The Dominafuhrer - THE GODMOTHER

Episode 28 - Meeting Michael

Miss Spiteful was not in her bedroom when we looked in so, after quickly changing my shoes, I left Kelly to finish packing her suitcase while I searched downstairs. I found Spalding in his pantry, wrinkling his nose as he sorted through a basket of dirty washing. Above his head, a little bell was ringing over the number 1 on a checkerboard panel of bells and numbers. He reached up and flicked the bell to silence it before answering my question.

“Yes, I have seen your Mistress but I don’t think that she wishes to be disturbed at this moment. Right after the two gentlemen went for their walk; she grabbed Sir Geoffrey by his ear and marched him down from his bedroom to his study. They have been in there ever since.”

The number 1 bell rang again only to be silenced once more by Spalding’s fingers.

“That’s strange”, he said, lifting a pair of yellow stained, red, white and blue striped pyjamas from the basket. “I would have expected to see more muck on Lord Mayberry’s jacket if he had been sick himself, but it all seems to be down the front of the trousers.”

Yet again the same bell rang and, having cancelled it, Spalding shook his head sadly.

“I shall have to get Eric to check out the bell in Sir Geoffrey’s bedroom. Poor Ashley could be up there alone and in need of assistance without being able to let us know down here. Anyway, I thought that you young ladies would be off to Thursford by now.”

“Oh, we got held up on our walk”, I replied. “I’ve come to get the keys of my car and then help my friend down with her suitcase.”

“No need for that, my lady. Sit down and we’ll have a coffee. Edwin!”

At Spalding’s roar, a blue eyed young man in a yellow and black striped waistcoat popped his head and shoulders round the door. “Yes Granddad?” he enquired.    

“Is Mister Harman’s order ready yet?” Edwin stepped into the room and presented the tray of coffee, rolls, cheese and cold meats that he was carrying for inspection.

“Very good”, Spalding conceded. “Now while you’re up there, Miss Downham’s case is to come down from the Rochester room to the Volkswagen. No hurry, as I believe that she’s changing her stockings at the moment.”

Edwin vanished immediately and we heard the sound of feet pounding on wooden stairs.

Spalding grinned; cancelled Ashley’s bell yet again and poured a cup of coffee each for us. As a reward, I opened my coat, hitched my tight skirt above my knees and crossed my legs to let the old lecher have an eyeful of my stockinged thighs while the number 1 bell continued to ring unanswered. 

Kelly stared silently out of the front window for most of the car journey, nodding occasionally at my attempts to discuss the morning’s events and I doubt if she even noticed when I stopped at a garage to fill up with petrol and stock up with cigarettes.

I followed Spalding’s directions and we eventually found ourselves on a narrow country road, looking for the Michael’s house. A notice on a high barred gate caught my as we passed; I braked and reversed so that we could read it. “Oh, very welcoming”, I muttered.

        

Through the padlocked gate, and up a lane, we could see a picturesque, two storied, thatch roofed cottage with what appeared to be a large greenhouse at the far end. Smoke drifted up from one of the chimneys towards the grey, rain laden sky. The visitor’s car park proved to be a graveled patch where the road widened and we struggled back to the gate with Kelly’s heavy suitcase. To our surprise, there was an unlocked wicket gate at the side of the secured one but we still had another fifty yards of muddy driveway to negotiate before Kelly could rap on the door.

One of the Miss Spitefulisms that I have stolen is that taking an instant dislike to people saves time later and Michael seemed to fit the bill immediately. Yes, he had Kelly’s long, oval face and big round eyes, but he also had a long thin nose, a straggling attempt at a beard and an untidy mess of black hair. What on Kelly was an attractive wide lower lip; looked weak and fleshy on Michael. There was no welcome or pleasure in his eyes when he saw Kelly and surprise and resentment as he saw me behind her. He was dressed in a grubby brown, roll neck sweater and well worn and baggy, light brown corduroy trousers. 

“You’d better come in”, he mumbled as he stood to one side to let Kelly stagger through with her suitcase. “I understood that this was to be only for one night”, his voice was loaded with suspicion when he saw the size of her portmanteau.

“I only have the one case and I had to bring everything with me”, she murmured apologetically. “This is my friend Ingrid, who drove me down in her car.” A wet clammy hand with long sensitive fingers finally came up to touch my extended palm and I looked around the interior in the awkward silence that followed. I confirmed the impression I had got from the outside. The building was probably two hundred years old but it had been tastefully and, from the look of it, expensively restored in the last few years. A polished wooden staircase led upstairs from the small entrance hall and, through the open door to my left, I could see a modern and well equipped kitchen diner.

“In here”, Michael grunted and opened the door to the right. In here was a lounge with big comfortable armchairs and a settee, a round polished oak table, thick carpets and a blazing fire in a big open hearth. The warmth, after the winter damp and cold outside was immediate. While Kelly put her case down on the carpet, I inched towards an open door in the far wall. I peered through and found that what I had taken for a greenhouse was a wood framed and glass paneled studio, built as an extension to the house. Paintings were stacked against the walls and there were several on easels, or lying on a couple of long wooden tables. I heard a sharp intake of breath behind me and stepped inside before Michael could intercept me. The paintings, in watercolor and in oils, were beautiful seascapes and landscapes, some of them featuring birds in flight or at rest. My eye was taken by one that was almost finished of a flight of waterfowl, I could not tell which, at sunset over an estuary with silhouetted boats, marshy banks and a familiar feature in the background.

“Oh, that’s the headland at Southcote!” I exclaimed. “We were there this morning. This is schön!”

“It’s not for sale and this is private in here!” Michael snapped, stepping between me and the painting. I felt my temper start to rise but I looked over my shoulder into the lounge and saw Kelly’s pleading face.

“I’d better be going”, I said as pleasantly as possible and turned on my heel. “I’ll pick you up at the same time tomorrow”, I touched Kelly’s hand as I passed but her face was pallid and she seemed near to tears.

“Goodbye Michael”, I called out as he slammed the door of the studio shut but he didn’t reply or offer to show me out.

Outside in the drive, I peeped back in through the lounge window and saw them as I had left them; still standing silently on either side of Kelly’s suitcase. Kelly still hadn’t taken her raincoat off and I debated whether I should go back in and drag her away but remembered my own views on not being able to escape one’s fate. Kelly had tossed her coin and chosen to follow the direction in which it had pointed. I turned and walked back to my car wondering how on earth Kelly could ever have fallen in love with a nasty shit like Michael.

End Of Part Three

To continue this story, click Rocking Around The Library




Back to the top