She pushed my dress down, bending over, and I kicked my shoes off and stepped out of it. She tossed it onto a chair and caressed my thighs with a light touch of her fingers which sent thrills of sensation racing through me. I turned toward her, my lips searching for hers, and she pressed her lips to mine as her fingers pulled at the fastener on my bra. It came loose, and she pulled the bra away from me and bent down, kissing my breasts. Tendrils of fire shot through me and I felt my nipples stretching hungrily for her lips.
CHAPTER ONE
She came in just as I was putting the blush on the sides and top of the apple in the still life, and I was resentful of the distraction and more brusque than I actually meant to be. "Please have a seat-I'll be with you in a moment."
There was a general impression of a young, dark-headed woman in a tweed suit, and her murmured reply didn't really penetrate as I glanced at her and looked back at the canvas, touching the streaks of white. It came in just right, blending with the suggestion of the priming showing through the transparent crimson of the apple. The whole effect was just right, and along with the warm, comfortable glow of satisfaction I always feel when completing a good one, I felt a rush of relief. I'd promised the woman in the furniture store to have the still life by Friday, and for a while it had seemed as though I'd been over-optimistic. Six starts had produced five blotched, half-finished canvasses thrown into the store room in the back, but the reshuffling of the composition on the sixth one had done the trick. Or perhaps it had been a reshuffling in attitude; it was hard to say. But something had happened, and everything had come together on the sixth one. And it was a relief, because I could use the money.
It all came down to dollars in the final analysis. But there were some things I wouldn't do, and one was trudge on through to the end with a canvas when I had a gnawing conviction that the masses were out of balance. Even though it was going to a furniture store and would probably be hung grotesquely in some living room with dimestore lithographs to keep it company or in some foyer to fill space by a hideous reproduction of an Early American planter or umbrella stand, it wouldn't be hacked out and have my name on it.
The name. I pulled out a number four Filbert from the end of the group between my fingers under the palette and picked up some burnt sienna, then drew the letters with a few quick strokes. It was done and done well. And the rent would be paid. Dollars again. The necessary evil. That was why I couldn't simply shut myself off and paint while the rest of the world went by. The rent had to be paid, the bill at the grocery store had to be taken care of, and my muse had to be bent to conform to the marketplace. So the front of my studio was a display area,-and I had to make myself available to those who saw the sign and came in off the street.
The thought made me remember the woman; she'd been waiting over fifteen minutes. I half expected her to be gone when I turned and looked-many of them were-but she was standing with her back to me and looking at some of the oils and sketches I'd hung along the front wall. She looked nice from the back; beautiful, in fact. Her tweed suit was obviously tailored, because it fit just right over her shoulders, slender arms, and tiny waist. The skirt hugged her hips and thighs, tucking neatly in below her buttocks, and it ended just an inch above her knees. She had nice legs, full and well curved without being too muscular. Alligator shoes and handbag, and her short, dark hair in a neat style. Beautiful.
I gathered up the brushes and palettes and walked toward the end of the workbench near the short divider I had built all the way across the room to keep customers out of my work area. "I'm very sorry to have kept you waiting."
She turned, smiling. "Oh, that's perfectly all right-I didn't mind. You know, I don't know the first thing about painting, but I like your work very much."
The direct force of the smile was a little hard to take. She had a lovely face with delicately rounded cheeks, a small dimpled chin, a cute nose, and massive warm brown eyes. The fully, perfectly formed lips parted slightly as she smiled, showing a hint of her ivory teeth and pink tongue. With the way I felt, looking at her was an onslaught and I felt a faint flush rising to my cheeks. I turned away, dropping the brushes and palettes and reaching for the liquid soap as I nodded. "Thank you very much."
The instant of silence was just a fraction too long. I glanced at her again as I began working the soap into the brushes; her expression was thoughtful, almost interrogative, then it immediately changed back to the smile. "What style of painting is it when everything looks the way it's supposed to-you know, people look like people, trees look like trees...."
I felt like giggling nervously. I cleared my throat and glanced at her again. "Representational."
"Yes, I thought I'd heard ... that's what you do, isn't it? It's very nice...."
It was beginning to sound lame and I was beginning to feel like an ass. I got a grip on myself, concentrating on the feel of the brushes between my fingers and looked at her, smiling. "Do you see something you like, then, or did you have something else in mind?"
She looked at the oils again. "Well, actually, I was thinking about ... they told me you did the portrait of Cliff Rosemont down at the Arboreum-is that right?"
The most difficult portrait I'd ever done, and I was-justifiably, I think-proud of it. Cliff Rosemont, the multimillionaire who'd had the Arboreum built by the Civic Center and donated it to the city, was a homosexual, and one of the most trying and at the same time rewarding experiences I'd had was to paint him. He'd been very understanding and had somehow found time in the hectic pace of his business interests to sit for me for just over one hundred hours. And it had been a nice commission. "Yes. Do you know Mr. Rosemont?"
"Well, we've met a couple of times, and I must say that I've never seen anything which ... which ... well, captured the ... spirit of a person quite as much as anything as that pain-ting...."
A big man, with bold, firm features. A magnate, holding the lives of thousands and the fortunes of millions in his hands, making decisions which spread across the country in ripples like the waves in a pond when a stone is cast. An alert, intelligent man with an incisive manner. And a homosexual. I had labored hard on that canvas. And I had been successful. To those who didn't know him, it was a representation of the man who'd donated the Arboreum. To those who knew him, it was Cliff Rosemont. I finished working the soap into the brushes and began rinsing them in the bucket. "Thank you."
"Oh, by the way, I'm Wanda Christopher...."
"And I'm Camille Evereaux, if you didn't notice it on the sign. Did you have a portrait in mind, then?"
I looked at her and smiled as I said it, and she looked away again, glancing over the oils on the wall. There seemed to be a slight flush on her smooth cheeks. I froze, looking at her, then looked back down at the brushes, clamping a firm control over the surge of hope which began flaming to life within me. Wishful thinking was a deadly trap, and the gloomy depression following blasted hope and anticipation was much worse than no hope at all.
"That's French, isn't it?"
But she was a long time coming to the point, which looked uncharacteristic of her; she looked to be one of the chic, sophisticated ones of the business world who counted every second and carefully weighed the time given to each appointment weeks in advance. I blotted the train of thought out of my mind before it could start feeding the hope and kept my eyes away from her as I moved along the bench to the sink with the brushes in a bundle in my hands. "Yes, my father was from France."
"Oh ... you were born here?"
"Yes, the accent is ... well, I lived with my aunt for several years, and most of them were spent in Europe."
"Oh, that must have been nice for you. You studied in Europe, then?"
"Yes, and here. And with my aunt ... mostly with my aunt...."
"Your aunt is an artist then?"
That hit a sore spot, and my face probably showed it. I turned off the water, shook the brushes and spread them on a towel, and went back to the pallets, picking up one of them and scraping at it with a pallet knife. "Was. She's dead."
"I'm sorry, Camille-I really didn't mean to pry. I don't know what on earth got into me to suddenly start asking you about yourself ... please accept my apologies...."
I shrugged and looked up at her, smiling. "I don't mind, Ms. Christopher-there's no big secret or anything."
This time she didn't look away. And hope thundered to glorious life within me, sweeping my feeble control to one side and making my heart race as the blood rushed to my cheeks. She flushed also, a hesitant, embarrassed smile playing around her lips and dimples appearing in her cheeks as her breathtakingly beautiful face turned rosy. The warm, brown eyes danced with a soft light which my burgeoning hope told me was desire and promise as she tilted her head to one side in a cute, appealing gesture. "I'll tell you all about myself then. I'm Wanda Christopher, I'm twenty-four, I work for Acme Advertising, I'm unmarried, live by myself, and I came to see you about doing a portrait of my grandmother."
The knife was about to make a hole in the pallet. I put it to one side, smeared some soap on it, and began scraping the other one, looking down at it and laughing. "I said no apologies were necessary, Ms. Christopher-"
"Please call me Wanda."
"All right, Wanda. No apologies were necessary, and that wasn't either."
She was controlling the flush in her face and she looked more self-possessed and assured. "Oh, I wanted you to know about me," she said lightly. "What do you think about doing a portrait of my grandmother?"
"How old is she?"
"Ummm ... about seventy, I guess. Why?"
"Well, there're a couple of things involved." I smeared soap on the other pallet and the knife, then moved to the sink to wash them. "To start with, it's physically demanding to sit for a portrait. I have to have something like fifty hours or so, and it's usually broken up into two-hour stretches. And it's hard to sit still for two hours-try it sometime. The next thing is, I'll have to meet her and talk with her for a while to see how we get along with each other. If there's a personality conflict, then I can't paint her."
She turned her head to one side again in the sweet, appealing gesture and looked at me thoughtfully. "Say ... I didn't think of that, but I guess that it's ... hey, how did you get along with Cliff Rosemont? Or am I being nosy?"
It had been an experience. He was an alert, perceptive man, and it had taken him about five minutes to figure me out. Then there had been an hour or two of cautious hedging, tentative questions, feeling each other out. We had come to an unspoken agreement to treat each other like people, and it had been beautiful. I nodded. "We got along well."
"At least you didn't have to worry about his making passes, right?"
I shrugged, putting the pallets and knife to one side to dry and rinsing my hands under the tap. "I don't have too much trouble with that, Wanda."
She made a disparaging sound with her lips. "Come on, Camille. You're absolutely devastating, and you know it. I'll bet you could slide down the sidewalk on the drool that runs out of men's mouths when you pass them."
I laughed, then smiled at her, drying my hands. "Well, hardly, but I appreciate the compliment, Wanda. And you're very attractive, too."
She shrugged it aside, smiling at me. She had herself under complete control now, and the look in her eyes seemed analytical, almost hopeful. I dried my hands and untied the smock and shrugged out of it. Her eyes moved over me as I tossed the smock on the workbench, and I was glad I'd put on a dress, even though it was only a simple print and somewhat the worse for wear from many washings. Wearing a dress was something I'd formed into more or less of a habit, though; blue jeans and a sweatshirt were nice and comfortable for working, but they didn't do much for my public relations when it came to handling customers. Perhaps not a big compromise, but a compromise nevertheless. Dollars again.
"What were you working on there?"
"A still life-would you like to see it?"
"Please...."
I pulled the small gate section of the divider open and she smiled her thanks as she walked through it. Her perfume was a faint, alluring cloud which seemed to hang around her, and her presence seemed to radiate warmth. The flush rose to my cheeks again, but she didn't notice it because she was walking toward the easel. My eyes involuntarily moved over her hips and thighs, then down her legs. Her hips moved from side to side with a graceful, unaffected motion, and the muscles in her calves and thighs moved smoothly. My cheeks began burning. I fought for control as I followed her.
"Oh, this is different...."
"It's alia prima. Wet on wet. Normally a loose painting of major elements is done, then an under-painting coat is put on and let dry, and then the final painting is done. In wet on wet, each coat is put on over the other without a drying period."
"God, how do you keep it from getting all mixed together?"
"Well, that's one of the problems, of course. The hardest part is to have the completed painting in one's mind before the first brush stroke. It has to be done fairly rapidly, too, so it can all be finished before it starts to set up."
"It's absolutely divine, Camille."
"The wet on wet is a good technique for certain motifs. It gives bold lines and simple designs, and ... well, I just hope whoever buys it will have enough judgment to put it with the right kind of furniture and in the right setting. In the right place wet on wet is just the thing, but in the wrong place it's ghastly. It's for a furniture store and it's an assigned commission, so at least I'll have something to say about where it's hung in the store...."
She smiled and nodded, looking at me, then looked back at the canvas on the easel. We were about the same height, but she seemed somewhat taller than I am because of her heels. She pursed her lips and looked down at the floor. "Well, about the portrait ... it was going to be an anniversary gift for them-their fiftieth-and I thought ... well, I hadn't even considered how long she'd have to sit for a portrait It just didn't occur to me, and she's not the strongest ... she isn't feeble or anything, but she is getting close to seventy." She sighed and shrugged. "I don't suppose that part of it could be done with photographs. . . ? "-
I shook my head firmly, softening it with a smile.
"Well, I didn't think so...." she murmured, her voice dying away as she turned and looked at the paintings on the other side of the room again. "But now that I think about it, one of these might be even better-"
I laughed and shook my head, cutting her off. "Wanda, you don't have to buy something to get back outside."
"Oh, I know that, dear," she chuckled, putting her hand on my arm.
Her hand was smooth, cool, and soft. And it was like a firebrand on my arm. I jumped involuntarily, and she turned crimson as she dropped her hand. It wasn't the first time in my life that I wished I were made so I could kick my own bottom, but I'd never wished it more fervently. My composure completely deserted me, alternating waves of cold and heat seemed to rush over me, and my arm still tingled where she'd touched me. It was impossible to tell if .her reaction came from within her or if it was simply in response to my reaction, but she had an iron control. The blush faded from her cheeks and she opened her purse and dug in it, obviously to let me get some of my self-possession back, as she asked me if I minded if she smoked. I managed to stutter a negative, and she took out a cigarette and lit it with a small gold lighter without-thank God-looking at me and offering me one. Then she began walking toward the paintings again, taking puffs on her cigarette and talking as though nothing had happened.
"No, I really mean it, Camille. I'd been thinking in terms of a portrait because a friend mentioned it to me and I thought it was something they might-like Granddad, particularly, because he's absolutely devoted to her-but it needn't necessarily be that. And I also started thinking of my place when I was looking over the paintings-I have this godawful thing I got from a dime-store over my fireplace-"
That took my mind away from myself somewhat. "God...."
She smiled wryly and nodded as she pushed the gate open and held it for me. "Yes, that's about what I think every time I go into my living room and look at it. Any suggestions?"
I cleared my throat. "Well, what kind of furniture do you have?"
"Early American."
There was a landscape of a barn on a hill with a creek and bridge in the foreground and a hint of a house on the other side of the hill. It was strongly coloristic, with the barn completely dominating the entire composition, and the lines were softened as far as I ever got into romanticism. A caustic opinion might label it posed and showy, decoration, but I liked it. The scene meant something to me, and I found a sudden pleasure in the idea that Wanda might buy it and put it in her place. At least a part of me would be there with her. I pointed to it. "That would go well with Early American." Then, out of honesty, I softened it. "Depending on your color scheme, of course. That's rather colorful, and it wouldn't go with just anything...."
She turned, smiling. "Now, isn't that something, Camille! That's the very one I was looking at...."
I couldn't look into her eyes, and I looked away, smiling and nodding. She walked closer to the painting, looking at it, and I looked at her. There hadn't been anyone since Beth had left. And I couldn't bring myself to look in cafes and bars. Besides being damned dangerous, love had meant too much to me in the past to make it a cheap, physical, mechanical thing now. There first had to be attraction and interest, then desire. It was all there with Wanda, but it might hot be reciprocated. There had been hints; the expression on her face, the soft tone of her voice, and the color in her cheeks. But it might have simply been embarrassment because she perceived my reaction to her. Or worse yet, she might have perceived my reaction and hers might be pity.
God!
"May I ask how much this one is, Camille."
"Oh ... a hundred dollars."
"Oh, come on," she chuckled. "That little? I simply knew it must be absolutely hundreds and hundreds, because I know how much artists' work is worth...."
I smiled ruefully. "At one time, perhaps. Cut rate painting factories have almost taken over."
"Yes, but you don't get this kind of work from an assembly line," she said, looking back at the picture. "As I said, I don't know anything about painting, but even I can tell the difference...." She looked at a seascape and nodded toward it. "That would do for my Grandmother and Grandfather-it would be simply divine in their den. But the color on this one...." She tapped her toe on the floor and looked up at it, chewing her bottom lip, then she turned and looked at me. "What are you doing right now, Camille?"
"Pardon me?"
"I mean, are you going to paint some more or something...? "
I shrugged and shook my head. "No, I was just going to clean up the place a little and think about dinner ... why?"
"Well, you must undoubtedly have an expert eye for color. I thought if you weren't really busy now I could get you to come over to my place and see if the color would harmonize."
Her smile was pleasant, business-like smile, nothing more. And my tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth. I looked at the picture numbly, my mind racing as I asked myself what she meant. Then I got my answer; nothing. She wanted to know if the picture would look well in her living room. There was nothing else in her expression. She was one of the calm, cool, beautiful women I occasionally noticed in offices and walking along the sidewalks. She would marry someone from her office, stop her pills a couple of times and have the obligatory child or two, and have a large house in the suburbs, two cars, piles, and suspicions about her husband's new secretary.
But I needed the money. Disappointment was a leaden weight on my shoulders and a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. But the rent would come due. And I needed groceries. The disappointment would fade into gray melancholy, and I would lie sleepless in my bed. Perhaps I would masturbate to bring a shallow relief, and perhaps I would think of her while I did it. Then I would sleep and I would wake again, and the rent would be due and food would have to be bought. The memory of her visit to my studio would turn up as a flowing, erotic line in some curved object in a painting, or perhaps a street scene would have a woman's face done in meticulous detail and it would be hers.
I nodded, licking my lips dryly. "Yes, all right...."
"Good," she smiled, then she held up her cigarette and glanced around interrogatively. I pointed toward the ashtray at the end of the battered couch I'd bought from the second-hand office furniture store, and she nodded and walked toward it briskly. "Well, I'm sure we don't have to take the painting, do we?
You can remember it well enough, I'm sure...."
I would never forget it. It had been a golden autumn afternoon. Her name had been Deirdre, and her head had rested on my lap as I made the first sketches. But that had been a long time ago. I shook my head. "No, we don't need to take it along. Just let me get the key, and I'll be ready to go...."
CHAPTER TWO
The car was a new Lincoln. The tailored suit, expensive shoes and bag, and chic, polished look had been a hint, and the car was proof; she was one of the accomplished, successful ones. She chatted smoothly and easily, but I was suddenly conscious of my appearance. I wasn't wearing hose, and I still had my paint-splattered work shoes on.
"Perhaps I should have changed or something ... I didn't think...."
"Don't be silly, Camille," she chuckled, leaning over and touching my thigh with an affectionate pat.
"You look like a doll-I told you that."
She was going through an intersection, watching the traffic, so she didn't see what the friendly caress did to me. I looked at the window at my side, controlling myself.
"...haven't met three women in my life who could go without makeup and get away with it. And I still don't know how you do it, but you look perfect. Of course, with a complexion and coloring like yours, it would b.e a shame to cover it with cosmetics ... didn't you ever get started on it, or what?"
I cleared my throat and shrugged. "Well, my aunt didn't wear any, so I suppose that was it-I just didn't get started."
"Did your aunt rear you...? " She clicked her tongue and shook her head. "There I go getting nosy again."
"Oh, no, it's all right ... she ... well, I lived with her from when I was fifteen until she ... died."
"I see."
Silence settled for a moment. It felt strained to me, but that was undoubtedly because I felt somewhat ill at ease. Wanda still radiated the composed, self-assured calm which seemed to be so much a part of her. And she kept the conversation going with a natural, easy talent. "The painting you've just finished-you say it's going to a furniture store? Do you sell many that way?"
"Well, not a lot. To tell you the truth, I started canvassing a little. I won't sell on the sidewalk, but I regard it as a legitimate enterprise to work with businesses. It's the first time I've done it, though, and I was about to give up until I happened to stop in this one store. There was a lady there-I guess she's the owner or something-and she told me she'd take one...."
"Oh? Is she a friend of yours, then?"
There was a tiny inflection which made it just that fraction more than a casual question. And what I'd said didn't call for that question. I'd plainly told her that I'd met the woman only once, and then for only a brief time. Or had I? "No, as a matter-of-fact. I've talked with her only once, and then for a short time. She seemed to be very busy, but she seemed to want to help...."
"I see."
There seemed to be a note of satisfaction in that. I looked at her thoughtfully, puzzled again. Her eyes met mine, the serene smile still on her lovely face, and she looked back at the windshield. It was puzzling; the question, reply, and comment seemed to lead nowhere, but I had a feeling that it had meant something to her.
She pushed the turn signal lever, braking, and turned in at the entrance to the parking lot behind a tall highrise apartment building. "This is it, Camille. Hey, I hope you won't think I'm a slob if my apartment's a disaster area. Sometimes I really scuttle around, getting out of there in the morning, and I got up late this morning-"
I laughed and shook my head, and she glanced up at me and closed one eye in a conspiratorial wink. My heart leaped, and I looked out the window again.
She parked in the basement, and there were several other people in the elevator as we went up. The presence of the others seemed to dilute my awareness of her, but only slightly; her perfume was a heady cloud which seemed to fill my nostrils and make my head swim, and I held my hands and arms close to my sides so an accidental contact with her couldn't make me jump and make an ass out of me in front of everyone.
It was an expensive place. The carpet in the hallway was thick and luxurious, and the decorator lamps along the walls had cost a lot. It was just a fraction overdone and I didn't like the artificial potted plants because I don't like artificial plants, but my tastes are more spartan than most. It was nice. And it seemed to fit her.
She unlocked the door and waved me in, and I managed a wan smile as I went through the door in front of her. The entrance foyer was nice even if the floor was artificial marble; a sculptured tile in a plain design would have been somewhat better. She closed and locked the door, then walked ahead of me and pointed at the living room, raising her eyebrows. It was perfect. An Early American couch and two chairs, end tables, coffee table, lamps, and a tea trolley in one corner. Just enough and precisely short of being too much. The maple gave a soft, overall glow, and the flower design in the fabric went well with the drapes and the red brick fireplace. But the picture over the fireplace was grotesque.
I looked away from it and nodded as I walked down the step into the living room. "Yes, it would go nicely here, Wanda. The barn is the dominant feature in the painting, and it would pick up the red in the furniture and drapes. If it looked a little too red to you, you could get some green throw pillows to emphasize the green in the furniture and drapes and tone the red down."
She nodded, smiling. "Yes, now that I look at it again, I know that it's just what I need ... God, let me get that down from there." She walked across the room and took the picture down, then turned it to the wall and leaned it against the edge of the fireplace. "There, that's taken care of. And the maintenance man told me he does odd jobs, so I'll get him to make a maple frame which will go with ... please sit down, Camille. Here, sit on the couch." She sat down on the couch, patting it, and I smiled and nodded as I walked to it and sat down. "Let's see now," she murmured, looking down. "I want the one for this room, I pointed out the one I want for my grandfather and grandmother, and perhaps ... perhaps a couple more for the office...."
That would take care of the rent and groceries for some time. It didn't take care of the empty gnawing within me, but I was grateful. I smiled and nodded. "Thanks very much, Wanda-I'm very grateful."
"Thank you, Camille," she chuckled, getting up from the couch. "Or thank the friend who mentioned you. This has solved a couple of problems for me, and that office needs something ... how about a glass of wine?"
More than anything else, I wanted to go home. The plush apartment was a sharp contrast with my threadbare, shabby place, but my place was warm and comfortable with the things I knew around me. And her presence was becoming almost overwhelming; I was getting all tied up in knots inside, and I wouldn't be able to trust myself much longer. "Well...."
"Oh, come on-just a glass of wine. To celebrate, right? I've found some things I need, and you've made a sale. So we can celebrate together, right?"
"All right, then."
She smiled and nodded and went into the next room, unbuttoning her suit coat and shrugging out of it. I looked down at my hands. There was paint under my fingernails and a line around each cuticle, as there usually was, and the splotches of paint on my shoes. The print dress looked even more faded and worn against the bright fabric of the couch, and I noticed that I'd got a spot of paint on the skirt. I sighed and scratched at it, wishing I were home.
She came back in with two glasses of wine. Her blouse had ruffles of lace at the cuffs and at the throat, and it was a sheer, silky material. I could see the line of her bra at the sides, and her breasts thrust out in two large, curved mounds in the front of it. The blood started rising to my cheeks again, and I kept my eyes off her breasts and concentrated on taking the glass without making it tremble in my hands. Her fingers brushed mine as I took it, and my hands trembled.
"This wine will probably taste awful to you, having lived in Europe," she murmured, sitting on the couch again and sipping her wine.
"I like the wine of the country," I replied and tasted it. It wasn't too bad; light but with a full bouquet, and sharp without being tart, and I nodded. "This is very good."
"Thank you. What do you think is the best wine you've ever tasted?"
We had gone through Luxembourg and across the German border at Trier to the weinfest on the Mosel one autumn. The weather had been superb, the air crisp and spicy and crystal-clear, with fleecy clouds floating in the azure between the towering mountains along the Mosel. There had been a feeling of timelessness in the tiny cities with narrow cobblestone streets, and the sturdy, smiling, red-faced Germans and their buxom wives had been friendly and pleasant. Perhaps it had been the wine of Gabrielle's lips which had made my head giddy and which had implanted the memory firmly in my mind, but it still lingered. "The wines from Bernkastle-Kues on the Mosel, I suppose."
She smiled warmly. "That made you think of something, didn't it? I could tell by your face that...."
Her voice faded and she chuckled, patting my arm. "No, I'm not going to pry again-Camille, your arms are very pretty and feminine, but they're absolutely like iron. That comes from painting, doesn't it?"
I took another sip of the wine and put it on the coffee table, nodding. "And from exercising. It's very important to have a steady hand, of course."
"Yes, I can see that being able to paint for hours without tiring would be very important," she replied, putting her glass on the coffee table. "You keep your hands nice, don't you? I should think that would be very difficult."
I shrugged. "Nice? They've got paint all over them most of the time...."
"Well, of course," she chuckled, reaching over and taking one of my hands. "I meant that they look soft and smooth. And they're so graceful, with long, tapered fingers-I wish my hands were like yours...."
My hand burned between hers as she held it, stroking the back of it with the tips of her fingers. I wanted to jerk it away from her and scream at her from the flood of emotions storming to life within me, almost throttling me, but I felt paralyzed by the sensation of her holding my hand and stroking it. A quiver raced through my arm and hand, and I began trembling. Her massive brown eyes looked into mine, and her smile faded. I tried to swallow, but my tongue wouldn't move. I tried to smile, but my lips would only tremble. The warm brown of her eyes was closer. Her beautiful lips parted slightly. She slid toward me, pulling on my hand. I leaned toward her. Her jutting breast touched my shoulder then pressed against it. The warm, damp silkiness of her lips touched mine.
She put one arm around my shoulders, holding me close, and her hand touched my cheek with a feathery pressure as her lips parted and enfolded mine; sweet, damp, and warm. The softness of her body seemed to envelop me, and the alluring fragrance of her perfume was the very air in my lungs. The battered and bruised spirit of my hope blossomed to life again triumphantly and anticipation swelled within me. It was mixed with relief and gratitude, and it soared upward with a surge, bringing the pent-up emotions churning to a climax. I burst into tears, i.
It startled her, and her composure slipped a little. "I'm very sorry, Camille," she murmured, pulling away from me. "I didn't mean to upset you, or-"
"You didn't," I sobbed, taking her shoulders and pulling her closer. "If you upset me, it was because you didn't do that an hour ago." Her arms slid back around my shoulders and I put my head against her breasts, then I pulled away again. "And now I'm messing up your blouse...."
"Don't be silly," she whispered, her lips touching my eyes, kissing away my tears. "I'm not worried about a damned blouse ... but do stop crying, dear.
It's making me feel awful."
"Everything happened so suddenly-it all happened so fast. If you'd just ... held my hand or something ... smiled at me ... told me you liked me...."
"But I wasn't sure about you, darling, don't you see? And it would have been horrible if I'd made a mistake and asked you, then found out that you ... that you ... didn't want me."
"I was screaming so loud inside that you should have been able to hear it."
"I had a suspicion, darling, but I wasn't sure...."
"Well, you're sure now, so why don't you do something about it?"
She cuddled my head in her arm, smiling down at me and chuckling. "You little imp-I am going to do something about it." Her arm tightened, her eyes were dizzyingly close again, and her lips were on mine again.
I opened my mouth, and her tongue crept between my lips and into my mouth, caressing the edges of my teeth, my tongue, and the inside of my mouth, and the fresh taste of her mouth filled mine as our saliva mixed between our open lips. Her breath brushed against my cheek and her body pressed against mine, and strong, demanding desire began swelling within me. I put my hands on her breasts and squeezed them, and she whimpered in her throat and trembled against me as she took her lips from mine and moved them over my cheek. "God, you're the most beautiful creature in the world, Camille...."
"You are, Wanda," I said, turning my head to one side and biting at her lips as I squeezed her breasts again.
She shuddered and drew in a deep breath as she cupped my breast and squeezed it, and the sensation made me go weak against her. I gasped for breath, trembling all over, and her hand moved down my body and felt my hip and thigh as she bent down and kissed me again. Her lips moved over mine and her tongue slid slowly from side to side between my lips, and I felt her breasts and moved my hand up and down her back, caressing her warm, vibrant body as the desire grew into a raging hunger within me. She moved her hand up my thigh and pressed it between my thighs, feeling for my pussy, and I opened my thighs. Her hand pressed harder, cupping my pussy through my dress and panties. "That's what I want, baby," she sighed. "I want all of you."
"God ... and I want you, Wanda ... want you so much...."
"Come on, darling, and let's go in the bedroom. Come into the bedroom, darling."
She stood up and took my arm and lifted me as I struggled to gather myself and get up. Her arms encircled me and her lips tugged at mine again as she pulled me to her, one of her hands sliding down to cup my pussy and her other hand caressing my buttocks. I melted against her, clutching at her breasts and thrusting my tongue into her mouth. She pressed it between her tongue and the roof of her mouth, sucking it and fondling me, then she took her lips from mine and moved me toward the hall.
We stopped in the hall to kiss and caress, the impulse seeming to seize us simultaneously and when we got into the bedroom we were both flushed and panting with arousal. She put her arms around me and began unzipping my dress, and I reached behind myself for the zipper. "I can do it...."
"I'll do it, darling," she murmured tensely, kissing me quickly and pulling the zipper down. "I want to get these clothes off you so I can see you."
"...want to see you, too...."
"You will, baby, you will," she said, pulling the dress off my shoulders. "But I want to get my hands on you and feel you. I'm so hot that I'm going to be biting pieces out of you in a minute ... here, step out of it...."
She pushed my dress down, bending over, and I kicked my shoes off and stepped out of it. She tossed it onto a chair and caressed my thighs with a light touch of her fingers which sent thrills of sensation racing through me. I turned toward her, my lips searching for hers, and she pressed her lips to mine as her fingers pulled at the fastener on my bra. It came loose, and she pulled the bra away from me and bent down, kissing my breasts. Tendrils of fire shot through me and I felt my nipples stretching hungrily for her lips. The tip of her tongue touched one then the other, and I swayed toward her, closing my eyes and gasping. She dropped the bra and wrapped her arms around me, taking one of my nipples into her mouth and sucking it with a firm pressure. The clinging, pressing sensation of her hot, damp mouth on my breast made the sensations skyrocket within me and I lay against her as one of her hands slid down my stomach and into my panties. Her fingers combed through the hair between my thighs, tugging at it and searching deeper, and I spread my feet apart. Her hand slid between my thighs and cupped me with a delicious pressure, caressing my vulva as her mouth sucked at my breast.
Her hands pushed at my panties, sliding them down my thighs, and I put my hand against the wall and steadied myself as I lifted first one foot then the other out of the panties. She cupped my buttocks and pressed her lips between my thighs, turning her head from side to side as she kissed my pussy with a hard pressure of her lips, and the sensation of her warm breath against my pussy made me go weak. I sagged, then her arms were around me, guiding me toward the bed. "Here, darling, lie down, and I'll take my things off...."
She flipped the covers back and I lay down on the bed, pushing the covers to the foot of the bed with my feet as I watched her. Her fingers moved hurriedly down the buttons, unfastening her blouse, and she shrugged out of it and dropped her skirt to the floor. Her skin was a soft, milky white, smooth and downy looking, and her figure was breathtaking. My eyes were riveted to her as she pushed her pantyhose down and stepped out of them, then stood up and unfastened her bra. Her breasts were large but so firm that they jutted straight out from her slender chest. She pushed her panties down and stepped out of them, and I reached out toward the triangle of soft, curly hair as she walked toward the bed. My fingers touched it, and she shivered as she took my hand and pressed it between her thighs, squeezing it against her pussy. "Do you like that, baby?" she murmured in a tense whisper, holding my hand to her pussy and bending over the bed, kissing me with a light pressure of her lips. "Do you want that?"
"...yes ... want it ... like it ... want it...."
Her tongue flicked in and out of my lips, then she straightened up and moved closer to the bed, cupping my face between her hands. "All right, baby, I'm going to give it to you," she said, lifting her thigh and sliding it across me, straddling my head.
There was a shining gleam in her eyes, her face was flushed and tense with arousal, and her lips were parted as she panted shallowly. Then her face was no longer visible as she straddled me, lowering her pussy toward my face. I caressed her thighs and buttocks, fondling her and lifting my head eagerly as the moist loveliness of her pussy moved down toward my face. She slid her hands behind my head, lifting it, and I opened my mouth wide and covered her vulva, sucking it and stroking it with the tip of my tongue. The heady taste of her beautiful body filled my mouth, and I could feel the muscles in her thighs quivering as she pressed her pussy harder against me. I stiffened my tongue and darted it into her pussy, then I flicked it over her clitoris. She jerked from the sensation and her fingers tightened on my head, then she pulled herself away from me and slid onto the bed on top of me, wrapping her arms around me. Her lips covered mine, and I put my arms around her and dug my fingernails into the warm softness of her back as our legs laced together and we undulated against each other.
We kissed torridly, our tongues entwining and our bodies moving against each other as we caressed each other. She pulled her lips from mine, drawing in a long, shuddering breath, and slid her hand down my body, cupping my pussy and squeezing it. "You're too beautiful to be true," she sighed in a trembling whisper, looking at me. "You're just too beautiful to be true." She bent down and mouthed one of my breasts, squeezing my pussy. "Let's make each other come, darling-let's make each other come now."
"...yes ... yes...."
Her lips made a trail of fire down my body as she turned on the bed, and I whimpered as I reached for her, clutching her buttocks and pulling her toward me. The tip of her tongue moved from side to side on my stomach in a damp, swift caress, and I gasped with the sensation as I spread my thighs apart and burrowed my head between her thighs. The delicious warmth of her pussy was against my lips again, and I moved my head from side to side, working deeper between her thighs and kissing the moist tenderness of her pussy. Her breath was hot on my pussy, and every muscle in my body tensed with anticipation. There was a suggestion of pressure against my pussy, her lips brushing with a feathery touch, and I spread my thighs wider as the suspense became agonizing.
Then the warmth of her tongue touched me, there was a groping pressure, and the quick, sharp thrill of penetration roared through me as her tongue slid into me. She began moving her head, sliding her tongue in and out, and her hands cupped and gripped my buttocks. My body began undulating in a throbbing rhythm, and I slid my tongue into her, lapping her eagerly.
The exhilarating sensations gripped me, rushing me toward an orgasm. In the back of my mind there was a fleeting thought that the almost unbearable emotional upheavals I'd gone through during the past hour or two would make me come quick, bringing me to a climax before her, but her arousal was as great as mine. She began flicking the tip of her tongue over my clitoris as I began caressing hers with mine, and I could feel the mounting urgency of the sensations building up in her body as rapidly as in mine. We writhed together in an orgy of love, our heads buried between each other's thighs and our tongues moving rapidly, and our muffled moans and whimpers became more urgent. Fire seethed within me, kindled at the very core of my being by her tongue stroking my clitoris, and it seemed to consume and melt me into her as my head reeled from the onslaught of sensation. It bore me higher and higher, then I was teetering on the dizzying peak, swaying toward the depths. Her body was hard and tense in my arms, every muscle in her body drawn tight, and I numbly began moving the tip of my tongue as rapidly as I could. Everything crumbled within me, and she exploded at the same time, her thighs clamping together on my head as she thrust herself at me convulsively.
It was a shattering orgasm, leaving me limp and lifeless. She stirred weakly, then turned and pulled the covers over both of us as she took me into her arms again. Our kiss was heady with the taste of each other's bodies. Her breath was fresh and sweet against my face. I wormed closer to her, letting the warm softness of her body envelop me, and we went to sleep with our lips touching.
There was an instant of befuddlement, then memory returned and I smiled up at her. She was leaning on one elbow, looking down at me and smiling gently as she stroked my hair. "You look like a little child when you're sleeping, darling," she murmured. "Just as soft and sweet as a little child. Are you hungry?"
I nodded.
She leaned down and kissed me lightly, then released me and rolled over, sitting on the edge of the bed. "All right, we'll fix something ... I have an extra gown you can wear-I don't want you catching cold." She pushed herself up from the bed and I turned on my side and looked at her as she walked to the closet. Her body was a symphony of feminine beauty and grace, and I could feel the desire beginning to swell to life within me again. She opened the closet and glanced at me over her shoulder. "Will you stay with me tonight, darling?"
I smiled and nodded. "Yes, if you want me to."
She pulled a gown from the closet and slipped into it, then took another one from a hanger and walked to the bed, her smile wider. "Silly-of course I want you to. You're the most beautiful ... here, let me put this on you...."
It was wonderful, like an act of love within itself. We fixed dinner together in the kitchen, caressing each other or pausing to exchange a quick kiss as we moved back and forth, then we sat at the tabfe and ate, our legs and our feet touching, leaning over to take a tidbit from the other's fingers or lips. After dinner we cleaned up the kitchen, put the dishes in the washer, and took a shower together. Her body was a sheen of damply gleaming beauty with the water pouring over it, and in her eyes I read her desire for mine. We went back to bed and made love again, then we lay in each other's arms.
After the months of frustration hardening into a choking congestion within me, satiation was heaven. We lay facing each other, our legs entwined, and I had my face buried between her resilient breasts and my arms around her as she held me with one arm around my shoulders and her hand slowly stroking my hair.
"Have you always been gay, darling? Or was it a bad experience with a man or something...? "
I stirred, almost dozing, and moved one hand down and felt her buttocks. "Always."
"Even in school?"
"Yes."
"Who was your first lover."
"My aunt."
She stiffened, looking down at me, and I raised my face and looked up at her. She pushed my hair back from my forehead, smiling. "I'm being nosy again, aren't I?"
I shrugged. "I don't mind."
"Was it the aunt you lived with?"
"Yes."
"And you said she's dead now, didn't you? I'm very sorry for you, darling, because I know you must have loved her very much...."
I sighed and put my face between her breasts again, nodding. "Yes."
"Was it love at first sight, then?"
I started to answer, then stopped myself, thinking. It had been a long time since I'd thought about it. A lot had happened since then. But it hadn't been love at first sight. I pulled my head back and looked up at her again, smiling. "No. The first time I met her, I just knew she hated me...."
CHAPTER THREE
I just knew she hated me. She positively radiated it. I was an outsider, an intruder rudely thrust upon her by a jeering fate which had engineered the death of her brother and sister-in-law so she would have to disrupt her life in caring for their offspring. My father had spoken about her a couple of times in my presence when she had come from France a few months before on a commission he had arranged for her, and there had been a visit, a strained, awkward two hours of sitting tensely on the edges of chairs. I had been introduced to her in a patter of French from my father. Her piercing blue eyes had swept up and down me with no hint of a smile changing the modeled contour of the full, naturally red lips, and the slender, graceful hand with the long, tapered fingers had been held out to me. I touched it and it enfolded my hand, shaking it with a single up and downward motion, and my hand had been released and her eyes had moved away. I had been dismissed from her mind. There had been stilted conversation with my father in French while my mother had made coffee and put out pieces of cake on small dishes-an unusual formality for a snack-then my father had translated a patter of liquid syllables to produce the intelligence that she drank only tea. I had been sent racing to the small grocery store near the thoroughfare for a box of tea bags and had returned with them, panting and gasping. But the beverage my mother had produced had been sipped sparingly a couple of times and a token nibble of cake had been eaten by her, then she had concluded her visit. There had been an atmosphere of relief that an onerous obligation had been discharged. Later, they had spoken of her laughingly a couple of times, referring to her as an eccentric, and there were murmured conversations out of my hearing about her which seemed to be about some of the deeper aspects of her oddities. And I hadn't seen her again.
Until my world was destroyed. Returning home from a party, my mother and father had been killed in an accident. At first it had seemed like some grotesque, twisted nightmare, being awakened in the middle of the night by a policeman and being taken down the street to a neighbor's house, the home of a family friend. Then it had become abundantly clear to me that it wasn't a dream, and the clarity of the realization had been shattering. The following day had been spent sitting in the guest bedroom of the neighbor's house and crying, tears which had somehow fatigued me so that I fell into a drugged sleep when I went to bed. The next morning I had been taken back home. My aunt had come. And she hated me.
Her black sheath dress had made her look even taller and more slender. Her hair was long and luxuriantly thick, falling over her shoulders and down her back, and it was a flaxen color, a pale gold. Her eyes were large and clear, a glittering china blue, and she wore no makeup and needed none. Her lashes were long and curly, abundantly thick and making her eyes seem even larger, and the brows were perfectly molded lines curving across her eyes and turning up slightly at the ends. Her face was a haze of pink and white, haughtily beautiful. A classic, chiseled beauty. She looked down at the woman who had brought me, then reached for my wrist and took it firmly, pulling me in the doorway. "Thank you," she said in a clipped, precise tone, her French accent thick even in the short utterance.
The woman was short and plump, motherly, and she was also the neighborhood busybody. "Would you like for me to come in and ... well ... help with something...? Anything...? "
The penetrating blue eyes shone down at her. "No. Thank you."
The woman cleared her throat and made an aimless gesture with one hand. "Well, if there's anything I can do...."
"Yes. Thank you."
She tried to smile and nodded rapidly, then looked at me. "Well ... ah, goodbye, Camille...."
"Goodbye, Mrs. Thompson."
She looked back at the blue eyes again, then dropped her eyes, clearing her throat again. "Well, if there's anything...."
"Yes. Thank you."
The door closed firmly. She turned and looked down at me. The Gallic beauty of her face was almost overwhelming as her attention focused on me. She seemed tired, weary and fatigued, and grimly resigned. "The funeral will be tomorrow. There were cases in one of the closets, and I put them in your room. Please to pack your clothes-we shall leave after the funeral."
I looked at her as she turned away. There was a large pile of papers and letters on the dining table which she had apparently been going through, piling a few to one side and shredding the others into tiny bits in a garbage bag. "Where are we going, Aunt Gabrielle?"
She stiffened and turned, looking at me, her blue eyes sparkling. "Please do not address me as your aunt. And please pronounce my name properly when you address me. Gah-bree-ell-ah. Say it."
"Gah-bree-ell-ah."
"Very good. Now please to pack your clothes. I leave out what you will wear tomorrow."
"I'm not going anywhere."
She walked to me with a slow, measured pace and my apprehension grew as she approached. Her eyes were icy as she looked down at me. "You are coming to stay with me. It is important that you learn to do as I say. When you do not do as I say, then I shall strike your face with my hand."
Anger made her accent thicker, but I didn't have any trouble understanding her. And the depression and melancholy in my mind were swept to one side by my own anger flaring in response to hers. "Slap me?"
"If that is what you call striking a person's face with one's hand, yes."
I drew myself up to my full height and glared up at her. "You will not!"
The room exploded in front of me and the wall slammed into my back. She took my shoulders in her hands and kept me from sliding to the floor, holding me up without apparent effort. I got my feet back under me again, then my features began crumbling and tears gathered in my eyes. She cupped my chin in her left hand and tapped the knuckle of her right forefinger against the bridge of my nose. "Do not weep."
I choked and swallowed rapidly, controlling the tears. The blue eyes softened fractionally, and she nodded as she pushed the hair back from the side of my face. "Very good. Now please to pack your clothes."
"Don't you know my name?" I demanded, my voice breaking into a squeak as I shouted up at her.
She nodded, turning away. "Yes. Please to pack your clothes, Camille."
She pronounced my name the way my father had, with a pleasant roll of the last syllable. I looked up at her and turned toward the stairs. We had come to an understanding. I could express objections and opinions. But she would tell me what to do, and I would do it.
When I was through, I came back downstairs. The dining room was in order again, with a thick envelope of papers on the table and the garbage bag removed. Gabrielle was in the kitchen, making tea.
"What's going to happen to all the stuff? The furniture and everything?"
"It will be sold. An attorney will see to it. I removed certain belongings of your father's and mother's, and I will give them to you after a time-perhaps you will want to keep them. The money from the sale of the things, from insurance, and from certain other transactions will be put into a bank account and will be given to you when you are of sufficient age."
She seemed cold, impenetrable. I took a stab at the armor. "I'll bet you get your share."
She glanced at me as she put two cups of tea on the kitchen table, sitting down in a chair and nodding at another. "Sit and drink your tea. And I want nothing which belongs to you, Camille."
That made me feel a little ashamed, but I couldn't resist another stab. "How much are you going to charge me to stay with you?"
"Nothing," she replied coolly. "You are my responsa-respons-" She gave up with a shrug, ". . .obligation. I shall see to your welfare until you are of sufficient age to see to yourself."
I sat down and took a sip of the tea; I didn't like it, but I was a little afraid not to drink it. "I'm hungry."
"Dinner will be at seven."
"I'm hungry now."
"You may eat a piece of bread."
"A person can't eat just a piece of bread."
"One who can't eat a piece of bread isn't hungry."
I thought about that for a moment; it seemed a sort of fascist attitude. "Aren't you married."
"No."
"You're a very beautiful woman."
"Yes."
"Well, if you're beautiful, how is it that you aren't married?"
"Because I don't want a man thrusting himself into me and drooling his filth into my body so it will squirt children back out."
That was food for thought. I looked at her as she looked across the room, sipping her tea, her long, heavy lashes moving when she blinked occasionally. It suddenly occurred to me that she couldn't have slept the night before, considering the distance she'd traveled. "There's also love, you know."
"Certainly. But hardly a subject on which you could express yourself from a knowledgeable viewpoint."
"I know about love."
She put her cup carefully on the saucer and looked at me. The blue eyes seemed to swallow me. "Indeed? I jet us see. Concern by me for your welfare is an expression of love. It is not necessarily love, but it is an expression of love. It is necessary for you to do as I say so that harm does not come to you. I struck you in order to teach you to do as I say, and I will strike you again if necessary. The act of striking you is an expression of love, because it reflects concern for your welfare. Do you agree?"
"No. One who loved someone else would explain something to them instead of hitting them."
"If one has a mature, logical mind, they will perceive the harm which will befall them and it would be unnecessary to explain it. If one does not have a logical, mature mind, it is a waste of time to try to explain it."
"I don't agree."
"It isn't necessary that you agree, as long as you do as I say. And please do not talk so rapidly-I have difficulty in understanding what you say at times."
"I'll be a pain in the ass to have around. I have a lot of nightmares, for instance."
"So do I. Perhaps we can endure each other without undue difficulty."
The doorbell rang. She had made arrangements with a charitable organization to pick up all the odds and ends from the garage and shed, and it was a couple of men and a truck from that organization. I stirred from the table and washed the cups and saucers while she went out to see to it, then I went upstairs and lay down on my bed. The mind is capable of only so much sorrow, and mine had been filled to overflowing. The resilience of youth was busily replacing it in my mind with other things, and I felt weary and fatigued. I dozed off, then woke when Gabrielle called me to dinner.
It was two boiled eggs, a thick slice of salami, a large piece of cheese, a chunk of some unfamiliar kind of bread, an apple, and a glass of wine. She had apparently been shopping sometime during the day, because it wasn't the type of food to which I was accustomed. But I was hungry. "I usually drink milk," I said through a mouthful of salami and bread.
"Milk from a woman's bosom is natural food for a small child. Milk from a cow is a natural food for a cow's offspring. What we have here is natural food for an adult human being, and the wine is to aid the functioning of the body in absorbing the food. But the wine can only do so much-please to take smaller bites and chew more slowly."
"You sure use a lot of big words."
"It is a product of my education-I learned to speak English at a university in England. One can speak only one's own native language with complete familiarity. You will learn that when you learn French."
"Why would I want to learn French?"
"To be able to talk to people when you go to France."
"When am I going to France?"
"When I complete the commission for which I was hired."
"When will that be?"
She sighed and shrugged. "Perhaps two years."
"I'll be old enough to look after myself by then."
"Possibly. Probably not. If you are not, you shall go to France with me."
"It must be a big commission."
"There is a lot of work involved, and much remains to be done."
Another factor of the situation occurred to me. Art had been an obsession for as long as I could remember, and two of the suitcases in my room had been used for my sketch books and the few canvasses I'd done. "Could you teach me painting?"
"No. I am an artist, not a teacher. And art comes from within, not from without. No one can teach another art. At best, a highly skilled teacher can assist one in learning art. And I am very busy at all times with my work."
"Will I be able to paint, then? And may I watch you work?"
"Yes, and no. You may have an easel and work area in my studio. And you may not watch me work. I find that distracting." The blue eyes turned toward me. "And I find distractions irritating."
We finished the meal in silence. Her attitude seemed to speak louder than words that my intrusion into her life represented an ultimate distraction. It was galling to be dependent upon someone who regarded the situation with a grim endurance and patience, but there was no option. My mother hadn't had any relatives, and the only other option was to run away. But that was out of the question; a couple of girls at my school had run away from home earlier in the year, and the stories brought back by the one who had returned had dissuaded several others who'd been contemplating doing the same thing.
The wine made me sleepy, and I went back to bed. The morning brought an icy clarity of mind, a reopening of tender wounds for gouging by the slashing knife of sorrow. Several neighbors came by, and Gabrielle sent them away from the door. An attorney came, they talked quietly in the dining room, and he left again. Then the horror of the funeral. I controlled myself through most of it, then virtually collapsed at the cemetery. Gabrielle was a picture of icy self-possession throughout it, including when she led me from the cemetery. Several of the neighbors were there, awkwardly offering help. We took a taxi back to the house.
She let me lie on the bed in my room for a couple of hours, then she appeared in the door. "It is time."
It didn't occur to me to argue; it was as though some immutable fact of life had been spoken. I got up and glanced around the room at the things I'd known as I shrugged into my coat, then I picked up a couple of suitcases and she took the other ones.
"Do you want to use the bathroom?"
"No."
A few people I knew passed by in cars as we stood at the edge of the sidewalk and waited for the taxi. Once or twice it looked as though one of them was going to stop, but the hostility Gabrielle radiated seemed to put them off. A girl I knew from school waved surreptitiously, and I returned the motion half-heartedly. The taxi driver was garrulous, then surly when a steely silence met his observations and probing questions. The fact that he didn't get a tip made him angry. Gabrielle effortlessly carried four of my suitcases and the bag she'd brought into the bus station, and I struggled along behind her with two suitcases. She bought our tickets, then we sat on one of the rows of chairs to wait in silence. A man came by and sat by us, trying to talk to Gabrielle. The brittle, unwavering stare from her cold blue eyes reduced him to silence and an awkward self-consciousness. His smile became sickly, then faded. He got up and moved to another seat.
"Why don't we take an airplane instead of a bus?"
"It costs too much money."
"Don't artists make much money, then?"
"No. If one would be an artist, one must be content with one's work."
"Father said the family in France had a lot of money."
"Yes."
"If you're from the family in France, how is it that you don't have a lot of money?"
"Because my father disinherited me when I decided to become an artist."
"Father said his father was a count."
"Yes."
"Who's the count now."
"My older brother."
"What does he do?"
"He is a pervert. He lives in the South of France, and he gives money to women of low character to let him perform obscene acts with their children."
"It isn't much of a family, then, is it?"
"No."
"What's your full name."
"Gabrielle du Evereaux."
"You don't have a middle name."
"No."
"Could I call myself Camille du Evereaux."
"Yes."
"Are you a countess."
"No."
"If your brother is a count, how is it that you aren't a countess?"
"When my brother dies, the title will become mine as a courtesy."
"Will you be rich, then?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because it apparently costs a lot of money to perform obscene acts with children. My brother has spent most of the family money, and the family properties are heavily mortgaged."
Before, the family in France had seemed something very remote and far away, not directly associated with me. Now it seemed much closer, very romantic, and highly appealing. Gabrielle didn't seem to fit my conception of genteel poverty, but her self-possession, assurance, and control over the situation around her was completely consistent with my ideas of the titled gentry of Europe. She seemed out of place in the bus station, though.
The bus came into the station, and we lined up at the door with the rest of the people and filed out to it. We got a seat, the bustle of the other passengers lessened, then the engine started and the bus pulled out of the station. For a while the sights out the window distracted me. Then I became bored. And hungry.
"I'm hungry."
She took a large bar of chocolate out of her purse. "I don't like chocolate."
She silently nodded and put the chocolate back in her purse.
I went to sleep, and it was dark when I woke. Gabrielle was sitting and looking at the back of the seat in front of her, as she had been before I had gone to sleep. I was ravenous, with pangs of hunger stabbing agonizingly in my stomach. "May I have some of the chocolate, please?"
She nodded, took it out of her purse again, and broke off half of it and gave it to me. I ate it and she ate a single small square she broke from the other half, then she wrapped the paper back around it and put it back in her purse. There was a small thermos of water and a tiny bottle of wine in the bag she had brought into the bus. She gave me a cup of the water to drink, then we shared the wine. It made me lightheaded and drowsy, and I went back to sleep.
The next day passed in a numb, fatigued daze. There was a forty-five minute wait at one place, and we walked down the street to a small store and bought crusty rolls, cheese, and cold cuts to make sandwiches. Gabrielle seemed to remain inexplicably fresh and bright, her eyes clear and her face unlined, and even her clothes didn't seem to get wrinkled. That night there was a drunk in the small, filthy bus station in some small city along the way, and he staggered toward us and reached for me as we came out of the toilet. Gabrielle's movements were lightning fast. Her hands flashed through the air, there were a couple of meaty thuds, then the drunk was lying on the floor with his tongue thrusting out and his eyes bulging, his body convulsing as he vomited. She took my wrist firmly in her hand and led me back out to the bus. The faces around us were pale and drawn, surprised and shocked.
Our destination was Williamsburg, Virginia. We arrived in the middle of the night and took a taxi through the deserted, ghostly streets with their buildings from another time, then went through a couple of modern housing developments to a road which led into the countryside. The fields and clumps of trees rushed by in the darkness for a couple of miles, then we turned onto a dirt road which led to the old, rambling house which she had rented for the period of her stay there.
It was cold and drafty, and the furnace and hot water heater had gone off. She left me emptying my suitcases and sorting my things out, hanging my clothes in the old fashioned wardrobe and shivering uncontrollably, and she went to see about the furnace and hot water heater. Presently, clanking sounds began to come from the plumbing and the ancient radiators began to thump and rattle as they heated. I went back downstairs. Gabrielle was in the kitchen, preparing a meal. There was dark, heavy bread, a sharp cheese with a dry, crumbling texture, and a long, thin sausage which smelled and tasted strongly of garlic, all apparently impervious to mold and spoiling. The kitchen was massive, and the table and chairs were solid and heavy, setting unevenly on the stone floor. She had kindled a fire in the old stove, and the red flames flickered through the cracks in it, making shadows in the dimly lighted room. A cat howled and scratched at the door. She got up from the table and went to the door with a piece of the sausage. The cat stuck its head in the door when she opened it, then it snatched up the piece of sausage and darted away. She returned to the table and sat down, reaching for the tall, thin bottle of wine to refill my glass.
"Why do you stare at me, Camille?"
"Because you're very beautiful."
"And you are an attractive child. You will be a lovely woman when you mature. But it is impolite to stare at another."
I chuckled. "You talk about things irritating you. Does that?"
"No, it disturbs me."
It suddenly didn't seem funny any more. But it was hard keeping my eyes off her. I looked down at my plate and finished eating. When we were through, I helped her clean up then I went upstairs to take a bath and go to bed while she went to the studio at the rear of the house to work.
An old woman had bequeathed seventy-five thousand dollars to a local art museum on the provision that the money be used to subsidize a modern painter who was to produce fifty paintings of events which had occurred in the local area during colonial times. The specifics of the paintings to be done had been provided in minute detail, because the old woman had been something of a local history buff. The trustees procrastinated until the old woman died, then promptly took the subscription to court in order to break the provisions of the endowment and use the money as they saw fit. The court threw out the request, ordering the trustees to execute the provisions laid down by the old woman. The largesse suddenly became a severe problem. There was an abundance of what could be loosely described as modern artists who were more than willing to throw paint on fifty squares of canvas to get the seventy-five thousand dollars, but there were none who could work within the restrictions laid down by the old woman, performing the research, accomplishing the figures and landscape features in clearly recognizable form, and fulfilling the overall requirements of making a contribution to modern art, the overriding stipulation of the endowment.
My father had heard about it and had written to Gabrielle, recommending that she submit some of her work for consideration and make sample sketchings for perusal by the trustees. She had been invited with open arms. What had represented a problem suddenly appeared to be a boon once again. There were visions of afternoon ceremonies when finished productions would be unveiled and the artist would speak a few words in a charming foreign accent and the admission fees to the occasion would go to bolster the coffers for the long list of overdue maintenance projects and further acquisitions. Possibly the artist, being a woman, could be prevailed upon to disseminate the cause of art further throughout the community by appearing at various functions, and the many other benefits of having a resident artist could be realized. On top of all this, the artist possessed a legitimate talent and was willing to undertake the prodigious amount of work involved for the relatively small remuneration. It seemed to be too good to be true.
And it was too good to be true. While the trustees were breathlessly awaiting word of which flight she would arrive on, she quietly came to the city on a bus, checked into a hotel, and began looking for a house to rent. She had found a country retreat built by a retired artist years before. It had passed through several hands, generally used as a farm house, and the massive studio behind the house had been used as a greenhouse. It was empty and she rented it, moved in, and began work. The first the trustees knew of her presence was when it was reported to them by an alert librarian at the county archives where Gabrielle was doing her research. After a hasty conference they had gone to the house and had been turned away at the door. The next time she was seen was when she left the first two completed paintings at the museum. They were strikingly authentic works of art, unquestionably fulfilling every requirement. And the next ones were. But there were no presentation ceremonies, no meetings with local art enthusiasts, no furthering of the cause of art among the local social clubs. They had hired a beautiful eccentric with a strong French accent, a cold, haughty gaze, and a volatile, temperamental disposition.
The school bus came by the end of the lane on which the house was situated, and I registered at the school the day after I arrived. School was school. The boys strutted down the halls, posing and posturing, and the girls fluttered around them. Some of the teachers were concerned and interested, most of them were wearily resigned, and the art teacher gave me a second glance because of my last name. I had no trouble assuming my position as the quiet one in the classes. Some of the boys made the prescribed advances to see if I would fuck, then dismissed me from their minds when I didn't respond.
A routine was quickly established. I prepared breakfast and dinner, and I put out cold cuts for Gabrielle's lunch and fixed a sandwich to take for myself. Half of the huge studio was designated for my use, and she didn't come into my side and I didn't go into hers. I didn't go out or entertain visitors; I had no interest in sports, dances, parties, or pep rallies. Gabrielle seemed to see nothing remarkable about it. She worked fourteen to sixteen hours a day seven days a week, promptly answered questions I asked, and volunteered nothing. I acquired a taste for the light, simple meals she seemed to prefer: cheese, sausages, fruit, and vinegar and olive oil on salads instead of dressing. On weekends I did the shopping. She rarely left the house.
A month after I came she completed two pictures and delivered them. Then she packed a bag and told me she would be gone for two days. When she returned, I asked her where she'd been and she replied that she had gone to Boston. I asked her why, and she said it was to rest. There was a change, but it was difficult to describe. Some of the tension seemed to have disappeared, but it seemed more that she had woken from a sodden sleep rather than restful slumber which regenerates and revitalizes. Two more paintings were eventually completed, and she went to Boston again for two days. I sensed the tension building up within her while the paintings were in progress, and I felt its absence when she returned. I didn't question her about it; I was completely involved in my own painting. I was vacillating between modernized realism and a hybrid of abstraction which was trying to assert itself within me. Gabrielle was unapproachable, and the art teacher was no help; she had been educated to lecture on the development of art and to help people draw sketches, and in terms of conceptual art I was already years beyond her. She couldn't understand my questions or my struggle, and Gabrielle wouldn't listen.
We cooked a chicken in Home Economics, and I decided to start cooking a chicken on Sundays. The first Sunday I did it, I built up the fire in the stove and started the chicken baking shortly after breakfast and left my work in the studio occasionally to check on it. The smell of the chicken baking filled the house, but Gabrielle didn't seem to notice it as she stood in front of her easel and painted with her slow, steady, minute strokes. Then it was ready, baked to a golden brown. I checked the dressing, put it out, opened a can of cranberry sauce, and opened the wine.
There was unspoken communication of sorts between us. She seemed to be able to read my thoughts with an uncanny accuracy, and I could detect when she was angry, tense, or upset, or when her work was not going well. There was a feeling that I could have delved deeper into her thoughts but for the barrier she kept between us. I walked back into the studio and looked at her, wanting her to notice me. The brush lifted from the canvas, and the blue eyes turned toward me. "Lunch."
She nodded fractionally, silently, her eyes still on me. I turned and went back into the kitchen.
I centered the tray holding the chicken, moved the wine a little closer to her plate, then plucked at my dress and looked around for something else to do, suddenly and unaccountably nervous. Her footsteps approached the kitchen, then she entered. The change in her face was slow. Her eyebrows lifted, then a luster came into her eyes. Her lips parted slightly, then stretched upward. The change was stunning. It was the first time I'd seen her smile, and it was like the sun coming from behind a cloud and illuminating a beautiful landscape. She was devastatingly beautiful. It was like a crushing blow hitting me in my stomach. I gaped at her, breathless. She glanced at me, then looked. Her smile faded, and her cheeks flushed. Then the flush died away and her face settled into its accustomed lines of serene composure. "This looks very good, Camille. Shall we eat?"
We sat down and began eating. Seeing the smile on her face had been a disturbing experience. Not unpleasant, but strangely unsettling. And I knew she knew how I felt, possibly better than I knew myself. "I wish I could get to know you better, Gabrielle. We live here together, but we're like strangers. You answer all my questions, but you never have really told me anything. I'd like to ... know you better ... be closer to you....
"It is perhaps better if you do not, Camille," she replied quietly.
"Well, why not? I mean, it's like we're all by ourselves. I don't know anyone else and don't want to, and you don't. And we're the only two in the family now, if you don't include the Count, and you don't even like to talk about him because he's some kind of screwball or something. So I'd like to know you better, Gabrielle. I'd like to ... like to ... well, love you...."
"It is perhaps better if you do not."
"Why not? Everyone has to have love."
There was a tinge of sorrow in the blue eyes, then they dropped as she shook her head slightly. "No. One must have nourishment and a purpose in life. Love makes life more full, but it is not essential to life. You are a very good cook, Camille."
"Yeah, thanks."
"More wine?"
"Please."
CHAPTER FOUR
The first time she really noticed me was when I won the contest. It was shortly before the summer recess. The two entries I had put in had swept the local and regional contests, wining a fifty dollar savings bond donated by a local civic organization and a one hundred dollar gift certificate from an art supply store in the city. The news that I had won the final contest with one of my entries came on a Wednesday, and I was called to the principal's office. He was somewhat glum over my declination to go to the capital to accept the five hundred dollar prize, but he seemed less than surprised; Gabrielle was well known.
I hadn't mentioned winning the local and regional contests to Gabrielle, and I didn't mention the final contest. On Friday the principal came to the art class and returned my entries and gave me the five hundred dollar check, and after school I went to the art supply store. Gabrielle had been giving me money for clothes, school expenses, and art supplies, and she had also been giving me a weekly allowance which amounted to several times the amount of money she spent on herself. But my consumption of art supplies seemed to be much greater than hers, and I was forever eking another squeeze out of a tube of paint, using both sides of sketch paper, hoarding tiny stubs of charcoal, and trimming ragged bristles on brushes until they were so short they would hardly hold paint. Even though her side of the studio was off limits, I had watched her and picked up the economies she practiced as a matter of course. I used the much less expensive raw canvas and made my own stretcher frames as she did, priming and sizing the canvas as she did and producing a much more flawless, even ground for painting than commercially prepared canvas, and I used textured paper to rough outlines and establish color balance schemes. Even so, I was forever penniless and always on the verge of running out of something I needed.
The one hundred dollar gift certificate and the five hundred dollar check gave me six hundred dollars to spend, and I went wild over the fat, studio-sized tubes of paint, long, thick charcoals, heavy bags of pigment and sizing glue, heavy, untouched sketch pads, acres of canvas, and sheaves of bright, new brushes in all sizes and shapes. The dealer seemed to be as pleased as I, and he dragged empty cartons out of the storeroom and helped me box my choices. I spent four hundred dollars, filling the back of his station wagon, and I was supremely happy as he drove me home, the two paintings which had produced the windfall on my lap in their paper wrappings and two hundred dollars in my purse.
He helped me unload the things on the porch, smilingly waved, and drove away. I carried the paintings and a twenty-five pound bag of tempera in first, walking back through the house and into the studio. Gabrielle glanced at me, we exchanged our customary nod and murmur of greeting, and I put the paintings and tempera on my work bench and went back out. It took me seven more trips to get everything in. From the fourth trip on, I could feel her blue eyes on me as she stood in front of her easel, the brush poised over the canvas, looking at the growing pile of boxes and bags on the bench and in front of it. On the last trip she sighed slightly and put her palette and brushes to one side; the bustle had disturbed her concentration. I began rooting through the things, sorting them out, finding cans for the brushes, stacking the bags of basics on the shelf under the bench and laying out the tubes on the shelf over it, and stacking away the canvas and sketch pads.
She walked to the invisible demarcation line which divided the room in half from the doorway to the opposite wall. "Where did you get the money, Camille?"
"I entered two paintings in the contest for amateurs. I won a hundred dollars in the pre-final and five hundred in the final."
"Very good," she nodded, the tone of her voice and her eyes reflecting pleasure. "Let me congratulate you. You are to be congratulated for the recognition of your work and for the money you received, but most of all you are to be congratulated for your judgment. Even with all the money you received, I see that you bought raw canvas and linseed oil rather than prepared canvas and medium. That pleases me very much, Camille."
I picked up the paintings from the bench and pulled the paper off, setting them side by side on my easel. "Would you like to come over and look at my paintings?"
She hesitated momentarily, then nodded. "Yes."
It was the first time, and I felt jittery. If we had been somewhat removed from each other personally and emotionally, our work had been poles apart. I had seen her work on display at the museum and found it magnificent. She had never as much as looked at a sketch book of mine.
The two paintings were widely divergent in subject, consistent in the stark, modern realism I had been working into during the past weeks. One was a wino I'd seen in a park near school and had given a dollar to sit for me while I sketched him. The clothes and background were indicated, and the outstretched hand and face were executed in minute detail. It was a sienna monochrome. The other was a classical exercise, a Dapline Rising in a wild riot of color, heavily erotic in content, execution, and in the Viridian glaze I had used as a unifying overlay.
The paintings stunned her. Her mouth opened slightly and her eyes opened wider, and there was a sharp hiss of in-drawn breath as she looked from one to the other. Then her mouth closed and her eyes narrowed slightly with thought. She slowly turned her head, her eyes moving up and down me as though seeing me for the first time. Her eyes moved back, to the paintings and she walked closer to them, looking at them more closely. She picked each one of them up, holding it at arm's length and examining it, then holding it closer and studying the brush strokes. A full ten minutes passed before she spoke. It seemed like years.
"You didn't learn this by yourself," she said flatly.
"No. The art teacher in the other school helped me a lot. Mixtures, techniques, and so forth."
"You are a technical expert. It was unfair of you to enter your work in an amateur contest."
"Maybe so, but I wanted the money."
She sighed and nodded, moving back from the easel, pushing her hair back with both hands as she continued to look at the paintings. "I expected to see the work of a child, Camille, of a dabbler in paint. I thought that you were one who would while away the hours in daubing paint on canvas until you became happily married and ... but I should have known. You never go out at night and you bring no one here ... I should have realized, but I was so busy with my work that...." Her voice faded and she sighed again. "In many ways I feel sorry for you, Camille. It will not be a happy life. You will have your vision and you will try to communicate it. You will have eyes in a world which is blind. You will work, and there will be few rewards. It is plain to see that you will be a superb artist, Camille, because you are much more advanced than I was at your age, but you will not be happy-"
It was the closest we'd ever been. Her wall of reserve had slipped, and she talked slowly, thoughtfully, as she looked at the paintings. Her tall, slender beauty was awesome, deeply unsettling. There had been times when a girl's slender hips in a tight skirt had kindled a glow in me, and there had been times when changing for gym class that I had broken into a heat of desire and had turned away to hide my face from some lovely girl. As I looked up at Gabrielle, it all came to focus on her. I wanted her. And there was a churning suspicion that she would respond.
I put my hand on her arm. "I would be happier if we could be closer, Gabrielle. And you would be, too. I want to be your ... friend...."
She stiffened, then looked down at me as she peeled my hand off her arm and dropped it. Her eyes were pained, and her face looked pale and drawn. She turned away and walked back toward her easel. "My brushes are drying...."
It was a devastating blow, and my heart sank. Winning the contest and the abundance of supplies were now nothing, less than nothing. The bitter ache of rejection gnawed at me as I watched her walking across the studio, her hips moving gracefully in the light, simple dress, taking the glowing cloud of her presence with her. I sighed and moved toward the door with dragging steps. "I'll fix dinner, then...."
"Yes, all right...."
It was a quiet meal. We usually talked about neutral subjects or I related some incident at school. More rarely she would tell me about something which had happened to her as a child or as a penniless student at the Sorbonne. But that night there was no conversation, and the atmosphere between us seemed to be strained. She always worked at least two or three hours after dinner, and after she finished eating she went back into the studio. I washed the dishes and cleaned up the kitchen, then went into the studio. Gabrielle was painting, frowning with concentration over some apparently particularly difficult or tedious area of the canvas.
I put a square of canvas texture paper on a cardboard backing and put it on my easel, and began an exercise in pointillism, the stippling together of alternating dots of pure color. The object was to achieve spacing between dots of appropriate size so they would blend together in the eye of the observer and produce the contrasting color, and after drawing in a hasty landscape and a tree I began painting the tree with alternate points of blue and yellow to produce a green blend. But nothing worked right. The points were either too large or too far apart, then they were too small and too close. Time after time I scraped them down and began over, and each time it again turned out more like a maple decorated with blue and yellow Christmas ornaments rather than a haze of green.
The hours passed unnoticed, and when I looked up Gabrielle had cleaned up her brushes for the night and had gone to bed. I had lost myself in the exercise, and the disappointment and heartbreak of the evening returned in full force. I gathered up the brushes and took them to the open end of the bench and began working the soap into the bristles.
It was impossible to sleep. I got out of bed and pushed my feet into my slippers, and quietly went back downstairs. Sipping a glass of wine, I walked back into the studio and turned on the lights. On a sudden impulse I walked over to the other side of the studio and lifted the dust cover on Gabrielle's easel, looking at the canvas. It was almost done, and another one was under a dust cover on her workbench, the last coat of varnish drying. It wouldn't be long before she disappeared for two days again on another of her unexplained absences. Or were they really unexplained? Did I know why she left and simply wouldn't face it? Did she go somewhere to search for companionship and sex to relieve her of the tensions and frustrations which built up within her? I felt a seething stab of jealousy as I walked back across the studio, drinking the wine with a single gulp. Perhaps she had a lover somewhere, someone who waited for her visits. Possibly it was even a man. The very thought was sickening, disgusting. I turned off the lights and walked back through the house to the kitchen.
I put the glass in the kitchen sink, then went back up the stairs, walking with slow, careful steps in the darkness. As I turned at the top of the stairs to walk along the landing toward my room, I heard a whisper of sound on the edge of audibility. I stopped and turned my head toward her room, listening. There was a muffled sob and a moan. I walked to her door. It was slightly ajar. I pushed it open, and the sound of the hinges grated loudly in my ears.
The moonlight was coming in the window between the open drapes, and the room was bright after the darkness of the stairs and landing. Her long, thick hair was scattered on the pillow, and her arms were spread wide. She was having a nightmare, whispers of protest coming from her lips as she turned her head from side to side and occasionally moved an arm or leg. I walked closer to the bed. The covers were pushed down to her waist, and I could see the downy cleavage between her large, resilient breasts at the top of her nightgown. The alluring fragrance of her perfume and her body were strong in the room and my heart began pounding. I stopped at the side of the bed and looked down at her. She was a picture of that unworldly yet earthly beauty artists had struggled for years to capture on canvas. Her face was that of an angel, sweet, untouched, and virginal in purity, yet the swell of her breasts and the hint of the line of her thighs and hips under the bedclothes would have stirred lust in a stone. I began trembling all over, looking down at her, and I lifted my hands and seized my hair, pulling it back until the pain was agonizing as I turned my head back and silently cried in the agony of my need. She breathed another whisper of sound, a whimpering moan, and moved on the bed. I looked back down at her. Her lips were parted and her breath was coming in shallow pants. The movement had pulled the top of her nightgown to one side, and one of her breasts was almost completely exposed. I could contain myself no longer. I sat down on the edge of the bed, reaching for her, and I put my arms around her shoulders as I buried my lips in the warmth of the hollow of her throat.
There was a barest suggestion of response as she moved from sleep to wakefulness. One hand pressed the center of my back gently and the other one touched my arm as her lips caressed my cheek, then she was wide awake and seizing my shoulders, pushing me away from her as she hissed with outrage. "Camille! What are you doing in my room? And this? What possesses you?"
I pushed her hands to one side and reached for her again. "I love you."
"Have you taken leave of your senses?" she snapped, sitting up and grasping my shoulders, again, shaking me. "What on earth ... ? "
"I love you," I repeated numbly, reaching for her, one of my hands brushing against one of her breasts.
She twisted away from my hands, holding me with one hand and her other hand flashed around. Bright spots of light exploded in front of my eyes as the sharp, numbing pain stabbed across my cheek and my nose burned with a hot, stuffy sensation. I began sobbing, tears streaming from my eyes, and I reached for her again. "I love you, Gabrielle."
Her palm slammed into my other cheek with a force which almost threw me off the bed, and I struggled to get back to her as I began sliding off the bed. She gathered her legs under her, sitting up, and smacked me again. I sobbed wildly, crawling toward her on the bed and clutching at her nightgown.
"Camille, I will punish you until you cease this foolishness!"
"Kill me," I bawled. "Go ahead and beat me to death ... smack me again ... I don't care ... I love you ... beat me to death ... I love you...."
She grasped my wrists and pushed me onto my back, pressing me down on the bed and leaning over me. "Camille, you must stop this or I will make you go elsewhere to live!"
"...won't ... no, you won't ... I'll follow you ... you won't get away from me ... I'll follow you wherever you go ... I love you ... you won't get away from me ... not ever...."
Then she seemed to give up. She released my wrists and slid back to the head of the bed, sitting on her folded legs and burying her face in her hands, shaking her head. I lifted my head and wiped the tears out of my eyes, then I crawled to her and put my head in her lap and my arms around her waist. My cheeks were burning and my lips stung, but the soft warmth of her body was heavenly. She was naked under the nightgown, and I could feel the satiny texture of her skin through it. The sensation made my heart pound and made the pain in my cheeks and lips dissipate into oblivion.
She sighed and put one hand on my shoulder and the other on the back of my head. "Camille, little Camille. This cannot be. This cannot be."
I seized her hand and covered it with kisses, then held it against my burning cheek. It felt smooth and cool. "There's no reason why it can't."
"There are reasons in abundance."
I crept higher on her, shrugging her hands to one side as she tried to grasp me again, and pressed my head against her breasts and locked my arms around her. "Kiss me, then tell me the reasons."
"To begin with, you are a child-"
"Kiss me first, then tell me."
"You do not tell me what to do," she snapped. "You must listen to me, or I will strike you again. You are only a child, and-"
"Slap me some more, then kiss me and tell me the reasons."
"Camille, you must listen to me when I talk to you and tell you-"
"I won't listen to you until you've kissed me. You've never kissed me, and you've never held me. Now hold me and kiss me. Not on the cheek or forehead, either. Kiss . . .e on my lips, then I'll listen to you."
She looked down at me in exasperation, her brows drawn and her lips tight: Then she chuckled and smiled wryly, shaking her head. "You are an Evereaux, Camille. You are sufficiently willful and stubborn. Very well, I will kiss you, then you must listen to me...."
Her arm slid around my shoulders and her other hand pushed my hair back from the side of my face as she bent down. I lifted my lips, and hers touched mine. It was meant to be the kiss of an adult for a child, a caress to calm and soothe, but I could feel the electric sensation race through her as our lips met. I opened my mouth wide, feeling for her hand, and her lips opened and covered mine as her tongue touched the tip of mine. Her tongue slid into my mouth and I sucked it and nibbled it as I lifted her hand and put it on one of my breasts. She squeezed it with a trembling pressure of her fingers, fondling it, and turned her head from side to side as she tightened her arm around me and kissed me passionately, gorging my mouth with her tongue. I lay in her arms, savoring the sweet taste of her mouth and the feel of her body against mine, stroking the side of her face.
Tremors were racing through her body and her jutting breasts were heaving with her breathing when our lips parted. She swallowed and took a deep breath, trying to control herself. "Now, Camille, you must listen-"
"See? There's no-reason now. I knew there wouldn't be when you kissed me."
She sighed and looked away, clicking her tongue, still holding me and absently stroking my head. I put my hand on her breast and squeezed it, and she lifted it from her breast, pressed it to her lips, and held it, shaking her head. "Don't do that, Camille. I can't think...."
"You're still worried about thinking, Gabrielle. Stop thinking and just do what you want to. And let me do what I want to."
"What do you want to do, then, Camille? Tell me what you want to do."
"I want us to take our gowns off and lie together. I want to put my hands on you and feel you. I want to kiss you ... all over...."
She shook her head again, looking at the window. "This is madness...."
"I love you," I murmured, putting my arm around her neck and pulling myself up, searching for her lips. "And you will love me if you'll let yourself."
My lips touched hers. She started to pull away, and I touched my tongue to her lips and nibbled at them, pulling her hand to my breast and pressing it to it. Her hand closed over my breast, and her lips opened damply, covering mine. I opened my mouth wide, taking her tongue into my mouth and sucking it again, and I slid my hand up under the hem of her gown and felt her thigh, training the tips of my fingers back and forth along the soft, downy inside. She moaned in her throat, kissing me harder; and she slid down to a reclining position on the bed, pulling me with her. I locked my thighs around one of hers and began undulating wildly, my body throbbing in the instinctive search to focus the hunger which was churning within me. She put her hand against my buttocks and pressed hard, immobilizing me, and turned me onto my back and lay on top of me, kissing me torridly. Her legs wrapped around mine and her arms wrapped around me, and I felt smothered in a sea of heavenly bliss as she began undulating with a slow, erotic movement of her body. I pulled her gown up and cupped her buttocks, feeling the muscles moving in her body, and the sensation of the movement of her Venus mound against mine began to fan to life a warmth which spread through me, bringing every nerve in my body to tingling awareness.
She lifted her lips from mine and looked down at me, her hair hanging tent-like down from the sides of her head and falling onto my face. Her hand pushed it aside and caressed my cheek. "Very well, cherie, we shall do as you wish. But now you must do as I say. If I am to make love with you, you must do as I say."
I nodded rapidly. "Anything...."
She turned onto her side, lying by me, and pulled my gown up. I lifted my hips off the bed as she gathered it up around my waist, then I sat up and lifted my arms as she pulled it off my head. Then she pulled her gown off, and I looked at her lovely body in the bleached light of the moon coming through the window, shimmering on her white skin, and I trembled as I put my hand on her large, resilient breast, feeling it. She took my hand from her breast, kissed it, then bent over and kissed my breasts. I shivered as my nipples stretched and stiffened, and she took one of my breasts in her mouth and began sucking it gently. Waves of fire coursed through me and I moaned as I tossed my head from side to side and arched up off the bed, pressing my breast further into her mouth.
Her mouth tightened on my breast, making the sensations stab through me, and her hand moved down my body to my thighs and began stroking back and forth along the inside of my thighs. I spread my thighs apart, lifting my hips from the bed and I pressing my pussy at her hand, and her hand slid up my thigh and cupped my pussy, squeezing it with an exhilarating pressure. The sensations had me spellbound, and I lay numbly with my arms apart and my legs as far apart as I could get them, my body jerking and twitching as my head tossed from side to side. Her lips moved down my body with a tantalizing pressure, and I began thrusting my pussy at her hand, moaning and whimpering as my limbs jerked convulsively. She mouthed the triangle of hair between my thighs, then moved down the inside of one of my thighs with the tip of her tongue touching it with a feathery pressure. I lifted my feet from the bed and splayed my legs apart, and she moved back along my other thigh toward my pussy. I threw my forearm across my mouth and bit it to keep from screaming aloud as I poised on the brink of the ultimate sensation, suspense and anticipation a boiling agony within me. Then her tongue touched my clitoris, and molten fire seemed to flow through me.
She expertly titillated me from one stage to the next in a series of shelving plateaus of sensation, bringing me to a feverish pitch of arousal then making me relax, kissing and caressing me, pulling my forearm away from my mouth and telling me to scream if I wished. Her tongue returned to my clitoris to coax me higher each time, then I was finally enfolded in a fleecy cloud of enjoyment, feeling the pressure building up within me" and groping for release. There was an unbearable moment of hanging suspended by a single thread which was fraying and unraveling, then I exploded, my body bursting into a flurry of motion and ragged screams tearing from my chest. I soared into blinding ecstasy as the wrenching orgasm gripped me, then I plunged into the bottomless depths. In one instant I was gasping for breath as the sensations wrung me, then in the next the tears were beginning to well up. She turned and took me into her arms, pressing my face to her breasts and stroking my hair, kissing the side of my .face. My mind struggled in the stormy depths of depression, and she was a haven for my bruised and battered spirit. I clutched her, pulling at her and choking with sobs, and she lifted herself onto me, enfolding me protectively and murmuring in my ear.
My tears ran over her firm breasts, dampening them against my face, then the depression faded away and the pleasure of having her for my lover began to assert itself in my mind again. I kissed her breasts and fondled them, kissing them,-and she began undulating against me again. Her legs tightened around me as she began thrusting at me harder, and a whimpering moan of pleasure came from her throat as I sucked one of her nipples.
She lifted herself to her knees over me, cupping my buttocks and lifting me, and she began stroking her vulva against my Venus mound. I strained to lift myself higher and press harder against her as I looked up at her, savoring the sight of a beautiful woman in the act of love, her face twisted with sensation and her long, thick hair flying from side to side. Her body tensed and her mouth opened as she threw her head back, shuddering and gasping, and her fingers dug into my buttocks as she undulated her hips rapidly and twisted them from side to side. The climax rushed over her as a gasping moan burst from her lips, and she threw herself forward on top of me, her arms and legs clutching me with a vise-like pressure.
The pounding of her heart slowed, and her breathing returned to normal. Her arms and legs slowly relaxed. She started to move off me, but I put my arms around her and held her. Her lips found mine, and our tongues caressed as she searched blindly for the covers with one hand. She pulled them over us, and we went peacefully to sleep.
The wall of reserve was completely destroyed. She was radiant and smiling, playful and teasing, and almost tearfully contrite over the black eye, the bruise on my cheek, and the swollen hp from her slaps. I shrugged it aside, kissing her, then bursting into tears of enjoyment. She kissed my tears away, we made love again, then we went down for breakfast.
It was almost ten when we finally got into the studio. She led me over toward her easel by the hand, smiling. "There will be no more sides in the studio now-it will be our studio, all of it. Look in that box over there, and you will find some copper etching plates and a set of etching needles."
"What do you want them for?"
"For you. It is time to fill in gaps in your education, and you must learn to etch."
"I don't need to know how to etch, Gabrielle."
"If I am to have an apprentice, then my apprentice must know how to etch. It will improve your composition, your control of lines, and it will strengthen your wrist. Which is something else we must work on. I have noticed that your elbow begins to-sag when you have painted for three or four hours. You must exercise to strengthen your arm and wrist. Now get out the plates and needles, bring a stool over to sit on, and get your sketch book and we will pick out a sketch suitable for etching."
"God! These are manual needles. Don't you have electric needles?"
"You and I shall use brushes instead of a spray gun for paint, and we shall use a manual needle for etching. Bring those over here so I can watch you work while I paint."
"Will you let me kiss you now and then?"
"Certainly not! I would like to finish this commission before I am an old woman. We are lovers when we are in our bed and artists when we are in our studio. Get your sketch book."
"I love you, Gabrielle."
"And I love you, cherie."
I opened the sketch book on her workbench, and she turned through the pages and pointed to one, nodding. "That one will do," she murmured, patting my shoulder. Her hand slid down my back and squeezed my bottom as she leaned down and pressed her lips to mine quickly. "Perhaps a kiss now and then, cherie. Now get to work."
Where I had labored before, the lines and colors now seemed to flow from the end of my brush. Trouble with proportion and foreshortening disappeared with a word of advice from her and a careless wave of her brush to point out where I had departed from my composition. Technique became such a natural part of me that it was left behind, and interpretation became the point of decision rather than whether or not I would be able to do something. I became an expert at etching and at reducing the plates with acid and pulling the prints from the plates, and my arms and wrists became so strong that I could hold them outstretched for over thirty minutes, rapidly squeezing a tennis ball in each hand. Her style had realism with a strong tendency toward romanticism, mine settled into hard realism, and they never mixed. But by the time I graduated from high school my work rivaled hers.
Her work had slowed drastically, but she was whimsical about it, shrugging it off with a smile. The cold, haughty reserve returned when others were present, and the abrupt transition to kittenish playfulness when we were alone again always amazed and delighted me. We never argued, because our unspoken communication between each other had become such a strong bond that we automatically steered around irritations with each other. I enrolled in the university for a year while she finished her commission, and during my spare time I made etchings of scenes in Williamsburg and sold the prints in tourist shops. It turned out to be so lucrative that at times my income exceeded Gabrielle's, which both pleased and wryly amused her.
The commission was eventually finished. Gabrielle had made it clear that she had decided to stay and find other work, but I wanted to go to France. We had accumulated literally tons of books, paintings, art objects, and other things, and after going through everything critically and weeding out that which wasn't absolutely essential, we were still left with tons. We called the packers and crated everything and had it shipped, we traveled around the country for a month, then went to France and traveled around for another month. Much of it was spent in Paris and we also visited the small, sleepy town of Evereaux, then we eventually settled in Chartres, the location of one of the better provincial art schools.
Money was no problem. I found that Gabrielle had a national reputation as one of the better modern painters, and even though no single commission brought a large amount of money she had work all the time. My etchings of the castles and chateaux along the Loire sold well in the tourist shops in Paris, my expenses at the school were comparatively minor, and we spent little beyond ordinary household expenses and our art supplies.
Life settled down into a rosy, dream-like pattern. By the end of the first year at the art school I was proficient in French and by the end of the second year my American accent had virtually disappeared. A couple of months after I graduated we were in Paris delivering portfolios of etchings to the shops which sold my material, and we met some American tourists; Gabrielle found it hilarious that I had difficulty in understanding them and that they mistook me for French because I had developed an accent in English during the years of not using it.
One of the landmark structures on the Loire was Cheronceaux, which had frequently been the subject of my etchings. The palace had been built and added onto at various times over a period of centuries, and portions of it were virtually in ruins. A couple of years after my graduation the count had finally succumbed to self-abuse and died, Gabrielle had inherited the title, and we were living on one of the family chateaux near Evereaux, having paid off the mortgage on the property and secured title to it. During a visit back to the Loire Valley we saw that the east wing of Cheronceaux, an old Gothic structure, was being restored. Shortly afterwards there was a small notice in a trade publication that the trustees of the property were interested in securing the services of a painter to execute a mural in the main dome of the wing.
Gabrielle was always a miniaturist more than anything, regarding a ground more than a meter wide as gauche and demonstrative, but my tastes had run to the monumental and colossal, and I had been fascinated by the European cathedral ceilings. She was also a modernist, interested only in interpreting modern life in modern terms, while I was fascinated by the classics, going to see the work of the masters over and over during our trips around the continent. She was laughingly indulgent until she saw that I was almost frantically determined to get the commission for the dome, then she put everything to one side and threw herself into helping me.
It was in the middle of winter when we went there the first time, climbing among the scaffolding erected by the workers and taking measurements of the drafty dome. We both caught colds, but she appeared to be captured by my excitement over the scope and magnitude of the work as we sat huddled with blankets over our shoulders in the chilly pension at night, drinking glasses of hot wine spiced with herbs and working feverishly over the notes and preliminary sketches of the design.
The design was submitted with a letter of explanation, and the days and nights seemed endless while I waited. It was a prestige job, with a token remuneration attached, and I was in competition with some of the best painters in Europe. Then a letter arrived from the trustees requesting that I submit samples of my previous work. I was limited to ten pieces, and we went through agonies of indecision in selecting them. Finally they were crated and shipped, and I went through alternating periods of excitement and utter depression while we waited, sure at one time that I would get the commission and absolutely positive at the next that I had no chance. When the telegram arrived awarding me the commission I fainted.
It was about a two-year project, and we moved back to the Loire. I decided to use the traditional method and prepare massive cartoons from the sketches and transfer the design to the ceiling with a stamping wheel. A frenzy of excitement over the project had me spellbound, and it was Gabrielle who had to point out that the plaster ground left by the workers was unstable and the scaffolding was unsafe. I filled and primed the plaster, but it was Gabrielle who was left to worry about the scaffolding, ordering workmen about with the heavy boards and shouting at me apprehensively as I trotted back and forth along the ceiling on the rickety structure, dragging about the huge cartoon sheets and oversized stamping wheel.
And it was she who fell. The heavy, sickening thud on the marble floor far below and the sudden silence which fell over the place was ominous and foreboding, penetrating the feverish preoccupation with which I was working. I looked down as the workmen rushed toward her. She hadn't uttered a sound as she fell. She had been bringing my lunch to me.
It took almost three years to finish the ceiling, and my grasping at immortality was executed as a monument to my love. She lay in a vault in the cathedral at Tours until I was finished, then I took her to the family plot at Evereaux. The days had been lonely and the nights had been endless and cold, but the fact that she was gone really didn't register until the priest at Evereaux addressed me by the title to which I had fallen heir.
CHAPTER FIVE
The piece for the furniture store had dried nicely by Friday, with the varnish forming a dully glowing finish over it, and I buffed it with a soft cloth to polish the finish to a sparkle and compliment the rather severe, plain lines of the composition. It was a soothing, peaceful, pleasant piece, and I was proud of the way it had turned out because it is difficult to get alia prima to fulfill an objective precisely. But it had, and I looked forward to the reaction of the woman at the furniture store. She was nice.
I wrapped it in paper and tied a string around it, then put on my jacket, turned the sign on the door, and locked it and walked down to the bus stop. It was a nice day, the sun bright without being hot and a pleasant breeze stirring, and it was early enough that the streets weren't crowded and noisy with people. But the bus driver had staring, insolent eyes looking out from the midst of the thick, untidy hair which covered his face and head. And he smelled bad.
The store had just opened when I got there, and there were no customers. I noted that with satisfaction, because the woman had been rushed and hurried when I'd talked to her before, obviously pulling herself away from a thousand other things she had to do in order to talk to me for a few minutes and just as obviously trying to hide it. And her quick, bright smile had been pleasant and warm to look at. There was a man moving around in the aisles of furniture, chewing a stub of a cigar and looking dissatisfied, and three men standing around a counter on the other end of the store and drinking coffee. The three looked at me as I walked in. One of them said something in a low voice, and all of them snickered lewdly; it was sickening.
I walked toward the man in the middle of the store; he at least looked business-like and looked as though he might be in charge of something. "Is Ms. Harris in, please?"
He looked at me, taking the soggy, nasty-looking cigar stub from his mouth, then he put it back in his mouth and shook his head. "No, she's out seeing about some stock ... oh, you're the girl who was supposed to bring in a painting, aren't you? She mentioned it to me...."
"Well, I'm not a girl and I haven't been for several years, but I do have a painting, yes."
He grunted, looking down at me sourly, then shrugged, looking away and gnawing on the cigar. "Yeah, OK, what ever you say. Well, there's an empty spot over there-put it over there, and I'll tell the cashier to get your money for you. It was seventy-five dollars, wasn't it? I'll get one of the guys to make up a receipt-"
"Oh, you can't possibly put it there," I said, looking at the partition he had motioned toward.
He frowned. "Oh? Why in hell not?"
"Because that's French Provincial furniture. Ms. Harris said she wanted something to go with modern or contemporary."
"Well, it doesn't make any difference where it goes as long as a customer can see it-"
"Of course it does," I said, untying the string and pulling the papers off the painting. "Look at it-see? It would look grotesque with French Provincial." I pointed toward an adjacent area set off with partitions, where there was a contemporary living room arrangement. "Something like that is what you want. You could take that horrible plaster shield thing off that partition and put it over here. It doesn't go with anything much but it certainly doesn't harmonize with contemporary and at least the general design and color wouldn't be as bad with the French Provincial. Then you could put this canvas over there, and it would-"
"Look, you're not going to tell me how to arrange my showroom."
"Certainly not-I couldn't agree more. I wouldn't presume to attempt to tell you your job, and I wouldn't attempt to determine an appropriate setting for some of the monstrosities you have for decorations in here. On the other hand, though, you aren't going to take a painting of mine and put it in an arrangement which would make it look ludicrous."
"Goddamn it, when you sell it, it isn't yours any more."
"That is debatable, depending on your precise meaning. Artists retain a vested interest in their work to some extent, and I believe I have the right to object to my work being placed in such a manner that it will reflect poorly on the painting."
He gnawed his cigar savagely, glaring down at me, then leaned toward me. "Well, I'll tell you what you do, sis," he growled. "If you think so much of it, then you take your painting and shove it up your ass.
It stunned me for a moment as he turned away, his fists knotted and his head pulled down between his shoulders, then I was seized with an overwhelming fury. All the narrow-mindedness and channel vision I had ever experienced in others seemed to be focused in him as I looked at his back, the anger swelling to a fiery rage within me. I took the stretcher frame firmly in my hands, walked after him, and lifted it up and brought it down on top of his head. The frame shattered and the canvas split with a loud crack. He stumbled, then caught himself. The three by the counter looked in open-mouthed amazement. He turned, shreds of the cigar hanging from his mouth and his eyes bulging in surprise. One of the three by the counter chuckled, then all three of them collapsed in laughter. The man looked down at me with the canvas hanging over his shoulders and the pieces of frame hanging loosely, and he blinked vacantly as his mouth opened and closed soundlessly, letting the shreds of cigar fall down onto the canvas. I turned and left.
Everything had soured. The sun seemed to be a spotlight to pick out the garbage which had collected in the gutters and the decay in the buildings along the street. The breeze was merely a wind which made it a nuisance to keep my dress down. Men turning to look at me again as I walked along the sidewalk were revolting instead of a minor annoyance. It wasn't the money. Wanda's purchases had taken the pressure off expenses for some time to come, so I didn't really need the money. It was the sordid, tawdry business of grubbing in the marketplace, of bending things to satisfy others so their purse strings would loosen. It was disheartening. What I had anticipated as a pleasant half-hour of conversation with Pamela Harris-or possibly a preliminary to something much more meaningful-had turned out to be a degrading experience. And part of my anger was directed at myself for letting myself be brought down to his level. And on top of everything else, Wanda had been vague about her plans for the evening, which meant that she was probably seeing someone else.
I went back to the shop and made myself a cup of tea, leaving the closed sign on the door and sitting in the rear in my living room. It was late morning and pangs of hunger were beginning to gnaw at me, but the thought of eating anything was nauseating. An hour passed, and I made another cup of tea and walked into the studio, looking around. There were a number of things I needed to work on, none of which were urgent, and I took out a half-finished study of the cathedral at Limoges I'd contracted to do for a beauty parlor and began working on it. Presently it occurred to me that the closed sign was still on the door. I went to the door and unlocked it, turned the sign, and went back to my easel.
A couple of pairs of shoppers came in and looked around, then a lady came in and bought a small seascape. An old lady came in with a photograph of her dead son that she wanted restored, and I sent her down the street to a photographic studio where their airbrush work seemed to resemble human beings, judging from the display in their window. The cathedral was all detail work and I became fully involved in it, and the hours slowly passed. More shoppers came in and looked around and left. My hand began to get unsteady and I felt lightheaded, then I suddenly realized it was from hunger. I looked up from the painting and checked the clock; it was almost seven, and I hadn't eaten all day. After I got to a place where I could stop, I went into the kitchen and made myself a quick sandwich, then came back in and ate it at the easel, using a maulstick to steady my hand until my energy began to return.
The sound of the door opening and closing barely penetrated my consciousness. There was a fleeting thought that it was late for a shopper passed through my mind as I concentrated on the painting, touching in one of the spires. The last tiny dot of paint went on and I stepped back from the easel, separating a long brush from the bunch in my fingers and holding it up to check the proportion. I held it parallel to the base of the structure to get the angle of diminisliment, then moved it slowly up to the spires; it was perfect, with the front spires just the fraction higher that a vertical plane will appear to an observer. Then I turned and looked. It was Pamela Harris, from the furniture store. She was standing at the room divider with her hand resting on top of it, waiting for me to notice her.
"Ms. Evereaux, I'd like to apologize for what happened to you this morning in my store...."
"It is I who should apologize, Ms. Harris. Of all the things I could have done, I picked the one thing I shouldn't have-"
"Oh, no. Fred can be such an ass at times, and I can imagine what he came out with ... am I interrupting your work, Ms. Harris?"
"No, I'm finished for the moment, and I'm just going to clean up now. Would you like to come in and sit down?" , "Yes, I would," she smiled, pushing the swinging door open and walking into the studio. "I've been out of the city all day, and I'm sort of tired, to tell you the truth...." Her voice faded as she looked at the canvas on the easel. "Oh, how lovely. Is it the Notre Dame?"
"No, the cathedral at Limoges, but it's Gothic and looks somewhat like the Notre Dame," I said, carrying the brushes and palette over to the workbench. "There's a stool, or there's a chair over there, if you prefer. Make sure there's no paint before you sit down...."
"All right," she chuckled, glancing at the stool then sitting on it, looking around. "This is a pleasant place, Ms. Evereaux."
"Please call me Camille, and it's sort of cluttered right now-I need to have a general cleaning, I guess."
"It's pleasant to sit in, though. My name's Pamela, by the way."
I nodded, working soap into the bristles on the brushes. "Yes, I saw your name on your door the other day...."
"About Fred, perhaps it would help if I explain, Camille. I'm in the process of changing our line of furniture from economy to quality, and Fred's having a hard time adjusting to things. I've had the place about a year now, and despite his faults, he's a fine floor manager. He's exasperating at times, but I don't know what I'd do without him and I'd hate to fire him-"
"Oh, good God, you weren't even contemplating firing him because of what happened, were you?"
"I'll have to admit that the thought did occur to me. There're some things that mean more to me than not having to worry about the floor management quite as much...."
"Well, you mustn't do that, Pamela. I said some things I shouldn't have, and what happened was as much my fault as his. We ... well, we got started off wrong. Anyway, from the look of him he must have a dozen children to feed, and I wouldn't want something like that on my conscience."
"He does have several, as a matter-of-fact," Pamela laughed. "You appear to be a good judge of people."
I smiled at her, carrying the brushes and palette to the sink. She looked cute sitting on the stool with her heels hooked over the brace. Her face was pleasantly attractive, and she had a nice figure. She looked to be about thirty or thirty-five and her clothes were expensive and well fitted to display her figure. And she didn't wear rings. "Well, sometimes I am and sometimes I'm not." Her cheeks flushed slightly, but the smile remained on her face as I turned on the water in the sink and began rinsing the brushes.
"Would you have dinner with me, Camille?"
That seemed apropos of nothing until I glanced at her and saw that she was looking at me. Her cheeks flushed a little more as her eyes moved up to meet mine, and her smile was still there. "You don't owe me anything, Pamela, but I would like to have dinner with you. Let's fix something here."
"I do owe you for something-I owe you for a painting, and I'm going to insist that you take the money-"
"You won't! I'm not going to take money for a painting that I broke in a temper tantrum."
"Oh, come on now, Camille. I asked you to do the painting, and it was my employee who aggravated your artistic temperament and made you-"
"I don't have an artistic temperament because I'm not a temperamental person. I'm an artist, but my qualities are those of a farm woman more than they are of a bohemian. And you're not going to pay me for the painting."
I said it somewhat flatly, because I find the subject vaguely irritating; everyone expects an artist to be volatile, while my placid disposition is a source of satisfaction to me. I have a temper as everyone does, but it is more difficult to arouse than that of many I have known. She looked at me and blinked in surprise, probably because of the abrupt change in my tone of voice, then she smiled, a conciliatory smile. "Yes, of course, Camille. And it was a lovely painting. I looked at it ... well, what is left of it, and I could tell that it was simply beautiful."
"It did turn out nice," I nodded, smiling as I remembered it, and I spread the brushes on the towel and turned to her. "Well, I can always do you another one if you like."
"That's something I wanted to talk to you about, Camille. Listen, if you don't want to go to a restaurant or something, let's go to my place for dinner. I do want it to be my treat, and I'd like to talk to you about some things I need."
That put, a somewhat different aspect on the invitation; perhaps I'd been mistaken. I looked at her again, shaking the water off the palette and propping it against the side of the sink to dry, then untied my smock and shrugged out of it. Business was business, though, and if she only wanted another painting, then the money would be welcome. "All right, Pamela."
"Good," she said, smiling radiantly. "What time do you close?"
I chuckled and shrugged. "Anytime I get ready. Let me turn off the lights and get the key. Shall I call a taxi?"
"No, I have my car outside."
Everyone seemed to have a new car. Hers was a Cadillac, a shimmering gleam of chrome and sparkling enamel, and the seat was marvelously comfortable, contoured and covered with a crushed velvet. We were silent as she drove through the city toward the freeway, and it was a comfortable, companionable lack of conversation rather then an awkward and strained silence. I felt more at ease than I had the night I had gone home with Wanda. For one thing, my libido was in an incomparably less active state. Not that Wanda was more attractive than Pamela, because she wasn't, but Wanda had been my first lover after a long period of abstinence, ' which had made me more excitable, and the activities of the day had done much to drain me emotionally.
She drove expertly, wheeling the large car onto the freeway with smooth coordination and accelerating to freeway speed. "Would you like the radio on, Camille?"
I looked at it; it had an FM selector. I nodded and turned it on, pressing the FM button, and turned it to the station to which I occasionally listened while I was working.
"That's pleasant, Camille. What is it?"
"One of the Nocturnes."
"It's very nice. If I'm not being too nosy, have you been in the country long? I expect you have, because your English is absolutely marvelous."
It was hard to answer her truthfully without making her look stupid. "Several years. Are you from here originally?"
"No, I'm from Iowa. I worked as a salesperson in furniture there while I went to interior decorating school, then I moved to Michigan and worked as a decorator. I was there a few years and opened up a shop, then when this store went up for sale I sold my shop and came here. Not as exciting as your life, without a doubt."
"I wouldn't say that. There's a lot of risk in giving up a job and starting on your own. And a lot of hard work."
She smiled wryly and nodded. "You're right about the work. A lot of it, and then some."
She turned off the freeway and drove along a thoroughfare with tracts of suburban homes on each side of it. It was a busy thoroughfare, four to six lanes of solid traffic working between the freeway and the tract homes, and she concentrated on her driving, her foot moving between the accelerator and the brake ' pedal and her eyes darting between the windshield and the rear view mirror. A mile further along she turned off onto a drive which wound along the side of the hill above the river, with massive houses on each side of it. She braked at one of the driveways and turned into it. I looked then looked again; the furniture business was more lucrative than I'd thought.
"You certainly have a nice house, Pamela."
"Thank you," she smiled, setting the brake and turning off the ignition. "Let's go in and see what we can scare up for dinner."
It was a two-story stone with a slate roof, English country cottage style, complete with ivy on the front. We walked around the flagstone path to the front door, she collected the newspaper and a handful of mail from the mailbox, and we went in. The same motif had been used in the interior, with Victorian in the den and dining room and Georgian in the living room. The tapestries were a little too bright and the copy of the Endicott didn't look too good even from the door, but it was nice. She was looking at me, waiting for a reaction, and I looked at her and smiled. "This is beautiful, Pamela. You have a lovely home."
"Thank you. Would you care for a drink? Or perhaps a cup of tea?"
"Tea sounds nice," I replied, following her through the dining room to the kitchen, "if that's what you're going to have."
She dropped the newspaper and mail on the counter, nodding, and took the kettle to the sink, glancing around. "This place gets lonely sometimes-it's big for one person-but I like to be comfortable."
"It looks nice and roomy. I could put my whole apartment in the den."
She turned off the faucet and put the kettle on the stove, turning to the refrigerator. "I have to get away from work-completely away from it. And then it almost drives me out of my mind sometimes ... like Fred and his capers. How about a grilled steak?"
"Please don't do anything special for me, Pamela."
"I feel like steak, if you'd like one."
"All right, then, if that's what you'd have anyway. Is there anything I can do to help?"
"Just talk to me, if you will."
I nodded and smiled, sliding onto one of the stools at the breakfast bar.
She put a couple of steaks on the counter and took two potatoes from a bin in a cabinet, washed the potatoes and put them in a microwave oven on the counter, and pulled the wrappers off the steaks and put them in the oven to thaw. We chatted about the store and her plans for it as she made the tea, then we took it into the den and sat down.
"With the new line of furniture I plan, Camille, I'll need something different in the way of accessories and decorations."
I nodded silently, sipping my tea; the decorations and accessories she had in her store wouldn't go with quality furniture.
"That's what I wanted to talk to you about. How long does it take you to do a painting?"
I shrugged. "That depends on the composition, Pamela...."
"Yes, well, to be more specific about it, I'm going to need paintings to go with Early American, French
Provincial, and Contemporary. Now I'll have my new lines in by the first of the year or so ... say six months, so could you have ... oh, fifty paintings done by then?"
That was a shocker, but I immediately knew I couldn't do it; there was no way I could turn out satisfactory work at the rate of two canvasses a week. I started to shake my head.
"...but I'm not really thinking," she murmured. "You have thirty or forty in your shop, and I'm sure I could use most of them. Do you have any that aren't on display?"
"Well, yes, I have a number in my storeroom...."
"Good enough. I'm sure you know what I want, and I'll trust your judgment entirely. I'd have to have them framed, of course, with the color and type of frame to harmonize with the type of furniture, but we could include that in the price. Could you let me have fifty at a hundred and fifty dollars each, including frames?"
It was stunning. The frames would be a problem, but I would be able to do something. And there were probably fifty or sixty canvasses in the storeroom which would be suitable, some of them dating back years. It would be a massive sale.
"Is the price .too low, dear?" Pamela asked, looking concerned. "I thought with seventy-five for the other one...."
"Oh, no," I said, shaking my head rapidly. "God, no. It's just that ... I had no idea that you'd want ... so many ... that's an enormous amount of money, Pamela."
She chuckled and shrugged. "I'll get well on it, don't worry about that, Camille. If I sell them for exactly what I paid or even use them for promos, it'll be more than worth it to me. There's not a store in the city which has an exclusive line of oil paintings. And your name is known, of course ... that won't hurt things." She put her cup down and stood. "I'll go check on those steaks while you're thinking about it."
I ran the contents of my storeroom over in my mind. It had been some time since I'd looked through it completely; in fact, there were many things, including a number of canvasses, I hadn't even glanced at since I'd moved into the combined apartment and studio. There had to be at least fifty canvasses in the room, and probably many more. A lot of them would be landscapes, seascapes, and still lifes, neutral enough to use in several types of settings, and there were classical works which would go well with French Provincial. Between the storeroom and what I had on display, I might be able to provide the full number of fifty paintings. Or at least not have to paint more than half a dozen of them. The frames would be the only problem.
She came back in for my cup to make another cup of tea, and we walked back into the kitchen, talking about it. The six-month time limit had been set against the time when she would have all the quality furniture in place, and she had set it at that in order to give me some time to do the work. When I told her that I could begin delivery on at least some of the paintings as soon as I could get them framed, she was relieved that she wouldn't be in a position of having expensive furniture and cheap decorations in her showroom.
The steaks were in the microwave oven, grilling, and I helped her make the salad. She apologized for the wine, but beyond being a little sweet it wasn't bad, and my elation over the huge sale was so great that I could hardly taste what I was eating. We chatted about the paintings while we ate and cleared away the table, then we took our brandy into the den. She sat down by me on the couch, sipping her brandy, and suddenly laughed. I looked at her, raising my eyebrows.
"I'd have given anything to be in the store today when you broke that painting over Fred's head-I'll bet his expression was something to see."
I smiled, then laughed, and nodded. "It must have been-the other three men were almost in hysterics."
"I know-he was still having at them about it when I got to the store this evening. I didn't think it was very funny, of course, and I came right over to see you about it."
"That was nice of you, but I meant to come to see you tomorrow."
"I was going to come and see you, anyway-about the paintings. I've been thinking about it since you came in the other day. About the paintings, and about you."
That seemed point blank, leaving little room for doubt about what she meant. I looked at her smiling. Her smile was hesitant, querulous, and it brightened as I smiled at her. "I've been thinking about you, too, Pamela."
Her smile disappeared and a flush spread across her cheeks. Her eyes moved up and down me, hesitating at my breasts, and the brandy in her glass trembled as she put her hand on top of mine. She looked into my eyes again, clearing her throat. "I hope you mean what I think you do, Camille."
My heart began thumping heavily, and the paintings were suddenly in a very remote corner of my mind. "You could check and find out," I murmured.
She put her glass down, took mine and put it on the coffee table, then reached for me. I slid toward her and nestled my head on her shoulder as her arms wrapped firmly around me and her hands squeezed and fondled my back. Her lips burrowed against the side of my neck, kissing and tugging. She shuddered, sighing heavily. "Oh, I wasn't sure, Camille," she breathed, her voice muffled against my neck. "I wasn't sure ... I was so afraid that ... that you wouldn't ... so afraid ... you're so beautiful, Camille...."
"And you're beautiful, darling," I replied, caressing the side of her face and lifting my lips to hers.
Her lips touched mine, opening, and her hand closed on my breast as her lips covered mine. A warm glow of desire began rising within me as I felt the warmth of her body against mine, breathed the fragrance of her perfume, and tasted her lips in my mouth. Her tongue wriggled into my mouth, and I wrapped? my tongue around it, caressing it and sucking at it. She moaned and sighed heavily, her breath through her nostrils fanning my cheek, and her hand squeezed my breast harder. A sharp, penetrating sensation shot through me, and I slid one hand up and cupped her breast, squeezing and feeling it. She moaned again, taking her lips from mine, and she moved her lips over my face in damp kisses. "You're so beautiful, Camille, like a dream. I want you so much...."
"...want you, darling...."
She covered my lips with hers again, thrusting her tongue deeper into my mouth and sliding her hand down my thigh. I turned my head from side to side, sucking and nibbling at her tongue, and she put her hand under my dress and slid it back up the inside of my thigh. A delicious sensation roared through me with a shudder as the tips of her soft fingers caressed the tender skin on the inside of my thigh, then her hand moved higher, tugging at my panties. She opened her mouth wider, kissing me with a hard pressure, and slid her hand down into my panties and combed her fingers through the hair between my thighs. I went limp, gasping and spreading my thighs apart as I leaned against her, and she held me tightly as she stroked my pussy with the tips of her fingers and rained kisses over my face. "Does that feel good, darling? Does that make you feel good?"
"...good ... hold me ... squeeze ... tighter ... good...."
Her hand caressed my pussy, squeezing and fondling it, and I panted with pleasure, lying limply against her. She slid her tongue in and out between my parted lips, then licked them. "I don't want to be a pig and rush you into the bedroom, darling," she murmured in a trembling voice, "but I'm burning up. Honest to God, I'm burning up for you."
And I was on fire for her. Her face was lovely, hovering over mine with her cheeks flushed with passion and her eyes shining with her need. I lifted myself, pressing my lips to hers, and she put her arms around me and lifted me to my feet as she stood up, kissing me hungrily. We embraced, our open lips kissing and our hands moving over each other, then we moved toward the hall. She held me tightly, moving me along the hall, and she pulled the zipper down on my dress and pulled the dress off my shoulder, kissing and nibbling at me. Her tongue, lips, and teeth made delicious shivers race through me, fanning the glowing desire higher as we went into the bedroom.
She fumbled with the zipper on her dress, jerking at it, and I pushed my dress down and stepped out of it. Her eyes devoured my body as she shrugged out of her dress, stepped out of it, and tossed it onto a chair. She had a lovely body, slender but with full, large breasts and gracefully curved hips and thighs. I unfastened my bra as she pushed her pantyhose down and tossed them to one side, and then moved back to me, putting her arms around me and sucking at one of my breasts. I put my arms around her head, closing my eyes and throwing my head back as I moaned and shuddered with the sensation. She put her hands in the waistband of my panties, pushing them down, and she let my breast slide from her mouth and knelt, pushing my panties down my legs and trailing her tongue down my body. A river of fire seemed to flow through me, moving toward the center of sensation as her mouth came closer to my pussy. She pushed the panties off my feet, kneeling in front of me, then burrowed her face between my thighs, her tongue lapping at my pussy.
A moaning whimper burst from me as her hot, damp tongue flicked across my pussy, and I clutched her head and spread my thighs apart, pressing my pussy against her mouth. She cupped my buttocks and felt them as she licked my pussy with long, hard strokes of her tongue, then the tip of her tongue was a probing pressure, groping and feeling. It penetrated, a battering wave of sensation rolled over me and my knees started trembling, and I swayed on my feet, moaning. Then she was on her feet again, her arms around me and her damp lips covering my face with kisses. "Come on, darling, lie on the bed. Lie on the bed and let me make love to you. Lie down so I can make you feel good and make you come, darling...."
She whipped the covers back and lowered me onto the bed. I was numb with arousal, the driving, agonizing pressure built up within me and screaming for release, and I quivered and panted as I watched her take off her bra and panties. She was a shimmering dream of sexual delight and beauty, with the soft light of the lamp gleaming on her silky skin and picking out the dark of her large nipples and the bun of pubic hair against her milky-white skin. I reached for her, struggling to sit up, but she put her hand against me and pushed me back down as she slid onto the bed, hovering over me and looking into my eyes. "Just lie still, darling, and let me do it," she murmured, her breath warm against my face. She pushed my hair back from my forehead, kissing me tenderly, then darted her tongue into my mouth. "That's what I'm going to do to you, darling. I'm going to make you feel good...."
I looked up at her beautiful face, now dark with passion, and the choking, stifling feeling swelled within me, the clamoring need for release ballooning.
"...Please ... need to come ... make me come ... now...."
She cupped my breasts and squeezed them, kissing me again, then moved downward and put her mouth on one of my breasts, sucking it as she fondled the other one. Fiery pangs of sensation roared through me, making the urgent need for escape grow still higher, yet soothing and gratifying in the promise of a movement toward relief. She moved down my body, kissing and lapping at me, then she took my thighs in her hands and spread them wide apart as she stroked my pussy with her tongue. I stiffened, moaning and whimpering, and I lifted my feet from the bed and spread my thighs as wide as I could. She wrapped her arms around my thighs, probing at my pussy with the tip of her tongue, then she slowly slid it in. The warm, heady rapture flowed over me, and a wailing moan burst from my throat as every muscle in my body tensed. She held my thighs apart and moved her head up and down, sliding her tongue in and out of my pussy.
It became focused, the widespread, all-encompassing hunger drawing closer, becoming concentrated, and then the gnawing need turned into an ecstatic cloud of exhilaration which bore me along, carrying me toward a climax. The tips of her fingers stroked and caressed me, making the sensations much more acute, and her tongue moved up to my clitoris. It was a firm, slow motion at first, her tongue lapping over my clitoris as her hands fondled me and coaxed me higher into the sensations gripping me, and I began thrusting my hips in rhythm with the movement of her tongue. Her tongue began moving more rapidly and the pressure decreased, and I began undulating as rapidly as I could as tremors raced through me and my body jerked convulsively. Then her tongue was a feathery pressure, fluttering rapidly, and ribbons of fire raced through every nerve in my body as moans and cries burst from my throat and my head tossed from side to side. I felt myself swooping upward, my breath catching in my throat and my head pounding with the racing of my heart as I poised, then I exploded. She gripped me and held me, her tongue driving me on through the orgasm, and I tossed and clawed at the bed as the ecstatic thrills battered me.
My body was limp, and my breath came in shuddering gasps as I moaned and writhed in the aftermath. I felt her pulling my thighs apart, kneeling over me, and I pushed my hair back and looked up at her. She straddled me, putting one knee between my thighs and holding them close to her as she lowered her pussy to touch mine. Her hair was hanging down in her face, her face was crimson with suffused blood, her eyes were shining, and her breath was coming in short, quick pants. She pressed her pussy against mine, then began undulating.
She moaned, closing her eyes and tossing her head back, and she began moving her hips more rapidly, twisting them from side to side. Our eyes met, and she gasped as she leaned over, still stroking her pussy against mine, and fondled my breasts. I took her hand and kissed it, then put it back on my breast and reached up for hers. She closed her eyes and tossed her head back again, her hips throbbing in a flurry of motion, and I caressed her breasts, looking up at her in the beauty of her passion. It came closer and closer, then it burst over her and a cry was torn from her chest as she began thrusting her pussy at mine with short, quick movements of her hips. I clutched my thighs to her, thrusting at her and squeezing her breasts. Her movements slowed, then she fell on top of me with a ragged sigh. I put my arms around her, kissing her, and her arms slid around me and our legs entwined.
It was hours later when she woke me. She was leaning over me on one elbow, smiling down at me. Memory returned, and I smiled up at her. "You looked so beautiful that I hated to wake you, darling. Do you have to go home, or can you stay here tonight?"
I stretched and yawned, looking at her; she was lovely, and a heady throb began stirring within me. "I'll stay here, if you don't mind."
She chuckled softly, gathering my head in her arms, and pulled my face to her breasts. "Don't be silly, darling. I'd be out of my mind if I did mindyou're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. Do you want to go back to sleep, or would you like something to drink?"
Her large, dark nipples were so close they were out of focus as she pressed my face between her smooth, resilient breasts. I kissed one of her nipples, sliding my hand down and cupping her pussy. "Let me think about it."
She chuckled again, then her smile faded and her cheeks flushed. Her arms tightened around me, and her lips moved down toward mine. I opened my lips under hers, feeling her tongue sliding into my mouth, and I squeezed and felt her pussy. Her hand slid down my body and cupped my pussy, feeling it.
CHAPTER SIX
The number of canvasses in the storeroom turned out to be much larger than I'd remembered. Some of them were still crated from moving a couple of times and had been done years before, and some of them were fairly recent. There were some that I'd done for specific commissions and the person who'd wanted them had never turned up, and others that I'd done because it was something I felt like doing at the time. I'd thought about displaying them for sale at various times, but I'd never really had the space to display a large number of paintings in such a manner that they wouldn't interfere with each other. There were other ways it could be done, of course; galleries had offered me opportunities to display, and there had been a number of friends who'd suggested a somewhat more business-like approach to marketing my paintings, but somehow I'd gotten along. And I was an artist, not a businessperson. But instead of delving into my stock of paintings when someone asked for something, such as the first painting for Pamela which had ended up so unfortunately, I'd always done a painting to fill the requirement. And my storeroom had become more cluttered with paintings, and each time I'd moved I'd shipped tons.
There was a certain amount of nostalgia associated with opening the crates and looking the canvasses over, because some of them dated as far back as France. It was pleasant in a bitter-sweet sort of way, and it took me most of the day to finish it and make a list of what I had that would be suitable for Pamela. While I was about it, I thought about the frames she needed. There had been a few times when customers had wanted paintings framed and" I'd had them made, but I'd never been really satisfied with the work. The best carpenter I'd found was a hairy lout who owned a shop a few blocks away, but along with a pedestrian ability to measure and cut an angle, he had an insufferable egotism and thought his body the one thing that every woman would want. He wasn't very perceptive, and I'd had to get nasty with him to stop the advances.
So that left him out, and the couple of other places I'd tried had come up with something horrible in the way of a frame. The fact that all the canvasses Pamela needed could come out of the storeroom put me ahead, but my thoughtless agreement to provide them with frames was a problem. I finished the list and came out of the storeroom and locked it, thinking about it, then went into the bedroom and brought the telephone directory out. All the carpenters advertised seemed to run toward installing kitchens, remodeling homes, adding rooms onto houses, converting garages into dens, and so forth. None of them appeared to involve themselves in anything as minor and prosaic as making a frame for a picture.
It was almost two in the afternoon and I hadn't eaten, and I locked up and walked a couple of blocks to a small grocery store to get some tea. While I was there I bought a newspaper and brought it back with me. I made a couple of sandwiches and a cup of tea, and I looked through the home services section of the advertisements. There were several handymen listed, along with a couple of carpenters, and a tiny, two-line advertisement by a cabinetmaker. The carpenters had contractor license numbers in their ads, making me think of house remodeling and room additions again, and I looked at the cabinetmaker ad again. That's all it was; the word cabinetmaker and an address. No telephone. I glanced at the clock; three-thirty. I finished eating, turned the sign over again, and locked the door and left.
The address was about ten blocks away, so I walked. It was a pleasant day and the evening rush home from work hadn't yet started, so I enjoyed the walk. I passed an area of apartments, then some small businesses, and entered several blocks of light industrial companies. I'd been there before, having my car worked on before I wrecked it, and I remembered it. The place I was looking for was a small shop between a machine shop and a garage. It had been a car parts shop at one time, judging from the sign which was partially painted over.
The door made a loud bell ring in the back of the place when I opened it, and an electric saw or something started winding down. There was a small reception area in front with a counter and a partition behind it, and a door at the side of the partition led into the shop area at the rear. Footsteps approached.
She was tall, with short, sandy-looking hair and a freckled face, dressed in overalls, and she was pulling goggles off and dusting sawdust from herself as she walked through the door.
"Hi," she said with a quick, appealing grin. "Can I help you?"
"I'd like to talk to someone about getting some picture frames made."
Her grin widened. "Well, would you like to talk to me?"
'I'd be more than glad to. Are you the proprietor?"
"Such as it is, I'm the proprietor of it," she said with a depreciating shrug and wave. "I'm Sandy Rodgers."
"How do you do. I'm Camille Evereaux."
"Glad to meet you, Ms. Evereaux. What kind of picture frames did you have in mind?"
"Three kinds, basically. One type will be maple, three to four inches wide, and fairly plain. Perhaps curves or something like that along the edges. The second will be mixed between light and dark oak, three inches wide, and plain. The third will be walnut, four to five inches wide, and preferably with a filigree design or something moderately ornate."
She looked at me as I talked, her blue eyes twinkling and her smile becoming wider. When I finished, she nodded. "Well, you know what you want, all right, don't you? Let's see...." She pursed her lips, thinking and looking down at the floor, then she looked back up at me. "How many of each type?"
"Twenty of the first and fifteen each of the other two."
Her eyes widened, then she chuckled. "Hey, I hate to be the bearer of bad news for you, Ms. Evereaux, but do you have any idea of how much money you're talking about?"
"I'd estimated between one thousand and one thousand and two hundred dollars, making an allowance for buying that quantity, of course."
She blinked, thinking, then nodded. "That might not be far off, depending on the sizes you want. Well, I have some framing stock in the back. Would you like for me to bring some pieces out for you to look at?"
"Well, I can come back there and save you the trouble."
"OK, but you'll have to watch yourself back here, Ms. Evereaux. I'm just getting set up, and things are sort of in a mess...."
It was a mess. Workbenches were scattered around with boxes of equipment, tools, and materials on them, and piles of lumber were against the walls. Near the front there was a bench with a saw on it, apparently the one she'd been using when I came in, and she had been cutting legs or braces for another half-finished bench against the wall.
"Right back this way," she murmured, taking my elbow and guiding me between a couple of wooden crates. "Watch that box-it's dirty, and you'll ruin your dress."
She had a pleasingly protective attitude, which was undoubtedly a normal reaction considering that she towered over me by a fifteen centimeters or so. Rut she was nice; statuesque, and nice. Perhaps one hundred and seventy centimeters and sixty kilograms or so, with an attractive face. The overalls and faded, wrinkled work shirt were loose on her, but she looked like she had a nice figure. Her breasts were large, jutting out in the shirt and overalls, and they moved as though she wasn't wearing a bra. A warm feeling suddenly developed in the pit of my stomach, and I tore my mind away. She was a large, healthy, brawny woman; she would probably help some man build a house someday, then she'd have ten children by him in it.
"Right, here you are-here, I'll move this out of the way so you can see what you're looking at."
It was in lengths, banded together and cushioned with cardboard, and there was a good assortment of widths and designs. The stack of banded lengths was two or three feet deep and went all the way up the wall; there was a lot of it. It hadn't occurred to me that it came ready made; I'd have thought they'd whittled it out or something when I'd ordered them before if it had crossed my mind to think about it.
"Shall I unstack it and spread it out?"
"No, I don't think that will be necessary. Could I look at that one?"
"Sure."
It was a bundle near the top of the outside of the stack. She walked to the end and lifted the other bundles off it effortlessly, then lifted it down and pulled the cardboard away from the side. It was a fleur-de-lis design and would be beautiful with the
French Provincial, but it was a light oak color.
"Do you have this in walnut?"
"No, I have maple and white oak. This is white oak, and I could stain it walnut for you. I could order it in walnut, but it would cost several times what this does and you wouldn't be able to tell the difference."
That seemed a little like artifice, but then the frames I'd bought before had probably been stained. If the wood was going to be stamped out on some machine or whatever they'd used to cut the design in it, then it could as easily be stained as in a natural color.
"Are you an art dealer or something? No, you're not a dealer, you're an artist, aren't you?"
I smiled and nodded absently. "Yes."
"Yeah, I could tell-you look sort of arty, you know what I mean?"
That sounded slightly presumptuous and remotely unpleasant. I looked up at her, my smile fading. "No, I don't know what you mean."
She looked a little alarmed and concerned. "Well ... I meant that you look like you have your own drumbeat, not wearing makeup or anything, and doing your own thing and if people don't like it then they can look the other way." She chuckled a little uncomfortably. "You're a living, breathing doll, which I'm sure you know, of course, and then there's your accent, and ... well, you look like you might be touchy ... temperamental, I guess-"
"I'm not temperamental in the least. I have a very pleasant disposition."
She cleared her throat and chuckled again. "Well, I don't really know you, do I?"
"No, and you really shouldn't jump to conclusions about people, you know."
"Well, I didn't mean to piss you off...."
"I'm not angry in the least. I'm simply pointing out that you shouldn't be so quick to characterize people."
She put her hand on my shoulder, smiling down at me. "Could we forget I said that and start over, Ms. Evereaux? I really didn't mean to ... to be so quick to judge."
I smiled and nodded. "Of course. This would do very well for the French Provincial. Do you have a plain design now?"
"Sure, several of them, in fact. Let's see, now...."
She took down another bundle and pulled the cardboard off, and I looked at it and nodded. "Good Yes, this is very good."
"OK, I have some here in maple which is designed to go with Early American decorations and furniture ... let me find some of it-yeah, here's one...."
It was perfect. I smiled and nodded. "Very good. How long will it take to make them?"
"Oh ... I can work on them in groups often, I guess. It'll take two or three days for the glue to set, then I'll stain and varnish-"
"Glue? Don't you nail them together, Ms. Rodgers?"
She laughed and shook her head. "You've had some half-assed carpenter doing your frames. You can't nail a frame together and size it exactly. Here's how I'll do it. I'll take the measurements and cut the pieces, then glue them together so the painting is just a firm fit. If they were nailed, it would press the wood together and it wouldn't fit precisely. Wouldn't be as strong, either, as far as that goes. Then I'll stain and varnish them, and they'll be ready. And incidentally, call me Sandy-everyone does."
"Then please call me Camille."
She smiled a little shyly. "Are you sure you don't mind?"
"Of course not, Sandy-that's absurd. Shall I take the measurements and bring them to you, then?"
She raised her eyebrows and shook her head doubtfully. "Look, I'm not saying you can't measure something ... Camille, but the measurements have to be right on the button-to the fraction of an inch-or we'll wind up with frames that don't fit. Are the paintings in several sizes, incidentally?"
That was another problem. With cutting my own canvas and making my own stretchers, there weren't two of them the same size. And a lot of them were in metric sizes. I shook my head. "No, I'm afraid not. They're all different, in fact."
"Well, that's no big deal. I can take the measurements and just put down which frame you want for each one. As soon as I get the sizes, I can figure out an exact price for you. Well, fairly close, anyway. The ticklish one is this imagine design here. I won't be able to just saw the lengths to fit. I'll have to cut the pattern in places where it'll match at the corners. The pattern repeats every ... oh, four inches, it looks like, but four inches is a lot when you're talking about four pieces for a frame and fifteen frames."
She certainly sounded like she knew what she was doing, and more than that-she looked interested. In the other places their attitude had been one of bored nonchalance. It was refreshing to work with someone who took an interest in their work. I smiled up at her and nodded. "When would you like to take the measurements, then, Sandy?"
"Well, I could get cleaned up and meet you at your studio tonight, if you're not busy...."
"Cleaned up? Don't be silly, Sandy."
"Well, I couldn't come over there looking like this. Christ, some of your customers might see me or something-"
I interrupted her with a laugh, shaking my head. "Don't get the wrong idea, Sandy. I don't have a salon-I have a studio with a display area in the front. It isn't a draped and carpeted gallery-just a studio. And you look fine. Look at me, with paint on my shoes and everything."
"I didn't notice it, and like I said, you're a doll, Camille."
"Well, unless you think someone else might come in before your normal closing time, you could come now."
"Well, I've just put out my advertisements, and someone might drop in. I don't have a telephone in yet...."
"What time do you normally close."
"Seven."
"Let's make it seven-thirty or so, then. I'll write down my address for you."
"OK, I have paper and a pencil out in front. Watch yourself on that box, now, and don't snag your dress...."
We went back to the front of the shop and I jotted down my address for her. She took the piece of paper and folded it and put it in her pocket as she walked to the door with me. Her demeanor was solicitous and concerned, her courtesy almost exaggerated, and I thought about it as I walked back toward my studio.
It would have been easy to interpret it as interest in me as a woman, but other circumstances didn't bear it out. She was a large woman, but none of the nuances of speech and conduct had been there. Of course they were absent in many instances, as in myself, but it would be easy to misinterpret her natural pleasure over such a large order. And she was just getting started, so it would be even more understandable that she would be pleased.
The daily exodus from the offices was starting, and the sidewalks became crowded and long queues of people were standing at the bus stops by the time I got back to the studio. There was an old lady standing in front of the door and looking at the sign as I walked up, and she went in with me when I unlocked, chatting with the long, rambling discourse of older people. She was nice, telling me that her sister had bought one of my paintings earlier in the year, and I left her looking over the paintings in the front of the studio as I went back to my apartment in the rear and put my jacket away. When I came back out she had picked out a still life that she wanted, and I took it down and wrapped it in paper for her. She left, and I went into the storeroom and brought a few more paintings out to replace those I'd sold during the past few days. The painting of the cathedral for the beauty parlor was still on the easel, needing a few finishing touches, and after hanging the paintings I set up a palette to complete it.
I didn't notice the door opening and closing, and I had no idea of how long she had been standing there, leaning against the room divider and watching me. The painting was finished, and I noticed her when I turned away from the easel to take the brushes and palette to clean them.
"Oh, hello, Sandy. Why didn't you let me know you were here?"
"Hi, Camille. I didn't want to interrupt you."
"How long have you been standing there? If you'd said something, I would have-"
"Oh, I haven't been waiting but for just a moment. Your door was unlocked, so I came on in. You stay open late, don't you?"
I shrugged and laughed, carrying the brushes and palette to the workbench. "No, not really. But I forget to lock the door at times, and I have customers coming in here until nine o'clock at night."
"Would you like me to lock it?"
"If you would, please."
She smiled and nodded, turning toward the door as I put the brushes and palette on the workbench and pulled the soap closer. She had changed into a dress and short coat, and she looked nice; the overalls had concealed a very attractive figure. Her hair was brushed out into pleasantly casual ringlet curls, and her face looked as bright as a new penny. Pink cheeks, the sprinkling of freckles, shining blue eyes, and just a touch of lipstick. As she went to the door to lock it, it suddenly occurred to me that she could have put off coming until later so she'd have a chance to make herself more presentable; I thought about it, then pushed it aside as conceit.
"I don't know the first thing about art," Sandy said as she walked back to the room divider, "so I'd probably say all the wrong things in trying to say something nice. I do like your work a lot-I don't like paintings when I can't tell what they are."
I laughed and nodded, working the soap into the brush bristles. "I don't either, as a matter-of-fact. My work is called representational in style."
"It's nice-there're some really nice paintings here. What are you working on there?"
"It's the cathedral at Limoges. Come on in and take a look at it, if you like. It won't take but a few minutes to take care of these brushes...."
"Oh, I'm in no hurry," she said pushing the gate open and walking toward the easel. "This is really lovely, Camille. Where did you say it's at?"
"Limoges."
"That's in France, right? Is that your home town, then."
"No, I'm from Dayton."
She looked at me in surprise, then laughed. "Oh, come on, Camille. You don't even pronounce it right-you say it's "day-tone". Not that your accent sounds funny or anything, because it doesn't-it's cute. But you're not from Dayton."
I smiled and shrugged. "Well, I am. I spent a long time in France, though. I lived there with my aunt."
"You mean you were born in Dayton, then."
I nodded, carrying the brushes and palette to the sink.
"Oh, I see. Say, can I help you with something there?"
"No, you might get paint all over you, and it would be a shame to get it on that pretty dress. Anyway, I'm almost through-see?"
"Jeez, this old dress is nothing...."
"It's very nice, Sandy, and you look very attractive."
Her cheeks flushed and her eyes shone with pleasure, then her eyes dropped. My heart gave a little leap as I looked back at the brushes, spreading them out on the towel. She hadn't seemed shy, then suddenly she had become shy; that looked promising. I smiled at her, drying my hands. "Would you like to look at the paintings now? Then when we're through with them, we can have a glass of wine."
"Sure, fine."
I had more or less left the paintings in groups when I had sorted them out, so it made measuring and taking notes easier. She had brought a tape measure and a tiny notebook and pencil with her, and I jotted down the measurements as she took them. One group of three landscapes was on top of a crate, and I pulled a stool over and stood on it to lift them down.
"Here, Camille, what are you doing? You'll fall from there and hurt yourself!"
"No, I won't," I replied, pulling at the paintings. "I do this all the time."
"Well, here, let me help you, then...."
She walked to me, putting her hand on my waist and reaching up toward the paintings. I slid one off the stack and handed it to her, leaning my hip against her shoulder. Her arm slid around my waist, her hand flat against my stomach with a firm pressure. I handed the others down to her and she stacked them against the side of the crate then lifted me down from the stool, one arm around the waist and the other under my thighs. Her face was crimson and tense. I reached for the notebook and pencil again, and her fingers shook as she pulled the tape out to measure the paintings.
It was all done a few minutes later, and we went into my apartment. Sandy seemed somewhat subdued; she put the tape, notebook, and pencil in her coat pocket, then laid her coat over the back of one of the chairs and sat on the couch. I went in the kitchen and poured the wine and brought it in; she was looking at the floor, her lips pursed thoughtfully. She looked up with a smile, and her hand shook slightly when she took the glass.
"It didn't travel very well, I'm afraid, but it isn't too bad."
She sipped it and raised her eyebrows, nodding. "It tastes very good to me, Camille." She took another sip, then smiled. "You know, not once have you mentioned that it's unusual for a woman to be doing what I am."
I shrugged. "A woman being a cabinetmaker? Is it unusual? I hadn't really thought about it...."
She put her glass on the coffee table and sat back, nodding. "There're not many women who are cabinetmakers, but it gets old hearing people hammering their gums on it all the time."
"As long as you like what you're doing, it isn't anyone else's business."
"Well, I suppose it isn't very feminine...."
"Oh, I don't agree," I said, putting my glass on the coffee table and taking one of her hands. "You're a very feminine woman, and your hands are so pretty and soft. Nicer than mine, with the paint and painting medium I get on them all the time."
Her hand felt hot and damp. She tugged at it, clearing her throat, her face flushed. "Camille...."
"Did I say something wrong, Sandy?"
"No. Camille, you'd better not...."
It had been a direct move to find out about her. And I had. But she didn't know about me. I laced my lingers through hers, patting the back of her hand.
"What is it, Sandy?"
"Don't, Camille. I'm going to do something in a minute ... and ... and you'll hate me...."
"Don't be absurd, Sandy. I can't think of anything you might do that would make me hate you."
Her face tensed, her lips trembling, and she suddenly jerked her hand away from mine and seized my shoulders, snatching me toward her. It startled me for a moment because she gripped me with a crushing pressure and put her lips on mine awkwardly, painfully, pressing my lips against my teeth. She was powerful and I felt almost frighteningly overwhelmed, enfolded in her arms and smothered against the back of the couch. Then the sensation of her breasts pressing against me and the warm scent of her body with her lips on mine began to assert itself in my mind, and I relaxed in her arms. She caressed me with an aggressive urgency, her fingers biting in my back and her lips moving on mine, then she lifted her lips from mine and looked down at me, flushed and defiant. "See? Now what are you going to do?"
I twisted my shoulders, looking up at her, and she relaxed her grip on me and started to sit back, looking guilty. Then she parsed and blinked down at me as I put my hand on the side of her face and patted it. "Please be more gentle, dear."
Her mouth opened slightly and her eyes widened. "You mean ... ? "
"Yes. Now be more gentle, and don't hurt me-"
"Oh, God, I wouldn't hurt you for the world, darling," she moaned, taking me into her arms again and covering my face with light kisses. "God, I wouldn't hurt you, darling...."
"Well, it won't hurt me to kiss me."
She looked down at me, cuddling me in her arms, her eyes moving over my face, then an almost painful look flickered across her features. "God, you're so beautiful, Camille," she breathed, lowering her lips to mine.
Her lips were tender, soft and damp, covering mine and tugging at them. A warm glow of desire began building up within me, and the tip of her tongue pressed at my lips, coaxing them open. I opened my lips inside hers, feeling blindly for her breasts with my hands. She moaned in her throat as she slid her tongue into my mouth, and the sweet, fresh taste of her mouth filled mine as I sucked and nibbled at her tongue. I fumbled, finding one of her large, firm breasts, and I squeezed it between my hands, surging up at her and sucking her tongue as I turned my head from side to side. She whimpered in her throat, a quiver racing through her body, and she slid her hands down my back, taking her lips from mine, cupping my buttocks and lifting me from the couch, sliding me onto her lap. I slid my arms around her neck, burrowing my lips into the soft, downy hollow of her throat, and she caressed my hips and thighs and she moved her lips over the side of my face with damp kisses.
"You're the most beautiful woman in the world, Camille," she sighed. "If I'd only known ... when you were at my place I felt like grabbing you and biting pieces out of you ... did I frighten you when I held you and kissed you?"
"A little...."
"I didn't mean to frighten you, darling, but you looked so beautiful and I wanted to kiss you more than I've ever wanted anything...."She pulled at the zipper on the back of my dress, pulling it down. "I want to see you and feel you, Camille."
I lifted my arm and pulled it out of the sleeve of my dress as she pulled it off my shoulder. "Aren't you going to take your clothes off, dear?"
"Yes, darling, but I've got to see and feel you. You'll let me make love to you, won't you? Please let me do it, darling."
I nodded, moving and pulling my other arm from the sleeve of my dress, and she put her arms around me again, pulling me to her and fumbling at the catch on my bra. Her lips moved back and forth along my shoulders, sending chills of sensation through me, and I moaned and quivered on her lap as she held me and unfastened my bra. She pulled it off me and tossed it onto the couch, then leaned me back against one arm, looking down at my breasts and feeling them. Her hands were gentle and soft, but they were trembling and urgent as she caressed my breasts. My nipples began hardening, and the desire soared higher within me as I looked up at her flushed face, tense and trembling with arousal. She cupped one of my breasts, bending over, and touched the tip of her tongue to my nipple. A raging wave of sensation roared through me, and I gasped and hissed through my teeth as I arched up toward her. She put her hand around my breast, squeezing it, and began sucking the nipple, moving her tongue around it. I threw my head back, moaning, and clutched at her head, wriggling up at her to press more of my breast into her hot, clinging mouth.
She put one hand under the skirt of my dress and moved it up my thigh, and I spread my thighs apart. Her hand moved over my thigh, feeling it, then slid up toward my pussy. I spread my thighs wider, whimpering, and she cupped my pussy and squeezed it through my panties. The pressure was gentle but firm, satisfying yet tantalizing, making the churning need swell higher within me. She took her hand away from my pussy and began pushing at my dress, sliding it down my hips, and I kicked my shoes off and put my feet on the couch, arching up so she could slide it down, then I kicked it off as she began caressing my thighs and stomach again. Her hand wormed into my panties, pushing them down, and I lifted myself again. She pushed my panties down, her mouth moving from one of my breasts to the other, then she began caressing me, moving her hands over me and feeling me as I lay across her lap, naked.
Her blue eyes were glittering with desire and her breath came in short, quick pants as her lips moved over my face. The tip of her tongue and her lips touched my lips, and I opened my mouth wide. She thrust her tongue deep into my mouth, her hand closing on my pussy, and I squirmed on her lap and whimpered as she gorged my mouth with her tongue and fondled my pussy. Her finger pressed, gently probing, then penetrated. A shock of sensation raced through me and I went limp, lying back in her arms. She began sliding her finger in and out of my pussy and her tongue in and out of my mouth. I spread my thighs wider, letting one of my feet fall to the floor. It felt as though she was entering and possessing the very fibre of my being, making the tide of hunger roar higher within me.
"Is that good, darling?" she panted in a whisper against my lips. "Does that make you feel good?"
"...good ... feels good ... want to come ... need to come...."
"I'll make you come, darling," she moaned in a trembling voice, kissing my breasts and stroking her finger over my clitoris. "I'll make you come like you've never come before."
The combined sensations of her mouth on my breast and her finger moving over my clitoris were almost unbearable, and I twisted and turned, biting at her arm. She put her hand behind my head and turned it to her arm, pressing my lips against it, and I began biting it harder, tossing and lurching. She let my breast slide from her mouth and gathered me in her arms, one under my shoulder and the other under my thigh, and she lifted me as she stood up. I put my arms around her neck, sobbing and gasping with arousal, and she walked toward the bedroom with me, carrying me effortlessly.
She carried me into the bedroom and put me down on the bed, then stood back and began undressing. I lay on my side and looked up at her as she pulled her dress off. Her body was lovely, tall and slender, with a tiny waist and softly curved hips and thighs. Her breasts were massive but so firm that they stood almost straight out from her chest when she took off her bra and tossed it to one side. I looked at her protruding nipples and at the triangle of crisp hair as she pushed her panties down and stepped out of them, and I lifted my arms to her as she moved to the side of the bed. She took my wrists and pushed my hands down to my sides, leaning over me and kissing me. "I said I was going to make you come, and that's what I'm going to do," she murmured, nibbling at my lips. "Now lie there and be my baby doll, and I'll make you feel good."
I nodded, looking up at her, and she slid onto the bed and hovered over me, pushing my thighs apart. I spread them, and she knelt between them and slid her arms around me, kissing my breasts. The sensations began building up in me again, and I pushed at her shoulders and head, bowing up off the bed and pressing my breasts at her. She began sucking one of them, pressing the nipple between her tongue and the roof of her mouth, and I lifted my legs and wrapped them around her, straining to lift myself toward her. Her hands slid down my back to my buttocks, cupping them, and she lifted me off the bed. My legs clamped around her as I began undulating, pressing my pussy against her stomach, and my clitoris touched the velvety skin on her stomach with an excruciating sensation. I uttered a whimpering moan as I began undulating harder.
She moved her mouth down my body, forcing my legs apart, and I fell back to the bed again. Her tongue and lips made a trail of fire down my stomach as she cupped my buttocks again, lifting me. I squirmed up toward her, my calves resting on her shoulders and my hips twisting as I pressed my pussy at her. Her tongue moved from side to side on my stomach with a tantalizing motion, then she gripped me harder and dipped her head between my thighs, covering my pussy with her mouth. Every muscle in my body jerked and a cry burst from me as the sensation roared through me with a battering force. She sucked my pussy, then lapped it with long strokes of her tongue, lifting me from the bed until only my shoulders were resting on it and my legs were spread on each side of her shoulders. Then she dipped her head lower, driving the tip of her tongue into my anus. I went wild, clawing at the bed and tossing convulsively, and she gripped me with tender but firm hands as her tongue moved up and down, stabbing into my anus, sliding into my pussy, and stroking my clitoris.
The impact of the sensations was almost overwhelming. Every nerve in my body came to screaming, chattering life, and it felt as though I were under a mountain of sensation, being crushed and smothered. I became numb, ragged wails bursting from me as I shuddered from the onslaught, trying to escape. Then the churning maelstrom became directed, carrying me upward with it. There was an instant when it slowed, an agony of sensation building up again, then it broke loose and I soared. It burst, and my fingernails dug into the bed and my head tossed from side to side as the spasms of orgasm seized me.
I almost fainted. I lay gasping in total exhaustion as she hovered over me, kissing and caressing me. There was a remote sensation of motion as she turned me onto her stomach, and I was dimly aware that she cupped my pelvic bones and lifted my hips as she straddled me, stroking her clitoris against my buttocks. Her hands gripped me tighter and her motions became frantic, then she burst into an orgasm. It gripped her for a long moment, then she lay forward on top of me.
Much later I woke. She was lying by me and breathing with a slow, deep rhythm as she quietly slept. I looked at her beautiful body in the dim light coming in from the living room. Then I began tugging at her. She woke, glancing around and blinking, then she smiled at me and reached for me. I put my arms around her and pulled her on top of me as she kissed me, and I wrapped my legs around her and dug my heels into her back as I began undulating. She slid her hands down to my buttocks and lifted me, helping me get my clitoris against the soft skin on her stomach. The shock of climax rolled over me again, and I fell back to the bed, gasping. She put my legs together and wrapped her arms and legs around me, and she began stroking her pussy against my Venus mound as I opened my mouth for her tongue.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The news of Julia's death came as a shock. Her vibrant spirit had seemed a stable, unchanging thing in a vacillating, unstable world, something which would somehow remain when everything else had passed away. Hut she was gone, the attorney's crisp, business-like tones over the telephone rattling in short, quick sentences. An automobile accident on the freeway. Death had been instantaneous. The other driver had been at fault, speeding away from a patrol car. Her will had designated me as the executor of her estate.
It had been beautiful while it lasted, but it had been too short, as all pleasure is. We had lived together for a few months, both of us doing what we could to make allowances for the other. But our life styles had been poles apart. She, an accountant, punctual, organized, efficient, and I an artist, erratic, unconcerned about time, and influenced heavily by whims of the moment. She had been exasperated and amused by the irregular hours I kept my studio open, appalled that I kept all my money in a can in the kitchen, horrified that I had no insurance, and stunned when I turned away commissions because I didn't like the client. But somehow we had met at a level which went deeper than the surface factors which separated us, and it had been beautiful. Then her parents had been killed in a boating accident, and it had ended in sorrow at a time when she needed my love most. I'd gone with her to Cincinnati to the funeral, and she had remained there to find a job and care for her younger sister, a thin, gangling, disconsolate child who had clung to her.
I thought about her sister during the bus trip to Cincinnati. Her name had completely slipped from my memory and I wasn't sure how old she was. She had been possibly fifteen or so when I'd seen her two years before, so she still wouldn't be old enough to look after herself and I'd probably have to make arrangements of some sort with relatives along with everything else. It didn't occur to me to begrudge the time and effort it would take. Julia would have willingly done that much and more for me, and my business was in relatively excellent shape. Sandy had picked up the last of the paintings before I left, promising to frame them and deliver them to Pamela's store.
The bus trip was dreary and fatiguing, as usual, and it was raining when I got there. The attorney crowded Julia's pitifully few affairs in between someone who looked as though he might have a suit in progress over an injury and what looked to be a divorce case. There were papers to sign, and he went down a list of matters, reading them off rapidly. Insurance was taking care of the funeral, and he had already contacted a funeral home and the remains were being prepared. The life insurance listed Julia's sister as beneficiary-he mentioned her name, Jocelyn, and I felt like kicking myself for forgetting it-and would be paid to her at age twenty-one. All other matters were up to me, including getting her sister to a relative, then he got up and took a cardboard box from a closet. It contained the belongings in her possession at the time of her death, and there was a receipt to sign. It was very depressing.
I took a taxi to the apartment. There was a middle-aged, heavyset man carrying cans of garbage out the side entrance as the taxi let me out, and he watched me as I went up the steps and checked the names on the door, carrying the box of belongings and my overnight bag.
"Say, Miss?"
I turned as he walked toward me. "Yes?"
"Would you be the friend of the Markham girls by any chance? The lawyer said that someone would be coming...."
"Yes. My name is Camille Evereaux."
He nodded, a tinge of a smile of welcome on his face. It was a pleasant face, round and ruddy. "My name's Billings, and I'm the super. Little Jocelyn is in our apartment right now-in the guest bedroom. We had to have the doctor to her, and he gave her something to make her sleep. Maybe you'd like to come in and talk to my wife for a minute-she's right in here...."
I nodded and moved out of his way as he reached for the door. "Yes, thank you very much, Mr. Billings."
"Just call me Bill-everyone does, including my wife. Let me get my key out here, arid ... Edna! Edna, come here a minute!"
He-pushed the door open, motioning me in, and a small, middle-aged woman came through from the kitchen. "This lady's the friend of the Markham girls that lawyer talked about...."
The woman smiled and nodded, walking toward me and extending her hand. "How d'ye do? I'm Edna Billings."
I shifted the box to my other arm and took her hand. "I am pleased to meet you-my name is Camille Evereaux."
The woman looked up at me, her smile widening. "Why, you're a little French girl, aren't you? And a pretty thing you are, too." Her smile faded, and she sighed and shook her head. "Well, I wish we could have met at a better time than this...." Her voice faded away as her eyes moved toward her husband. "Wasn't you putting out the trash? You don't have to stand there with your ears flapping, Bill. I'll tell you everything later-as much of it as pertains to you, anyway."
"Yeah, well, I was just leaving...."
"Not standing there, you wasn't. You take care of the trash, and I'll take care of this. We can call you if we need you."
He nodded, smiling amiably, then nodded to me and went back out the door, closing it. The woman sighed, looking up at me. "Would you like to put your things down and come on in and have some coffee? I'd like to talk to you a minute or two ... here, just put them down here by the door-I won't keep you but a minute."
I put the overnight bag and box down in the corner by the door and followed her into the kitchen. She picked up a pot from the stove and shook it, then walked toward the sink. "Would you like a cup of coffee, then?"
"I don't like to impose, but do you have tea?"
She smiled and nodded. "I sure do, honey-Mrs. Willis in apartment nine B comes to visit with me now and then, and that's all she'll drink. She's from England, she is, and they drink a lot of tea there. like they do in France, I guess. And my mother drank tea all her life-God bless her soul, she's been dead these past fourteen years. She never was in England nor France neither, but she did like her cup of tea...."
Her voice chattered on, pleasantly and aimlessly, and I sat down at the kitchen table as she put water on to heat in a saucepan and got a tea bag from a canister. She had an affable, unassumed friendliness that was soothing and peaceful. The water came to a boil, and she took a cup and saucer from a cabinet and put the cream and sugar on the table, falling silent.
"What do you intend to do about little Jocelyn?" she asked as she put the cup of tea in front of me and pulled out a chair to sit down.
"Thank you. I'll talk to her and see where her relatives live-"
"She's got an aunt in Astoria-that's all she has."
"Well, I'll contact her, I suppose, if she doesn't have any other relatives."
"Her and her sister was in Astoria last summer. Her sister for a vacation, and they went there and to some other places. They didn't stay there long."
The tone of her voice had changed. Before it had been light, pleasant. At the end of the last sentence it dropped to an ominously deep note. I stirred the sugar into the tea and put the spoon down, then sipped it. It was good, refreshing after the bus ride and the trip to the attorney's office. I put the cup back down and looked at her. "Is there some reason why the child shouldn't go to her aunt's home?"
She looked at me, biting her lower lip between her teeth, then she dropped her eyes. to the table, shrugging. "I didn't say that-exactly."
"Ms. Billings, I have difficulty at times in understanding nuances of meaning. If you have some information which I should know, I would appreciate it if you would tell me and I will not tell anyone else that you told me."
She pursed her lips, nodding, then flushed and looked down at the table again. "He tried to put his hand in her drawers."
"I beg your pardon?"
"Her uncle. He tried to ... feel her. That's why they just stayed there one night and then left again. That child is terrified that you're going to send her there-she was crying and telling me about it last night. So along with losing her sister, she has this to face."
The full meaning gradually registered on me. With her uncle-and her only relative, apparently-some kind of sex maniac or something, the problem rapidly complicated itself. I could go back to the attorney and ask that she be declared a public ward, but that would mean a foster home or orphanage, which was out of the question. That left only taking her with me. But I had no right to commit her to my way of life, so that meant my formerly carefree and unrestrained associations with lovers would have to be curtailed. My life would have to be sacrificed until she was old enough to look after herself. The woman was still looking at me, and I thought of her; she seemed to have an intensely personal interest in Jocelyn. "What do you suggest?"
"I don't know what to suggest, honey. I'd take her myself, but my youngest boy's in the Army and he's going overseas, and he's bringing his wife and two children here to live with us while he's gone. If it wasn't for that, I'd take her myself...."
I immediately felt a flood of guilt and remorse flow through me. Julia was yet to go in her grave, and I was trying to give her sister away to whoever would take her. If the situation had been reversed, Julia would have made whatever sacrifice was necessary. "No, I didn't mean that you should take her, Ms. Billings. I meant that her aunt and uncle very probably have a legitimate legal claim on her. I am an unmarried woman, and if I took her and they went to the authorities about it, they could very well make me give her up."
Her brows knitted in a frown and she looked down at the table again. I took a couple of drinks of the tea, then put the cup back in the saucer. "Well, I didn't think of that, to tell you the truth, honey," she said.
"But if you could figure out some way to straighten that out, she wouldn't be any trouble to you. She's a good girl."
"I'm sure she is."
"I mean, she's never been the slightest bit of trouble to her sister. There's good kids and there's mean ones, but I've never seen a nicer, quieter little girl. You take that Blakely girl in apartment Fourteen-C, now. She's a good girl and everything, but there's all the time some boy from high school coming to see her and parking his car in someone else's parking I place. If it's not that, then it's a bunch of kids over there playing the stereo and dancing, and people over here complaining about it. I guess things like that are part of being a kid now, but you wouldn't have any of that with little Jocelyn. Her school and her drawing is all she thinks about."
"Drawing?"
"Oh, you've never seen anyone draw like that kid does. All the time with the big book of paper under her arm, and all the time drawing something in it. And good, too-that little girl can draw a picture of someone so good that you'd expect it to talk to you."
There was a powerful feeling of deja vu, of having passed this way before. So she thought herself a budding artist, perhaps; many did, and few realized the ambition. And she had little to do with others. That also struck a note of familiarity. We were silent for a moment as she looked down at the table and I took another sip of tea-then she looked up at me. "Well, what do you think you'll do, honey?"
I shook my head. "I don't know. Your husband said that Jocelyn has had a sedative-when will she be awake?"
"The doctor said it would be late this afternoon or tonight."
"Well, I'll go and see to the more ... unpleasant details now, while she is asleep. On this other matter, I don't know-I'll have to think about it."
"All right, honey. The funeral's tomorrow, ain't it?"
"Yes, I understand it is."
"Well, me and Bill are going, and we'll give you and little Jocelyn a ride there and back, if you like."
"That would be good of you, Ms. Billings." I finished the cup of tea and pushed the chair back, standing. "I appreciate your telling me this, Ms. Billings, and I'm grateful for the tea."
"Lord, don't think anything about it, honey. And if there's anything me or Bill can do to help, don't hesitate to tell us."
"Yes, thank you very much."
She followed me to the door and helped me pick up the overnight bag and box, then quietly closed the door behind me. I went up to the apartment, then thought of the key. I started to turn back, then remembered the ring of keys in the purse. Putting the box and overnight bag down, I opened the purse and took put the keys. Her compact, lipstick, wallet, and other things were in the purse. It was unpleasant.
It was more unpleasant in the apartment. Her slippers were at the foot of the bed, and her gown was behind the door. There were matchbooks and notes on scraps of paper in the bureau, mute, obscure glimpses into another's life. The scent of her perfume was strong in the apartment. It was nostalgic, yet very remote in some strange way. I sat on the couch and cried for a while.
I thumbed through the telephone book and called charitable organizations until I found one which could send a truck and men over immediately, and I got the clothes and other things ready to go. They came and left with them, and I gathered her jewelry and a few other personal items together and put them in the purse in the box to give to Jocelyn at an appropriate time.
There was an address book in the desk in the living room, and I sat down and thumbed through it. The single listing in Arcadia was a Mr. and Mrs. James Tomlinson. I moved to the other end of the couch and picked up the telephone, spreading the book open, and I dialed the number.
"Hello."
It was a woman's voice, an adult woman. "Ms. Tomlinson?"
"Yes, that's right," she replied guardedly. "Who is this?"
"My name is Camille Evereaux, Ms. Tomlinson, a friend of Julia's. Have you been made aware of Julia's accident?"
"What? Oh, the car accident? Yeah, they called us ... who'd you say you are?"
"I am Camille Evereaux, a friend."
"Could you talk slower? I can't hardly understand you ... your accent...."
"Very well. I said I am-"
"Oh, yeah, I got that-I got your name all right. And we know about the accident, but we're not ... well, we can't come to the ... funeral. Jim-that's my .husband-he's in the hospital, and we won't be able to come ... did you need something from us? If it's money or something, we're not very well off ... he's been laid off for about a month, and then these guys caught him and beat him up, and ... well, what did you want?"
"I wanted to make arrangements to see you and discuss Jocelyn with you and your husband."
"Arrangements? You wanted to ... what are you talking about?"
"I wish to make an appointment to see you and your husband to discuss Jocelyn," I said in slow, clear syllables. "She is too young to-"
"Well, what's your deal in this? I mean, how did you get involved? Did you just decide to take it on yourself to take care of everything or what?"
She suddenly sounded aggressive, belligerent. "I was named by Julia in her will as the executor of her estate."
"That means you're supposed to take care of things for her?"
"That is correct. And in the matter of."
"Well, if you're supposed to take care of things, then you can take care of the kid, too. We've got three here, and that's enough for us. Besides which, that kid has got enough goddamned imagination for a dozen kids. We don't need her around here causing trouble....
That settled it. I'd been contemplating a trip to Arcadia to face them with Jocelyn's story if necessary and threaten them with the police, but it evidently wasn't necessary. There was an ominous undercurrent to her husband's being in the hospital; perhaps he'd tried his perversion with the wrong child. "I believe I can make suitable arrangements for Jocelyn, Ms. Tomlinson, if you or your husband will interpose no objection-"
"What? I can't understand what you're saying."
"I said I believe I can make arrangements for Jocelyn if-"
"That's what I thought you said. Well, you go right ahead and do whatever you're going to do, and don't bother us with it ... how did you get my telephone number."
"It was in Julia's belongings."
"Well, you take it out of there and tear it up, do you hear? I don't want to be bugged by a bunch of people asking me questions and things. Those girls came to see us one time, and all we got 'was trouble for our efforts. So I don't need to know what you're doing, because I don't care. You tear that telephone number up, do you hear."
"Yes. I won't bother you again, Ms. Tomlinson."
"Well, you see that you don't," she snapped and hung up.
I looked at the telephone, then replaced it, closed the address book, and got up and tossed it onto the desk. It was almost five o'clock. I started to go into Jocelyn's room, then turned back toward Julia's room; there had been suitcases in the closet. I got them out of the closet and stacked them outside Jocelyn's room, then opened the door and pushed them inside. As I started to close the door, I glanced inside, then froze. My fingers found the light switch and turned it on. The walls were covered with charcoals, water paints, and a couple of small oils. They were good.
There was an intuitive feel for the dramatic and a commendable restraint. The proportion was the completely natural, effortless-looking result of painstaking effort. Two of the water paints were disturbing, showing a mature, adult grasp of the grotesque. Street scenes depicting depravity. A man picking up a prostitute, her breasts and hips exaggerated, his trousers bulging with an erection, her hands fondling his erection and taking his wallet from his pocket, his smile lewd and hers avaricious. Children beating a blind street musician and taking his money, their faces old with cruelty and his child-like with pathos. One of the oils was of Julia. It was beautiful with all the love which had gone into the brush strokes. The portrayal was of an image of Julia rather than of Julia. It was lovely, but it wasn't Julia. She had let her hand and eyes be influenced too heavily by her heart.
The charcoals were a scattering of street scenes, Mr. Billings trimming shrubbery, Julia at the stove in the kitchen, an assortment of sketches from school. She was still groping, searching. Her style was loose and vacillating. She was still a child, her hand unsure and her eyes untrained, and she had far to go. But she had also come far. She would be an artist.
She was sitting at the table in the kitchen, her hair mussed and her eyes clouded with sleep. I had expected a child, but she was a young woman. There was an agonizingly haunting hint of Julia in her face, but it was only a hint. Julia had been robustly extroverted and had looked it, but Jocelyn was obviously withdrawn and silent, even under normal circumstances. Instead of Julia's fair hair and shining face, Jocelyn had long, dark hair and olive skin. But she also had massive, deep blue eyes, contrasting strangely with her dusky complexion and black hair. She was small and slender, and she was stunningly attractive.
Ms. Billings walked ahead of me into the kitchen, circling the table and smiling sadly down at Jocelyn, putting her hand on her shoulder. "Why, you didn't touch your ice cream, child. This is the lady who came down to see about things ... honey, I have a head like a sieve when it comes to names...."
"Camille Evereaux."
"Yes, I remember you from ... the other time. It was nice of you to ... to come, Ms. Evereaux."
Her voice had a thin, bell-like timbre, the voice of a child, and she lisped slightly; the corner was chipped from one of her front teeth. It was a pleasant irregularity which emphasized the ivory evenness of her teeth. And it sounded absolutely charming. Every day she lived with me was going to be utter torment. "Thank you, Jocelyn, but Julia was my dear friend and I am only doing what a friend should."
She nodded and looked back down at the bowl of half-melted ice cream in front of her, pushing at her hair. Ms. Billings put her hand on her shoulder. "Now, honey, you'd feel better if you'd eat something. You haven't had enough these past two days to keep a bird alive...."
"I'm really not hungry, Ms. Billings. It's nice of you, but ... but I'm really not hungry."
"Jocelyn, perhaps we can talk about a few things. There are things we need to discuss."
She nodded, sighing and pushing at her hair, then she pushed her chair back from the table. "Yes ... all right. We can go up to the apartment...."
"Maybe you children should have your talk, then come back down here and stay here tonight," Ms. Billings said.
Jocelyn looked from Ms. Billings to me, and I smiled at her and shook my head. "Thank you, Ms. Billings, but you've done quite enough already. Jocelyn might sleep better in familiar surroundings, and I don't want your affairs interrupted more than they have been. It's very nice of you to make the offer, though, and I appreciate it."
"Well, let me get those pills the doctor left, in case this child needs some more of them tonight...."
She got the phial of tablets and gave them to me, and walked with us to the door, telling us repeatedly to call on her if we wanted or needed anything. The door closed behind us, and we walked up the stairs in silence. I unlocked the door, held it for Jocelyn, then closed it and put the chain in place. She walked into the living room and sat down heavily on the couch, pushing her hair back from her face with both hands.
"I'm not going to Arcadia to live," she said in a flat, belligerent tone of voice. "You can do whatever you want to, but if you send me down there to stay with that mother-fucker, then I'll just split."
I sat down in an easy chair and crossed my ankles, adjusted my skirt, and folded my arms. "Jocelyn, I have an appreciation for your state of mind because I once had an experience similar to yours. The kindest thing I can do under the circumstances, I believe, is to arrive at a full understanding with you in the shortest possible time."
Her eyes were red with weeping and there were lines of sleep and sorrow on her face, but there was also a stubborn thrust to her lower lip. "All right, let's have an understanding, then. You go first."
"Thank you. I will tell you what to do under all circumstances, and you shall do what I say."
Her lip pushed out further. A tremor passed across her features; she wanted to cry, but wouldn't let herself. "I'm not going to Arcadia."
I nodded. "You shall not. I have already discussed the matter with your aunt."
"You talked to her about it?"
"Yes. There were three options for you. The first was to have you made a ward of the courts, but I know that would be contrary to Julia's wishes. The second was for you to live with your aunt and uncle. The third was for you to live with me. I understood that you had a disturbing experience with your uncle, and I dismissed the second. However, I was concerned that your aunt and uncle might take legal measures against me if I took you with me. I called your aunt and determined that they have no interest in your welfare, so that problem was eliminated. The only option remaining was the third. However, if you are to'live with me, you shall do as I tell you."
She cleared her throat and looked down at her hands. "What will you do if I don't do as you say?"
"That depends on the specific circumstances. If it is a situation of minor importance, I shall withhold privileges. If it is serious, I shall punish you physically."
"You mean you'll hit me."
"If necessary."
"I can split from you, too."
"I beg your pardon?"
"I can make a break from your place, teo."
I sighed. "Please speak English."
She looked up at me and almost smiled, then she looked back down at her hands. "I can run away from your place, too."
"Are you aware of what happens to young women who run away from home."
"Yeah, it's a cold scene."
"I beg your pardon."
"Bad things happen."
"Yes, and being at your uncle's home would probably be preferable, regardless of what kind of person he is."
"What's your husband like?"
"I'm not married."
"Your roommate, then."
"I live alone."
She cleared her throat and looked down at her hands, picking at her fingernails. "You don't really want me to stay at your place, do you?"
"I wish to fulfill what Julia would want. This is what she would want."
"Well, I don't need your goddamned charity, or anyone else's."
"That is the second time you have used a vulgar word. The next time you do, I shall slap your face. And I am not offering charity-I am offering a place to live and adult guidance and counseling until you are of sufficient age to care for yourself. In return, you shall have household duties and you shall help in my studio."
"You don't really want me to come with you-I can see it in your face and eyes. You don't like me, and you don't want me to come with you."
"I am not going to give you repeated assurances. I told you that this is what Julia would have wanted, so it is what I'm going to do."
"What will you do if I run away?"
"Report it to the proper authorities. If you are murdered by a pervert or drug addict and your body is identified, then I shall see to it that you have the customary funeral observances. If you are apprehended and brought back, I shall refuse to have anything further to do with you, in which case you will be made a ward of the court. You will then become the responsibility of the juvenile authorities who are accustomed to dealing with young people."
There was a long silence.. She almost broke into tears a couple of times, and I clenched the arms of the chair. If she began crying, I wouldn't know What to do. A lover's tears were kissed away, and a child's tears were soothed away. She was neither a lover nor a child. And I didn't want to take her in my arms. She was a temptation, an allurement which would be an exercise in self-control every minute of the day.
"Julia told me about you one time-she said you were an artist."
"I am."
"I'm an art student. I won first place in the State junior amateur last year."
"That is very commendable."
"Will you help me?"
"No, I am an artist, not a teacher. I do not have the patience or the pedestrian approach to technique necessary to teach. I shall set aside a portion of my studio for you, and you may work when your school work and household duties are finished."
"I'll graduate from high school next term."
"There is an art institute in the city where you may enroll."
She looked down at her hands, picking at her fingernails again and nodding. A long moment of silence passed, then she sighed heavily. "It's nice of you to ... to take me in. I'll be good for you-do what you tell me."
I nodded. "Very well, Jocelyn. I put the suitcases in your room, and you should pack your things tonight-we will be leaving tomorrow after the ... tomorrow afternoon. While you're packing, I'll go to the shops down the street and get us some things for dinner. And I want you to eat dinner, even if you have to force yourself. Your body must have nourishment."
She rubbed her hands together and got up from the couch, nodding. "I'll try ... what do you want me to call you?"
"Camille."
She nodded again. "OK, I'll try, Camille."
She walked slowly into her room. The springs squeaked as she sat down on the side of the bed. Then she began quietly crying. I got up and got my purse and coat, put Julia's keys in my pocket, and walked toward the door.
CHAPTER EIGHT
I had little difficulty in concealing my private affairs from her. Sandy had delivered the framed paintings to Pamela's store as I'd asked and they had become acquainted, with predictable results. And Wanda's absence was abundant evidence that our brief affair had been a casual contact during the absence of her lover or some such circumstance. It made things easier in dealing with Jocelyn, but it didn't help my disposition or state of mind.
She was energetic and aggressive toward the household duties, a rare characteristic considering her age, but she seemed determined that my provision of her food and lodging wouldn't be charity. When she began taking over everything to do with the household I explained to her that she wasn't to assume the position of an unpaid maid. She listened, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, then continued doing everything before I got a chance to do anything. We had another talk which ended in a disagreement and brought me to the bare edge of slapping her, then she finally began to accept an allowance.
When she recovered from the initial shock and sorrow of Julia's death, there was little change in her personality. She was a quiet, withdrawn person, and there were many afternoons when she would be in the studio or apartment for an hour or more before I realized she was there. Her function in the household began to change when she had been there for about three weeks. My shopping had always been done at wide intervals, because the French loaves, lengths of sausages, rounds of cheese, and similar items could be stacked or hung in the kitchen without fear of spoiling and I usually bought enough to last for a couple of months. Along with the staples, I usually bought three or four cases of wine, filled the refrigerator with fruit, eggs, and vegetables, and bought several bottles of pickles and olives. One evening when she told me that we were running out of bread, she was perceptive enough to see that my grim silence was because of my extreme aversion to shopping and she volunteered to go to the market. I nodded with relief, telling her where the money was, and went back to my painting. A few minutes later she came in with the money can and a pained expression on her face. There was a total of three or four thousand in cash in the can, along with checks from Pamela for several thousand and assorted other checks from customers. And under the can she had found several bills I'd forgotten to pay, along with a threatening letter from the gas company. She began remonstrating with me about it, and I told her shortly to do whatever she wanted with it. The conversation reminded me uncomfortably of similar conversations with Julia. The following day she brought home some blank forms from the bank for me to sign, then took the money and deposited it, leaving an amount in the can to make change for cash customers. After that, she took care of all the bills and household accounts, and she took care of all the shopping except the wine. Despite my explanations, she was unable to select a good wine.
We had an unspoken agreement to stay out of each other's parts of the studio. I had the bulk of it, of course, and she had a corner near the room divider. When she passed through the studio she scuttled hurriedly by, and when she had something to discuss and I was working, she would stand in the door to the apartment and make sub-vocal noises until I looked at her. Then we would talk across the studio. In addition to the other things she did, she regularly worked at her easel until far into the night. I carefully refrained from saying anything about it, making a mental note to check her report card when it was due. It came due and I looked at it; she had excellent marks in everything, and I left her alone as she continued to work far into the night.
I had expected to make some adjustments, and during the first weeks she was there I analyzed what I might do to make things more suitable and compatible for her. I didn't own a TV, and when I asked her if she would like to have one she shrugged it off. At first I thought she might be concerned about the expense, because she was an unusually thoughtful and considerate person, then I came to the conclusion that she was telling the truth. When I approached the subject in general she told me that she would like a newspaper, and I told her to have delivery started. The newspapers turned out to be more useful than I'd anticipated; after she was through reading them, we kept them for wrapping garbage and wrapping paintings which customers bought.
A good commission for the management offices of a wine distributing company came in. They wanted a dozen large still life arrangements of wine bottles and glassware, which they provided, and it was a lot of work but the remuneration was appropriately handsome. While I was working on them, I caught Jocelyn sketching my work from her side of the studio and warned her about it; she had been there for several months at the time and my accumulated frustrations, which had been aggravated by her presence, made me somewhat sharp with her. But she seemed more hurt than resentful, and she was quieter than usual for the next few days.
Then it occurred to me that every night was being spent in front of her easel. Something about her conduct had nagged at the back of my mind for some time, then I identified it as her unusual isolation from others of her age. It was more or less to be expected that it would take her a time to make friends, but by the time I noticed it there had been ample time for her to get to know others. When I thought about it, I recognized that there was a possibility that she would be reluctant to bring others to the apartment because she might be uncertain over my reaction. And uncertain as to my reaction if she even asked. But that still didn't explain why she didn't go out to visit anyone, go to the movies occasionally, or have dates. She was unquestionably attractive enough to compete.
I made a mental note to talk to her about it, then kept forgetting it. The canvasses for the wine company were finally finished, the last one was picked up, and the man who came to pick it up brought me the check for the entire commission. I signed the receipt for him, held the door while he carried the canvas out to the company truck, then went in and put the check into the can with a sigh of satisfaction. There were a couple of things I could be doing, but there was no urgency associated with them and it had been some time since I'd simply sat and relaxed for a while. I poured myself a glass of wine, went into the living room and sat down, then idly picked up Jocelyn's newspaper which had come that day. I glanced at the front page, then refolded it and put it down again, reaching for my wine. The front door opened and closed.
"Oh, hello, Camille-I wondered where you were."
"Hello, Jocelyn. I'm taking a few minutes off."
"It's about time-this is the first time I've seen you sit down since I've been here. I've never seen anyone work as hard as you do."
"I enjoy painting. But it's work, and I'll undoubtedly have varicose veins before long."
She grunted. "I doubt it-you have beautiful legs."
She went into her bedroom, and I heard her moving about, putting her coat away and changing clothes. Presently she came back out.
"All those big canvasses are gone, I see."
"Yes, there's a check in the can."
"OK, I'll deposit it tomorrow. Unless you want me to take it to the night depository."
"To the what?"
"The night depository. It's a thing where you can deposit money after the bank is closed. You fill out a deposit slip and clip it to the check, and there's a chute outside the bank where you drop it in."
"What proof do you have that you gave it to them?"
She laughed. "Well, the company which issued the check will get the cancelled check, and it's credited to your account the first thing the next morning. A bank won't try to steal your money, Camille."
I shrugged, bored with the subject. "Well, do it tomorrow. I don't like for you to be out on the streets at night."
"It isn't dark yet, Camille-it won't be for hours."
"Well, still, it's crowded now from people going home from work." The mention of going put at night reminded me that I hadn't asked her about visiting, visiting others, and having dates. "Get yourself a glass of wine and come in and sit down a few minutes, Jocelyn-I'd like to talk to you."
She laughed again and sat down on the couch. "I'll talk, but I'll pass on the wine. I can't drink wine with you, Camille. If I have some now and have some like we usually do with dinner, I'll get gassed. I've got so I like it now, but I still have to watch how much of it I drink."
"You didn't like wine at first? Why didn't you say something?"
"Oh, it wasn't anything big, and I didn't want-to be a pain. Anyway, like I said, I've got so I like it now."
"I do wish you'd be more straightforward with me, though, Jocelyn. I can't read your mind, you know, and if you like something or don't like something, I won't know until you tell me about it."
"If it was a big thing, I'd tell you, Camille."
"Are you certain?"
She smiled and nodded, and her eyes smiled too. They were a rich, pure blue, surrounded by a china white. "Positive, Camille. Really. If it's something little, then I'm not going to tell you-I appreciate your having me here, and I'm not going to make a pain out of myself. But if it's important, then I'll tell you."
I nodded, taking a sip of my wine. "Very well. On this same subject, Jocelyn, I've noticed that you don't bring any friends here and you don't go out at night. That is something very unusual for a person of your age."
She looked away, shrugging. "I haven't made any friends...."
"Well, why not? You've certainly been here long enough to make friends at school, Camille. And it wouldn't bother me for you to bring your friends here. As long as they didn't make a disturbance, anyway."
"Well, it just hasn't come up-"
"What do you mean?"
"Well ... no one has invited me anywhere, and no one has asked to come over. I haven't gone out of my way to encourage it, though, to tell the truth. I don't have a lot to do with the others...."
There was a possibility that she had guessed about me and didn't want to bring her friends over because of that; that was a disturbing thought. "Jocelyn, are you being absolutely frank with me?"
"Sure, Camille, I'm not upfronting you. I'm not."
"I beg your pardon?"
"I'm being absolutely frank with you. I didn't visit back and forth when Julia was.. "alive, either. She asked me about it a time or two, too, but she got used to it. You don't go out, though, so why are you concerned about me?"
"The situation is quite different, Jocelyn. I'm an adult woman, and I have my work to do."
She laughed. "You're making yourself out to be an old maid or something, Camille, and I know better.-Guys scope on you all the time, and they'd do a lot more if they had a chance. Why don't you ever go out on dates?"
"Jocelyn, we're straying from the subject."
"I don't think so, Camille. You say you have your work, well I have my school and my work. Did you go out a lot when you were in school or something?"
"Now, Jocelyn, that is quite beside the subject. We are discussing you, not, me. I am sure that boys have asked you out on dates."
"Yeah, well, it's a pain, right?"
"Pardon me?"
"Well, they're all after just one thing, right? And they usually smell bad, they brag about things that really make no difference whatsoever to anything, and all that stuff."
"Jocelyn, learning how to deal with others is a part of learning to deal with life. Unfortunately, dealing with men is largely learning how to convince someone that 'no' means 'no'. Nevertheless, it is a part of a woman's ... ah, education. But if you never have anything to do with the opposite sex, then ... well, you should."
She giggled. "It sounds like you're going to break into the birds and bees with me almost any minute, now. I've had hygiene, you know."
The conversation wasn't going at all like I'd intended. The role of mother was uncomfortable and difficult. I wasn't all that much older than her, and there was a nagging suspicion that she was finding the conversation amusing. And now that I had given the matter some thought, I felt strangely disturbed by her lack of communication with her contemporaries.
"Jocelyn, I can't find it within myself to treat this subject as lightly as you seem to regard it."
She sighed, her smile fading, and looked down at the floor. "Well, what do you want me to do, Camille? Do you want me to go out on some dates or something? If that's it, then just tell me."
"Of course I don't. The last thing I would want you to do is ... to do something you really don't wish to do simply because ... well, I don't want you to do something you don't wish to do."
She sighed again and looked away. She looked somewhat irritated and thoughtful. It occurred to me that she might accept an invitation for a date with some young thug simply because she might have the idea that it was what I wanted; that wouldn't do at all. "Jocelyn, let me emphasize that it makes no difference whatsoever to me if you never go out on a date. Please don't think that I want you to."
She silently nodded, still looking away.
"Is that perfectly clear, Jocelyn?"
"Yes, but" that's all that is. I'll be goddamned if I can figure out what you're telling me...."
Her voice died away as I stiffened with anger. It had been a slip of the tongue, that much was clear, but it was inexcusable. An expression of shame and guilt came over her face as she turned her head and looked at me. She had come close to it a few times and had been warned when she'd used questionable expletives. She knew that she was not to use the vulgarities of a common, sweaty, filthy laborer. I put the wine glass down on the coffee table, stood up, and walked toward her. She looked up at me, her lips trembling. I slapped her smartly on her cheek. Her head snapped to one side, then she looked up at me again, her chin trembling along with her lips, her eyes filling with tears, There was a red mark on her cheek. "Jocelyn, I will not tolerate vulgarisms. I have told you that several times, and now I hope it is perfectly clear to you."
"Yes," she said, her voice almost breaking as she stood. Her shoulders drooped and her hands were dangling loosely at her sides. She pressed her lips together in a tight line to keep them from trembling. Her eyes were liquid with the tears she was holding back, still fixed on mine, resentful and accusing.
I turned and walked toward the studio. She picked up the wine glass from the coffee table and walked toward the kitchen.
My working stock of prepared canvasses was low, and I set up a workbench to make up a few. There were several canvasses in the storeroom which I had put on stretcher frames a few days before, and I put a pot of rabbitskin glue on the hotplate to warm while I carried them out, then I began painting the key coats of sizing onto the canvasses. I had finished the first two, and something nagged at the back of my mind, hovering on the edges of my consciousness. I turned and glanced around. Jocelyn was standing in the door. "Dinner." I nodded, finished coating the canvas I was working, then put the brush in a pot of water and went in.
Her eyes looked slightly out of focus and sleepy, and her coordination seemed to be a little off. I wasn't really hungry, and she had little appetite. She picked at her food, blinking and clearing her throat occasionally, and I ate a few bites as I surreptitiously glanced at her and wondered what was wrong. Then I noticed there was a fresh bottle of wine open on the table. I glanced at the garbage can by the stove and saw the top of the other bottle over the edge of it. She had emptied it. I almost smiled, then looked quickly down at my plate and took another bite of cheese and bread.
"Wine?" I asked, picking up the bottle on the table.
"No, thanks," she murmured, her voice slightly slurred. She cleared her throat and pushed her hair back from her face. "I've had too much already."
"Do you feel bad, Jocelyn?"
"Yes."
"Would you like to go lie down for a while?"
"I think I will-I'll clean up later."
"I'll take care of it, Jocelyn. If you start feeling ill, then call me."
"Thank you, Camille."
"That's quite all right, dear."
I ate a few more bites and drank a glass of wine, then got up, cleaned up the table, and did the dishes. The door of her room was open, and as I started to go back to the studio I stopped in the hall and looked toward it, hearing a sound. She was quietly weeping. I turned and went into the studio to finish the canvasses.
CHAPTER NINE
Things returned to normal after a few days. It occurred to me that I hadn't bought her any clothes since she'd been with me when I passed her room one evening and saw her sewing on a couple of dresses, and the following day we went shopping for some new clothes for her. It was a battle, because she was so obstinate about not wanting me to spend money on her that it was almost impossible for me to tell if she liked something or not. We finally got a couple of dresses, some slacks, and a couple of sweaters for her, and started back to the studio. As we passed a couple of shops, I remarked that some of the styles seemed to be reverting to the past, and Jocelyn told me about the nostalgia craze, the interest in things of the past.
It didn't seem to mean anything to me while she was talking, but I thought about it that night while I lay in bed, waiting for sleep. Things were slow in the studio, and the next day I got some of my old sketch books out of the storeroom and looked through some of the sketches I'd made of the Colonial-style buildings in Williamsburg. There were several good subjects for etchings, and I went to the storeroom and began looking for my etching materials and tools.
The scent of the acid-proof resin was hauntingly familiar as I coated a copper plate. Gabrielle had been an Old World artist, well based in the fundamentals of art, and it was because of her that I mixed many of my paints from raw pigment, made my own varnishes and mediums, and did many other things for myself which had been available from factories when I was still very young. And she had laughingly chided me for wanting to smoke my etching plates so the lines of the needle would be easier to see.
The sketch was a fairly simple one, with a minimum of shaded areas, and when I'd drawn it I'd fancifully put in a couple in Colonial clothes on the sidewalk in front of the building and a horse and carriage going along the street in front of it. I put them in but kept the sketch fairly simple, fading the street into shadowy indications of buildings along each side of the center building. It progressed rapidly as the day wore on, and I was barely conscious of the few people who came in to look over the paintings. After one of them had left, there was a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that she'd said something to me but I hadn't noticed because of my concentration on the etching.
By the time Jocelyn got home I was working on the border. There was an expression of curiosity on her face when she glanced over the paraphernalia on the workbench and we exchanged a greeting, but she didn't ask me about it. She called me to dinner and we chatted about her day in school and other neutral subjects while we ate, then I went back to the etching to finish the border and put in my signature. I had always used a calligraphic drawing of my first name for etchings, and it had taken innumerable hours of practice to properly draw the letters backwards. Gabrielle had always scorned unsigned etchings, saying that an artist should be able to write his or her name backwards, and I had finally perfected it so that the print was an exact duplicate of my signature in offhand calligraphy. It had been a long time since I'd done an etching, but it came back to me and the needle flowed through the resin in the swirls of the letters, raising its tiny burr.
Jocelyn was working at her easel, and I could feel her eyes on me as I mixed the acid at the sink. It was a tense moment for me, because the day's work could be ruined in a single motion. Etched lines could be annealed or a plate could be spot burnished to remove errors, but I had always followed Gabrielle's practice of using a plate as it came from the acid and destroying it and starting over if it was unsatisfactory. I immersed it and let the acid bite the burr, then lifted it out and drained it, narrowing my eyes against the fumes and smell of the acid as I watched it eat. All the lines were taking. I lowered it again and let the acid have it. There was always a temptation to lift it too soon, and I steeled myself against my impatience. The seconds ticked slowly by. Jocelyn cleared her throat softly and moved one of her feet. It was time. I lifted it out and drained it, then reached for the stopping-out varnish brush. It was an old one, and the wood was bare of paint and pitted from the spots of acid on the rubber gloves which had grasped it over the years. It was another crucial moment, because the utmost care had to be used to stop the action of the acid just at the right moment in each area, and the hand had to be firm and sure so that the stopping-out varnish wouldn't spread or splash. I began working down the fine lines, then into the darker lines. It became feverish in the medium shades, then it was finally done.
The plate looked good with the resin removed. But it was still a plate and not a print. I carried it back over to the workbench and began heating it for the press, and opened an old box of print paper and got a cloth to dampen it. There was a measure of judgment involved in each step. The plate would produce only fifteen prints before the pressure of the press began to blur the lines, so each one had to count. The ink had to go on in a smooth, even coat, and the wiping from the high surfaces had to be exact but done before the ink started to dry. The paper had to be damp enough to sink into the crevasses and pick up the ink, but if it was too wet the lines would blur. If it was too dry, the stiffness of the paper would put too much pressure on the plate and it would be impossible to get fifteen prints from it.
My fingers trembled as I pulled the first print off; it had been a long time, and the hand forgot easily. I turned the print and looked at it, and a warm, glowing satisfaction flowed through me. It was perfect, with the soft effect of pencil but the fine, clearly delineated lines which came only from soft ground etching. There was a low gasp from Jocelyn as I propped it against the wall at the back of the workbench to dry. I ignored her, wiping my hands on my smock and reaching for the pot of ink again.
It took ten minutes to get the fifteen prints, and they all came out good! After the last one I took the plate out of the press, put it against the top of the workbench, and broke it in two and tossed the pieces into the garbage. I began cleaning up and gathering things up, and Jocelyn's eyes met mine as I slid the heavy press from the workbench and carried it toward the storeroom.
"Camille, I don't mean to be nosy, but those are the most beautiful...."
"Go and look at them if you wish."
She smiled eagerly, nodding, and put her palette and brushes down. I put the press away and came back out, and she was standing in front of the workbench and looking at them closely. "Camille, those are the most beautiful engravings I've ever seen."
"Engravings are dry point. Those are prints from an etched plate, which is in a soft ground."
"Well, they make our postage stamps and currency look like they were done by an amateur ... here, let me help you carry those things in."
"All right, but be careful with that bottle of acid."
The first prints were almost completely dry by the time we had put the things away, and I looked at them closely, comparing them. It was impossible to have the prints completely identical when the wiping from high areas on the plate was done by a human hand, and one measure of the skill of the artist was the degree of variance. It was somewhat more than I'd allow myself when doing etchings regularly, but it was less than the most critical layperson's eye could find. Gabrielle would have raised her eyebrows and smiled wryly, though, perhaps shaking her head slightly and making a quiet comment to limit myself to one glass of wine at dinner when I planned on printing an etching plate afterwards.
"These are the best I've ever seen, Camille-better than I've ever seen in a museum."
"Artists haven't always had the purity that we now have in copper plates or needles which will hold a point like the ones that are now available. Ink is also better now, as is the impression paper."
"No one else has ever had your hand and eyethat's the difference."
I smiled and nodded at the compliment; they had turned out well, with the slightly embossed look which came from a combination of a good line cut, precisely the right amount of ink, and paper which was just damp enough. The real test was yet to come, though. The test of the marketplace. It had been years since I'd sold etchings, and I pondered about how to go about it as I looked at them. One way would be to display them in my studio, but it seemed logical that people who would buy etchings wouldn't look for them in a place where they'd expect to find paintings. Another possibility would be to put a few of them in gift shops on a commission basis.
"Camille?"
"Yes, Jocelyn."
"Camille, I promised myself that I wouldn't ask you for anything when I came here, and ... well, I can't hold myself to that any longer. Camille, I've got to know how to do this. I'll do anything if you'll teach me. They don't do this anymore ... well, they don't teach it, anyway. They have steel impression engraving and things like that, but I don't know anywhere that I'd be able to learn this-I've never even seen something this good before. I've got to know how to do it. I'll never ask you for anything again if you'll just do this for me, Camille. And I'll do anything in return if you'll teach me."
It came out in a rush, the words tumbling over each other in her eagerness. The large, deep blue eyes were looking at me beseechingly, her lovely face was drawn with fear of a refusal, and her small, thin hands were clutched together in front of her. There had been other things, small things, and I had maintained an impenetrable distance between us. She had mentioned in a too-casual voice several times that her brushes seemed to fray much more quickly than mine, and I had ignored the obvious question. Then as a result of her evident spying on me while I worked, she'd seen that I treated my brushes periodically in linseed oil and let them dry with it in the bristles because she started doing it. There had been other things, all of them similarly petty, perhaps, but the only way I knew to maintain my self-control around her was to keep a wide distance between us. Having the beautiful, alluring young woman around me constantly was an agony, and it would be unbearable if our relationship developed to a closely personal basis. And the situation was made considerably more difficult because of her personality and attitude; she was congenial and affable, and she went out of her way in every respect to ingratiate herself with me. There was also the searing knowledge that she would undoubtedly give herself to me if I simply indicated that was what I wanted. Surprise, hesitation, and distaste, perhaps, but also submission. But, of course, I would hate myself for it for the rest of my life.
There were other considerations involved. An artist has a responsibility to art. Dedication encompasses the obligation to preserve and advance art. There could be little doubt that etching was becoming a lost art, at least in the more traditional aspects, and it was my obligation to preserve it. I was also obligated to help Jocelyn-an obligation which I had previously ignored-to help develop herself toward the strong-likelihood that she could advance art. She was good, precocious, in fact, and she would become a master in time.
"All right, Jocelyn."
She uttered a squeal of delight and threw her arms around me. The feel of her firm, slender body against mine made a gnawing torment swell within me, and I gripped my hands into fists and held them at my sides. "Please do not be demonstrative, Jocelyn."
"Oh, I'm sorry, Camille," she murmured, releasing me and stepping back, her expression contrite but her eyes still dancing with joy. "It's just that I ... I don't know what to say. I'll do anything to pay you back, Camille, anything at all...."
"If you give your attention to what I say and work diligently on the exercises I give you, that will be payment enough."
"May we start tonight?"
"No, it is too late, and you need your sleep-a steady hand is crucially important for etching. Let's get the things back out and clean off a workbench where you can work. That will be enough for tonight, and tomorrow I'll begin showing you how to resin a plate."
"I read somewhere that etchers smoke their plates so the lines in the resin will be more visible while they're working."
"You will also read about electric needles, if you read enough. Smoke makes the lines easier to see but it tends to obscure the burr of the needle, and the burr is highly important to the etching of a clean line. You shall not use an electric needle, and you shall not smoke the plates. Let's clean off the workbench by your easel and put the things there. We needn't bring out the press, ink, and paper, because it will be some time before you need them."
Her easel and whatever she'd been working on was put away, and I spent a sleepless night. The following day I trimmed the edges on the etchings and took a dozen of them and divided them between two gift shops a few blocks away in one of the fairly fashionable shopping districts and hung the other three in my display area. I began working on another plate, also a scene from one of the streets in Williamsburg. It was of an old house which still had the hitching posts in front of it, and I redrew the sketch, leafing through several portfolios and finding a couple of horses to draw in, before I began working on the plate. The sleepless night had made my hand unsteady and I found it difficult to concentrate fully, so it went slowly. But the three prints I'd hung in my display area were sold before Jocelyn got home from school.
It was sheer torment to maintain my cool reserve with the scent of her hair and body in my nostrils, and her lovely body so close to mine at the workbench that I would feel her warmth. I was somewhat sharp with her, but she didn't even seem to notice it. It was the first time I'd seen her in a learning situation, and she was unbelievably quick to catch on. Her graceful hands were nimble and dextrous, the huge blue eyes saw everything, and her mind was like a sponge. Within an hour she could resin a plate properly, and I leafed through her sketch books and found a suitable sketch, then left her at her workbench, perched on her stool with her lips pursed in concentration and her eyes narrowed with effort as she moved the needle with slow, sure strokes.
I became completely involved in the etching again until she called me to dinner. After we ate she rushed through the dishes and got back to her workbench, and both of us worked until ten or so, when I finished my plate. I decided to wait until the next day to reduce it and print it because I was tired and couldn't trust my hand and eye, and I put it to one side and went over to her bench to look at her work. She got "off her stool and watched me nervously as I tilted it so the light would reflect off the lines and looked at it.
"It is excellent for a beginner-better than some who call themselves artists. But the burr is uneven. Is your arm tired?"
She smiled wryly, rubbing her right forearm and flexing her wrist.
"You need to exercise it. On the way home from school tomorrow, buy two tennis balls. Spend thirty minutes each day with a ball in each hand, squeezing it, with your arms extended straight out from your body. Within a few weeks you will be able to work for hours with a needle without tiring." J put the plate on the bench. "And also buy a pair of rubber gloves-we will both need to wear them when we start working with the acid."
"Will we reduce this one, or do you want me to do another one?"
"We'll reduce this one and print one copy for your portfolio. I want you to see how the burr works on the lines."
"OK, I'll finish it tonight, then it'll be ready."
I shook my head. "Tomorrow, Jocelyn. You are young, and you will have ample time to finish everything."
She chuckled. "All right, Camille." Her smile faded and she looked at me with concern. "You look tired, Camille. Is there anything I can do?"
I shook my head, turning and walking back toward my workbench. "No."
"Are you sure? You'd tell me, wouldn't you, Camille?"
"Yes. Get ready for bed, Jocelyn."
The following morning I reduced the plate and printed it, and it came out well. After the prints were dry I trimmed them and wrapped up a dozen of them in two packages to take to the gift shops. At the first one, the manager was just unlocking the door when I arrived, and he welcomed me in with a beaming smile. Four of the six prints I'd left the day before had been sold, and a customer had asked him to hold the other two to be picked up that afternoon. He wrote me a check for my share of the sale and I left one package of the new prints with him, and he was making a prominent place in his display window for one of them as I left. A couple of the prints had been sold at the other place but they didn't want any more, so I took the other package of prints to another gift shop on the next block and left them.
When I returned to the studio I hung the other three prints in the display area and started on another plate. I had rested somewhat better the night before, so I selected an ambitious and detailed sketch of a city square in Williamsburg and it went well as the hours wore on. There were a couple of interruptions when customers came in, and two of the prints were sold.
Jocelyn came in from school, put her coat and books away, and began working on her etching plate again. She had been working on it for thirty or forty-five minutes when the door rattled open and another customer came in. I didn't look up; by unspoken agreement, Jocelyn had long since been taking care of customers who came in while she was in the studio.
It was a woman, and her tone of voice sounded somewhat impatient. I was laying in lines of cobblestones in the square and they were looking somewhat too regular and even, and I didn't look up.
"Camille?" Jocelyn murmured, close to me.
I paused with the needle halfway through a stroke and suppressed a sigh as I lifted the point carefully above the resin. "Yes?"
"It's about the etching. The one of the house. She wants to talk to you."
"She doesn't have to talk to me," I replied, keeping my eye on my place on the plate. "Sell it to her or give it to her or something. Get rid of her."
"Well, it's not exactly about that one. She said she wanted to talk to the one who had done it-"
"Listen, I don't have time to wait while you two have a conference or something!"
Jocelyn moved back, turning and looking at the woman, and I turned my head and looked at her. She was a tall, slender blonde, very attractive and neatly and expensively dressed in a wool dress and coat. A businesswoman, probably, with an aggressive thrust to her chin and determination in her eyes and mouth. And very obviously in a hurry.
Irritation flooded through me, and I frowned. "All right, don't wait, then. Leave."
"Listen, I want to talk to you if you're the one who did that drawing of that house. That one, there on the wall. I saw it down at a gift shop, and-what? What did you say?"
"I said that if you're in a hurry, then leave."
"Well, are you in business, or what? You have a shop here, and if all you're going to do is sit around and ignore customers who come in, then you should just close up-"
"I have a studio here on which I pay the rent, and I do as I wish. If you don't like it, then leave."
"Look, my money is as good as anyone else's, and I demand that-"
"And your manners are atrocious. Get out of my studio."
She stiffened, her face flushing with anger. "Look, I came in here because I want you to do a goddamned drawing for me-"
"And I don't intend to do it. Now leave!"
Her mouth dropped open and her face turned crimson, and she wheeled and walked rapidly toward the door, her heels rapping against the floor. She jerked it open, went through it, and slammed it behind her.
I turned my head, looking at Jocelyn. "Go lock the door and turn the sign. I can't get anything done with people coming in here all the time and bothering me."
She opened her mouth to say something, a wide smile spreading across her face, then she closed her mouth and tried to suppress the smile as she walked toward the door, shaking her head slightly. I looked at her, wondering what she had found amusing in the situation, then looked back down at the plate and lowered the point of the needle toward the half-finished line.
CHAPTER TEN
Jocelyn finished her plate and I went over it and pointed out the errors before we reduced it and printed it. She quickly caught onto dampening the paper and wiping the plate free of excess ink, and she pulled a couple of prints from it which were as good as the plate would reproduce. We went over the prints, discussing them, then I had her wash the plate and coat the back of it with resin to practice her signature in reverse while I went back to my plate.
The following morning I finished my plate, reduced it, and printed it. I divided twelve of the prints into three packages of four prints each to deliver to the gift shops, and they were all glad to get them; the prints were selling well, even in the shop which hadn't wanted any the day before, and I received checks from all three of them. When I returned to the studio I looked through a couple of sketch books and decided to do a plate of animal studies. I selected a horse for the center subject, and a sheep, dog, cat, bird, pig, and reptile for the smaller figures to surround it.
It was a quiet day, with no customers at all to distract me, and the etching went rapidly. By the time Jocelyn came home, I was putting the border on. We greeted each other and she put her coat and books away, then she coated a plate with resin and worked on it for a while before she went to prepare dinner. I put the signature on my plate, and I was starting to mix an acid bath for it when she called me to dinner.
Our conversation had gradually assumed a more weighty character since I'd started helping her, and we chatted about the relative advantages of etchings, line drawings, aquatint, and charcoal as we ate. I was pleased to see that she was pragmatic enough that commercial aspects of art were given due consideration, but she wasn't so shallow that they took an unwarranted precedence in her mind. She broke off in the middle of a sentence, looking toward the door and frowning, then she got up from the table and walked to the door, looking along the hall toward the studio.
"Is that someone knocking, Camille?"
"It sounds like it. Did you lock the door?"
"Yes."
"Well, perhaps they'll come back tomorrow. Sit down and finish your dinner."
She smiled whimsically. "Camille, if you were less than a master artist, you'd starve to death. You carry things all over the city to sell, then won't let people in your own studio. Let me go see who it is and what they want."
The knock came again, louder, and I shrugged. "All right, Jocelyn, if you wish."
She smiled, going through the door, and her light footsteps faded along the hall. I took another bite of cheese and sausage, reached for a shallot from the small plate of shallots, olives, and pickles in the center of the table, and poured myself another glass of wine. There was a distant, muffled sound of the door opening and closing, then a murmur of voices. The conversation went on for a moment, then the voices came closer and footsteps came along the hall. I sighed, swallowing and taking a sip of wine; Jocelyn knew that I didn't like to be disturbed while in the apartment.
She looked somewhat guilty and apprehensive as she came back in the door. The woman following her was the one I'd asked to leave the studio the previous evening.
"Ms. Evereaux, please don't blame Jocelyn for this interruption-it is entirely my responsibility because I insisted on seeing you to apologize for what happened last night."
I looked at her silently, my lips pursed and the tip of my tongue moving around my teeth. Her eyes had darted around the kitchen as she came in, and even though her face and eyes had reflected nothing in the way of judgment, I knew what she had seen and what she was thinking. It was small and cramped, the doors were battered, and the walls needed repainting. The refrigerator was small and old, wooden cases of wine were stacked in a corner, the wooden shelf over the tiny window was stacked high with loaves of bread and lengths of salami, sausage, and rounds of cheese were dangling from strings against one wall. Those who tailored their talents to the whims and fancies of the marketplace and satisfied more popular demands lived better. I felt irritated and resentful.
She cleared her throat, her cheeks flushing, and tried again. "Ms. Evereaux, I had a day yesterday that shouldn't have happened to a dog, and I should have known better than to try to have anything to do with real, honest-to-God people. I should have gone home and got drunk, but instead I came by here to see you because ... well, because it was important to me. Will you please accept my apologies for what happened?"
It was costing her, heavily. She wasn't a woman who apologized very often. And for her it was abject, a groveling before someone. I relented, nodding. "Will you have something to eat, Ms...? "
"Frodsham-Judy Frodsham, and please call me Judy. And I don't care for anything to eat, Ms. Evereaux."
A wool dress in a pastel, different from the one the night before, a wool coat with a fur trim, also different from the night before, and expensive and stylish leather handbag and shoes. And stunningly beautiful. She did look as though nothing less than filet mignon in an exclusive restaurant would tempt her appetite. I smiled coldly. "You have already eaten, perhaps?"
She smiled warmly and shook her head. "If you must know, I'm on a diet. And I also love Gruyere cheese and that smells lovely, so please don't tempt me."
The smile made me feel a little ashamed of myself; perhaps I was being petty. And it was next to impossible to resist the impact of the shining eyes and beautiful face smiling at me. I relented, relaxing my smile, and nodded. "A glass of wine, then, Ms. Frodsham."
"If I may, please," she said, walking to the table and pulling a chair away from it. "And please do call me Judy."
"Please call me Camille, then. You've met my apprentice, Jocelyn, I assume. Jocelyn, would you get Judy a glass, please? And you hardly look as though you need to diet, Judy."
She seated herself, straightening her coat, and put her purse on the table, shaking her head and smiling. "If I didn't, you wouldn't be able to say that. Sometimes it seems as though I can drink a glass of water and gain ten pounds." Jocelyn put the glass on the table and filled it, and she took it and sipped it. "Oh, that's a delicious wine-thank you."
Jocelyn murmured something and sat down in her chair again, and I began eating. Normally, common courtesy would have kept me from eating, but I found a perverse pleasure in it; I still remembered the glance around the kitchen, she hadn't been invited, and I wanted to make her uncomfortable because she was alluring and unavailable.
We chatted about the amenities, how long I'd had my studio there, Jocelyn's school and work, my accent, and Judy's job; she was an advertising copywriter, whatever that might be. Then she came to the point.
"You know, I was shopping for some gifts for ... friends during my lunch yesterday, and I saw those wonderful drawings of yours in one of the shops I went in-"
"Etching," Jocelyn said quietly.
Judy blinked, looking at Jocelyn and at me, then back at Jocelyn. "Etching?"
"A paper master is used for a drawing," I said. "What you saw were prints from an etching plate. The master is a copper plate which is incised with a steel needle and acid, and the prints are taken with ink. The lines are much finer than would be possible in a drawing, and the shading is much more precise."
"Oh, I understand," she said, blinking, obviously not understanding at all. "But you did it, didn't you? The one of that old house...? "
"Yes."
"OK, well, what I need is something like that. It's for my aunt and uncle-they're the sweetest old couple you've ever met-and I know it'll be just exactly what they want ... well, let me start from the beginning. You see, they reared me and my two brothers when our father and mother died, and it's just as though they were our parents ... a little too old to be our parents, really, but I guess you get the idea., Well, they have this old place out on the edge of the city, and they're just too old to take care of it. There's this tract development adjacent to their property and the developer made a good offer for it, and my brothers and I got together and bought them a condominium in the city. With no rent or anything to pay and what they get from the other place will set them up fine for the rest of ... well, anyway, what I want is one of those ... etchings of their place. We didn't pressure them into giving it up or anything, but they hate to leave it-you know how it is. But it won't be long until it's torn down, and I know they'd love to have one of those etching things of it."
She finished talking and looked at me hopefully. Jocelyn looked at me, chewing, then swallowed and took a sip of wine. It would be easy enough to do unless there was something about the location which would make it difficult. But it would be wasteful. "Are you sure you want an etching? Perhaps a charcoal or ink drawing would be better."
"Oh, no-I want it done like that one ... well, why do you say that?"
"An etching plate is made to reproduce fifteen prints.-It would be wasteful to reproduce only one."
"My god, you mean you make all those lines on a metal plate and get only fifteen copies of it? I thought you got a bunch of them."
I shook my head. "The impressions are blurred after fifteen copies."
"OK, well, let's see. A couple of prints would be enough ... no, let's say five. That would be one for them, one for me, one for each of my brothers, and an extra. Could you make them larger than the ones I saw?"
"My press will take a plate up to forty by fifty centimeters, but I don't know if I can get a plate that large. I'll have to check with a supply store and see."
"Oh, I can get that for you. We work with Ace Metals over on the other side of the river, and they make copper tubing, do metal plating, and all kinds of things like that. Alice Bixbee over there is a good friend of mine, and she'd be able to get it done for me. How much will that cost, by the way?"
"Well, I usually sell etching prints for ten dollars each-"
"That's right, I priced them at the gift shop. So that would be a hundred and fifty for a small one ... let's say ... three hundred?"
I shook my head. "That's too much. I would say-"
"Don't worry about it, Camille-my brothers will carry their share of it, and it's more than worth it to me. When can you do it?"
"I'll go look at it tomorrow and make sure that it's a suitable subject. If it is, then I can make my sketches tomorrow and begin on the plate as soon as I have it."
She smiled, sitting back and nodding her head, and I chuckled. "Don't forget to give me the address, though."
"I can come by and pick you up, and drive you out there tomorrow."
I shook my head. "I can't have someone watching me while I sketch."
"OK, I'll come by, pick you up, and drop you off there, then I'll come back and get you later. How's that? And I'll see about getting the plate tomorrow, too-that developer is going to be tearing it down before long, and I want to be sure we get it done before it's too late."
I nodded, finishing my wine. "All right. What time do you want to go?"
"It's up to you, Camille."
"At eight, then-I want to be sure I get the best light. Would you care for another glass of wine."
"Camille, I'd love to, honestly I would, and I'd love to sit and talk with you because there's all kinds of things I'd like to know, but I have tons of work to do at the office and my boss will be waiting for me. We have a project we have to get out tonight, and that's why I'll have time to goof off tomorrow. So rain check me, OK?"
I smiled and nodded, standing as she got up from her chair. "Certainly, Judy-I'll be looking forward to it."
I walked to the front door with her and let her out, saying goodnight to her, then locked the door and came back into the studio. Jocelyn was moving around in the kitchen, cleaning up and doing the dishes, and I put on a pair of the gloves and mixed the acid for my plate.
Jocelyn came in as I was removing the resin and checking the plate. "May I watch you print it?"
"Yes."
I finished cleaning it and took it over to the workbench to dry and warm it. She watched intently as I put on the ink, wiped it, then dampened the paper and closed the press on it. I opened the press and took the print out, glanced at it, propped it against the wall at the back of the bench, and reached for the ink again.
Jocelyn made a soft sound of admiration in her throat as she leaned over the bench, looking at the print, then she turned and watched me inking the plate again. "I'll be glad when that etching is done for that woman Judy."
I froze, reaching for the wiping cloth, and looked at her. "What do you mean?"
"I don't trust her."
"Don't trust her?"
"That's right."
"You mean you don't think she'll pay or something? Don't be absurd, Jocelyn."
"Oh, she'll pay all right. She has all kinds of money-anyone can see that."
"Then what do you mean that you don't trust her?"
She turned away and walked toward her workbench. "Nothing. I didn't mean anything."
The ink was starting to set. I took the cloth and wiped the plate, then made the print. Jocelyn was at her workbench, scratching at her etching plate. I turned back and began inking the plate again.
It took ten minutes or so to make the rest of the prints, then I took the plate out of the press and broke it, cleaned up, and went over to Jocelyn's workbench.
"What did you mean that you don't trust Judy, Jocelyn?"
She lifted the needle from the plate and kept her eyes on the line, pushing her hair back with one hand. "I didn't like the way she looked at you."
"What do you mean now?"
She sighed and shook her head fractionally, her eyes still on the plate. "I don't know what I mean, Camille. I just didn't like it, that's all."
"Well, I'm old enough to take care of myself, Jocelyn."
"Yes."
I turned away, glancing at her over my shoulder, and walked back to my workbench. She finished the line, moved the plate fractionally to one side on the workbench, adjusted her sketch, and lowered the needle toward the plate again. I looked at the prints, comparing them; there was virtually no difference between them.
"I'll still be glad when it's done!"
I turned and looked at her. She was looking at me over her shoulder. Her cheeks flushed and she turned her head back, looking down at her plate. I turned around and looked at my prints again.
Judy was there promptly at eight. Jocelyn had just left for school, and she had been unusually quiet as she got ready, drank her juice, and gathered her things to leave. I thought about what Jocelyn had said the night before as I rode with Judy in the car along the freeway toward the suburbs. Judy looked very chic and beautiful, and she talked about a play she'd seen in the local theater the week before, apparently on the mistaken assumption that I would have some interest in modern theater. The new car, her expensive clothes, and her sophisticated chatter were a wall between us. I saw nothing of what Jocelyn had intimated she'd seen. Then it occurred to me to consider the implications of what Jocelyn had said. There was an intimation of protectiveness, but that really meant nothing in view of her occasionally patronizing attitude toward me on business and financial matters. I glanced at Judy's smart dress from the corners of my eyes again, then looked down at my somewhat shabby coat and worn dress. A button had been replaced on the coat and the hem of the dress had been recently sewn. I didn't remember doing it. In fact, I was positive I hadn't done it. Jocelyn must have done it at sometime or other.
It was a lovely old house, and I replied to Judy's parting comment with an absent nod as I looked at it. It was surrounded with tall, massive oaks, and it was a three-story wood siding house with sprawling wings and three main gables. There were broken lightning rods and a broken wind direction indicator on the main peak. Some of the shingles were missing. The eaves were faced with decorative carved boards, and each of the gables was decorated with a wooden gargoyle which jutted out from the peak. There was a wide veranda in front which had carved support posts along the front of it with a banister between them. The front door was a double door with an old-fashioned fanlight over it. It was a relic of a bygone time, a more graceful and casual time, and it was lovely.
The best view was unquestionably from the front, and all the architectural features were best displayed by a slightly elevated perspective. There was a little wind, but I had brought some paper clips to hold the pages of my sketch pad together as I worked. I made a couple of straight sketches, then carefully made one from an elevated perspective, drawing in each feature. It came out well, and I moved to the left front and made two sketches then moved to the right front and made two. My arms were beginning to get tired holding the heavy pad in the wind, and I moved closer to the house so it would shelter me from the wind as I began sketching detailed studies of the gargoyles and decorative trim on the eaves. I started feeling even more tired, and I sat down on the path in front of the house to complete the detail figures. By the time I had finished the light had changed significantly, and I moved back away from the house and made two more sketches of the front from an elevated perspective.
I didn't hear the car drive up, and I didn't notice Judy until she walked into my line of vision. "Hey, hi. You sure get involved in what you do, don't you?"
I nodded, putting in a couple more strokes with the charcoal then looking at the sketch critically. "Yes. It's a beautiful house. It's a shame that it will be torn down."
"Yes, in a way. But it's a wreck, Camille. You can't believe what they spent last year on plumbing alone. And it needs a new furnace and ... hell, it needs everything. It's a beautiful house, but it's completely uneconomical. It's simply outlasted its time."
"That's a shame, isn't it."
"It's more than that-it's criminal. But it's also a fact of life."
I glanced at her; there were slight lines of fatigue in her face, and she looked thoughtful, slightly depressed, and considerably more subdued than she'd been before. Then I looked at the sun; it was well toward the west. I'd been there for hours.
"I got the plates, incidentally." She chuckled and shook her head. "Alice almost had a fit when I popped that one on her. She began asking me about gauges and whatnot, things I don't know the first thing about. I remembered that you said forty by fifty centimeters, but that's all I know. She checked some books and things and made a couple of calls, though, and she found out all the specifications. While she was at it, she stamped out twenty-five of them."
I looked at her, turning the page back on the sketch pad and closing it. "Twenty five? That's a lot of money, because twenty-five of the smaller ones costs quite a bit-copper is very expensive."
Judy shrugged, smiling. "Well, it's free-she said she would mark it off as stock loss or something, and she didn't charge me. She's one of the plant supervisors, and she can get away with things like that. When will you be ready to go."
"I'm ready now, thanks."
"I don't want to rush you now, Camille. If you're not through, then I can get away from here and stop bugging you, and I can come back later."
"No, honestly, I'm through now. I have all I need."
She nodded, turning toward the car, and I followed her to it. She unlocked and opened the passenger door for me, and I put the sketch pad in the back seat and got in as she walked around the car. I settled myself in the seat and closed the door, taking a handkerchief from my pocket and wiping the charcoal from my fingers. She started the engine and put the car in gear, and it started moving along the road.
"Aren't you getting awfully hungry, Camille? It's," she glanced at her watch, "Almost three o'clock, and you didn't have any lunch."
"I frequently get involved in something and miss lunch, and I'm not really hungry."
"I wish I could get involved in something like that and miss lunch now and then-no wonder you have that swell figure. Do you mind if I ask how much you weigh?"
"I don't mind, but I'm not sure exactly. About fifty kilograms, I think. But I still say you have a nice figure, Judy, and you don't need to diet."
"Yeah, well, if I don't, then I'll get like a butterball in a week. You're lucky that you don't have to. I'll bet you have all the guys giving you the once-over-do you date a lot, if you don't mind my asking?"
"No, I don't. My works keeps me busy. And Jocelyn came to live with me a few months ago, and recently I began teaching her. Her sister was a very good friend of mine and was killed in an automobile accident, and I brought Jocelyn here because there was no where else for her to go."
"Christ, everyone should have friends like you, Camille."
"There are responsibilities attached to friendship. Surely you would do the same for a friend, Judy."
She was silent for a moment, glancing at me a couple of times, then she nodded. "Yes, I suppose I would. I might not like it, but I guess I'd do it."
"Yes."
She looked at me thoughtfully, then turned her face back toward the windshield, her lips pursed. I thought again of what Jocelyn had thought; perhaps she was more observant and intuitive than I was. Now it seemed that Judy was thinking about me, and occasionally I felt her eyes flick over me as she glanced at me briefly.
We were silent until we were on the freeway, nearing the city. "I need to go to the office and take care .of a few things, Camille, and I need some correspondence I left at home. Do you mind if we stop by there?"
"Not at all."
"It's about time for Jocelyn to get home, isn't it."
"Yes, but she has a key."
There was another long moment of silence, and Judy cleared her throat. "Perhaps you'd like to come up and look at my apartment."
There had been a subtle change in her tone of voice; it seemed pregnant with meaning. A thrill of anticipation shot through me, and I took a deep breath, controlling it; I could have misunderstood her. "Yes, I'd like that very much, Judy."
She smiled and nodded, pushing back in the seat and settling herself more comfortably, and she pressed on the accelerator harder.
We were silent again, and a couple of miles further along the freeway she turned off and drove along a wide street. The traffic was heavy, and we eased along between the traffic lights until we approached a high-rise apartment complex. She worked into the right lane and turned in at the parking basement entrance under the tall buildings. A guard in a small structure by the entrance glanced at the car and waved it in, touching his cap and nodding to Judy.
There were other cars moving in and out of the parking basement, and she drove slowly to the end of a lane near the elevator entrance and eased the car into a slot.
"The sketch pad will be all right in the car, Camille. "We'll just lock it, and no one will bother it."
Her voice was a little strained and tense, somewhat too loud. I nodded, opening my door to get out. "All right, Judy."
Three other people joined us as we walked toward the elevator entrance. They got in the elevator with us, and an older man spoke to Judy and nodded to me. The elevator shot up to the sixth floor and two of the people got off, then the doors closed again and it went on up to the tenth floor. The man walked out of the elevator as we did, speaking and nodding again as he turned to the right, and Judy returned his nod as she turned to the left.
The slightly strained silence was still between us as we walked down the hall and she unlocked and opened the door. She smiled vaguely, motioning me on into the apartment as she closed and locked the door, and I walked out of the foyer and into the living room. There was a large, enamel painting of two nudes on one of the walls. It was amateurish and grotesque, the figures out of proportion and the colors grossly contrasted, but there was little doubt of the message conveyed by the painting. The figures were both female, and they were embracing passionately.
Judy walked into the living room and stood by me. "I hope that doesn't ... well, gross you out, Camille...."
The back of her hand brushed mine. I groped for her hand, and it slid eagerly into mine, her fingers lacing through mine.
"No, it doesn't bother me, Judy."
A brilliant smile spread across her beautiful face, a mixture of relief and joy, and she tossed her purse onto the couch. "That's good," she murmured, taking my purse and tossing it onto the couch by hers. "That's good, darling, because I hoped it wouldn't turn you off."
Her other hand clasped my other hand, and she smiled into my eyes as she squeezed my hands. We swayed together, and our lips touched. Her hands released mine, and her arms slid around my shoulders. I put my hands inside her coat and put my arms around her waist, and we pulled each other closer as our lips parted. The sweet taste of her lipstick filled my mouth, and the heady scent of her perfume was an alluring cloud which filled my nostrils and lungs. Her lips moved on mine with a damp, silky smoothness, and I opened my lips wider, thrusting my tongue into her mouth. She turned her head slightly sidewards, pulling on my shoulders and crushing herself to me, sucking my tongue into her mouth and nibbling at it, and I slid my hands down her back to
-her buttocks, cupping them and pulling her thighs harder against mine. A whimper came from her throat, and her lips quivered on mine as she trembled and undulated against me with a slow, sensuous movement.
Our lips parted, and she smiled into my eyes. I squeezed her buttocks and felt them as I looked at her beautiful face, my eyes moving over the warm eyes, the long lashes, the smooth skin, and the trembling lips damp and shining with our saliva. She put her lips gently against mine again, the tip of her tongue moving from side to side and caressing my lips.
"It's been a long time for you, hasn't it, darling?" she murmured against my lips. "I can feel you trembling so hard...."
"Yes."
"Then you and Jocelyn....."
"No."
"That must be hell for you." She took her arms from around my shoulders and pulled at her coat. "Take your coat off, darling."
I took my arms from around her and shrugged out of my coat, dropping it across the back of a chair as she tossed hers across it, and I looked at her slender body, the fiery, raging need for her a demanding hunger which made me feel weak. She put her arms around me, the tips of her fingers digging into my back, and I cupped one of her breasts and fondled it as we embraced and kissed again. Our lips were soft and gentle on each other, then they were suddenly tense and hard, tugging and pulling at each other. Her breath rushed against my cheek as she bit at my lips with the tips of her teeth, her fingers hard and strong on my back. She pulled me toward the hall, and we walked toward the bedroom, our arms around each other.
We stopped in the hallway a couple of times to kiss and fondle each other, then moved slowly into the bedroom. A warm, rosy haze of desire, arousal, and anticipation filled me with the promise of relief after the months of abstinence and torture of the nearness of Jocelyn. Judy was beautiful, fragrant, and loving, her hands and lips gentle on me. She smiled apologetically and shrugged wryly because the bed was still unmade, but it looked pleasantly mussed and inviting, still disarranged from her lovely body lying in it. I reached behind myself and unzipped my dress as she kicked her shoes off and unzipped her dress. She shrugged out of the shoulders of her dress and pushed it down, her smiling eyes moving over me, then her smile faded and her cheeks turned red with desire as she looked at me in my bra and panties.
She threw her dress on a chair and pulled me into her arms again, burrowing her lips into my throat as her hands moved up and down my back, feeling me. "God, you're beautiful, Camille...."
I nibbled and kissed her shoulder, feeling her buttocks through her panties and pantyhose. "And you are, dearest Judy."
"Not like you, Camille. You're ... you're just too much. I'm going to eat you up. I'm going to feel and suck you all over. I'm going to make you come until you're screaming for me to stop. God, you're so beautiful...."
She was warm and soft in my arms, trembling against me, and the thrills of sensation racing through me made my body quiver against hers as I felt and kissed her. Her hands moved up my back to the fastener on my bra, and she unfastened it and pulled away from me, looking down at my breasts as she pulled the bra away from me and tossed it onto her dress. My nipples were already firm with arousal, standing straight out from my breasts, and she uttered a low murmur as she bent down, feeling one of them and kissing the other one. I cradled her head in my arms, pulling it closer, and she opened her mouth and took my nipple and part of my breast into her mouth. The sucking sensation of her mouth made the burgeoning arousal within me swell into fiery torrents which raced through me, making every muscle in my body quiver and making my breath catch in my throat. One of her hands slid down into my panties, worming between my thighs, and I spread my legs apart. Her hand cupped my pussy, squeezing it, and my body began involuntarily undulating, pressing my pussy against her hand.
She sighed, pulling her hand away from my pussy and letting my breast slide from her mouth." ... can't keep my hands and mouth off you, darling ... let's get on the bed...."
I pushed my panties down and stepped out of them, and tossed them to one side as I walked to the bed and lay down. She pushed her pantyhose and panties down her legs and pushed them off her feet, and she walked to the bed, taking off her bra. I looked at her lovely body, the soft light gleaming on her white skin and the triangle of pale brown hair nestled between her thighs, reaching out toward her. She tossed the bra to one side and slid onto the bed, putting her arms around me. I dipped my head down, mouthing her breasts and she whimpered as she cupped one of them and lifted it to my lips, putting her arm around my head and pulling me closer. The taste of her silky skin filled my mouth as I closed my lips on her breast, sucking, and I slid my hand down her stomach and cupped her pussy. She whimpered, pressing herself against me and feeling my pussy and breasts. Our bodies trembled and writhed on the bed in a tangle of limbs as we fondled and caressed each other, kissing and whimpering.
She pulled her breast from my mouth and turned on the bed, clutching my thighs and kissing at them. I cupped her buttocks and pulled her toward me, pressing my lips to the crisp hair between the thighs, and a tremor raced through her body as she spread her thighs apart. Her lips tugged at the hair between my thighs and her head pushed impatiently at my thighs, and I spread my thighs apart as I burrowed my head between hers. The damp warmth of her mouth enfolded my pussy with an ecstatic sensation as I covered her pussy with my mouth, probing at it with my tongue. She slid the tip of her tongue through my vulva, her fingers digging into my buttocks, and the heady taste of her beautiful body filled my mouth as I opened my thighs wide for her and abandoned myself to the raging fury of the sensations racing through me.
We lay with our heads between each other's thighs, our tongues titillating each other as they stroked and probed. Her arousal was as great as mine, and when the shattering sensations of her tongue on my clitoris began to rush me toward a climax her body also began responding violently, thrusting at me and smothering my face between her thighs as my tongue flicked over her clitoris. The cumulative frustration of months gathered within me, feeding the growing impetus drawing me inexorably toward an orgasm, and the thrills plunging through me became more and more exhilarating, wracking my body. It reached a peak, and through a numb haze I could also feel her body poised on the brink of a climax, shuddering violently. The ecstasy gripped me, and I exploded into an orgasm. Her muffled cries mingled with mine as her body throbbed in her climax.
I turned, putting my arms around her and resting my head on her breasts, my breath coming in gasps. Her breasts were heaving with her labored breathing and she cuddled my head close to her and rested her cheek on top of my head, relaxing. A sweet, heavy lassitude swept over me.
Her hand caressed my back and she bent her head lower, kissing my cheek. "I'm not through with you yet, baby."
"Umm?"
"I'm not through with you yet-you're going to come again for me."
I smiled, nuzzling her breasts. "I thought you had some work to do tonight."
"First things first. Are you ready to come again for me?"
I looked up at her and smiled, nodding. "Yes."
She extricated herself from my arms, kissing me. I was still relaxed in the aftermath of the climax, and I responded passively, my limbs heavy and my movements slow. She chuckled, kneeling by me and turning me onto my stomach. "I'll bet I wake you up." She pushed my head to one side and kissed the back of my neck. "Nicely, of course."
I rested my cheek on my forearm and watched her as she slid off the bed and walked to the bureau. Her slender, curved body was beautiful, and a warm gnawing began forming within me again as I looked at her. She opened a drawer and took out a dildo with straps hanging from it, and she fastened the straps around her hips and waist as she walked back toward the bed, the dildo standing out from her and swaying from side to side. "It's large," I murmured.
"I'll be gentle, darling," she replied, sliding back onto the bed and brushing her lips down my back. "I'll be gentle, and I won't hurt you."
She pulled the pillows down from the head of the bed and lifted me, sliding them under my stomach. I gathered my strength and raised myself, then relaxed on top of them. She spread my legs apart, bending down and running the tip of her tongue along the inside and back of my thighs, and I shivered from the sensation, the glowing fire beginning to come to life within me again. Her tongue moved further up, her head pressing against my buttocks, and it lapped at my pussy with long, slow strokes. I sighed, trembling, and spread my legs further apart as I curved my back and lifted my hips. Her lips moved up my buttocks and along my back as her fingers stroked my pussy and one of them penetrated, sliding in and out. The tip of the dildo touched my pussy, and she gently spread it open with her fingers, easing the dildo in. A couple of inches of it slid in, and she began undulating, sliding it in and out of my pussy.
Her lips brushed from side to side on my shoulders, and her teeth nibbled at the back of my neck, adding to the probing sensation of penetration from the dildo sliding in and out. One of her hands slid down under me, groping, and her finger touched my clitoris. I moaned, quivering all over, and I lifted my hips higher and began thrusting back at her. Her other hand slid between my buttocks and her finger pressed on my anus. My body tensed involuntarily, then relaxed from the stimulation of her finger on my clitoris. Her finger slid into my anus, and I gasped, digging my fingers into the bed.
Hard shudders raced through me as she bent over me, stroking my clitoris, sliding her finger in and out of my anus, and working the dildo deeper into my pussy. My back was arched in a deep curve, holding my pussy up to the dildo and my anus up to her probing finger, and I clawed at the bed as I whimpered and moaned. Her breath was warm on the back of my neck, and the tip of her tongue moved across it. "Now come for me, baby ... come good for me ... let it all out ... come for me, darling ... come for me...."
The sensations were a crushing weight, smothering me and grinding the life from me. My entire body was enveloped in a seething mass of fire which was consuming it. I tried to escape, gathering my flagging strength to creep away from her, but she was still over me and on me, inside me and tearing my very being from me. Then the sensations began lifting me, snatching me upward at a dizzying pace, and I grasped eagerly for relief. It came in a shattering wave of ecstasy which gripped me and wrung me, and I released myself into it, holding myself up to her. Her murmurs of effort were drowned in my smothered scream as I burrowed my face in the bed and tore at the bed with my fingernails.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The street was dark and deserted in front of the shop, and the door was locked. I got my key out of my purse and unlocked it, and Judy carried the heavy box of copper plates in behind me as I carried my sketch pad. The lights were on in the studio, but Jocelyn was apparently back in the apartment. I pushed the gate in the room divider open and held it for Judy, and she carried it to one of the workbenches and put it down with a sigh of relief. She had put on fresh makeup, but she still looked vaguely mussed and disorganized. I smiled at her as I put the sketch pad down, and we walked back out to her car. There was a hasty kiss and caress, a whispered goodbye, and she got in the car and drove away. I pushed my hair back with both hands, watching the lights fade along the street, then turned and went back in.
There was a muffled noise from Jocelyn's room, and I stopped in the hall and glanced in; she had done the washing, and she was folding the clothes. "Hello, Jocelyn."
She looked up at me, and nodded, her smile a little too bright. "Hello, Camille. Did you get the sketches done?"
"Yes."
"It must have been windy-your hair is messed up."
"It was a little windy," I replied, pushing at my hair. "I think I'll take a shower and freshen up before dinner."
"Oh? You haven't had dinner yet? I thought you must have stopped to have dinner somewhere, because you obviously couldn't have been sketching while it was dark."
"No, I haven't eaten yet."
"Well, I haven't either-I was waiting for you. I'll finish this up and fix dinner while you're showering, then. There are clean dresses in your room."
"Yes, all right. Thank you, Jocelyn."
"You're welcome.-"
Her tone and manner were cold and distant, and the question as to what I had been doing until so late still hung between us. I let it remain there; I didn't explain or excuse myself to her. But she still seemed somewhat too chilly for a simple absence of a few hours. I thought about it as I got a dress and underwear from my room and a towel from the linen closet in the hall. Could she have guessed where I'd been and what I'd been doing? She had intimated that she'd detected interest in Judy's looks at me the night before, which had been more than I'd seen, and perhaps she had combined her suspicion to my absence to conclude I'd been with Judy. If that were so, then her attitude indicated anger or disgust with me. I sighed as I turned on the water in the shower closet to let it get warm while I undressed. Another thought occurred to me; instead of anger or disgust, the way she was acting could as easily reflect jealousy.
She was in the kitchen when I came back out of the bathroom. I put the soiled clothes into the hamper in the hall and went into the kitchen. The food was on the table and she was standing with her back to me, screwing a corkscrew into the bottle of wine. It made a soft squeaking noise, then a muffled pop as she pulled it out. I sat down, she poured wine into the glasses, then pushed the cork into the top of the bottle and sat down.
"Is something wrong, Jocelyn?"
"I'm in trouble at school."
"What sort of trouble?"
"I attacked a boy. I'm supposed to ask you to come and see the principal at ten-thirty tomorrow."
"Very well," I chuckled. "I shall go and see him and see if you did lasting harm to the boy."
"It's not funny, Camille."
My smile faded and I looked at her. She was looking down at her plate. I reached over and patted her hand. "I'm sure it wasn't funny for you, Jocelyn." She pulled her hand away from the touch of mine, and I frowned. "Do you find it distasteful for me to touch you, Jocelyn?"
"Not if you mean it, but I can't stand for you to touch me like I'm a stranger."
"How does one touch another like a stranger?"
She looked up at me, her wide blue eyes liquid and hurt. "Like you just did me. As though you're doing it because it's the thing to do then. Not because you want to, but because it's the thing to do."
"I don't understand what you mean."
She reached across the table and took my hand, pulling it toward her, then held it and looked at me. "I'm touching you. I'm not moving my hand or anything-just touching you. But I'm not touching you like you're a stranger."
Her hand was soft and warm, slender and satiny on mine. Then suddenly it was like a firebrand, sending a thrill of sensation up my arm. I felt the warmth spreading up through my cheeks, bringing a flush. Her cheeks were flushing also, but her eyes remained fixed on mine. Her face was stunningly beautiful, haunting in its youth and fresh in its young womanhood. My cheeks began burning. I pulled my hand away, looking down at my plate and clearing my throat. "Shall we eat, Jocelyn? Perhaps you'd like to tell me what happened at school."
She looked down at her plate, shrugging, and took a bite. "A boy pinched my butt, and I scratched his face."
"Not the most unusual thing in the world, surely."
"I scratched him pretty bad."
"When the term is out you may go to the self defense school over on the next block. After a few weeks there, you'll know how to do more than scratch someone's face. You'll be able to make them remember it for a time."
"He'll remember it for a while-wait until you see his face. You said you got the sketching done?"
"Yes."
"When's she coming by for the prints."
"In a couple of days-why."
"I just wondered."
"You're talking very strangely this evening, Jocelyn."
"I feel strange. I finished a plate that looks pretty good-maybe you'll look at it later and see what you think."
"Yes, when we're through eating. Wine?"
"No, thanks. One's enough for me."
When we finished eating I went back into the studio and stopped at her workbench, looking at the plate in the center of it. It was good. A study of a man and a woman in Colonial clothes, shadowy indications of other figures behind them suggesting other people in the same dress and position in a ballroom dance scene. Sufficient detail but not overworked, with strong, clean lines. There were problems which are inherent in any scene constructed in the imagination, basically a lack of feel for the character of the figures. There was a hint of masculinity in the woman expressed in the bold, forthright position of her arm, and the position of the man's feet and some of the lines of his body seemed effeminate. But it was good. Good enough to reproduce for sale. And she had perfected her signature in mirror image; it was calligraphic, and it was only her first name.
There were two oils propped against the wall at the back of the bench, apparently placed there for me to see when I looked at the plate. They were landscapes, decorative rather than interpretive, but stunningly good considering her age and experience. The colors were glaringly bold, though, much too bright for the naturalistic tone established by the pastoral scenes.
Her footsteps came along the hall, into the studio, and stopped behind me. I turned and glanced at her, then looked back at the plate. "The plate is good. You didn't have a feel for the people, but one can't have a feel for what one hasn't seen or experienced. But it is good. We'll reduce and print it, and I'll take the prints and put them in a shop along with some of mine. The oils are too coloristic. Color saturation has a certain freshness in its place, but a landscape isn't the place for it. A landscape must have color harmony. But you have a good balance of warm and cold, so what you need here is to reduce the intensity of the colors and unify them. Do you know how to glaze?"
"No."
I glanced at her; she was smiling with satisfaction. "Then I will show you how to mix a glaze. Alizarin Crimson would be a good shade for glaze on these, and it will diminish the colors and improve the harmony. After they are glazed, you may hang them in the display area and perhaps someone will like them." I glanced at her again; she was beaming, delighted, and sympathetic pleasure made me smile as I put my hand on her shoulder and squeezed it affectionately. "Get a pot to mix the glaze, and we'll reduce your plate while it thickens."
She nodded, walking toward the storeroom, and I walked across the studio and opened the box of plates Judy had brought in from the car. They were massive and heavy after being accustomed to the smaller plates. I tilted one to let the light shine on its surface, turning it from side to side and looking at it. The surface looked good. I put the plate down and reached for a box of resin to coat it.
Jocelyn came back from the storeroom with a paint pot, humming to herself. Her steps were quick and light, and her face was still shining with pleasure. "Are you happy, cherie?" I chuckled, walking back across the studio.
She nodded, rummaging in tubes of paint on the shelf above her workbench, and selected a tube of Alizarin Crimson. "Very happy, Camille."
"You have reason to be happy. In time, you will be a superb artist."
"I'm happy because you liked the work, and I'm also happy because you didn't touch me like a stranger when you put your hand on my shoulder a few minutes ago."
I looked at her, then flushed and looked away, taking the tube of color from her and pulling the pot closer. "Get some linseed oil, damar varnish, and turpentine, and pay attention to what I tell you."
She reached for the cans and bottles on a shelf, still smiling as she nodded. "Yes, Camille."
From a physical standpoint the experience with Judy had brought total relief and satiation; she had been an aggressive, ardent, determined lover. But there was still an emotional vacuum. Sleep evaded me for hours while I tossed and turned on the bed, impatiently trying to find a comfortable, relaxing position. My mind raced, flitting feverishly from one thought to another, and I had the insane conviction that Jocelyn was similarly wakeful. I thought about her, what she had said, and how she'd acted. There was an uncomfortable feeling that I had somehow precipitated some sort of reaction between us when I'd started helping her with her work. It had been stewing below the surface between us, gradually working toward a climax, completely out of my control.
I got to sleep a few hours before daylight. Jocelyn was moving around the apartment and getting ready for school when I woke. My mind felt numb, still drugged with fatigue and sleep. I propped myself on one elbow, yawning and pushing my hair back out of my face. Jocelyn's footsteps went along the hall and across the studio. The front door opened and closed. I turned and slumped onto my back again, stretching and yawning.
The telephone began ringing, and I got out of bed and stumbled into the living room to answer it. It was Pamela. The paintings were selling rapidly, and she wanted more as soon as she could get them. Her voice became solicitous when I mumbled and yawned, and I told her I was simply sleepy. She laughed merrily, chiding me for being in bed so late, then told me to call her back about the paintings. I grunted an affirmative and put the telephone back down.
After washing and drinking a cup of tea, I began to feel more human. I looked through the storeroom, picking out a couple of paintings which would do for Pamela, then I looked at the ones I had in the display area. As I walked back through the studio I looked at Jocelyn's paintings on the easel by her workbench. The glaze had dried, and they looked beautiful. I pursed my lips, looking at them and thinking, then nodded to myself; they would do well for what Pamela wanted, and the sale would please Jocelyn.
I called Pamela, then she called Sandy and Sandy came for them in the van she'd recently bought. She was warmly friendly, but simply friendly; she and Pamela meant a lot to each other. Strangely enough, though, I felt a curious sort of relief about the situation. Sandy looked at the paintings and murmured admiring comments about them, saying all the wrong things, of course, and I helped her load them into her van.
There was a set of etching prints still to be delivered to the gift shops, and I trimmed and packaged Jocelyn's to deliver them at the same time. I dropped them off at the shops and picked up a couple of checks, and on the way back from the shops I remembered the appointment to see the principal at Jocelyn's school. Relief flooded through me as I saw a clock in a store window; it was only a few minutes after ten. A passing taxi slowed as the driver looked at me, then he braked to a stop when I waved.
The scene looked hilariously amusing in a way. The door to the principal's office was across the anteroom from the hall door. A secretary's desk was just in front of the door to the principal's office, and she was typing rapidly, looking down at a piece of paper on her desk. There were two long, wooden benches on each side of the room. On one sat Jocelyn, looking very small and young, slightly frightened. On the other sat a youth of eighteen or nineteen, with his father. They were both massive, towering well over one hundred and eighty centimeters. The father was somewhat heavier, but the youth had brawny shoulders and heavy limbs and would weigh close to one hundred kilograms. There were deep scratches on his face, with red disinfectant smeared over the long, dark scabs. The youth and his father closely resembled each other. Both of them had coarse, brutish features and thick, protruding lips. And they both looked like escapees from a zoo.
I let the door close behind me and laughed. "Good Lord, Jocelyn, is this the child you attacked? Really, you should be ashamed of yourself for having attacked such an obviously helpless creature."
They had been sitting and glowering at Jocelyn. Their heads turned at the same time, as though by a common impulse, and they glowered at me. The secretary stopped typing, looking from them to me, and turned crimson as she looked down at her desk and suppressed her laughter.
I laughed again, walking toward the bench where Jocelyn was sitting, and I sat down by her and patted her hand. "You'll be pleased to hear that Pamela Harris has bought your two paintings for her furniture store, Jocelyn."
Pleasure replaced the expression of relief and gratitude on her face at my arrival. "Really? She really bought them?"
"Yes, indeed. And I delivered your etchings to the shops this morning, and I confidently expect that they will be sold in the near future."
"Excuse me-you're Camille Evereaux, the artist, aren't you?" the secretary said. "I thought I recognized your name...."
I looked at her and smiled, nodding. "Yes."
"A couple of friends of mine bought some of those lovely etchings of yours at a gift shop down on Twelfth. They are so pleased with them...."
"Thank you. Jocelyn has started reproducing her etchings commercially now, and they will be available there as well."
"Oh, really? Isn't that wonderful? The art teacher has mentioned her several times, you know, and she's said that Jocelyn has advanced completely beyond the rest of the class."
"Her work is very promising, and she'll be enrolling in the institute this summer."
"Oh, that's just wonderful...."
Her voice faded away as the door to the principal's office opened. He glanced out and nodded to her, then left the door open and walked back to his desk. The secretary stood up, smiling vacantly. "Well, if all of you would like to go in, now...."
I guided Jocelyn through the door, getting into the doorway and slowing to let the two thugs catch up, so that when the principal looked up from his desk he was confronted with the sight of two women of approximately the same height with two men behind them and towering over them by some thirty centimeters. The effect wasn't lost on him. He blinked, motioning toward the chairs, and I guided Jocelyn to one and sat down.
The principal cleared his throat and sat back in his chair. "I like to call the parents in to discuss it when we have ... an ... ah, incident on school property, so that we can be sure that it's ... ah, settled and won't recur...."
"Well, I don't want my boy's goddamned eyes scratched out again," the man rumbled in a deep baritone voice.
"I will not allow Jocelyn to remain here to be. verbally assaulted with profanity," I said quietly, looking at the principal.
"Yes, that's right," he said, frowning darkly at the man. "We can't have language like that here."
"Well ... but...."
"And I believe that it is patently absurd to proceed on the proposition that Jocelyn gratuitously attacked this person. She would hardly attack a person some two times her size."
"Well, look at him!" the man snarled, wheeling toward me.
"And no shouting, if you please," the principal said, frowning at him again. "We are not here to place blame or determine responsibility-we are here to assure that this is settled."
"If it happens again, I'm going to call my lawyer," the man grumbled.
I laughed, and the principal smiled involuntarily.
"What's so funny about that?"
The principal shook his head, sighing, then shrugged. "Well, if that's what you intend, I think you should consider what kind of impression you would create by going into court and saying this young lady here attacked your son. I wouldn't want to be in your position."
"The way women are today, anything's possible," he growled.
The principal's face darkened in a frown again. "I'll ask you not to make comments of that nature, please."
"What the hell is this? Every time I open my mouth, there's something wrong with what I say. If you're going to try to railroad my boy, then I'll go to the school board and-"
"You may contact the school board if you wish," the principal said, shrugging. "As I said, our purpose here and now is to assure that whatever disagreement occurred is settled. If it happens again, I will appoint a faculty board to investigate it and determine responsibility. They will interview witnesses, draw conclusions, and make recommendations to me. Their recommendations usually include suspension of the responsible student. But let's hope that it doesn't come to that." He looked at Jocelyn and raised his eyebrows. "Is it over as far as you're concerned."
"Yes, sir."
He looked at the youth and raised his eyebrows, and the youth silently nodded. "Very well," he said, putting his hands flat on his desk and smiling slightly. "There was a time when I attempted to achieve understanding between parents in situations such as this, but I eventually realized that I was wasting my time and theirs. We seemed to have reached an agreement of sorts between the students, and that was our purpose. So I appreciate your time and trouble in coming here...."
I smiled and nodded to him, standing. The two thugs looked around, blinking vacantly, apparently somewhat slow in realizing that it was all over so quickly. Jocelyn and I went back out into the anteroom, smiled and nodded at the secretary, and went into the hall.
Class was changing, and the hall was crowded with students thronging in different directions. Jocelyn clutched her books to her, moving to one side of the door and leaning against a row of lockers, and I moved to the side of the door with her. The two men came out the door, glowered at us, and pushed their way through the students, making their way along the hall.
"You were beautiful in there, Camille-simply wonderful."
I smiled at her and put my hand on her shoulder. "And you were, Jocelyn."
Four women crowded up to Jocelyn in a group, nodding to her and to me, then leaned against the lockers beside her, obviously waiting. I glanced at them and looked at her, raising my eyebrows.
"They're my witnesses. You heard what the principal said about what happens if the action starts going down again ... ah, if there's trouble again. That's the way it always is, so if a chick has a beef with a guy they get some witnesses to follow them around for a few days."
"Oh? Are they friends of yours, then?"
"No, but I'm a chick and they're chicks, so they'll help me out. You know how it is."
"Yes, I see."
My hand was still on her shoulder. She put her hand on top of mine, smiling into my eyes. "I guess I'd better get to class now. I'll be late and make my witnesses late."
I felt warm from the touch of her hand on top of mine and from the glowing smile in her deep blue eyes. "All right, Jocelyn. I'll see you after school."
She nodded, squeezing my hand. I started to move my "hand off her shoulder. She gripped it, kissed it quickly, then pressed to her cheek and released it. A tingle rose to my cheeks, and her smile was flushed as she turned away. Her witnesses crowded around her, chewing their gum and carrying their books clutched against them. The group moved along the hallway. As they turned the corner, Jocelyn glanced around and smiled at me, waving. I waved, then turned toward the other end of the hall.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Jocelyn hummed softly to herself as she perched on the stool with her legs wrapped around the legs of it, scratching with the needle at her plate. There was a time when it might have irritated me, but it was only a pleasant reminder of her presence as I leaned over the plate, carefully drawing the needle through the resin and raising a tiny burr in the copper. And it was an indication of her satisfaction with how things had turned out for her. She had been pleased with the outcome of the conference in the principal's office, and she had been ecstatic over the sale of the paintings. Her constant chatter had filled the place since she'd come in from school, and I'd smiled quietly through dinner while she rambled on. She'd been torn between starting another painting and another etching, and I'd put her on another etching; there would be less loss if she ruined it in her scatterbrained state.
I turned the plate slightly and flipped a page in the sketch book propped on a stand in front of me. The baseline of the building and the trunks of the trees were in, and I glanced between the sketch book and plate. It would be better to fill in the limbs of the trees and the main outline of the roof, then I could work down toward the baseline with detail. I held the needle up to the light and slowly turned it, examining the tip, then edged the plate a fraction closer and began figuring the trunk of one of the trees.
"How soon do you think it'll be before they sell the prints in the gift shops?"
I lifted the needle. "I don't know, Jocelyn. Some of mine have sold in a day or two, but some of them have taken several days."
"When are you going to check on them?"
I was starting to lower the needle again, and I lifted it back up. "Tomorrow or the next day-whenever I deliver more prints to them."
"Tomorrow's Saturday."
"Monday or Tuesday, then. Jocelyn, if you are talking and etching at the same time, you will ruin your plate."
"I'm not. I'm doing my exercises like you said, but I still have to rest my arm and wrist every few minutes."
"Jocelyn?"
"Yes, Camille?"
"I don't have to rest every few minutes."
She chuckled apologetically. "OK, Camille. I can take a hint."
I smiled, looking back down at the plate and picking out my line, and I carefully lowered the needle into the resin and finished the line.
An hour passed, and the lines began to blur before my eyes. The few hours of sleep the night before hadn't been enough, and presently my hand would start to shake. And I could ruin the plate. I put the needle to one side and sat up straight, rubbing my back.
"Tired?"
I turned; she was looking over her shoulder at me, smiling. "Yes," I said, sliding down from the stool and yawning. "It's been a long day, dear, and an eventful one. Let's get ready for bed."
She nodded, sliding down from her stool. "All right, Camille. You go ahead, and I'll clean up in here."
I nodded, walking toward the doorway to the hall, and she began picking things up. She was moving around in the kitchen after I showered and changed into my gown. I went into my bedroom and lay down, sighing. Things had seemed to happen with dizzying speed during the day, and I felt numb with fatigue and the lack of sleep the night before. The bathroom door closed and the shower started running. I turned onto my side and yawned, composing myself for sleep.
"Camille?"
I looked. She was silhouetted in the doorway by the light from the kitchen, and I could see the outline of her body through the gown. I turned my head the other way. "Yes?"
"You were really great at school today-I mean, really great. There was a minute or two that I was really scared you weren't coming, but I should have known better. And then you came, and ... well, you were great, Camille. And I appreciate it a lot, I really do."
"That's all right, Jocelyn."
"Did you do it for me, or because Julia was my sister?"
I drew in a deep breath and let it back out in a silent sigh, then told the truth. "It was for you, Jocelyn."
There was a long moment of silence, then she spoke again. "May I kiss you goodnight, Camille?"
I closed my eyes and opened them, clenching my hands into fists. "Yes, if you wish."
Her slippers whispered against the floor as she walked across the room in the darkness. The mattress sagged slightly as she put her hand on the side of it, leaning over me. Her lips were smooth and cool against my cheek. Then they moved across my cheek, opening. Her damp, warm lips enfolded mine with a hint of pressure from her teeth and tongue as she kissed me hungrily.
I recoiled, pulling away from her. "Jocelyn!"
She stood up, looking down at me, her face in dark shadow. "Do you hate me now?"
"No, but ... but you mustn't...."
"You kissed Judy Frodsham, didn't you?"
"Jocelyn, that is none of your concern!"
"If you can kiss Judy Frodsham, then you can kiss me. Unless you don't like me. Is that it?"
"Jocelyn, you must stop this-"
"Is it that you don't like me? Do you think Judy Frodsham is more attractive than I am?"
"Jocelyn, what has possessed you to start acting this way?"
"Because I know what happened. I saw how she was looking at you, and I saw how you looked when you came home last night. So I know what happened. I wouldn't have said or done anything, but I know what happened. And if you can do it with her, then you can do it with me. Unless you don't like me. Is that it? You don't like me and you're just waiting until I get old enough to leave so you can get someone else here?"
"Jocelyn, if you keep on acting this way, I'm going to smack you again. Now you must-"
"Then smack me," she wailed, breaking into tears and throwing herself at me, clutching my shoulders and burrowing her face against my throat. "Go ahead and smack me or even kick me if you want to, but tell me the truth. Tell me if you don't like me ... tell me, and I'll leave and not bother you any more...."
Her tears were damp against my throat. The alluring scent of her hair and body filled my nostrils. I could feel the resilient firmness of her breasts against mine, and I could feel the heavy pounding of her heart. Her hands gripped my shoulders almost painfully. She stopped sobbing and sniffled, lifting her head slightly and looking at my face. Her breath was sweet and fresh against my face. She moved slightly, inching upward. Her lips touched mine hesitantly, then more firmly. It was a chaste, dry kiss. Her lips began slowly opening, becoming warm and damp against my lips. The kiss had a silky, smooth texture. I opened my lips under hers, moving my tongue. She uttered a muffled whimper in her throat, kissing me greedily, and I lifted my hands and cupped her face as I slid my tongue into her mouth. A quiver raced through her, and she kicked her slippers off and slid onto the bed by me.
I put my arm around her and pulled her onto her side, facing me, and kissed her. Her body pressed against mine eagerly, and she slid her arms around my neck. I took my lips from hers and looked at her. Her face was beautiful in the dim light, so lovely that an aching pain dug into me. She would be satisfying, both physically and emotionally, but she was very young. I stroked the side of her face, pushing her hair back, and kissed her again. "Are you sure this is what you want, Jocelyn?"
"I've always been sure, Camille," she murmured. "Right from when I first came here. I've lain awake at night thinking of you, dreaming of this. But I thought that perhaps you ... wouldn't, and you'd ... hate me if I said anything, so I didn't. Then when I saw what happened with that Judy Frodsham-"
I put my hand on her breast, feeling the firm mound through the front of her nightgown. "All right, darling, if you're sure."
She put her hand on top of mine, holding it to her breast, and unbuttoned the top of her gown. Then she pulled her gown to one side and put my hand on her naked breast. "I'm sure, dearest Camille," she breathed, her lips searching for mine.
We kissed again, our lips wide open and our tongues entwining. Her hand touched my breast hesitantly, then cupped it and felt it eagerly. I pushed the covers down with my feet, putting an arm around her waist and sliding my hand down to her buttocks, and I pulled her toward me, pressing her thighs against mine. She whimpered, clutching one of my thighs between hers and undulating against me, mouthing and sucking my tongue. I fondled her breast and felt her buttocks, savoring the sensation of her firm, young body against mine, and the hungry desire for her swelled within me.
"Do you really want me, then, Camille? Really?"
"Yes, darling, yes. I really want you."
"Am I beautiful? As beautiful as Judy Frodsham?"
"Even more beautiful-you are the most beautiful woman I've known." I tugged at her gown, gathering it up to her waist. "And I want to see you. Take off your gown, darling."
"You, too," she whispered, turning onto her back and wriggling her hips as she pulled her gown up.
She sat up, taking it off over her head, and I pulled my gown up and sat up, taking it off. I shook my hair out of my face and looked at her, my eyes moving over her slender limbs in the dim light of the room. She sat on the bed, naked, leaning on one arm and looking at me. Her breasts were small but so firm they stood straight out from her slender chest, with long, large nipples. Her waist was tiny and her thighs were slim and graceful. I put my hand on her thigh, moving it along it until my fingers were touching the crisp hair. She shivered, leaning against me and feeling one of my breasts as her other hand crept hesitantly between my thighs to my pussy. I cupped her small vulva in my hand, fondling it, and I put my arm around her shoulders and pressed my lips to hers again.
Our breasts pressed together with a burning sensation, and an overpowering surge of desire swept over me. I pushed her back, lowering her to the bed, and I leaned over her, sucking at one of her breasts and feeling her pussy. Her hand stroked back and forth on my pussy, one of her fingers parting my vulva and feeling for my clitoris. I moved my lips down her body, kissing her stomach, and she whimpered and writhed on the bed, rolling from side to side and clutching at me. Pushing her hands away, I lifted her thighs and parted them, then opened my mouth wide and lowered my head, covering her vulva with my lips.
She stiffened and arched up from the bed as I sucked and tongued her pussy, and the warm taste of her young body filled my mouth and generated a sensation of intense gratification in me. I cupped her buttocks and lifted her, probing at her vulva with my tongue. The tiny nub of her clitoris began lifting from her vulva, and I touched it with the tip of my tongue, coaxing it from its nest. She whimpered, undulating and pressing her pussy at my mouth, and I began flicking my tongue back and forth over her clitoris. A tremor seized her, making her entire body quiver in rippling waves, then her hips began undulating rapidly. I squeezed her buttocks harder, moving my tongue more rapidly, and she immediately exploded into an orgasm.
It was a shattering climax, wracking her body with convulsive spasms, then it diminished. I kept lapping her pussy with long strokes of my tongue until the sensations became too much for her and she began whimpering and pulling away from me, then I pulled away from her and knelt by her on the bed, looking down at her. Her hair was scattered on the pillow, and her breasts were heaving with her labored breathing. Her lips were still damp with our kisses, and there were traces of moisture on her cheeks from tears of joyous sensation. She was very lovely. I caressed her breasts with one hand and moved my other hand over her stomach, thighs, and Venus mound, feeling her.
"That was wonderful, Camille. It was the most beautiful thing ... it was wonderful. And the most wonderful part of it was that you did it for me. You wanted to make me feel good, and you did it for me. That makes me so happy, darling."
"And it makes me happy that you enjoyed it, darling."
"May I do it to you now?"
"I would like to do it another way this time...."
"Anything, Camille-anything, darling...."
I put my hands on her pelvic bones and lifted one leg over her, then I lowered myself onto her. My pussy rested on her Venus mound, and I lowered my weight onto her. It was an exquisite sensation, and the sight of the young, beautiful woman lying on the bed in front of me made it much more acute. My hips began involuntarily undulating, pressing my pussy harder against her and moving it, and the sensation became more intense. She began moving her hips from side to side, and it became ecstatic. My hips began moving more rapidly.
"...good, Camille? Is it good, darling...? "
"...beautiful, beautiful, wonderful...."
"...wonderful to watch you do that, Camille. You're so beautiful, doing that. May I feel your breasts? May I hold your breasts while you're doing that?"
"...take them ... squeeze ... take them ... squeeze hard...."
Her hands groped for my breasts as they bobbed from the violence of my movements. I leaned forward over her, putting my hands on her breasts and squeezing them, and her hands closed on my breasts. She arched up from the bed, pressing herself against me harder, and my hips moved back and forth and twisted from side to side in a flurry of movement as the rosy, numbing cloud of an approaching climax enveloped me. My breath caught in my throat and I threw my head back, groaning with the fiery sensations which were bringing every nerve to life within my body. She whimpered and groaned, driving her body up at mine and begging me in whispers to come, and I felt the orgasm moving closer and closer. Then it was imminent, and my body moved in driving spasms as I eagerly grasped for it. I burst into a wild, triumphant climax, throwing myself forward on top of her and seizing her, lurching against her, and her muffled cry of joy blended with my gasps of ecstasy as the orgasm gripped me.
I collapsed limply on the bed, struggling to catch my breath, and she turned me onto my side, straightened my limbs, and pulled the covers up as she lay down by me and put her arms around me. The feel of her body against mine was soothing, and the murmurs and caresses were comforting. My breathing slowly returned to normal and my heart stopped its mad pounding, and I sighed with satisfaction as I put my arms around her and rested my head on the pillow by hers, looking into her eyes.
"Am I a good lover?"
"You are a wonderful lover, Jocelyn."
"Will you let me do things to you the next time?"
"If you wish. If you wish to do something or you want me to do something, simply tell me, darling."
She smiled and wriggled with satisfaction, touching her lips to mine. "When will the etching for Judy Frodsham be ready?"
"A couple of days-why?"
"When it's ready, may I take the prints to her."
"Why, Jocelyn?"
"So you won't be kissing her and holding her like this. I'm jealous."
"We must trust each other if we are to be lovers, darling."
"All right. May I take the etching to her so you can show me that you trust me?"
I laughed, sliding my hand down her back and cupping her buttocks, moving her closer. She put one of her thighs between mine, pressing it against my pussy, and I put one of mine between hers. Our nipples touched each other. "I do trust you, darling, and you would be doing that because you don't trust me."
"Well, promise me that you won't kiss her or anything, and I will trust you."
"To make a lover promise shows a lack of trust."
"Or a lot of jealousy. Please promise, Camille."
"Very well-I promise."
She murmured with satisfaction, her hands moving over my back and her lips touching mine in light, dry kisses. "Thank you, darling. And you were telling me the truth when you said that I'm more beautiful than she is?"
"Yes, it was true. You are much more beautiful, Jocelyn."
"I should hope so. She has a big butt. And mine is just a nice double handful for you, right?" I smiled and nodded.
"Will we sleep and then wake up and make love again?"
"If you wish. If you wish to make love and I am sleeping, wake me and we'll make love."
"Oh, you don't know what it does to me to hear you say that, Camille," she sighed. She pushed herself closer to me, pressing her breasts against mine and lacing her legs more firmly through mine. "Goodnight, Camille."
