“Yes, Miss Cleves.” “By the by,” the redhead said over her shoulder as she quit the library, “your brother James is waiting there too.” I must give a full, clinical report. This Era, this Victorian Era, is full of dissembling and hypocrisy. I pride myself so far on my candor… What I did not care for in the situation with Angela was the plain and simple truth that she was blackmailing a ten-year-old girl-no matter how precocious and sophisticated I was-and a twelve-year-old boy-and there was no male more advanced than he was for his age. Somehow, therefore, Angela Cleves had to be brought to book. For the moment I did not know how, but I promised myself that this would be a major undertaking, and that my co-conspirator would be, of course, my brother James. In the meantime, however, I had no recourse but to do Angela Cleves' bidding. For me to say that in doing so was unremitting misery, I should have to lie. No, much of my association with our governess was pure bliss, unmitigated pleasure, a fantastic trip to the sublime-especially so during an Era when the Establishment officially looked upon sex with loathing and disgust, aside from such figures as Sir Richard Burton who, during the intervals between his explorations translated the whole of the Arabian Nights, but which I was only able to read in expurgated version at that time. Now, when I must buy my lovers, I can read the unbowdlerized edition, but the erotic impact, I fear, is minimal.
Then, the impact of the Arabian Nights, even in its scissored version, was maximal, and I fantasied opening my legs and permitting an army of men to book passage-whom I would then transport… But I am anticipating my story. Let me return to Angela. Unlike many another English family of the blood, my mother and father never for a moment believed in stinting on attire and ambience either with their children or those most directly concerned with them, such as the tutor or governess. Accordingly, Oliver Harwell and his like during his tenure had a most comfortable small suite, and Angela Cleves, and others of her tribe, were similarly ensconced. When I entered Miss Cleves' well-appointed precincts, I was struck by the fact that the gaslights were low in the bedroom while, beyond, in the bathroom, they burned with a feverish brilliance. Almost as if to say, what was to be done in burning clarity might even be better done in the shadows. I can't say that Cleves was champing at the bit while waiting for me, nor did it seem to me that my brother was unduly aroused. On the contrary, they seemed to be having a perfectly composed exchange. It appeared that Cleves was an amateur naturalist much taken by the observation of birds. “Did you know that?”
James asked of me. “I had no idea.” My reply had been reserved.
How Angela Cleves could be brought to book and got rid of, would be the riddle of the century if it turned out James would not join forces with me. But he shall-he must! We could not tolerate a blackmailer in our bosom-she must be rooted out. But the rooting out of Angela would have to be put off at least for this evening, and probably for some time to come. There was nothing either James or I could do for the moment except to comply as graciously as possible with Cleves' wishes. Of course, the nature of her wishes were such, too, that we could hardly turn away from the pleasures of the sensual. “I would suggest,” Miss Cleves said, her faintly slanted gray eyes betraying a kind of curling amusement, “that since we are presently not involved in observing the winged creatures of our land, and that because hot water does tend to cool, we presently undress for the bath. As you know, since I'm rather forward-looking, I do not allow false modesty, especially under these circumstances when discretion is the better part of valor, to stand in our way.” Ah, indeed. Who could forget Miss Cleves? And, without further ado, the redheaded voluptuary began to divest herself. James and I had no recourse but to follow suit. James was shortly bare of all but his skin. I had to smile, and Angela Cleves' lips trembled in repressed humor, as for the moment we regarded my estimable brother standing there in the integument with which he had originally been brought into this curious world. His face was a very model of serenity and composure, but-alas-the youth was elsewhere betrayed. For, in its tremor dancing a little jig, between his thighs there shook his as yet unmonstrous catapulter. In the parlance of my imagination, my brother's member was at half mast and at the mercy, one might have said, of a mild seismographic effect. It was a sweet member, I thought, and one which I would have liked, tenderly, to kiss-in a most sisterly fashion! But I was never to experience that with James, and to this day it distresses me to think of the taboo that had me desist from kissing my brother's phallus and bringing it within my pulsant harbor, while I nevertheless permitted my fingers to have my way with him-in what way may the hand be less guilty than the vaginal and oral orifices?
In any case, it was obvious that James was already responding to the spirit of the occasion. The many highlights on the lustrous, curling black hair of his groin seemed to indicate, too, that there already might have been something of a discharge that had burnished the hair. The heavy throbbing that had commenced in the region of my own genitalia led me to believe there might shortly be a similar effect on my black curls which, for my age, were a profusion. It took Angela Cleves and myself considerably longer to denude ourselves because of the multiple nature of our undergarments. I do know that, finally, I made quite a picture-Miss Cleves had had the foresight of having had a full-length dress mirror installed in her bedroom, and I found myself staring at the raven-tressed lass who had developed rather in advance of the full decade she had been on the earth. All the concavities and convexities were present save for the abundant teats-they were not yet so except for the marvelous gifts of my nipples, whose sharpness and protrusion I could match with almost anyone's… “The bath,” I heard myself murmuring. “Oh, the bath,” I muttered, knowing that James was staring at me as I felt myself, felt the sticky wetness even as I watched myself do it in the mirror, felt an even heavier throbbing as I saw Angela Cleves, petticoat after petticoat, ruffle after ruffle, laciness after laciness, at last reveal herself and shake loose the red hair piled atop her head, shaking it loose so that it fell to her waist, her incredibly slim waist that flared into the harp of luxuriant womanhood. She lifted both her arms and took our hands, James's and mine, and led us, as if we were sacrifices-and by that point we were willing enough!-into the bathroom where the gaslight was high, was a feverish brilliance, where the sheer milkiness of my skin and that of my brother's could be clearly seen, contrasting with the ebon of our hair, and where, too, the beauty that was Angela's could be gazed at to the heart's content.