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I shook my head. “She died when I was a baby. My education was entrusted to my aunt, who in turn sent me to a convent school. The nuns weren’t exactly helpful, as you can imagine.”

Rebecca chuckled softly. “All hellfire and brimstone no doubt.”

“Yes, quite.”

“And what about when you were first married? What’d they tell you would happen then?”

I shrugged, stroking my hands over the fur of the mink. “Not a great deal. My aunt gave me a very brief talk about stirring members and flowers blooming the night before my first marriage. Nothing about the… physical side of it.”

“Bet it was a shock when the old man stuck his Johnson in then.”

My cheeks flushed violently, my eyes dropping to my lap as I nodded. “Yes, it was rather.”

“I’m sorry, love.”

I looked up to see nothing but sympathy on Rebecca’s face. She shook her head, rubbing her chin with her thumb. “I always feel for you high class ladies. No one gives a tosswho we marry, but you lot? You lot don’t even get a choice. I couldn’t even imagine being married to someone old enough to be me grandad.”

“It was… not always pleasant.” As much as I wanted to tell someone just how horrid the marriage to Acton had been, reliving it would have been that much worse. That was best left behind, and not spoken of.

“And now you gone and married his son, ey? Bet that’s gone over well.” She widened her eyes for a moment, puffing out a breath from her red lips. “Brave, he is. Reckless, but brave.”

“Did you… enjoy sex with him?” How odd it was to even ask another woman this, whether she had enjoyed fornicating with my husband. Odd, and yet strangely liberating.

Rebecca smiled widely at me. “Is it wrong of me to say yes?” She shrugged, bouncing her legs up and down lightly. “He’s extremely passionate. Very good with his tongue.” She narrowed her eyes as she raised the cigarette back to her lips. “Do you not enjoy it with him?”

I looked back down at my hands, my fingers fidgeting relentlessly with the lace on my skirt. “I do. And that’s what I’m afraid of.”

“Afraid of? Nothin wrong with a good time, love.”

“Isn’t there?” I raised my head again, fighting to bring breath into my lungs as the room became stifling. “He… he makes me feel things I’ve been told I shouldn’t. He… touches places I was always told not to touch.”

“Like your clitoris?”

“My what?”

Rebecca burst out laughing, and quickly covered her mouth with her hand as my cheeks flamed. “Oh I’m sorry, I don’t mean to laugh, you poor lamb.” She gestured to her lap. “Your clitoris, that little bud he touches and has you practically singing for the angels. That’s the medical term for it.”

“As I said, my education was… lacking.” My throat felt desperately dry, and when I coughed, Rebecca sprang to her feet and poured me a glass of water from a pitcher on her night stand. I took the water gratefully and gulped it down.

“So, what were you taught?” She asked, standing by the small hearth with her arms crossed over her chest. “What do you know about your body?”

“That pleasure was sin, and that there were parts of your body you should never touch.”

Rebecca grimaced. “The standard religious trollop then.”

“Indeed.” I placed the glass on the table. “And now I have to come to my husband’s prostitute for an education. A searing indictment of the state of our education system.”

Rebecca laughed merrily as she collapsed back into her chair. “Oh, I like you!” She stamped her cigarette out in an ashtray beside the glass I had placed down, and brushed the hair from her forehead. “But I’m here to tell you, ain’t no better place to get an education on anatomy. We pinchcocks have to know our fronts from our backs or we’ll be in a right mess in no time.”

“So it won’t drive me mad?”

Rebecca frowned. “What won’t?”

“Azriel… touching me, and making me….”

“Come?” Rebecca smiled kindly, and shook her head. “A load of bollocks, that is. I’d be in the madhouse by now if it was true.”

“But I find myself wanting it.” I tore off my gloves and dropped them in my lap, rubbing my hands together. “I find myself desirous for him to touch me. At first… I did not.”