Thyme II Thyme (20 page)

'You thinking that maybe Meg started playing around with some sort of dark forces and maybe unwittingly released some sort of power that's working on you?' Anne-Marie suggested. 'I suppose that could be one explanation.'

'It could be,' I agreed, 'but then so could almost any theory. It's not a devil worship thing though, that I'm sure of. There has to be a logical, scientific explanation for it.'

'Except that I doubt anyone could find it,' Andrea said. 'And all we know is that Megan Crowthorne liked to run around naked at night.'

'But it was interesting what the old man said about the death duties stuff dating back for years,' Anne-Marie threw in. 'There's definitely something fishy about the way so many important bits of so many records seem to be missing, like who the estate went to after Meg died, and how she managed to establish a title to it in the first place.'

'And I want to know what happened to Angelina. She's the real key in all this, I'm certain. After all, it's her body I keep popping back into. She needs my help, I'm sure of it.'

'Which you can't give,' Anne-Marie pointed out, 'all the time the mad maidservant and her Viking sidekick keep you all parcelled up in that doggie outfit.' She shuddered. 'That must be really awful, being treated like a dumb animal, and worse.'

'It is,' I assured her. 'I can't do anything for myself and I can't stop anyone else doing anything they like to me, but there has to be some way I can get free of it for long enough to try to sort that Meg bitch out. I'd like to kill her.'

'Except you can't, and you won't, not unless you go back to a time several years later,' Anne-Marie reasoned. 'We know she lived for a good few years after eighteen thirty-nine, so if she's to be stopped, and Angelina is to be freed, it won't be by killing Meg. Besides, as I think you already said, if you do kill anyone back then, it'll be Angelina who has to face the music for it and she'd probably end up on the scaffold.'

'Hey, there's a point,' Andrea said suddenly. 'How about we try checking back through the old records to see if she was ever hanged? That way we'd know if you were supposed to kill Meg or Hacklebury for her and it wouldn't really be your fault. After all, you can't change history, can you? Something to do with the
paradox theory
, or something like that.'

'No,' I said, 'I don't think I'd like to know the answer to that one, not just yet. If Angelina did kill Hacklebury, or if it was me killed him for her, then that'll happen again as it's already happened, if that makes any sense.'

'Then everything else will happen as it's already happened,' Andrea insisted, 'so there's not much point in you being dragged back there over and over again.'

'Unless it's to protect Angelina's sanity,' I suggested, 'to ease some of her suffering and help her get through to whatever conclusion eventually happened. Besides, point or no point, it keeps happening, and I don't have any control over it.'

'And the more you can learn about the people involved,' Anne-Marie added, 'the better your chances of both of you surviving unscathed.'

7.

That night I dreamed I went back again and for a moment I thought I had time-hopped, except that when I tried to look down at myself I saw I didn't have a body. I seemed to be a spirit looking down and watching a scene being played out over which I had no control and in which I took no part.

I was in a large room of the house again, but a different room from any I had seen when I was there. The curtains were drawn and the lamps were lit, which suggested it was night. A fire burned in the grate in a tall fireplace but the flames themselves were small, lit more for comfort and effect than for warmth. Several large padded chairs, a sofa and a long chaise lounge, were arranged around the room and on the latter Gregory Hacklebury reclined wearing a dark-red silk robe with matching slippers and smoking a large cigar.

As I watched, the door at the far end of the room opened and Meg entered. Behind her followed the maid girl, Polly, whose hands I saw had been tied together in front of her by what looked like a long length of silk ribbon. She wore her normal uniform except that the long white pinafore was missing and there was no little starched cap on her head. Her eyes looked red and I guessed she had been crying.

'I've brought the wretched girl to you for punishment, sir,' Meg said, turning to push Polly ahead of her. 'Erik caught her trying to take the bitch's head off to feed her some pieces of meat she had stolen from the kitchen.'

'I see,' Hacklebury drawled, staring up at Polly where she now stood before him, her eyes downcast. 'And what have you got to say for yourself, girl?'

'I... I'm truly very sorry, sir,' she murmured, 'but I didn't think it would do no harm seeing as the scraps was going to be thrown out anyway, and that poor girl... well, whatever she's done, I knew she hadn't eaten anything proper for days.'

'And so you took it upon yourself to look after her dietary needs, did you?' Hacklebury enquired pleasantly.

'I just... I just thought she needed a bit of something solid in her, to save her getting poorly, like, sir.'

'You did, did you?' He raised an eyebrow. 'You decided, all by yourself, that my orders and Miss Meg's orders were totally inadequate and so you were going to remove part of the stupid wench's punishment? Tell me, Polly, how would you like to spend a month in such a suit yourself? Mr Pottinger is delivering us several new ones later this week and I'm sure we could accommodate you.'

I saw the girl's face turn ashen. 'Oh no, sir!' she cried, raising her bound wrists in supplication. 'No sir, please, I beg you, not
that!
'

'Then perhaps I should turn you out on the streets again and tell the local magistrate about your little criminal adventures in Bath? How many unfortunate fellows had their purses lifted by your bully-boy associate before I came along? It would be Australia for you, at the very least, or a pretty dance at the end of a rope.'

'Sir, I'm sorry!' Polly wailed. 'It shan't happen again, sir, God's honest truth, as He's my witness!'

So that was it, I thought, that was why Polly seemed to go along with all of Meg's extravagances and didn't try to interfere. Hacklebury had over her that she was a criminal, and the sort of crimes she had been involved in more often than not meant a capital sentence. The fact that Hacklebury couldn't turn her in without risking her spilling his own beans probably hadn't occurred to the silly wench.

'I know it shan't happen again,' Hacklebury said placidly, 'because I am going to teach you a severe lesson in obedience, a lesson you shall not forget for a very long time, my girl. Meg, you may untie her hands now, help her out of her dress and petticoats, and then check to see that her corset is good and tight. If it is, then later you will find her a smaller size and lace her into it once the stripes fade from her backside as a reminder to her.'

Bastard
, I thought. As with Angelina, he was turning a supposed fashion accessory into an instrument of torture, an instrument that could be worn undetected by anyone other than the wearer. Going about the daily chores of a maid even in an ordinary corset would have been laborious enough, but to be really tightly laced would be murder.

Polly was quickly stripped of her uniform, which consisted of two long petticoats and an additional shift she wore over her corset, a plain garment with thick laces. Beneath this she had on a pair of voluminous pantaloons that tied about her knees over black cotton stockings, and simple laced shoes with small heels. Meg then immediately checked the corset's lacing and declared it to be far too slack.

'I'll check this myself every morning from now on,' she declared, drawing in on each of the laces in turn. I saw Polly wince, but in truth, the corset fully closed would have been nowhere near as severe as the last one I had worn. Meg also knew this, for she quickly commented on the fact. 'We'll have a much smaller set of stays for you in the morning,' she promised. 'These are for a fat slovenly pig and you wouldn't like people to think you're a fat slovenly pig, would you Polly?'

'No, miss!' the poor girl gasped. 'No, I shouldn't like that!'

'There,' Meg said at last, retying the laces. 'That's as tight as this one gets.' She walked back around in front of Polly and peered down at the girl's pale bosom, which had now been lifted somewhat higher. I saw tiny brown freckles and two thin little blue veins just beneath the surface of her skin. 'She is quite ready for you now, master, unless you wish me to remove her drawers as well?'

'No, that will not be necessary,' Hacklebury said, rising. 'Just put her over the red chair there and tie her wrists to the arms and her ankles to the back legs. It doesn't do to have a girl moving about during punishment.' He turned away and walked to the far wall, where a long sideboard sat beneath a large landscape painting. He opened the cupboard at one end and extracted a selection of canes, which he brought back and laid out on the chaise lounge while Meg set about the task of tying Polly down to the chair.

The maid, her eyes wide and glistening with unshed tears, was made to move behind the heavily padded back of the red armchair and to bend forward over it, laying her arms out along the padded wooden arms whilst Meg, with two lengths of the same material that had been used earlier, tied each of her wrists firmly in turn. Then, from a pocket in her long dress, the older woman drew out two lengths of cord and with these she proceeded to draw Polly's ankles apart and to tie them to the back legs of what was now a very effective whipping horse. The girl's bottom was raised invitingly, unprotected save by the thin material of her pantaloons. Meg then crossed to where Hacklebury was now testing each cane in turn for suppleness and spoke to him quietly, so that the apprehensive prisoner might not hear. I, however, heard every word she said quite clearly.

'I suppose you'll want to fuck the silly bitch afterwards. I can't imagine you being able to say no to such an available target.'

'It'll do her good to know who is master around here,' Hacklebury replied serenely. 'She's a little too flighty about the place, you know, always trying to give me the eye. Probably imagines I might take a fancy to her.'

'She's pretty enough, in a stupid way, but I doubt she ever thought to win your cock whilst bent over a chair with a red raw arse. Yes, you give her a good old-fashioned rogering afterwards. It'll make her think a bit differently then, I reckon. And now, if you have no further need of my services for a while, I think I'll go and see how my little Sheba bitch is getting on. I'd bring her up for you, but I doubt you'll be in the mood for her after you've finished with this little bumpkin.' And with that, she left the room.

Perhaps the worst part of any physical punishment is waiting for it to begin and Hacklebury clearly understood that, for he seemed in no hurry. Instead, he walked slowly around his helpless victim, stroking her back and then her buttocks before reaching down to run his fingers tantalisingly across her bulging cleavage. 'How long is it that you've been with me now, girl?' he asked, gently stroking the nape of her neck with the back of his hand.

Polly sniffed back her tears. 'About two years, I think, sir,' she replied in a shaky voice. 'Quite a time, and I've always tried to be good, sir, honest.'

'Well, I'm going to teach you that you need to try harder, Polly,' he said sternly. 'I'm going to teach you just how hard you need to try and how good you need to be. Otherwise, I'll let Miss Meg have you to play with the same as she's doing with another very disobedient little bitch. Understand?'

'Yes, sir, I understand.'

'Good.' He stepped back and picked up the cane he had finally selected. He flexed it once more and then, positioning himself solidly beside Polly in line with her buttocks, he swung his arm in a wide arc. The whippy instrument cut through the air with a sharp hissing sound and struck the girl's bottom across both cheeks with a high-pitched crack that immediately elicited a shrill scream of agony from her.

'Silence!' Hacklebury roared. 'You must learn to take your punishment quietly or else I shall have you gagged, and leave you gagged for a whole day.' Again the cane swished down and there was another wicked crack upon impact, but this time Polly let out only a stifled groan from between her firmly sealed lips. 'Much better,' he muttered grimly. 'Much better.' Another stroke, followed by another crack, and Polly could not restrain a sob of anguish. I could see that her eyes were screwed shut and that there were fresh tears glistening on her cheeks.

A fourth and fifth stroke were delivered, each one causing the round bottom to jump upon impact and its poor owner to groan and gasp. I doubted she would be able to maintain her self-control for much longer and hoped the punishment would soon be over, for even though the girl had been rough and rude with me as Angelina, I still did not like to see another human being suffer and having been thrashed similarly myself now, I knew how terribly she must be suffering.

Finally came the sixth and, as it turned out, final cut. Polly began to sob openly then, her shoulders heaving as tears streamed down her face. She tried to plead but her words were an incoherent jumble. It was easy to guess, however, that she was promising anything, and everything, to her master in the desperate hope of being spared further punishment.

'That will do for now, Polly,' Hacklebury said severely. 'Stop your stupid snuffling,' he admonished her, 'and listen to what I have to say.'