"Yes."
"You would be over head and ears in love then," she rejoined, laughing, "and I fear I should be compelled to punish you again. But, come, how would you like to love me?"
"I should like to be close to you-oh, so close-to feel you as close to me-to hold your hands, to look into your eyes, to kiss you, to expire for you."
"If you think of kissing my lips, some day, years hence, if you are very good and very obedient in the meanwhile, and have a moustache-well, perhaps then, if you remember, you may ask again."
"But how could I wear a girl's clothes with a moustache?"
"I do not think it is good for a youth without a moustache to kiss a lady's mouth. It is only after long and devoted service, after winning his way upwards in her favour by slow degrees, that such a delight could be permitted."
"But may I," I asked eagerly, half-rising, "kiss your feet? I have done so once. Let me begin at the beginning. Let me do it again, and perhaps I may get a little higher, because-because-"
"Because what?"
"When you were whipping me you-you stood over me, and perhaps-might-kiss your-"
"Kiss what?"
"Your leg," said I with bated breath. I was intoxicated with the recollection of the contact of the warm soft flesh and the satin skin.
"And would you really like to kiss my legs again?" enquired Mademoiselle archly, moving them ravishingly. "Well, we shall see. I have something here I want to read, when we have done talking; and then perhaps I may let you put your lips to my ankle. But you must first tell me about your experiences of a petticoat-you were very inquisitive about them. What could have induced you to lift up that girl's petticoats? What did you expect to see underneath them? Your affection for petticoats made me put you in them, Julian. That is what your curiosity has brought you to."
"Oh, I lifted them out of sheer mischief. What is it that girls hide so carefully underneath them? I only saw a pair of fat legs."
"I dare say you will know before you are much older. Mischief! Mon Dieu! Did you not feel naughty?"
"I felt carried away by some passion or other. Is that feeling naughty? It is rather a nice feeling."
"Did you feel the same under my petticoats?"
"A little."
"And whilst Elise was marching you off to be birched by me?"
"Yes."
"And whilst I was punishing you?"
"Yes."
"Especially, I suppose, when I lifted up your shirt?"
"Yes."
"Now, cannot you guess why?"
"No. Have girls the same thing under their petticoats as I have under my shirt? Is that why they wear them?"
"Have you never seen a girl naked?"
"No." '
"Look at those statues. Look at that Venus; look at Aurora. Have they got the thing you complain of?"
"No; but I always thought that was because they were only statues."
"And you don't know what that thing is capable of, and why women have not got one?"
"No."
"I must really give you a psychological lesson, Julian, and put you in possession of knowledge which a great boy like you should have. At present you are unfit for life and for the world, and much of the discipline you are having would be thrown away if I did not instruct you."
So Mademoiselle got up, and radiant with amusement, she reclined on the great ottoman at my side, with her left arm across me. She settled herself comfortably, and then turning her head and looking over her shoulder into my eyes, she questioned me archly as to whether her being so close to me did not make me feel naughty? I was almost suffocated by the violence of my feelings, nor did she wait for any reply, but rapidly slipping her right hand under my petticoats and moving it along the front and inside of my things, she caused me inexpressible emotion. She then caught hold of the thing in front of me.
"It is here you feel naughty, you bold boy. Another time I should whip you for this." These words made me worse.
"Yes! Yes!" I gasped in hushed tones.
"How it has grown!" she exclaimed, as she held it tightly in her hand.
Leaning close to me, she mingled a little pain with my pleasure by drawing the foreskin up and down several times, each time further back. I wriggled and said she hurt me.
"It is very tight," she remarked, and then finally grasping it and the testicles together in her hand, she squeezed and opened her hand frequently, sending a convulsive thrill each time through my body, so that several times I nearly threw her off me and jumped up. But she held me tight in that delicious thraldom and persistently continued her movement.
"Oh! Oh! Mademoiselle. Oh! Miss de Chambonnard! Oh, how nice! Oh, how I love you! How I adore you! I–I-worship" (squeeze, squeeze) "you! Oh, let me go! Oh, don't! Oh, how nice your hand" (squeeze) "is there! Oh, how I love you!" clasping her slender waist round from the back with any disengaged arm.
"Oh, take your hand away! Something awful-something dreadful will happen. I am sure it will, and I cannot prevent it. Oh! Oh!" For all answer, squeeze, squeeze, squeeze, uninterruptedly and determinedly continued.
When she worked me almost into a frenzy, and my movements, jerks, and exclamations showed me to be in extremis, still holding me and pressing me more tightly, she again turned her head to look into my eyes. I noticed her own eyes were swimming. She squeezed me and crushed me more energetically, not uttering a syllable, but pressing against me with her whole form.
At last a convulsive shudder shook my frame from head to foot, and finally centred and concentrated itself in what she had hold of. Completely beyond myself and without my control, it went into a violent spasm of throbs, causing me such a sensation of delight and satisfaction as I had never dreamt of in my wildest moments, spouting out something time after time into her dainty hand, which was now still, and only quiescently grasping me.
"Oh," I gasped as I lay exhausted, and she arose, "if only I could do that to you!"
"Where should you put it, Master Julian?" she asked, laughing.
That, I confess, puzzled me.
As I lay recovering, my eyes rivetted on Mademoiselle, I understood why women have such power over men, why men will go through so much for them, and how truly they may be named "mistress." It is because they have it in their power to do that with his body, which can convulse him with inexpressible and delirious joy. I began to feel the subtle pleasure of being wrapt in a woman's garments, which seemed hallowed from their resemblance to those which enveloped Mademoiselle herself, as she stood a little distance off, wiping her dainty hand with a handkerchief, and putting on a pretty and amused air of delicate disgust.
I had been introduced to Love, and made acquainted with one of the secrets of its influence and power. Love was no longer an abstraction, but the sweetest and most desirable reality. Venus had, however, so far only uncovered her face. I felt the want of some complement of my ecstasy, of some participation in it. The veil had fallen to the Goddess's shoulders, not yet to her feet!
Mademoiselle again ensconced herself in her easy chair, and taking up her book, turned over its leaves somewhat at random. Her breasts rose and fell more quickly than before; and upon her cheeks there was just the slightest possible flush-such a flush of pink as a delicate white rose sometimes has. And in her dark eyes shone a glorious and laughing light, which she allowed to radiate upon me, reminding me of the laughter-loving Venus, and revealing the significance of that Homeric epithet.
CHAPTER 7
I felt convinced that there was some way as yet undisclosed-some means by which I could comprehensively and entirely love and be loved.
I had already become sensible of the rapture of possessing in some degree the secret of the concealed springs which, duly worked upon, rose in fountains of overwhelming volume and transported one in floods of delight.