Dear editor, happy thanksgiving and thank to you for taking an interest in our email. Please take the time to read the first chapter of my book set in 17 Centuryxx  blurb

His memory of two days ago he realised was not entirely clear, it was a series of staccato moments. Although the morning had been cold, he’d not been aware of it as he followed the girl to their rendezvous. Every so often, he noticed, she would stop to make sure he was still following. Why did she have to be so blatant about it in public, touching her breast and licking her lips, goading him? It irritated him, but the frisson of the game and the anticipation made it worthwhile. The maid had been teasing him for weeks: posing on the top of the stairs to the servants’ quarters with her skirts exposing her thighs, stooping to pick up imaginary objects from the floor in front of him. The passably pretty housemaid exuded an animal magnetism that he found difficult to ignore; the slightest smell of her musky body odour sent him to the privacy of his bedroom.

The neglected wood ran parallel to Amsterdam’s main highway a mile or so beyond the city walls. He watched as she tried to find a suitable place to enter the undergrowth, not easy as it was thick with brambles and tangled ivy. A gap between two skinny trees provided an ideal opening. He chuckled as he pursued her, a confident hunter closing in on his quarry, but his humour soon evaporated as the thorny bushes tore at his face and exposed hands. He emerged into a clearing and saw the maid straddling a fallen tree trunk, skirts above her knees, her hands clasping her breasts. His only sexual experiences had been with city whores, flashes of female flesh blurred by alcohol, vague vignettes of weighty breasts, painted faces and failed erections. Confronting this sight in chilly daylight and sober was both intimidating and exhilarating. He found it difficult now, on reflection, to pinpoint the exact point at which he lost physical and mental control of himself. Her pretty talk, as he caressed her neck, turned to ear-splitting shrieks of objection as he placed a hand over one breast and squeezed hard. Her cries ignited a fuse in him and he felled her to the ground slapping a hand across her mouth to silence her. She fought him as he ripped apart her fragile bodice and exposed her childish breasts. She kicked out with her legs as his hand found the unexpected softness between her legs. He felt the heat of her fiery punches to his cheek and jaw as he ripped through her maidenhead and rode his hot spasms of orgasm. His final, physical relief came in the violent struggle to break her neck. An exquisite climax. Hiding her body was done in a haze of heated after glow, the uppermost thought in his head was the craving for more. *** With his adrenaline rush quickly subsiding Jan felt a strong urge to go to ground. He had to get back home. He edged towards the perimeter of the copse, before crouching motionless, listening for any sounds of life from the road. Across the track one of Holland’s many areas of water-drained flatlands, known as polders, stretched away smoothly into the distance. He stilled his breathing as a cart rattled by, passing very close to where he was hidden. He recognised it as belonging to Thys van Dyk, a local farmer who supplied fresh produce for his father’s table. Hemp sacks bulging with root vegetables and corn piled high on the creaky vehicle suggested he was on his way to one of the many open markets in Amsterdam. He waited until the old horse had drawn the farmer past the wood. He glanced backwards. Whatever had happened today, the local wildlife would soon obliterate the damning evidence. He smiled as he forced his way out through the bushes and onto the road. Straightening up, he started to brush the debris from his breeches, only then to realise that the farmer had halted his horse a few yards away and was bending down to attend to a wheel spoke that had split. How had he missed hearing this? The nag snorted and the farmer turned his gaze upwards to the young man. Jan strolled as casually as he could towards the cart. “Afternoon, Master Jan, now where’d you come from? And 2 what’s a fine young man like you doing outside the city’s limits on your own? There’s all those banished devils, thieves and vagabonds out here.” “And murdering bastards like me!” thought Jan. He suppressed a smirk. “Good day to you, Menheer van Dyk,” Jan replied. “Thank you for your concern. I’ll be getting home now.” He bowed his head curtly. The farmer squinted at him. “Have you been set about? That graze looks painful.” Jan touched his bruised and scuffed cheek. It felt sticky to the touch and stung like mad. “No, I didn’t see a branch, that’s all,” he offered. The farmer nodded, finished binding the spoke, climbed aboard and passed on his way with a short wave and a flick of the reins. Jan watched as the cart and its load disappeared into the distance. Crossing the dirt track he stooped down beside the waters of the polder and gingerly sluiced his knuckles and face. He used a handful of coarse grass to rub dirt from his hands. The gentle lapping sounds of the water soothed his throbbing head. He took in a long, salty breath, closed his eyes and exhaled slowly. Damn that farmer. Jan listened again for sounds, any sounds to fear. There were none save for the wind rustling in the reeds and the pulse of constantly rolling ripples. It was time to go before anyone else chanced upon him. The trek back to the city was frustratingly slow; the deep ruts and holes from countless cartwheels and cattle hooves provided a danger of twisted and broken ankles for the incautious traveler. Jan’s thoughts turned to what he was about to face at home. There was no guilt in his mind about taking life. The only thing that rankled was the thought of having to swallow his pride and confess all to his father. For most of his seventeen years his merchantman father, Willem Van Der Linde, had spoiled Jan. His mother, Elsa, had died in childbirth. She had been the daughter of a wealthy trader, who had disapproved of her union with the socially inferior Van Der Linde. A tall youth, he had inherited much of his good looks from his mother: his curly, ebony hair, shoulder length and thick, his straight nose with a slight upturn, sensuous lips, sadly marred by 3 a crookedness that gave a sneer to his expression. Only the intense shot of chill from the cold blue eyes belied his careless, almost foppish outward manner. His character came from his father: selfish, ruthless and lacking in any emotional sensibilities. Jan had been a keen observer of his father’s callous manipulation of affairs, not only in business, but also in personal matters. He bore a grudging respect for the way in which his father outwitted and outmanoeuvred fellow traders, twisted the loyalty of friends to his own ends and sucked the passion and fire from his numerous lovers. No one complained because the old man held such sway with those that mattered, that bringing a charge was pointless and potentially suicidal. From a young age he had accompanied his father to the bustling Commodity Exchange in Amsterdam’s financial heart. A rectangular stone building surrounding a courtyard, it attracted all who wanted to trade freely, regardless of nationality or religion. Around the huge courtyard, with its colonnaded arches supporting the upper rooms, all manner of merchants, gaudily dressed in rich red and gold brocades, and traders, similarly clothed in velvets and silks, topped with flamboyant hats swathed in ostrich feathers, mingled and talked business. As an influential member of the elite Amsterdam Chamber of the West India Company, Willem Van Der Linde was both respected and feared. Although the morning had dawned bright and sunny, rain clouds were now pushing in across the marshlands. Arrow-headed flocks of migratory birds fled the on-coming storm. The coarse, tall grasses of the dunes swayed and shivered in the freshening breeze. “That’s all I need,” muttered the youth. Pulling his black linen cape about his shoulders, he hurried his pace as he approached the city boundary. The polygonal Regulierspoort came into view just as a few, chill spots of rain assaulted him. The wooden gate was part of the old medieval stone city wall, its grey slate roof supporting a clock tower and steeple with an openwork orb. Jan noted that the time was just after two in the afternoon, but it seemed dark enough to be early evening. Huddling into his now sodden cape, he entered the city, turning then to hurry alongside the Rokin, the waterway that had been 4 formed when the River Amstel had been dammed several centuries earlier. The soaking squall added to his feeling of irritation and discomfort, but he was also grateful that the storm had prevented his father’s friends congregating in Dam Square where they exchanged trade gossip on a daily basis. He hurried past the fourteenth century Nieuwe Kerk, which stood at the corner of the square and moved briskly over two canals and a sluice gate that straddled the Singel canal. His father’s house was situated on Herensgracht, a newly built canal. Amsterdam’s recent expansion had seen the building of three new canal rings and it was a matter of social standing to own one of the grand mansions situated along these new waterways; wealthy merchants, city officials and businessmen had flocked to acquire plots. It was, therefore, a matter of no surprise when Willem Van Der Linde had purchased the largest, most prized house in Herensgracht. Outside the Van Der Linde home, Jan paused. The downpour was not letting up, but he didn’t want to face his father, not yet, he needed a few more moments to compose himself. This was going to be a little harder to explain than his previous misdemeanours. He had lived in the warm and secure knowledge that his father’s sole weakness was himself, his precious son and heir, and that his father would move heaven and earth itself to protect him. When Willem Van Der Linde had used his elevated office as a senior City Magistrate on Jan’s behalf, compromising both his position and reputation, it was something Jan took for granted. As for thinking through the consequences of his actions, that had never occurred to him. Why bother when the old man always dealt with it? He looked upward at the vast maroon brick and cream stone façade of the family mansion. A flamboyant step gable, with marble obelisks and scrollwork, towered above the elegant, double-fronted house. Beside the magnificent, wooden door was a discreet, white porcelain plaque bearing a brilliant, blood-red tulip. Jan hadn’t really taken any notice of it before and he grinned as he suddenly appreciated the spite behind that symbol. Time to face the music.