To Dress With Spirit free porn video

TO DRESS WITH SPIRIT "You know the locals say it's haunted," said my quirky friend Elena as we turned into the long carriage drive which led to the country house hotel in which I'd gained an internship. Her eyes were laughing as she said this, and I pinched her arm jokingly. "Pull the other one." We were both too worldly and rational to believe in ghosts. I'd heard the rumours about the hotel when I talked to people about the internship opportunity, and of course I'd dismissed them as a louche PR stunt. But Elena had been in the trade for a few years now, and knew more about the hotels in the region than I did. She assured me that the rumours had been flying about for decades. Despite them, or perhaps because of them, the hotel had gone from strength to strength in the twenty years or so since it had opened. The restaurant was beginning to attract national - and perhaps even international - attention. So Elena had been approving about my choice of employer, although she'd cautioned me that the work would be frenetic. I'd applied for the internship without much hope. The hotel trade was far from buoyant at the time, and few were hiring. But I'd graduated from catering college with good grades and a glowing reference, and I needed hard experience in a restaurant kitchen as the proper launch pad for my chosen career. Still, the upmarket restaurant in the hotel was widely rumoured to be close to gaining a Michelin star, and I felt lucky to have been accepted. The hotel itself had formerly been a rather grand country house. It was still owned by the descendants of the aristocratic family who had built the house two centuries earlier, but to cope with the rising costs of upkeep, they had transformed it into a money-spinning business. The building itself was U-shaped - an imposing frontage flanked by two longish wings - and spread over four main storeys. The main entrance was in the centre of the frontage, and the spacious reception area was flanked by the restaurant on the left and a lounge and bar on the right. Above them were four function rooms, let out to companies for conferences and seminars, and then on the next two floors four expensive suites. The arms of the U - the north-west and south-east wings - had also been converted for the most part into hotel rooms. The family and the senior staff lived in apartments which had been constructed in a converted stables block to the rear of the house, and the live-in staff, of which I was to be one, had bedrooms in the attic of the main building. The kitchen and store-rooms were in the basement below the dining room and bar; the basements below the wings were occupied by a spa, a gym, and a swimming pool. I was greeted by Georgina Devrus, a member of the family which owned the house, who proved to be a skinny, rather striking woman of about forty. She had dark hair styled in a long, rather severe bob, a prominent nose, fine bone structure, and thin lips which she had decorated with scarlet lip gloss. Her most striking features were her piercing blue eyes, emphasized by dark eyeliner and thick mascara. But her mobile, expressive face - she had a way of exposing her small, sharp teeth when she spoke - and her jerky movements created an impression of nervousness which, I was to discover, belied her true, strong character. Georgina showed me to my room which proved to be a large airy L-shaped room, with an en suite bathroom taking up the corner space between the main frontage of the building and one of the arms of the L. Opposite the bathroom was a pink door evidently leading to another room and for a few moments I had fantasies about having my own sitting room, but on closer inspection this second door turned out to be locked. My room contained a bed, an easy chair, and a desk, with a large, heavy wardrobe made of dark wood, and a chest of drawers which together would provide ample space for my meagre collection of clothes (two sets of chef's whites, a few pairs of jeans, a couple of smarter pairs of trousers, some shirts, sweaters and T-shirts, the usual underwear and socks, and a suit which had seen better days). The heavy wooden furniture gave the room a rather old-fashioned air, and this impression was not dispelled by the decor. The walls were covered with 1960s-style anaglypta wallpaper, painted pink; there was a patterned carpet in shades of grey and gold, and the bed was covered with a pink candlewick bedspread rather than a duvet. Brass brackets held wall lights, and a tasselled, fabric light shade covered the central light fitting. The curtains were cream-coloured with an old gold paisley pattern. The room was clean and the walls looked as though they had been repainted recently, but the room, although comfortable, was not, I felt, a friendly one. There were no pictures or ornaments of any kind. After unpacking, I went downstairs for an interview with the Chef, an Italian by the name of Lorenzo. My duties, it seemed, would initially consist of chopping vegetables, ensuring supplies of ingredients were available when needed, and perhaps preparing stocks and the bases for sauces. More experienced members of the team were responsible for the actual preparation and cooking of meats and vegetables, and the Chef oversaw the preparation of sauces and garnishes, tasted them, and supervised the assembly and presentation of finished dishes. As in most kitchens, the issue requiring the closest attention was the complexity of ensuring that dishes were ready on time and in sequence so that servings for all members of a table appeared simultaneously. The team members operated an eight-day shift pattern: two days? morning shift; two full days; two days? evening shift; and two days off. The symmetry of this shift pattern enabled the Chef to ensure that the kitchen was always fully complemented, and although the two full days? work were undoubtedly arduous (often involving frantic 14-hour sessions of continuous work), there was at least time for us to rest and recuperate. I spent the afternoon and evening in the kitchen observing the rhythm of the work, and preparing myself for my first active shift the following day. The other consequence of the elastic shift pattern was that the kitchen required an unusually large staff, and this generous staffing structure was reflected in the prices the hotel charged. Many of the team (including waiting and bar staff as well as kitchen staff) lived in, and occupied rooms on the same floor as me. Some of the rooms were tiny ? scarcely more than cupboards: my corner room was, as Georgina had assured me, quite a bit larger than most of the others. At about midnight, rather than queue for the tiny staff lift, I climbed the six flights of stairs from the basement to my bedroom, realising as I did so that I would need to maintain a high level of fitness to cope with both the stairs and the pace of work in the kitchen. The corridors were quiet ? most other team members had either gone to bed, or were still occupied closing up the kitchen and restaurant. I opened the door ? which to my surprise was unlocked, although I distinctly remembered having locked it before going down to the kitchen ? and looked around what was to be my living space for the next few months. The lights, I noticed, were dim giving the room a rather gloomy atmosphere, which had the effect of making the ceiling seem lower and the walls more sombre than before. The vibrant pink I had observed earlier in the day now seemed to be transformed into a darker, brooding colour which was obscurely unsettling. The impression was heightened by a draught from the window which gently moved the curtains, so that the orange car park lights made shifting patterns on the walls. I powered up my laptop to check my emails (there were no new ones) and, finding it impossible to settle down with a book, washed, undressed, and shivering slightly, slipped between the cold sheets. Sleep took some time to come ? I was disturbed by noise. Some sounds ? footfalls and closing doors in the corridors, half-heard snatches of conversation ? were familiar; others were obscure and more difficult to identify. I thought I could hear the sound of soft, rapid breathing coming from somewhere close by, but could not identify the source. When sleep did eventually come, it was restless and shallow, disturbed by vivid dreams which, however, I found impossible to remember on waking. I did not feel rested when I rose next morning. The next few days saw a process of learning and acclimatisation. The kitchen was busy and our Italian Chef was (like most chefs) aggressive in his management style and intolerant of poor performance. Dishes had to emerge in perfect condition like clockwork, and woe betide the staff member who allowed three dishes to stand cooling whilst the fourth dish for the same table was being frantically plated up. My own duties while apparently mundane, still attracted Chef?s attention. Ingredients had to be prepared in great number, in the right order, and in good time to allow the more senior chefs to keep perform to Lorenzo?s tightly- controlled schedules. And although I became quite adept at this, and drew some grudging praise for my preparation of stocks and sauce ingredients, I was the butt of Lorenzo?s sharp tongue sufficiently frequently to keep me on my toes. I developed some easy relationships with the other staff, including Peter, a talented pastry cook, Mike, one of the sous-chefs, and Pauline Devrus, a young member of the owner?s family who was doing a stint in the kitchen in preparation for moving into management. She was, she said, expected to gain experience in all the elements of running the hotel ? from cleaning and maintenance, through waitressing and room service, to reception and book-keeping, so that when the time came for her to move into a more responsible position, she would take decisions on the basis of a solid understanding of the hotel?s functioning. She and I quickly developed a rapport which helped me cope with the emotional turmoil of working in a stressed environment, and made it easier for me to settle into the hectic routine of my job. I learned a little about the hotel and its eccentric owners. The Devrus family had inherited the house in the 1940s from the eighth earl of Avonford, who had died without direct male heirs during the second world war. Robert Devrus ? the original inheritor ? had gambled away much of the family fortune, and had sold off much of the farmland which surrounded the house, and which had provided most of the income. It was his son Stephen who had hit on the idea of converting the manor into a country house hotel to generate the income needed to support the remaining estate, and the hotel was now run in turn by his son, another Robert who was still running the business despite being at least eighty years old. Georgina was Robert?s son by his third wife, and another daughter by Robert?s first wife ? Arabella, who was much older than Georgina ? was also involved in the day to day running of the establishment. Robert was not a hands-on manager, and mainly managed the marketing strategy and finances. Pauline was a niece of Georgina and Arabella by a brother who now lived abroad in Europe. I came to derive quiet satisfaction with my work as my skills developed, and I formed good and mutually supportive relationships with the other kitchen staff. By the end of my first week there, I was at ease in the kitchen and reasonably confident about my place there. But other elements of my life seemed to be going awry. In particular, I found myself increasingly uneasy in my pink bedroom. The room faced south east and the mansard window let in little light at the best of times, so the evenings were gloomy and oppressive. Sudden draughts rattled the old sash windows and disturbed the curtains, and occasionally blew papers of my desk. The breezes made strange noises in the eaves, and I also thought I heard the sound of voices from nearby ? a kind of excited, anxious chattering that was too quiet to enable me to distinguish the words. And then there were the dreams ? vivid, disturbing dreams that interrupted my sleep and left me the next day (because unlike the dreams I?d had on my first night in the room, they started to remain vivid in my memory) anxiously contemplating their meaning. For the first few nights, I had the kind of anxiety dreams I?d had before ? finding myself walking naked through a shopping centre and attracting attention and ridicule; or embarrassing myself by foolish behaviour in front of my friends. But as the week wore on, I found myself dreaming of odd, involuntary transformations that even in my dreaming state I struggled to understand. I would be wearing outlandish outfits ? PVC, leather, lace, ribbons, straps, and buckles, often feminine in character ? in the most unlikely and inappropriate dream locations encountering authority figures, or friends, relatives and others whose liking and respect I craved but failed to secure. I would be walking through a church or my old college wearing a skimpy dress or an indescribable, gauzy garment that left nothing to the imagination; or attending a job interview to find, in mid-interview, that my suit had transformed itself into a sparkly jumpsuit, and my brogues into a pair of stilettos. I would wake up, cringing with embarrassment, hardly daring to believe that what I?d experienced was a dream, and it would take quite a time for reality to settle gently on me. But the oddest thing was that these dreams ? however disturbing, however cringe-making ? left me in a state of sexual arousal no matter how great my dream-imagined humiliation. I would awake in a state of combined dread and excitement that I could neither account for nor wholly dispel. And I began to feel that there was someone nearby who knew exactly what I had dreamed and exactly how I felt about it, and that this person was watching over me in a state of satisfied amusement. I was being toyed with and I didn?t like it. After a particularly restless night, I decided to speak to Polly (as Pauline Devrus liked to be called). Without going into the more egregious details of my fantasy humiliations, I told her about my disturbed sleep and the anxiety it created. She frowned and looked thoughtful for a while. "We haven?t used that room for a while. For some reason, people ? men in particular ? never seem to settle in it. I wonder why Georgina put you there." "The only room that was free, I think. And she thought she was doing me a favour because the room?s supposed to be bigger than the other attic rooms." "Perhaps you should have a word with Arabella." Arabella, as I?ve said, was the other half of the day to day management team. While Georgina managed the public-facing elements of the hotel (room and restaurant bookings, reception, waiting staff, bar), Arabella was responsible for the backroom jobs ? furnishings, decoration, the cleaning contract, and the management of the kitchen (it was she who had interviewed me, along with Lorenzo, when I?d originally applied for the internship). I struggled to understand why she?d have a special insight into the allocation of bedrooms, and said so. "It?s not the allocation of rooms, it?s the history of that particular room," said Polly obscurely. But when I pressed her about what she meant, she wouldn?t elaborate. "Arabella will talk to you," she repeated. I sighed and returned to my work before retiring, exhausted, to bed (I was on evening shift that day). As had become usual, my sleep was restless and on this night disturbed by a particularly vivid dream. I found myself opening the locked internal door of my room and venturing into the space beyond where I found myself looking into dark, obscure alcoves pushing aside heavy velvet curtains to find out what was stored there. For some reason, it was excruciatingly urgent that I did so, and yet however hard I pushed, I could not move the curtains aside to see what was behind them. And then I awoke, breathless with a rapidly beating heart, to find myself standing before the pink-painted door, with a long, old-fashioned hatpin in my hand. The door was ajar, although it had definitely been locked before I went to bed. For a moment, I struggled to understand. In my dream, I had managed to unlock the door using an improbable pin- like key, not in fact dissimilar in appearance from sharp hat-pin I was holding in my hand. But the pin was not a key and could not possibly have been used as one. Unless I had used it to pick the lock. I had never picked a lock before, and had not the slightest idea how to do it. But the more I thought, the more I became convinced that that was the only possible explanation, however improbable. Could it have been something in my dream which had guided me? But if so what? I tried to put aside these panicky thoughts and entered the mysterious room to see what it contained. It was a long, narrow north-east facing room with a floor to ceiling window. Along one side was a continuous sequence of built-in wardrobes with sliding, mirrored doors from floor to ceiling. A dressing table was positioned on the opposite side of the room from the wardrobes between the window and the door. There was an easy chair on the other side of the door. The wardrobes, when I opened them, unsurprisingly contained clothes. But what clothes they were! Dresses, skirts, blouses in all styles ? the colours vibrant, the fabrics sumptuous. My initial glance took in silks, satins, velvet, crepe, leather, suede, and PVC. There were bright spring colours ? emerald greens and pinks ? with brighter summer colours, together with the blacks, reds, and purples of evening wear. A curiosity was the vintage ? or should that be vintages? ? of the clothes. The left hand wardrobe contained styles seemingly from the 1960s and 70s ? short skirts, flares, a lot of denim and cheesecloth and the kind of artificial fibres that had long since disappeared from the catwalks (if they had ever appeared there at all). There were smocks, jackets with huge lapels, short dresses in bright geometrical patterns, and blouses with extravagant pointed or rounded collars. But as I progressed rightwards towards the picture window, the styles became more modern ? jumpsuits and padded shoulders from the 1980s, leggings and tight jeans from more recent years, and tulip skirts and peplum dresses. As I delved more deeply into this trove, I saw that the wardrobes all had integrated drawers containing tops, lingerie, hosiery, and a few pullovers. Shoe racks sported an array of footwear with a predominance of high heels and pointed or narrow-fitting toes. This sequence was interrupted only by three pairs of clogs from the 1960s, and some platform boots from both the 1970s and the most recent decade. But who could they belong to? Polly was not old enough to have a wardrobe dating from the last century (never mind the 1960s), and neither Georgina nor Arabella would be young enough to carry off the more extravagant modern styles with aplomb. Disturbed by these mysteries, I returned to bed. Surprisingly, I feel asleep quickly and slept peacefully and (so far as I remembered) dreamlessly for the rest of the night. So far, nothing had come of Polly?s suggestion that I should talk to Arabella, and I reminded her of it during the day when we were both working in the kitchen. I was panicky and unsettled and made an uncharacteristic mess of chopping, slicing, and mixing and earned a deserved reprimand from Chef. But worse was to come. It was after midnight when I crawled, tired and irritable, up the stairs to my room and fell into bed. I would, I thought, enjoy the sleep of the just that night. But again, the dreams came to me. Disturbing, incoherent, somehow threatening. Difficult to remember afterwards. And then I was awoken suddenly by a sharp pain in my groin, and discovered to my horror that I had once more sleepwalked into the now unlocked dressing room. Standing naked before the mirrors I was startled ? terrified might be a better word ? to see an unfolded cut-throat razor in my right hand, and a spot of blood at the base of my penis where I had evidently nicked it. With an incoherent yell, I tried to fling the blade away from me, but succeded only in dropping it on the floor, where it narrowly missed impaling itself in my right foot. Severely shaken, panting, frightened, and whimpering at the discomfort in my groin, I backed out of the room and closed the door. I thought of locking it, but realised I had no key, and my ability to unpick the lock (if that was the right term) would be non-existent. I placed a wooden chair in front of the door, thinking perhaps that if I sleepwalked again, I would trip over the door and wake myself before I had time to enter the dressing room and do myself more harm. I tackled Polly first thing in the morning, and she rang Arabella to tell her what had happened to me, before taking me by the arm and steering me across to the stables block to the rear of the north-west wing of the hotel where the offices and family apartments were located. Arabella was very different from her niece Georgina. Whereas Georgina was all sharp business suits and expensive grooming, Arabella had the throwaway style of the English landed classes. Older than Georgina (I?d put her in her early sixties) she was tall, slim-bordering-on-skinny, and undefinably elegant. She favoured a long-legged look, choosing leggings and slim trousers rather than skirts, and tops that were either hip-length and tunic-like, or short and closely fitting, perhaps tucked into her trousers. She moved with the ease and grace of a much younger woman, and her skin, although carrying the characteristic lines of age around her eyes and mouth, was smooth and taut. She had a strong jawline, a long, slim neck, and a chin without a trace of jowls or surplus flesh. Her abundant long hair was iron grey in colour, but extravagantly styled in tiny, tight waves. In contrast to Georgina, her blue eyes were full of laughter, and she had a mocking way of grinning at you while you talked which nevertheless, somehow, managed to put you at your ease. This morning, however, she was anxious and full of concern. As Polly repeated what I?d told her, and I added some more details, she nodded with understanding, and when we had finished, she sat silent for a minute or two, apparently lost in thought. "It?ll be Jackie," she said at last. Polly sighed, as if expecting this answer. "Jackie was Arabella?s twin," she said. "She was born John, but thought of herself as a girl. She more or less committed suicide ? oh ? it must be fifty years ago now. Well before I was born. Arabella thinks her spirit is still with us, here in this house." She looked across at Arabella, who gave a nod of agreement. "Jackie started presenting ? that?s the word we would use today, but we had very different language in the sixties ? as a girl when she was about ten. Our parents were horrified. By the time she was a teenager, she was talking about having an operation to change sex ? we used the term sex change rather than gender reassignment in those days ? but our parents were completely opposed to the idea and wouldn?t do anything to help Jackie. In any case, the NHS didn?t really go in for that kind of thing then. You had to travel to places like Switzerland or Morocco for surgery, which cost a lot of money, so mum and dad could just refuse to pay for it. Eventually, John ? Jackie ? became desperate and slightly unhinged, and took the matter into her own hands. She cut off her penis with dad?s cutthroat razor ? it must have been agony." Arabella hesitated, looking at the floor, her eyes moist. "The wound became infected and Jackie developed sepsis. She died a fortnight later." I absorbed this awful story. Horrified, I wondered what this could possibly have to do with me. "You?re in her old bedroom," said Polly. "And it?s Jackie that lured you into her dressing room," added Arabella. "I think she still lives there." She glanced across at a sceptical- looking Polly. I was aghast. I didn?t believe in ghosts ? I really didn?t. But how to explain the picking of the lock, the dreams, and the episode with the razor? Was it the same blade Jackie had used to mutilate herself? And then another thought struck me. "What about the clothes? Lots of them look as if they must have been bought after Jackie died ? some of them quite recently?" Arabella hesitated. "I know the kind of styles Jackie would have wanted to wear if she?d lived. And sometimes, when I see something in a shop or on-line, I know that Jackie wants me to buy it for her." Polly snorted. I understood why: it was one thing to believe in ghosts, but quite another to buy clothes for them. "No, really. I just know when something has taken her fancy. And she?s insistent, you know. There?s no way I can say ?no? when she?s told me what she wants." This was ridiculous, I thought. But Arabella?s belief was evidently firm and unshakable. And for the time being, I decided not to challenge her. There were more immediate, practical issues to deal with. I was genuinely worried that the saga of the previous night would repeat itself, and that this time I?d fail to wake up before I did myself serious harm. "But why me?" I still didn?t understand. "What?s happening to me? Are you saying that you think she means me harm because I?ve been given her bedroom?" "No, I don?t think so," said Arabella cautiously. She hesitated for a moment, choosing her words with care. "I do think she?s trying to speak to you, to communicate with you, but hasn?t quite worked out how to. I think that explains the dreams, and it also accounts for the lock- picking. But I?m guessing she?s trying so hard to make contact with you because she sees you as a kindred spirit." "I...what??" I had no idea where this was leading, or what Arabella meant by a kindred spirit, and she refused to elaborate when I tried to worm more information out of her. But she insisted that she understood Jackie?s state of mind, and was quite adamant that Jackie meant me no harm. "There won?t be a repetition of the razor incident." I wondered aloud what I should do, but Arabella refused to be drawn on that question either. The one piece of advice she had was that I shouldn?t try to move to a different bedroom. "I do think that would offend Jackie. She means well towards you: you don?t want to upset her." We talked in circles for a while, but it became evident that Arabella had said all she was going to. Her belief in Jackie?s spiritual existence was absolute. And although I made attempts to steer the conversation into what I thought was a more rational course, she couldn?t or wouldn?t accept any alternative explanation for the events of the previous nights. So after a while, Polly and I walked back to the hotel, deep in thought. "What do you think," I asked. "Do you believe there?s a ghost in my room?" Polly didn?t answer at once. She scuffed the gravel with her boot and looked away. And then, choosing her words carefully, she said, "I don?t know. I don?t think so. Maybe you heard the rumours about ghosts and your mind was inventing stories around the idea. But I do know that Arabella was devastated by Jackie?s death. She?s got this belief that she can somehow atone for it by indulging her by buying her things she wants ? or things Arabella imagines she wants ? with some idea of making her happy wherever she is now." I absorbed this information in silence. I could see how the stories I?d heard, and the slightly creepy room I?d been allocated could have fed my imagination. But I still didn?t see how ? even if it was the power of suggestion that had made me sleepwalk ? I could have somehow acquired the technique to pick the lock out of thin air. I shook my head in confusion. Polly and I carried on talking around the subject for quite a while, but we failed to come up with any new ideas about what had happened to me. And after a while, I stopped trying to look for new explanations. I mentally filed the whole thing under "unexplained", and vowed to put the thought of Jackie?s ghost from my mind. But when I said this to Polly, she was cautious. "I don?t really believe in ghosts either ? I told you that ? but something spooky is going on. I think you should try to think of what Jackie would want and try to do it. If we?re both wrong and there is some kind of presence in your room, she needs to be kept sweet. And even if we?re both right ? well, it can?t do any actual harm, can it?" And with that we parted. I made my way to the kitchen, where I worked the mid-day shift in a state of mental turmoil. I didn?t actually knock over the stockpot, or chop my fingers off while tackling an onion, but I was preoccupied and moody, which didn?t fail to attract attention. Fortunately, it was quite a quiet shift, but Lorenzo looked at me with concern bordering on irritation, and one of the sous-chefs told me off when I failed to produce the ingredients for a garnish on time. At the end of the shift, I retreated gratefully to my room, lay down on the bed, and lost myself in thought. If Jackie was there, what did she want? There must be some reason why she had prompted me to break into her dressing room, but what could it be? And why had Arabella described me as Jackie?s kindred spirit? What did that mean and how could she know? Could she communicate in some way with Jackie? She had described her as "insistent" ? but what was it that she insisted on? Would she want something from me, and if so what? I turned to my laptop and started researching ghosts, but to little avail. The true believers brooked no doubts, and the sceptics had plausible non-ghostly explanations for reported hauntings. I tried opening blogs and chatrooms, but when I got a reaction at all, it was either glib nonsense, abusive reactions from spiritualists and their fellow-travellers, or unhelpful impossible-to-believe ideas about how I could communicate with my ghostly companion. One woman who described herself as a medium offered to visit me and help me establish what she called a fruitful relationship with Jackie (so desperate was I that I almost accepted); another promised to exorcise the ghost if I paid a substantial sum into a bank account in Croatia. Evening came and I slammed my laptop shut in frustration. I needed to get out of my room, but there were few options. I could walk the three miles into the village (there was no bus service in the evenings), but apart from a couple of not very interesting pubs, there was nothing to do there. The nearest large town ? Avonford ? was too far away and the public transport connections were in any case poor. There was a staff room in the basement, next to the kitchen, and I went there to eat, but I found myself unable to strike up a conversation with any of my fellow workers. And Polly, who might have helped, was working the evening shift, so I couldn?t talk to her. In the end I threw myself onto my bed and dozed. And then the dreams came back ? the themes much the same, but somehow more peaceful. I found myself in the dressing room, positively wanting to experiment with Jackie?s collection of designer outfits, a warm glow of contentment surrounding me. In my dream, I reached out and pulled a hanger from the rail, holding a dress in front of me, and smoothing down the silky fabric against my torso. The material caressed my naked skin, and I found myself shivering with anticipation. And then I woke up, penis erect, and found myself standing in front of an open wardrobe. I was not at all surprised. ++++++ The thing about the next few hours was how natural it all seemed. I searched in Jackie?s drawers and found some underwear, including what seemed to be a well-worn padded bra, and some tights, which I slipped into. The movements were natural, almost familiar. I was drawn to a short, close-fitting dress in the 1960s section of the wardrobe, quite possibly one which Jackie herself had once worn. Had she directed me towards it? It was made of some kind of artificial fibre which must have been fashionable half a century ago, with a swirly pattern in purple, cream, and a kind of rust colour, with a V-neck and long sleeves. I unzipped it, stepped into it, and with some difficulty fastened it again (I was not used to rear zips). I found some shoes ? strappy, black slingbacks with a low heel ? and put them on, fastening the buckles with care to avoid snagging the unfamiliar tights. I sat down at the dressing table and took stock. I was quite smooth- skinned and youthful-looking, and wore my light coloured hair ? not quite brown, not quite blonde: one of those difficult colours to describe ? shoulder length (I had to wear a hair-net in the kitchen). I had little or no facial hair ? something I?d found embarrassing at times in the past, but which now seemed suited to the role I seemed to be adopting. On the table in front of me was a tray containing various items of make- up, which looked to have been recently purchased. I picked through them, and then started to experiment with them. Applying the various products seemed to come quite naturally to me, and I chose a foundation which suited my pale skin tone, added a hint of colour to my cheekbones, and then set about my eyes and lips. In the spirit of the sixties, I used quite a lot of glittery purple eye shadow which I thought would complement the colours of the dress, together with heavy eyeliner and a generous application of mascara. I chose a bright pink lipstick, which again I felt to be in the spirit of the age. The result at first sight was competent-bordering-on-professional, although the colours were, I felt, a little on the garish side. Nonetheless, I was pleased with the result, and once more surprised by how easily the techniques had come to me, almost as if somebody had been directing my movements. But as I examined my appearance more closely, I became more critical. The 1960s colouring did nothing for my complexion; the dress itself was not well suited to the shape of my body (not helped by the fact that the old-fashioned padded bra sat uneasily against my chest, so that the dress hung badly and developed creases and folds that should not have been there); the geometric pattern distracted the eye, and the low- heeled shoes looked clumpy on my feet; the material of the dress, which contained a high proportion of artificial fibres, was scratchy and uncomfortable. I nervously rubbed an eye with my right hand, and then shook my head in irritation as I realised that I?d smudged my make-up. I?d have to look out for that, I thought, and then started as I realised that I?d suggested to myself that I?d be doing this again. Surely that was out of the question? And yet, and yet. Somehow, despite the flawed presentation, a surge of some obscure longing had been released by the image I saw. Despite the fact that I felt that the effect of the was unsatisfactory, there was something liberating, something powerful, raw, and sexy about the clothes, and I was intrigued ? compellingly so ? by the results of my transgressive behaviour: behaviour that would appal my parents, shock my close friends, and potentially (I thought) attract disdain and perhaps even hostility from any strangers I passed in the street. "Passed in the street"! Where did that thought come from? But as soon as the phrase had formed in my mind, I knew that it had to be so. The 1960s look I had chosen looked out of date rather than retro (still less "vintage"), and scrutinising my appearance in the mirror with a jaundiced eye, I could not strike a convincing, relaxed pose. But despite this awkwardness, the idea of successfully carrying off the challenge of appearing in public as a female sent a deliciously terrifying shiver through me. In short, I had been hooked. I stood for a while contemplating my reflection, and could not but help notice the outline of a robust erection (I had not tried to conceal or tuck away my penis) spoiling the line of my snugly fitting dress. And even as I began to divest myself of my borrowed garments, I found myself sliding open other doors to survey the racks behind them, removing hangers and examining outfits, wondering to myself which styles from which epochs might suit me best. I would, I knew, want to return for more of the same later. ++++++ The following morning found me in the kitchen talking to Polly as she prepared some puff pastry ? a laborious, repetitive task which involved folding and rolling and re-rolling dough, interleaved with unfeasible quantities of butter. I was chopping herbs for use in the sauces Lorenzo was so proud of, and for which he was the recipient of much acclaim from food critics ("beautifully balanced flavours", "robustly, but not excessively seasoned", "velvet-like texture", and so on). I?d been telling Polly about my experience the previous night, sotto voce (although I needn?t have bothered, since in the raucous, frenetic environment of the kitchen nobody else was likely to be listening to us). I?d explained the strange compulsion which had drawn me to the dressing room, and the feeling that I was being driven to adorn myself in Jackie?s clothes and make-up by some kind of unseen presence. "And how did you feel about it afterwards?" I shrugged. There had, undoubtedly, been an illicit excitement, a thrill that I couldn?t really explain; but at the same time elements of the experience had been unsatisfactory: the scratchy, old-fashioned fabric, and the unsatisfactory padded bra. "Mm," said Polly, "I think the technology has improved since 1969. And I expect you?ll find outfits that are more comfortable and more enticing." I wasn?t sure about this. What exactly did Polly mean by "enticing"? There was an assumption there, which she was surely not entitled to make, that I?d be repeating my experiment. For a moment, I rebelled against the thought. And yet I?d had the feeling the previous night that there was more and better to come, that something was telling me that this was what I was born for. "Oh, you?ll do it again," said Polly in response to my evident scepticism. It wasn?t a question. I shrugged again. Perhaps Polly had over-interpreted the look that I?d given her but I wasn?t about to contradict her, because I couldn?t. "This thing that?s egging you on ? let?s call it Jackie, because we have to give it some kind of label ? is it there all the time?" "I?m not sure. It?s not always speaking to me. But I don?t think it ever completely goes away." Polly turned over the pastry she was working on. "I?ll have a word with Arabella," she said. "She might be able to help." I wasn?t sure about this. And in any case, what help could she give? I voiced my doubts. "And I don?t really know if I want her to know..." "Silly," said Polly. "She?ll know already. Jackie will have told her." I looked at her open mouthed, my herbs forgotten for the moment. "I thought you didn?t believe in ghosts." "I don?t know about ghosts," Polly shook her head, "and it may be some kind of auto-suggestion, some trick of memory or false memory that?s bringing a shared kind of empathy between you and Jackie. But whether it?s a ghost or some kind of psychological phenomenon there?s something that?s created a mental bond between you and Arabella and the memory of Jackie." The idea was absurd, of course; but on the other hand, there seemed to be no rational, plausible alternative explanation. Finding I had nothing useful to say, I returned to my work, and Polly folded her now- completed sheets of pastry. She looked at me before carrying them over to one of the commis chefs. "Jackie will be back," she said. ++++++ I never knew whether Polly had a conversation with Arabella, but a couple of days later I found a paper on the floor of my room. A computer print-out had been pushed under my door. It was the record of a purchase of a session at an establishment named "Tina?s Dressing Agency", bearing a company logo showing the stylised image of a glamorously-dressed girl, and the slogan "Unleash Your Inner Woman" printed in elaborate, cursive lettering beneath. Somebody had scribbled in blue biro, ?A car will pick you up at 11 am on Saturday?. The next few days passed peacefully enough. The compulsion which had seized me in the preceding days seemed to fade, and Jackie seemed to be quiet. The meaning of the message about the booking was clear enough, and the mysterious presence infesting my room ? whether or not I chose to think of her as Jackie ? was perhaps biding her time to see what happened. Meanwhile, I found myself in a state of nervous anticipation ? an unsettling feeling that intensified as the week progressed. When Saturday came, I felt apprehensive, on edge, eager, and stimulated all at the same time. Not quite knowing how to prepare for the appointment (it never occurred to me not to take it up), I dressed in a sober pair of dark jeans and a plain T-shirt. I decided to take nothing with me other than some cash and my mobile phone, so that when the car ? driven by a uniformed chauffeur ? arrived, I was but lightly laden. I was dropped off outside what looked like a shop in the warren of streets south of Oxford Street in central London. "My colleague will pick you up at six," said the Chauffeur. I shot him an enquiring look. "Miss Devrus was insistent that you should be collected by a female driver," he said, before driving off. I stood uncertainly on the pavement. It took a moment or two before I summoned the resolve to approach the door in front of me. The entrance to the shop did not look inviting. The door was closed and locked, and the view through both the window and glass doorway were obscured. The glass was covered by a pinkish-brown coating, on which was the same stylised image of a sharply-dressed young woman as had appeared on the printout with my booking. A metal plate next to the entryphone proclaimed that the name of the establishment was indeed Tina?s Dressing Agency. The bright gleam of the plate hinted at regular and diligent polishing, and the carefully extravagant, cursive lettering of the inscription obscurely signalled flamboyant femininity. I buzzed myself in. I was greeted by an elegant, attractive middle aged woman wearing a dark blue shirt-dress clinched at the waist by a broad elastic belt; the outfit reminded me reassuringly of an old-fashioned nurse?s uniform. She shook my hand ? hers was soft and moist ? smiled, and introduced herself as the eponymous Tina. "Welcome. You?ll be Arabella?s prot?g?." I nodded. "A newbie? Arabella generally sends us beginners." Usually? A dozen questions came to mind, but I simply nodded. Tina must have seen my bewildered expression, and continued, "Arabella?s been involved with us from the beginning: one of the first investors in the business, and still one of the biggest. And you?ll be about the third or fourth clients she?s sent us." I thought for a moment. Jackie?s death must have had a profound effect on Arabella, and I could imagine her looking for a way of preventing the tragedy repeating itself in other, vulnerable young men. Perhaps she saw the establishment of a dressing agency as a way of helping conflicted young men struggling with their identities at a time before gender fluidity was properly understood. But the reference to previous clients? Had other members of the hotel?s staff been housed in the room which was now mine, and had similar experiences? Perhaps Jackie wasn?t just a figment of an over-active imagination. Perhaps there was a presence of some sort in the room. Or maybe Arabella had found her prot?g?s elsewhere, through a counsellor or some kind of support group. When I thought about it, I realised I didn?t really know what motivated her. Perhaps after Jackie?s death she had seen Tina?s agency and its work as an outlet for her grief, a way of atoning for the tragedy. But before I could reflect on this further, I was ushered into a room where two attendants waited ? both reassuringly down to earth, middle- aged women, unglamorous, practical, and friendly. Their task was to introduce me to the finer arts of dressing ? breast forms, foundation garments, concealment ? and to help me select an outfit. I find it difficult to describe the next hour or so without embarrassment ? my fumblings and uncertainties contrasting with my helpers? direct and down to earth approach ? and I will not attempt to do so. Suffice it to say that after an hour or so I was wearing, as well as a full set of foundation garments and lingerie, a taupe-coloured dress of flimsy, clingy fabric with bat-wing sleeves and a short tight skirt, its wide neckline exposing the points of my shoulders. My legs were clad in black, seamed stockings, and knee-length boots. But as I examined myself in a full-length mirror, I still deemed my appearance unsatisfactory: the absence of make-up made my face seem pale and somehow plain, and my lank, dark-blonde hair ? shoulder length, but too fine and lifeless ? seemed quite lacking in style. Help was, however, at hand, for I was steered out of the dressing room into what to all intents and purposes was a beauty salon. Here, I was taken in hand by an impossibly tall, willowy blonde with improbably long fingernails, wearing a shiny silver-coloured jumpsuit. The voice was rich and deep, and the hands, though skilled and gentle, were a little on the large side, and I wondered idly whether this was another (another!) T-girl. I never did find out. Imelda ? for that was the unlikely name she used ? discussed my hairstyle with me (or rather, she told me what she was going to do). My hair was trimmed and layered ? to give it more body, explained Imelda ? and strands wrapped in packets of silver foil which, she explained, contained a product which would give it pale highlights. My ears were pierced and fitted with gold studs, at the cost of some temporary discomfort. And then, while my hair was setting and drying, she gave me a manicure, painting my nails a deep, dark red, and then a facial before making me up with dark lips, smoky eyes, and a hint of colour to highlight my cheekbones. And then came eyeliner, mascara, and some careful re-shaping of the eyebrows. And now the transformation was complete and successful. My hair, curving inwards below my jawline, seemed glossier and fuller, rippling pleasingly as I moved my head from side to side to get a better view in the mirror before me; my make-up created an entirely feminine effect, no less successful because of its striking flamboyance; and my movements, as I pirouetted before the glass, were natural and fluid. The heels of my boots ? improbably high and narrow ? emphasised the feminine gait I adopted, and the flimsy material of the dress I was wearing clung to my new curves enticingly. I felt impossibly sexy. Imelda was fulsome in her compliments ? "You?re a natural," she said. But perhaps she said that to all her clients. She explained that I had almost three hours before I would be picked up ? I was a little surprised to see it was already mid-afternoon ? and would I like to relax in the lounge or did I want to go out for a walk or to do some shopping. "The lounge," I said. A walk, fully dressed for the first time, and by myself to boot, seemed for the moment a step too far. "And when do I need to change back?" I asked. "You don?t." Imelda smiled. "Ms.Devrus has paid for your outfit, and she was quite explicit that you should return in it." I swallowed nervously. Again, I had a dozen questions, but Imelda hurried me out of her salon. "I have another client waiting. The lounge is just there, to your left at the end of the corridor." I walked nervously down the corridor and pushed open the door indicated. I found myself in a richly decorated room, with easy chairs, footstools, and coffee tables scattered artfully across the room. Some might have found the ochre and maroon walls, and the mock Empire-style furnishings a little vulgar, but to me they seemed in keeping with the spirit of the place. A slim woman ? well, someone with the appearance of a woman ? with a mass of blonde hair piled on top of her head was sitting to my left as I opened the door, and she glanced at me, smiling. I returned the smile, and she beckoned me to join her. I walked self-consciously across the room, and sat at right angles to her beside a low table covered with magazines. The only other occupants of the room were three youngish T-girls, boisterous, giggly, and not wholly convincing. My new companion, who seemed glad of my presence (had the three youngsters been making fun of her?), was wearing an emerald-green dress fashioned from a glossy green ? almost metallic ? fabric with tight, three-quarter length sleeves, a round neck, and a short hemline. Her lips and nails were pink, and her eyelids green, a shade darker than her dress. She sat back in her chair, relaxed but elegantly poised, holding a glass of white wine in her right hand. We exchanged pleasantries. The three T-girls on the other side of the room continued to gossip and giggle, whispering between themselves. I felt sure that they were making unflattering comments about my outfit, and shifted in my seat, turning away from them, and trying not to listen. My new friend ? she introduced herself as Jenny ? indicated a drinks cupboard to my right, and feeling that my morale needed a boost, I poured myself a shot of vodka, trying to ignore the fact that it was scarcely past three in the afternoon. When Jenny had introduced herself, I had failed to respond - not out of unfriendliness, but because the need to identify a feminine name simply hadn?t occurred to me. I realised, as I scrabbled mentally for something sensible to say, that there were aspects of my transformation that I hadn?t thought through. My real name ? Philip ? didn?t at first seem to lend itself to reinvention in female form, and for some reason I decided I didn?t want just to pick a name at random. Eventually the name Pippa suggested itself to me. This, I decided, was a shortened and more attractive form of Philippa, which had always seemed ? to me at any rate ? rather an ungainly name, and so from that moment on, Pippa I became. "Nice outfit." We were engaged in the usual fencing of the just-met, struggling to find commonplace things to say which might move the conversation on. "Thanks," I replied. "They?ve found a stunning dress for you too." "This old thing," said Jenny with a dismissive gesture, "I?ve had it for years." I must have looked puzzled, because she continued, "I almost always wear my own clothes here. Really, I just come here to be pampered. And for the shopping of course." "The shopping?" "Oxford Street. Just around the corner. You should never miss an opportunity for a bit of retail therapy." Jenny took a sip of her wine, sat back, and looked me in the eye. "I?m off in five minutes. Want to keep me company?" I wasn?t sure about this. My nerves were still a-jangle with new sensations, and the idea of trekking into the busy streets filled me with anxiety. Moreover, the morning had been a chilly one, and I had no coat or jacket to wear. But when I voiced this objection, Jenny directed me to a closet in the corner of the room. "There are some things you can try in there if you decide to come out. Tina puts them there for clients to borrow if they want to go for a walk." They say curiosity killed the cat, and once Jenny had pointed it out to me, I couldn?t stop myself from looking to see what was in the closet. I found a rack of half a dozen coats and jackets of differing styles and sizes. I pulled out an aubergine-coloured PVC raincoat, unbelted and fastened with a kind of metal hook-and-hoop arrangement, and slithered into it. It fitted me pretty well, and I thought it complemented the outfit I was wearing. I left the coat unbuttoned, turned up the collar, and plunged my hands into the deep side pockets, turning this way and that in front of the full-length wall mirror to gauge the effect. I was conscious of the eyes of the three T-girls following my movements. Somehow I felt, having put on the coat, the option of staying behind while Jenny went out had been closed. The expectant glances of the three other occupants of the room signalled that the climb-down would be all the more humiliating (and it occurred to me that being left alone with them might not be the best way of spending the afternoon). Jenny was pulling on an expensive-looking Burberry trench coat, and having done so, made for the door gesturing me to follow. I swallowed hard, walked behind her into the corridor, and then we both left the building through the front door into the street. I felt as if I was walking on air or through treacle, suspended a few inches above the surface of the pavement. Nervousness made me stumble awkwardly, and for a while I had to concentrate on trying to walk naturally, tightly gripping the strap of the shoulder bag I?d been given as if by that action I?d be able to support my stumbling gait. The feeling of unreality subsided only slowly, to be replaced by a more acute anxiety as we left the quiet streets around Tina?s agency, and walked towards Bond Street and South Molton Street. As we started to encounter more people, I had the constant sensation of pairs of eyes looking at me, assessing, judging. Some of my nervousness must have conveyed itself to Jenny, because she attempted to reassure me with a stream of light, gossipy conversation, and when I eventually voiced my anxiety she tried to be reassuring. "What," she asked, "is the worst thing that could happen?" Well, my over-active mind could think of a number of possibilities from ridicule to physical attack, but Jenny brusquely dismissed these worries. "It?s not going to happen. As far as the rest of the world is concerned, we?re just two attractive people out shopping." But I noticed that she used the word "people" rather than "women". Jenny was an active and enthusiastic shopper. We dipped into one high- end boutique after another, and she was adept at finding pieces that she thought would suit her. I was constantly being asked for an opinion, but although she would hold a garment in front of her, judging its likely effect in a mirror, she was her own fiercest critic: "I couldn?t carry that off with my skin tone"; "I couldn?t wear that in any of my local haunts". But once or twice, she found something that she wanted to try, and I found myself being shepherded into changing rooms and hauled before mirrors after trying on some new garment myself ? because, of course, I needed a reason to accompany her. I tried a little black dress, and a chestnut-coloured skirt-suit outfit in one shop, and was reluctantly pleased with the effect, but one look at the price labels decided me against buying either of them. Jenny, however, had accumulated a couple of designer carrier bags by the time we approached Oxford Street and turned towards Selfridges. Once or twice Jenny called attention to my reflection in shop windows, complementing me on my appearance, and making small suggestions about my look. Once I?d overcome my initial terrors, I settled into the rhythm of walking along the crowded streets quite naturally. My heels were not a problem ? again, I seemed to have the facility of long practice, although it was of course the first time I?d worn such high heels ? and I developed the facility of anticipating the movements of people walking towards me and swerving away from them without awkwardness. Jenny also gave me little tutorials on presenting myself naturally. She told me not to try to heighten the pitch of my voice, but simply to speak with gentle modulation; she also talked to me about ways of standing and sitting without drawing the wrong sort of attention to myself. And while most of these ideas had already seemed to have occurred to me spontaneously ? Jackie again? ? it was good to be able to talk about them with a kindred spirit. My confidence grew as the afternoon drew on. Jenny steered me through Selfridges, where she had several favoured concessions. Here needs here were more functional ? underwear and tights ? but after a while we found ourselves in a department selling coats and jackets and bags. And here Jenny insisted that I try on something that I could wear on my way home since, she observed, she knew I had no coat with me. "Miss Devrus would certainly not want you to come home without a jacket." I gave her a sharp look. I hadn?t mentioned Arabella to Jenny, and although Tina and Imelda had been aware of who had made my booking, I didn?t expect them to gossip about it with other customers. Was Jenny part of Arabella?s scheme? I guessed she had to be. Had this entire shopping trip been contrived by Arabella as a means of introducing me not so gently to the challenges of the outside world, and what was the relationship between Arabella and Jenny? And what other surprises did Arabella have in store? But Jenny was speaking to an assistant, who removed a jacket from one of the racks next to us. It was black, in beautiful soft leather, fastened biker style, with more zips on the pockets and at the cuffs. The assistant held it out to me: I was, it seemed, to try it on. The fit was good and the look offered a nice contrast between the street style of the leather and the careless elegance of the taupe-coloured dress. Jenny and the assistant made admiring noises. The price was high, but not prohibitively so, and I allowed myself to be persuaded to buy. My salary as an intern was not large, but I?d had little to spend it on in the weeks I?d been living at the hotel, so I reconciled myself to the expenditure without too much difficulty. And, as my trophy was carefully folded and packed into a yellow Selfridges bag, it did give me a little thrill to make my first purchase as Pippa. The purchase made, Jenny decided we had to head back. "You?re to leave at six, I think." Again, she seemed to know all about my arrangements for the afternoon. I looked at my phone. It was already after half- past five. We would have to hurry back to Tina?s. When we arrived, a car was already idling outside the shop, from which Tina had emerged to talk to the driver. This turned out to be a tall, slim woman of about 40, wearing a maroon uniform consisting of narrow trousers, a double-breasted jacket with brass buttons fastened almost to the shoulder, with the jacket collar turned up. Her dark hair was cut short, and she wore no make-up. Dark glasses and a peaked cap completed the look. As we approached, Tina nodded to her, seemingly confirming my identity, and the chauffeuse opened the rear door of the limousine and motioned me in. I hurriedly shuffled myself out of the PVC coat I was still wearing and handed it to Tina. Smiling, Jenny kissed me on the cheek. Somehow, there was no time for extended goodbyes, and as the car pulled off, I felt I was leaving with my dialogue with Jenny still incomplete. A dozen questions I might have asked her flooded my mind, but it was too late. Traffic was heavy in London, and the journey back to the hotel took us until mid-evening. The driver was not very conversational, but she complemented me on my makeover, as she called it, and I wondered whether she, too, was in on Arabella?s plans. But she gave no further sign of this, and our desultory chats on the journey home were limited to mundane things like the weather and the scenery. When we were a mile or two from the hotel, she used her hands-free phone to advise Arabella that we?d be back in a few minutes. The car pulled up to the main entrance of the hotel, rather than the side entrance for staff, and I manoeuvred myself out. I?d managed to pull on my new jacket during the journey, and the driver removed a bag from the boot with my male clothes in it (I guess Tina must have given it to her before I arrived back from our shopping trip, for which I was grateful since I?d completely forgotten about my possessions). Polly was waiting for me on the steps, and she steered me into the bar, where Arabella was waiting. This was unusual ? kitchen and waiting staff were not encouraged to use the bars and restaurant ? but it seemed that Arabella had some kind of celebration planned. A cocktail jug sat on her table, and as I entered she poured its contents into three large tulip glasses, ice clinking as she did so. We touched glasses. "So how did it feel this time?" said Polly with a broad grin. "Better than your first attempt?" "Mm," I said, noncommittally, taking a sip of my drink. It was sour and strong-tasting, but undoubtedly refreshing after my journey. I wanted to ask Arabella some pointed questions about Tina and Jenny, and whether she had other schemes in the offing, but I couldn?t find the words. Eventually I said, "You obviously had the day carefully planned." Arabella shrugged. "If something?s worth doing at all, it?s better to do it properly. Or so my mum always said. Anyway," she continued, "it was all Jackie?s doing." What Jackie had to do with the arrangements was beyond me. Even if they did exist, ghosts couldn?t book appointments on-line, could they? But I decided not to press the point. It occurred to me as I started to relax that I was now well-set to experiment with some of Jackie?s other outfits, although I wondered when I?d be able to wear them, and indeed said as much. Polly waved my objections aside. "Don?t worry, if no opportunities present themselves, we?ll make some." It seemed that both Polly and Arabella had firm ideas about where my newly discovered hobby was taking me, and I felt uneasy about this. But for the time being, I didn?t press the point. The evening was developing into a pleasant social occasion ? we were joined for a while by a couple of the waiting staff ? and the conversation moved on to less complicated subjects. One of the waitresses asked me about my outfit, and I never knew whether, on that first evening, she realised who I was. A second, and then a third jug of cocktails was ordered, and I began to feel pleasantly mellow. Polly was, I thought, a little drunk. The only jarring presence was Georgina, who was on duty on the reception desk across the lobby. She had a clear view of the bar from where she sat, and she stared at us ? at me ? wearing a fixed, brooding expression. I formed the distinct impression that she was annoyed at something. Perhaps it was no more than an objection to staff members using the bar on a Saturday evening. But I remembered Polly saying to me at one point a few days earlier that there was little love lost between Georgina and Arabella, and that Georgina was always looking for ways of undermining Arabella?s little projects. It occurred to me that I was now one of Arabella?s projects, and the thought sobered me a little. Still, soothed perhaps by the alcohol, I put the thought to one side and managed to enjoy the evening. I retired to bed, tired but exhilarated, close to midnight. ++++++ The next two days I had all-day shifts, and then evening shifts for Tuesday and Wednesday, so it was Thursday before I had another free evening. I had been contemplating the prospect of another opportunity to experiment with Jackie?s wardrobe with growing excitement for much of the week, and I found myself during the afternoon eagerly sorting through drawers and wardrobes. I?d already tried on a couple of outfits ? a casual rig consisting of glossy leggings and a loose, vibrant red top; and then a skirt-suit in needlecord with a bright paisley-based pattern which I wore with a black silk blouse ? when I hit on a short purple dress with three-quarter sleeves and a round neck. The effect of this pleased me, and I teamed it with very dark green tights and high- heeled ankle boots in a shade of purple that closely matched the dress. I was sitting at the dressing table working with my make-up tray when there was a knock at the door. Startled, I heard the door open (I really must remember to lock it, I thought), and then I relaxed as I glimpsed Polly in my bedroom. She poked her head around the door of the dressing room and waved at me. I was in the process of applying a dark, rich lipstick, and could do no more than gesture back at her, but she walked into the room and gave me an impulsive hug. "Now why did I know what you?d be doing?" she said gleefully. "Don?t know," I replied after blotting my lips. "Perhaps Jackie told you. She seems to talk to Arabella about everything I do. And be careful ? you?ll make me smudge my lipstick." Polly ignored my remark. "I thought we might go out for a drink together." "Oh did you? Where? We?re not welcome in the bar at the moment." Georgina had taken me aside the day after my trip to London and made it very clear that she hadn?t taken kindly to seeing me in the bar on Saturday evening. I wondered if she?d said anything to Arabella or Polly. "I thought we?d go to the King?s Arms in the village." I raised an eyebrow. "You got a car?" I said. "No, but I?ve got a bike." And I remembered having seen Polly once or twice on an unexpectedly large and powerful-looking BMW once or twice in the early morning, when it seemed ? weather permitting ? to be her custom to take a ride before going on-shift. "You?ll need a jacket and a longer pair of boots if you?re going to come out wearing that dress. You?ll find some long boots in the end wardrobe. You get ready, and I?ll get the bike. Meet me outside the stables block in ten." I didn?t much like the idea of sitting on a pillion in a short dress and started to voice an objection, but Polly was already out of the door, and I sighed, realising that again I was being given no choice in the matter. I raided the wardrobe Polly had pointed to and found a pair of over-the-knee boots in rather heavy leather with a sturdy heel, and zipped myself into them, before donning the leather jacket I?d bought in London. I consulted my reflection in the mirror, and the result was certainly striking, if not exactly sophisticated, although I was still far from certain that I was ideally clad for an autumn bike ride. It would, I thought, really be best to call Polly out on this idea of hers, but even as this thought came into my head, I knew I wouldn?t do it. Call it cowardice or call it stubbornness, but something made it impossible for me to pull out of the trip. Or was something else at work on my mind? For a moment, I thought of Jackie. I took the lift downstairs and crossed the lobby, once more attracting as I did so a hostile glare from Georgina who was again on reception duty. My boots crunched across the gravel, as I saw Polly wheeling her bike out of the stables block. She was wearing a one-piece close- fitting leather suit all in black. She propped up the bike and strapped on a black helmet. Wordlessly, she handed me another, and I struggled with the problem of tucking my hair beneath it without ruining the style. That done, I mounted the bike awkwardly, and Polly kicked it into life. I don?t think I?ve ever been as terrified as I was on the ten minute drive to the village. It wasn?t that Polly drove fast or recklessly. I?d just never been on a bike before, and I wasn?t dressed for it. Even in my long boots and leather jacket, I felt vulnerable. I found myself clinging on hard to Polly?s torso in front of me, and then anxiously relaxing my grip, worried that I might distract her from the controls. The road was mostly quite straight, and eventually I worked out how to balance myself and lean into the curves, but I was still glad when we reached our destination. I dismounted, took off my helmet, and adjusted the hem of my dress. "Do I look a mess," I said, smoothing my hair. "Darling," said Polly, "you look wonderful." I looked at her sceptically, but she gave an encouraging smile, and I realised that I?d have to be happy with that. I unzipped my jacket, and we walked into the pub. So preoccupied was I with the journey ? not to mention the prospect of the journey back ? that I forgot to be nervous, but as we walked towards the bar, the essential oddity of my situation struck me again. The King?s Arms was an old-fashioned pub with oak beams, settles, and a flagged stone floor. The wooden counter looked as though it had been a fixture since the early part of the last century, and the shelves of the bar back were filled with pewter mugs and toby jugs. The customers consisted of a raucous group of young farmers, some of whom were playing skittles in an old-fashioned alley behind the bar, a party of office workers, a couple of old codgers occupying a window seat, and a family of four eating a meal. I felt distinctly out of place, but Polly plumped herself down on a bar stool and ordered a soda water for herself. She looked enquiringly at me, and I asked for a large gin and tonic. I took a hefty gulp to steady my nerves. For a moment, I contemplated the bar stool next to Polly?s, wondering how best to manoeuvre myself on to it in my short dress without creating a wardrobe malfunction. Oh well, in for a penny. I did, in fact, manage to wriggle on to the stool without major mishap, and as I did so I found myself shivering with pleasure (or was it fear?) as the silky material of my dress and camisole slipped and slid over the skin of my torso. I hooked a heel over the metal frame of the stool, and crossed my legs, admiring the effect. Polly winked at me knowingly. We sat in silence for a few moments, and then found ourselves talking about the previous Saturday. Polly wanted to tell me about a conversation Arabella had had with Tina after my visit ? Tina had apparently been gushingly complimentary about my appearance and the skill of my presentation ("unbelievable for a first timer"), and had asked whether I?d be returning for a second appointment. Georgina had, apparently, tried to tell Arabella off for gathering us in the bar after my return, but Arabella had given as good as she?d got. "Still," said Polly, "Georgina?s obviously fingered you as a weak point in Arabella?s armour, so you can?t ? you know ? assume it will all blow over." I absorbed this thought. Robert would undoubtedly want to retire in the next year or two, and Arabella ? as the eldest daughter ? was the logical successor. But Georgina was, I knew, fiercely ambitious, and Polly seemed to think that she would use any lever to undermine Arabella. I didn?t like to think of myself as a pawn in this game. I thought I was in reasonably good standing with Lorenzo, but who knew? Seeing my worried expression, Polly reached over and laid a hand on my arm. "Not to worry," she said. "Arabella will make sure you?re OK. She?s more than a match for Georgina." But really? Georgina was determined and seemed unscrupulous. If she thought that discrediting me in the kitchen would serve her purposes, what were my chances? I took another gulp of gin. While I was reflecting on these thoughts, the door to the bar opened, and a white-haired man ambled in, waving as he did so to the two rou?s in the window seat. He wore an ill-fitting tweed jacket and a pair of crumpled flannels that had seen better days. Both garments looked as if they had been bought for someone a couple of sizes larger than their wearer. He shuffled over to the bar and nodded at Polly, who returned an insincere-looking smile. While he ordered, she leaned towards me and hissed, "Don?t encourage him, and for God?s sake keep an eye on his hands." But in fact it was Polly ? slim, beautiful, provocative Polly, resplendent in her leathers ? who turned out to be his target. Holding a beer in his left hand, he seemed to start walking over towards his two companions in the window seat, but then turned to face Polly and whispered something in her ear, placing his right hand on her thigh. Polly laughed awkwardly and said something I didn?t catch, and then flinched. I?d been watching the new arrival?s hands, and saw that he?d slid the hand resting on Polly?s thigh towards her crotch, insinuating a finger between her legs. Gently but firmly, she gripped him by the wrist, and moved his hand aside. He laughed and lent towards her, again whispering in her ear. "Play with somebody your own age, Neville." Polly?s words were clearly enunciated and directed towards Neville?s two companions, who laughed knowingly. One of them said something which might have been, "The old sod?s at it again." But if Neville was embarrassed, he showed no sign of it. He patted Polly on the shoulder, letting his hand linger longer than was strictly necessary, gave a proprietorial smile, and then left us to join his friends. I realised I?d been holding my breath, and let it out, glad that the episode had ended without any unpleasantness. Polly rolled her eyes: she and Neville evidently had a history. For my part, I just hoped that we could spend the rest of the evening enjoying a quiet drink. I?d reckoned without the Young Farmers. A few minutes later, when our conversation had moved on to more comfortable if more mundane issues, a group of four lads emerged from the skittle alley. Two of them stumbled towards the bar with the evident intention of placing an order while the other two stared tipsily in our direction. "Oh God." Neville was obviously not the only one in the bar who knew Polly, I thought to myself, as the two of them weaved towards us. "Tell me," I said to Polly, "why exactly did you choose this particular pub to go to?" The larger of the two ? dishevelled hair, weather-beaten skin, checked shirt, mud-spattered work boots ? made for Polly, putting his arm around her waist and almost unbalancing her from the stool as he tried, drunkenly, to pull her into an embrace. The smaller of the two ? more smartly dressed, but perceptibly drunker ? focused on me. I couldn?t say that the two of them issued a specific ? or a coherent ? invitation to us, but the gist of what they suggested was that we should accompany them (to where, God knew) if we wanted an enjoyable evening. Polly, who was evidently adept at dealing with unwelcome suitors ? well, it would be reasonable to suppose that she had more experience of them than I had ? spoke to hers as if he were a naughty adolescent. She would, I thought, have no difficulty in fending him off. My would-be companion, who generously said that I could call him Malcolm, was on the other hand, a more awkward proposition. He wasn?t a great conversationalist, but his wandering hands made Neville seem positively priestly. I pulled hard at the hem of my dress in an attempt to block a hand from exploring my inner thigh, but even when I placed my hand on his chest and gave a firm shove, he continued to lurch towards me, his lips curled in an unattractive slobber as he tried to plant a kiss on my cheek. I stared helplessly at Polly, but she was too preoccupied to help, and ? losing patience ? I said, firmly and in my normal masculine voice, "You should be careful. Things might not be what they seem." Malcolm looked at me through unfocused eyes, a puzzled expression on his face. And then, as realisation dawned, he leaped back as if I?d given him an electric shock (as perhaps I had). A flutter of expressions crossed his face ? disbelief, puzzlement, embarassment, anger ? and then he shook his friend by the shoulder, pointed at me, and slurred, "?Assa guy... We can?t allow that kind off..." He stuttered to a halt, without enlightening us as to the consequences of the transgression he believed had taken place. Still, there was no reason to suppose that they would be particularly welcome ones. For a moment, Malcolm swayed uncertainly, seemingly trying to find the right words to throw at me. He failed to do so, and looked away in confusion, and I thought briefly that the incident would blow over without further trouble. No such luck. Giving us a further angry look, the two guys stumbled towards the skittle alley, collecting their two companions from the bar as they did so. And then we heard loud laughter which smacked first of amusement and then disbelief. I heard someone shout something which sounded like, "Well, let?s take a closer look and then we?ll..." before the rest of the sentence was lost in cheers and bellows. There was a sound of people getting to their feet and footsteps which seemed to be hurrying in our direction. "Um. I think we?d better call it an evening." Polly slithered off her stool and pulled me towards the door, fumbling with her crash helmet, just as a dozen or so aggressive-looking young men erupted from the skittle alley. With a whoop of triumph the leader gestured at us and, as we slipped into the car park, gave pursuit. We skittered across the tarmac towards the waiting bike. Polly vaulted onto the front seat of the bike and started the engine, but cursing my clumsiness, I struggled to mount the pillion. Eventually, I managed to shuffle myself on, just as our pursuers reached us, but I was a second or two too late for comfort, as one of them, more daring or more impetuous than the others, made a grab for me as we were moving off, and succeeded in seizing the strap of my shoulder bag. Unbalanced, I seized Polly around the waist, with the result that the bike swerved awkwardly as Polly desperately struggled to compensate; for a moment, I thought we were going to fall off. But, tyres screaming on the tarmac, we steered into the skid and precariously righted ourselves, and then picked up speed as we exited the car park. I gasped with relief, as Polly, rigid with anger, drove back towards the hotel at unsettling speed. We stopped outside the main entrance to the hotel and removed our helmets. "Are you all right?" Polly?s gloved hands took me by the shoulders and drew me into a hug. Whether it was the adrenaline, the stimulus of the alcohol, or my suddenly returning awareness of the clothes I was wearing and the sexy feelings they aroused in me, I don?t know. But misinterpreting Polly?s gesture, I grabbed her by the waist and drew her towards me. But she turned away, evading my attempted kiss, grunting with surprise. "No," she said seriously, "that is not what I meant at all." She drew back for a moment and looked at me. "You?re very beautiful and very sexy, Pippa, but you need to know that I?m already involved in a relationship." I reeled with a combination of embarrassment and shock. I?d never seen Polly with a partner, nor heard anybody speak of one. "He?s a Captain in the Army," she went on. "He?s on a peacekeeping mission in Africa just now, but he?ll be home for Christmas. You?ll see him then." "I.." I could think of nothing to say. The evening had hardly been a success at the best of times, but the shared experience might have been amusing had I not spoiled it by my clumsiness. Awkwardly, I turned away and walked slowly into the hotel. As I did so, I looked back at Polly. She was standing legs apart, one hand on her right hip, the other clutching her helmet, with an unreadable expression on her face. Maybe I was overreacting, but I could not help fearing that I had lost a good friend. As ill luck would have it, Georgina was on reception duty. She glared at me as I walked through the door. "Indulging our pathetic little fantasies again are we?" She shook her head. "Get out of here before somebody sees you. Oh, and next time, use the staff entrance not the lobby." I made my way slowly upstairs. The evening could hardly get any worse. ++++++ For the next few days, I avoided Polly, shunning conversation when we encountered each other in the kitchen. Perhaps it was my awkwardness, but Polly seemed distant, although not particularly unfriendly when our paths crossed, and we exchanged only the most banal of pleasantries. She didn?t suggest another evening out, and I couldn?t bring myself to do so either. And as it happens, our shifts didn?t seem to cross much in the fortnight after our evening out. But despite my embarrassment at the way the evening had ended, the itch to go out as Pippa had not disappeared. The urge came to me most strongly when I was alone in my room ? perhaps because of the proximity of the dressing room, perhaps because I had too little to do and turned to brooding about my situation, perhaps ? whisper it ? because of "Jackie". In my imagination and in my dreams, which were frequent, Pippa was always with Polly, and we were always on her bike, speeding to ? or from ? some unseen, unknowable place of beauty and contentment. Days passed, and I found myself one lunchtime in the kitchen glancing at her assembling some salads, hoping against hope that she?d engage me in conversation ? I couldn?t bring myself to take the initiative ? and feeling a void when the natural moment seemed to come and then pass without either of saying anything. At the end of my shift I retreated to my room without visiting the staff room to have my own lunch. I lay on the bed for a while brooding, turning over in my mind what I wanted, what might have been. Frustrated, bored, and dissatisfied, I decided to dress as Pippa. The process was desperate, angry and haphazard. I found a pair of wet- look PVC leggings in deep indigo, with zipped false pockets at the hips, and more zips at the ankles. I pulled these on, found a pair of pillar box-red ankle boots with vertiginous heels, and a short, loose gauzy top with long, flared sleeves in a kind of sunset orange colour. For some reason, despite the clash of colours between the boots and the top, I decided that these bright colours were best calculated to lift my mood. I swayed on my heels in front of the mirror for a few minutes, checking the reflection and wondering if I could find a lipstick to set off the top, and then, having done my best with make-up, stumbled downstairs into the hotel garden. This was on two levels: the first, a formal garden at the rear of the hotel with raised beds, formal pools with waterlilies and fountains, and a ha-ha, which led down to the second level which consisted of a manicured expanse of parkland with benches, meandering paths, and copses, with a flight pond at the limit of the hotel grounds. Beyond the grounds was a patch of woodland with pathways along which guests often walked or jogged. I found a bench at the edge of the flight pond and flopped down on it, feeling drained and unhappy, wondering what to do next. I?d dressed in a kind of defiant frenzy, as if to prove to myself that this aberration gave me pleasure, that it was a normal and necessary part of life, that it made me feel better about myself, that it was right and good. And indeed, as I collected my thoughts, I did feel peaceful and sexy and positive about my lot. But even so, I couldn?t help but wonder where these feelings came from, and how I could manage my immediate future in a world where my day to day role was mundane with a frenetic workload and a sexless uniform, and where, it seemed, I had limited time to relax and be myself. And then there was the undoubted fact that being Pippa attracted unwelcome attention and open hostility, not least from Georgina, who in part held my professional future in her hands. The only help I could potentially call on was from Polly and, it seemed, I had blown that. Wrapped up in my thoughts, I hardly noticed when a figure sat down heavily beside me. Until he prodded me in the ribs. I looked round: avuncular, moustachioed Lorenzo, in his chef?s whites, breathing heavily as if with exertion. He raised an eyebrow, looked me up and down, and gave me a smile of ? I realised with a sinking feeling ? recognition. For a moment we looked at each other. Perhaps both of us were waiting for the other to speak first (I certainly was). At length, Lorenzo sighed, and then said, in quite a friendly voice, "You have started to indulge your new hobby again." So, word had got out. I wondered how. Not being able to think of a suitable reply, I simply nodded. "Georgina has told me about you." Again, I said nothing. "You need to be careful of Georgina." I thought about this for a minute. "We work for Arabella," I said. "Georgina doesn?t have the right to..." Lorenzo held up a hand, stopping me in mid-sentence. "It is true that Georgina is not your manager and that she can?t sack you. But she has the ear of Robert, and if she turns Robert against you, things could turn difficult." He touched me on the arm. "Don?t give her the chance." A bird started from the lake, crying raucously as it took wing. I thought for a moment. "But why," I said, "would Georgina mean to do me harm." Lorenzo sighed once more, looking into the distance towards the pond, and hesitated before he replied. A small flock of waterfowl took flight, as if pursuing the lone bird which had taken off a few moments before. The air was filled with the sound of their cries. Lorenzo continued slowly. Perhaps because the subject matter was troubling him, his normally mild Italian accent thickened a little. "Georgina knows you?re close to Arabella." Am I? I wondered. "And at the moment, she?ll look for any lever to undermine her. If Robert can be persuaded you?re a threat to the business, then Arabella will be tainted by association." I knew, of course, that Georgina?s ambitions extended to taking over from Robert after his retirement, and that she feared that her half- sister, as the elder daughter, was before her in the pecking order. But I couldn?t see how discrediting me with Robert could help her in her rivalry with Arabella, and said so. Lorenzo rolled his eyes. "If she can convince Robert that Arabella has acted unwisely by appointing you ? and she will portray you as Arabella?s blue-eyed boy ? then Robert?s confidence in Arabella?s judgment would be undermined. She sees you as Arabella?s weak spot ? oh yes, she knows all about Arabella?s obsession with her dead twin brother and how that plays out with you ? and she?s going to be quite ruthless in exploiting it." I reeled at this suggestion. I could quite see how this might work. But what could I do about it? I had scarcely spoken to Robert, and I certainly didn?t see myself as having a head-to-head with Georgina. "But you have another ally." Lorenzo turned to me, and placed a chubby finger on my thigh, a gesture I found disconcerting. "Polly. Polly is the apple of Robert?s eye. If you get her on your side," he shrugged, "Georgina will be toast." I wasn?t sure about that. I thought I?d burnt my boats with Polly a couple of weeks before after our trip to the pub, and said so. But Lorenzo shrugged off my concern. Polly, he said, was well-disposed towards me. Whatever had happened that night didn?t seem to trouble her, or at least she?d never mentioned it. And besides, what other choices did I have? My best interests would be served by asking for Polly?s support, and if she refused ? well, what had I lost? It seemed, according to Lorenzo, that Polly had been working in other departments for a few days past, which explained why I hadn?t seen much of her in the kitchen. She was, however, on duty that afternoon on reception, and as it was a quiet time, he suggested, it would be an ideal opportunity to talk to her. "Do it for yourself. Do it for me. You?ve done well in the kitchen, and I don?t want to lose you." He paused for a moment, and then continued, "Especially if it?s because of that cow Georgina." He spoke with vehemence, his Italian accent mangling the word "cow". I grimaced. Georgina was not popular with the kitchen crowd, who thought she had no role there, and yet interfered and stirred things up with Robert. But Lorenzo?s open rudeness in a space where clients might be present made me feel uncomfortable. Still he was, I reflected, right. Georgina could do me harm, and it seemed I would need help in order to avoid the damage she could inflict. I was still nervous about approaching Polly again, but I had, it seemed, few other options. I hadn?t noticed Polly at the reception desk earlier in the day ? I had come to the garden by the staff stairs which led directly to an outside door without having to go through the lobby ? but I decided to go in search of her straight away. Tottering a little nervously in my heels, I made my way to the front of the hotel and went in through the main entrance. Polly was head down before a computer screen, scrolling through a document and didn?t see me at first. The lobby was empty. I approached the desk and coughed gently. "I?d like to book a motorcycle taxi to the village pub, please," I said. Polly looked up, a puzzled expression on her face (there were no motorcycle taxis in the district), and then, seeing that it was me ? or rather, Pippa ? she giggled. "Would that be for tonight, madam," she said, with a huge grin. She pretended to consult the computer screen. "I could make you a booking for ? er ? 6.30 if that would be convenient?" "That will be fine," I said. "Good. Meet the driver at the entrance to the stables block. No need to wear a jacket. She?ll have all the equipment you need." She looked me up and down, and smirked, before continuing. "But for God?s sake, change either those boots or the top you?re wearing. Fortunately, there are no horses to frighten, but the colour clash will upset the locals, and by and large, they?re a pretty tough bunch." Shamefaced, I crept upstairs. I?d dressed hastily and in frustration at not having done so for some time, I?d perhaps been careless about my choice of colours. But it was galling for Polly to be so blunt about it, and in so public a place. ++++++ Stung by Polly?s criticism, I spent a fair time in the afternoon mulling over my outfit and trying several different combinations. Black knee- length boots looked odd with the PVC leggings, and black and indigo didn?t go well together either. And hard as I looked in the cornucopia of clothes occupying the multiple wardrobes in my (!) dressing room, I couldn?t really find a top which went with the red boots I?d worn earlier (Arabella must have bought them: what can she have been intending Jackie to wear them with?). In the end, I decided it was the leggings which were the problem, and discarded them for a pair of tight, slightly stretchy denim jeans. I paired these with the knee-length black boots, and kept the vibrant orange top. When I appeared at the stables block at the appointed time Polly ? already mounted on her bike ? gave me an approving nod. She pointed at the ground, and I saw there a helmet, and also a heavy leather motorcycle jacket ? much bulker than the soft version I?d worn previously, which had been designed for style rather than practicality. I struggled into the heavier version, which was stiffly reinforced at the elbows and the shoulders, and pulled on the helmet, and a pair of leather gauntlets which Polly handed me. She kicked the bike into life, and I clambered awkwardly aboard the pillion seat. I was prepared for the motion now, and the journey was less nervous before. The new jacket which, I gathered, had been funded by Arabella and selected and purchased by Polly. It protected me against the cooling evening air, and we swept at speed along the narrow country roads, before pulling up at a cottage-like half-timbered building which advertised itself as "The Avonford Arms". This establishment evidently catered for a more affluent crowd than the pub we?d previously visited: well-dressed, predominantly middle aged couples and family groups. There was a sprinkling of men and women in business clothes who must, I guessed, have been commuters into Avonford, but there were also a few locals amongst the clientele. The pub was busy but not crowded, and we had no difficulty finding a table to ourselves in one of the many discreetly-lit alcoves opposite the bar. The furnishings were chintzy, the ceilings supported by beams, and the bar area reassuringly solid and old-looking. There was, I was pleased to see, no sign of any young farmers. The only slightly jarring aspect was that Polly and I ? in our leathers ? seemed out of place amongst the local gentry, and we did indeed attract one or two startled looks as we entered. But having satisfied themselves that we weren?t hells angels, the locals decided to ignore us and returned to their own conversations. Polly went to the bar and came back with drinks ? tomato juice for her, white wine for me ? and sat down carefully beside me. "So," she said, "what made you decide to ask me out for a drink just now?" I took a sip of my wine. This was, I thought, an obvious allusion to the fact that we?d hardly spoken in the last fortnight. But that was not, I thought, entirely my fault. And she could, after all, have sought me out at any time. "I thought," she said when I put this to her, "that I?d let you make the first move. I left you in a sour mood after we last met, so I thought it best to let you decide when you were over it." In fact, of course, I?d been worried that I?d offended her, and had been hoping that she would approach me first, but when I said this she shook her head. While I had been embarrassed by the way in which we?d parted ? by the way in which, in fact, I?d made a clumsy pass at her ? Polly had thought me angry at her rejection of me. She?d been pretty confident that I?d get over it, but hadn?t seen it as her role to chivvy me on. Having talked around this for a while, and cleared the air between us, I told her about my conversation with Lorenzo. Was it really true that Georgina was gunning for me, and was there anything that could be done about it? "You needn?t worry about Robert," said Polly. "He?s a sweetie really. And in any case, as far as he?s concerned, Arabella is your boss, and Georgina has no right to interfere in her business. And with Lorenzo on your side, I don?t see you?ve got a lot to worry about." She thought about this for a second. "Georgina might try to blacken your reputation with Robert, or to claim that your habits risk the reputation of the hotel, but Robert?s not a fool. And if she does manage to start a hare running, Arabella will knock some common sense into him." She took a sip of her drink. "I can also have a word with Robert if that would help. After all," she grinned, "as far as he?s concerned, I?m the future, not Georgina." I absorbed this information thoughtfully. I wasn?t entirely sure what Polly meant when she said she was the future: did she mean that the succession would skip a generation when Robert retired? Surely Polly was too young. And I wasn?t so sure as Polly that Robert would overlook my habits ? presumably Polly meant my habit of dressing as Pippa ? given his age and what I knew to be his generally conservative outlook on life. Still, it was reassuring to know that Arabella and Polly were on my side. I wondered, however, whether it might be useful for them to speak to Robert now, rather than waiting to see whether Georgina made a move, and said so. Polly frowned. "I?m not sure that would help. We don?t want Robert to start thinking that we think there?s a potential problem before Georgina makes her move. When she does, we can poo-poo the idea ? we?ll say that it?s so preposterous that the issue had never even occurred to us. But if it?s us that puts the thought into his head, he might be more inclined to think there?s something to it when and if Georgina eventually speaks to him." There was, I supposed, something to this, but I still felt uneasy about the situation. Although I had said my piece, and it seemed that I was unlikely to change Polly?s mind, I wasn?t comfortable about leaving the situation unresolved. But she was adamant that talking to Robert now would do more harm than good. She did, however, promise to talk to Arabella about my worries, and make sure that she was ready to counter Georgina?s arguments if she needed to. Being unable to think of any arguments to make Polly change her mind, I crossed my legs and stretched out a toe, looking thoughtfully at my boot as the leather tightened pleasingly about my ankle. For no reason I could put my finger on, I suddenly felt very sexy. I took another swig of wine, and found that I?d emptied my glass. I looked at Polly, hoping she?d get us another drink, but she pointed a varnished fingernail at the bar and said, "Mine?s an orange juice this time." It seemed it was up to me. I hesitated for a moment, nervous about going to the bar myself, but it seemed that Polly was, for reasons of her own, testing me out, and I reluctantly got up and walked across the room. The barmaid was a young, brash-looking woman with very long bleached blonde hair which had been permed into tight waves; disconcertingly, a streak at one side, close to her face, had been dyed a vibrant cherry red. She looked me up and down as I placed my order, and kept her eyes on me as she pulled glasses from a shelf and started to pour our drinks. "Tarted ourselves up tonight, have we? Big evening ahead?" The barmaid was, it seemed, the chatty type. I didn?t, in fact, feel particularly tarted up in my motorcycle jacket and jeans, and I made some kind of dismissive response. The redhead grinned, and leaned forward and, with a confidential air, said, "There?s lots of blokes here who go for your kind. See that guy in the corner eyeing you up." I whipped round in alarm. Unwanted attention was the last thing I needed, and I was still haunted by the memory of Malcolm?s wandering hands in the King?s Arms and what that had led to. But in fact she had been winding me up. There was no-one in the corner, and nobody, so far as I could tell, looking at me with undue interest. Irritated, I turned back round, to find her smirking at me, pleased at having rattled me. "Must be a bit dull working in a quiet place like this," I said. "You evidently have to make your own entertainment. Still, with a subtle mind like yours..." She gave me a filthy look, and for a moment, I thought she was going to come back with a cutting remark audible to all and sundry in the bar, exposing me as a T-girl. It wasn?t that I was worried about the reaction ? the pub didn?t seem to be the sort of place for casual violence and in any case nowadays reactions to gender-fluidity were more accepting than they used to be ? but I?d wanted my presence there to attract as little attention as possible; I wanted my appearance to be accepted, in short, as normal and natural. Fortunately, any cutting remark was forestalled by the approach of another customer. The barmaid gave me a sardonic look as she shuffled over to deal with the newcomer, but said nothing more. Deciding that an embarrassed scuttle back to the table would be an admission of defeat, I strutted back with as confident a stride as I could muster, swaying my hips and ostentatiously clicking my heels on the flagstone floor. As I approached, Polly gave me an amused what?s-got-into-you look. I passed the juice to her and took another swig of wine. I?d been drinking quite quickly and started to feel a bit light-headed. My senses heightened, and my libido aroused, I wondered for a moment how Polly would react if I placed my hand on her leather-clad thigh, but fortunately common sense reasserted itself, and I sat back in my seat, ensuring that there was some space between the two of us. The conversation moved on to less sensitive matters, and we talked for a while about work and our colleagues, and our plans for the future. Polly was evidently expecting to be given some kind of formal managerial role, and I said that I hoped to get an appointment in the hotel as a commis chef for a year or two. Polly nodded approvingly, but then asked me, "So Pippa will be around the hotel for a while yet." I nodded. Polly grinned her approval. But then she looked thoughtful, and asked, "And what will happen to her after you leave here?" I hadn?t really thought about this and said so. "Because I wonder," said Polly, "whether, once you?re free of Jackie?s influence, you?ll still need the release of being Pippa." I?d thought that Polly didn?t believe in Jackie, and said so. "Mm." Polly hesitated. "But did you ever feel an urge to wear a dress before you came here?" I shook my head. "Never? Not even trying on your mum?s clothes in secret at home?" I shook my head again. "Well, something has awakened that urge in you, whether we call it Jackie or not. And I wonder whether the urge will stay with you when you leave here." I didn?t answer for a while. Instead, I tried to analyse my feelings. I thought about the sexiness I felt the first time I?d tried on Jackie?s clothes, despite the unsatisfactory outfit I?d chosen. I thought about my journey of discovery at Tina?s dressing agency. I thought about the delicious, terrified feeling of excitement the first time I?d ventured out with Jenny. I recalled the sense of anticipation I felt each time I rifled through the wardrobes in the dressing room. I thought about the sensuous feel of the clothes that I had worn ? that I was wearing even now as these thoughts flickered through my mind. And as I digested these thoughts I knew that, whatever difficulties, whatever embarrassments lay before me, I was incapable of ceasing the journey I had embarked upon. Pippa would be my companion for life. I tried to convey all this to Polly, and she nodded absently, as if to suggest that I had merely confirmed what she already thought. I could not tell whether she was pleased or not, but the evening meandered onwards in a companionable way, and it was after ten o?clock when we returned to the hotel. Polly offered her cheek for a kiss as we parted, and I approached the hotel entrance feeling calm and content. It had been a good evening. I?d thought that the night clerk would be on duty by the time of our return, and I wandered incautiously into the main lobby of the hotel. But I realised, with alarm that Georgina was still behind the desk. She looked at me, a malicious glint of recognition in her eyes, but said nothing. I slunk past in the direction of the staff lift. As the doors of the lift closed, I looked back towards the reception desk and met Georgina?s eyes. Her expression was one of cold, implacable anger. ++++++ There were no immediate repercussions from my brief encounter with Georgina. We had few day to day dealings, and on the rare occasions work brought us together, she handled herself professionally. Her conversations with me, such as they were, were formally polite, if sometimes abrupt. Meanwhile, my work in the kitchen was going well. Lorenzo gave me new tasks to work on, to deepen my skills and increase my confidence. And although Polly was no longer a fixture in the kitchen, I found myself increasingly accepted by, and friendly with the catering team. Three or four weeks after my trip out to the Avonford Arms, I found myself shadowing Peter, the pastry chef. Peter was a calm, friendly blonde ? shockingly thin, with piercing blue eyes, and long hair which he kept under a net in the kitchen, as I did mine. He was an informative mine of hotel gossip, funny, and gentle. He seemed to want to get to know me, and although I was cautious at first, we gradually found ourselves taking coffee breaks together. He told me about his time at college, other jobs he had done, his ex-girlfriends, and his aspiration to own his own restaurant. I was a little more reticent about myself. I did not really want to say anything about my alter ego Pippa ? the most obviously interesting thing about me ? because although she seemed increasingly likely to be a permanent fixture in my life, I still had no settled idea about how I would manage my ? or rather her ? future. But of course I was under no illusion that a hunter of gossip like Peter would be well aware of Pippa?s existence, particularly after my conversation with Lorenzo. More than once, Peter suggested we have an evening out together ("I have a car") and I began to worry that he was being too pushy, and might be developing an interest in me that I could not reciprocate. It was not that I had any inhibitions about the idea of a physical relationship with a man, it was simply that he was not my type. But although I was, as I say, cautious, it was in fact events which conspired against us spending an evening together. The kitchen was suddenly short staffed, and staff rotas had to be adapted to fill the gaps. So my next two evenings off turned out to be on nights that Peter was working. The second of them, however, coincided with a free evening for Polly, and we roared off on her bike further afield than normal to a wine bar in Avonford. I?d chosen what I thought was a particularly sexy outfit ? a little black dress, which I?d teamed with a tan leather jacket and matching long boots. Polly tut-tutted when she saw that I wasn?t wearing the heavy motorcycling jacket she?d given me on our previous night out, but relented in the end ? and although my outfit was skimpy and rather draughty as Pippa put the bike through its paces, the journey went off without incident. I was becoming more confident about Pippa appearing in public, and the evening was a convivial, enjoyable one. Polly had friends in Avonford, and she?d arranged to meet a couple of them in the bar we were visiting. The two girls ? Cherry and Olivia ? were pretty, giggly young things, who (I was sure) worked out quickly exactly what sort of person Polly?s new companion was. But they were friendly and took pains to put me at my ease, and as the evening lengthened the three of us drank far more than we should have done (Polly was, thankfully, drinking mineral water) and it was a distinctly woozy Pippa that struggled on to Polly?s pillion for the ride home. Rather than struggle with the keypad on the staff entrance (it was dark, and the pass code had recently been changed) I entered the hotel cautiously through the main entrance, heart pounding in case Georgina was behind the reception desk. Fortunately, however, the night clerk was on duty by this time, and it was with distinct relief that I scurried into the lift. I was in the process of unlocking the door when I was startled by another figure in the corridor. The light was gloomy (the staff landing had never been very brightly lit) and it took me a second or two to recognise Peter. He walked slowly towards me, his expression making clear that he knew exactly who I was. Although I had strong grounds to suspect that Peter knew all about Pippa, I was alarmed to be discovered in this way. I had hoped ? if I had thought about it at all ? that if Pippa was to meet Peter, it would be on my terms, after careful preparation of the ground. I wrestled with the door, trying to open it, but I was having trouble with my keys, and Peter was alongside me before I managed to work the lock. He looked me up and down, perhaps amused by my difficulty, with an expression that might have been interest combined with uncertainty. Was he unsettled by what he saw? He certainly didn?t seem hostile. He looked for a moment as if he wanted to speak but couldn?t find the words. "Hello, Peter." I had to say something. "Philip. Or, er..." "Pippa," I said. "Nice name," he said with a nervous smile. "Nice outfit too." "Er, thanks." Where was this leading? Peter babbled something which I didn?t quite catch ? I heard the words "a pity" and "my size", and there was a gesture which seemed to encompass my outfit, but the meaning was lost on me. I started to ask him to explain more clearly what he wanted, but Peter, having blurted out his piece, was already retreating. I turned back to my bedroom door, and ? managing at last to wrestle it open ? scurried inside. Slamming the door behind me, I found myself anxiously panting, unable to catch my breath. Why had Peter scuttled off like that? What was he thinking? What would he say about me to the other kitchen staff the following morning? And what was it that he had tried to ask me? Perhaps he had merely been simulating friendship over the past few weeks ? perhaps I?d be the butt of some pointed, cruel joke. Oh God. As you can see, my drink-fuddled mind was in overdrive. As I undressed and prepared for sleep I reflected more calmly on what had happened. Peter had seemed genuinely interested in Pippa and her outfit, and had apparently wanted to ask a question. Was it perhaps Pippa that really interested him rather than Philip? And how did I feel about that? ++++++ The following evening was free, and I spent some time drowsily researching kitchen lore on-line. I was downloading and printing off some website addresses, when I heard a noise from the dressing room. Surprised, I stood up and walked through the door. A figure was examining herself in one of the mirrored wardrobe doors. She was tall and slim and long-legged, and had a shock of strawberry blonde hair. When she turned to look at me, I saw that her features were similar to Polly?s ? the same long, straight nose and full lips, the piercing grey eyes, the beautifully sculpted cheekbones ? but although the resemblance was a close one, it was not exact. And then, I thought, she also bore an odd resemblance to me: the same long hair in only a slightly different shade of blonde, same height and size, similar body shape, and even some of her movements and gestures seemed to mimic mine ? or should I say, to Pippa?s? She was wearing the sixties dress with the geometric pattern that had been the first of Jackie?s garments I had tried, with a pair of clumpy lace-up shoes that I had not seen before. On her, though, the effect was striking ? she was natural and graceful and beautiful in the outfit which had made me feel so awkward and ugly. She started to walk ? or rather shimmer ? towards me. Startled, I realised it could only be Jackie. "Hello Pippa." "Hello Jackie." Formalities over, we stood in silence for a while. "Nice dress." I looked down at myself in surprise at Jackie?s remark. A few moments before I had been wearing jeans and a T-shirt, but now I seemed to have donned a skimpy plum-coloured dress, made from a glittery fabric which clung provokingly to my body. I sensed an erection building ? but although I was wearing no foundation garments, nothing was visible through the flimsy fabric of the dress. On my feet were pair of shiny black pumps decorated with a silver bow; the high heels dug into the thick pile of the carpet. "I ? yes, I suppose so," I said uncertainly. My mind was a blur: what was happening? Again, there was silence for a few moments, until Jackie said, in a dreamy voice, "You?re worried about Georgina." I nodded. "Don?t be." I must have looked sceptical, because she continued, "I can make sure she does nothing to harm you." "She?s going to speak to Robert." But Jackie shook her head in denial. "She won?t. And if she does, Robert will do whatever Arabella and Polly want. And if he?s tempted not to, then I?ll be there for you." Jackie was quite certain of herself, and I absorbed the information thoughtfully. "Exactly how far," I asked, "does your influence go?" Again, the dreamy voice. "All the family listens to me, even if they don?t realise where their thoughts are coming from. And I can speak to them anywhere in the hotel and the grounds. And sometimes I can put thoughts into other people?s heads." "You prompted me to try on your clothes." "I only helped you to do what you wanted to do anyway." I raised an eyebrow. "Think about that trip to London, and all those trips out with Polly. All well outside the boundaries of my influence. But you were excited all the same: you wore my clothes and revelled in the sensation." It was true. I had already realised that my life as Pippa would not end when my time at the hotel was finished. But there was another thing. "What about the people who have met me when I?ve been Pippa? Did you have something to do with those meetings?" Jackie smiled. "A little. I can try to make people want to see you. And I can keep people away too, if I think that a meeting with them would be ? how to put this? - unpleasant for you. But the meeting in the garden with Lorenzo was me, and that first meeting with Polly, and your encounter with Peter. And I?ve kept Georgina away from you on a couple of occasions." Her words were trailed away. She seemed to shimmer in the moonlit room, and I strained to make her out. I was puzzled about the reference to Peter, but taking her at her word when she?d suggested that she?d set up my meeting with him the previous evening, I asked her why. "Peter is needy. He wants what you have. But he doesn?t quite know what he needs to do to get it. I think it would be good if you could help him." Even in my befuddled state, I was puzzled by this. The meaning was clear enough: Jackie was telling me that she knew that Peter, like me, wanted to explore his feminine side. But what was all this about me helping him? I suggested to Jackie that if Peter needed support, then Arabella was better placed than I to give it. "No." The denial was voiced decisively. "Arabella supports me. She buys clothes for me. When you arrived, I saw something of me in you and perhaps Arabella absorbed that thought from me. She helps you because she sees my spirit in you, and because you resemble me." I gave Jackie a startled look. It had never occurred to me that Arabella?s kindness to me, and her role in creating and helping Pippa had derived from a belief that I was in some way a reincarnation of Jackie. I wondered for a moment about the other newbies she had sent to Tina?s agency, and whether Jackie had also played a part in influencing Arabella to help them. But before I had a chance to ask her, Jackie started speaking again. "Peter is from a different roll of fabric ? different size, different spirit, different look. Arabella will buy clothes for me, and she and I will enjoy letting you wear them. But Arabella is not going to construct a wardrobe for Peter, or pay for him to go to Tina?s." She paused, looking at me coolly. "It will be good for Peter if you could help him, and it will I think be good for you to have an understudy. And more than that: I wanted you to meet a kindred spirit," she said. "And Peter is, I think, a very kindred spirit. I want you to see the friendships that Pippa can have. And I want you to have fun. I want you to have a lot of fun." "So what will happen now," I asked, realising as I did so that it was an impossible question to answer. "I want you to be happy, Pippa," she said faintly. She was almost transparent now, her figure fading away with the sound of her voice. My head was aching. And then I found myself on the bed, naked, with an erection, trying to work out how I got there and when, and whether the conversation which was still fresh in my mind had really taken place, or whether it had been a dream. I struggled to my feet, and stumbled into the dressing room, feverishly looking through the wardrobes. And yes, the clumpy lace-ups were indeed there in the sixties wardrobe ? I?d never noticed them before ? and I found the dress and shoes I?d been wearing scant moments before in one of the other wardrobes. I felt the material of the dress, trying to work out whether it had been recently worn. But any warmth it might have had had long dissipated. It must ? surely ? have been a dream. And yet. I was no longer convinced of the non-existence of Jackie?s spirit; and I was coming to think that she could indeed influence people?s actions. She had influenced mine, after all. And she was right ? my meetings with Polly and Peter and Lorenzo must have been more than a coincidence. I needed to think about the implications of all this. ++++++ The next few days were busy, and although I worked alongside Peter for a couple of sessions, we had little time for a proper conversation. I was free on Sunday evening, and so was Polly, and we took the opportunity for an evening out. (Me: bright red jumpsuit, slouchy boots, wide elasticated belt, heavy jewellery; Polly: motorcycling leathers.) The evening was a convivial one ? we seemed to have found an equilibrium after our early initial misunderstanding ? and passed without incident. The following day was quiet, and as it happened, Peter and I were both working the lunchtime shift. As orders trickled to a halt, and the rest of the team started clearing up, we took time out for a coffee on the rear terrace. Peter seemed a little subdued and it fell to me to broach the subject that had preoccupied me ? it had almost certainly preoccupied us both ? since our encounter outside my room. I said that I hoped that I hadn?t startled him when we?d met, and when he assured me that he?d half-expected to find me there (Jackie?s influence again?), I asked him what it was that he?d been trying to say to me. It took a fair amount of prompting to get Peter to open up, so the conversation was an awkward one which I won?t attempt to reproduce in full (no fun for me to write or for you to read), but after a few false starts, he told me his story. It was not perhaps such an unusual one, but that made it no less uncomfortable for Peter to tell, or indeed to have experienced. He had experimented with dressing in the clothes of his mother and sister as an adolescent, and gained erotic satisfaction from doing so. But the experience had also left him feeling ashamed and embarrassed, and he was determined that nobody else should find out about it. (He was surprisingly confident that neither his mother nor his sister suspected anything.) He had suppressed his urges to dress remarkably successfully for a few years, but when he heard gossip about my own forays into the cult, they had returned with a vengeance. The sense of excitement and anticipation was so great that he now felt he could no longer resist the temptation. But ? and here was the crux of the matter ? he saw me as a collaborator who could help him understand how to take his first steps into that beckoning world. He had, in short, looked for an opportunity to appeal to me for help, and had tried without success to intercept me in my guise as Pippa for a while. On the night in question, he had become aware (how, I wondered) that I had gone out with Polly, and had positioned himself so that he and I must meet when I returned to the hotel which ? after a fairly long wait on Peter?s part ? we did. Unfortunately, he had been overcome by shyness, and was unable to deliver his prepared speech. This was perhaps not such a revelation ? after all, Jackie had prepared me for it ? but it left me at a loss as to what I could do to help. Jackie had made clear that neither she nor Arabella would themselves lift a finger to help Peter, and the thought hit me that so far I had had to do nothing too difficult to transform myself into Pippa ? my clothes had been bought for me, Arabella had arranged for me to be instructed in the art of transformation at Tina?s, and Polly had acted from the outset as a supporter and companion. And then another thought struck me ? that one day I would leave the hotel and be without those sources of support, and that if I wanted to continue my adventures as Pippa (and I certainly did) then I would need to build my own networks. Perhaps that would not be too difficult (I had a sudden mental picture ? thrilling, terrifying ? of myself strolling through a department store, browsing racks of dresses) but it was still something that would require some effort and planning. I had, for example, no idea how to order breast forms or for the kind of foundation garments that I needed. With these thoughts churning through my mind, I agreed to do what I could to support Peter in his journey. And so, when we had spare time, we spent the next few days undertaking on-line research into sources of supply, and discovering the support groups and blogs from which flowed advice, guidance, encouragement, and the wide and strange variety of commentary and chatter (not all of it positive) that exists on the web. This world was as new to me as it was to Peter ? I had never needed to involve myself in it up to now ? and I was pleased and relieved to discover it. Peter?s taste in clothes was feminine and flowery ? quite unlike the harder-edged wardrobe that I favoured (or rather, that I had inherited from Jackie and Arabella), and he was, as I have said, at least a size larger than me. So the wardrobe we ordered for him was not at all like my own. Nor was the make-up, which focused on pinks and pastel colours rather than the bolder colours that I used. Make-up was an area which caused Peter some problems, and his early experiments with it were awkward and discouraging. But with my help, he eventually created a look which worked for him, and with some trepidation, he told me that he felt able to stray beyond his bedroom and start to explore the outside world. Peter had a car, and he spent some time practising driving while wearing heels, although otherwise dressed as himself. And so, just a month after our first, hesitant conversation, we arranged an evening out. I asked Polly to join us, thinking that perhaps there was strength in numbers, and ? once I had explained the situation (Peter had asked me to keep his transformation private, and we had been remarkably successful in doing so) and she had overcome her initial surprise ? she agreed to come with us, for which I was profoundly grateful. The evening was an odd one. Peter ? he called himself Penny ? was nervous and clumsy (he knocked over a full glass of wine as soon as we sat down), and his movement and gestures were generally jerky and abrupt. He had, it seemed, forgotten the advice I had given him on posture. And when he spoke, his voice was either too penetrating, or an almost inaudible whisper. His hands shook each time he took a drink. Polly did her best to put him at his ease, and in the end he did calm down, although he never looked entirely comfortable. We attracted some attention from the other customers ? the woman behind the bar couldn?t suppress a smirk when I ordered a round of drinks ? and when we rose to leave, Peter stumbled over the threshold as we left the bar. Still, it was a beginning. And Peter, as he drove us home, was eloquent about the epiphany he had experienced that evening, and how excited he would be to repeat the experience. And if Polly and I thought that he was protesting a little too much, well, that was our problem and not his. Peter?s self- confidence perhaps needed a boost in order to help him feel natural when out in public, but his enthusiasm was certainly not lacking. But if the aim was to boost his self-confidence, it took a severe knock when we arrived back at the hotel. As the two of us entered the lobby (Polly was walking back to her apartment in the stables block), I was startled to see Georgina on duty behind the reception desk. It was late ? well after ten o?clock when the night clerk should have been on duty: he had evidently failed to turn up on time that evening, and Georgina was, as a consequence, in a foul mood. Her eyes flashed in our direction as soon as we walked through the door, and she ? quite literally ? hissed with anger. "What in heaven?s name do you think you are doing, walking into the lobby like that? And how do you think you look? I will not... NOT have this hotel turned into some sort of cross-dressers? awareness centre." So agitated was she that she started hyperventilating, struggling for breath. Peter/Penny took one horrified look at her, and scuttled for the stairs, making good his escape. I was not so fortunate, as Georgina emerged from behind the desk and seized me by the arm. "It was bad enough when it was just you. But how dare you ? how DARE you ? start inveigling our colleagues into your loathsome habit." She hopped from one foot to the other, unable to stand still in her state of agitation. I opened my mouth to speak, but couldn?t think of any words which might stem the tide of bile coming from Georgina?s mouth. And before I could say anything, the torrent of words started flowing again. "You are pathetic! How Lorenzo puts up with you I can?t imagine. You seem to have entranced Polly and Arabella, but you haven?t impressed me. If I have anything to do with it, you?ll be out on your ear tomorrow." And so on. The tirade lasted for what seemed an eternity, although it was probably only a couple of minutes ? but it went on long enough to attract the attention of a gaggle of customers, who edged nervously out of the bar to see what was going on. I struggled to release myself from her grip, but succeeded only in snapping a couple of buttons off my blouse, revealing the lacy underwear beneath. Feeling, in addition, my short skirt starting to ride up, I eventually stopped struggling in order to preserve a scrap of dignity, and waited for the storm to subside. I think it was only the realisation that we were being observed by a growing crowd of onlookers that eventually caused Georgina to desist. "Away with you," she snarled as she released her grip at last. "You haven?t heard the last of this." It was a chastened and shaken Pippa that slunk up the stairs. I retreated to my room, alarmed and disoriented by Georgina?s outburst. Locking the door behind me, I sat down heavily, and pondered with my head in my hands. Could I carry on like this? Was the pleasure I gained from dressing as Pippa worth all the unpleasantness that it generated? I would be in a state of permanent anxiety about the possibility of being ambushed and berated by Georgina. And what of the other risks? Would the deepening rift between Georgina and Arabella have repercussions in the kitchen? Would Lorenzo blame any such problem on me and would my internship be at risk? And what of Polly ? might her future become precarious in the face of Georgina?s undoubted anger? I retired to bed in a state of indecision. The prudent thing to do would be to desist from further adventures into Jackie?s wardrobe. But then Jackie herself would be alienated. I didn?t want a return to disturbed, sinister dreams and sleepwalking. And ? to recognise the truth ? I didn?t really want to stop. I drifted into a restless sleep, turning over these thoughts in a series of uneasy dreams. And then, at about three in the morning, I was awoken by the sound of a key rattling in my bedroom door. Startled, I sat up in bed and switched on the wall light. As I did so, my own key on the inside of the door dropped from the lock, and I heard a rusty scrape as the barrel of the old-fashioned lock turned. Somebody tried to open the door, but an incoherent rattling betrayed the clumsiness of the attempt. And then whoever it was hurled themselves against the door in an attempt to force it, before wrestling anew with the door handle. Eventually, after a noisy struggle, the door swept open, and a figure stumbled ? in fact more or less fell ? through the doorway. Georgina. Of course. But a near-unrecognizable Georgina. With no make-up and her usually immaculate black hair unkempt and awry, the woman who entered the room was a far cry from the cool, professional manager I knew. Clad only in a flimsy nightgown, she was soaked from head to foot (it was, I realised, raining hard outside), and her bare feet were torn and bloody ? no doubt from walking across the gravel from the stable blocks. Georgina?s eyes were open but apparently unseeing; they seemed to dart around the room in search of something. She lurched to the centre of the room, eyes flickering from side to side. For a moment, she swayed indecisively, and then began stumbling from one corner of the room to another, flinging back blankets, pulling up cushions, sweeping aside books and papers, her head cocked as if listening for something and then jerking towards some unheard sound or unseen movement to continue her increasingly desperate search. And then I seemed to find myself sensing, rather than hearing, ghostly, tinkling laughter from different nooks and crannies of the room. Georgina, panting with frustration, frantic to locate and capture this phantom mockery, sobbed and wailed uncontrollably as she continued her fruitless quest. And then, suddenly, she careered towards the window, unlatching it and leaning out, peering from side to side through the driving rain. "Jackie. Jackie! Come here at once." A pause, as if listening to someone. And then, "No, Jackie. No excuses this time. I want you here now!" Head through the window, Georgina continued to swing her head around, first to the left and then to the right, as if looking for something ? or someone. I think I said something ? tried to attract Georgina?s attention ? but to no avail. In her sleepwalking state, she was deaf to anything I might say. And as I watched, horrified, she started to clamber out through the window. As I?ve said, my bedroom was an attic room, and outside the narrow window was a parapet separated from the roof by lead-lined guttering perhaps half a metre wide. Jackie stumbled into the guttering and sat on the parapet, crossing her legs as if waiting impatiently for Jackie to appear. She leaned back, her unseeing eyes peering downwards, and for an awful moment I thought she was going to fall. I darted towards the window to try to drag her back into the relative safety of the room, but although she was separated from reality, she fended me off easily with the surprising strength of the sleepwalker, and I retreated, worried that I might cause her to lose her balance. I would need help if I was to achieve anything useful. With shaking fingers I picked up my phone which was lying on the bedside table, and keyed in Polly?s number. After what seemed a long interval, she picked up, and stammering I tried to explain what was going on. While I did so, Georgina began to sing ? or at least, she emitted a tuneless keening note that might have been an attempt at music. I stood in the centre of my room, helpless, bewildered, and terrified. It seemed an age, but it was probably only a few minutes before Polly burst into the room, followed a few steps behind by Arabella. Polly was wearing an old raincoat over her nightclothes, but Arabella I noticed was fully dressed ? jeans, boots, and a dark red cowl-necked sweater. I wondered how she had had time ? perhaps Jackie had summoned her before I?d made my call ? but then I banished the thought from my mind. It was a time for action, not questions. Georgina was shifting jerkily on her perch, was still leaning over the parapet, staring down at the ground as if she thought that Jackie might be there. She shifted her weight forward as if to get a better view, balancing precariously on the rough stonework. It was Arabella who, with great presence of mind, darted forward while Georgina was turned away from us, leaned through the window, and grabbed her firmly by the hips. Georgina shuddered and convulsively shook herself from side to side in an apparent attempt to loosen Arabella?s grip, but a determined Arabella only held on more tightly, and then Polly and I, shuffling awkwardly around Arabella, reached through the narrow window and added our strength to hers. It took some time, but the three of us managed eventually to manhandle Georgina back into the room, even as she thrashed around, lashing out at us as she did so. There was an audible crack as her arm came into contact with the window pane, and I shuddered a little as her bare leg was scratched deeply by the metal window latch. Finally, we had her in the room, half-sitting, half-lying on the floor, with the three of us holding her down. Arabella sat on Georgina?s legs facing her, and took her head in her hands, shaking her gently, encouraging her to wake up with an urgent, soothing whisper. Georgina continued to struggle, but then awareness seemed to return to her, and she gradually became calmer. I had expected her to wake with a jerk, but in fact her return to consciousness was gradual, a matter of slow, dawning realisation of where she was and whom she was with. As her eyes cleared she looked at each of us in turn, bewildered and upset. As her eyes rested on me, I realised with a start that I was still naked, not having had an opportunity to throw on some clothes since rushing out of bed. "What happened?" Georgina?s question did not seem directed at any of us. "I was fighting...fighting with Jackie. And she ran away and I was chasing her and I followed her and then..." She stuttered to a breathless halt, shaken by a convulsive sob. Arabella looked at Polly and me and shrugged, and I think we both then realised the oddness of this. Georgina was too young ever to have met Jackie. How, then, could Jackie have entered her dreams? But of course, I knew the answer to that. Jackie had a habit of entering people?s dreams and prompting them to do things. At that moment, any doubts I?d had about the reality of Jackie?s spirit were gone ? whipped away by the winds which continued to howl around the outside of the house. It was Jackie who had propelled Georgina in a crazed, involuntary flight into my bedroom. But to what purpose? At that moment, Georgina tried to struggle to her feet, but managed only to half-rise, before collapsing back on to the floor. It became clear to us all that not only were her ruined feet causing her excruciating pain when she put any weight on them, but also that she had badly injured a leg or an ankle while resisting our efforts to calm her down. Blood seeped on to the carpet from her torn thigh. "Oh God, oh God. I?ve got to work tomorrow." But it was clear to us, if not to Georgina herself, that she was in no condition to work. The need now was for a doctor. A confused conversation followed. Georgina had rostered herself to be on duty at the reception desk for the difficult early morning shift, and again in the evening. Nobody else, she said, was available, and it was too late to get anybody from the agency. Arabella glanced at Polly. "Could you fill in for Georgina?" "Afraid not. Wedding reception in the afternoon. Lorenzo?s team are overstretched as it is and I?ve been asked to help out. We spent all day yesterday training and planning. Can?t let them down now." "Perhaps I could fill in for you," I said to Polly. But even as I said it I knew that the mercurial Lorenzo was unlikely to be happy with that. It was my day off, and as a result I hadn?t been involved in the planning and preparations for the wedding feast, and Lorenzo or one of his team would have to keep me under close supervision if I were to work in the kitchen, distracting them from more important work. "Perhaps," said Arabella after Polly had confirmed this, "you could man reception." I looked at her, startled. Reception was another thing I hadn?t been trained for. "It?s not that difficult. I could give you a tutorial," said Polly thoughtfully. "We could meet at 6.30 ? that would give you an hour to learn the ropes before the night clerk goes off duty." I wasn?t too happy with this, and said so. But the more we talked around the subject, the more obvious it became that there was no alternative solution and so ? at just after four in the morning ? it was settled. We then had the unhappy task of manhandling Georgina back home to her apartment in the old stables block. I found a pair of trainers into which Georgina?s swollen feet would fit, and lent her an old jacket of mine, and we half-carried her sagging body back through the still- raging storm. Tears and protests were our thanks for the support we gave her, as she tripped and stumbled in the dark, on more than one occasion almost pulling us to the ground with her. It was by now nearly five ? I would have little more than an hour?s rest before starting my training on reception duties. ++++++ Nigel, the night clerk, was still on duty as I stumbled downstairs to the reception desk. Polly ? already in her chef?s whites ? greeted me as I arrived and showed me how to log on to the computer. I felt grubby and unkempt: the suit I?d brought with me to the hotel was far too disreputable, even for a humble reception clerk, and I?d had had to dig out a doubtful pair of dark trousers. I?d managed to intercept one of the waiting staff as he was making his way sleepily towards the dining room for the breakfast shift in order to borrow a white shirt, which I wore tieless and open at the neck. The shirt was at least clean and ironed, but I still felt underdressed. Immaculate Nigel fussed around dealing with early morning breakfasters and taking dinner bookings as Polly took me through the software, showing me how to book people in, how to book a table in the restaurant, and importantly (for this was the main business of the reception desk between breakfast and lunch), how to check people out. She also pointed me at some useful sources of information to use to answer guests? questions. My head was muzzy with detail after an hour of this, and when the end of Nigel?s shift came half an hour later I felt deeply insecure. But the morning didn?t go too badly. As it was a Saturday, and the bulk of the conference crowd had left the previous evening, there weren?t many people to check out, and as it turned out we weren?t taking restaurant bookings for the evening because of the big wedding reception we were hosting. The reception itself wasn?t scheduled to start until one o?clock, so the task of greeting the party would fall to the afternoon shift, and careful Georgina had arranged for additional agency staff to be present to cope with the rush. So when my shift ended at noon, and Emma came to take over for the afternoon shift, I was, although slightly shell-shocked from the unfamiliar work, on a bit of a high. But I was careful not to congratulate myself too heartily: I would be on duty for the evening session after all. I staggered upstairs and threw myself on the bed, going over the morning?s work in my mind, and thinking about little things that had gone wrong, and how I might manage better in the evening, when we were expecting to be busy. Although the wedding reception would finish by mid-evening, the family party had booked a late dinner, and some of them were staying overnight. The bar would be busy ? and stragglers from the bar often had questions and little requests for the reception staff ? and we had a few other bookings to check in. Thinking about all this made me drowsy and I dozed for a while. Then, at just before 4 o?clock, Polly, still in in chef?s whites, knocked at my door. I blinked myself awake. "How was it?" I was flattered by her apparently genuine concern, and not a little surprised that she had managed to escape from the frenzy in the kitchen in the middle of the reception. I could hear raucous shouts and whistles drifting up from below. Perhaps the speeches were in progress, and there was a lull in the work. "OK I suppose." I thought for a moment. "I just felt that everyone knew I was a junior chef pretending to be a receptionist. And I kept messing up the booking system." "Everyone does that at first," Polly reassured me. "Anyway, if you don?t want to be recognised as a chef, perhaps you should be Pippa for this evening?s shift." She laughed as she said it, and I laughed in return, not taking the suggestion seriously. But once formed, the idea lodged itself in my mind and grew and took shape. The picture of me behind the reception desk, fully dressed as Pippa ? terrified, excited, brazen, vulnerable ? overwhelmed me. And as the afternoon wore on, when the time came for me to prepare for the evening?s duties, I found myself in Jackie?s dressing room in front of an open wardrobe, shuffling through the hangers and assessing outfits. And yes, Jackie was definitely there ? a brooding, anxious, excited presence, willing me to do the deed which I was too frightened to confront directly. She wasn?t an irresistible force, but she was certainly a powerful one. Even as I rifled through the racks of clothes, I told myself I wasn?t seriously contemplating going on duty as Pippa. I was engaged in an intriguing "what if" game, but it would never happen. Intrigued, despite myself, I pulled out half a dozen dresses which I rejected as too sexy or (alternatively) too boring. A fuscia pink jumpsuit might look good on me, but it would be too informal for the hotel?s image. And the leather suit with the short skirt and the matching round-necked jacket would... Actually, the leather suit would probably do. I looked down at the array of shoes and boots laid out below the clothes, and selected a pair of knee-length boots with a heel and a gently pointed toe, and then, excitement growing, started shuffling through drawers looking for something to complement the rather aggressive-looking suit. A black, roll-necked top would probably do if I could find some suitable jewellery to soften the image. Black tights? Yes, indeed. Still treating the idea as a fantasy, I spent half an hour dressing and applying make-up. The suit fitted me beautifully, as did all the clothes which Arabella had bought for Jackie. I?d found a heavy gold- coloured chain which I put on over the roll-necked top, and left the jacket unzipped. Deep red lips and nails, smoky eyes, dark evening- coloured foundation. I found a couple of statement rings to decorate my fingers. I would like to be able to say that I experienced a tingling of ecstasy as I slid the skimpy skirt over my hips, that I felt quiet satisfaction as I applied my make-up, enjoying the perfection of my maquillage and tasting the sticky-sweet lipstick with the tip of my tongue, that I thrilled with excitement when I examined my appearance in the completed outfit. But any excitement I might feel was tempered by the knowledge that I would be terrified by the prospect of dealing with hotel guests as Pippa. There was no way that could happen. Still, for the moment, I could wallow a little in my fantasy; and forty long minutes remained before the beginning of my shift. Plenty of time to change back to Philip, I thought. And then, a knock at the door. Polly. She breezed in. "I came to tell you that Georgina?s been sectioned. She?s had a breakdown. The doctors think she might be ill for weeks, maybe months. Robert?s made promoted me temporarily into her role until she recovers." This all came out in a burst, before she registered my appearance with a double-take. "Wow, you?ve actually done it. I never thought you?d have the bottle." A broad, mischievous grin crossed her face, as her mind changed gear from contemplating her own future to thinking about my here and now. "It?s high time we had a bit of fun in this old folks? home." "Er... I... That is to say..." But with Polly rhapsodising over my appearance and taking for granted that I was up for it, I couldn?t quite bring myself to say that I?d been about to change back. Had Jackie summoned Polly at the critical moment? Would I have backed out if she had not come? Even now, there might have been time to change my mind, but confronted by the determination I sensed from Jackie and unbalanced by Polly?s enthusiasm I couldn?t find it in myself to say the necessary words. Polly nodded with something like gleeful satisfaction. "I?ll go and warn Emma." So it was settled. I prepared to descend the stairs in an ecstasy of fear and apprehension. ++++++ Goggle-eyed. That?s how I would describe Emma?s reaction when I appeared at the desk. She shot an enquiring look at Polly, still standing by the desk, who simply shrugged. To me, Polly silently mouthed ?bon courage?, and withdrew. Of course, she would be needed again in the kitchen now. She patted my bottom as she passed. I could see the waiting staff and some agency workers clustered around the dining room door ? either they had overheard Polly and Emma, or one of them had told them ? staring at me, mostly with comic or amused expressions. For a moment, I wanted the ground to open and swallow me up. Then one of them flashed a "good luck" sign in my direction, which made me feel a little better. I thought of scuttling back to my room. But then I mentally straightened my shoulders, and tried to convey a business-like approach, as if turning up to work in a short skirt was something that junior (male) chefs did all the time. "So tell me what?s going on?" Emma continued staring at me for a moment. She opened her mouth as if to ask a question, and then shut it again and shook her head. I could almost see the mental change of gear as she decided to behave as if nothing unusual was taking place. "Well, two of the six we were expecting this evening have already checked in. No bookings for the restaurant, as you know. The family dinner is scheduled for eight in..." she glanced at the clock, "two hours? time. I?ve ordered a taxi for a party who are going into town for a meal. And that?s about it. Should be a quiet evening." I nodded my thanks. "Are you sure you?ll be all right? Alone, I mean." Emma looked genuinely concerned for a moment, and I tried to smile reassuringly. "It wasn?t easy for me to come down like this, but I needed to. I?ll be fine." I felt less confident than I hope I sounded, but I knew I had to deal with this alone. It wouldn?t do to have dressed transgressively, and then to rely on the help of someone who was off shift to keep me on an even keel. In fact, not a good look at all. And so, giving me a smile of encouragement, Emma sauntered off ? to her bedroom, I supposed. She was one of the team who slept in, and I wondered what further gossip would be generated this evening. Judging by the reaction of the waiting staff a few minutes earlier, Emma was not one to keep quiet. I collected my thoughts. Although Georgina wasn?t around to tell me off or (heaven help us) discipline me, that didn?t much allay my fear of discovery. Would Robert find out about this, and if so what would he do about it? I reassured myself that I had the support of Arabella and a newly-promoted Polly, that Lorenzo was also an ally, and that Jackie was in the background to weave her own web of influence. But I couldn?t altogether banish the nagging worry from my mind. Still, the evening went quietly, although no less nervously for that. I was acutely conscious of my clothes ? the way my tiny skirt rode up provokingly as I sat down, the need to balance carefully on my precipitous heels when I had to get up and take something from the printer, the feel of the heavy jewellery on my neck, wrists, and fingers. And when anybody came into the lobby, my first instinct was to flinch in alarm. I spent the first hour in a delicious mixture of terror and excitement, my stomach a constant flutter of nerves. The first time I had to speak to a guest, I completely failed to modulate my voice to sound feminine and then over-corrected and spoke in a nervous falsetto, and I received a puzzled look in return. I supposed that meant that the guy hadn?t spotted my true gender until he heard me speak, and there was some comfort in that at least. But I spent a lot of the evening trying to work out whether the hard looks directed at me were the result of someone realising what was under my clothing, or because an unthinking man (the hard looks almost always came from a man) had found me attractive or sexy and was too boorish to keep his glances discreet. I dealt with the four remaining bookings without incident, ordered taxis for two more couples who had arranged to eat in Avonford, and dealt with another pair who had failed to hear ? or at any rate to absorb ? the news that the dining room was closed for a private function. And whilst not all the encounters went perfectly, at least I wasn?t called out. I had calmed down considerably by the time the end of my shift approached at ten and was beginning to enjoy myself. I even found time to derive some erotic satisfaction from my get-up as I glanced at my reflection in the glass doors of the lobby. Nigel the night clerk appeared on schedule a few minutes before ten and began bustling around logging on to his computer, when the lobby doors opened and a tall figure walked into the hotel. She dragged behind her an impossibly large suitcase on wheels, struggling to manoeuvre it through the revolving door, and looked around with an expression which suggested a degree of helplessness entirely at odds with her appearance. This tall ? statuesque ? woman was slim, elegant, and beautifully groomed, a mane of auburn hair framing a strong, face with assertive make-up rather like my own (red lips, smoky eyes, careful, rather dark foundation). She wore an ankle length leather coat, and I could see heeled platform boots beneath. Having spotted me behind the desk she stumbled towards me a little nervously. "I need a room for tonight. Do you... do you have one available?" I looked at her in surprise. Ten o?clock was late for someone to turn up at an isolated hotel without a booking, and we had a wedding party. I opened the room booking system on the computer screen. "Er, yes. We do have a room available." I quoted the price for the only remaining room which was unsurprisingly on the expensive side and the woman grimaced, but nodded her acceptance. "My car?s broken down and been towed to a garage ? the pick-up truck dropped me here ? and there are no taxis available for at least two hours." She held up her mobile phone, as if inviting me to scrutinise her call history. "I was on my way to Avonford - booked into the Travelodge - but no chance of that now." These gabbled sentences explained why she had turned up without notice, but hardly why she seemed so nervous. I smiled and tried to calm her down while programming her key (the hotel bedrooms, unlike the staff rooms on the top floor, had a modern, electronic room security system, with microchipped keys the size of credit cards), and gave her the standard explanation of the hotel?s facilities, and told her how to get to her room. She signed the booking form as Tanya Pilkington. "Could someone give me some help with my luggage? This case is a bit difficult to deal with." I looked at Nigel who had, by now, finished organising himself for the night, but he shook his head. The porters went off duty at nine, and the agency staff were fully occupied in the dining room. I sighed and offered to take the case from her, indicating to Nigel as I did so that I was going off duty. Nigel acknowledged this absently. If he recognised me as Philip, he certainly gave no sign of it, and I was at least grateful for that. The lift from the lobby was constructed in the centre of an old stairwell, and was, to say the least, cramped. There was just room for the two of us and the heavy case. I pushed and prodded this unwieldy piece of luggage to the back of the lift, struggling with my balance as I did so (those heels again!), but I realised as I stepped back to let Tanya in before me that we would be crammed together in a floorspace about the size of a small bathtub. She swept into the lift, confidence apparently restored, her leather coat swirling behind her. I followed her timidly, trying unsuccessfully to avoid our bodies touching, but I couldn?t avoid brushing against her hip as I tried to creep in past her. I was acutely aware of her body and clothes, and the heady, musky perfume she was wearing. I looked straight ahead, not exactly avoiding her eyes, but not looking directly at her either. The lift reached the fourth floor and again I motioned to Tanya to go ahead of me. I struggled with the suitcase, but eventually arrived in front of the allotted door, and I held my hand out for the key. Smiling, Tanya passed it to me, her fingers brushing against mine as she did so. Never mind the fact that her hands were gloved, I found myself withdrawing my hand with a jerk as if an electric charge had passed between us. Stop it, I told myself, you?re being stupid. I opened the door and explained to Tanya how the key card was used to activate the room lighting, and she strutted past me into the room. I hefted Tanya?s suitcase on to the rack by the wall, and turned to face her. She was looking around the room, which was quite large, with a double bed, a desk, two wardrobe spaces, and an en suite bathroom. There was room to walk around and space and furnishings in which to relax, which was certainly more than could be said for the average Travelodge bedroom. Tanya untied the belt of her long coat, and began undoing the buttons. "God, I could do with a drink," she said. She shrugged herself out of the long black coat, and it fell to the floor, making the luscious crumpling sound characteristic of high quality leather. I instinctively bent down to pick it up, and then as I rose with it in my hands, found myself staring at the extraordinary costume that had now been revealed. Tanya was wearing a tight and very short leather dress, sleeveless with a stiff, raised collar, very long boots ? almost crotch length ? which stopped just an inch or so below the hemline of her dress, and beautifully fine leather opera gloves extending above her elbow. She stood before me, consciously posing, arms extended sideways, elbows slightly bent. I found myself looking at her a little more closely. The make-up was heavy and stylised, and there was ? was there? ? just the hint of an adam?s apple above the ribbon of black silk that adorned her neck. And there was something about the body language as well. I think I might have suffered an involuntary intake of breath. Tanya, perhaps assuming that I was struck ? understandably enough ? by her outfit, smiled at my confusion. "I was planning to go clubbing this evening," she said. Well, it wasn?t exactly the outfit for a church service, I thought to myself. And even for clubbing, it seemed a bit extreme. "What sort of club exactly was it that you were going to?" I asked. "Skinny?s in Avonford. It?s got a very strict dress code." Avonford was just under half an hour?s drive away. "So I see," I said drily. There was a pause, during which I think we were both uncertain how to continue the conversation. I really ought to get out of the room and leave Tanya to her own devices, but I was still agog at the vision I was faced with, and I think Tanya was perhaps surprised by her impetuosity in revealing it to me. I stood rooted to the spot, and at length, Tanya broke the silence. "How about coming to the bar with me? I think you?re off duty now, and I really need a drink after what?s happened this evening, and although I?m used to being dressed in shining armour, even I don?t want to go by myself to the bar in a hotel like this dressed in these clothes." "Um," I said, "we?re not exactly encouraged to use the bars or the restaurant in the evenings. They?re for guests, not staff. And in any case, there?s most of a wedding party still here, so it might be a bit rowdy. But I think there?s some champagne in the mini bar." Tanya knelt down before the cabinet, and extracted a half bottle of champagne which she deftly opened and then, without asking, poured two glasses and handed one to me. I took a cautious sip and, feeling that some further comment on her outfit was required, asked again about Skinny?s and its dress code and what attracted her to it. She shrugged. "I enjoy wearing striking costumes." (I smiled inwardly at the choice of word.) "And there?s something special about being part of a scene where the whole point is to see and to be seen. I like to think that I can play a part in a drama that not many people can carry off." And then she looked at me, appraising and ? I thought nervously ? judging. "But you could pass muster," she said finally, taking a couple of steps towards me. She took the hem of my jacket in her left hand and zipped it up with her right, so that it fitted snugly around my torso, and then took a step back, scrutinising me once more through narrowed eyes. "Lose the roll-neck. You?d want to wear nothing under the jacket but your underwear. Accessories? We?d need to choose them with care. Gloves maybe ? or maybe better, gauntlets ? perhaps a studded dog- collar. More assertive make-up. We?d get you in with ease." She hesitated. "I?m going again in a fortnight. You could come too. I?d pick you up on my way." What was this about? We?d met scarcely five minutes before, and suddenly it seemed I was being propositioned. Perhaps Tanya, unsettled by the ruin of her plan for the evening, was improvising a fall-back. I had the sense of being carried away by the force of a personality much stronger than my own. I was nervous, intrigued, and excited all at once. (This seemed to be becoming a familiar combination of emotions.) For a moment I didn?t know what to say by way of a reply. "Would you like me to?" I temporised. She nodded, still looking me up and down, lips slightly parted. "You make a very beautiful woman." So there it was ? any thought that Tanya had been taken in by my deception was comprehensively blown away. Still, it was a compliment of sorts, and perhaps it took one T-girl to know another. Small, give-away signs that might not be spotted by a person without the right sort of experience. "So do you," I replied. In truth, I hadn?t been completely sure of my ground, but Tanya nodded: and now we both knew where we stood. And I knew in that moment that I would go to Skinny?s with her and I had a pretty good idea where it would lead. Tanya stepped over to the desk, picked up her glass, and took a sip. I followed suit, and we stood facing each other for a moment. And then she took a step towards me, closing the distance between us. Instinctively, I inclined my head back to maintain eye contact with the taller woman. For a fleeting moment, I had time to wonder whether this was what I truly wanted. And then I felt an arm snake around my waist and pull me towards her so that our bodies were touching. My skirt rode up slightly as it rubbed against the leather of her dress, and as its material slipped around my hips and thighs, an erotic surge pulsed through me. Tanya?s soft lips found mine, and I felt an eager tongue dart between my lips in search of my own. I knew, in that second, that what was important to me for the rest of the evening was the here and now and my desires and her eagerness to help me achieve them. And then I closed my eyes and lost myself in the swirl of sensations that obliterated all conscious thought. ++++++ Somewhere, somehow Jackie was at peace. The swirling, unsettling emotions she had prompted in me had dissipated for ever. Had she done this before? Had other occupants of that room left the hotel finding their lives going down a new track? I would have plenty of time to think about that as I contemplated and organised the next steps in my life. In the meantime, all that remained of Jackie was an all-embracing feeling of well-being and contentment. Afterwards, when I returned groggily to my own room, I had time to contemplate the future. My internship had settled the direction not only of my career, but also of my personal life. There were, of course, loose ends to tie up. I would need to complete my internship and find out whether there was a permanent place for me at the hotel. Or maybe move to London where there were undoubtedly opportunities both for work and a more colourful social life. And in the immediate future, there was Peter?s further development to steer: but perhaps that is a story for another time.