Chapter 2: Art for Art's Sake

Corky dreamed he was drowning.

He was falling endlessly amid seashells and salt water, the irresistible suction of the current, the distant cries of the seabirds. Strange corals slowly undulated about him. He was being swallowed up whole, he was drinking in the wine-dark fluid. He struggled against the many-tendrilled grip of the waves, but his frantic movements only sank him deeper in to the water's soft embrace.

He felt the oceans smooth, warm thighs sliding against his face, He felt the hot mouth of the current gliding along his aching member. He gave up all struggle. He surrendered to the ancient rhythm of the waters, drifted down to the ocean's soft bed, and there he gave up his last breath and died.

He woke with a start, his heart pounding. Morning sun was streaming in through the lace curtains of this room, this almost-familiar room.

With another jolt, as bad as his waking, it came back-the locked door, the divan, the succubus Mrs. Dalrymple and her curious daughters, the awful pleasure she had ruthlessly extracted from him. And this was the room, the room he had looked at.

Without knocking, Mrs. Dalrymple strode in, carrying a tray. "Ah, William, I see you're awake," she said brightly. "I brought you some tea."

Corky hurriedly turned on his side, lest she notice the prominence in his coverlet. Calm as you please, she seated herself on the bed, and began to pour tea into one of the two floral porcelain cups on the tray. "I trust you slept well?" she asked.

"I... what... how did I get here?" Corky stammered.

"Well, you must have been quite exhausted from your travels last night. After you fell asleep, the girls helped me put you to bed in your new room. Isn't it lovely? East-facing windows make a room so cheery, don't you find?"

"I fell asleep in the middle of, of, of being violated!?"

Was that an actual blush that stole across the widow's delicate features? "Well, when you were indulging me last night (a task for which you show impressive aptitude, might I add), I waxed rather enthusiastic, and was less attendant to your air supply than I might have been."

"You asphyxiated me? With your... nether parts?"

"It seems altogether possible. On the other hand," the widow continued, brightening substantially and stirring a lump of sugar into her tea, "you did spend in Beatrice's hand at roughly the same moment, so perhaps you collapsed from a surfeit of enjoyment."

She sipped her tea in silence, while Corky attempted to collect himself. "Beatrice was delighted, of course," she continued politely. "It was quite a copious emission for the second in a single hour."

Once again, conversation faltered. She indicated a small plate on the tray. "I also brought toast and jam, you'll notice, and it shan't stay warm forever."

"So, I suppose I'm to be your prisoner now," Corky said glumly.

"Prisoner? Whatever do you mean?" Mrs. Dalrymple poured a second cup of tea.

"Well, you can't very well let me go," said Corky, "for fear I'd report you."

Mrs. Dalrymple handed him a teacup, which he took without thinking. "Consider this carefully, William," she urged him. "What would you report me for."

"Well, for, for, for rape, I suppose," the student exclaimed uncertainly, and took a sip of his tea.

Mrs. Dalrymple nodded for him to go on.

"I'll, I'll, I'll say that you locked me in your sitting room. And that you forced me onto your divan. Or rather, that your daughters did. And that you, you opened my trousers, and performed an unnatural act. On me. With your mouth!"

Mrs. Dalrymple merely nodded again.

Corky took up a piece of toast, and began buttering it morosely. "They won't believe me, will they?"

Her eyes twinkled. "I'm afraid the local constabulary is not renowned for their imaginative capacity."

"Then I'm free to go?"

She drained her cup, then leaned over and kissed his cheek. "William, dear, you are not just free, you are encouraged. If you are going to be sulking all day about last night's entertainment, I certainly do'n't want you doing it here."

She stood and brushed off her skirts. "I believe your first class is in half an hour, so I'd advise you to look sharp about setting out. Here is your key to the front door. I've sent for your luggage from the hotel, the carriage should be here momentarily. Supper is at eight."

She paused in the doorway. "Oh, and I promised Maggie she could sit for you this afternoon. Is six o'clock acceptable?"

He opened his mouth. Then he closed it. Whatever was happening to him was happening terribly fast.

"Splendid! I'll see you at supper."

Corky's day passed in a daze. He appeared on time in the appointed studios, took notes on the appropriate lectures (later he found the notes to contain a curious sprinkling of shocking language), but his mind was entirely elsewhere.

As he walked back to the boarding house, he attempted to gather his wits and formulate a plan. If possible, he would sneak into his room, seize his luggage, and make a quick getaway. If necessary, he would confront the un-natural Dalrymple women and make it plain that he had no intention of remaining a victim of their perverse machinations.

He considered hailing a coach to whisk him away and make good his escape, but he realized that this was unnecessary; once he attained the street with his belongings, his landlady's hold on him was broken. She couldn't very well publicly haul him back into her house after all.

He approached the house and opened the front door with infinite caution. Someone was playing the pianoforte in the sitting room. He tiptoed up the heavily-carpeted central staircase, and crept along the upstairs hallway, but a creaking floorboard betrayed him, and from an adjacent room shot Maggie Dalrymple like an arrow. Her embrace staggered him backwards as she gushed, "Mother says you're going to paint me today! She says I'm to sit for you. That sounds delightful!"

She put out her arm to be escorted, and Corky, not knowing what else to do, started to walk her toward his room. "Did you do any 'figure studies' at the University today, Mr. Brandywine?"

Corky strained to remember what had happened that day. "In painting class, we did, er, still lives."

"But you said that the model has to be still anyway."

"No, no, no! Still lives are when we paint apples, skulls, water vases. Studies of light and shadow, you know. Development of color-sense."

"Why that sounds dreadfully dull!" exclaimed Maggie. "Personally I should much rather paint an unclad person! One so rarely sees those about, whereas I see quite enough apples and vases in my day-to-day life." She grinned flirtatiously. "Don't you think painting me shall be much more fun than apples and skulls?"

They were standing at the door of his room now.

"Well, I was thinking that today we would just do some charcoal sketches. At six," Corky said, and attempted to slip into his room. Too quickly to prevent, she pressed herself through the door beside him, and, in a moment uncomfortably reminiscent of last night, shut the door behind herself with an audible click.

"Charcoal sketches?" she pouted, "Will you need me to be nude for those?"

"Oh, goodness no!" Corky exclaimed. "We'll do some facial studies, some, ah, some work with drapery, er, some studies of light-"

"-and shadow," she finished for him. "Are you certain," she said, leaning in close, "that it wouldn't be helpful for me to undress?"

"Oh, abso-"

"Because, I do'n't mind. I mean, after all, it's for art."

Corky tried to back away, but found that his heels were against the foot of the bed.

She pressed his hands in hers and continued: "Some girls might be shy about being all alone with man, completely naked," (she shivered with delight at the forbidden word) "utterly at the mercy of his desires, her soft bare flesh exposed to his relentless gaze, her tender white limbs defenseless against the incursions of his fierce, marauding hands.

"But I know that there is nothing indecent about the human body when it is displayed for a truly high-minded purpose. And I have perfect faith that you are a gentleman, Mr. Brandywine." She paused and bit her full lower lip, her freckled cheeks flushed with emotion

"I, I, I. Thank you. For your faith." said Corky. "At six, then!" he said, with the best simulation of enthusiasm he could muster.

She reached up and kissed him on the cheek. "At six!" she cried, and dashed out the door.

Corky sat down heavily and mopped his brow. "What am I going to do?" he murmured to himself desperately. His insolent pego had a suggestion ready. However, well knowing the irreparable harm to physical health and moral fibre that self-abuse exacts, he struggled to ignore his rebellious organ's demands.

"Think, Brandywine, think!" he muttered to to himself, kneading his forehead with one hand. "If I try to make it out of here with my luggage, I shall raise such a commotion that Miss Dalrymple will be on me in a flash. The only thing for it, then, is to do her portrait, and then make my getaway before supper.

"So, I have until six to plan my escape. The front stairs wo'n't do-is there a back way out?"

Corky left his room and crept down the hallway. He soon found himself in a narrow ill-lit wooden stairwell-presumably intended for servant's access. It led to a similarly close and dingy ground-floor hallway. Eventually, he selected a door at random and opened it.

The door opened onto the parlor, where Beatrice looked up in alarm and slammed shut shut the book she was reading. She sprang from the sofa, her face flushed. "Mr. Brandywine!" She cast about for what to say next. "How were your classes?"

"They proceeded quite well," Corky said cautiously, poised to run if the girl should spring at him and attempt to bring him down.

There was silence for a moment. "Did you find your walk to the University agreeable?" she ventured.

"Oh, quite," he assured her, as he tried desperately to remember the walk so as to provide some corroborating detail. "The weather was, was, was... drizzly."

"Ah."

"Well, I'm terribly sorry," he said, backing for the door through which he had entered. "I interrupted your reading, Miss Dalrymple. I should allow you to continue."

She started guiltily. "Reading? Oh, no-I was just pausing a moment in practicing the pianoforte. But, yes, I should go back to doing that."

"Well, good day, Miss Dalrymple."

"Good day, Mr. Brandywine."

As he closed the door, she sat down at the piano bench, and began to play. Her halting and uncertain melody followed him as he set out once again to find an egress. After forays into the kitchen (mercifully empty) and two linen closets, he located an unused back door. For a moment, freedom beckoned, but he needed to have his luggage. What would his parents say if he lost all the fine clothes they had bought him for his education? He turned about to return.

In his room once more he paced by the fire. It was entirely possible, he mused, that Maggie would attempt to seduce him during their posing session. If any such thing occured, he resolved, he would be gentlemanly, but firm, and, if necessary would show her the door before the conclusion of the sitting.

He imagined her gazing deeply into his eyes, her soft arms twined around his neck. He imagined her pleading words as she begged him for a single kiss, a brief embrace. But no, he would tell her, not unkindly, not only his own purity but hers as well was at stake. Reminded of her maidenly duty by his example, she would reform her ways, forsake the path of her debauched mother, modeling herself thereafter upon her demure and ladylike sister instead.