‘He could be a bit more sensitive,’ Jenna agreed. ‘But then, that’s Victorians for you, probably.’
‘Harvilles, more like.’
‘Yeah, that wouldn’t surprise me. Harvilles.’
Jenna sighed, thinking of her own narrow escape with a scion of that ilk.
‘I don’t know if I dare read on,’ she said.
‘I’ll do it,’ Jason offered. ‘I’ve got used to that curly writing now.’
‘Oh, go on then. But don’t laugh in the middle of a sentence. Poor Frances. She deserves a bit of sympathy.’
‘No, I’m with you there. She does. OK then.’ Jason cleared his throat and read on.
‘I opened my eyes, but what I saw was not what I had pictured. Nothing like the small appendage sported by Michelangelo’s David. This was a longer, thicker thing, curving upwards like a hunting horn . . .’
‘You promised you wouldn’t laugh,’ Jenna reproached.
‘No, but “hunting horn”! I wonder if she wanted to blow it.’
‘Don’t be horrible.’
‘Sorry. I’ll try to control myself, OK?’
It was certainly almost twice the length of my hand, and it looked primitive and fierce, rising from its nest of downy dark hair as it did. I could look at it for only a second or so before lifting my eyes to his.
They glowed with satisfaction. His smile was wide and bright.
‘Touch it, Frances,’ he said. ‘Put your fingers around it and feel its spirit.’
Its spirit, if such it possessed, was warm, firm, and yet also soft. In my hand, it felt like something I could bend, but I did not dare try.
My husband was satisfied with my quick obedience. He rewarded me with kisses, and not just upon my face. His mouth roamed the length and breadth of my body, his breath hot and fast and broken by growls at times. He was like a wolf, come to feast upon its prey. I should never have imagined him so, from his behaviour in the drawing room. Are all men thus? I suppose I shall never know.
He left no part of me untouched by hand or mouth, even when I tried to shut my legs to his attentions. He would not have it, and made me lie in such an abandoned pose that I felt sinful in the extreme.
At length his wanderings seemed to come to their end, and he crouched above me, close enough for his hair to brush my skin.
‘You know what I must do?’ he breathed, and I shook my head. ‘The best I can do is show you. But be warned. There will be some pain, some blood.’
‘Some . . . blood?’
I felt a bolt of panic rise in my throat and I tried to push him off, but he held me in place, shaking his head.
‘No, Frances, no. You should have been told. Your mother?’
‘She said nothing of blood.’
‘It will be only very little. And it will not last long. The pain will soon ease and then all will be much easier.’
‘You are sure of this?’
He stroked my face.
‘I am quite sure. Hold tight to my shoulders. I will be as quick as I am able.’
Yes he was quick. And it did hurt. And there was blood. But none of these three things made the strongest impression on me. Much stronger, staying with me in my mind, was the sense of violation and of terrible degradation that I felt. Pain was nothing in comparison. Blood could be washed clean. But this feeling of having been burrowed into and invaded could not leave me.