'I really don't know what your concerns are, my dear. The boy will have a very good home, with the prospect of a full-time job in a couple of years if he wants it. And Mrs. Palmer has undertaken to supervise his education, using the Refugee Centre's Correspondence Course. And, above all, she needs the help, up there on that isolated farm. Besides, there are no other options. We can hardly have him here. Not with Stanislous. We just haven't the room.' The Reverend Cyril Grandage pushed himself back in his chair after this deliverance, his fat hands clasped over his fat paunch, and his pouched eyes gleaming, as if in triumph.

Marjorie Grandage gripped her chair and strove to conceal her annoyance. She loathed her husband's smug arrogance but she needed to be careful. She spoke quietly, ' I'm sure you are right, dear. I had thought Niklos could have stayed at the Centre till he had finished his schooling and then come to us. After all, Stanislous may leave us and go elsewhere. His obligation to stay only lasts till his application to remain in the country is approved. And that may be less than six months.'

'Mmm', the Reverend Cyril pursed his fat lips, 'Yes, I see what you mean, my dear. Nice to have all that help around, I suppose. But the decision's been made. And I can hardly put those reasons to the Committee, can I? They would see it as an attempt by us to exploit these people for our own selfish ends.'

Mrs. Grandage, whose reasons for wanting the refugees from the Southern Balkans in her house were entirely selfish, maintained a look of demure innocence as her husband continued,

'And that would never do, would it?' He rose as he spoke, and kissed his wife's proffered cheek. 'Now, I must go. I've got to collect Niklos from the Centre and drive up to the West Riding. Mrs. Palmer's expecting us for lunch. I should be back about five o'clock or just after. What are you up to, my dear?'

'I'll get Stanislous organised with painting the shed and cutting some logs, then I'll sort out the correspondence. I may have a lie down this afternoon. I've not been sleeping too well.' Mrs Grandage, who had slept like a top in the bedroom next to her husband's - an arrangement she had insisted on for over a year now, having professed a need to escape from his snoring - told the lie with such innocence. ' Where is Stanislous now?', she inquired rising from her chair.

'He's been cleaning the car. Shall I send him up when I go?' Reverend Grandage was fussing about, as he always did when he was anxious to be off.

'No', his wife glanced at the clock, ' tell him to start on the logs and to come and see me at eleven o'clock. That will give me time to get things tidied up at least. If I'm not in the study, I'll be upstairs, tell him.'

They exchanged more words as the Reverend got himself into his coat, and then, in the hallway, they pecked each other on the cheek by way of goodbye, Mrs. Grandage not wishing to come to the door in her night-robe.

Her husband gone, Mrs. Grandage moved about her tasks with a self-imposed slowness that belied the excitement coursing along her 40-year-old veins. Having cleared away the breakfast things, she took the correspondence from the letter-rack and set the various letters out on the study table. She sat there for a moment composing a note; through the window she could see Stanislous coming out of the wood-shed with the axe and chopping block and she watched with a quickening pulse as he removed his shirt. Her hand went to her mouth as the light of the morning sun accentuated the rippling muscles of his dark brown skin but, with a firm, fierce resolve, she turned from the window and went upstairs to make the beds and tidy the rooms. By focussing on the tasks in hand she gradually quietened, and by the time she had arranged things in her own bedroom she was more relaxed.

Going to her little bedside table she checked the drawer: everything was there. After a final glance round her room, Mrs Grandage adjusted the Venetian slats until she was satisfied with the dim half-light, then she turned the heating up, slipped out of her robe and left the room.

Before the steam from the filling bath clouded the glass, Mrs. Grandage, now naked, turned to examine her image in the full-length bathroom mirror:

Looking back at her, she saw a slightly plump but shapely woman with largish firm white breasts whose sizable aureoles were surmounted by cherry-pink prominent berry-like nipples. As if concerned by the thought that her breasts might be sagging slightly, Mrs. Grandage cupped and raised them in her slim, well-manicured hands, jiggled them a little, then let go. She smiled as if satisfied with their firmness and examined the rest of her body. Her belly she noted was firm - perhaps a little rounded, but that is considered an asset by some men, she reminded herself. She passed her fingers through the reddish brown thatch of curls at the base of her belly and ran her palm over the hairy protuberance of her mons veneris, stroking lightly the hidden lips that guarded her opening. She resisted the temptation to probe the soft pink interior with a finger, and instead moved her hands to her buttocks.

The mirror was beginning to steam slightly as she swivelled, first one way then another, to examine their soft white mounds. She clasped one in each hand, and at the same time clenched, her bottom cheeks, ' Still firm', she murmured with satisfaction, 'not yet heading South!'

Now she bent forward as far as she could. 'Thank goodness for my Yoga course', she mused as she looked backwards through her spread legs. Her bottom was quite big in proportion to the rest of her, she thought, and she reached back to run her hands over her bum, pulling the cheeks apart to reveal the slightly darker skin below the base of her spine, and the small crinkled pink-brown rose of her anus. Satisfied, Mrs. Grandage stood up, and proceeded to pour various scented additives into the hot soap-bubbled bath water.

Had the Reverend Cyril Grandage looked in on his wife's bedroom - a sanctum he had not entered for several years now except by rare request - he would have been astonished. The heavy curtains were now drawn and the room was lit only by numerous candles and scented oil burners each of them reflected in the several mirrors. A musky air permeated the atmosphere and there was an arousing sense of eroticism such as the Reverend Cyril had never experienced on the few occasions of his visits.

Far more surprising to him would have been the sight of the woman who sat at the dressing table, applying to her lips a dark red lipstick which gave to her a sensuality he had certainly never witnessed.

Mrs Grandage carried out a final appraisal of her features before adjusting the dressing table mirror to an angle she had long before worked out. She stood up and, slipping her feet into high-heeled shoes, tiptoed past the large bed and halted before the full-length mirror to gaze at her image. Her legs were encased in garter-less black stockings which left a goodly expanse of plump white thigh between them and the matching silk French knickers, with their openings at front and rear. The strapless filmy bra which covered so very little of her ripe buxom breasts was cut in such a way as to allow her nipples to protrude.

Mrs. Grandage smiled in satisfaction and ran the pointed tip of her little red tongue over her lips, causing them to glisten, then she reached for her silken red robe.

The clock down in the hall struck eleven, as she now moved to stand facing the door, one hand resting on the brass bed-post. Her heart was beating wildly with excitement and she could feel her breath hot in her throat.

The knock on the bedroom door was firm and commanding, and Mrs. Grandage's voice trembled as she responded,

'P... please come in.' She gripped the metal bed-post even more tightly as she felt her legs turning to jelly.

The door was thrown, rather than pushed, open and she drank in the sight of the man who stood in its opening holding his shirt in one hand:

Naked to the waist, his dark-brown body gleaming with sweat from the exertion of cutting logs for the past two hours, Stanislous Annopoulis stood, all six foot five inches of muscular manliness, appraising the woman whom the world knew as his employer, but who now waited before him, clad only in the flimsiest of clothing, her part-open gown barely concealing her undoubted charms, while the rapid rising and falling of her full round breasts revealed her excitement and arousal.

Mrs Grandage, in turn, surveyed Stanislous from the top of his close-cropped large head to his big bare splayed feet; his wide shoulders and tapering waist; the flare of his hips and his long strong legs, tightly encased in denim jeans whose crotch showed the generous bulge of his manhood.

At first glance the great brown torso seemed hairless, except at his chest, where tight black curls of hair clustered on the prominent hard pectorals, and also where a dark column of hair began at the depression of his navel and disappeared downwards below the waistband of his jeans. Closer examination however, would have revealed a profusion of fine black wiry hair covering his belly and his upper back, as well as his powerful arms. All-in-all, Stanislous Annopoulis was a man who exuded testosterone from every pore.

Slowly he moved into the room and swung the door shut with a flick of a large hand. He moved towards her, then stopped about three feet from where she stood visibly trembling, clutching the bed-post.

'Take it off.' His voice was well-modulated and warm But it was a command. Of that there was no doubt. Mrs. Grandage allowed the silken robe to slip from her shoulders.It slid down and fell in a heap round her feet.

'Come!' Again the command. She stepped slowly across the remaining space between them and stood facing him, eyes averted from his face, as if afraid to meet those burning dark eyes. Her face was on a level with his chest and she could see the little beads of sweat clinging to the black hairs there. She felt she could not breathe.

'Closer', he spoke quietly but no less imperiously. She moved until her nipples were almost brushing his belly and her face so close to him she could see the pores of his skin under the mat of fine body hair. His smell was filling her nostrils and she felt she might faint. A warm wetness pervaded her sex. Desire filled her and she ran her tongue round her parched lips.

'Good', he murmured, ' it is pleasing'. He bent swiftly, grasped her shoulders and thrust her backward from the waist, catching her by surprise. He pulled her bra off with a tug of his teeth, dropped it, and then bit her nipple, causing her to squeal with pain. Then he straightened and, putting a hand under her chin, raised her face toward his, so that she was forced to stand on tiptoe.

Stretched as she was, she was unprepared for the hand plunging between her thighs and grasping her sex. Again she squealed as his thumb pushed between her labia. The silken knickers were torn from her and she stood before him in only her black stockings. Her breath now came in gasping sobs and she would have fallen but for his hold on her.

'Take them off! Now!' He spoke in that same unhurried, deep tone that seemed to disguise a latent power. Hurriedly she bent to obey him and he smacked her bare bottom, twice, hard, with the palm of his huge hand. Tears welled in her eyes and she gave a choking sob.

He grasped her by the elbows and straightened her up. He moved against her, so that her face was pressed into his sweat-soaked chest, while her bare breasts rubbed against his belly. She leaned harder into him, thrusting her hips out and she felt the hardness of his erection on her own belly. She gasped, her mouth open, close against him, and, with each intake of her breath, she sucked in droplets of the moisture that clung to his body hair.