Notebooks of the Young Wife (17 page)

After such sexual shenanigans the supper went down a treat. I squatted on my satisfyingly tender backside and tucked into a cold table that featured, among other delights, salpicon-filled brioches and confit of duck, to be washed down with a fine Muscadet. While the full-time residents were said to partake of a spare diet consistent with their dedication to bodily discipline, it was plain that visitors, at least of my host’s rank, were indulged with the best produce of the area. Fed and watered, I was only too happy to be quizzed by Sibyl about the volumes that had brought me to the home of the Rigorist Order.

‘I believe they will prove doubly important. There are a few treatises on the benefits of whipping that begin to appear at the end of the seventeenth century, but they are typically unreadable, filled with pompous generalities.
Uxor juvenis
, as I think of her—’

‘The young wife.’

‘Yes, though in the odd pieces published she styles herself
studiosa
, which I gather means eager rather than studious. And that she certainly was. In what I’ve read there is an enthusiasm in her embracing of the perverse that is uncommon in any author of the time, but in a woman... When this is employed to log the activities of a household given over to the newfound passion for flagellation the result must be a treasure. Or so I expect to find, when I have the chance to examine it in full.’

‘Ah yes.’ The
Hauptoffizier
leaned back in her seat and swirled the wine round in her glass, studying it. ‘The errant Dr Torman. She too, I understand, is an enthusiast, one who has let her ardour run away with her on this occasion. It is, however, inexcusable that she should have kept you from the study of your prize. I told you that I am to oversee our young lady’s schooling in the rigours for which these walls are noted: her misdemeanour will be punished in the morning and I should like you and the boy to witness that justice will be done. But come, Jane, let us move to more comfortable seats. While you assist me in sampling this bottle of the local apple brandy – a prize in its own way – I should be grateful for some advice on historical writing about the institutional correction of women.’

When my eyes opened in the morning I closed them and groaned. But they’d seen enough to rule out lying in bed until the hangover eased its grip on my temples. It was already after nine, and while the later stages of our discussion were not easy to recapture, I did retain the clear memory of Sibyl Metzger’s resolve to stage an early correction. So I forced myself out of bed, struggled with the shower controls and doused my head in water that was even colder than I intended. It was only when I emerged spluttering under a brisk towel that I saw the hump in the far bed, unoccupied at the time of my own collapse the night before. And nor was it just a hump, for it moved and snuffled before fingers lowered the quilt enough for eyes to blink up at mine.

I squatted and continued the process to uncover a rumpled T-shirt. ‘You won’t have a sore head like mine, boy,’ I growled at the fresh-looking face, ‘but I could work on the other end. Always assuming it didn’t get too hard a night.’ He turned coyly pink, but let me stand him up and examine the bum that poked out bare under the white cotton.

Besides the traces of
un martinet fort
, as our steward on the train had admiringly called it, I could see no signs of a nocturnal instrument having been used. One of chastisement, that is. I wasn’t going to address the question of what else might have been at work, probing between those inviting cheeks. Instead I pulled the boy down and he settled across my lap without a murmur. Several sharp slaps soon had him yelping and I was absorbed in studying the pinkening curves when there came a sharp tap followed by a head round the door.

‘Oh,
pardonnez-moi, Docteur Greene
.’
The maid put a hand to her mouth to stifle a giggle. ‘
Le garçon méchant
... I am sorry to interrupt.’

‘Not at all, he rather likes an audience, don’t you boy? But not so formal, please Annabelle. It’s Jane.’

‘
Bien
. I come to say there is the hurry. The Officer sends me to say she will be ready in ten minutes.
Ainsi la fessée
, er, the smacking...’

‘Will have to wait. No problem.’

‘
Le café
before, yes? I will come back at once.’ Our visitor left with a smile and I hauled the boy to his feet. I fished a clean T-shirt out of his open bag and was amused to find a pair of white briefs that were little more than a genital pouch attached to waist and leg bands.

‘Quick shower,’ I ordered, thrusting the articles into his hands, ‘and tuck the beastie away as discretely as you can in these. He’ll get his exercise later, never fear, but it’s going to be a stimulating morning and I wouldn’t want you alarming the ladies. Right?’

‘Right, Miss.’ The cheeky grin as he disappeared made me itch to spank him until he came between my thighs, or better, until he was moved to bugger me as he had on that wild night. But with the arrival of our coffee I was able to rein in my lust enough to snap on a solid pair of navy-blue knickers, and in five minutes we made a sober couple in dark shades of grey. Very suitable, I remember thinking, for the promised severity of the event to which we’d been invited. And severity was indeed on the agenda, though at that stage I didn’t know the half of what was coming. The half that was going to put me right in the firing line.

Annabelle was waiting on the corridor below to take us to what she referred to as the place of grief:
La Douleur Ancienne
. The first letters were audibly upper case in a way that had me prickling. We were led down another of the spiral stairs with which the mediaeval core of the building was riddled; worn step followed worn step before at last we came out through a steel door that swung open noiselessly on greased hinges. It thudded shut behind us, and the drop in pressure made me catch my breath. For a long second there was only darkness, and then the click of a switch sent a dim glow flickering into the black ahead.

It was a low-roofed passage, and what had bound the stonework of its sides was long gone. Even below ground we were high above the shore and there was no dampness in the air. As we turned a bend the boy swayed into me and I slipped a hand round his arm, glad of the contact in the confined tunnel. Then there was another door, another disconcerting change of pressure, and we stood in what felt by contrast open space, flanked on two sides by rows of arches set on top of short stout columns. As we glanced up and down, a voice from behind us made me start.

‘Welcome. I am glad you are here. It is good for one guest of the Order to invite others to see a little of its work. This is a place with atmosphere, I always find.’ The speaker was Sibyl Metzger, who came out into the light in a white shirt, ruffed at the neck, tucked into what looked like breeches and riding boots. Her hands toyed with a short whip as she spoke. ‘An ancient chapel, set apart from the cathedral itself and hidden. Although not well enough, for the authorities in Rome learned of irregularities and sent its officers to root them out. It was here, where we stand, that they made into the centre of their interrogations.’ She paused, leaving us to contemplate the idea of walls that had resonated to the sounds of plainchant echoing to screams of torment. ‘Naturally, when the inquisitors were done and the existing cathedral was sacked after their visit, this place could not be returned to its former use. The entrance to it was closed. The instruments are stored here still.’

To the left the long rectangle of the floor broadened into semicircles with the central area curtained off. Our guide walked towards it, and we followed until she indicated with the leather stock in her hand that we should position ourselves. Then she tugged on a cord that hung down from the dark above and the draperies swished apart. Now it was plain that where the altar must once have been located was a freestanding structure of pillars supporting a canopy that made, in effect, the proscenium arch of a stage. There was a flare of light and I saw a frame of rough wood that narrowed in to a high crosspiece, rather in the manner of the easel of an old blackboard. At its centre was indeed something black, but shiny and rounded... In a fraction of a second the image had resolved itself: what I was looking at was a pair of buttocks surmounting legs bound together by a single sheath of tightly-stretched rubber.

As we moved forward and to the side the full picture became clear. The arms, too, were encased in a single tube, wrists roped up to the top bar. Thus the torso was thrust forward with shoulders drawn back, and bare breasts swelled large and proud as if from a figure adorning the prow of a ship. The waist was held by a shaped piece of wood, and the knees pinned by another. Hair tumbled down in chestnut curls past a jaw clamped on the ball of a gag; then the head strained round and eyes caught mine. A touch wild – and whose would not be in such a situation? – but I could see nothing of desperation in them. It was my first sight of Dr Belle Torman, promising young historian of sexual mores, and one I would recall fondly on later, more conventional meetings. For that one she was simply The Penitent whose disciplinary education was in the hands of her strict Superior.

Without a word the older woman moved us back with the sweep of an arm, and raised the black quirt high in the air.
Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!
The air sizzled with the rapid strokes that left the latex marked with four pale lines across the whole breadth of the splendidly full arse. Four and four again in short order, and I stood with a dry mouth waiting for the jerking of the hips to subside. So far there had not been a hint of protest, but the next batch was delivered at full stretch and the fourth of them was rewarded with a
nnngggg
! that sounded as though forced up from the pit of the stomach. Sibyl looked round with a smile of satisfaction.

‘That is better. I was thinking our miscreant had been struck dumb. I chose the covering to save the skin, at least for a while, but it conceals the degree of our progress. Jane, since you are the ones sinned against in the matter, I wonder if
der Junge
would like to decide for me how far the punishment is to go. By how the bottom feels, I mean.’ The last was added in response to my blank look, but the boy understood. I watched as he went straight to the frame and laid his hands on the rubber-coated mounds that were still rippling from the recent assault. With surprising self-possession he squeezed a little here and pinched a little there, all over the main area before cupping a palm to lift and let fall each buttock in turn.

‘She’ll take another dose,
Hauptoffizier
. But after that...’

‘They will be good ones.’ And indeed they were. When she drew back from the jerking and quivering hindquarters we stood silently in that kind of awe reserved for the soundest of thrashings thoroughly executed. It was maintained until the figure on the frame was finally still, then Sibyl Metzger placed her whip on a side table and took up a paddle in its place.

‘I began with this before you arrived, and I shall finish with it. The thighs, you understand. Annabelle, take our visitors back please. Lunch will be in an hour.’

We followed her without a word up to our room, where I expected her to leave us to make her preparations downstairs. However, it seemed the maid had other plans. After closing the door she turned the boy to face her. Despite the restraining pouch there was an unmistakable bulge below the waist and she reached for it.

‘
Le fouet a fait ça
, yes?
Er, may I, if you do not mind...’ She looked from one to the other, as if uncertain whether to ask him or me, so I came to the rescue.

‘Feel free. Let’s see him in all his glory.’ From its performance on the train the day before, I felt safe in assuming the organ was not one to shrink under a novel female gaze. And I was right. Annabelle delved, rather expertly for one who claimed a dedication to women, and in a trice there was the thing exposed. A fine specimen, I thought fondly, and true to form it stiffened even more under our eyes.

‘
Bravo
!’ cried the maid, squeezing her find, ‘there is no other like this here.
Le garçon
, he allows only the one the same as himself to touch.
But I do not forget
le docteur
. Jane,
montre-moi ta chatte
.’
The gesture made her meaning clear and I needed no urging to kick off my shoes and divest myself of trousers and pants. By the time I was ready the boy’s cock was in Annabelle’s mouth and he had his eyes closed. On her knees she pulled us together and boldly inserted the wet head between my equally wet labia just below the clitoris. Never had he been so near to the norm of hetero-penetration, but she wasn’t to know that and he was in no condition to be complaining. Then with her mouth pressed to him and me, she worked the shaft with thumb and forefinger until I felt the hot goo flood the opening of my cunt while she sucked and slurped.

I didn’t come at that point, but I knew my Annabelle wouldn’t let me down. Rather breathless at the stage management of it all I watched her lick him clean and restore the wilting object to its place. Then with a wink she pushed him gently in the direction of the door, saying, ‘Kitchen,
oui
?
Ils t’attendent
.’ Once he was gone she turned back to me. ‘On the bed, Jane. And very wide, please.
Il me faut travailler
.’