Chapter 11: Tiera

The next time the old madam sent for me was an entirely different matter. "There is in the city," she said, looking very cross, "a young woman I want you to go see, to recruit if possible. She is, I am told, second only to Mrs. Loring in the female pecking order."

"A whore?" I asked, trying not to sound hopeful.

She nodded. "Courtesan is the word they like." She snorted derisively.

"Why, Madam? We've got good contacts now."

"She evidently knows all the nabobs, the high mucky-mucks. She's Welsh, I think, perhaps she's a Scot. Her name is," she picked up a note, "Tiera, did you ever hear such a thing, Tiera Mac-something-or-other. Here's her address; a description of her home really. She certainly lives well, this one." She handed the paper to me. "Go see her; talk to her; convince her if you can, threaten if need be; she may be very valuable to the cause. Money won't do it, I'm told. They call the silver slut, say her cunny is a mint and her arse a crown jewel."

I nodded and stood, smiling at the old woman's casual crudity.

"Take this seriously, you big ape," the madam said, "it will be dangerous, but I think it is important or I would not send you."

The brick house was in a part of town untouched by the fire and stood behind an ornate wooden fence. The place looked somehow prosperous, well kept while many other homes in the area appeared deserted and dingy. It also looked empty from the street, windows shuttered, and I wondered if I was in the right place or if the woman had moved. In the back was a carriage house, a tidy stable and a brick privy. The black stable man, who was mucking out stalls, said he did not think anyone was "t'home."

I knocked at the back door and when no one responded, entered by using my bayonet as a pry tool and stood still, listening, ready to explain myself. Not a sound reached me. It was late afternoon with the sun settled down in the almost-leafless trees. I roamed the well-furnished rooms, read a few book titles, examined a couple of prints, rummaged through a small desk and found the place deserted so I mounted the carpeted stairs and ensconced myself in the biggest and fanciest bedroom with a bottle of wine, some sausage and a hunk of bread, pulled off my boots, stretched out on a comfortable chaise and waited, not quite relaxed but accepting the opportunity for rest. When you soldier for a living, you never miss a chance to rest, piss, roger or eat.

Halfway through the claret with the sun setting, I must have fallen asleep. I awoke when I was kicked in the thigh and looked up at a lovely tow-head who was standing with her hands on her sleek hips, grinning down at me, her face painted scarlet by the sun's last rays. Her tumbled hair, neatly disarrayed I am sure and dangling in long curlicues, was nearly colorless and her eyes were the palest of blues, nearly transparent thought I.

She had a lean body that would make a saint weep, an open invitation to carnal pleasure displayed in a violet sacque dress obviously built just for her, bejeweled and made of the richest brocade and silk, with a V-pointed bodice aimed right at her belly. Her petticoat was big enough to be a tent for a half-dozen men and she stood with her feet well apart and a curious smile on her lovely face. Her globular breasts, at last half free of her dress's neckline, rose and fell steadily.

"Miss," I said, nodding to her and getting my feet to the floor, "good-day t'you." I did my best to lay in a bit of a northcountry twang, a Scottish sound I hoped.

"Who the 'ell are you?" she asked sharply, "an' wot the 'ell are you doin' in my room, in my house f'that matter, drinking my wine, dirtying my furniture?"

I reached up, held her chin and kissed her sweetly. "Cousin," I said with a smile, as I peered down the front of her tight-fitting dress at a fine pair of barely restrained orbs, "you told me to visit when I was in the city. Don't you remember."

She frowned up at me. "I'd recall anybody big n'ugly as you, y'smelly yahoo. You better get out a'here 'fore I sic the dogs on ye."

"I'm hurt. I bathed and shaved just before I came, really I did." I put a hand on her raised hip, pulled her toward me and took another brief kiss, sliding my hand down over her firm buttock to pull her a bit higher. "And I didn't note any dogs out there, just old Charlie."

"Stop that," she said, pushing on my chest with both hands. "Wot the hell are you doin'?"

"I want to talk to you," I said, dropping the accent. "It's important. I think you are in some danger."

"I will be if I don' change," she said as her forehead wrinkled. "I've a big an' important rout tonight an' I'm near fagged out now." She swirled away from me, seemingly talking more to herself, as I held her hips. "Did a pair of randy cavalry types this afternoon, showoff braggarts they were."

She wiggled free of my groping hands and began unhooking the flat front of her fancy dress as if I did not exist. "You can stay here until I get back. Be quiet. I will be late. You've got my curiosity up and running." She rose on her toes and gave me a kiss and a quick lick with the tip of her tongue. Then she slapped my cheek and cried, "Marie, get in here!"

A black maid hurried in and helped the white-haired girl change her clothes into a flowing gown of some gossamer stuff that was cut almost to her waist, barely hung across her upright breasts and exposed almost all of her spine and the rise of her butt; the French style, I later learned. She pulled a transparent golden shawl about her shoulders, pirouetted and smiled and me and then hurried off without a word, clamping gold bracelets to her thin wrists and sliding her feet into golden slippers. The maid hung up the discarded clothes and ignored me steadily. I wondered where she had been hiding.

"Good master is she?" I asked, having resumed my comfortable seat.

"I'm free," the black woman said. "Ain' got no massa nowadays, mistress neither."

"Sorry," I said quickly.

"She fair, that one; crazy I think, but fair. You be nice to her."

"Can I get something to eat?" I asked her, and she beckoned. I followed her down and sat at a plain table in the shed-roofed kitchen and shared her cold meal and cider. We talked some, but I learned little so I retreated to the fancy bedroom and made myself comfortable, turning up a lamp when the light completely faded and reading the thick novel I found on the small table by the big bed. It was a romance of the worst sort filled with sentences hundreds of words long which described actions between the sexes I thought banned by all civilizations.

I finally shucked off my britches after hearing the clock chime two and crawled under her counterpane with just my shirt on. It was a fine and comfortable, high-canopied bed with a thick mattress that raised it nearly four feet from the floor. After sleeping on the ground and in cold cellars, I was in heaven, rejected any doubts I might have had, routed out a hip hole and slept soundly, my knife within easy reach beneath my pillow.

I woke when the girl crawled in beside me.

"Make yourself right at home, why don'cha," she hissed. "Such nerve."

"Um," I said, tumescent but not overly eager.

"Goodnight," she said, turning away from me and rubbing her buttocks against mine. I dropped back to sleep, warm and happy, barely aware of the smell and warmth of her.

She woke me with an elbow in the ribs in a softly pink dawn. "You snore like a damn'd sawmill," she whispered, "an' there's something goin' on down twixt your legs I don' want to even think about."

I raised my knees so the tenting would not be so obvious and smiled at her well aware of my fierce erection rising above my belly, but hesitant to push my luck, I pressed it down. My ram leapt steadily, pulsing with my heartbeat, rubbing alongside my leg. I put a fingers to my stones and found them hard and swollen. She tossed the covers back and gasped, hand to her mouth. She was wearing what appeared to be a man's dress shirt with long puffy sleeves and flapping ties hanging loosely at her neck. It barely covered her privates and since it was unbuttoned and the shoulder seams were halfway down her arms, it fully displayed her fine boobs with their pink and pointed tips.

"I can take care of that," she said. "Won't take but a minute, and we can get back to sleep."

"That thing stays hard a long time," I told her.

She grinned at me wolfishly, pushed my legs flat, put a hand on my belly and got up on her hands and knees, bending to examine my morning erection as if it were some sort of natural phenomena. She poked it with a fingertip and glanced back at me. "That's the worse thing I ever saw," she said, "an' I've seen a few."

She opened her mouth, licked her lips and then took my prong's huge, purple head between her lips, twisted herself about and licked at the sensitive area on its underside just beneath the ridge. I closed my eyes and made some sort of noise, and she started to hum, vibrating her lips on my raging member, grasping it firmly at its thick and hairy base. She ran her fingernails up and down the ridged stalk, massaged the head with her flicking tongue and then grabbed my stones and gently squeezed. I could not help myself and came, groaning and pumping as her cheeks caved in with her sucking and swallowing, and she steadily scratched with one hand and held my balls with the other, pressing gently, watching me from the corner of her eye.

When she was sure I was done, she flopped down beside me. "Good morning," she said, licking the stickiness from her lips. I kissed her and cupped one lush breast, pushing her loose-fitting shirt from her rounded shoulder. "I haven't slept with a man for some time. Who are you?" she asked quietly, leaning away and pulling up her nightshirt.

I told her my name, said I was in the Maryland Line, and that a good woman, who suspected she might be in danger, had sent me to see her.

"Did you plan on putting that, that foul post into me?" She flicked the limp, tubular thing that lay athwart my belly, still blood-filled and pulsing. I barely felt it.

I smiled at her, and turned toward her, feeling my prod warming again and rising toward her navel. "Up to you," I said. "You were awful nice to it just now. I never had that kind of treatment," lied I.

"Such a story, a lie with a latchet. I'm hungry," she said. "I worked hard last night, made fifty quid I expect. You can be patient now, I'm sure." She picked up the tiny bell on her bedside table the shook it. Nothing. She looked at me, puzzled, and I handed her the small clapper I had removed and put on the floor near the top leg on my side. She fixed and rang the bell with an odd look on her face, a sort of puzzled amusement. Nothing seemed to surprise her. I lay on my side so my growing need would not be so obvious.

The same maid appeared, ignored me, and nodded herself from the room after the girl told her to bring us a big breakfast; eggs, ham and everything she had in the kitchen. "I have to feed this mule," she said as the servant departed.