Maureen Quincy - Forbidden Sex Games

Cunningham hadn't been a particularly religious man. But he couldn't shake off the suspicion that his previous life of immorality had aroused the wrath of a vengeful God. The twin disasters which had been visited on him, he began to see as a divine punishment; and from that moment on, he changed character completely. The hard-drinking, wenching John Cunningham became a churchgoer-a strict disciplinarian with his children, a model of respectability. He gained the reputation-both at business and in his private life-of being an anti-feminist: actively hating or treating with contempt every woman, young or old, who was unlucky enough to cross his path…

He raised his children as if they were living in the middle of the 19th, instead of the 20th, century. Lisa arid Richard were subjected to the kind of restrictions that were out-moded and stunting to their development; and when they complained to their father that none of their school friends had to behave with such decorum, that they were allowed to watch television, play in the park without constant supervision and so on, Cunningham immediately removed them from the private school and such pernicious influences. Since the age of ten and continuing (Cunningham intended) until they were ready for University, Lisa and Richard had been taught at home by a Governess. Kathleen Wynter was her name, a tall and authoritative young girl whose Irish descent had endowed her with a fiery temper and flashing brown eyes. Cunningham treated her curtly, avoiding her presence whenever possible. He had searched in vain to find a male tutor suitable to educate and care for his children; and when this proved impossible, he had decided against employing a matronly woman for the post. A mature, experienced Governess might easily usurp his own authority over Lisa and Richard, he reasoned-whereas Miss Wynter who was just 25 years of age when she first came to live with them, was young enough to be quelled by Cunningham's stronger personality. She was surprisingly competent, too: although this was only her second position, Miss Wynter had formed an instant attachment to the two sensitive and docile children, and her instruction was received by them with attention-enabling them to progress, educationally at least, as quickly as if they had been attending an ordinary school.

So far as Kathleen Wynter was concerned, it was only the strong, protective feelings which she had for Lisa and Richard which kept her in the same employment for so many years. True, Cunningham was a prosperous businessman with a dozen lucrative finance companies under his directorship and he paid her a good salary. But there was an unpleasant atmosphere in the large house whenever he was present… an indefinable but depressing gloom that was communicated to the children as well as to Kathleen herself. It was a modern, five-bedroomed, detached property at Purley, Surrey; a semi-rural district in the “Green Belt” country some 15 miles from London, known as “the stockbroker-commuter area” in the popular press. Although the town was only a short distance from the house, Kathleen felt inexpressibly cut off from the mainstream of life: almost a prisoner in the pleasant, beautifully furnished home which Phyllis-and then Judith-had briefly prepared for Cunningham and the children; attending to the layout of the gardens, the disposition of the rooms and other details before they died so tragically young…

She was, of course, free to take vacations; to enjoy her weekends and holidays as she pleased. But Kathleen, during the long period of her employment, had rarely taken advantage of these opportunities. She hated the thought of leaving Lisa and Richard alone in the house with their father. It was clear to the girl that he was still-nearly 15 years' later-harbouring deep-seated guilt concerning the death of his two wives; and this obsessive neurosis had taken the form of safeguarding his children from the kind of loose morals which he had once indulged in-and which, irrationally, he felt had contributed to the tragedy of their mothers' early demise…

It was now 1961. But despite the gradual easing of restrictions-the opening-up of the era of permissiveness-John Cunningham persisted in treating all matters pertaining to sex with strict intolerance. He refused to permit Kathleen to give Lisa and Richard any form of sex-education, glowering at the Governess with the indignant self-righteousness of a Victorian patriarch.

“Never make that kind of suggestion again!” Cunningham had roared, his dark eyes alive with anger. “I'll decide when my children are to be told the facts of life! And they're certainly not ready to fill their heads with perverted nonsense at the moment!”

“They are thirteen years old", Kathleen remonstrated. “Surely — .”

She had been silenced by Cunningham abruptly turning his back and striding away, slamming the door behind him. But Kathleen was fortunately too spirited to accept her employer's decision on such an important question. Almost immediately, she took the children aside and gave them their first, elementary lessons in human biology: explaining carefully to Lisa and Richard that they should refrain from mentioning the subject to their father…

In other, equally subversive and surreptitious ways, Kathleen opposed Cunningham's intentions regarding the first days of her engagement that he wanted them both to develop into the kind of extrovert, outdoor types who enjoyed “the healthy, outdoor life”; who despised, as he did, those “weak, so-called sensitive layabouts with their poetry, their artistic pretensions and their free-thinking philosophy-which was merely an excuse to indulge in filthy, perverted habits”. His children, Cunningham had vowed, would be protected from such influences as these…

Unfortunately, he had underestimated the passion for giving Lisa and Richard a thorough education which burned in the Governess's breast. Kathleen, in a hundred subtle ways, undermined their father's bias-cleverly developing the gentle side of their natures (which they had inherited from their mothers) and encouraging them to read secretly the volumes of “forbidden matter”-verse, psychology, modern fiction-which she smuggled into the house.

At this period in time, John Cunningham's thriving companies demanded a great deal of his energy and attention. He was obliged to spend a considerable number of hours away from his home, entrusting Lisa and Richard more and more frequently to the sole care of their Governess. Kathleen Wynter had been acting in this capacity now for almost three years-and Cunningham was reasonably satisfied that the girl had continued to carry out his instructions regarding the education of his children to the letter. For her part, the Governess had never given him cause to suspect that Lisa and Richard were developing in diametrically different directions from those Cunningham had intended…

But it wasn't until they had both reached their fourteenth birthday (Lisa a few months earlier than her stepbrother) that Kathleen unwittingly discovered their shocking secret…

The revelation-and the turning point in all their lives-came during one of John Cunningham's weekend business conferences. He had been forced, through pressure of work, to make an overnight stay in London on alternate Saturdays and Sundays, and on one of these occasions Lisa and Richard planned to make a daring extension of their “night games”. For the first time, with a sense of embarking on a great adventure, they decided to explore each other's bodies and play “sexy feelings” (their private phrase for the heavy petting in which they indulged) in broad daylight!

Previously, their forbidden love-making had taken place only in darkness; the intimate moments cloaked under cover of bed-clothes and dim moonlight. It was Lisa who had suggested that it would be “so exciting” to lie naked together on the lounge sofa, with the sun streaming through the windows, their kissing and fondling made especially thrilling by the danger of discovery which was inherent in the situation. Not that there would be any real danger, Lisa hastily reassured her step-brother. Their father, of course, would be miles away: and Miss Wynter would be taking her regular afternoon nap-“forty winks” which invariably lasted for two hours or more. No, they wouldn't really be interrupted; it was just the apparent peril which would give their game its added excitement…