Frantically, I tried to count our party. Hannah. I knew she was there although I had lost sight of her for the moment. Becky. She was sitting decorously at a window seat, not unaware that she looked pretty as a picture, neatly framed and wearing her new bonnet. Rosie, Ian and Donald, Catherine, the dark girl, the two aesthetes, Cecily, Gwendolen, Becky's friend's cousin Jack from Paris. If everyone was who I thought they were, the numbers added up. I breathed a sigh of relief. Then I realised that they didn't. I'd forgotten to count myself. 'Deirdre's coming as well,' said Rosie suddenly. 'Hannah told me.' This was too much to bear. The signal at the end of the platform dropped. The guard whistled and waved his flag. The locomotive gave a great Whuff! and a cloud of black smoke shot up into the station roof. I gave up, dived for a compartment and scrambled in, pulling Rosie with me. I banged the door shut behind me, barked my shins on a wicker hamper that was on the floor and, as the train jolted forward, sat down abruptly. 'Ow!' said Becky. 'You're heavy,' and pushed me off her lap. And so we set off on the great Northampton adventure, although who was there and if they were the right people, I had no idea. Nor in truth did I much care. I pulled out a handkerchief and mopped my brow. The train was labouring and lurching as the locomotive made heavy weather of the steep gradient out of the station. There came a sudden jolt and I dropped the tickets which I had managed to retrieve from Rosie all over the floor of the compartment. As I scrabbled around frantically on all fours, reaching under seats and people's feet, the wicker basket by the door over which I had tripped on getting in, creaked and moved.
'What the devil is that!' I exclaimed. 'It moved. There's something alive in it!' 'It's all right,' said someone. 'It's only George.' 'I thought George was Gwendolen's friend. Cecily, you pointed him out to me. The tall man in the fur coat and green carnation. Now you claim he's shut up in a hamper! I think I'm going insane!' 'That's the other George,' said Cecily. 'This George is the other George's friend Monty's pet mongoose. He called it after George. At least that's what Gwendolen told me.' 'A mongoose!' I cried out. 'Why in God's name have we brought a mongoose with us.
Northamptonshire is not particularly known for its snakes is it?'
'Monty always travels with George, or so I have been given to understand,' said Cecily. 'He takes him for walks on a lead.'
'This is a mad house!' I exclaimed. 'And that is Camden Town,' said Rosie. Everything went dark. 'Primrose Hill tunnel,' said Rosie in my ear. 'Quick!' She seized my hand, causing my to drop the tickets again and thrust it under her skirt. I felt the warmth of her pussey beneath my fingers. 'Like that,' she said, and began to rub herself gently against me. First one finger and then a second slipped into her. I felt her hand as in turn she felt for me, unbuttoned me and drew my prick out. In spite of my confusion and worry, I felt it begin to stiffen in the smoky darkness.
She licked my ear with her pointed little tongue. 'Don't you just love travelling by train?' she said. Before I could do anything more, the train shot out into the daylight again. To my horror I realised that sitting opposite me was the pale young clergyman I had seen talking to the other aesthete on the platform. Rosie's skirt was up around her waist. My hand was clamped in her pussey and my member was standing up in full view. 'Bless you, my children,' said the cleric. 'Pray, continue. Such a pretty sight.' Even Rosie looked startled. 'I am Montmorency Willowherb,' he went on. 'What a charming bush your young companion has.', 'What-' I exclaimed, jumping as though I had been bitten and withdrawing my hand from Rosie's pussey as though it was on fire. 'Although for myself,' he went on, 'I find that the completely naked, hairless quim has a great attraction.
There is an innocence about it that I find delightfully prelapsarian.'
'What -' I spluttered again. 'I am sorry,' he went serenely on. 'A technical term in my calling. Before the Fall. That state of unashamed innocence that existed in the Garden of Eden before that unfortunate incident with a snake and an apple. I have a friend who swears by the exquisite pleasure to be had from a hairless cunney. I don't know whether you have any strong opinions on the subject?'
I had become completely speechless but Rosie, intrigued possibly by meeting someone even more outrageous than herself, was beginning to look interested in the conversation. 'The Art Master at school once told me that he had always preferred the pussey to be naked and unadorned until he met my friend Henrietta. She was of Italian extraction and had the most luxurious dark-haired pussey in the whole school. She tied little pink and pale blue bows in it before he photographed it. Every time he fucked her, she used to take one of the bows out of her hair and give it to him. He was most taken with the sight. He said he didn't know if it was Art but he knew that he liked it. Unfortunately my pussey hair is not long enough for me to decorate it in such a fashion.' 'It looks very sweet as it is,' said the young clergyman. 'Thank you, Sir,' Rosie said, smiling sweetly.
'Andrew, where is your hand? Put it back at once.' She grabbed for me but I resisted, completely taken aback by this conversation and display before a complete stranger. Rosie looked a little cross.
'Andrew,' she said, 'You are being difficult. Oh, look! There is a smut on the end of your prick.' She fished out a small cambric handkerchief, wetted it with her tongue and then rubbed delicately at the tip of my half-awakened member. At her touch it stiffened somewhat. 'There,' she said. 'That's better.' She bent down and kissed it lightly, at the same time pulling my hand on to her pussey. I was too taken by surprise to resist in time. She began to rub my finger up and down the entry to her hidey-hole. 'Tell me,' she said, redirecting her attention to the cleric opposite us, 'Do you enjoy travelling by train?' 'As a general rule, yes,' he said.
'There is often something of interest to be seen. Usually this is outside the carriage window but, on occasion, within as well.'
'Shortly you will have the choice,' said Rosie, 'between watching Watford outside the window, or my pussey inside.' 'While I have nothing against Watford,' said the cleric, 'I think that the nearer view is the more enchanting by far.' 'Without wishing to seem in any way forward,' said Rosie, 'I feel that I must ensure your undivided attention.' With that, she began to unbutton her bodice. As her fingers busied themselves, the upper slopes of her lovely rounded little breasts were revealed. Between them a small locket nestled. With the swaying of the train, it swung forward.
'Seed pearls and gold, if I am not mistaken,' said our companion.
'Is there some picture of sentimental value inside?' 'Not exactly a picture,' said Rosie. 'See.' She pulled it free, ran a thumb nail along the side and it opened easily. 'A souvenir of schooldays,' she said. Inside was a small coil of hair. I looked closely at it and realised that there was both light brown hair and dark hair carefully entwined. 'Henrietta and I,' Rosie said with a grammatical precision that made me realise that at least some orthodox teaching had gone on at her school. 'Just before I left, we swore eternal friendship and each of us snipped off a tuft of her pussey hair which we plaited together so that we should never forget one another. We gave another similar memento to the Art Master after he had fucked us both for one last time. We made him swear that he would wear it next to his heart.' 'How delightfully sentimental,' said the clergyman. All went suddenly dark again. 'Watford tunnel,' said Rosie. 'You appear to have the entire map of the railway system committed to memory,' came another female voice out of the darkness. 'I used to study the map at nights in the dormitory while I was planning my escape from school,' said Rosie. 'Who's that?' I asked. Rosie meanwhile was pressing my fingers against her and I felt her open up to my touch. Inside she was warm and mouthwateringly wet. 'A friend,' said the second voice.