Cheese, Chalk and Plenty of Pork – Part 06 of 10
by Lin Dale

Synopsis: When Greta meets Gavin at her rich father’s second wedding, she immediately falls in love. But, just like cheese and chalk, he is a beautiful, slim young man and she is heavily obese; she needs to find some way to stop him wandering off. Her father’s new wife has problems facing up to her role as a Lady, so she decides to involve Gavin in a project with certain challenges.

Author’s Note: This story is complete and in ten parts which will be released at approximately daily intervals. It contains items such as crossdressing, non-explicit sex between adults and language typical of that between English adults. If you feel this may offend you, then please do not read.

Part 6 – Gavin has to Make a Deal

“I don’t think I know you, do I?” the portly Lord Rupert Carver said as Gavin entered his drawing room.

“That’s not surprising,” he replied. “I’m Gavin Smythe. My mother and I attended your wedding last week but you would hardly have noticed us on that day.”

Gavin held out his hand for Lord Carver to shake, which he automatically did, enveloping Gavin’s hand in his own sweaty palm. As he released his hand, Lord Carver still looked mystified about his identity so Gavin clarified. “I’m Chelle’s cousin.”

Carver’s face changed to one of anger. “Since I am Lord Carver,” he said, “it is polite to address my wife as Lady Carver. As a member of the family, it just might be acceptable for you to address her as Lady Michelle, but it is incredibly rude to use a nickname.”

“That’s put you in your place,” Greta said to Gavin. She turned to Carver. “Daddy, Gavin doesn’t know about these things but I’m sure he’ll quickly learn.”

Bloody, hell, Gavin thought. His new cousin-by-marriage was only a minor, non-hereditary Baron, hardly a member of the Royal Family. All the same, he had to talk his way out of the munt so he smiled back at Greta. “I’m sure I will,” he said, trying not to grit his teeth.

“Have a sherry,” said Greta.

“Thank you,” Gavin said.

“it’s a wonderful country house you have here,” Gavin said to Lord Carver.

Carver’s mood changed in an instant. “Cheap to buy but cost me a fortune to renovate,” he said, clearly pleased the subject had been brought up. “I bought it with my retirement lump sum.”

Seeing the unasked question on Gavin’s face at the size of such a lump sum, he added, “I was in stocks and shares. Amassed a reasonable amount during my career, mostly based upon instinct.” He gave a self-satisfied smirk, obviously meant to be modest but it actually made him look even more pompous than ever.

“But I could see the world was changing,” he continued. “Nowadays, it’s all computer prediction – but even in my day, the writing was on the wall. So, I decided to sell up and get out whilst the going was good. But instinct still kicked in. After I’d sold all my own stock, I temporarily reused the capital to back a massive deal selling short. It was just before the stock market crash and it turned my few millions into several hundred. Certainly, enough to get this place going.”

Nice though it was, if Gavin had hundreds of millions of pounds, he wouldn’t have bought a house like a mausoleum, creaking with Victoriana. Never before had he worn a dinner jacket for dinner at someone’s house, let alone an uncomfortable Victorian dinner jacket.

Tonight, Greta was heavily corseted in her evening dress, which actually gave some shape to her enormous body.

Just then, a maid entered wearing a black dress with white apron – apparel Gavin had only seen on the TV – to tell them that dinner was served.

***

“I don’t think we’ve met,” Carver said to Gavin, as he sat down in the chair next to him.

Gavin stared at him, suspecting some kind of joke. “I’m sorry?”

Carver looked angry again. “Well, sir, you have sat down at my dining table without introducing yourself.”

“This is Gavin Smythe, Lady Michelle’s cousin,” Greta interjected, as Gavin was coming to the realisation that Rupert was suffering dementia. “Sorry, I should have introduced you earlier.”

“Should think so to,” Rupert said, with a grump. “Nice to meet you, young man. Tell me, what do you do for a living?”

“I’m one of those who’ve become unemployed because of the Covid, so now I work in a…”

“Damn bad show,” Rupert said. “I was in stocks and shares, myself, you know. But I could see the world was changing and I decided to retire. Made quite a bit of money when I did so…” And off he went on the only subject he could remember.

***

The meal was not as dreadful as Gavin anticipated, once Chelle had joined them and they chatted over old times. Indeed, he had never seen the usually sullen Chelle in such a vivacious mood, but he guessed she was still practising her role as Lady of the Manor, in which she clearly revelled. She spoke of the Garden Party she was organising, and how she’d been invited to become Honorary Lady of the local hunt.

“How’s your side-saddle training going?” Greta broke in, explaining to Gavin, “To be Honorary Lady, she has to ride side-saddle.”

“Oh, it’s coming along quite well,” Chelle said casting an anxious glance at Carver, clearly worried he might pick up on the point. “As Honorary Lady, I’ll be the person to greet the Queen when she visits the County in six months’ time.”

“Fortunately, not on horseback,” Greta impishly said. “But in order to become Honorary Lady and thus greet the Queen, she does have to ride side-saddle in the next three hunts. We’re all looking forward to it.” She turned to Gavin. “Don’t you ride a little?” She already knew the answer as they had briefly chatted between rounds of sex the previous week.

“We lived in the country before moving to London,” Gavin said. “I used to ride quite a lot.

“But not side-saddle,” he added to Chelle, “so I’m afraid I can’t help you there.”

“It’s no problem,” Chelle said, and then rapidly changed the subject to the forthcoming Garden Party.

***

It was some time later that Carver suddenly got up from his chair and walked out.

“You’ll get used to Daddy,” Greta said to Gavin. “He’s probably gone to the toilet. He may be back – if he remembers. Otherwise, we may not see him until tomorrow morning.”

“He looks quite young to be so… vague,” Gavin said.

“He’s sixty-one,” she said. “Early onset Alzheimer’s.” She shrugged. “It’s a bit hopeless.”

Gavin nodded. He could understand that, but mentally he was deducting his cousin’s twenty-eight years from that of Carver’s sixty-one. “How long has he been like this?”

“His memory has been bad for years,” Greta said, “and gradually getting worse. I tried to warn Michelle about it but she thought I was simply trying to put her off marrying Dad.”

“Which you were,” Chelle said. “He was nothing like this even a few months ago when we first met.”

Greta simply sniffed.

Which was when Clarissa’s comment earlier hit Gavin between the eyes. Carver had remarried so all previous wills were null and void. Gavin had suggested that he could make a new will but Clarissa had put doubt on that, and as Gavin thought back to the only readings of the will he had ever observed – on TV – he remembered one of the first lines of the will read ‘…being of sound mind…’ Carver was suffering dementia and whilst he had remarried, he would certainly not be able to make a new will. Therefore, on Carver’s death, the whole of this estate would be inherited by his cousin, Chelle. Greta, his daughter would get absolutely nothing. In particular, Greta would have nowhere to keep her precious pigs. Whilst he had not been over enamoured with Greta as a person, he could recognise the terrible loss this would be for her.

“I was thinking,” Greta interrupted his thoughts, “that with Gavin’s current riding abilities, he could probably learn to ride side-saddle quite quickly.”

“But it’s surely one of those sexist things, isn’t it?” Gavin said. “Women only ride side-saddle because they can do so whilst wearing a skirt.”

“Doesn’t mean to say that a man can’t ride side-saddle, though, does it?” Greta asked.

“Er, no, I suppose not,” Gavin replied.

“Where’s this conversation going?” Chelle asked, which was exactly what Gavin was wondering.

“Michelle,” Greta said, “you must surely have noticed over the years that Gavin is about the same height as you, he has a not dissimilar build, he has a similar face, and he can even copy your voice.”

“He couldn’t look like me,” Chelle said.

“Wearing a Victorian Hunting dress, boots, bonnet, gloves? All you’d see would be a face and maybe hear the occasional comment.”

“Er, hang on,” Gavin said.

“It would be a set-up,” Chelle said. “You’d expose me as a fraud in order to cause me maximum embarrassment.”

“Not if there was something in it for me,” Greta said.

“Like what?”

“Look, girls…” Gavin started to say, but both of them immediately interrupted.

“Shut up!”

“When you eventually inherit and sell off the estate, I get to keep the crofter’s cottage where my Large Blacks are kept. A few years ago, we sold off the stables and now it’s running as an independent stable, so it’s not as if it hasn’t been done before. We could do the same for the area around the cottage. It might slightly reduce the value of the estate, but not significantly.”

“And in return,” Chelle said, “Gavin pretends to be me, riding side-saddle at the next few hunts?”

“Look, this is crazy,” Gavin said. “I can’t…”

“Shut up,” Greta repeated

“But clearly, Gavin isn’t going to agree to it,” Chelle pointed out.

“It might take a week or two to persuade him,” Greta said, “but I’m sure that in time he’ll come round to it. Won’t you darling?” She smiled directly at Gavin and he knew exactly what she was threatening. No sex until he agreed.

“Maybe,” he said.

“There,” Greta said. “Do we have a working proposal on the table?

“But Chelle has huge boobs,” Gavin pointed out the obvious.

“They do marvels with silicone, nowadays,” Greta said, adding rather bitchily, “Don’t they Michelle?”

“She has a narrow waist.”

“Victorian ladies had a solution for that,” Greta said with a nasty grin.

“I don’t know,” he muttered.

“It’ll work fine,” Greta said. “Of course, it means you’ll have to spend the next few weeks here, which means we’ll be together, and you’ll have to give up your job where you live. I’m sure Michelle would compensate you for loss of income.” In fact, Gavin had already told Greta that he’d lost his job, but they both looked to Chelle for her response.

“I suppose so,” she affirmed, “but in return, you’d both have to sign a confidentiality contract.”

“That’s fine,” Greta said.

“I’m not so sure,” Gavin said, deciding he might get something out of it. “How much will you pay me?”

“£5,000 for the first month,” Chelle said. “I’ll give you another £5,000 when I become Honorary Lady.” The price staggered him, but then he guessed that she had so much money now, it had become almost valueless. He agreed and said he would ring his mother to tell her he was staying up here for the time being.

“After that,” Greta said, staring at Gavin, “it doesn’t look like Daddy is going to reappear. I fancy an early night. Don’t you?”

Gavin admitted that he did, and the two left Chelle chatting with the maid.

***

“I’m sorry if you think I’ve dropped you in it,” Greta said some time later. “But you don’t understand, I’m desperate that I’m going to lose a place to keep my Large Blacks when Daddy dies and Michelle inherits everything.”

“I can understand that,” he admitted. “But it all sounds a crazy idea. Do you really think I can get away with pretending to be Chelle?”

“Your imitation voice is superb,” Greta said. “Your body is going to be almost unseen beneath layers of Victorian clothes. “Your face is pretty good and I reckon a bit of Michelle’s makeup skills should cover it. As for you learning to ride side-saddle – well, that’s a female skill so probably, as a male, you won’t be able to do it very well.”

“I can, too,” he hotly retorted.

She giggled. “Were you saying that you can two, as in twice? Because so far this evening, you’ve only done it once!”