The Maestro's Mistress by Angela Dracup Page B

‘Little games are entertaining for a while, but I
think it’s time to stop now.’ He had taken her gently in his arms, terrifying
her with the prospect of a fresh assault on her virginity – for it was as a
virgin that she saw herself after the years of chastity.
    Dr Denton watched her contorted
face. He waited. She wrapped her arms around herself and then, dismissing
Xavier from her mind, embarked on her favourite pastime – taking herself back
to her golden childhood. ‘My mummy and daddy used to say that nothing would
ever harm their little baby,’ she told him. ‘If the cold east wind tried to
touch a hair of her little blonde head they would trap it in a bottle and put
the cork on so tightly it would fizzle away to nothing.’
    Dr Denton believed her. Gradually
over the weeks he had come to the conclusion that Georgiana’s problems lay, not
in dealing with the loss of her baby, but in finally accepting the loss of her
childhood. At first he had thought her eulogizing was some kind of fantasy. But
then the picture began to emerge as the truth. She had never known need or
cruelty, there had been no traumas, no illness or untimely deaths. Home had
been a warm pool of love peopled by parents who made a goddess of her.
    Clearly Georgiana had had a
wonderful time controlling them. Whatever she wanted they had given her:
approval, attention, love. And material goods – oh, lots of material goods.
    The adult Georgiana went about
the world in disguise, presenting herself as an object of beauty and genteel
leisure. Trophy-offspring transformed into trophy-wife. There was no career, no
drudgery of housework, no children.
    Dr Denton considered that
inwardly Georgiana’s passivity concealed a ferocious inner drive. Georgiana was
still the narcissistic baby who had sought control of the world and gained it.
Why should she give it up?
    A job would have been out of the
question. A job would have made demands on her. Moreover Georgiana would only
be happy as the boss. She must control things. But she had neither the maturity
nor the necessary skills to obtain a position as a leader.
    The act of sex would be even more
damaging than a job, far too threatening for her mammoth child’s ego to
withstand. To be penetrated by a powerful man would be deeply painful
psychologically. Maybe physically painful also. And ironically she had chosen
to marry the dynamic, dominating Xavier who would have no intention of being
anything but in full control himself.
    Georgiana would have no way of
understanding that. She would, of course, have regarded the snaring of him as a
great achievement. A beautiful girl gets presents. She gets dolls and clothes
and puppies and diamonds. And when she is old enough she must get a man worthy
of her feminine perfection and prove to other women how superior she is.
    Xavier must have been a real
catch: brilliant, talented, famous and wildly attractive. An international
hero.  Entirely worthy.
    But now Georgiana’s marriage was
faltering as she and Xavier struggled for power and he refused to bow any
longer to the demands of a wife who was a sexual failure and had a
pathologically undeveloped appreciation of the way her fellow human beings
ticked.
    Dr Denton found himself
fascinated. He speculated on the nature of her sexual encounters with Xavier
but she remained stubbornly silent on that subject. ‘Do you want to change?’ he
asked her. ‘As a person?’
    Her eyelids flickered. A slow
smile crept over her face. ‘No – no, not at all.’
    Dr Denton smiled. He doubted she
would ever change. What motivation was there? She truly believed herself
perfect. He imagined her naked, the smooth skin, the elegant bone structure,
the small breasts with rosy nipples. Her buttocks would be soft ellipses; if
she turned her back to him and bent over with her long legs together those
globes would form a perfect heart.
    His pulse quickened. As the light
on his tape recorder winked and Georgiana’s voice chimed in the