Blue Tango

Chapter Twelve

Today after lunch Julie said her spirits have improved. “I won't be dismal.”

“Of course not.”

“I don't like people who continually fret.” She turned the teacup and looked around the room. “Do I seem happier?”

“Yes, I think so.”

She wore a light summer gown and her throat was bare. Her face had a pink glow. I thought the room was much too warm. I waved my fan.

Julie quivered. “But it's the future that concerns me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I can't live here forever.”

“Yes, you can.”

“I certainly cannot.”

“Darling, I want you to stay with us always. Don't you want to?”

“Claire, I simply can't.”

“But why not?”

“It's not fair. And I do want a house of my own. If only John hadn't gone down in that silly balloon. It's awful, isn't it? Being a widow is so ridiculous. I don't have anything. I ought to have something. Don't you think I ought to have something?” She waved a hand at me.

“You do have an income.”

“It's a pittance.”

“You shall stay here as long as you like.”

“You and Edward have been perfect darlings.”

“We do love you.”

I couldn't help it. I had to imagine them together. Oh, how comical it is. Perfect darlings. Does she call him a perfect darling when she rides him? I wonder what she thinks when they do it. One cant help wondering. One can't help thinking of them together.

“What do you think of Walter?

She looked at me. “What?”

“Walter Bramsby, darling. What do you think of him? Have you changed your mind? Do you find him more appealing these days?”

“I think he's a bore.”

“Oh, you don't mean that.”

“Men are… impossible.”

“Useful at times. I should think he'd make a decent husband. He seems adequate, doesn't he? I mean he seems to have the proper attributes.”

“What attributes?”

“Darling, he seems capable enough. He seems qualified to entertain a woman. More than qualified, I should think.”

“Oh that.”

“I don't know, of course. I'm sure you know, but I don't.”

“I don't know anything about Walter.”

“Darling, you can't mean…”

“Yes, I do mean. I don't know anything.”

“Nothing at all?”

“Nothing important. If you must know, I haven't been close to a man since John. It's not nice of you to ask, but since you did, you now have the answer.”

“I didn't ask.”

“I think you did.”

So there it is. She denies knowing anything about Walter. She denies that anything happened in that theater box. She denies whatever it is that goes on with Edward. Their secret meetings in his flat in Bedford Way. She denies everything. She claims to be a model of virtue.

“Indeed.”

“What?”

“Julie, darling, I think you ought to consider marrying Walter Bramsby. He's quite suitable, you know. He has a decent income and he seems quite fond of you. I think you ought to consider it.”

“I thought you said you wanted me to stay with you and Edward forever and ever.”

“You do know what I mean.”

“I do, I do. All right, I'll give Walter Bramsby my deliberate consideration.”

“Shall we have more tea?”

I never know what fills her mind. Is she serious about Walter? I think of them together. The way she milked him in the theater box. Walter says she does it often. He says she likes to do that more than anything else. She tells him she likes to see the spurting. He says she drives him completely mad.

After that Julie and I talked about clothes. I said she ought to think about a new wardrobe. “The fashion changes so quickly now.”

“I don't know what I want.”

She looked down at her frock. She ran a hand over her bosom. I suppose Edward likes her fullness there. He likes the rounds, the flesh heaving. “I'll take you along to my dressmaker.”

She smiled at me. “Oh, never mind that.”

“Darling, you must. It's a pity you can't wear my clothes, but our measurements are too different. You have more bust.”

“And more bottom.”

“That too. Will you agree to come with me to Mrs. Childers?”

“Yes, if I must.”

“A new wardrobe for the new season.”

“I shan't be able to pay her until Christmas.”

“Don't be silly, darling, Edward will pay. He's certainly rich enough to afford to dress two women.”

I found myself gazing at her throat, the soft hollow that sometimes pulses when she feels excitement. It was pulsing now. My sister has the loveliest complexion imaginable. How exquisite she is, how completely exquisite in that open summer gown.

Then Perkin brought a fresh pot of tea, and when the girl left, Julie said: “I should like to see her poked.”

“Poked?”

“The maid. I should like to see her with a man.”

I was speechless a moment. Then I laughed. “Darling, that's very naughty of you.”

“I should like to see a man in her bottom. She has a nice one, don't you think?”

“You've never talked this way before.”

“I don't know why.”

“We shouldn't talk of the maids like that.”

She made a face. “But why not? She's only a maid.”

“It upsets them.”

“She didn't hear me. Besides, we do things with them, don't we?”

“Yes, we do.” I looked at her. “And what do you do?”

“Do?”

“What do you do with them?”

She blushed. “I do what one does.” Then she smiled. “Or to put it more exactly, it's the maid who does what she does. I don't do much of anything.”

“Is it nice?”

“I'd rather not talk about it. I don't think we ought to talk about it.”

“She licks you, doesn't she?”

“Claire!”

I laughed. “Darling, there's no need to conceal it. I have her do the same, you know. I do like it.”

“You said we oughtn't to talk about them. In any case, I won't admit to anything. I won't admit to anything at all.”

I wondered about it. I wondered about what she actually did with the girls. All three. I know she's had each of them in her room. Is she ever tempted to kiss them? Selby is the prettiest. And the prettiest little bijou. Is my sister ever tempted?

She talked of Paris. “We ought to visit soon.”

“Perhaps at Christmas.”

“I don't like the crossing in winter.”

“Then perhaps next spring.”

“Mother's letters are so ridiculous.”

“Do you think much about them?”

A bubbling laugh came to her lips. “One must always think about them.”

“The other day I thought about the grange. That day you called me to the barn.”

“I did not call you. On the contrary, it was you who called me.”

“You always say that.”

“Claire, it's true.”

“Not quite, darling. I have the memory of it.”

“I don't think you do. You never remember exactly. You always have it wrong.”

“Wrong?”

“Where he was.”

“In her bottom.”

“In the other place.”

“Oh dear.”

“And it was your doing, Claire. I insist it was your doing.”

Her face was hot. I could see it in the color. “That's not true and you know it, don't you, darling? I don't know why you pretend. I have a complete memory of it. I was in the garden when you called me. You made me climb up that horrid ladder. Then you pulled me to have a look at them. She was on her knees. She had her skirts thrown up and he was definitely in her bottom.”

“It's all a lie!”

Her teacup rattled. She had such bitterness in her eyes. Her lips always swell when she's angry. She has such lovely lips.

Walter is so helpless. He sits beside me in a hansom in Mortimer Street. The carriage encounters a break in the road and he pouts. “Where are you taking me?”

“To Bloomsbury, darling.”

“But where?”

“Does it really matter? I thought you were fond of my company.”

“I like to be aware of my destination.”

“Yes, of course you do.” I pat his thigh. He has such marvelous thighs. I wonder if Julie is aware of them. Delicious.

He groans to protest when my hand finds the front of his trousers. “Claire, darling, not here.”

“And why not? I think you like it. Yes, you do like it. I can feel the evidence. You like to be touched, don't you, darling? I'm surely not the first. Tell me about your other women. I imagine you've upset half the ladies in Mayfair.”

“That's not true.”

“Then not half, a third. These buttons are a nuisance, aren't they?”

“Claire, please…”

“Here we are. How sweet. Just peeping. I'll keep it covered.”

“Someone will see.”

“Don't be such a dolt. This fellow in my hand has more sense than his master. Or is it the master in my hand, after all?”

“Where are we going?”

“We'll be there soon and then you'll have the answer.”

“I don't understand you. I'm not sure I ever understand you.”

“Walter, darling, it's not necessary to understand a woman. It's the woman who must understand the man. You do know that, don't you?”

“I don't know anything.”

“Don't spend. I shall be very cross with you if you spend in my hand.”

Then finally we arrive in Bedford Way. Walter's puzzlement shows in his face. We enter the small building. We climb the stairs to the flat. I open the door with my key. We enter the flat and I close the door behind us.

Walter pleads. “Whose flat is this?”

“It doesn't matter, does it? You ought to be quite happy to be here with me. Anyway, darling, it's not this flat but the one next door that counts.”

“I don't understand.”

“Yes, of course you don't. Kiss me, won't you?”

He kisses me. I press against him. I can feel his erection. How impatient he is. He quivers with anticipation. Now he understands the fact of my presence with him in this empty flat. Empty except for bits and pieces of furnishings. A jumble of things. I haven't had time. Walter kisses me again. Now he fondles me. He murmurs. He strokes my breasts through my gown. He holds my bottom.

“I must have you.”

“You're a naughty boy.”

“Claire, please-”

“Tell me what you want.”

“I want to make love to you.”

“With this?”

“Yes, with that.”

“First a surprise.”

“Surprise?”

“Yes, darling, a surprise. I've something to show you. In the bedroom. Come along now.”

I lead him to the bedroom. I lead him to the wall separating this flat from the one adjacent to it. The slide. I move the wooden slide and a wide slit appears. A thin slit. A thin opening in the wall. A thin view into the view next door. I whisper at Walter. “Come have a look.”

How unbending he is. He stands there in his Victorian obtuseness. He whispers back at me without stepping forward. “My God, what is it?”

“It's a peep-slit, darling. I've been told this place was once a house of unsavory reputation. You must look. If you don't come here at once, I shall never allow you to touch me again.”

At last he comes forward. His face is hot. His eyes are so innocent. He stands beside me and peers with me through the slit.

Of course the scene is already begun. I know their doings. I know the schedules. Julie is already naked. She lies on the bed while Edward sits beside her. They talk of something. Their voices are low and the words are only a mumble.

Walter shudders. For a moment I fear for his health. He whispers. “Good Lord, it's Julie.”

“Yes.”

“And Edward.”

“Most definitely Edward. Now don't say another word. We don't want them hearing us, do we?”

Walter shudders again. His eyes are now glued to the slit, his head bent in the effort, his hands trembling against the papered wall.

Caught like a minnow. Walter is such a boy. I look at them again. Julie and Edward upon the bed. She lies on her side, her full breasts showing their weight. Edward leans over her and kisses her mouth. He touches one of her breasts, squeezes it with his hand. Then his hand leaves her breasts and slides over her belly to her nest. She smiles and opens her legs to him. How pretty she is. Edward strokes her. Walter and I can see everything. Edward's fingers inside. Julie closes her eyes as he strokes her. She squirms beneath his hand. I know the precise moment he touches her clitoris. I can see his fingers in her wet sex. And Walter can see. I touch Walter's trousers. I find his buttons. All of them undone. His tool comes out. His cods. His swollen apparatus fully displayed. I fondle him as I peer through the slit again. Walter trembles in my hand as I gaze at Edward and Julie. I hold Walter's balls in my hand as I gaze at my husband and my sister.

Edward lies upon his back now. Julie bends over him. Her breasts hang. She has him in her mouth. She has his penis between her lips. How hungry she is. How gluttonous she is as she sucks at his knob.

She teases him. She pulls her mouth away. She laughs. We can hear it. We can hear the laughter, the words.

“You shouldn't have kissed me yesterday.”

Edward groans. “Where?”

“In the drawing room, silly. You kissed me in the drawing room and one of the maids almost noticed.”

“Don't stop.”

“My hand?”

“Yes.”

Her fingers stroke his tool. He seems so totally taken with her, so totally helpless. She watches him. She looks at his face, then she looks at his penis in her hand. She laughs as she fondles his balls. She turns in her bending. Edward gazes at her bottom. Walter and I gaze at her bottom. My sister has a glorious bottom.

Then she unhands him. She stretches out beside him and raises her knees. “You're quite ready, darling.”

Edward groans. “Yes.”

He mounts her. Her thighs are raised and the joining is hidden. Her breasts jiggle as he moves. She tosses her legs. Walter and I have them in profile and all that one can see is Edward's muscular bottom pumping up and down. Then suddenly he pulls out and he mutters something at her. Julie laughs and rolls over onto her belly. She raises her body, kneels before him with her bottom lifted. He enters quickly. This time we see the sliding of it, his thick tool pushing inside her sex. She groans. She wiggles her bottom as he pokes her. I hold Walter's affair in my hand. I can see how Julie grips Edward. I can see the fat lips of my sister's quim as she grips my husband.

“Edward, darling…”

“It's lovely.”

“You can finish in my bottom if you like.”

He laughs. “Good Lord, yes!”

His tool is withdrawn. He holds it in his hand, points it at the new target. Julie makes a sound of pleasure as he pushes in. Her bottom-hole. With a steady sliding, Edward enters her bottom-hole. They both groan. Julie wiggles. Edward moves more forcefully. Walter gasps beside me. His crisis is upon him. How amusing. How helpless he is as he spends. My fingers working in the milking. Pity the papered wall. The curlicues in the paper are so awful to the eyes.

The first time anything happened with John we were at a large dinner party in a castle in Newbridge. Edward and I had gone up to Oxford to visit Julie and John, and then somehow we all moved on to become weekend guests of a certain Lady Masham. She was a dotty old thing with a great deal of money and a paucity of brains, but she did have a splendid estate and a fondness for happy weekends. After the first dinner, I walked with John in the gardens. This was the first chance I'd had to be completely alone with my sister's husband. I took his arm. I told him how nice it was to be away from all the chatter at dinner. “I don't like crowds.”

He patted my hand. “Then you're not like Julie.”

“She's the prettier one, isn't she?”

“What?”

“I said Julie is the prettier one.”

“I find you just as pretty.”

We flirted. His eyes were upon my bare shoulders. He stroked my arm. He seemed surprised that I did not discourage his touching me. I was amused at the way he insistently gazed at my breasts. “You find them interesting?”

“What?”

“My breasts. Of course these are so tiny compared to Julie's. Not at all substantial.” I pulled at the front of my gown to show my nipples, to show the long points.

He flushed. “Good Lord, Claire…”

“You don't approve? I think my nipples, at least, are pretty.”

He mumbled, “Exquisite.”

“Kiss me.”

“He kissed my lips. He pressed against me. I allowed my belly to rub against the front of his trousers. His excitement was apparent. A conquest. How easy it is when the moment is ripe.

When our lips parted, he touched the front of my gown. He found a nipple and pinched it through the silk. He found the other nipple and did the same. “Superb.”

“You're my sister's husband.”

“Yes.”

A simple statement of fact. He seemed so capable. I was envious of Julie. I remembered the two of them frolicking in the wood in Surrey. I imagined him sailing in his balloon. How amusing it was to have him touch my nipples. My long points. Nature has awarded me a certain recompense for the lack of rondeur.

After that evening, John and I shared our little secret. In London again, I kept him at bay. He pressed for a rendezvous. One day when we were alone, he insisted it was impossible to wait. “You can't put me off any longer. I don't believe you want to. We must meet somewhere.”

I teased him. “I thought you were a patient man.”

“But a man at his limit.”

At his limit, indeed. I imagined his limit. I pictured the length and breadth of it. I hadn't seen much of it in Surrey. One wants the knowledge, the touching, the weight of a man's balls upon one's fingers.

I agreed to a rendezvous. We met one afternoon in a teashop. We drove in a carriage in St. James's Park. He kissed me. “I think of you constantly.”

I laughed. “Immoral thoughts.”

“Quite immoral.”

“We mustn't drive too long. I'm expected at home in a quarter hour.”

“But I thought…”

“Today?”

“Lord, yes!”

“John, it's not possible.”

“You put me in a frenzy.”

How quaint he was. I kissed his cheek. I touched him. I touched the bulging of it. I had to see. He groaned as I undid his buttons. Too many buttons. His tool came out long and thick in my hand. Formidable. Then his balls. His hairy cods bulged out of the opening in his trousers. He gasped as I tickled his balls. The carriage was closed. No one on the walk could see us. The driver was oblivious.

John shuddered. “It's unreasonable.”

“Unreasonable?”

“We ought to be in a room somewhere.”

“Not this? Don't you like to be stroked? Yes, you do like it. Certainly His Eminence likes it. Look how strong he is.”

Impressively strong. What a lovely thick tool. He groaned as I stroked him. I had such fun with it. The heat of it. His throbbing in my hand as I pulled the cowl back and forth over his knob. Then a firmer grip as I lengthened the stroking. He was sensible enough to offer his handkerchief. Then a moment later he made a noise in his throat. A yielding cry as he spouted. A cry of complete submission.

We met again briefly a week later, once again in a carriage. He said it was imperative that I go with him to a room he had. I refused. “Don't you love Julie?”

“I love Julie as much as you love Edward.”

“Then it's obvious we can't go on with this.”

“Claire, I'm desperate.”

“I should think you'd have more sense. A man who sails in balloons ought to have more sense.”

I finally agreed to the accomplishment of it. I agreed to meet him again in a private flat. Three days later we were alone in Belgrave Mews. He kissed me. He pressed his hands against my bottom.

“Don't be impetuous,” I said.

“I must have you.”

“I want something to drink.”

He brought champagne. I dawdled. I teased him. I made him wait. I thought of that lovely tool so eager for it. My sister's husband. How strange to be alone with Julie's husband in a flat in Belgrave Mews.

At last I undressed for him. His eyes were feverish as he watched me. He wanted so much to have me. I stripped down to my stockings. “Well, there.”

“Exquisite.”

“You always say that.”

“It's the word that defines you.”

How gallant he was. I could not deny my own excitement. I could feel the tingling, the signs of expectation. “A gentleman oughtn't to remain dressed while a lady is undressed.”

His clothes flew away in an instant. He came to me. He pressed against me and kissed my lips. He fondled my bottom. I held his balls in my hand. His tool throbbed against my belly. How impressive he was. I fondled him. I teased him. My conquest of him was complete. In a few moments he had me upon a chaise, his mouth pressed upon my sex. He burrowed. How ardent he was in his burrowing. His mouth sucking at my juices. Then he mounted me. My legs raised. His muscular body so demanding. So methodical in his lovemaking. One remembers the force of it, the frenzied insistence, the sliding tool. He moved quickly to the finish, thrusting at me, his chest heaving. I felt the wetness as he spurted. The very next day he sailed in his balloon and that was the last anyone saw of him. I don't think he shared Julie's bed in the interim. In fact, I'm quite certain of it.

Part Three: Edward