“That was partly because you gave her such an admirable first dozen. After that, it was child's play. Is she out from Solitary yet?”
“Came out last night, Head,” said another voice, “distinctly sorry for herself.”
“Did you visit her the day before, Luzie?”
“Yes, Frau Direktrice. I gave her ten.”
“So did I,” said another. “And the bar?”
“Oh yes, she did the bar all right. Lord, how they all seem to hate that.”
“Yes, it's quite salutory. And the swing? Did you put her on that, too? Good.”
“She had one whole morning hanging in the cage and it was so funny, Head, she kept peeing through it.”
“I hope you corrected her for Incontinence.”
“I did,” said the grinning Fraulein Holz, one hand expressively rubbing a meaty hip. “Ten, also.”
They all laughed. Even Frau Grumkow joined in.
“Come to that, I've only had one of you flogged so far this term,” she added with a chuckle. Maria Daunitz stirred in her seat. “I seem to remember you got it twice last half, Holz.”
“I certainly did, Head,” came the equally cheerful reply, “and I can remember every lick.”
Maria's face had darkened at the allusion. She was aware that the Head was staring at her. She wished her friend Inge had been present, but she was on Duty today.
“And do you remember every lick, Daunitz?”
“Distinctly, Frau Direktrice,” she answered at once.
“Do you still have some marks?”
“I… I think so… a little.”
“Show them to us.”
“Certainly.”
Maria was learning. She stood up with alacrity, turned and bared her bottom, raising on high the soft leather skirt. There was a prolonged silence.
“Thank you. You can sit down.” Maria did so and confronted as it were head-on the bright eyes of the French mistress, Jacqueline Bellais, boring into hers. There was something in the expression that locked her own eyes… but the Directress was continuing, “So what did you think of your first birching?”
“Me, Frau Direktrice?” she answered, aware that they were all staring at her now; “I… I thought that, why, it was very severe.”
“Too severe?” The Head's blue eyes were no longer merry.
“No. Just that it seemed… er, a lot… for a little offense.”
Frau Grumkow struck her placid forehead, making her blonde wig dance.
“Good Lord! It's just occurred to me. Daunitz is new to us here, and she probably thinks I was extra-strict with Joyce because she was English.”
“That's heresy,” said Fraulein Katte softly.
“You would never do such a thing,” joined in another shocked tone.
Maria wanted to interject, such had not been in her mind, but the Directress went on at once: “Absolute justice is all we seek at Schloss Rutenberg. No idea of nationality existed or exists in punishing. Joyce was simply… someone to correct. Listen. Here's a wager. I'll send for the girl…”
“It isn't necessary, Frau Direktrice,” Maria murmured unhappily.
“… and ask her direct. If she thinks there was the slightest excess of zeal in her sentence, I shall offer myself in expiation. Yes, Wedell here will be instructed to give these,” and she tapped her tubby bum, “exactly what she gave you.”
Maria again tried to interrupt, but the little woman had tinkled a bell. A pretty maid, engaged in clearing off the dinner next door, appeared instantly. She was a lissome thing, inky-locked and succulently outlined in her short black satin uniform with its tiny apron and cap.
“You sent for me, Madam?”
“Yes, Resi. Fetch the English girl, Hall.”
“Very good, Ma'am.”
The maid curtseyed and left. Maria Daunitz had already learnt (to her own discomfiture, she was sure) that the maidservants employed at the Schloss were a special breed. They occupied a strange stratum in the local hierarchy, being above the girls yet in a curious below-above relationship to the mistresses. The latter could whip the maids, and did, though the whole servant staff came under the iron rule of the head kitchen maid or, as she was better known, the Raumpflegerin. But the maids, mischievous monkeys that they were, did not seem notoriously averse to corporal correction, and could, and did, report the mistresses for delinquencies to the Head. They maintained what Maria conceived to be an almost mockingly respectful demeanor to the teachers, however.
Having prostrated herself and been summoned to stand in the ring before the fireplace, Joyce Hall looked extremely frightened in her succinct gold tunic, or chlamys. She clearly imagined she was likely to be punished again and her sturdy bust wobbled unashamedly.
“Well, Joyce,” said Frau Grumkow, “have you learnt your lesson?”
“Oh yes, Madam,” the girl answered gratefully.
“How did you enjoy your Solitary?”
The girl bit her lip. How to answer properly? Her heavy lashes moistened. Finally she blurted, “It… it taught me a lesson, Madam.”
Frau Grumkow laughed shortly.
“You don't think I was unduly severe to you?”
“Oh no, Madam, no… not at all,” answered the big girl eagerly, albeit with a hint of tears at the edges of her orbs.
“And what would you expect if you repeated the offense?”
“Oh I would get even more, Madam.”
“That's right, you would, Joyce. You'd get four, or five dozen and then I think you'd really know you'd been birched. So you have no ill feelings?”
“Non, Ma'am.”
“Good. I'm glad to hear it. Now show your buttocks to Miss Daunitz. She is new here and might care to see how we treat casual offenders in Solitary.”
Maria had been accompanying her friend Ingeborg Untermacher on her rounds as Duty Mistress for the day. And one of the first tasks of such was to “inspect” any girls in Solitary. There had not in fact been any this day, but they had gone the rounds nevertheless. Solitary was paid off in subterranean cells, entirely bare, whitewashed, with short barred windows high up, at ground level. Entering one of these bleak chambers, with its ammoniac stench, Maria had received a profound sense of depression. So big, and bare, and barren. Some ringbolts on one wall, a hole in the floor for natural needs, and a bare board to sleep on, that was all.
The offender was kept manacled, on bread and water, so it seemed, employed during the day on purposely useless labor-such as scrubbing her floor over and over on her knees, or cleaning out the Groves till they glowed. Evidently she could count on a sound caning a day. Even so, Maria was quite unprepared for the sight that met her eyes as the English girl, skirt raised and knickers down, turned directly in front of her chair.
She had thought Monika Vorst well wealed, but this was something else again. The birch-marks had mostly subsided to decorative green and yellow tracery, though the signal efficacy of the “master's strokes” was still on display. But the big patient buttock had been blatantly beaten all over — the cane markings were in groupings, extending well down her legs.
“All right, do up your things,” came the order, and the girl quickly obeyed, only too glad to do so, it appeared. But her fingers fluttered as the Head drawled through her cheroot-“And what would you say if I said that to complete your lesson, Joyce, six with the switch might be in order?”
The great eyes welled. Suddenly something profoundly affecting-at least for Maria Daunitz-occurred. The seventeen-year-old burst into tears, gulping sobs she clearly tried to check and stifle. For there had been a greedy clicking round the room, as the mistresses all menacingly unclipped their switches. She dropped clumsily to her knees before the Frau Direktrice and lowering her blondish head kissed the toes peeping from the trousers there. No words could possibly have been more eloquent. And at this exact same moment Maria Theresa Daunitz felt a
