The embarrassment was exquisite. Alice had never felt such powerful empathy with a film character in her life. That was her own flesh and blood up there, her closest and most beloved relative. It was as though a part of Alice herself was on-screen.
The camera zoomed in to show Lili’s wriggling bottom as her angry master flipped up her skirt and pulled her bloomers down to her knees. It was clear from the darker colouring of Lili’s cheeks that there was no fakery, and Alice suspected that her kicks and cries were every bit as real.
‘OWW! OH! SIR, PLEASE!’ Lili yelped and pleaded in histrionic capitals while the action continued in silence. Alice’s mind provided the soundtrack. She winced in sympathy with every slap and smack, and her own bottom began to tingle as Lili’s grew redder and redder. Well, darker grey anyway.
When Alice didn’t think she – or Lili – could take any more, the spanking stopped. Now Mr Pinkering was stroking the maid’s poor punished bottom, cooing to her in silly intertitles. His rubbing became more lascivious as Lili wriggled about on his knee. Mrs Pinkering was soon joining in, and then the kinky couple had their naughty maid on the bed and were undressing her completely.
Alice pressed her hands against her burning face as she watched her great-grandmother stripped naked. She was beautiful, with a body to match. She raised her long dancer’s legs in the air and parted them to reveal her sex, thatched with pale hair that she must have dyed to match the hair on her head. The camera pushed in for a good view of her pussy as the Pinkerings caressed and stroked her. Mrs Pinkering kissed the dewy little slit, flicking her tongue over Lili’s clit while Mr Pinkering played with her breasts, pinching and teasing her nipples into erect peaks.
The title writer had stopped intruding now that there was no need to explain the plot or elucidate dialogue. Alice didn’t need any help to imagine Lili’s moans and gasps as both master and mistress toyed with her. Lili was astonishingly flexible, a talent they exploited fully, putting her in a variety of different positions while they sucked and fucked her. Alice had inherited some of that flexibility, but nowhere near as much as she’d have liked once she saw its full potential in Lili.
Her panties were soaked by the time the reel clattered to a halt and the loose end of the filmstrip whipped against the projector. She hurriedly went to turn it off. Her hands shook as she removed it and placed it carefully back in its canister. She was still blushing so hard she didn’t think she could face her guest. He hadn’t said a word since the real action had begun.
‘Well,’ she said at last, just to say something. Anything.
Jake got unsteadily to his feet and Alice couldn’t help but notice the bulge in his trousers. He cleared his throat and met her eyes with a sheepish grin. ‘That was … quite something.’
Alice could only nod. Silence spooled out between them like a dropped reel of film. When they finally spoke, they did so in unison.
‘Would you like to—’
‘Maybe we could—’
Alice laughed. ‘You first.’
He smiled. ‘I was going to suggest a double bill.’
Alice returned his smile, relieved and excited. ‘So was I. It was Lili’s final wish, after all. Make the most of my inheritance. That’s what she made me promise. She said not to let her be forgotten.’
‘I can guarantee I’ll never forget that,’ Jake said.
‘Me either.’
They both looked back at the open box, a treasure trove of secret delights.
One by one, they took out all the film cans. There were 47 in all. Alice’s heart swelled with pride at the body of work, at Lili’s obvious pride in preserving them. These probably weren’t even all she had made. Surely other people – directors, producers, actors, collectors – must have some as well. Maybe there was even a preservation society for films like Lili’s.
All the titles were intriguing, but some of the slang expressions were downright mystifying.
‘What the hell is a “bearcat”?’ Alice said, squinting at the handwriting on a peeling label. ‘Or a “floorflusher” for that matter?’
Jake shook his head with a laugh. ‘I’m sure they’d have been just as confused by our terms. Hey, I like the look of this one: Molls and Dolls.’
Alice had to laugh. Guys hadn’t changed in a hundred years. ‘Sounds good,’ she said, taking the canister from him. She threaded the film through the projector and they resumed their seats as it began.
Two flappers laden with shopping bags and hatboxes were giggling outside a shop window displaying Roaring Twenties fashions. The blonde was Lili. She didn’t really have the boyish figure for the fringed dress and ropes of pearls she wore. Her breasts were rather larger than most women’s of the period. But, of course, the audience for these particular films wouldn’t have been too concerned with how fashionable the actresses looked wearing clothes. From what Alice had seen of her naked, Lili would still be a hit today.
Suddenly, an old car screeched to a silent halt on the street behind them. The girls threw up their hands in fright, dropping their parcels as two pinstriped figures emerged from the car, holding tommy guns. They were both women. An intertitle popped up. ‘YOU TWO! IN THE CAR!’
The flappers obeyed and there was a lovely close-up of them huddling together on the back seat before a dissolve relocated the action to a swanky hotel room. The kidnap victims were gagged and tied to chairs while the molls stripped out of what were presumably their gangster boyfriends’ pinstriped suits. Underneath, each wore a silk chemise and what looked like a cross between a girdle and a garter belt. The camera panned up their black-stockinged legs and over their bodies while they contrived sexy poses, chatting to each other and taunting their captives.
Alice couldn’t help but laugh. ‘I could almost have believed it was a normal film until now.’
Jake agreed, then added, ‘There’s something quite sexy about period underwear, don’t you think?’
‘Yeah. It looks so constricting, like a corset, but it’s actually showing off everything it’s pretending to conceal.’ She stopped short of confessing that she’d always wanted to wear something like it.
Lili and her friend struggled against the ropes, pleading with their eyes. But the molls showed no pity. The taller one, a leggy brunette, crossed to a cupboard and took out what looked like a riding crop. She smiled cruelly at the girls as she slapped it against her palm.
‘NO ONE DOUBLE-CROSSES US!’
Alice felt her face turn scarlet as the flavour of the action became clear. She was beginning to sense a theme in Lili’s pictures, a theme she’d often explored in her own fantasies, but never revealed to a living soul. The film was putting all her secret desires on-screen.
Then the camera iris closed itself, trapping Lili inside a diminishing circle until the screen was black. When the iris opened again, both girls were untied and crouching on the floor, clinging to each other. The director was clearly a leg man, as the low shot favoured the molls’ thighs, calves and feet as they walked back and forth and circled their prey.
Then the tall brunette grabbed Lili and dragged her over by the bed while the other moll took Lili’s friend into an adjoining room. Lili clasped her hands and beseeched her captor, ‘PLEASE, NO!’
But the other woman was merciless. She threw back her head with a theatrical laugh and then proceeded to strip her prisoner, slowly and sensually, making a show of exposing her charms to the camera. The director lingered on shots of her legs, before focusing on what was between them.
A glance over at Jake confirmed that he was enjoying the sight and Alice felt herself grow even wetter at the thought of his arousal.