I pictured to myself that it would be there Lord Alfred would lie; that his cold soft hand would make itself at home in that shrine, and prove but the precursor of the whole man himself, whom I should envelop with my being-then suddenly the thought struck me that I should have to lie not so-on my back-but on my face, and this disappointed me extremely.
I was still under the influence of the discontent this reflection had set up in my mind when Lord Alfred entered in his rich dressing robe.
"Julia," he presently said softly, his eyes sparkling and his voice resonant with a tone of deep complacency, "you shall not escape so easily now. Look here!" said the wicked man with deliciously cynical shamelessness and a recklessness which I enjoyed because it took my breath away. I looked and saw at the top of his legs-which, by-the-bye, I observed were plumper, rounder, and whiter than my own-and at the bottom of his exquisitely undulating abdomen an engine, fierce and formidable, exactly shaped as what I had in front of me but much larger. He wagged it with glee, menacing me with it so that I tingled from head to foot and hid my face in the bedclothes.
"Oh, no! No!" I cried.
"Yes," he rejoined with electrifying determination, "this is the great High Priest of Love who will take no refusal but insist upon entrance. He will unite you and myself."
"Oh, Alfred!" I cried.
"Come, my darling. You have instinctively assumed quite the proper attitude."
To my astonishment I was lying upon my face.
"Come, surrender to the tyrant!"
"Get into bed, Alfred!"
"No, Julia, you must submit naked this time."
Must submit naked! I did not feel at all inclined to abandon the pleasant warmth of my couch. I should have very much preferred his getting into it.
"Why, Alfred!" I said. "It has got no hair about it like mine, and-and-why have you those ribbons about your waist?"
"Oh! You see, Julia, Lady Alfred makes me work so hard, as you know from Mademoiselle, who has told you what she is, that the poor fellow has to be supported. These are patent American suspensory bandages. I am obliged to wear them; and the reason that he has no hair about him is that it has been all shaved off."
"Shaved off?"
"Yes," he rejoined quite coolly, repeating reflectively and sadly a minute or so later the same words, "shaved off."
"Why-how-because-because-you like shaving?" I enquired, perforce smiling at his lugubrious air.
"Oh, no!" he returned, with a laugh. "But just before I came here, Lady Alfred had reason to be displeased with me-I was really very tired at the time-and she shaved it all off."
I felt completely puzzled.
"May I feel him?" I asked, moving across the bed and putting on my hand.
He let me do so. My manipulation of the engine did not seem to affect him or it in the least. I looked up into his face. He then began to affect throbs of passion. My observation was quite acute enough to convey to my mind that it was acting or affectation on his part.
"I really don't know what it is," I observed, discomfited and dissatisfied.
He did not appear to me altogether comfortable.
"Lie across the bed and I will show you," he reiterated.
The situation had made me feel naughty, and I was disposed to acquiesce; but I remembered, when he turned up my night robe, he would be sure to see the wales of Beatrice's whip. How could I account for them? They might suggest certain things to him and he might, besides, mention them to Mademoiselle and then there would be a row and more wales, undoubtedly.
However, I knew he would have his own way in the end, and that, then seeking a reason for my obduracy, he would be led to attach undue weight at the marks which he would be sure to regard as the motive. Delay, it appeared, would be a mistake, so I exclaimed.
"Oh, Alfred!" and hid my face.
"What a coy girl it is!" he cried, amused and delighted.
Pushing away the bedclothes, he uncovered me, and drew my right leg across the mattress away from its sister leg.
Then he got between them both and embraced me. Removing a hand and arm, he inserted the implement and I noticed he kept his hand upon it.
My throes were very violent as he fell upon me, and before I went off in front, where his other hand had got to, he made the thing inject a quantity of warm fluid.
Then I got up. "Get into bed, Alfred," I directed, my suspicions fully aroused. "I shall tear that thing off when I return."
I hurried on a dressing gown and departed, knowing from experience the inconvenience I should suffer.
On my return I got into bed.
"Now," I said, "I shall play the part of a masterful wife! You shall be underneath, my boy!"
In the struggle the thing slipped; there was between it and him a total disconnection.
"Alfred," I exclaimed, "you are an impostor! I shall make you feel and receive the expression of what I feel."
