Birds of Prey - Smith Wilbur (полная версия книги .TXT) 📗
Katinka had been on the point of passing on, but now, with a small thrill of excitement, she turned back to study this creature. He towered above her, and she looked UP into his strange pale eyes, imagining what dread sights they had seen. Then she glanced down at his hands. They were farmer's hands, broad and strong and calloused, the backs covered with stiff bristles. She imagined them holding a spade or a branding iron, a pitchfork or the knotted coil of the strangling cord.
"They call you Stadige Jan?" She had heard the name spoken with fascination and revulsion, the way one speaks of a deadly, venomous snake. ja, Mevrouw." He nodded. "That is what they call me." "A strange name. Why?" She found his level yellow stare disquieting, as though he was looking at something far behind her.
"Because I speak slowly. Because I never rush. Because I am thorough. Because plants grow slowly and fruitfully under my hands. Because men die slowly and painfully under these same hands." He held up one for her to examine. His voice was sonorous yet melodious- She found herself swallowing hard with a strange, perverse arousal.
"We are soon to have a chance to watch you work, Stadige Jan." She smiled slightly breathlessly. "I believe that the dungeon of the castle is full of rogues awaiting your ministrations." She had a sudden image of those broad strong hands working on Hal Courtney's slim straight body, the body she knew so well, changing it, gradually breaking it down. The muscles in her thighs and lower belly tightened at the thought. it would be the ultimate thrill to see the beautiful toy of which she had tired being maimed and disfigured, but slowly and slowly.
"We must talk again, Stadige Jan," she said huskily. "I am sure you -have many amusing stories to tell me, about cabbages and other things." He bowed again, replaced the Hat on his shaven head and stepped back into the line of servants. Katinka passed on.
"This is my housekeeper," Kleinhans said, but Katinka was so engrossed in her thoughts that, for several seconds, she gave no indication that she had heard him. Then she threw an idle glance at the female Kleinhans was presenting, and suddenly her eyes widened. She turned her full attention on the woman. "Her name is Sukeena." There was something in Kleinhans" tone that she could not immediately fathom.
"She is very young for such an important position," Katinka said, to gain time in which to allow her instincts to have play. In an entirely different manner, she found this woman as enthralling as the executioner. She was so exquisitely small and dainty as to seem an artist's creation and not flesh and blood.
"It is a characteristic of her race to appear much younger than their years," Kleinhans told her. "They have such small childlike bodies you will observe her tiny waist and her hands and feet, like those of a doll." He broke off abruptly, as he realized that he might have committed a solecism in discussing another woman's bodily parts.
Katinka's expression did not change to reveal the amusement she felt. The old goat lusts for her, she thought, and she studied the jewel-like qualities to which he had drawn her attention. The girl wore a high collar, but the stuff of her blouse was sheer and light as gossamer. Like the rest of her, her breasts were tiny but perfect. Katinka could see the shape and colour of her nipples through the silk. they were like a pair of imperial rubies wrapped in gossamer. That dress, although simple and of classical Eastern design, must have cost fifty guilders at the very least. Her sandals were gold-embroidered, rich raiment for a house slave. At her throat she wore an ornament of carved jade, a jewel fit for a mandarin's favourite. The girl must certainly be Kleinhans" pretty bauble, she decided.
Katinka's first carnal fulfilment had been at the age of thirteen, on the threshold of puberty. In the seclusion of the nursery, her nurse had introduced her to those forbidden delights. Occasionally, when her fancy dictated and opportunity presented, she still voyaged to the enchanted isles of Lesbos. Often she had found there enchantments that no man had been able to afford her. Now as she looked up from the childlike body to the dark eyes, she felt a tremor of desire run down her own belly and melt into her loins.
Sukeena's gaze smouldered like the lavas of the volcanoes of her native Bali. These were not the eyes of a subservient child slave but those of a proud, defiant woman. Katinka felt herself challenged and aroused. To subdue her, and have her, and then to break her. She felt her pulse quicken and her breath come short as she pictured it happening.
"Follow me, Sukeena," she commanded. "I want you to show me the house." "My lady." Sukeena placed the palms of her hands together and touched her fingertips to her lips as she bowed, but her eyes held Katinka's with the same dark, furious expression. Was it hatred, Katinka wondered, and the idea increased her excitement.
Sukeena has intrigued her, as I knew she must. She will buy her from me, Kleinhans thought. I will be rid of the witch at last. He had been aware of that interplay of passions and emotions between the two women. Although he did not flatter himself that he could fathom the slave girl's oriental mind, she had been his chattel for almost five years and he had learned to recognize many of the nuances of her moods. The thought of parting with her filled him with dismay but for his own peace and sanity he knew he must do it. She was destroying him. He could not remember what it was to have a quiet mind, not to be plagued and tormented by passions and unfulfilled desires, not to be in the witch's thrall. Because of her he had lost his health. His stomach was being eaten away by the hot acids of dyspepsia, and he could not remember a night of unbroken sleep in all those long five years.
At least he was rid of her brother, who had been almost as great a torment to him. Now she, too, must go. He could no longer endure this blight on his existence.
Sukeena stepped out of the line of servants and fell in dutifully behind the three, her loathsome master, the boorish giant of a soldier and this beautiful cruel golden lady, who, she sensed somehow, already held her destiny in those slim white hands.
I will wrest it from her, Sukeena vowed. This vile old man could not own me, although for the last five years he has dreamed of nothing else. Neither will this golden tiger woman ever own me. I swear it on my father's sacred memory.
They passed in a group through the high airy rooms of the residence. Through the green-painted shutters spilled the mellow Cape sunshine, casting stark zebra shadows on the tiled floors. Katinka felt a lightness of the spirit in these sunny colonies. She felt a recklessness in herself, an eagerness for strange adventures and for un-fathomed excitements.
