Lords, Ladies, Butlers and Maids Page 6

  John looked up, appearing both surprised and somewhat lost for words himself. Then he gave her that roguish smile of which she had become so fond.

  ‘And yet I find the pleasure was not necessarily in the winning, but in the manner of it. And please – call me Johnny, when we are alone. All my most intimate friends do.’

  ‘I fear that no such opportunities will present themselves if you are to leave tomorrow … Johnny.’

  John was stepping forward with words on his lips when Sylvia’s voice and footsteps echoed down the corridor. With a look of regret, John hurried to the door, unlocked it and waited behind it so that he could slip out unseen once Sylvia had entered.

  ‘My dear!’ Sylvia exclaimed when she saw Anne. ‘Why are you next to the window on a chill day like today? Come sit by the fire.’

  Glancing wistfully after John as he disappeared from sight, Anne joined her aunt by the fire as she replied, ‘Thank you for your concern, Aunt, but I assure you I am quite warmed through.’

  *

  John awoke several times during the night. He wanted to be away at dawn and, although his valet had promised faithfully to rouse him, he still woke repeatedly and checked his clock.

  So he was more than surprised when he finally swung his legs out of bed, stretched, walked over to his dresser and found an envelope addressed to him that had not been there when he retired. He glanced at the door, wondering when his visitor had slipped in unnoticed. The delicate cologne surrounding the envelope conjured up one word: ‘Anne’.

  He held it a moment, staring at it thoughtfully with a mixture of hope and foreboding. When he eventually opened and read it through, he could honestly say it was not what he had been expected.

  My dear Johnny,

  I have so enjoyed our diversions together this Christmas. You have been a light in this widow’s dark world and I thank you for it.

  And now it seems only fair that I should place a bet before you in return. I shall bet that in the course of your travels some young Italian heiress will dazzle you and that your natural charm and unique skills will soon win her hand in marriage. I would bet that, as a consequence of this, you will return in a haze of glory and happiness, and will not have a second glance for the dour governess of a country doctor.

  But when you do return, seek me out. I shall be waiting to hear about your travels – and to see whether I have lost my bet.

  Your fondest friend,

  Anne Pearson

  John read the missive through a second time to commit it to memory, then he placed it in the grate and set a match to it. He knew too well the scandal that would be caused if it was read by any other. It warmed him just to know she had written such words; he did not need to keep them. He smiled as he watched the paper blacken and curl. He had not even left for Italy yet and already he was counting the days until his return.

  The Kiss

  Ludivine Bonneur

  I see his bare chest for the first time ever. The shock almost makes me drop the tray. He is sitting upon the edge of the bed, bending down to kiss and joke with Madame, who is propped up on the pillows as usual. His shirt is open, yet to be buttoned up. I have caught him dressing. I feel my cheeks go red and hurriedly put the tray down and scurry to attend to the shutters. I pull them back to let the June morning flood in, but then it’s like I’ve done it on purpose just to get a clearer view of him. I can see my hands shaking. What if I had entered two minutes earlier, when his trousers were still to go on?

  ‘Ah, Sidonie, mon chouchou,’ he says to me as brightly as ever, ‘how are you this lovely day?’

  It makes me colour up even further to hear him use that term of endearment in front of Madame, but this has never bothered him. I had been unaware of the phrase when I first came here, and wondered how it could possibly be a good thing to be called a cabbage. The others told me, with some bitterness, that it meant ‘favourite’. They thought I had asked just to ram it down their throats. Still now some of them sneer the name at me, saying, ‘Here comes le petit chou’ when I go in for lunch, or ‘Pass the bread to The Master’s Cabbage.’ He also sometimes calls me his ‘little peach’, but I am careful not to make the same mistake and tell anyone this. I think it is because my cheeks are so red. He doesn’t know they are only like this when he is around.

  I sneak another look as I go to pour the coffee. I have my head bowed but I can’t help snatching a glance. Madame has her hand up resting on his chest, her elegant pale fingers making his flesh look firm and tanned. I spot some grey hairs amongst the black, just as on his head. This is only to be expected on a man older than my father. Monsieur celebrated his twenty-first birthday the very day the Blitzkrieg first came, so the story goes, which puts him at 49 now. Madame is maybe five years his junior and still as handsome as ever. She is so beautiful he doesn’t even have a mistress in the city, or so they say. She looks flawless this morning, her hair so unruffled after a warm night that it must have been brushed, her skin showing traces of make-up without any smudging, suggesting it has been put on fresh today. She doesn’t seem like the type to be so vain, but maybe I don’t know her that well. She might sneak out of bed extra early to get herself ready, not wanting to look anything less than perfect in front of us servants. Or maybe it is just for him.

  The belly looks firm, with no trace at all of fat around his middle, even though he likes his food. I can catch these glimpses because he is so untroubled by my presence with him thus. There is no insecurity. He stays as he was when I first entered, sitting there smiling down upon his wife, telling her that he is meeting the artist Duval in half an hour, which explains his early rising. Not, of course, that I’m supposed to be listening to his conversation. It is hard to turn a deaf ear to anything he says. His voice is so mellow and gentle, so deep and never angry. I wish it was my hand on his chest now, feeling that unflappable heart beating beneath.

  I can catch theses glimpses because I am doing my duty as always, my regime set in stone. Each weekend they lie in, so I take them coffee and the paper at eight on the dot, knocking twice before entering, setting down the tray and opening the shutters to the balcony, then pouring the coffee and handing it to them in turn, Madame first. I then lay out their gowns at the foot of the bed, and take out fresh towels from the drawer to replace the ones from the previous night. These things I have done for over a year now, so I can almost do them blind, which means I can sneak just one more look at Monsieur with his shirt unbuttoned. Then I spoil it by spilling some coffee through not paying attention while pouring it. I give a little gasp of mortification, especially as it must be obvious where my eyes have been. I deserve chastisement but they are both smiling, almost knowingly, and Monsieur tells me, ‘Never mind, my little cabbage.’ They are so perfect. He is so perfect.

  I don’t know how I’ve held this job down. I get in such a state around him. He rises from the bed and slowly buttons up his shirt. It is of crisp white cotton and fits close to his skin. He never needs a jacket to hide unsightly bulges. All his clothes are tailored to fit exactly, all cut from the finest cloth. It would be heaven merely to lie against him and just stroke the soft material and feel the gentle warmth of his body beneath. If I were Madame I would do that every day. I’m staring again. I drag myself over to the robe, just about remembering that Madame will still need her gown even if he doesn’t. I lay it out at the foot of the bed. It means passing near him again, turning my back on him, bending slightly over the bed as I spread the gown out. I am almost willing the pressure at my back from his hand to keep me there, to push me further towards the sheets.

  There would be nothing I could do about it. He is, after all, my Master. His rights extend to everything in this household, including me. At my interview, Bernard, the majordome, made one thing implicitly clear: I was to do whatever the Master said or asked, immediately and without question, anything and everything.

  ‘Forget all the nonsense talk of Marxism and revolution, of abolishing our class society. Instead, always remember
how lucky you are,’ Bernard had said. ‘Monsieur gives us everything: a room of our own in the chateau in these glorious surroundings, food to eat from his farms, even wine from his cellar, all free. It costs us nothing to live and yet he pays us to be here. We want for nothing and yet he rewards us nonetheless. All he asks in return is that we clean a few rooms for him, take him his coffee, attend to his guests. The least any of us can do is anything he says.’

  I try to remember this when I’m up at five to get the eggs in, but Bernard has a point. Our days are long and the work can be arduous, but it is done in good humour, we are treated very well and we get to sample some of the luxury of chateau life. Yes, it is borrowed luxury, but it has let me experience things way beyond my expectations. ‘Servant’ might be a dirty word in a country once again teetering on the edge of revolution, but Monsieur only owns my heart and soul because I want to give it. Equality would not let me have him any more than I can now; it merely robs me of my obligations to my Master. I want him to own me. I want him to order me to do the kind of things I do not possess the tongue to ask for myself.

  He need only say the word now and I would have to go over. Maybe he would unclip my hair so it might spread across my face to cover my shame in front of Madame. The skirt of my outfit is short and loose. There is nothing to stop it being lifted with little more than a flick of the wrist. I wear no hosiery. We used to wear Lycra tights, added by Bernard to our uniform in concession to our constant pleading for shorter hemlines. Now they have been made optional by the Master, such is the summer heat. My horrible nylon panties would hopefully be down in a second, no doubt leaving the usual unsightly red line around my waist. Why aren’t I wearing the beautiful silk ones I saved up to buy? He would order me to rise up to meet him and I would have to comply. I would feel the grasp of his strong hands on my hips, steadying me for his slide. Then he would be there inside me, driving deep until his body met with mine.

  The country boys I came here to escape are said to do it like animals. They rut and hump and grunt, slapping your backside and calling you ‘whore’, even though they have no intention of paying for it. He would be more measured. It would be a slow, surging forward drive and a sliding exit, deep but controlled, building the heat within. He would be listening for my sighs, responding to them, ensuring I took my pleasure even though the act was supposedly only meant to be for his. Maybe he would plunder me with a little more harshness than he would Madame, just as a sign to her that I was merely a servant to be used in this way. Still, there would be no frantic impersonality from him. His instinct for chivalry would not allow it. There would be something like tenderness. He would bend forward so that I could feel the closeness of him, the press of his chest on my back, his breath in my ear.

  Beneath my cheek and palms I would feel the satin of the bed sheets. My God, those sheets! When I first came here I thought them the epitome of rich snobbery, an expense just for the sake of it. Then I got to touch them, to feel them on my bare skin. I realised why you would never sleep on anything else if you could. I am the one now responsible for this room. I get to change the sheets. I can spend a long time smoothing them out, getting them as flat as possible, just to feel the tingling silkiness on my palm. I wondered what that sheer contact would feel like on other parts of my bare body, what Madame feels when she pulls up her nightdress.

  It got the better of me one day. I knew they were both in the city and Bernard was in the wine cellar. I would not be disturbed. I have been told it is different elsewhere in Europe but here we strictly respect someone’s privacy. Doors are kept closed and we do not enter any rooms without express purpose or direct invitation. This goes for the largest chateau as well as the smallest hovel. Over half the rooms in this house I have never entered and never will. There are rooms the Master himself has never stepped inside, even rooms that Bernard has not been in, and he is in charge of the running of the house. Since this is my room to clean, no other maid ever comes here. So I took off my dress. The sheets were to be cleaned anyway so it wouldn’t matter. I slid in between them and lay there, in his bed. I felt down for signs of their shared desire, but there were none. Then, I’m a little ashamed to say, my panties came down too.

  It is hard to describe the bliss of this material against your skin, rucking up in your own creases as you writhe. Only the fur of Madame’s winter scarves comes close. I shivered whilst I did it, but it was a beautiful shiver. I shook from the dread of his premature return but my head was filled with the idea of him discovering me there in such a way. On a handful of occasions, maybe ten or more, I have had the sheets off the bed and gathered up before it gets too much for me. I find myself clutching the bundle, wrapping it into a tighter sausage to give it more substance. Somehow I end up face down on the bed, the bundle of sheets beneath me, embracing it tightly with arms and legs. Somehow I end up with my panties down and my bareness rubbing against the satin. The humiliation of being found humping the sheets almost makes me sob, yet still I would not postpone the day he comes in unexpectedly and finds me there.

  It would indeed be a surprise. Except for bringing the morning tray and when I have been expressly summoned by the bell, I am banned from even going to their room at a time when either of them might be present. In return, they know when I am likely to be cleaning the room and ensure they stay away. It could never happen by accident. For him to get me here alone he would have to order it. That is all it would take: one simple order, and I would have to obey. Maybe I shouldn’t even expect any warning. Perhaps just a hand on my back to hold me down and the sound of his zipper coming open to announce he was to use me as he saw fit.

  Imagine being entered whenever it took his fancy, without foreplay or so much as a by your leave, of just being laid out and stripped for his purpose. Is this all the treatment I can expect, even in these days of feminism and supposed equality? Imagine being used in front of his wife, in front of guests, of being done in the secret garden or in the stables, at any time of the day, just on his whim, without any power to refuse it. Fortunately when he is around it is never long before I am ready for him. Would he expect to finish inside me? Thanks to Monsieur Neuwirth contraception was legalised last year, although we are supposed to be a good Catholic country. Some of us are yet to embrace this new freedom but would he assume I had, simply because he was in his right to use me as it pleased him? It might not even occur to him that he has a need to withdraw.

  It might save me some pain, at least. Before the pill, and I’m sure even now, another common method existed to avoid having the sin of premarital sex revealed by an unwanted pregnancy. As my friend Gabrielle once explained it to me:

  ‘You have two holes down there. One is for the start and one is for the finish. The first is for pleasure, the second for relief,’ the relief being his, in the form of a climax, and yours in the form of an ejaculation without conception.

  Trouble was, or so the rumours went, most of those rural guys saw us country girls as pigs, and many didn’t even bother with the first hole, going directly to the second. I wonder if Monsieur would commit such a rude act? Imagine being filled to bursting from the rear. Perhaps it is the only way he thinks to take us servants, not wanting to treat us as Madame’s equal? God, what if she used her fingers inside me while he went at my behind! How could I stop them? The rich can do whatever they like so why would it surprise me to have them use me together? They are usually so nice to us all but behind closed doors must surely be a different matter.

  Sometimes it shocks me when I hear what people get up to in this age of Free Love. I feel I should embrace it but I just do not have the nerve. The revolutionaries say the rich and authoritarian are morally devoid, but they only want to overthrow them to have a taste of that immorality themselves. Some of us can’t do with the freedom; we need to be told, or made. I could choose a hundred guys from the street and find that none of them match the expectations of my fantasy. Then what? With Monsieur I simply know, since such skills and attitudes are born within
him. You need only look at the beauty and happiness of his wife to see this is true. Force or otherwise, at least I would know I could not be taken by a better man. I stay leant across the bed for longer than is necessary but with his hand not pushing at my back there is nothing to do but straighten up and go off to the bathroom to swap their towels. In my absence I hear him bid Madame a cheery au revoir, and my heart sinks a little.

  *

  I cannot necessarily expect to see him again this day, at least not until the evening. Yet he calls for me unexpectedly, not an hour after he left the room. I am summoned to one of the private salons on the third floor. I have been to it a couple of times before with items for storage. It was almost empty then, with the carpet recently pulled up to leave a wooden floor. There is not much more to it now. Everything in it is white from the streaming sunlight and the sheets draped over all the furniture. The only things left uncovered are Madame’s old dressing screen in one corner and a large cheval mirror standing near the centre of the room. My Master is standing there in only his dressing gown – the silk one with the Japanese design. I do not know what he has beneath it but I can see a V of exposed flesh at his chest and his bare legs are testament to the fact he has no pyjama bottoms on. Why he is like this I have no idea, but I can feel the heat in my cheeks. I get a sudden mental flash of him opening the gown to reveal his nudity beneath.

  However, such images must wait because he is not there alone. He is with Monsieur Duval, the artist. The latter has a sneer and a large mole on his face, neither of which I am particularly partial to. Perhaps I’m being unkind and judging him based on what Bernard has said. Bernard does not like M. Duval one bit. He scorns him for being ‘jumped-up nobility’, that is, one whose ancestors were ennobled during Bonaparte’s time, usually for nothing more than holding clerking duties. The Master’s family have held their title for centuries. They have owned these same lands, raised armies at their own expense that fought for kings and emperors and even republics. For Bernard that means everything. He thinks breeding and class are innate. He cannot bear the fact that our Master is considered no more than bourgeois these days, when his blood is so noble. The others tease him and remind him that nobility means nothing in our country any more, that class was something the government wanted to abolish once and for all. This infuriates Bernard, who is funny about such things. I remember how angry he was once when a visiting Englishman referred to him as a valet, rather than a majordome – a mere gentleman’s assistant rather than the overseer of an entire estate.