It was over, and probably, looking back on it, it was just as well.
As Nan said, if this thing ended up in court it would be all over the papers: A fetishist relationship between a female student and the headmaster of a prestigious English private school; an allegedly sadistic beating in his penthouse apartment in Hong Kong; sexual emails sent in code to the office of China border security; hacking into an Australian newspaper to report the killing of European royalty who never existed; an alleged kidnap in Pimlico of all places, – you couldn't make this stuff up – enough juicy headlines to keep the tabloids busy for weeks.
Or I could let it go. Put it down to experience – be careful what you wish for, Catherine – and return to the relative comfort of anonymity.
"Given the alternative, I think you made the right decision," George told me. We were having dinner together at a Spanish restaurant on Lupus Street, sharing a bottle of Rioja. Maybe more than one. It was my treat. I have a lot to thank him for.
"You actually saw him enter my building?" I asked him, topping up his glass.
"I saw a man of Middle Eastern appearance, as they say. Didn't think anything of it."
"That's so sweet – you were watching over me."
"Not really, but I can see the front door of your building from my kitchen table. I wasn't doing anything really. Reading the paper, watching the world go by. But when I saw him come out half-an-hour later and get into his car, he had a woman with him. He was holding her arm tight, supporting her as they walked down the steps. My initial reaction was, 'Isn't that nice, he's taking his frail old mum grocery shopping.' But on second glance it didn't look right. It was almost like he was holding her up. She looked like a rag doll as he bundled her into the car."
"Whatever he drugged me with, I pretty well didn't know what was happening. The scary thing was I felt no fear, it was like, 'Woo, where we off to? The burqa was a clever touch. It could be anybody under that thing."
"Just in case, I jotted down his license plate number."
I reached over and gave him a kiss on the cheek.
"My guardian angel."
He blushed.
"Then what?"
Of course, I know what happened next. I have gone over it in my mind a dozen times. What happened to me could have ended terribly, but it didn't. It ended in dinner with George at little checkered-cloth restaurant.
"I phoned you. No reply, although I know you were home because I had seen you go in not an hour earlier, carrying your yoga mat. I rang your bell. No answer. A neighbor let me in. I was worried, now she was too. When we saw signs of forced entry, I called the police and told them what I had seen. What do you think he hoped to accomplish by abducting you?"
"I don't know. He said he wanted to talk. Apologize. Whatever. In any event, his story was well rehearsed. We knew each other. We had lived together. We were in costume. It was Hallowe'en. It was pretty much my word against his.
"How did he find you?
"Yoga. He knows I love yoga. Apparently, he went to an internet café where he hacked into the databases of every leisure center in central London. He checked recent enrolment in yoga classes and up popped my name and address. It was all too depressingly easy."
George poured the last of the wine into our glasses.
"How's your book coming? It's been six months since we made our pact. We have to decide where we go from here."
Chapter Fifteen
TommyYamomoto arrived at London's Heathrow Airport on an overnight flight from Tokyo and ninety minutes later checked into the Churchill Suite at the Savoy Hotel on the Strand. He was a man with a mission. Once settled, he unpacked his best Savile Row suit, showered and shaved, put on a freshly laundered white shirt and tied a conservative knot in his corporate tie. The vice-president Western Europe and the Americas for TrashTalk Mobile Inc. (corporate slogan: The Competition Sucks), the newest entry in Asia's highly competitive mobile phone market, had an unsigned contract in his briefcase. At 11 am precisely, he heard a knock on the door and automatically he glanced at his watch. Through an open window he could hear Big Ben chiming the hour in confirmation and he nodded with satisfaction. His visitor was right on time. He jumped to his feet to let him in.
"Good morning. I am Tommy Yamomoto," he said, bowing from the waist.
His visitor also bowed, although as Japanese etiquette required, not quite so low. Then he stuck out his hand.
"George Aloysius Brown, I'm pleased to meet you."
George couldn't believe his luck. Churchill was his greatest hero, even more than Charlie Chaplin, and here he was in what used to be the great man's private suite in one of London's finest hotels. He recognized many of Churchill's books on the bookshelf and was thrilled to see old black and white family photos on display, the sort you might see on the mantelpiece in any front room in England. He took a deep breath as if he might get a whiff of lingering cigar smoke, suddenly realizing Mr. Yamomoto was watching him.
"I'm sorry, I don't mean to be rude."
"Not at all. Please have a seat. May I offer you a cup of tea?"
"Thank you." George plumped himself down in a leather armchair next to the fireplace. He was far too young to remember, but in his imagination he could hear the crackle of a wartime radio broadcast, the mournful wail of air raid sirens and Churchill's stentorian tones – perhaps emanating from this very room – inspiring a nation digging out from the rubble.
Tommy Yamomoto came straight to the point.
"Mr. Brown…"
"George. Call me George."
"George, as we discussed during our conference call last week, TrashTalk is seeking to buy the worldwide publishing rights to Fly On The Wall. Our plan is to serialize it for subscribers in comic book format."
"Manga?"
"You know manga?"
"A little." George was careful not to let on that he knew anything about Japanese culture, but when Putney & District was twinned with the Tokyo ward of Shinjuku, he had made several visits to coordinate arrangements. He knew that in Japan people of all ages read manga in a broad range of subjects from adventure to romance, from science fiction and fantasy to mystery and horror. He also knew that some adult manga contains explicit sexual content. A quick check on the internet told him the market had grown since he was there to be worth more than £2.5 billion a year.
"But why my book? Why Fly On The Wall? I imagine Cleopatra is well known, but do Japanese people know Boadicea, or Catherine de Medici or the other characters Dr. Whom meets on his travels?"
"Boadicea, no. Medici, maybe. Casanova, of course. De Sade, a little. The Duchess of Windsor, only a few who study history. But who could resist the story, however unlikely, of a future British royal in a Beijing brothel? And he won't be Dr. Whom, he will be Doctor Fly. We are offering to buy the concept, George, not the novel, at least not the novel as you wrote it. We think the fly on the wall has great potential. Some of the original we can certainly use. The banquet scene where Doctor Fly leads the royal flycatcher on a merry dance is comic genius. We will animate it. As for the sexual content, there is a long history in Japan – as there is in your country – of erotic discipline. Plus, we will add characters from Japanese history. Over the centuries there have been many scandals in the palace of the emperors. Your book will cause a sensation."
Sensation or not, George was wondering how much of his novel would be left after the cartoonists and animators had finished with it. In spite of the compliment he was feeling somewhat aggrieved. "What about the final scene at the royal banquet where Dr. Fly jumps from cheek to cheek before seeking refuge in the wetlands. Are you going to animate that? Is that comic genius too?"
Mr. Yamomoto took a sharp intake of breath. It made a whistling sound. "Let me assure you that we will test the boundaries. If the authorities censor us it will be good for business. We have thought of that. But we have a plan B. Are you familiar with the Japanese term 'panchira'?
George was, but he wasn't saying. He shook his head.
"Really? I always thought that was an urban myth."
George thought about it briefly and could barely refrain from laughing. He had a mental picture of a spotty Japanese adolescent savagely kicking a vending machine because the panties in slot J6 had failed to drop. Panchira. He had forgotten about panchira.
"So you are telling me that to avoid censorship you will put panties on 16th century wenches even though women's underwear hadn't even been invented yet." He sighed. It was a battle he knew he couldn't win.
George looked at his watch. He was meeting Catherine for lunch and time was getting short.
"Mr. Yamomoto…"
"Tommy."
"Tommy, do you have the signing authority to conclude a deal right here, today?"
"Within reason, yes."
"Okay, as I understand it, you want to publish my book, change the name of the hero, eliminate characters while adding others and serialize it in comic book form for the mobile phone market. Am I missing anything?"
"No, except I can promise you our animators will do a brilliant job and I think you will be delighted with the result. Plus, we give you full credit: 'Based on the novel by George Aloysius Brown.'"
George liked the sound of that. And, let's face it, he thought sensibly, it was the only offer he had.
"Let's talk money," he said.
It's a short walk along the Strand from the Savoy Hotel to Trafalgar Square and then to the National Portrait Gallery where on the top floor is an elegant restaurant with a view over the slate grey rooftops and in the distance the River Thames and the Houses of Parliament. From this perspective it felt to George as if he were almost at the same height as Nelson, standing defiantly on his column with his back to him, so close it seemed that a well-aimed bread roll might prompt him to spin around.
Catherine Mallory Jones, newly-crowned queen of paperback romance, was already ensconced in a corner booth.
"What's with you?" she said as he approached. "You look like the cat who swallowed the canary."
"Of course I do, I'm having lunch with my favorite author." He stooped to give her a peck on the cheek.
"When's the big day?"
"You mean publication? They say November, in time for the Christmas market. Also, get this, they've offered me a job."
"Catherine, that's great. As what? They want you to write another book?"
"It's better than that, they want me to head up a new division, Pandora Booxx, that's books with a double X." She wrote it on a napkin for him. "They're diversifying into erotic literature." She patted her briefcase. They've even given me a manuscript to read, submitted by a retired Methodist clergyman from Dorset."
George laughed.
"Don't tell me the genre, let me guess. Mmmm… Anything to do with choir practice?"
"Don't be beastly. You'll love it."
"Go on."
"It's about an 18th century French nobleman who staffs his chateau with gorgeous French maids…"
"Well, they would be French, wouldn't they? It being France and all."
"Are you interested, or not?"
"Sorry, carry on."
"Well, naturally, they are all very disobedient, deliberately so, and he has to discipline them.
George leaned forward and lowered his voice so as not to startle the other diners.
"So he puts them over his knee, lowers their frilly French cullottes and spanks them on their bare bottoms. Mon Dieu. It's crap. I can't believe it has a chance of being published when my book, which at least is…."
"George, I didn't write it, I just have to evaluate it..."
"Sorry didn't mean to sound bitter. And what is your evaluation?"
"Here's the interesting part. Being a fair-minded chap, on one day a year, each of the maids gets to punish him for his sins and some of them are very imaginative – hence the name of the book Reversal of Fortune. Check it out, I brought a teaser."
Conversation was put on hold as the waiter brought their food and waived cracked pepper at it with Eastern European flourish before topping up their wine glasses and wishing them bon appetit. George put the folios she handed him next to his plate so he could read them while he ate and armed himself with a forkful of ravioli.
The first two encounters of my reversal of fortune sessions have been so pleasurable, it is with mounting anticipation that I await Sophie's arrival and I can barely contain my excitement when I hear her now familiar knock on my door. I conjecture that my posterior, in particular, will be in for some attention as many times have I bade Sophie bend over my knee and now it is her turn to have her way with me. Sophie recently arrived in my house from the French Congo. She has black hair, full ripe breasts and a derriere so plump and exquisitely round that it quite takes my breath away. She is the most delinquent of the domestic servants deliberately so, I fancy, for she transgresses frequently and submits to her punishment with little cries of protest. Thus there is seldom a day when her bottom is not made to sting courtesy of my scrupulous attention to discipline.
Well, George is thinking, it's a better read than your average Sunday sermon.
Without a word of greeting she bids me stand, obey orders and speak only when spoken to. If the others had been shy, almost diffident at first, being uncertain perhaps that I mean what I say, there is nothing equivocal about Sophie and she soon makes her intentions clear.
"Remove your clothes and lie on your back," she instructs me, as if such a demand were no more unlikely than asking me to lift my feet the better to sweep beneath them.
Of course, I hasten to comply and no sooner am I settled on the silken sheets than she spread eagles me, producing from the folds of her apron some lengths of velvet cord with which she binds me hand and foot.
Naked, tethered to the bedposts, I can no longer move. Only my manhood begins to rise.
Rather disconcertingly, the little fella was starting to sit up too and George folded his napkin over his lap. Catherine pretended not to notice. George sprinkled some parmesan over his ravioli and read on: "You will remain bound for one hour," says she, "and should you be uncomplaining and not beg for your release, you will be rewarded. If, however, you cannot stay the course, you will receive six strokes of the cane. Do you understand?"
"Yes, yes, dear Sophie," I mutter, thinking idly to myself that one hour of repose will be of little inconvenience and time will pass quickly enough. Surely, she means to mount me when the ordeal is over, or I her, or she might apply her sweet lips to my lance.
"Ooo la la," George said. "The Count of Monte Cristo wants her sweet lips on his lance." He raised his eyebrows theatrically. Exasperated, Catherine tried to take back the document, but George held it in his grasp.
"Anyway," she said. "I see it's piqued your interest." There being no answer to that, George adjusted his glasses and read on.
Dropping her skirts, the hussy pulls down her undergarment, placing it shamelessly over my nose so that I am at once subsumed by her aroma and enchanted by the thatch of dark curls that spills invitingly between her thighs. I content myself by breathing deeply, my manhood stirring the more I do so. Then in my full view, she removes her blouse, her nipples dark and erect. Without so much as a by your leave, she leans over the foot of the bed and brushes them lightly against my swollen member.
If this is her torment, I am, at this juncture, a most willing victim. But worse is to come.
And George is thinking, 'Way to go, Reverend. Pass the collection plate.'
Naked now, she straddles my body, placing her secret place just inches from my nose. Where before, her aroma competed with the smell of freshly laundered cotton, I now find myself assailed by the very fount of it. So near and yet so far, its hairs tickle my nose while my tongue reaches in vain. Straining and
squirming at my bonds, I cannot help but utter a small cry of frustration. At which Mistress Sophie becomes displeased, or at least feigns displeasure, for I do believe this was her intent. Sophie well knows where I keep the cane as she has been required to bring it to me many times so that I might administer a few reminders to her shapely rear thus teaching her the error of her ways. Now, at her bidding, it is I who is obliged to assume the punishment position, which I do at once, quivering with excitement. Now, standing before me, she flexes the willow as she has seen me do, before bringing it down lightly on her thigh. Once. Twice. Apparently well-satisfied, she takes a pace to my left as if to measure her delivery and taps me lightly on the buttocks to signal her readiness.
George glanced up at Catherine who was studiously ignoring him. "They don't teach you this sort of thing in ecclesiastical college, you know." He skipped a few paragraphs.
By God, the woman holds nothing back. "Take your punishment like a man," says she, "and you may find relief on the final stroke."
The sensation was palpable, the sting exquisite. For several seconds I wait. Then swish and swish again, I am dizzy with excitement. There is a pause, then I feel her hand stroking my lance as the cane falls for the last time and I spasm in ecstasy.
"Actually, it's not bad," George concedes, handing back the folios, which Catherine tucked away in her briefcase.
"Actually, it's rubbish," she said. "It's a one trick pony. Read one chapter and you've read them all – they all follow similar themes. I suppose it's a difficult balance to write this sort of stuff with enough variety to make it interesting to a broader audience while at the same time satisfying the hard-core reader who really only wants on thing. You did it. I loved your book. I tell you what George, give me a few weeks to get settled in the new job and I bet I can sell it to Pandora."
George cleaned his plate with the last slice of bread and picked up his napkin to wipe his lips.
"Too late, my dear, the horse has left the stable," he said triumphantly. "I signed a contract this morning."
Spank: The Improbable Adventures of George Aloysius Brown Page 21
