Life After Death

Someone once told me an old say they said came from Iceland. I think it went like this: “Nothing grants such an advantage as being dead.” I wasn’t sure at the time what it meant, but driving home in the funeral car from Alfred’s funeral I came to see what it might mean.

You see, when people got up to speak about him at the service they said such wonderful things that I began to think I must have been married to a saint. Of course, Alfred had always been very kind and considerate to me, but I didn’t think he quite qualified as a saint.

I first met Alfred when I went to work in his office. I had been orphaned when I was six when my parents were killed in a car accident. I was brought up in a Girl’s Home - what they used to call “an orphanage”. You may have heard terrible things about such places, but really they were quite kind.

When I left high school I was sent to a Business College where they taught me about working in an office. Then it was still shorthand, typing and booking keeping and few other things, before the days of all that electric stuff. I came out top of my year, “Dux” as they called it.

Then the people at the Girl’s Home said, “Glenda, you will need to go to work now, and when you started to earn money you will have to leave the Home.”

The people who ran the Business College had a lot of employers wanting to employ the graduates, and as I was the best of my year I got several offers, and I went along and they asked questions, and ended up asking if I wanted to work for their firm. Several times I said I would think about it.

Then I was interviewed by Mr. Benjamin. He was very nice and spoke kindly to me, and his office suite was lovely, all carpet, glass and polished wood. Mr. Benjamin’s office was particularly lovely with a huge polished dark wood desk and beautiful pictures and hangings.

Mr. Benjamin was a very handsome man but very old, about forty I think. After he had spoken with me for a while he asked, “Would you like to be my secretary, my dear.”

Well, I was surprised. I mean, I thought I would get a junior position like the office girl, but here he was offering me a very important job, so I said “Yes” straightaway. Mr. Benjamin seemed very happy about that.

So, soon after I started work I moved into a hostel for young business ladies, and when I got my first pay cheque I was very pleased because I had never had so much money before.

I tried very hard to please Mr. Benjamin taking down his dictation in shorthand and typing it afterwards ever so nicely. After a week he told me how pleased he was with me and what a lovely girl I was. That made me feel all nice inside.

One day Mr. Benjamin asked if I would be willing to work through the lunch break. He said he would order in something to eat and we could continue working. I said,”Yes that would be all right.”

He ordered a lovely meal with wine and it was brought to us by a man who looked like a waiter in a very posh hotel. Actually, we didn’t seem to do much work, and Mr. Benjamin asked me about living in the Girls Home, and what it was like in the hostel, and did I have a boyfriend.

I did my best to answer his questions, and told him I had never had a boyfriend because the people who ran the Girls Home where very strict about that sort of thing. The hostel was also strict and any boys that came in had to sit with the girls in the lounge and leave by ten o’clock.

Mr. Benjamin seemed pleased when I told him that for some reason.

After that we often worked through lunch although it was always the same, we didn’t really do any work. After me telling him about me, Mr. Benjamin told me about himself; how he was a widower and felt very lonely since the death of his wife, Mavis. He said how I reminded him of Mavis when she was my age. He looked very sad and I felt sorry for him.

One day I let slip that it was my twenty first birthday in two days. When my birthday came he gave me a lovely locket with a beautiful ruby set in it – a real ruby, not like the coloured glass things I bought at the “Fancy Shop” near the hostel.

Mr. Benjamin insisted he put it round my neck, and his hands on the back of my neck felt ever so nice, but they did seem to shake a bit so he had a job fixing the clasp.

For lunch that day we had champagne and I felt all whooshy as I had never had champagne before. Then Mr. Benjamin asked if he could give me a birthday kiss, and I said “Yes” and he did. It was right on the lips and in a way I had never been kissed before. It went on for a long time and when he finished he was really shaking all over and I wondered if he was unwell.

He bought me other presents after that, what he called, “Unbirthday presents,” like a lovely ring with real diamonds and a bracelet and, oh well, lots of things.

It was a funny thing about the general office girls. When I first started work they were all very kind to me. They seemed to be frightened of Mr. Benjamin and said they felt sorry for me being his secretary. Then after a while they changed. They got quite nasty; not that they said anything, but they wouldn’t speak to me unless they had to. I simply couldn’t understand why they changed like that.

It didn’t really matter much because I spent more and more time in Mr. Benjamin’s office, and he was so nice to me, even putting his hands on my shoulders as he stood behind me to dictate.

One afternoon he asked if I wouldn’t mind working late and afterwards we could go out somewhere for dinner, so I agreed.

It was like our lunch times, we didn’t really do much work, but Mr. Benjamin talked a lot more about his wife, and how he would like to have a wife again, and I saw some tears in his eyes. I felt so sorry for him, so I went to him and kissed him and said, “Don’t cry Mr. Benjamin, I’m sure you’ll find someone.”

He was shaking again and he pulled me down on his lap, and then he kissed me back; a very long kiss and his tongue came into my mouth. It made me go all peculiar and there was a sort of throbbing at the bottom of my tummy, and Mr. Benjamin put his hands on my breasts and started to squeeze them very softly and I got a wet feeling at the top of my legs.

He kept on kissing me so I kissed him back and tried putting my tongue into his mouth which he seemed to like. Then his hands went down the top of my dress so they were holding my breasts with no cloth between because I don’t wear bras like the other girls.

He kept telling me how sweet I was and how pretty and he was very, very fond of me. Then he put his hand up my skirts and I felt him touching me down…well, you know where, and before I knew it we were rolling on the carpet and he was really shaking badly, and was taking my panties off.

I may not have had a boy friend but I did know what happened between men and women, and I thought, “He’s going to do it with me,” and I wanted him to.

One thing I should tell you is, that I was on the contraceptive pill, only to regulate my monthly women’s trouble you understand, not like some girls who…you know.

Mr. Benjamin got his…his…thing out and he lay between my legs and pushed it against my thing. He started to push it into me and suddenly I got a terrible pain but he didn’t stop and soon he was gasping and moaning and I felt stuff coming into me. After that he was very quiet for a while, and when we stood up we saw a lot of blood on the carpet and I had to go to the broom cupboard and get cleaning stuff and we tried to get the blood out.

After a long time we got most of it out and Mr. Benjamin asked me to call him “Alfred” when we were alone together. Soon after that we went out to dinner, and then he took me back to the hostel in his car.

Next day Alfred came in late to work and asked me to go with him downstairs. He took me to the car park and showed me a lovely new little car.

“That’s for you,” he said.

I think I nearly fainted and when I got over the shock I said, “But I can’t drive.”

“Don’t worry he said, I can arrange for you to have lessons. You can take them during working hours.”

The other girl’s seemed to hate me more than ever, but they didn’t dare say anything because they knew I would tell Alfred and he would dismiss them. Not that their attitude mattered very much because now I spent most of my time with Alfred in his office, and he would tell the rest of them we mustn’t be disturbed for an hour. Then Alfred would do lovely things to me and make me feel good and end up putting his sperm into me.

It was very wonderful and it got even better when a nice boy came to work in the office suite next to ours. I could see straightaway he liked me, and would hang around after work trying to see me. His name was Edwin, and I mentioned him to Alfred who then seemed to get very angry and after that he always left the office with me so that Edwin couldn’t talk to me.

One day during lunch, just after Alfred had put his sperm into me, he asked, “Will you marry me?”

I wasn’t sure I wanted to marry an old man, even though he was so nice, so I said I didn’t know. Alfred said, “I’ll see you right if you do marry me.” I took this to mean that he would very kind and look after me, so I thought, “It would be nice to be looked after,” so I said, “Yes.”

Next day he took me out and bought an engagement ring with a huge diamond with other smaller diamonds round it. When the other girls in the office saw it they were nastier than ever, but I didn’t care.

We arranged to be married quite soon, but before that took place I got a little shock. He had told me about his dead wife, but he hadn’t told me about his live children. He had a daughter, Kinley, aged fourteen and a son, Richard, usually called Rick, aged twelve. I was only twenty one, and it seemed funny to be stepmother to two children not much younger than I was.

When they heard that I was going to marry their father Kinley seemed furious, but Rick was very nice and kissed me on the cheek and said what a pretty mother I would be.

The day we got married we had lots of Alfred’s business friends and other important people at the ceremony. I only had a couple of friends from the hostel. It was a wonderful affair, and we were actually married by a bishop instead of an ordinary priest.

After we were married I was not returning to work, and so I helped Alfred choose his next secretary. We saw quite a lot of applicants, and I ended up selecting a very nice middle aged lady who was rather plain, but who I was sure would be a very good secretary.

We went on a months honeymoon and Alfred taught me lots of marvelous things about what husbands and wives do to make each other happy. I really enjoyed it when he did things with his tongue to my sex organ, but at first I wasn’t sure about taking his penis into my mouth and letting him put his stuff in it. But I got used to it, and he did it very nicely.

When we got back from our honeymoon Alfred had to go back to work and I was left at home. The house was so big – I had thought that one day I would have a flat or a small house for myself, but this one was huge.

When I first saw it I told Alfred I couldn’t possibly keep a house that size clean and he laughed.

“Darling,” he said, “You will have two cleaners come in twice a week, you won’t need to lift a finger unless just to tidy occasionally. And you won’t need to bother about cooking because I have two women who take it in turns to come in and cook. Anyway, that will be mainly for the children, we can eat out quite often.”

At first I thought this would be wonderful, but once I’d experienced the life of a lady of leisure for a few weeks, it began to pall. How as I to fill in my day?

It was the Church that came to my rescue. Alfred went to church every Sunday, as he explained, “It gives people confidence in you if they think you’re religious.” So I went to church with Alfred, and discovered that churches too have clerical and secretarial work that needs doing. In addition, they have charity work, and Alfred had given me a very liberal allowance so using my office skills and some of the money I had for charitable purposes, I was soon busy again.

Quite apart from the allowance Alfred made me, he continued to buy me lots of presents, mainly jewelry, but other things as well. He bought me lots of underwear, mainly black and lacy and with designs I had never seen before. Really, some of the garments covered almost nothing, and Alfred liked me to wear it when we went to bed. It seemed funny wearing underwear in bed.

As long as I continued to let Alfred put his semen into me, either my vagina or my mouth, he was very happy with me, so I made sure I kept him that way.

There was something that happened that puzzled me at first. One night Alfred, instead of doing the usual things like kissing me, sucking my nipples and putting his tongue into my vagina, produced some strips of cloth and one of those sticks or canes, the sort of cane they used to have in schools for punishing pupils, and said, “Tie me down and punish me, Glenda darling.”

I was rather shocked and asked why he wanted to be punished. He wouldn’t tell me but went on begging me to do it, so I tied him down on the bed and on his instructions began to cane him. He yelped and moaned, but every time I went to stop he would say, “More, harder,” so I went on until he told me to stop.

Then he wanted me to bite the top of his penis, so I took it into my mouth and started to nibble on it. “Harder, harder,” he demanded, “make me scream.” I bit harder and harder until I thought I would bite it right off, and he screamed and screamed.

After that this punishing became a regular feature of our nightly activities. I didn’t mind, so long as he didn’t want to punish me.

We had seven years of married life before Alfred died. His death happened like this; one night I was giving him his punishment with the cane. He had been yelling as usual when suddenly he gave a sort of groaning gasp. He went white and I asked him if he was all right. I could see he was trying to answer, but words would not come. His lips turned purple and his gasps grew more laboured. I untied him and ran to get him some brandy. When I tried to get him to drink it mostly ran down over his chin.

Frightened I rang our doctor who listened to what I told him then said in a stern voice to ring for an ambulance straightaway.

The ambulance took nearly twenty minutes to arrive and Alfred’s breathing got worse and worse. They took him to the hospital, but, as they told me afterwards, he was dead on arrival.

Two days later two police detectives came to see me, one a constable the other a sergeant. They began quite nicely but got quite unpleasant as our talk went on.

They said that the doctor in the hospital had noticed severe marks and bruising on the body and could I account for this? I tried to avoid the question but they kept on and on until I had to tell them about giving Alfred his “punishment”.

They really were rather rude when I told them, because I could see they were trying to stifle their laughter. Then they wanted to know about Alfred’s will, and I told them Alfred had not discussed it with me, and they would have to ask his solicitor.

They left me then saying they might have to question me again, “Just to tie up any loose ends.” They sniggered when they said that and I felt rather sick after they had gone.

On the day of the funeral, as I have said, there were so many nice things said about Alfred, and this was surprising as most people, including his own children, seemed frightened of him. It was as if I was the only one who was not scared of him.

Driving away from the funeral I sat in the back of the vehicle with Kinley and Rick. Rick held my hand while Kinley glowered at me from the corner where she was half slumped. That girl really disliked, even hated, me.

I had tried to play the stepmother to them, but with Kinley it was total rejection. Rick on the other hand, responded to me very positively. At times I felt he was a bit too positive. His goodnight kisses were not what you might call filial. Still, he was a loving boy and his kisses were rather nice, so I didn’t complain.

It was two days after the funeral that the solicitor turned up to read the will. There were lots of bits and pieces to it, but the upshot as far as I and the two children were concerned was this; Kinley and Rick were to receive very large sums of money, but the money was tied up mainly in safe investments, so they would only have the interest. Kinley was to have one of the cars and Rick the Land Rover. They were also to continue to have residence in the house, but the house itself went to me together with a monetary figure that I could barely comprehend.

The solicitor was concerned about the future of Alfred’s business, and wondered if I would like to sell it. I said I would think about it, but asked if in the meantime he could find someone to manage it. He said he would attend to the matter, and no doubt rubbed his mental hands at the fee he would charge for this service.

Soon after the day on which the will had been read, Kinley announced that she was leaving. “I’ve had the offer of a job up north,” she said, almost truculently, “don’t expect to see me again, Glenda.” Another couple of days and she was gone.

Rick on the other hand was content to stay. He was eighteen and about to begin law studies at the university. He was a sweet boy and was clearly very fond of me, so I was happy to have him around the place.

With Kinley gone and just Rick and I left, I began to wonder about the business. I discussed the matter with Rick in case he had any ambitions to take it over, but he said no, and that he had other ideas for his future. In fact with what Alfred had left him he had no need to work at all, but as he said, “I’ve got to do something useful with my life.”

So I had just about made up my mind to be rid of the business when I had a call from the solicitor.

“Mrs. Benjamin, I don’t know whether you’ve decided anything about your husbands business, but I’ve had an offer to buy it. The man I put in as manager wants it. He’s given a figure, and while we might get more if we hung on, it’s really up to you.”

He announced the figure being offered and once more I was staggered. I asked myself how a poor little orphan girl had managed to become a wealthy woman with so little effort, and thought that it was a pity Hollywood didn’t make films about that sort of thing anymore. You know rags to riches. Well, not quite, but you know what I mean.

I told the solicitor to sell and invest the money for me.

A couple of months went by and nothing very notable happened. I got back to my church secretarial tasks, and was by then president of a charitable organization and secretary for another.

Rick had begun his studies and was making his adjustment to university life. When he was at home he was even more attentive to me than he had been before, and it was very nice.

One adjustment I had to make was sleeping alone at night and not having what I used to have with Alfred. I suppose most people would think I should have still been in deep mourning, and in some respects I was, or at least, I thought I was.

I began to look back over my years with Alfred. He had always been kind and generous to me, but I asked myself, “Did I love him?” I was never sure what people meant by “Love,” but I can say I had affection for him and wanted to please him, at least in bed.

On the whole I would do what he wanted me to do, but I was no longer the naïve girl I had been when I first met him. I now realized that although when we had finished making love he always seemed relaxed and contented, for me, it was a job well done. A pleasant job mostly, but one in which I seemed to have no deep satisfaction of the sort that Alfred seemed to get.

I wondered at this. Could I get that satisfaction? Did other women get it with their lovers? If so, what was it? Put baldly, “Was there more to sexual intercourse than simply pleasing the man?”