Keeper of Pleas

by A. Wendeberg

  He snapped his watch shut, dropped it back into his waistcoat pocket and turned to the witnesses. They didn’t seem to share his worries. His assistant and his housekeeper stood there quite relaxed, waiting. The one rocking on his heels, the other with her hands folded behind her back. Both smiled pleasantly, perhaps stupidly. The priest smoothed nonexistent hair over his skull. Behind him, a fly buzzed around Jesus’s crotch.

  This is ridiculous.

  His hand hurt. Which one. Ah, the left. He looked down at it and was surprised to find something pale, claw-like. He could barely loosen his grip around the head of his cane. That was when he realised he was about to panic.

  He cleared his throat. Why the panic? Because it’s my wedding, dammit. Why did I even… Ah, it was my own stupid idea. My own. No one to blame but myself.

  A creak yanked him from his thoughts. He looked up and saw Mary, no, Olivia, stepping through the large double-winged door. The first thing he noticed was that she was alone. He had two witnesses, a priest, and even Jesus protecting his back. Not that he needed protection. But she walked alone, and that wasn’t right. There should have been her father there, leading her to the groom.

  Get a grip on yourself, man! This is not a happily-ever-after wedding.

  And yet.

  Seeing her walk alone made him feel uncomfortable.

  The second thing he noticed was that, despite her solitude, she held her head high and her back straight. A queen walking to her own beheading.

  How do I bed a prostitute without giving her the feeling she’s doing her duty?

  He almost laughed. Wives were supposed to fulfil their duties to their husbands. Whores were supposed to fulfil their duties to their clients.

  Where was the difference?

  What a twisted situation.

  The third thing he noticed was that, today, she shone. An otherworldly creature. Her gown was made of white silk with white beads or pearls forming delicate patterns. Sunlight and dew on a butterfly cocoon. Her hair was elaborately braided and pinned, white pearls on black hair. Her gaze was directed at the altar, not straying left or right. He didn’t even know if, to her, he existed. All of a sudden, he felt old. Old and incapable.

  What was I thinking, offering her this? Ha! Offer! I blackmailed her into it. Marry me, or die a whore.

  He blinked, and told himself to stop it already.

  She came to a halt next to him, still looking straight ahead, and wrapped her gloved fingers around his elbow. He’d forgotten to offer it to her, so now he jutted it out a little too much to compensate for his previous lack of attention.

  She tugged at his arm, and he bent toward her.

  ‘You are nervous,’ she whispered into his ear. ‘It was your idea. However, you may run if you wish. I promise, I won’t weep.’

  He pressed his lips together and cleared his throat. It was all he could do to muffle the snort that was threatening to rip through his nervousness. He sucked in air, exhaled it, and smiled at her. ‘Thank you, my dear. Should we run together?’

  ‘A very romantic offer,’ she whispered into his ear. ‘But this is a business transaction. Treat it as such.’

  ‘I should have courted you.’

  ‘What for?’ she asked, puzzled.

  The priest announced the beginning of said business transaction with a pointed, ‘Erhem!’ then rattled down his speech. Sévère didn’t hear much of it. It must have been what the man usually said on such occasions. At some point, Sévère said his vows and Olivia said hers.

  Then, everyone looked at him expectantly. He wondered what they wanted from him.

  Stripling wiggled his fingers.

  The ring! Where was the bloody ring?

  Ah! In his waistcoat pocket. He pulled it out and almost dropped it, then attempted to slip it onto her gloved finger. He cleared his throat yet again, and pulled off her glove, finger by finger.

  A flicker of sunlight caught on the golden band.

  Sévère inhaled, exhaled, grew calmer. Sign the papers, he told himself. Don’t forget to sign the goddamn papers.

  The priest said something and when Sévère didn’t react, the stout man repeated, a little louder this time, ‘You may now kiss your wife.’

  Sévère knew he’d forgotten something essential. He looked down at Olivia and Olivia looked up at him. She took a step forward, rose on her toes, and pecked him on the cheek.

  Pecked him!

  ‘I’ll be damned,’ he murmured, and grabbed her waist with his right hand — he didn’t dare let go of his cane, else his body might fail him entirely — and yanked her against his chest. The position forced her to tip her head upward.

  There might have been coldness in her eyes, something that told him that she was used to being taken, that she couldn’t care less.

  As if.

  Well, then, he thought. Here I come.

  He softened his grip and ran his hand up along the silk which so deliciously hugged her body, trailed his fingers up to her neck, and rested his palm against her face, drawing circles on her temples with his thumb until her eyelids fluttered a little. He leant in and softly kissed her forehead, her nose, and the corner of her mouth.

  He felt her stiffen under his ministrations, so he whispered against her lips, ‘Later, perhaps?’

  And that was when she stepped on his toes, grabbed his cravat, and parted his lips with hers in a no-nonsense kiss.

  ‘Erhem!’ the priest said again and Olivia let go of Sévère and answered, ‘Erhem.’ Sévère couldn’t not say ‘Erhem!’ now, and so he did.

  The priest’s throat reddened over his whatever-this-collar-was-called-again, they signed the papers, and walked down the aisle together.

  Sévère’s new brougham awaited them.

  ‘Are your shoes comfortable?’ he asked Olivia.

  ‘Quite.’

  He shrugged off his coat and dropped it over her shoulders, tucked her hand tighter into the bend of his elbow, turned on his heel, and marched her away from the four-wheeler, away from church and witnesses and priest. ‘I’ve had enough of this circus. Let us have pastries and coffee. And perhaps a brandy.’

  ‘Are you abducting the bride?’

  ‘Precisely.’

  ❧

  ‘Allow me,’ he said.

  She dropped her hands and straightened her back. In the vanity, her eyes were watching him. ‘You are nervous,’ she said. ‘Still. But why? Neither of us is a virgin.’

  ‘I’ve never done this before. Tell me if I hurt you.’ His fingers gingerly extracted the first pin from her hair. A strand was caught in the small metal loop and he struggled to remove it without causing her pain.

  ‘Only ninety-nine left.’ Her voice wobbled. A twitchy smile slipped off her mouth.

  ‘You are nervous,’ he copied her. ‘Why? Neither of us is a virgin.’

  ‘I’ve never been nervous. Before.’

  ‘Neither have I.’

  ‘I’ve never been married,’ she said.

  ‘Perhaps that’s it? Neither of us has ever been married, let alone to each other. We are justified in being nervous together.’ He managed to extract a second pin.

  ‘It’s growing dark outside,’ she said.

  ‘Are you in a hurry?’

  She inhaled as deeply as her stays would allow. ‘I want to know how it ends.’

  ‘Do you read books like that, too? From back to front?’

  She shook her head, pulling a pin from between his fingers.

  ‘Did you always know how it would end when you received a client?’ he asked.

  ‘I usually did, yes.’

  ‘I am not your client.’

  Fifth pin! He almost blurted out his triumph. Were there really a whole of ninety-five left?

  He began to count but stopped when she said, ‘You are my employer.’

  ‘It was you who asked to be bedded, not I.’

  ‘True. Maybe that’s why I’m nervous. I’ve never asked for this before. I don’t know what to
expect. Let me do this.’ She raised her hands and impatiently picked one pin after the other, not caring about pain and ripped-out hair.

  He watched until he couldn’t take it any longer. ‘Olivia, stop!’ He covered her hands with his, pried her stubborn fingers off, and continued pulling her hairpins. One by one. ‘Lean back,’ he said softly.

  She sank against the backrest.

  He felt her eyes on him and wondered how he appeared to her with his clumsy fingers that would surely need another hour or so to free her hair of pins and needles. His age. His odd gait. Did they bother her?

  He wondered if a man had ever served her this way — undoing her hair without making demands. His eyes strayed to her slender neck, her shoulders, the delicate sweep of her clavicles pressing against her dress.

  He looked up at her reflection in the glass and saw that her gaze had softened.

  ‘I am nervous,’ he said quietly. ‘Because you are young, and I am older. Because you are healthy and strong, and I am weakening. Because your social status is so much lower than mine. You’ve been coerced into taking my offer if you want anything better in life than what you’ve had. This should make me bold, but I am not. I’m afraid of breaking you, although you are the one who’s laid hands on me. I’ve fancied myself experienced. Until now. I’ve fancied myself a man who could easily show any woman the pleasures of the marriage bed. “Look, this is how you do it. And here is how you touch me and this is how I touch you. You like it, don’t you.”’

  He smiled a bitter smile. ‘I know precisely what to do with a woman whom I’ve paid to give me pleasure. I might even know what to do with a woman who knows little of such matters. But I am at a loss for what to do with a woman who knows too much, and asks me to please her.’

  ‘I intimidate you?’

  ‘It’s odd, isn’t it.’

  She nodded, and looked down at her hands. ‘One hundred strokes,’ she whispered.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘One hundred strokes.’ She held out the brush to him.

  ‘Shouldn’t I unbraid it first?’

  Her hand sank back to her lap. ‘Yes.’

  His fingers wove through her braids and undid them. One by one. Her heavy hair spilt onto her shoulders, the straight black now in waves. He thought of a raven’s wing ruffled by the wind.

  He began to brush her hair, combing with his fingers, then running the bristles through the strands. ‘Is this how you make it so beautiful? With one hundred strokes?’

  ‘Yes. Twice a day.’ Her voice was low, the timbre of it drew his eyes to her reflection. He felt a pull inside his chest, and the wish to lay his lips on hers.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked.

  ‘I need to sit for a moment,’ he lied. He felt surprisingly bad about the lie. But wasn’t he supposed to lie tonight? She’d asked that of him. Didn’t he lie with ease? Usually?

  She rose and took his hand, led him to the bed and sat him down. Without a word, she slipped off his shoes and pushed them beneath the bed.

  ‘Olivia,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Are you certain you want this? We can simply sign a paper that states we consummated the marriage.’

  ‘As long as you are certain you can lie well, I am certain I want this to happen. Can you, Sévère? Lie well?’

  ‘Have I ever treated you without respect?’

  ‘Yes, at the beginning you did. But that does not matter now. What I’m asking of you is to pretend you love me. I ask you to make love to me as a husband does to his beloved wife on their first night together.’

  ‘You owe me your honesty, Olivia.’

  ‘If I lied to you, I wouldn’t be so complicated.’

  Frowning, he dipped his head.

  ‘You have my honesty, Sévère.’

  He gazed down at her slender fingers that rested on his knees. ‘Then I will make love to you as a husband does to his beloved wife on their first night together.’

  She reached out to unbutton his waistcoat. He caught her hands and said, ‘There are only three buttons on my garments, but hundreds on yours. Allow me to undo yours first.’

  ‘Hooks,’ she replied, as she sat on the bed, offering her back to him. ‘Forty-five, I believe.’

  He began to slip small metal hooks through small metal eyelets and peeled the gown off her shoulders, arms, waist. Silk pooled around her hips.

  ‘And lace,’ she whispered. ‘And twenty-two eyelets. Whale bone. Silk. The word silk needs to be spoken softly, a brush of warm breath against skin, don’t you think?’

  ‘Hmmm. Lace needs to be whispered, too.’ His hands trailed over her back and pulled at the narrow silk ribbon, loosening it at every eyelet. He watched her inhale deeply, and wondered how she’d been able to breathe in this constricting garment.

  She stood and her gown fell to the floor as she peeled off her stays. Her breasts sprung free. Only the faintest sheen of silk covered them, her stomach, the dip of her navel and the swell of her hips. The black triangle between her legs.

  She stepped out of her wedding gown, dropped her stays onto the floor, and put her foot up on the bed.

  ‘Thigh, too, needs to be spoken softly.’ He unclipped the garter, slipped a finger beneath the silk and pushed down the stocking. How can there be enough silk in this world to clothe all the beautiful women?

  She offered the other leg and he repeated the procedure, leant closer, brought his lips against her skin, and whispered silk and lace and thigh. He smiled and told her that she was right, these words needed to be sent softly across skin. Her skin.

  She raked her fingers through his hair and gently pulled him back. ‘May I?’ she asked and touched his waistcoat.

  He signalled yes and so she slipped silver buttons through silk buttonholes. ‘Four buttons,’ she said, pushed the garment off his shoulders, and flung it aside. It flew through the room and landed next to a chair.

  ‘You need target practice, dear.’

  A smile flickered past her lips as she touched his shirt. ‘Twelve buttons. Plus two at each sleeve.’

  When he lifted his hands to untie his cravat, she pulled them away.

  She took her time with shirt, cravat, and collar — starched, fine cotton, supple silk. She lay his skin bare until only the glow of the fire clothed his chest. The cold air drew his nipples to hard nubs. She licked her finger and touched one, then the other.

  ‘I wonder…’ she said and ran her fingers along his crotch. ‘Ah, four buttons. I guessed as much.’

  He huffed.

  She unbuttoned his trousers. He lifted himself off the mattress, and she pulled them down his legs. His drawers were slipped off, too. His socks and sock garters.

  His breath stopped when she placed her hands on his bare thighs. Worried she might be repelled by the appearance of his weaker left leg, he followed her gaze. Right thigh, left thigh.

  Did she compare them? Surely she must?

  Her hands travelled up, brushing past the nest of dark blond curls. Up her fingers went, up his stomach, his chest. The line of hair on his breastbone. Up to his collarbones, his throat, jaw, the side of his head. She buried her hands in his hair.

  ‘I want to kiss you,’ she said and he remembered to breathe. His lungs ached when she bent closer and stopped a mere inch before his face. He felt her warm breath on him, smelled coffee, brandy, pastries, and the sweet scents of her hair and skin.

  He leant closer, halted a hairbreadth short of her mouth. Her lids were lowered, pupils wide open. He smiled and touched his lips to hers. As she opened herself to his imploring tongue he felt an urge to fall into her and lose himself.

  Then he remembered that she was a prostitute. He drew back and looked at her, wishing he could dissect her reactions to him, her heart, her mind, so as to know and be certain that she was sincere.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s chilly. The fire is dying. I’ll put more coals onto it.’

  She scooted back and lifted a blanket. ‘This wonderful item has been inv
ented to keep out the cold. Come. I’m warm enough for both of us.’

  He hesitated for a moment, then slipped under the offered blanket, careful to leave a gap between himself and her.

  She bent to the nightstand and blew out the candles. Then she tapped her fingertips onto his left leg and asked, ‘Are you comfortable?’

  ‘Yes, thank you, I am quite comfortable. As you will have noticed when I led you down the aisle and abducted you only moments later, I’m far from being disabled. But I think I might be growing blind. It’s rather dark. Why did you blow out the candles? Am I not handsome enough?’

  She hesitated. ‘You are handsome. But I don’t want you to see me.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t trust my face, my expression. I don’t know what to do with it now that…’

  ‘Now that you don’t have to pretend you are the bawdiest little thing in London? Ouch! Why did you punch me?’

  ‘You once said you fancied my ruthlessness, so…’

  They both fell quiet.

  Could it be? he wondered. Is it possible that she doesn’t know what to do with herself, here in her own bed with him in it?

  The silence seemed to wedge itself in, forming a wall between them.

  ‘You don’t know what to do with yourself,’ he ventured.

  ‘Yes. I mean, no. How would I know what women do on their wedding night?’

  She sounded sincere, and yet, he found it hard to believe that a prostitute… He told himself to stop seeing her as a prostitute. He hadn’t paid her for this. She wanted this, for whatever reason.

  Doubt nagged at him.

  ‘Well, how would I know?’ he said. ‘Would you do it like all other women do it? Do you think they do it all in the same fashion?’

  ‘I’m sure that whatever they do, it’s proper.’

  ‘And certainly very un-outrageous.’

  ‘Why do people even get married?’ she asked half-heartedly.

  He decided to push all doubt aside. He would deal with it tomorrow morning. ‘I don’t care about other people’s reasons for marrying. May I touch you, Olivia?’

  ‘Yes, Gavriel.’

  He was shocked by how softly his name rolled off her tongue, slipped past her lips. He wished to hear her say it again. Often. His fingertips found her throat, slid up along her jawline and into her hair. Sighing, he bent closer, inhaled the scents of rose and lavender and soap and Olivia.