Chapter 22

The Good of the Country

Lindiwe

2067

There were some days that Lindiwe dreaded more than others. Most days were bad enough. She almost wished she'd never got used to the relative sanctuary of life at the Reigate Refugee Centre now she'd had to leave it behind. The crackdown on illegal immigration subsequent on the General Election resulted in Lindiwe and most other employees of the Reigate Refugee Centre being forced to resign and find employment elsewhere.

But what employment was there for a young African woman where her legal status wasn't an issue? It could only be a profession exactly like the one in which she was currently engaged.

Lindiwe stood outside the rear entrance of a grand old house in the securely guarded avenues of Reigate South Park. Only clients like the gentleman she was about to see had benefited at all from the lack of opportunities for more conventional employment whose inevitable result was less expensive and more widely available sexual services.

Sir Eric Esterhazy was a regular client of Empire Cleaning Services, Lindiwe's employer, and consequently one that she couldn't afford to disappoint. He was also the client that Lindiwe least enjoyed having to visit, even though he was one of her most frequent clients. He always requested her by her business name, Ebony, rather than the name with which she'd been christened. Lindiwe often contemplated exercising her option of refusing to go, but Empire Cleaning Services could easily find someone else to replace her and it wasn't as if they could ignore the specific requests of a Knight of the Realm, even if he was now only a backbench MP. Lindiwe suspected that the reason Sir Eric was so insistent on her services rather than those of Laura, Ivory or Onyx was precisely because she so evidently hated both him and his sexual predilections.

Lindiwe was a busy woman. She might have to provide services to as many as a dozen clients in a single day. Fortunately, not all clients were as demanding as Sir Eric. Many simply required oral or manual relief. Although these services weren't especially enjoyable for Lindiwe, she could generally complete the job within a quarter of an hour. As a general rule Lindiwe preferred repeat custom. This wasn't because her existing clients were in any way better than the rest of humanity, but because they were all known quantities. She knew what to expect and normally there were very few surprises.

Prostitution was still illegal, of course. Successive governments had tightened legislation against the trade at exactly the same rate as economic circumstances compelled ever more women were to take it up. The result of this was that women like Lindiwe were even more vulnerable to the predations of clients who had no respect for her. Lindiwe was almost a prisoner of Empire Cleaning Services as a result of the draconian penalties imposed on illegal immigrants, although she was grateful that her employer's business practices were actually rather more ethical than many entirely legal enterprises. If she was working in one of the countless sweatshops in Central London, she'd have to work for very long hours and never get more remuneration than food to eat and a mattress to sleep on. It was ironic that the employment practices Lindiwe knew from Africa had migrated into the country along with much of the continent's population.

Empire Cleaning Services advertised itself as a cleaning company. Its advertisements openly promoted the house-cleaning aspect of the services provided by its employees. If a client actually did want one of the women employed by the company to do nothing else than vacuum-clean, dust and polish, this was a service that would no doubt be provided with great relief. It would be a relatively expensive service, however, given that the minimum hourly rate for the advertised services was more than enough to cover the weekly wage of most cleaning maids.

The uniform Lindiwe wore was more appropriate for a maid than for a prostitute—or at least for those prostitutes that frequented Holmesdale Road and Bell Street. It might be noted that high-heels weren't especially practical for pushing a vacuum cleaner around the house and that stockings weren't very suitable for kneeling down on the kitchen floor with a scrubbing brush, but such detail was sufficiently subtle for Lindiwe to pursue her trade without fear of arrest. The dark green nylon outfit was almost utilitarian. She looked almost like a nurse, which was ironic given that Lindiwe wore no such uniform when she did work as one at the Reigate Refugee Centre.

Sir Eric was very old. If it hadn't been for the miracles of medicine and erectile enhancement drugs, the worst Lindiwe might have suffered would be a bathing in urine and possibly a severe spanking. Unfortunately for her, the knight was so well medicated that Lindiwe was fully occupied for the whole span of her two or three hour appointment. Before she left, she would need to shower and apply makeup to remove the traces of semen, spit and urine from her face and body. Such cleanliness was expected. It was as much in Sir Eric's interest as it was for Lindiwe's dignity. The employees of a cleaning service company, even one as expensive as Ebony, wouldn't normally be expected to leave the client's home with semen dripping down her chin or have mascara smeared all over the face. And Sir Eric wouldn't want either his neighbours or his constituents to know what he did for amusement.