Richard Mason - History of a Pleasure Seeker

“Cheer up, chum.” Didier had risen at dawn to enjoy his final bath and pack his trunk. “You’ve got my hot water to yourself now. I was just saying good-bye.”

“Good-bye?”

“Blok caught me last night getting our cake. I have to be out of the house before they get back from their prayers.”

Piet sat up. “Again … slower.”

Didier repeated himself. When Piet understood what had happened, he subsided onto his pillows and told Didier to stop packing. “Mrs. Vermeulen-Sickerts trusts me. I’ll make sure of everything.”

“Cocky, aren’t you?”

“It’s only cake. She’ll see that.”

“She can’t countermand her own butler. That’s not how these things work.”

Piet got out of bed and pulled his trousers on. “I’ll see to it. There’s no need to pack.”

“I don’t much fancy being here when you’re gone, as it happens. Blok’s only prey. Get me a reference if you’ve got so much influence.”

“That’s easily done.” But Piet’s conscience was troubled. He did not think Didier should pay the penalty for the purloined apple cake alone. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay?”

“Not if you’re not.”

“All right, then.” He stepped by him, went to the desk, and opened the steel box he kept in it. He had a small bundle of notes left and counted out ten of them. “I always earned more than you, though I hardly deserved to. Take your share and have the winnings from last night, too.”

“I couldn’t.”

“Of course you could.”

“I won’t.”

Piet made as if to put the money back, but at the last moment he grabbed Didier’s arms and pinned them behind him. He put the notes forcibly into his trouser pocket. “And now you have. I feel sure we will meet again. God bless, and good speed.”

Piet slept for four hours, and as he drifted towards consciousness Jacobina appeared to him, aloof but available. He woke with the idea that he should not delay and got out of bed. As he washed and dressed he almost brought himself to believe that Maarten owed him the freedom to pleasure his wife.

He had saved his son, after all.

The house was Sunday-quiet. He went to Jacobina’s private sitting room and found her in her reading chair, beside the window that looked onto the canal. On her lap was an open book that had rested there for half an hour.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Barol,” she said coolly.

“Good afternoon, mevrouw.”

“You missed church.”

“I was unwell. I said my devotions in private.”

“I trust you are better now?”

“I am, thank you. I have come about Didier Loubat.”

Jacobina’s face tightened. “There can be no leniency for thieves. I would never have thought it of him.”

“I asked him to get the cake. I did not know it was forbidden.”

“You woke him at three in the morning to send him on an errand?”

“No, mevrouw. We were out together.”

Jacobina’s older brothers had been merry carousers, and she had often heard them defend themselves to her parents. She approved of boys sticking up for one another. “Why did he not come to me to explain?”

“He did not wish to place you in the awkward position of going against Mr. Blok.”

“I see.”

“He is an upstanding fellow. I come to ask you to give him the reference he deserves.”

Jacobina did not intend to gratify Piet’s request too readily. “I will consult my husband. The last word on the matter is his.”

“Thank you, mevrouw.”

“Is there anything else?”

“I should like to give my notice.”

“May I ask why?”

“Now that Master Egbert is well, he should go to school. He will have no need of a tutor after Christmas.”

“On the contrary, Mr. Barol. He may need your assistance to make up lost ground.”

“He is far ahead of his peers in anything I can teach him.”

“What if he relapses?”

“He will not. Be firm with him if he stumbles.”

Jacobina was not in the habit of begging servants to stay on, and she did not intend to do so now. Nevertheless, she had imagined having the time to subdue her conscience and enjoy Piet again. The knowledge that this was not so made her petulant. “Have you not been happy with us, Mr. Barol?”

“It has been an honor to be of service to your family.” Piet paused. “And especially to you. I have never had such rewarding employment.”

“You have done fine work.”

“Perhaps I might be useful in some small way before I leave?”

Jacobina rang the bell. “Tomorrow afternoon at three o’clock.” She spoke without emotion. “I have some letters you might address.”

“With pleasure.”

And when Piet had bowed and left her, Jacobina ordered hot chocolate from Hilde and found fault with the china she had selected, and the composition of the tray, and told her that if she did not improve she would have to get rid of her.

Then she sat down and wrote Didier Loubat an excellent reference.

Almost twenty-four hours separated this brief conversation from the time Jacobina had named. Piet passed them in a state of trying anticipation. There was no Didier to hurry the minutes along with, and weeks without touching a woman made the wait unendurable. His suspense was heightened the next morning when Maarten proposed a visit to Willemshoven to show Egbert the place for the first time. The boy accepted excitedly; so did Constance; but Jacobina said she had too much to do to go frolicking about the countryside. She was wearing her apple-green dress and looked at her plate when Piet excused himself too, on the grounds that it should be a family outing. Louisa also refused, because she was angry with her father and wished to make this plain to him.

“We shall spend the night in an inn in the village and return tomorrow,” said Maarten merrily.

“Don’t hesitate to spend two if you’re enjoying yourselves.” Jacobina had spent much of the previous day, and all this morning, adjudicating a fierce debate between her conscience and her inclination. She had decided at last on a rendezvous with Piet Barol; now the question remained what its business might be.

The party left after lunch. As she waved them off she reached a compromise she found acceptable and climbed the stairs to her aunt’s bedroom, feeling fearful but alive. She would see Piet naked, but this would be their last encounter. She would never repeat such wickedness with him or anyone else.

He knocked ten minutes later and had had the good taste to change into the suit of English wool he had worn to their first interview. He was wearing nothing that had once been her husband’s.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Barol.”

“Good afternoon, Mevrouw Vermeulen-Sickerts.”

At the foot of the bed was a round carpet, which had been the setting for certain fantastical scenes Jacobina now intended to act out. “Please stand in the center of the circle and remove your jacket,” she said.

Piet did as he was told.

“And your waistcoat.”

He complied again.

“Your tie, if you please.” She spoke in exactly the tone she had used to Hilde that morning, when instructing her on the correct way to lay out her clothes. “Your shirt.”

Now Piet understood her intentions. He had long wished to show her his body, but his hands as they undid his buttons were shaking.

“You may drop it at your feet.”

He did so.

“Now your shoes and socks.”

He bent down before her and removed them.

“Your trousers,” said Jacobina.

Piet took his trousers off. In the cheval glass on the wardrobe door he could see his reflection: his pale, muscular body; the patch of dark hair on his chest; the trail of it that led over his stomach and thickened at the waistband of his drawers, which were unequal to restraining their contents. He was proud of his cock, which had aroused admiring attention before. And the clipped, disinterested voice in which Jacobina said, “You may remove your undershorts,” satisfied the last demands of ego.