Page 2 of The Demons of Wychwood

A LITTLE NOSEY …

As the church bells of London congregated and chimed out seven o’clock, I returned to the lower floor of the mansion.

I laid out cards and board games in the games room, and then moved to the library, music room, dining room, and drawing room, topping up the coals in each fireplace, lighting candles, gas lamps, and incense burners.

The burners sent out the heady scents of Patchouli into the air.

The scent was said to have aphrodisiac properties as well as lifting the mood and relieving tension or anxiety, but I didn’t care for the cloying scent myself.

I preferred good honest male sweat, tobacco, and hard liquor.

At seven-thirty, there was a knock on the front door, the heavy lion-faced knocker resounding in the vast uninhabited house.

I strode to the door and rapped twice.

The person outside knocked three times, then once in response.

I unlocked the door, and opened it.

A gust of icy air rushed into the foyer.

The long driveway to the road was shrouded, and the lamps at the end of the drive shimmered like beacons in the mist.

A carriage was moving off down the drive, hoof beats echoing.

I grinned as I saw my three familiars.

We’d performed this dance so many times that even though I knew nothing but their names I was comfortable in their presence.

We were partners in this illicit activity and so I stood back, bowed, and invited them inside.

“Blimey, it is a stinker out zere tonight, Felix.”

Mr. Hugo exclaimed his accent German, as he stepped into the house rubbing his leather-gloved hands together.

He was a short man, with a round face wearing a heavy moleskin coat and bowler hat, which, when removed showed an over-pomaded head that made it appear as if his remaining black hair had been painted onto his scalp.

Swiftly stepping aside and undoing his coat, I saw Mr.

Hugo wore a green velvet jacket and cravat with smart black trousers.

He was accompanied by an androgynous young man who went by the name of Miss Georgette.

“My bleedin’ balls have retreated in fear of the cold!”

Miss Georgette snickered lewdly. “I guess I’ll have to sing some bawdy songs to get the old blood pumping down there again!”

“You always sing bawdy songs, that’s why you’re invited back!”

I reminded her, which made us all laugh.

Miss Georgette’s face was made up with white powder, rouged cheeks, and deep carmine red lips like a doll, and to complete the look she wore a blonde wig of girlish ringlets and a heady perfume.

On removing her cloak Miss Georgette revealed a red silk and lace gown with a low-cut bodice neckline displaying a pale powdered flat upper chest.

“Very fetching, Miss Georgette. You’ll certainly get ‘em going tonight!”

I smiled and she curtsied.

The third man nodded solemnly in greeting as he removed his bowler hat and greatcoat.

He went by the name of Mr.Joshua.

He wore a dark brown beard and round brass spectacles.

Beneath the heavy wool coat, there was the smart, tidy suit of a servant.

I’d not yet been able to identify the livery of the household he belonged to, but he had an air of authority about him, like he was the sort to make the rules and ensure they were followed.

I had the sneaking suspicion that this man worked in the home of our employer and attended the Club Fifty-five not only to act as the butler, but to ensure that his master’s wishes were carried out to the letter!

Mr. Hugo’s coat and Miss Georgette’s cloak were handed to Mr. Joshua, who took them to the cloak room.

“It’s time. Places please, boys and girls!”

Mr. Joshua instructed on returning to the hall, his open pocket watch in his hand. Mr. Hugo and Miss Georgette walked through to the dining room, and Georgette pinched a slice of pineapple from a display .

“Oi, that ain’t for you missy!”

I scolded. She giggled coquettishly.

“It’s not as if the nobs‘ll miss it, there’s plenty of other things for them to eat,”

she said, hitching her dress and flashing the frilly pink French knickers she wore over a pale firm boyish arse. Georgette was a tease, and apparently a favourite of many of the rich men who attended the club, but I had no idea if she was anything more than a songbird for them.

Mr. Hugo opened double doors from the dining room that led to the music room.

He took his seat at a grand piano, and Miss Georgette arranged herself to her comfort on a high stool beside the piano.

Soon there was melodic piano with a countertenor voice lifting high in song banishing silence from Wychwood.

Miss Georgette’s voice gave me chills right down to my nethers and always stopped me in my tracks with its beauty, but as the performers were in their places my work was done for the evening.

Mr.Joshua took his post beside the front door awaiting the first arrival.

I was to leave the same way entered the house—through the kitchen porch door. But tonight, and not for the first time, my curiosity had gotten the better of me and I wasn’t quite ready to leave Wychwood.

****

To any fellow on the street, I was just another worker bee striving to feed his family, doing the right and honest thing, and not acting as I desired—such was the fate of the common man.

Everything that I desired was out of my reach anyway, not only because of the low status of my birth, but because my desires were a hanging offence.

I lived with my younger sister Elowen and her baby daughter Bess.

No one in Stepney knew that we was brother and sister.

The arrangement suited us both, ensuring that Elowen and Bess looked part of a traditional family and that I wasn’t an invert.

How could I be when I had a wife and kiddy? My employment at the General Post Office gave me a respectable, honest living and ensured I kept a roof over my family’s head and food in our bellies.

The extra money I made from my mysterious side job was my secret, and I squirreled the five-pound notes away to fund my future.

Elowen was pretty as a peach and still got advances from coves, even with the ring on her wedding finger.

If she fell for a gentleman, I’d be more than happy to welcome a good man into our family to take care of Elowen and Bess.

But if that didn’t happen Elowen promised that when Bess was older, they could find work together in a big house so that I was released from my responsibility.

Then I would live life as I wanted with my bountiful nest egg.

I’d be free to travel and follow my dream of seeing the Americas .

Wychwood was a hundred-years-old, if not more, and from what I’d gathered by nosing around the library, it had once belonged to a shipping magnate, and it was while in the library that I discovered the house had a secret.

My Pa’s training came in handy once again when curiosity led me to the book of architect's plans.

I understood how to read the drawings, see, and it was while perusing the plan book for Wychwood that I saw something worth investigating—the layout of the upstairs rooms was peculiar, and there were passages that led from a linen closet upstairs to behind the walls of every bedroom.

This meant that the inhabitants of the bedrooms could move between rooms unseen…and be secretly observed.

Initially, I wondered if the peepholes I’d found were known to my employer and used during the Club Fifty-five parties, but on inspection of the passages, I found them to be cobwebbed and unused for generations.

Up until that point I’d carried out my tasks to the letter, taken the money, and told myself to think no more about what salacious doings occurred when I left Wychwood.

But as the months progressed, I became more and more curious.

I knew full-well that I preferred cock to cunny, but I didn’t know how men loved , if they could love one another or if what happened here in this house was like scratching an itch or an outpouring of the ‘demonic sin’ the clergy always harped on about! And so, I became adept at secreting myself behind the walls and got myself quite an education observing the erotic goings-on.

****

I said goodbye to Mr.Joshua, and waved to Mr.Hugo and Miss Georgette, then returned to the kitchen.

There I shrugged into my heavy coat; thrust my cap, scarf, and gloves into my pockets.

I opened and then closed the back door without leaving.

Then I picked up a small box of treats and a bottle of Cognac I’d put aside for myself, and silently scurried up the servants back stairs to the first floor.

When I opened the servant’s staircase door I heard the resounding thud of the door knocker, and then the deep rumbling murmur of the highfalutin voices.

“Welcome Gentlemen, welcome.

Let me take your hats and coats.”

Mr.Joshua’s voice resounded.

I scurried to the linen closet.

In the closet, I lit the lantern I’d previously left there, took off my coat, and sat on a shipping trunk.

The trunk was covered with labels from many of the foreign destinations I longed to see.

I was determined that one day I’d have a trunk just like this one showing all of the wonderful places I’d visited.

I relaxed and listened to the distant songbird Miss Georgette as she sang a music hall number with filthy lyrics.

The scents of lavender soap and vinegar were strong in the small windowless linen closet.

I hummed along as I settled with my back against a shelf of folded sheets and spare bedding; I’d have a while to wait before the gentlemen had done their socials—gaming, eating, and quaffing, and then retired to the bedrooms to do what comes natural to fellows of our preference.

By nine o’clock the roars of deep-throated laughter echoed, and then the sounds of heavy treads ascending the wide staircase made me stir from a doze, sit up, and take notice.

Soon my wait would be over and there would be something worth watching.

The entertainment was welcome because I’d eaten my box of sweets and had sipped a little Cognac to warm my cockles.

There was a particular favourite I was hoping would attend the party tonight.

Of course, I didn’t know the man’s true name, but I identified him only by his number, 27.

He was mysterious and there was something in the fellow’s brooding nature that appealed to me.

Mr.27 was tall, well-formed, with features that reminded me of an oil painting I’d seen of that handsome Lord Byron cove, his eyes stormy and dark wavy hair falling in curls.

27s bared arse—which I’d seen a time or two—was pale, muscled, nicely shaped, and hairless.

I found I liked the look of a hairless backside on a man—something I hadn’t known before because my only experiences with fellows were under cover of darkness, or a rushed to-do in a back alley—trousers down, cocks out, him faceless and pressed to the wall, me, making swift work of an Oxford-style pounding, always wary in case someone disturbed us.

On several occasions, I observed that Mr.27 would occupy his allotted bedchamber long before his brutish partner arrived.

You see, Mr.27 had quite the tempestuous relationship with Mr.45 – an older, heavy-set gentleman with a bullish, unflinching nature who seemed to obtain his pleasures from pushing his younger man to the ends of his endurance.

Their back-and-forth struggle was compelling viewing—much like a wrestling match where the loser got buggered.

Poor Mr.27 was always on the losing end of the fight!

At first, when I watched these men at it I was concerned that Mr.27 was coerced into buggery against his will.

I ain’t okay with the rape of a woman same as ain’t okay with the rape of a man.

But as the couplings continued and I’d heard that Mr.

27 consenting, begging even, I figured that this couple’s bed-play was just rough and unfeeling cos that was how they wanted it.

I didn’t know if men should be intimate with one another when engaging in backdoor activities.

But during my peeping at Wychwood I saw that there was intimacy as well as pleasure to be had.

And so, it confused me that there was no tenderness in the acts between Mr.27 and Mr.45.

I’d also discovered that men said peculiar things to one another while in the throes.

45 always told his partner that he was ‘ doing it for his own good, to feed the demon ’.

I didn’t have a clue what he was on about.

Watching the activities of the other men who attended Wychwood confused me further, cos they showed one another tenderness and they loved in the same way I’d seen men and women love.

The relationship between Mr.27 and Mr.45 was a mystery I was curious to unravel.

****