“No, no, I told you,” Mother insisted, “You are the reverend’s child, that’s why you read so eagerly, have such devotion to duty Geoffrey, why you are so unlike my husband.”
“Oh my lord,” I gasped, “Oh god!”
Suddenly a wave of compassion spread over me, twenty and more years of a loveless marriage while her husband fornicated his fill, suddenly mother’s demeanour became plain to me, the frustration of an old maid with no outlet it was at once both clear and sad. Xnx Father was fond of sampling maidens, droit de signeur they called it, and the lord of the manor, or his heir apparent, which father had been hitherto, might lawfully lie with any maiden who came of age and wished to marry, he might sample her, enter her into the joys of marriage gently in a soft bed was the intent, but father more
