— And how did you get out of that predicament? asked Mrs. de Ransac.
Choisy shrugged his shoulders.
— Sir Desportes was calmed with a handful of gold coins and the slap he gave his daughter. As for Clorinde, it wasn't so easy. I told her that under the circumstances, I could not stay among the troupe, and she admitted it. So, after a stormy night, I left Berlin.
— And you came straight to Venice?
— Yes, because I knew you were there.
There was a silence. The sun, as magnificent as the Roi Soleil himself, cast its golden rays on the lagoon.
— Venice is really a town made to measure for lovers, don't you think so? Choisy asked.
Mrs. de Ransac giggled nervously.
— So you think that here I would have weaknesses that I would not have in Paris? she said. No, my dear count, I intend to remain a faithful wife.
— What an honour for Mr. de Ransac!
— You might have complimented me on my virtue, but you personify insolence and one has to take you as nature made you.
— Well, then take me!
— I prefer being a spectator to your successes.
— Don't you mean being part of it, rather?
— Pshaw! You have at your disposal a large number of belles who would not resist you. I am not going to be your accomplice.
Night was now descending on Venice and Choisy was moved by the beauty of the scene and the intimate presence of Charlotte de Ransac.
He had first met her in Paris, where he had tried in vain to seduce her. She was then a young bride. Now, she had matured, and the forms of her body had very promising bulges, and her eyes and lips sent out silent love-calls.
He was determined to lay siege to her heart (to use a euphemism), but, being a good tactician, he knew he would have to use a lot of patience-Mrs. de Ransac was not one of those women you took by violence.
— You did not pass unperceived in Venice, she said. Not later than yesterday in the salon of the marchioness of Rubo, they were discussing you.
— Really? exclaimed Choisy, curious.
— Yes, my dear count. But in Venice anything that is ambiguous is food for gossip.
— And they want me to furnish them with gossip?
— That is already done. The big question is to know which sex you belong to.
— I have given ample proof of that.
— Not here. You have a knight's costume but they say it proves nothing.
— The Carnival is over, Choisy observed. Would they want me to have gondolier's arms and halberdier's calves? Do tell me about this marchioness-is she a citadel of virtue?
— So they say..
— That does tempt me. I'm prepared to wager that I'll win her heart.
— I'll accept the wager, and even introduce you if you like, although you'll find more accessible beauties in Venice.
Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Mr. de Ransac who was back from the embassy where he worked as first secretary. He invited Choisy to supper and asked him many questions about Berlin.
The next day, Choisy's gondola crossed another gondola in which he saw a very attractive woman and he could have sworn that she smiled at him. The gondolier told him that it was the beautiful Francesca, a courtesan richly kept by a rich merchant of Murano.
— Is she virtuous? he asked.
The gondolier, in the way of answer, grimaced and started singing a local song, the meaning of which escaped Choisy.
When he had returned to his hotel, Choisy called in his valet Bouju.
— Try to get information where Francesca lives — she's a creature as beautiful as Venus herself.
— But, Sir, I don't speak Italian.
— Francesca-keep that name in mind. The rest shouldn't be difficult. And he dismissed him with an elegant gesture of his hand.
Indeed, Bouju soon found Francesca's address, and in the evening, Choisy passed in a gondola in front of her house. He saw her graceful silhouette delineated in the frame of her window.
But there was a man with her-an elderly man, richly dressed.
He wrote her a letter, calling her “The Pearl of Venice.” Flattery reached its target and she sent back a letter inviting him to spend the night in her palace.
As he arrived at the house, she came down the marble steps and he received her in his gondola. Together they went inside and drew the curtains.
He thanked her in a few words of Italian he had picked up. She retaliated with a few words of French which took on a southern charm under her warm voice and accent.
— What did you come to Venice for? she asked.
— For love! he answered with fire in his voice.
— Love? scoffed Francesca, they say that the French make it chiefly in words.
— It's a slander, an awful calumny.
— Then there is a rumour that you are really a woman disguised as a man.
— So it's curiosity that drives you to see for yourself, is it?
— Shall I be the first in Venice to learn the answer?
— Upon my word, that is so, he assured her.
She allowed him to take her hand, on which Choisy gave a first kiss. Then he prolonged his kisses up to her elbow. Her skin was unctuous and gave off a heady perfume.
In the dark, Choisy's lips searched Francesca's. As he found them a tremor of bliss agitated them both and they remained long in a loving embrace. As he finally released her, she exclaimed:
— Oh, dear, how well you can deceive people!
He kissed her again, drawing back the curls of her hair and drinking in the perfume of her throat. She sighed with ecstasy, but, growing a bit alarmed, she said:
— Let me go home now!
— Not yet, he answered, it must be so lovely to remain together in this swaying gondola.
— I'm afraid it will be swaying too much, and then we'll be in the drink.
— Then we'll love each other in the water like sea-monsters, he bantered.
She tried to push away his straying hand. Under her cape she was wearing only a light dress and a thin chemise.
This little struggle lasted a moment, he trying to reach with his hand at the vulnerable points of her anatomy, and she striving to push his hand away, until eventually she felt against her bare loins something unmistakably hard and warm, and she gave way to his advances.
Slowly, in order not to disturb the balance of the gondola too much, he drove his instrument in and out. But she soon grew so amorous and excited that she found his slow movements too little of a good thing, so she thrust out with her loins and hastened the movement, whispering passionately the while: “Caro, caro…”
Then she gave orders to the gondolier to driver her home.
— Are you convinced, now? asked Choisy.
She tenderly shut his lips with her warm scented fingers, which he kissed with devotion.
Before leaving the gondola, she told him to return on the following night.
But what a surprise she had when, the next night, she saw a lady enter her palace instead of the man she was expecting.
Then the “lady” unveiled “her” face and, to her amazement, she saw it was really Choisy, or someone looking very much like him, for she was not convinced yet that a disguise could be so perfect.
— Is it really you? she asked, dubious.
— Shall I tell you what we did yesterday in the gondola to convince you? he asked.
— But your coiffure is absolutely ravishing!
— And, see, I even have a bosom-but an artificial one.
Still a little doubtful, she asked:
— Wouldn't you by any chance have a brother looking like you?
He laughed:-No, I am an only child.
Then he proceeded to divest himself of his feminine garments, in the privacy of her luxurious room.
At each phase of the undressing, she exclaimed “incredible!”
Then, when the Big Bad Wolf came to be seen, her heart gave furious thumps.
She let Choisy undress her and wondered at the skill of his hands.
— You're better than my maid, she said smiling.
The caresses his hands gave her as he undressed her were an excellent prelude to love. Choisy, too, was getting very much excited at the sight of her flesh getting more and more revealed, and the warm heady perfume that emanated from her delicately embroidered clothes.
At last, with feverish fingers, he divested her of the last protection of her garments, and threw himself on the bed with her.
He lay on top of her and kissed her neck, her mouth, then her bosom and remained some time savouring the milky whiteness of her voluptuous breasts, and, as he made the pink nipples grow under his gently biting lips, she squirmed with passion, and, as he came into her, she was ripe and ready.
But Choisy was determined to give her the whole gamut of love a la Francaise, so he did not go in yet, but proceeded to make her come several times with his tongue.
And how she responded to his clever love-making! She had never had such a lover before. Choisy had opened up new vistas of sensual pleasure to her.
As a good strategist, he kept attacking on all fronts at the same time. Thus, while he was sucking her off, with one hand he pinched her nipples in turn, and he used one-or sometimes two-fingers of the other hand as a penis, driving them deeply in and out of her warm juicy pussy.
He finished off by going into her himself, and timing it so that they came together in an orgasm so violent that it left them both dazed in blissful forgetfulness for a moment.
With some pauses for sleep, their love feast lasted long through the night and, in the morning, Choisy left Francesca's apartments dressed as a woman. He continued to adopt this disguise and it was funny to see that nobody ever suspected anything was afoot between him and Francesca.
At times, he even crossed in his path Francesca's lover-the rich merchant-and Francesca had a good laugh when he told her once that her elderly lover was making eyes at him, taking him for an attractive woman.