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  At the threshold of their room, he scooped her up in his powerful arms and carried her inside. Olga giggled as he gently returned her feet to the floor. With a finger, he tilted her face upward and kissed her. This time, he took his time. This time, he held her close and savored her tender lips.

  Yes, marriage is going to be very nice.

  Olga closed her eyes and pressed her body into his and her spine tingled.

  The porter cleared his throat. “Will there be anything else, sir?” He put her valise on the bed and lit several candles

  “No,” Peter said. After waiting for the porter to depart, he continued, “I’ll be in the washroom down the hall.” He needlessly pointed. “There is a chamber pot there,” he nodded toward the wooden box in the corner. “And everything else you might need.” He turned away. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  When he closed the door, Olga examined the ten by ten foot room. She unbuttoned the gown she had borrowed from her mother, and hung it in the wardrobe. She stripped off her blouse and bodice. She rolled down her stockings and used the chamber pot. Finally, she unbuttoned her chemise and examined her lanky, nude body in the mirror. She wondered what Peter would think of her.

  What had his first wife looked like? Was she pretty?

  Her fingers twisted the brown curls covering her mons. She had been thrilled when this symbol of female maturity had appeared. Her breasts had never swollen to full size, but seventeen-year-old Ida’s bosom was ample.

  Tonight I become a real woman.

  She wondered how long it would be before she achieved the final step in a woman’s maturity and became a mother.

  Olga unpacked her bag and poured water from the pitcher into the basin. She added lavender scent, a gift from her sister, to the water. After rinsing her body, she pulled on her nightdress. Instead of donning her sleeping bonnet, she brushed out the braids in her straw-colored hair. Blowing out all but one of the candles, she slid under the bed cover. She lay on her back and waited.

  When Peter returned, he quietly crept into the room as though he was avoiding disturbing her. He was wearing his nightshirt and was carrying his clothing in a bundle. She silently watched as he placed his clothes atop hers. Embarrassingly, she had forgotten to conceal her chemise and underskirt. Now, his gray woolen trousers and white cotton shirt were intermingled with the lace of her undergarments. However, he took no notice.

  Peter extinguished the last candle. Illuminated by the slivers of light around the curtain, Olga watched her husband pull off his nightshirt. In the dim light, she could not discern the features of his manhood. He tip-toed to the bed and crawled in next to her. The newlyweds lay side by side under the bed cover, panting with anticipation and excitement.

  I’m glad he knows what to do.

  Olga was actually pleased that her husband was experienced in these matters. She did not want this to be a clumsy game of the blind leading the blind. As instructed by her mother, she lay still.

  “Are you asleep?” he whispered.

  “No,” she whispered back.

  He rolled to his side and placed his hand on her abdomen. Touching her in the manner only a husband could touch his wife. His warm palm massaged small circles over her cotton nightdress. Tingles flowed along her spine and her womanhood began to itch.

  Yes, this is it!

  He nuzzled against her shoulder. His beard both tickled and scratched her neck. She wondered what she should be doing with her hands. He kissed her and she placed a hand on the back of his neck. She did not want him to stop. She relaxed, and his lips opened her mouth. His tongue touched hers.

  Oh, my God!

  Her Venus swelled and Olga opened her thighs a couple of inches. Peter broke their kiss and nuzzled his forehead against the side of her head. His hand inched up her torso and cupped her small breast.

  Should I apologize for them?

  He exhibited no disappointment with her diminutive bosom, and shifted his body closer to hers. She felt a hardness pressing against her thigh. She felt her nipple stiffen under his touch. She gasped.

  “Are you all right?” he whispered.

  “Yes, I’m sorry.”

  “No need to be. I don’t mean to rush you.”

  She swallowed the lump in her throat and pulled his lips back to hers. The stiffness of his manhood twitched against her leg.

  Peter’s hand abandoned her breast and slid down her torso. His fingers did not pause as they passed over her belly button. They did not pause until he felt the thatch covering her mons. Two fingers pressed the cotton fabric between her thighs.

  An electric shock flared as he gently touched the soft folds below her bush. She broke the kiss and clutched his neck. She gasped again and opened her legs to allow his fingers to advance further into her unexplored territory. She moaned and felt a pleasant wetness ooze from her puffy pussy lips. He rolled over on top of her. She lifted her knees as he knelt between them. His hardness now pressed into the inside of her thigh.

  Peter pulled up the hem of her nightdress. They touched skin to skin.

  Using his hips, he pushed her thighs wide apart. His cock was cool and hard as he pressed it against her hot, soft core.

  Olga clenched her jaw tightly shut to suppress any scream she might make. Her mother and married friends had all warned her of the pain Peter would cause as he penetrated her for the first time. He pressed his hips forward.

  “Oh ah,” she groaned between clenched teeth.

  She had been expecting the pain of having a tooth pulled, but this was much less. Peter withdrew and pressed again. The pressure of being stretched was uncomfortable, but not painful.

  Lifting her knees, she planted her feet flat on the mattress. She gripped his shoulders and pressed her face into his bare chest. The tickling hairs distracted her for a moment as he thrust once again, deeper.

  She groaned again, aloud. This time the pain was sharper, but it quickly passed. He withdrew and thrust one more time. She felt the hairs below his belly entangle with hers. In response to the fullness in her core, she dug her heels into the bed and rolled her hips upward.

  It is done!

  “Are you all right?” he whispered again.

  “Yes,” she sighed.

  But it wasn’t over. He wasn’t finished. Instead of withdrawing and climbing off of her, he resumed thrusting into her. Faster, rhythmic—he pumped in and out of her womanhood. While no longer painful, it was uncomfortable. She pressed her face against his neck and wondered how long this would last.

  Peter groaned and his motions acquired a new urgency. His thrusts were deeper, harder. A tingling bloomed from her Venus. Olga groaned and lifted her hips higher. Pressing into his motion, she matched her movements to his thrusts. Surprisingly, the deeper into her channel that he invaded, the better she liked it.

  Then, he released a long sighing groan and at the same time she was surprised to feel a hot, wet stream of liquid shooting up inside her. It was an interesting sensation and not at all unpleasant. She wondered what this liquid was. Mother had not explained.

  He collapsed atop her. While he lay still, the hardness within her continued to twitch. Minutes later, he rolled away from her and fell asleep.

  Olga reached down and touched the sticky ooze along her womanly slit.

  This is what will make me pregnant—his seed.

  She pushed her nightdress down, and wondered how she would know when she was with child. She turned to sleep.

  Sometime during the night, he awoke her and completed the entire process again. As promised, there was no pain. Olga actually enjoyed it. Then, as the first rays of sunlight found their way around the curtain, he did it a third time.

  Her mother had said she would enjoy his attentions, and she found the sensation of his hard manhood deep inside her to be a pleasant feeling, but she wondered just how many times he was going to do this. The space between her legs had become very sticky and she felt the need to bathe.

  Chapter 2

 
March 16, 1848

  Cincinnati, Ohio

  The morning following her wedding, Olga Graus pretended not to watch, but she did. She watched as her husband swung his legs to the floor and stood up from the bed. Her younger sister had been the only person she had ever seen naked before she saw Peter’s bare butt. His was entirely different from Ida’s round posterior. Despite Peter’s other round features, his bottom was a flat deflated balloon.

  He picked up his shirt and put it on. Olga caught a glimpse of his manhood—gone was its rigidity. It was small and flaccid.

  I wonder how he does that?

  She marveled at how he could so drastically alter his anatomy. In the morning light, his member clearly contained no bones, yet it had been so hard during the night.

  He pulled on his trousers, and lifted the suspenders to his shoulders. He stuffed his feet into his boots. He turned to look at her and she was caught.

  “Wait here,” he said, ignoring that she had been watching him. “I’ll get you some breakfast.”

  Perhaps it is normal for husband and wife to look at each other. Will he want to look at me in the bare?

  She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. She nodded.

  As soon as he left, she hastened to use the chamber pot. She quickly dressed in the light gray day-frock that she packed in her valise. She rolled on her stockings and was tying the garters behind her knees when he opened the door. He had not knocked.

  He placed the breakfast tray on the washstand. He did not avert his eyes despite having discovered her with her legs scandalously exposed. She made no move to cover herself until she had finished with the placement of her stockings.

  “Here,” he said, “I intended for you to have breakfast in bed this morning.”

  “Oh, that is very thoughtful of you. And I shall.” As she was shoeless, she reclined on the bed. He placed the tray of scrambled eggs, bacon, and fried potato cake beside her. “Thank you, very much… Peter.”

  She watched his eyes trace along her exposed calves to her feet. For some inexplicable reason, she wiggled her toes. He gripped the toes of her left foot in his hand. She enjoyed the smile it brought to his face.

  “I’m off to work this morning,” he said. “Feel free to come by the store so I can introduce you to my friends.”

  “Yes, I will. However, first I must return to Papa’s farm. I need to begin packing for the trip to Oregon.”

  “Yes, about that… Olga, you must remember that we can take very little with us. Only what is essential.”

  “Won’t we have one of those big wagons?”

  “Indeed, but it will be filled with our provisions for the trip. It is a four-month trek and the wagon will be filled with food and supplies. There’s simply no room for a collection of niceties.”

  “Yes, of course, I understand.”

  After collecting her husband’s buggy and horse from the livery stable, Olga drove the three miles northwest to her family farm. Her father and brother were working in the fields, but her mother greeted her warmly. Her sister Ida was full of smiles and giggles, and pulled her aside at the first opportunity.

  “How was it? Really?” she whispered.

  Olga did her best to look like a full-grown woman of the world, as though the experience had changed her, matured her. With casual distraction, she answered, “Oh, it was pleasant enough. Don’t let the old women scare you. It doesn’t really hurt enough to bother mentioning.” Olga searched for the words to explain the frequency with which Ida could expect her husband to repeat the lovemaking act. “It gets better with each time you repeat it.” Embarrassed, she turned her eyes away.

  Olga selected the three largest trunks in the attic. She and Ida began to fill them with everything she owned. At lunchtime, her mother came to call them to dinner.

  “I didn’t imagine that you could take so much all the way to Oregon? Are you having that shipped?” she asked.

  “Shipped?”

  “Yes, on a schooner around South America to Oregon?”

  “Is such a thing possible?”

  “I don’t know about these things, but I do know there are ships that make the voyage.”

  “Hmm, well, I expect we will take this with us. Mr. Graus is securing us a big wagon.” Her mother opened her mouth as though to say something, but then closed it. “No one can expect us to travel so far with only the clothes on our backs. Mr. Graus will see my way of thinking, I’m sure.”

  Again, her mother appeared to have some words on the tip of her tongue, but she held them.

  After lunch, they loaded the trunks onto the buggy and Olga returned to the boarding house. Two men helped her carry them up the stairs and stack them in the corner of their small room. By the time this was completed, it was late in the afternoon and she was tired. She had not gotten much sleep the night before.

  Olga lay down on the bed and closed her eyes. She dreamed of green fields dotted with yellow flowers. She imagined that it was Oregon Territory.

  “What is this, Mrs. Graus?”

  For a moment Olga did not recognize Peter’s voice or that the voice was talking to her. She rolled onto her side and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. She opened them to the blurry vision of her new husband.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Graus, I didn’t get much sleep last night.” She responded with the same formality of his speech.

  “You said that you would come to the shop. I told my friends that you would be there.”

  “I, uh, well, it took more time than I imagined to pack my things.” Olga gestured to the stacked trunks in the corner.

  “Mrs. Graus—” Peter paused to take a deep breath and scoff before continuing in a softer tone. “Olga, we discussed these matters this morning. You agreed to visit the shop and to limit your baggage to a single trunk.”

  “Yes, I know, but—”

  “If you have need to change the plan, you are required to discuss it with me first. We are married and now make the decisions together.”

  “Yes, I am sorry, but I don’t see how you can expect me to move to the other side of the world with only one trunk for my clothes and things.”

  “As we discussed this morning,” Peter was having difficulty keeping his tone under control, “there simply isn’t room. Take only those things you must have. You can make new clothes when we get there.”

  “Can we not have them shipped?” Olga borrowed the term from her mother.

  “No, that is not possible. Do you have any idea how much that would cost?”

  Olga slowly shook her head. His tone implied that it would cost a great deal of money.

  “Come here,” Peter commanded. He pulled the chair from the washstand and sat in it. He patted his thigh.

  “Oh, no, Mr. Graus, you can’t mean to—”

  “I most certainly do intend to punish you. We should have had a conversation about how I intend to manage your discipline earlier. It is most definitely my intention to perform my husbandly duty as stipulated by the preacher.”

  “But,” she took a breath, “he was talking about transgression with our Lord.” Olga knew that her father spanked her mother and that her argument was on shaky ground.

  “You know that was not the only intention of the preacher’s words—his command to us as husband and wife.” Peter swallowed and patted his thigh again. “As this is the first time, I won’t be harsh—if you submit now.”

  Olga realized that she had reached the end of her rope. If she persisted, he would overpower her and eventually have his way. The sounds of the tussle would certainly draw the notice of everyone in the boarding house. To avoid this humiliation, she surrendered.

  Olga rose from the bed and took the three steps to her husband’s side.

  “Lift your skirt.”

  “No, please!” Her hands jerked back as if to shield her backside.

  “Yes, your spankings will always be on the bare bottom. Your skirts offer too much protection.” He patted his thigh again. “Let’s get this over, quietly.�
�� He whispered the last word. Olga began to lift the back of her skirt and petticoat. When she had the hem up to her mid-thigh, she bent over his lap.

  Peter pushed the material up and over her bottom. He placed his warm hand on her bare flesh.

  “As I said, I will not be harsh for your first spanking as my wife. However, be warned that repeated transgressions will be met with more severe punishment. Since you are new to this role as a wife, I will take the time to give you a maintenance spanking each day, perhaps in the mornings to ensure your obedience.”

  “Peter, really—”

  “Yes, that is what I have decided. You know what it means when I have decided an issue?”

  “Yes.”

  He lifted his hand and applied the first swat. True to his word, the spanking was largely symbolic. Olga had received much worse from her mother. Peter applied the swats slowly, allowing their sting to full penetrate her thin skin before the next one. He spread them out to cover her entire bottom.

  “There, how many was that?” he asked.

  “Uh, I don’t know. I wasn’t counting.”

  “You should always count. Let’s do ten more and I want you to count each one saying that you promise to do your duty as my wife.”

  He smacked her derrière again, this time with noticeably greater force.

  Olga grunted with the new pain. “One, I promise to be your dutiful wife.”

  He repeated nine more swats, and she replied with nine more promises. Olga offered no resistance in an effort to hurry him along. She was concerned that the sharp report from these spanks could be heard in the hallway.

  “Now, tell me what you are going to do to correct your transgressions?”

  “My dear husband, tomorrow I will return two of the trunks to my father’s house and I will bring you a luncheon at the store.”

  “Excellent, but as you select those items to keep in the one trunk, remember to leave room for my belongings as well.”