‘Your guest left a small present for you, my dear.’ This was Mistress Pickles speaking when later we met, I having been summonsed to her sitting room. Jenkins stood as silent as the grave in her habitual corner of the room. I was dressed and hair pinned and presentable. She handed me an envelope which I opened to find a sum of money the like of which I had never seen before.

‘You have clearly made an impression, Madeleine. You will give the money to me and I will ensure that it is placed safely for your future. None of the ladies of this house can work forever and a nest egg is essential for later life. Do not expect all your guests to be so generous. Last night was a special event for you and for her. You are a good girl and her comments to me this morning were most favourable. You may take a day to visit your mother.’ She handed me a few coins. ‘Take these from your gift to help her. I expect you back by nine this evening. Do not be late. I do not like my ladies abroad in the late evening.’

I assured her I would return in good time and Jenkins followed me out of the room and closed the door. I turned to face her.

‘I pray, Miss Jenkins, have I angered you in some way unwittingly?’

‘Don’t be so foolish, girl,’ was her brusque reply and she strode off. I could not understand it. I had, as I believe I have said, become affectionate towards her and did not wish in any way to arouse her ire. To arouse her, yes, but to anger her?

I returned the following evening having found my mother in good health and her spirits lifted by seeing me so well attired and by her own well-being after her years of poverty and poor health. I went to my room and changed out of my day clothes and into a gown which the ladies of the house habitually wore when not entertaining in order to maintain their best clothes in good order. I then went along to the salon where, on evenings when there were no guests, the ladies would meet, converse, play a hand or two of whist or sometimes even charades. The other ladies are friendly and involve me in their games and conversations but this evening I wanted to sit quietly amid the hubbub and read, for Miss Jenkins’ attitude toward me was troubling me greatly.

I read quietly but my attention was not entirely focused thereon. Of a sudden I felt the weight of another upon the sofa and looked up from my book to find Maria had joined me. I have, I think mentioned Maria before. She is the lady of the house who on the night of my first guest had been dressed as a man and had performed with Bella and Grace. She was indeed a little masculine in appearance but in a gown of white cotton she looked very beautiful. Her hair is dark brown, her skin a little sallow and her eyes shaped like almonds. One might think her to have mixed blood. Mixed blood or not, she was very striking, and exceeding tall. Even seated as we were my nose was level with her sharp chin.

‘What are you reading?’

I raised the book, ‘it is the Book of Common Prayer.’

She smiled, ‘I doubt prayers escape these walls,’ she said. I told her that I had greatly admired her performance.

‘My guests tend to a liking for the manly woman.’ She opened her gown and her two tiny breasts were revealed to me and I admired them, thinking too how free we were with our bodies in this house. ‘You see I lack your proportions even though yours are by no means large like Bella’s. My guests like the shaft and I have grown adept at being a man for them. Did you enjoy your first evening?’ I admitted I had. ‘The rumour amongst the ladies is that you were a maidenhood gift to your Lady, is that so?’ Again, I agreed that this was so.

‘Did it hurt a great deal, dear?’

‘I felt a sharp pain but it was transient and I recovered in short time, thank you.’

‘You are fortunate. The first time can be harrowing, I know mine was. I suspect you have done well, for the Mistress was in good spirits.’

‘Miss Jenkins did not seem so gratified.’

‘Ignore her!’ Here Maria leant close to me, her arm sliding along the back of the sofa behind me, ‘she covets you I imagine.’ You may well understand, dear reader, that a soft word from a beautiful woman to one in some minor distress as I was can be a great comfort. I found myself leaning into her embrace and a small tear slid from my eye. She held me to her making comforting noises and stroking me.

‘Does it not get cold at night?’ I looked up into her almond eyes and agreed that indeed it did. ‘We could share our warmth, might that not be pleasant?’ I said nothing but she smiled. ‘I shall come to you later and we will warm each other.’

I retired early and extinguished my candle. I lay in my narrow bed and thought of the pleasure of sharing it with Maria, enjoying her warmth and presence. The door opened and closed softly behind her and I caught but a fleeting glimpse of her white nightgown. Then in the darkness I felt her slip into the bed and I made room for her. It was snug but she was indeed warm and we lay face-to-face and our lips met. It was the tenderest of kisses and her hands roamed over my arms as our lips and tongues gently introduced themselves. She shifted and between our bodies, below our waists, I felt the hardness of her ladyprick.

‘You are,’ I hesitated, ‘equipped.’ She burst out laughing.

‘Why, of course I am.

Did you not expect so?’ In fact such a thought had never come to my mind. We embraced for a long while, our kisses becoming more intense. Then she turned me so my back was to her and we lay like spoons, her hand on my breast and moving down to lift my nightgown. She slid her ladyprick between my legs so that it almost poked out in front of me and with slow movements rubbed it on me so that I flowered and opened for her and I felt the slick of my juices running onto it. It was a heavenly, safe feeling as she nuzzled my neck and kissed my hair. Maria was slow in all her dealings, gentle and patient and I was responding as I had been taught and, more importantly, as I wished. She removed her nightgown and then my own and guided me to lie face down. Her hands grasped my hips and lifted them, her hand went to my cunny and, satisfied that I was ready for her, entered me with one, steady stroke and eliciting a gasp of pleasure from me then folding herself down over my naked back and nibbling and kissing the base of my neck. Her tiny nipples were hard against me.

The door burst open.

In the light of the chamber stick held by the intruder I could see Jenkins, her face like some Halloween mask as the light from the candle formed shadows of her features. I gasped and made to move but Maria held me still and despite the intrusion continued to rock inside me.

‘What is the meaning of this?’ demanded Jenkins loudly.

‘I should have thought, my dear Miss Jenkins, that the meaning was abundantly clear.’ Maria seemed not remotely put out by Jenkins’ arrival but I was trembling and all feelings of arousal had evaporated. We disengaged and I pulled the bed sheet over me, not for warmth or modesty’s sake but as a vain protection from Jenkins.

Her voice increasingly loud and passionate, Jenkins shouted, ‘Get out. Go back to your own room.’ Maria slowly left my bed and equally slowly donned her nightdress but leaving her shaft poking, obscenely it now seemed to me, from the front of her gown. She walked with nonchalance past Jenkins, stopped and stroked her ladyprick insolently. She was about to leave when to my horror the Mistress arrived, she also carrying a chamber stick.

The Mistress spoke very quietly. ‘Maria, get to your bed. Jenkins and you, Madeleine, come immediately to my bedchamber.’

It was a few moments later that we stood, me now dressed once more and Jenkins in her nightshirt, and both shamefaced awaited the Mistress’s wrath. She was sitting on the chaise in her sitting room and wearing a fine, silk nightgown that somehow accentuated her mature but very fine frame. Her large breasts seemed to float beneath the silk.

When she spoke it was with an unexpected gentleness. ‘I had seen this coming and should have done more to prevent it. Hence I accept some of the responsibility for tonight’s unpleasantness. You have always had a weakness for the new girls, Jenkins. It does not surprise me. You teach them well in the Mysteries, you guide them and enjoy their bodies but, as in this case, you are denied the opportunity to pluck that fruit which you crave. Yet you grow fond of them then have to see that which you so desire taken by another. I cannot find it in myself to admonish you even though you should know better for I share your feelings.

‘You will go now to Maria’s room and apologise.’ She halted Jenkins’ protest with a raised hand. ‘You will go to her and apologise. You may have her, for I will not have tensions in this household. She is a good girl and you are fond of her as am I. Now go and deal with it and let that be an end to this nonsense.’

Never before had I see Jenkins look so sad. She spoke quietly. ‘You are, of course, correct Mistress and I shall apologise to Maria and I do so now to Madeleine with all sincerity.’ She smiled wanly at me and I smiled back at her, astonished by her manner and magnanimity. She left the room and I stood before Mistress Perkins, my hands laced before me.

‘Do not hold ill feelings to Jenkins. She is not all she seems. She is my most trusted servant and companion. Her feelings towards you are perfectly understandable; a teacher forms a bond with her pupil and it is a bond that is hard to relinquish. Nor should you feel guilt at your behaviour with Maria. You live in a Sapphic hothouse, it is what you were trained for and, in your case I think, born for. You have sexual energy that no one woman could satisfy and it will make you, if you follow my instruction, a wealthy woman.’

She smiled and slowly lifted her nightgown up over her legs which she spread wide.

‘Come, Madeleine, pleasure me. I am not angry with you and I wish to have the joy of your face before we retire.’

I knelt before her, placing my hands on her thighs and caressing them as I bent to her cunny and used all my skills to lead her to a rapturous climax. It was a calm eruption. It seemed not to be a firestorm but a slow, gradual wave which I could feel rolling over her. In the final moments she wet me copiously and somehow it warmed me that she had allowed me this.

‘Now, return to your bed and sleep and sleep well. You are a good girl but you have much to learn about yourself and others.’

Thus dismissed but with a lighter heart I returned to my bed and slept.