Pandora's Hideaway

Chapter Two-2

“It was fine, darling. I think I’ll sleep now.”

“Not here!”

“Of course not here,” she answered, rising from the cot. “Let’s just go to bed. I’m sure all that pink lace and ruffles won’t bother me now.”

***

“And don’t you look fine and fit this morning?” Jack passed Mariel in the hallway, as she returned to her room from the bath.

“Yes, I’m just fine.”

“I’d think you’d still be sleeping, what with your marauding all night long.”

“What?” she blushed, even though he could have no basis for the claim he made.

“You think I didn’t hear your shenanigans in the attic with Albert?” he smiled deviously.

“How could you?”

“This is my home, too, Miss Mariel, and sometimes I walk the corridors when I can’t sleep at night. Her stared around at the hallway walls, musing. “Perhaps it is the house that inspires sleeplessness.”

Mariel blushed understanding that the brother may well have witnessed at least the sounds if not the sight of her bound in the attic. “I really need to get dressed,” she tried brushing past him.

“Certainly. Maybe sometime I’ll show you what Albert didn’t.”

Her back was to him, and for an instant, she hesitated. Then, without turning around, she hurriedly returned to her room and closed the door firmly behind her.

***

“Ah, I didn’t scare you away,” Albert whispered in her ear at the breakfast table.

“Of course, not,” she whispered back. They were alone, but hardly out of earshot of the rest of the household who were still in the process of getting to the dining table for the morning meal. Meanwhile, Jenny, their maid, was serving platters of bacon, eggs and toast, and pouring steaming mugs of fresh roasted coffee. “But I think Jack might have heard us,” she added.

“How do you now that?” he looked surprised.

“He told me. Told me he couldn’t sleep and was roaming the halls.”

“Ah, that’s like him. I’m sorry, Mariel.”

“Actually, I don’t think it bothered him at all.”

Albert was going to ask why, except that Henry and Jonquil Reynolds had moved into the room and were taking their seats.

“Great morning,” Henry announced, his large, florid face was as robust as usual. Mariel couldn’t figure out how either of his boys came to be so handsome, though she imagined that the pudgy Jonquil was quite the sexy charmer in her day. “Thought we’d do some fishing, Albert. We have some business matters to discuss as well.”

“I planned to spend the day with Mariel,” the son respectfully answered. “After all, she came all this way.”

“Ach, let her fend for herself for a few hours,” Henry cut him off, “Jonquil would be more than happy to give her a tour of our homestead. You’ll do fine, won’t you, Miss Fitzgerald?”

“Of course, Sir. Though I wish you wouldn’t call me Miss Fitzgerald.”

“Habit, girl.” She was a secretary working for the firm of Reynolds Actuarial. “You’ll stay here. I promise to bring your fellow back by lunchtime. Then you’ll have all day.”

“That would be fine.” Why it would be fine, she wasn’t sure. But no one argued with Henry Reynolds.

During the night, a light dusting of snow had covered the ground, though it was melting fast as the sun rose to warm the day. Albert and his father took off for the fishing boat, dressed warmly in winter coats and mufflers.

Mariel was glad to stay inside. She even submitted to the tour Henry promised her. Her future mother-in-law happily led her through every room and secret passageway of the old house—save the attic. But she hardly needed a tour of the attic; she would have likely blushed her way into some foolish confession if they had taken the steps to the third floor.

The pair did explore the cellar. Jonquil had lots of old stories about bootlegged whiskey in the 20s, and the time that one of the children had run the house as a brothel. “It was just for a night—but the scallywag got his due. His daddy collared him and trashed him soundly in the woodshed.”

“There’s a woodshed?”

“Yes, just outside the back door. Used for all the right reasons, Henry’s grandfather used to say. And he meant it. To this day, I believe there’s an old razor strop hanging by the door.” She chuckled.

They had just made the trek back up the stairs and were in the kitchen, peeking out the back window on what had once been an outhouse and nearby the infamous woodshed.

“I wonder who was the last to get a taste of that,” Mariel said.

“That’s easy to say. Jack got his bottom blistered by Henry when he was eighteen and came home drunk. Jack refuses to believe it was true, but I know better. I heard the wailing, and commotion, and the smack of that leather strop. But you know Jack. Irrepressible as he is, things like that just slide right off of him.”

The tour ended where it began, in the dining room, where Jonquil loaded Mariel down with more accounts of the family history. She was about to launch into a tale regarding Henry’s sister and a sailor when the phone rang and she excused herself. While she waited, Mariel roamed the room, running her hands along the delicate rim of the china teacups on the sideboard, letting her thoughts once again turn back the years.

“So, has mother told you all the sordid tales of Reynolds’ bygone days?”

Mariel turned to see Jack smiling by the kitchen door, tossing a biscuit in the air for sport. “Yes. I found her stories quite intriguing for the most part. Especially the one about your trip to the woodshed at eighteen.” It was her turn to snicker.

“Ah, they love to tell that one. I assure you it was hardly the event that it’s been made out to be.”

“I understand that your father burnished your backside until it was blistered red.”

“He tells it that way, and I let him think that. I’m not about to counter his lagging memory. If you want the really good stories, though, you’ll want to see the other letters.”

“Other letters?”

“Albert treasures the one from Colette with the photographs. What he doesn’t know about is the box full of randy missals to my great grandfather from his mistresses.”

“I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about?” She didn’t want to admit anything or sound too eager.

“You might find the letters interesting, especially if you have an interest in kinky s*x. They will prove one thing for sure—there’s nothing new under the sun.”

Her head, her heart and crotch were curious. Her brain thumped hotly for the information, as if an obsession had taken charge of all her faculties. But never would she divulge that fact to Jack Reynolds. Remaining cool and detached, she turned down his offer, “I think things like that are best left tucked away. They are like a diary of personal thoughts, meant to remain private.”

“My, how high-minded you are? But I ask you, if such confession and revelations were meant to remain private through posterity, then why commit them to paper and tuck them away in steamer trunks for future generations to discover? I think behind the act of writing down such smut is the subconscious desire for it to be found, read, and made public.”

“Yes. I imagine you’d think that way.”

“Glad I’m not disappointing you.”

“I’m sure you never will, Jack Reynolds. You were quite right, yesterday. I did make a snap judgment about your character when we met—just as you did about mine. So far, you haven’t proven me wrong.”

“Nor have you.”

“Very well then.” Even to herself, Mariel sounded like some old bitty. Was there any way to retreat from this perpetual snit?

Thankfully, Jack saved her. “You know, we don’t have to be so cross with each other,” he speculated, in what seemed to be a conciliatory tone. “What point is there in that?”

She thought a moment, fingered the doily at the back of Jonquil Reynolds’ dining room chair. “I guess no point at all,” she finally conceded.

“Then truce?”

“Yes. Truce.” She could have kicked herself for not thinking of it herself.

Mariel was flushed, warm, the back of her neck tingling, her mouth parched in need of a kiss, her palms sweating. Hating this physical response, she then, awkwardly excused herself and took the stairs to her room—hoping, wishing that Albert would return soon. She felt so much safer with him nearby.

After refreshing herself, Mariel changed into jeans and tennis shoes—quickly taking the back stairs to the outside door. A brisk walk around the Reynolds’ property refreshed her spirit. She imagined the house in the middle of summer with the trees fully leafed out, the lawn green, and flowers blooming in the great beds that surrounded the Victorian masterpiece. Despite its beauty, however, the house made her feel close and careful, speculative and wary as if something terrible would suddenly mar the success of this trip. It seemed a tenuous excursion from working in the company secretarial pool, to become an honored guest and fiancé of the Reynolds’ heir. The one small smudge upon her past lay secret, dormant, so completely forgotten most every hour of the day for years. But now, with such talk of mistresses and hidden lovers, and private missals not meant for the public eye, the specter of her tiny secret seem to rise all around her, greeting her at every turn with a twisted smile.

The walk did her well, but she was chilled by the time she returned to the house. She snuck up the back staircase not wanting to be found and slipped into her bedroom as if she’d never left. But then, of course, she had left, and someone knew that she was missing. Lying on her bed was a note attached to an old letter—much like the one Albert read to her the night before. “It’s the randiest of them all… and does beg to be read, even if it was meant to be kept secret. God won’t strike you down, I promise. Jack.”

The writing was faint and delicate on the envelope and inside on the three sheets of thin parchment that were just this side of dust. A naughty desire to peek inside this woman’s world set all her high-minded virtue aside. With crotch hot and beating urgently, she opened the letter and began to read.

My love,

Oh! How I miss you! I am now and always will be yours. And though I know that the service in Ellery House is your desire for me, I cannot completely comprehend why you have me here, and so far away from you. I am, however, following your orders as your dutiful servant.

In this effort, you have prepared me well for my position here. I am, as you suggested I would be, tested each day. Mistress is teaching me fortitude, how to hold my tongue and practice submission. Every day this seems easier. I must admit, I was about to explode those first few days inside this fine house—so many commands, so much contradiction. It was impossible to please my caretakers. However, now I find my position reasonably pleasant, though a great deal is demanded of me. I do my regularly assigned chores in the morning, and then prepare myself to pleasure Master and Mistress in the afternoon and evening. I wear the clothes of a common kitchen girl in the morning, and wear just my frilly underclothes as soon as I’m beckoned for my s****l duties. I’m told that it’s only practical to dress lightly for these activities—it would be impossible to crawl the floor in a long skirt. But oh, how I blush having my fanny bared to so many grueling and interested eyes. I am a bit like a piece of meat to be inspected and eventually used. I am well used indeed, have become as you desired, well versed in all the s****l behaviors my body was designed to perform. Though you primed me well for such things, I’ve had to go deeper into my submission to take the physical use required of me. I’ve never seen the likes of such equipment these men carry on their person!

Mistress is encouraging, often whispering in my ear at the most distressed times words of support and comfort. I am not allowed to back off of any task, no matter how demanding. I’m told that this is only fair—and certainly good training. In time, my body relents to the great intrusions forced on me, and I regularly find some satisfaction and even pleasure for myself. I have learned, too, how strict the discipline can be for faltering. Unlike your implements, the ones laid on me here are not sensuous additions to making love, but ones that cut deep and leave wounds that last days—I’m sitting on some now. Oh, but please don’t worry that I am failing you. I’m told daily, even after punishment, how well my training is going, how first class I am as an indentured slave.