Later in the day, she had to change her casual clothing for something else, before she could show me some other parts of the building. One of these was the 'Lounge', a lovely room plushly furnished with deep leather armchairs and dark timber panelling, where male owners were expected to wear dark suits and ties and ladies long evening gowns. Before we entered, she warned me that slaves were not to utter a sound in this room and an infraction of the rule would be dealt with very severely.

I found the experience almost unreal. The owners sat in their armchairs, chatting quietly over their drinks or reading papers and magazines, as if they were in a genteel English club; accompanying many of them were their slaves, stark naked like myself, other equally naked slaves moved about silently as obsequious and deferential waiters, and still others stood or knelt motionless in one or other of the 'poses' I'd been taught, their naked bodies clearly there purely for decorative purposes. Yet the apparent incongruity between these extremes seemed not to detract at all from the sense of gentility!

My Contessa joined another Mistress she'd befriended that day; they sat down, casually gesturing to myself and the other male slave to kneel beside them, then summoned a waitress with the merest flick of a finger. The waitress, a dark-haired girl whose naked body was nothing if not voluptuous, took their order, returned promptly and dropped gracefully to her knees to proffer their drinks -- and smiled sweetly without a murmur when they each 'rewarded' her with a quick caress of her large breasts and a tweak of her nipples. They chatted, about subjects completely unconnected with domination and slavery, and sometimes idly caressed my and my fellow-slave's naked bodies.

I could barely believe they could be so casual! For my part, I found myself staring about me, amazed at the formality of the owners contrasting with the nakedness of the slaves, yet strangely complemented by the totally silent servility of those slaves. Suddenly, I recognized one of the 'decorative' bodies nearby -- it was Danielle, her slim nakedness frozen in the 'Pose' and her gaze fixed on a corner of the ceiling. I watched, fascinated by not only her beauty but also her self-control, as more than one owner fondled her as they went past; one even pressed an ice-cold glass against her pussy for a few seconds, but her only response to all these attentions was a brief bright smile and a glance that could only be interpreted as gratitude or deference.