The Confessor. – This is indeed a sin. Send your husband to me for confession.
The rest of her confession was boring. Shortly thereafter, my aunt took her place in the confessional, and I heard the pleasant sound of her voice. From what I could hear, she was admitting having often missed confession. But you could have bowled me over with a feather when she added, in low, halting tones, that although she had never before felt any carnal desires, she had been moved to passion upon seeing her young nephew in his bath, and had libidinously touched his body, but fortunately had been able to dominate these wicked desires. Except once when her nephew was sleeping: the blanket had slipped off the bed, leaving his sexual parts exposed. She had stood there looking at him for a long time, and had even taken his member in her mouth. She spoke with difficulty, as though the words were sticking in her throat. I experienced an extraordinary surge of emotion.
The Confessor. – Haven't you ever sinned with men, or haven't you ever polluted yourself alone?
My Aunt. – I am still a virgin, at least as far as men are concerned. I've often looked at myself in the mirror, and caressed my private parts with my hand. Once… (she hesitated).
The Confessor. - Courage, my child, conceal nothing from your confessor.
My Aunt. – Once my sister said to me: 'Our maid uses an exorbitant number of candles. She's certainly reading novels in bed, and one of these nights she's going to set the house on fire. You sleep near her, you want to be careful!' That very evening, seeing a light in Kate's room, here's what I did. I'd left the door open, and noiselessly entered her room. She was sitting on the floor, her back half-turned towards me, leaning forward in the direction of the bed. In front of her was a chair on which a mirror was placed, and on the left and right of the mirror two candles were burning. Kate was in a nightgown, and I clearly saw in the mirror that she was holding something long and white which she was manipulating back and forth between her well-spread thighs. She was sighing deeply and trembling all over. Suddenly I heard her cry out: 'Oh! oh! oh! it feels so good!' She bowed her head, closed her eyes and seemed completely out of this world. Then I moved. She sprang to her feet and I saw that she was holding an almost concealed candle in her hand. Whereupon she explained to me that she was doing this in memory of her lover who had been drafted into the army. I expressed amazement that one could do such a thing, but she begged me not to tell anyone. I left, but this performance had made such an impression on me that from then on, my Father, I couldn't help trying the same thing, which, alas! I've often repeated since. Yes, I've fallen low, Father. I've often lifted my nightgown and, following Kate's example, given myself up to these sinful pleasures.
The reader can easily guess, in the light of my aunt's and mother's revelations, what Kate's confession consisted of. But I learned besides that she was more and more desirous of having a man, and that her friendship with Berthe was growing by leaps and bounds. They often slept together, and frequently compared their buttocks in the mirror, after having mutually examined each other's bodies.
The maids' confessions were all simple. They'd let the hired men fuck them, but their tales were stripped of all adornment. And they had never allowed the men to enter the room in which they all slept together naked. But during the military maneuvers their precautions proved to be in vain. A whole regiment had passed through the neighborhood. Thus all the girls, and even one who was pretty well along in years, were obliged to take them on, even from behind, which last, moreover, seemed to the maids a mortal sin. When the friar asked them if they had never masturbated alone or with a girl friend, they replied: "Who'd want to stick her hand in such a smelly cunt?"
But they didn't consider it sinful to watch each other shit or piss, or to have used chickens, pigeons or geese to make them come.
One of them had once let a dog lick her love lips. When asked if she had let him screw her, she answered:
"I would have been only too glad to, but he wasn't big enough."
I took every possible precaution to escape being seen as I returned to my room.
CHAPTER SEVEN
SHORTLY AFTER I HAD RETURNED to my room, my aunt and mother came in to announce that my father was coming to pay us a visit. They also told me that Berthe was not feeling well, and had been put to bed. They added that she was not seriously ill, and would soon be better, but that it would be preferable for me not to go to see her.
The announcement aroused my curiosity, and in two shakes of a lamb's tail I'd decided what I should do. I knew that my aunt and mother were to spend the afternoon in the village with the friar, visiting a poor sick lady, and that Kate was going with them to take a basket of clothes for her.
While the ladies were conversing, I studied them attentively and saw them in a completely new light as a result of the confessions I had overheard.
The dark clothing they were wearing acted as a foil to their appearance, accentuating my mother's blossoming countenance and my aunt's tightly laced figure.
Each was as desirable as the other: one, whose virginitywas as yet unsoiled by masculine contact, holding out the promise of undreamed-of voluptuousness; the other, whose exciting maturity and conjugal experience with an imaginative husband had led her through a maze of sensual caprices.
I was washing as they came in, and explained that I had tried to go to bed, for in reality my pretended illness was beginning to bore me considerably.
My aunt, who had never seen either my room or the library, wandered into the latter. My mother hurried off to the kitchen to supervise the preparations for lunch.
Being alone with my aunt, who now seemed doubly desirable to me, excited me no end. But I was still feeling the effects of my session with the bailiff's wife, and I realized full well that I would easily compromise my plans by being over-hasty.
Margaret, after having inspected the library, had approached the table and was standing there looking at what was on it.
She could well have made some interesting discoveries. The volume "O" of the encyclopedia was lying on the table with a book-mark stuck in the page dealing with onanism. I had penciled a question mark in the margin beside it.
I heard her close the book, and then the Atlas of Anatomy, over certain of whose plates she had lingered for quite some time.
So I was not surprised, upon entering the library, to find her cheeks a burning red.
I pretended not to notice her embarrassment, and said to her in a quiet voice: "You, too, must get bored sometimes, auntie dear. The priest who lived here before had quite a collection of interesting books dealing with the problems of human life. Why don't you take some with you to your room?"
I took two and slipped them into her pocket: Marriage Unveiled and Love and Marriage. When she affected reluctance, I added: "Naturally, this is between you, and me and the lamp-post; we're not children any longer, are we, auntie?" And I suddenly seized her and gave her an emphatic kiss.
She had her hair arranged in a pretty chignon, and the nape of her neck was extraordinarily lovely. Pretty chignons and necks have always had a tremendous effect on me, and the series of resounding kisses that I planted on my aunt's neck intoxicated me completely.
But Margaret was still under the sway of her recent confession. She pushed me away, but not harshly, and after darting a final glance in the direction of my room, she left, carrying the books in her pocket.
In the course of the afternoon I heard the friar and the ladies leave for the village. I decided to go and find Berthe and ask her what had prompted her to feign illness to get out of confession.