Pleasure exploded in my groin, shooting my eyes into the back of my head like balls in a pinball machine. I waited until the last faint reverberations had echoed down my legs, culminating in my toes, which stretched out as the orgasm reached its final resting place.
I stirred as her breath, scented with my own intimate juices, scuttled across my eyelids. As I opened my eyes, Guinevere appeared, fuzzy around the edges, like an inkblot dripped onto wet paper. Gradually she crispened into perfectly shaped eyebrows, eyes like dark cherries and a cupid bow mouth. She whispered, "You know, your vagina is really something. Its as beautiful and expressive as your face, my darling."
"Aaah," I sighed, rolling over onto my belly and sinking my cheek into the pillow, reluctant to leave the private realm of my post orgasmic state and join her. Her silky inner thigh settled across my buttocks. I willed my mind not to stir but already it had transformed her words into a ludicrous image of my shaved cunt, a fur stole wrapped around it to keep out the cold, strutting down the street. I giggled.
In one swift movement she straddled me and grabbed my shoulders. "What's so damned funny?"
"Nothing." She started to nibble at the back of my neck. I was dimly aware that rain was hammering against the glass as her breasts fell like warmed dough against my back.
"You haven't forgotten that we're due at my parents have you?"
"Urggh," I groaned as I bit into the pillow. Meeting her parents signaled crossing that line in our relationship between casual to commitment. I wasn't at all sure I was ready for all that. "Do we have to?'
Apparently we did. With much reluctance I got out of the warm bed and we drove the two hours from London to Ashford, then along what seemed like a mile of driveway. I gasped as I saw her family home, a white wedding cake of a mansion, glowing through the splodges of slush that clogged my windscreen.
Guinevere jumped out of the car, pulling her scarf over her head to shield herself from the elements, and shouted that she was going to try and find her mother around the back and would meet me inside.
I walked up the imposing white marble staircase, hesitating at the door. My heart hammered in my chest. I had heard much about her father, who, she had warned me, was rather unconventional. Nevertheless, I was anxious to make a good impression. I opened my compact and applied lipstick before pressing the bell.
The door opened and I was ushered into the hall. A poker straight woman in a starched apron who led me through a maze of dim corridors papered in autumnal shades. The furniture flew by me, antique faux Chinese chests with ornate gold encrusted legs, padded chairs and lamps with long purple fringes, as I struggled to keep up with the woman's brisk pace. Finally she led me to a stifling room, in which a fire flickered in the grate. Without a word she was gone.
I sank into the chaise lounge, unbuttoned my coat and waited for Guinevere to return. Bored and exasperated I began to leaf through a book on the National Gallery, which lay on the table in front of me. Looking at the images lulled me into a doze, and I entered a state of beatific calm from which a booming voice blasted me awake.
"There's a funny story behind that," the voice said as a finger was thrust over my shoulder and began to stab at 'Portrait of a Tax Inspector, by unknown German artist.' Petrified, I stared down at the picture of a grim faced man in a stovepipe hat, posed against an ochre colored background. "Art history is littered with such instances," the voice said.
I twisted my head and my gaze moved slowly upwards, taking in the white handkerchief that poked like a tongue from the breast pocket of his dark suit and the monocle that nestled in his eye socket. He stared back at me, one eye slightly larger than the other due to the monocle's magnification, then flicked on his lighter and lit a cigarette. He looked like the love child of Montgomery Clift and Rock Hudson.
"I'm Jane Branwell," I said, the catalogue slithering to the floor as I leapt up and proffered my hand. He eyed me warily but did not shake it. I felt exceedingly foolish.
"Where was I? Ah, yes. Deception is at the very core of art history." He chuckled and took a deep drag on his cigarette. Where on earth was Guinevere? Despite the fact that he was clearly mad as a march hare he emanated a heady charisma that was pulling at me and making me weak. In the stuffy room my head began to pound as his eyes drilled through me. It felt incredibly incestuous to be in this situation.
He walked over and sat beside me, picked the catalogue up from the floor and turned back to the page he had pointed at. "Until recently this was thought to be a Holbein portrait of Martin Luther, if you can believe it. Some eighteenth century forger painted the background blue, as is characteristic of so many of Holbein's backgrounds and covered most of the hat so it resembled Luther's characteristic beret. No one spotted the fake!" He snorted. "Despite the fact that prussian blue wasn't invented until the eighteenth century."
As I nodded, trying to look intelligent, I noticed that his hand was hovering over my knee. I tensed, thinking he would touch me, but instead it landed on the shiny pages of the book.
"In the eighteenth century, when Lutheranism was all the rage, no doubt the forger had no problem offloading this doctored painting as an original Holbein." I shifted uncomfortably, trying desperately to think of something clever to say. "When the experts removed the blue surface, they came upon what you see now." He shuddered with laughter.
"You mean it wasn't a portrait of Luther at all?" I mumbled, relieved that Guinevere had just come in.
"Just so! A portrait of a non entity by a non entity."
