The Ornaments of Love

Chapter Seven

"Do you have any questions? You must always feel free to ask anything you like, no matter how improper you think it to ask. To you, my life shall be an open book, and you will eventually understand that I will insist upon the same courtesy from you. For you see, you will be my teacher as much as I will be yours. So, ask me anything. I know there are things now overwhelming your thoughts, yes?"

Veronica thought for a moment before answering, trying to walk her way through the information without stumbling.

"No, not overwhelming so much as confusing. I want to believe you're a good woman. I know you to be such a good and kind woman, but I still cannot understand why you would have done such a thing with the General, to say nothing of keeping his wife and daughter housed under your very roof."

The Marquesa was finally satisfied the girl would not disappoint her in the end, regardless of the difficulties she now faced.

"Well, there is the pleasure of our relations, of course. Like Don Eduardo, I enjoy the pleasures of the flesh. And he brings me a great deal of pleasure."

Veronica was stumped, utterly and honestly. Pleasures? But then, there seemed to be something hidden behind all of this, some misunderstood truth attempting to reveal itself, a profound secret that she already knew about. "But I don't understand, what pleasures do you mean?"

The girl's words were still on her tongue when it struck Marcelina that she had been mindlessly naive to begin this education with ridiculous assumptions. How could she have ever hoped to carry on this conversation with her sister's child when it was so obvious that the girl did not have the foggiest notion of what sex was, to say nothing of its hold on the mind.

"No, my dear, you should not understand, but I will see to it that you shall soon enough."

The Marquesa rose from the sofa and began to wander about the room. "I'm afraid I must throw you out from the nest before I can continue in your education. You will not truly understand anything I will say to you until you have explored sex for yourself. I can talk forever, but you must have the opportunity to experience the sensation before I am to have any hope of making clear the purpose of my instruction."

She seemed now to speak to herself as if she were alone. "Yes, I think we must do this. It is the best way, I think. It's the only way, I'm afraid."

"I don't understand you at all," Veronica said, agitated by the woman's resolve to exclude her from the discussion at this moment.

And lifting the fog from her eyes, her aunt pierced through the girl's misunderstanding. "You will remember that I am your teacher in this venture, and you will do as I instruct."

Marcelina's tone had altered considerably. She retained her patience but assumed a new attitude of control that Veronica had not heard from the woman before. She was taken by it at once and found that she couldn't help but submit.

Holding her niece in her stare to be certain of their agreement, Marcelina continued. "Tonight, I will make arrangements for you to be alone and in your bed by ten o'clock. At such time, I will have seen to it that a gentleman has been predisposed to assist me in your education. He will arrive at the stroke of eleven, and you will be prepared to accommodate him in any manner that he wishes." The woman was now gentle, though quite serious in her tone. "As you are a virgin, it is in your best interest to see to it by then that you have taken the responsibility of breaking your hymen. I will provide you with the proper instrument to accomplish this."

Again, the girl stared with helpless eyes. "Hymen? Break my hymen? What does that mean?" And it was of no surprise now to Marcelina that the girl hadn't the slightest idea of what this meant either.