fter filling Rowena with a comfortingly large second breakfast, the Governess set her to have a morning nap, and went to have Tea with the Old Tutor. She asked him about the Inventor, and whether he had ever been one of the Tutor’s boys, or had any sort of Reputation, and the Tutor brightened.
‘Ah, yes! Young Vartan! Where is my portrait-book…’ he got up from the tea-table and went to root around in his piles and piles of untidy books (though he always seemed to know where every thing was), coming back with an old album and flipping through it until he got to a photograph of a young, wide-eyed dandy all in red, with a long froth of curls of a shade of red that spoke of his fine lineage. ‘Bright and sharp as new paper, young Vartan; never much got the hang of anything social, mind. Why, is something the matter with the Machine?’
‘No, nothing of the sort,’ the Governess said, transfixed by the picture. ‘Doctor Crema recommended him to me…’ and he might have told her he had Royal blood! He was the very image of one of his sisters, a girl nearly as sweet as Rowena, though a little bit loud and exciteable, compared to Rowena, who was so mild that she wilted if you even frowned a little in thought, so eager was she to please… ‘I was not aware Lily and Rosine had a brother…’
‘Ah, well, he had a difficult time—a bit of kerfuffle as happens to royal children, you know. Kidnapping, I believe.’
‘Oh dear.’
‘Oh yes, deuce of a thing getting him straightened out after that. I suggested one of your sisterhood, but the Queen would have none of it. “He’s not a Lady” she said, “for what would he need a Governess?”.’
This was intriguing, and the Governess knew if she just made encouraging little noises, he would rabbit on. She sipped her tea and was attentive.
‘The Queen is a little too traditional at times, I think. I did let him have long hair—well, no harm in that, and he is so nervous. Of course, we aren’t much equipped on nerves, like you are. Brilliant boy, could make anything out of gears and springs. Do you know, he repaired my pocket-watch when he was eleven years old?’
‘My,’ said the Governess, supportively.
He went on like this for the next hour, and the Governess started, gently, being able to steer him into the topic of just why he thought Young Vartan might have needed a Governess, curious, until finally, the Old Tutor said,
‘What would you do, for a charge with a nervous disposition?’
‘I would begin with adding a bit of Calming Tincture to their daily lade,’ she said, thoughtfully. ‘It depends on the type of nerves, really; some girls are flighty, you know, and cannot concentrate on their lessons, or anything else, but in quite an Obstinate way. They require tiring out, and plenty of sunlight. But fluttery girls are simply afraid of being Bad, as though it might happen to them, like catching a Chill; those can be calmed with heavier lades whenever they are beginning to fret, to weigh them down comfortingly, and to remind them often of the great difference between one’s body being weak and one’s will being Obstinate. It is not so bad a fault for a girl to be a little nervous, it makes her eager to please; I suppose a boy with such a temperament has it much harder.’
‘Oh, yes, quite so. I was tempted to try and use the Machine on Vartan before; how he asked me about it! But of course, I didn’t dare do anything so experimental, not on a royal child. Still, he’s achieved a man’s estate now…’ he said thoughtfully, and the suggestion lay heavy in the air between them. The Governess only smiled a little smile that didn’t reach her dark lips, and set her cup and saucer down, pouring herself more tea.
‘I wonder,’ she said, ‘if you have heard of these spider devices?’
‘Oh yes! I’ve got the latest advertisement for one here somewhere… keep meaning to get one…’ he said as he loped around, digging through his desk. ‘Where is it… no, no, that’s from last March… ah! Here we are,’ he said, finding the folded brochure in a stack of post closer to the surface, the paper of polished type, and with two colour printing.
The Governess looked it over carefully. It purported (as most advertisements do) that anybody living without one was struggling unnecessarily with their work—raising up a girl-child, in this case—and promised it was both much more effective and much more convenient than a Machine, and could even make a Governess’ labours easier (it was very careful not to imply it could replace such a creature as a Governess, because one had to be careful not to imply that), by use of “Electrovibratory Stimulation Filaments”, which could do everything from “Excite And Arouse” to “Instantly Dilate and Constrict the Orifices” of the “Nether and Mammary Regions of a Lady of Any Kind”. “Wonderful for Marital Discipline and Training of the Ladywife as Well as the Girl!”
Each phrase was starkly contrasted with Rowena’s sobbing account of the horrible things that her only year of marriage had contained, illustrating—with diagrams—exactly how that Wretched Evil Woman had achieved her Wicked Ends….
‘You look pale as a whiting, my dear,’ the Old Tutor said, ‘whatever is it?’
‘And the Court knew,’ she breathed, ‘they must have known, and—oh, excuse me, I—I must have some air.’
She quit the room, politely but instantly, and went out into the loggia that overlooked the sea, her stomach feeling as churning as the surf below, still clutching the brochure. She forced herself to think of Doctor Crema and his Ladywife, when she read it over again, to think of what he must have used it for. To give his Ladywife a taste for his tastes, no doubt—to perhaps encourage and monitor her milk, he was a doctor after all, and her teats were the largest the Governess had ever seen, constantly producing.
And what would she have done with it, with some of her charges being as difficult as they had been? To be able to finely control the arousal would have been marvellously useful for the more Obstinate girls, who had fought until she could drag them through to the point of developing their Fertility. Some of them had ended up with quite small clitori; if she’d had the ability to make them like the proper course of behaviour….
The sea-air, and this course of thought, calmed her considerably; yes, she decided, the Kindly Doctor was right—there was more Helpfulness in this Sexual Programming and Discipline Electrovibratory Remote device than there was Evil; and any sort of object could be used for Evil, for it was an Evil Person holding it. Even so, she would have to be careful about whether to tell Rowena. Rowena did not know, and breaking the news to her might be upsetting. Better to simply know how the device worked, and learn to use it for its intended purpose. The end of the brochure gave an address to write for more information, and the Governess dashed off an aethergram to them, saying only that she was very interested in an instructional manual of the most thorough sort, and a catalogue that included all models from the past five years.
She returned to the tea-table after that. ‘My apologies,’ she said.
‘Oh, no trouble, no trouble at all! Only you must tell me what had you looking so very ill.’
‘It is—simply something that occurred to me, to do with Rowena.’
‘Ah,’ the Old Tutor said, in a much different voice. ‘Yes, I understand these things can be very sudden.’ He patted her hand in a comforting way. ‘For what it’s worth—not much, I suppose—I think she could ask for no better friend than you.’
‘That is—that is kind of you to say,’ the Governess said, putting her hand over his gratefully. ‘Thank you.’
‘Do you want me to invite Young Vartan here? I think he should greatly like to meet you. He does love his sister Lily. They’re twins, you know.’
‘How singular.’
‘Yes, I thought.’
‘I would be very grateful to meet him, if he is not too busy.’
‘Capital, capital, I shall write him this very moment, then!’