Free Mistress of Darkness by Christopher Nicole Page B

in such apocryphal tones, had a good deal of the Wesleyan in him. He had, in fact, attended meetings at Smithfield and taken his wife and foster child with him. But Gislane had always been more interested in the thousands of people, all earnestly listening to the tall, spare figure on the dais, all nodding their heads while surreptitiously snatching swigs of gin from their flasks, rather than in what the great man had had to say.
    But in this sense, Matthew Hilton was a figure from her past. They would have shared the same warmth, heard the same noises, smelt the same smells. The difference was that Matt's mother would not have lowered her eyes and accepted every dictate of Matt's father. She would have had legal rights. And when Ned Hilton had ridden into town, she would have ridden at his side, not been forced always to wave goodbye from the front verandah.
    It had been to avoid that constant humiliation as much as any physical mistreatment that Papa Nicholson had stolen her away. So then, what did the future hold? She sat up, tempestuously, her black hair flying. She left the bed, stood in front of the mirror. She did not doubt her own beauty. Had she been no judge of it herself, she was yet made aware of it every time she left the house, in the men who would stop to stare at her. Some had come calling, and been turned away. They lacked introductions, and no doubt she was apparently young. How young? Her fingers tore at the fastenings to her gown. Mama Nicholson dressed her as fashionably as their meagre income would permit, and she never went abroad without a corset. This pushed up her breasts and made them seem larger than they were, held them close together to compress a deep valley. Yet here were no girl breasts; they overflowed from her hands. She was a woman, and should she not be, at eighteen? She had looked no different two years ago.
    But what had she known, two years ago? Had she not always lived in a sort of limbo, a pleasant enough existence, with her music and her needlework to occupy her time, and her walks in the park for fresh air. Yet had she been but waiting, as every girl must wait, for the man to come along who would propose marriage, for the change in her existence which would ordain the rest of her life.
    So then, Matthew Hilton. Had she ever considered a man? Not really, save that he should be young, but not too young, and well connected, and handsome, and in good health. Matt filled every one of those requirements, save perhaps the first; he could hardly be more than two years her elder. But he was of planting stock. Did that put him in the same class as a man with a face scarred by smallpox, or with a wooden leg? Because if he was of such a background, he was willing to renounce it, for her. There was actually a cause for fear. He was renouncing wealth and fortune, and a high place in the world, to accomplish what? She touched her cheek, and growing more daring, a nipple, felt the thrill coursing down her body to her groin. She did this, from time to time, titillating her senses, daring herself to do more and always lacking the courage while always promising herselfthat one day she would be bold, at least with herself. Perhaps the day had come. She released the corset and threw it on the bed, stood before her mirror clad in only her shift. She had never dared consider herself in less than this. Mama Nicholson had always said, time enough for the flesh when the moment came. Your body is but a case for your mind. It is the soul that matters.
    But Matt Hilton would know nothing of souls. Of that one fact she could be sure. He wanted her body. There was an uncommonly bold thought. But one which had to be thought. He wanted these legs. Would he love them? She had always worried about their length, and about the gentle ridges of muscle which rippled beneath the smooth white skin as she moved. And what did a man want with a woman's legs, what could he do with them? She had no idea, just as she had no idea