dread, which heightened when I saw Rose and Mrs. Jones with him. Rose was ordered to undress me and hurried to obey even as I was about to protest. Remembering my promise to her I stifled my words and acquiesced in being stripped. When I was quite naked and standing before the fire so that I would not freeze, the doors were opened and the presentation of the new mistress to the outdoor staff took place. There were perhaps three dozen of them, all men: gardeners, groundsmen, gamekeepers, grooms and stable boys, even the coachmen from yesterday. It seemed to go on forever and by the end my back was warm while my front was frozen, which had the unfortunate effect of making my nipples as hard as little flints. When the doors were finally closed on the last man I turned towards my husband. He had that hungry, wolfish look and I thought he would take me to his chamber and ravish me immediately. I was almost disappointed when he simply allowed Rose to dress me and left stating he would see me at dinner.

Much later when we were alone in his room he undid my sleeping gown and stood admiring me. There was something about the way he looked at me that made me quiver inside and triggered the dampness in my sex. When we were in our bed and were touching each other before the actual deed itself he pulled away from sucking on my nipples and pushed me down towards his member.

“Now it is your turn to suck me.” I could hear the teasing in his voice.

I had never done this in my life.  Once or twice in those few months with my first husband I had actually kissed his thing out of a sense of fun and then only when the act of love was over.  Besides I was very young then and very in love. I knew that the deed was possible as I had heard women discussing it, usually after too much wine had been taken and it was more than liberally represented on the headboard. But there is a great difference in knowing and doing and I had no particular wish to learn. So seeking to appease him I planted a couple of kisses on his organ before returning to his lips.  It was clearly not exactly what he desired but it passed and our lovemaking was vigorous and mutually enjoyable.