Notebooks of the Young Wife (16 page)

After I dispatched the post-orgasmic and awkward boy to clean up, I fumbled amongst my things for a bunch of paper tissues. Sibyl looked at me. ‘Such a large quantity of desire, released by a little whipping and fondling. The simple pleasures of the young male, Jane, are they not a marvel?’ I looked at her, we both looked at the tabletop thickly spattered with gobbets of sperm, and then, all at once, we were gripped by a manic fit of laughter. Neither before nor since can I remember such a sidesplitting convulsion that forced helpless tears from the eyes, and I would guess that my companion was not one that laughed easily or hard. It passed, and before a solemn-faced lad returned from the lavatory to resume his seat, but in its wake I received some information that would give both of us a boost. Sibyl cleared her throat and spoke carefully.

‘I had better, as you say, come clean before our journey ends. For I realised a while ago that we are headed to the same destination.’ I remember blinking stupidly with the unnerving sensation of ground moving unexpectedly under one’s feet.

‘But how, I mean, why...?’

‘I spoke this very morning with Samantha James, an acquaintance of longstanding. And she talked of eagerly awaiting new material from a collection in the country, and of some notebooks. Old ones from the seventeenth century that were missing. Of course, in the process your name was mentioned and when I saw the Englishwoman on the train with a boy and
that
book...’

‘And you know why we are headed to Brittany?’ I must have sounded a little sharp, but the eyes behind the steel rims remained amused.

‘My dear Jane, our quarry is one and the same person. For I go there by invitation to take part in the disciplinary education of the fledgling American academic Dr Belle Torman.’

Under the wing of our guide we were spared the task of talking our way into the unofficial access on Rue des Vierges. Though the entrance for visitors formally sanctioned was no grand affair: at the end of a cobbled street to the side of the cathedral stood a plain stone arch with a short flight of steps directly inside to the left. At the top of them, the sound of the iron bell-pull echoed and died to silence within, before the weathered wood of the door swung open. A young woman in a grey dress with pulled-back hair stood aside to let us pass through the modest opening, and bobbed her head to the one bringing up the rear.

‘
Hauptoffizier
.’ Even my scant German was enough to recognise the seniority of the title that was being acknowledged beyond its probable jurisdiction.

‘
Annabelle. Conduis nos amis à la chambre à deux, s’il te plaît. C’est libre, n’est-ce pas?
’

‘
Oui, mais
...’

‘
Sois tranquille. Ça plaira Madame, j’en suis sûr
.
I shall go to her now.’

‘
Elle vous attend, Hauptoffizier
.’ The girl bobbed again and turned, indicating that we should follow. While the tall German strode off down the passage that stretched ahead, we were led through a side portal that brought us to the foot of a spiral stair. Before I realised quite what she was doing, Annabelle hoisted my bag onto a shoulder, took the boy’s out of his hand and twirled up the first half-dozen of the worn stone steps. ‘Allow me,’ she said over her shoulder, shaming us both by her agility and her grasp of our language, ‘the space is narrow and I am accustomed to it.’

At the top she marched along a short corridor and opened the door at the end of it. Inside was a narrow room lit by a small window high on the far wall. Our luggage deposited on the nearer of two divan beds, she was gone without an opportunity for questions. However, the charge of us had been assumed by our ‘officer’, as if she spoke for the institution’s real head, and I had no doubt we should hear sooner rather than later what was in store. An inspection of our quarters showed that we had a compact bathroom of our own, two chairs, two divan beds and not much else; appropriate enough to the bare boards and plain white walls of what was still a retreat. There was a single cupboard built into a corner of the wall, and I was in the act of peering inside when there came a sharp knock at the door. Sibyl Metzger swept in and steered a lad to the fore by his shoulders.

‘This is
le garçon
. It is how he is known in this almost entirely female establishment. I thought he could take your boy down to the kitchen to eat then show him around. Meanwhile, we could share a light supper and a
tête-à-tête
, if you were so minded.’ She smiled and I tried to look enthusiastic. The woman was the kind of organiser that left barely time to catch one’s breath.

‘Of course.’ The boy was looking a little warily at the newcomer, who was kitted in a pair of cut-off trousers and a worn sweatshirt not unlike his own dress at home. Then he raised an eyebrow and his counterpart gave a little jerk of the head, after which enigmatic interchange they were gone out of the door. Sibyl walked to it and turned back on the threshold.

‘My room is directly underneath. So if in a short while you feel ready it will not be hard to find.’

I made a pretence of unpacking the few garments brought with me, but once the bag was emptied I washed quickly and prepared to go down. The invitation had something of the tone of an order, and set off twinges of apprehension that took me back to my later schooldays. It was disconcerting though not perhaps inappropriate since I was, as then, in the course of engaging one-to-one with a woman older and more powerful than I. There was, too, a subtle change in manner since the encounter on the train: while it was difficult to be sure I sensed her watching me, as if in the interval she’d learned something that gave her an advantage. Backing out was, of course, not an option, though I had for the first time the feeling that I had rather lightly plunged myself – and the boy, for that matter – into an affair that might prove far from simple to negotiate.

At the foot of the stair I turned right to find the first door ajar. As I hesitated, uncertain whether to knock or announce my presence through the opening, there came an interchange from within.

‘
Maîtresse, ce n’est pas juste.
Je vous en prie
...’ It was Annabel, pleading, and she was cut short by the icy voice of command.

‘Go to Madame at once! Or shall I send word for you to be whipped twice?’ There was a short silence. ‘I thought not.
Va-t-en
!’ The door was flung wide and I shrank back from any involvement, but the young woman stomped off in the other direction, shoulders hunched. Then Sibyl Metzger appeared, and seeing me, shook her head resignedly.

‘You heard? It is for her own good. She knows this and I know this. I grow too lenient with age, so I send her to one who will do what is required. It is completely logical, yet we are treated to a tantrum. But I forget myself, dear Jane. Please, come in.’ I was led through into a room whose old stone walls were hung with tapestries, where a dining table was set for two. My German host poured two tall glasses of a sparkling rosé from an ice bucket on the sideboard, and handed one to me. After we drunk each other’s health she waved me to an easy chair and took up a position opposite.

‘Perhaps you do not know that there have been changes in recent times within
l’Ordre Rigoureux
, as they name themselves. Since its originator withdrew, no permanent replacement has been found and I myself have been drawn in to assist on an ad hoc basis. Hence my presence here and our felicitous encounter on the train.’ I explained that while I had been aware of the existence of the Rigorists for some time, the fact that they were a group of women devoted to a philosophy of corporal punishment was the extent of my information. ‘So you are not acquainted with members of the Order, or, to your knowledge, with its acting head?’

‘No. Indeed, no to both.’ It was a curiously phrased question that revived my feeling that the
Hauptoffizier
knew something I didn’t. Though what exactly I would have to wait to find out, for no sooner had I mentioned my connection with Judith Wilson at the Nemesis Archive, than I was treated to an account of those early years and the ethos achieved therein. Not that I was bored, far from it. Indeed, mere moments seemed to have passed when the flow was broken by a knock, followed by the re-entry of the maid.

‘
Fais voir
.’ A twirled hand accompanied the command, and it was a moment before I understood what was meant. Though the eyes were wet the petulance was undiminished, and the girl turned with a flounce and slowly dragged up her dress. Chastised she may have been, of which the cherry-red buttocks laced with purple left no doubt, but the little minx was not what one could call chastened. Good on her, I remember thinking, warming to the show of resistance in decidedly unfavourable conditions. However, it soon appeared that I had slightly misjudged the relationship between mistress and maid. After a brief inspection of the punished parts, Sibyl let the hem drop.

‘
Ça suffit, ma chère. Bon
. You have received your due on my return: it is our ritual. Now there is another custom that you know as well as I, one that relates to the arrival of unscheduled visitors.
Tu comprends
?’ The scowl cleared as if wiped from her face; it took me a little longer to move from a vague sense of foreboding to a full grasp of what was coming.

‘
Maîtresse. Le docteur Greene, elle serat
...’
Both looked at me, and I knew the worst.

‘
Parle Anglais, mon choux
. Yes, I believe our guest will accept the usual means of demonstrating a commitment to the ideals of this house. Jane, I believe you understand what we speak of. It will be a token only, of course...’ I bowed my head; at that moment I didn’t trust myself to speak. ‘Very good. Annabelle, you will go to the cabinet in the next room and select a rod from the middle of the rack.’

By the time she returned, Officer Metzger had placed a dining chair with its back towards me, and I bent over it with the best grace I could muster. While it was given to a teenaged Annabelle to sulk sexily, that was scarcely becoming in one of my years. As I found a grip on the crosspiece below the seat, sentence was pronounced at my back.

‘Six cuts, twice. I like to exercise each arm equally. To one as versed in these matters as yourself, Jane, it will be a mere
apéritif
. Annabelle, uncover the behind, if you please.’ I lifted my hips enough for the girl to open the trouser fastening in front, and when she pulled the garment down I heard a slight intake of breath that I assumed to be caused by the absence of underclothing. I managed a surreptitious wink, and was pleased to have it rewarded with a small but lascivious grin. Then I felt the cane pressed to my bare flesh and rubbed up and down over the curve of my arse. With the answering stab in my loins I was catapulted back across the years to a book-lined study, in which I more than once occupied a rather similar position under the eye of a senior schoolmistress. At that time I was modestly knickered in navy blue serge, but the use of the instrument in a preliminary caressing of the target area was identical. So was the beating when it actually began. In each case there was a positively cheerful air to the business: while nothing was audible, I had a strong sense of the chastiser humming under her breath while she worked. Vigorous canings both, short only of that last ounce of effort required to cause the toe curling hurt of which a length of rattan is capable. Instead there was the fierce stinging that for me remains the very essence of erotic pain. I can remember to this day how a brief touch of the sore parts in the corridor took me running behind a locked door to a climax that left me slumped and gasping on the lavatory seat.

When Sibyl finished I was able to exert a little more control than on that earlier occasion, but the cumulative smart of a dozen weals excited me to the point that I was afraid to move in case I should make my state even more apparent that it might have been already. Perhaps my host was aware of that, perhaps not. What she did was to announce her intention to spend a few minutes updating her records, thus leaving me in the hands of the maid, who made it clear at once that she knew exactly how I was placed.

I rose to explore the exquisite tenderness of the caned cheeks to find Annabelle at my feet. One foot lifted, then the other had my trousers off and her head was at my crotch. Such was my arousal that with spread legs I thrust into her face and bit my tongue to stop from crying out, while hers twirled around my throbbing clitoris. It was one of those rockets that was gone in a short cascade of brilliance, and in the anteroom I kissed her mouth thoroughly before she helped me to wash and dress.

‘
Le garçon
– he is, er...’

‘Not the jealous type, if that’s what you’re thinking. Might like to join in, though. But aren’t you and, er,
ta maîtresse
...’ Faltering speech seemed to be catching.

‘
Oui
. I give her the service.
Mais pas tous les nuits
.’
There was the sound of a door opening through the dining room, so the question of when Annabelle was next due a night off would have to wait. However, she’d asked first so I decided to remain optimistic of making a more prolonged connection with the delectable creature.