Mr. McKeldin smiled slightly as he heard the doorbell ring. He moved out of his easy chair with grace, dropping the copy of "Plutarch's Lives" in the seat.
Ines, his housekeeper looked as if she were about to answer the door, but Mr. McKeldin waved her away.
"Is Miss Lois coming? Ines asked with a knowing smile. Mr. McKeldin nodded, coloring a little. He ignored Ines's titter.
Mr. McKeldin answered the door and there was DeLois Hornbake, slightly chunky but with big, welcoming breasts under the knit sweater.
"Hello, Lois dear."
"Hello, Mr. McKeldin." Lois was so compelling. Short, black hair and blue black eyes peeping under the long lashes. Lois leaned up and bussed Mr. McKeldin on the cheek.
Lois wore a rich, red lipstick, and so Mr. McKeldin touched his cheek with a monogrammed hankie, but he smiled at her anyway.
Lois's pale skin really accentuated against the red lips and heightened blush on her cheeks. Lois's jeans were tight and fit well in the Doc Martens.
"Hello, Lois, " Mr. McKeldin said again.
"How've you been, Mr. McKeldin?" Lois asked. "The week gone well, has it?"
Mr. McKeldin thought of Lois's active hairbrush. He quivered just a bit.
"Yes, yes of course" Mr. McKeldin said, tentatively, looking a little unsteadily at the gym bag that Lois held in her left hand.
"Well, why don't we go into your library, unless you want to go in the den?"
"The library is fine" he said hesitantly.
"Wonderful. I love your big house. The garden, too. I have such a cramped apartment."
"You can always stay here, Lois" Mr. McKeldin said hopefully.
"No, no, can't play favorites among the clients." Lois laughed. "Dr. LeFrak actually proposed to me yesterday, showed me one helluva diamond."
Mr.McKeldin actually knew LeFrak. An osteopath. LeFrak was into this?
They went into the library, Lois smiling at Ines.
"I hope you have not been giving Ines any trouble, Mr. McKeldin."
"Uh, no of course not."
He didn't want to annoy Lois. God, remember how she acted when he hadn't had the shrubbery trimmed.
As they entered the library, Lois put the gym bag on the coffee table by the divan. Unzipping it, she looked up briefly at Mr. McKeldin.
"That's not quite what I heard from Ines. As you know I taught Ines how to send e-mails, the same week I put Net Nanny on your ' puter."
Mr. McKeldin flushed. He was much too old for Net Nanny, but too embarrassed to call a serviceman to remove it from his system. Oh well, he'd be punished and it would be put on again. That was Lois.
"So anyway, now that Ines knows the Net, she sent me an e-mail about you, sir."
"D-did she?" Mr. McKeldin asked, his heart growing cold.
"She did indeed" Lois smiled.
"Oh, wait, this is for you, and I added a little tip."
Mr. McKeldin hoped that handing Lois an envelope full of cash might cool possible ire, but Lois just matter of factly took it and dropped the envelope in her gym bag.
Lois rustled around in her bag more and finally removed a thick, wide hairbrush. She tapped it against her long pink nails.
"Ines said you were snappish with her when she was serving at her opera society on Tuesday."
"Sh-she said that?"
Lois laughed, and her considerable breasts shifted against the sweater.
Mr. McKeldin had never seen DeLois Hornbake's naked breasts, but she had worn some snug tank tops during her spring and summer visits.
Those gorgeous alabaster mounds, a cleavage he wished he could kiss. And the nipples, were they pink or brown?
"Of course the word 'Snappish' isn't in Ines's vocabulary, nor is 'sulky' which she says you've also been, but fortunately I am fluent in French, Spanish, Italian and German...
...It helps in my business, and I understood the gist of Ines's complaint."
Mr. McKeldin waved his hand dismissively. "She was late with the wine, that was all."
"Well, we talked about mutual respect, didn't we, Mr. McKeldin?"
Mr. McKeldin's fists closed, though his arms were hanging helplessly by his sides.
"OF COURSE THE WORD 'SNAPPISH' ISN'T IN INES'S VOCABULARY. BUT FORTUNATELY, I SPEAK FRENCH, SPANISH AND GERMAN...
Oh, that hairbrush.
"Yes, and so you had to bark at her, Mr. McKeldin. That's impressive. A tantrum. I thought we worked on tantrums, Mr. McKeldin. "
It was true. She had gone to all sorts of efforts to break him of immaturity. Once, adult diapers for seventy-two hours, and Ines had changed them. Oh God.
Mr. McKeldin trembled slightly. He looked so forward to these weekly visits from the little Goth girl. Twenty-nine years old.
But he was so scared!
Sometimes Lois's jet-black hair was spiky, and sometimes it was blonde or red.. Now and then there were piercings in her nose. But she was always Lois.
"Did you finish your sentences? All two thousand?"
Mr. McKeldin looked down at his wing tips.
"I got eighteen hundred fifty-three done, Lois."
The sentences weren't so bad. Lois's mother, Eulalie, now retired had forced Mr. McKeldin to conjugate French deponent verbs.
"Eighteen hundred?" Lois frowned.
"Eighteen hundred fifty-three, and I'll finish-"
"Oh, they're doubled plus what you have coming for this week. You couldn't finish them and yet you have time to read and give opera society parties."
She made opera society parties seem like heroin shooting.
"B-but you made me write them one letter pencil, one letter pen, that takes longer and it's so-"
Lois laughed again. "You love to complain, don't you, Mr. McKeldin.
Lois went over and sat on the couch. She patted her right leg with the hairbrush and biting his lip, Mr. McKeldin approached.