56. Pillow talk, part the third

Helena and I talked about this that night.

This was after I had explained to Charlotte how Arabella and I had been 'introduced'. Her eyes went very round at this, after which she declared that she thought that a collaboration, even a union, was a good idea. She said that all of my sisters liked Arabella. In fact, she said wistfully, there was much in her to admire. Which is true, there is much to admire about Arabella. Her strong will, her independent mind and her charming personality. I had to fight the feeling that I did not want Charlotte, Caroline, Margaret, Louise and Hermione to be known for having the same amorous nature that Arabella has. But I chided myself for that as being unfair, because I, personally, had already been teaching them exactly the same thing for the last few months. I told myself, I was not encouraging them to be as adventurous as Arabella, just helping them to understand what they wanted in the bed chamber, but I feared that, in actual fact, I was opening the door for them to be the same as her.

Helena was distracted, it was as if she could not settle, so I turned instead to cunnilingus to pleasure her and bring her mind back to bed. I thought I had been successful but it was Helena that got up first and she poured herself a glass of madeira.

"What are your feelings for Arabella?" She said at last.

"Is that what this is about?" I said packing the pipe with the sobranie tobacco.

"What do you mean?"

I lit the pipe, "You are not 'here' tonight, even licking your quim will not do it, and I know that you love that."

Helena reached for the pipe, blowing a thin stream of smoke into the air. "Yes." She said, "That is precisely what this is about. How do you feel about her?"

"I have told you before, we are friends, and we have much in common, the not least of which is a desire to preserve what we have. We like each other, for sure, but it is my belief that she is more interested in you than she is in me."

I do not think that that answer did anything to reassure her. Helena scowled.

She shook her head, "I do not understand how this idea of marriage came about? Did you not say that I was everything to you?"

"I did and you are," I told her.

After a moment's thought, I saw Helena take a deep breath. "I do not want to be put aside!" She said emphatically. "You are correct. I have come so far in my journey with you, I have given you so much, and you have taught me so much more, I do not want to stop this and have Arabella take over in my stead."

"That shall not happen." I told her. "I said forever and I meant it. It was you that I came home to. It is you that I want.

"If anything," I said, "It makes our lives easier.

"I understand that!" Helena snapped. Then she relented, "Can you understand the fears of an older woman, in the face of a younger, prettier one?"

There is only one answer to that kind of question.

I immediately took my mother back to bed and fucked her relentlessly, ensuring that she spent again and again and again. We fucked, she sucked, we frotted, frigged, fondled and fussed over each other. I caressed her and coddled her, touching and tasting all of the places that I have become so familiar with over the last few months. I weighed her boobies and tweaked her 'sacred', coral-coloured nipples between my fingers. I licked every inch of her body, tasted her cunny and ran my tongue around the rim of her arse. We kissed, French and otherwise, we chewed at each other like wild, hungry animals, our mouths hot on each other, wet tongues exploring where ever we could. There was much gasping and breathlessness, and my mother demonstrated that she had become quite adept at profanity. We laughed, Helena cried, I groaned, she called out my name, I whispered hers.

In the end we lay wrapped in each other's arms, sated, perspiration-sheened and exhausted. The candles had burned low, the room was warm but dimly lit.

"You need not worry," I said. "You will never need to worry."

"I'm sorry," she said. "I scared myself."

I enfolded her tightly in my arms.

"I can see the benefits. Arabella might give you an heir, something I cannot do."

"What?!"

"Have you never wondered, with all of the fucking we have done, why I am not with child?"

"I - er - I assumed ... I ... I don't know."

Helena gave me a brief amused look that said 'men!'.

"One of the reasons why your father concerned himself less with us was that I could no longer bear him children, another male child in particular." She said sadly, "They say that Hermione's birth moved something inside me."

I recalled her being ill in bed for several weeks after Hermione was born, but as children all that we were told was that she was ill, simply that. We were too young to really understand it.

"I never knew."

"It was not something that I really wanted discussed." She said, "Perhaps now is a good time to face up to it."

If I had hugged Helena any tighter, I might have hurt her. I could not possibly understand what she had gone through or what she was going through now, admitting it. I just wanted to protect her and show her that I loved her more than anything else.

She turned in my arms and kissed my face, her hand on my cheek. "I should have told you earlier."

"Even if you had, it would not have mattered." It was true, "There are ways and means for everything. I simply want ... I want you and I want you to be happy and I don't give a damn about anything else."

"Oh, William! I thank God for your being in my life!"

"And I, thank Him for you, Helena."

I wanted to lie there, in that warm darkness for the rest of my life. If I never moved apart from her again, it would be too soon. Lying next to Helena was not the answer to many things, it was the answer to everything.

It had all seemed so simple. Come home and make Helena mine. That plan had changed so quickly, become so complicated - my sisters, society, Arabella, the Season, the responsibility of the dukedom, it was a tangled puzzle, but the answer was always Helena.

My mother must have sensed something in me, she turned over and pressed back against me, so that we fitted together like two spoons.

"Arabella will be your wife?" Helena asked into the darkness.

"In name only. It will be a convenience, so that we can each follow our hearts. Mine will be with you and hers will be with whomever."

She considered it in silence for a few minutes, "Such an arrangement is not unheard of, I will consider it."

It seemed like no time at all after that, that Barclay brought my washing water.