“Ja, Frau Direktrice. Entschul'.”
“These last cuts over two minutes.”
Maria listened to the metronome ticking. Her anus was burning like a brand. Her whipped seat was afire. No more, no more…
But the next belted into her with a shock that shook the trestle and a drenching streak of agony seemed to pass right through her. Her vision fogged.
“Much better. They should all have been like that.”
“Haaa. uuuuu…”
H-h-hwhttt!
“Nine. That was too high. Take her at the top of the legs for the last.”
Shivering as if with the ague Maria Daunitz awaited the stroke, stretching forward and, in doing so, pulling up just that part the mistress had been told to flog. The big woman took a prancy pace and wrapped the length of the rod around the base of the wealed surfaces. Maria lunged with a grunting moan, her body spasmed in a cramp, then sheer pain seemed to flood through her from insteps to eyeballs. The last three stripes had been worse than the whole of the first seven.
Her legs were released first, and she jacked them back together, writhing. Ingeborg had instructed her in protocol. She was somehow or other supposed now to kneel and kiss the… the… and thank for punishment… with her hands by her sides… with her… but her hands had been released, her mouth, and her waist, and herself, and a voice was saying sternly, “Stand up at once. This is extremely poor comportment, Daunitz.”
Alas, it was. Pain suffused her from tip to toe, and she realized she was rolling on her back on the floor, with her knees drawn up to her chin, and her hands grabbing and rubbing the twin coals of her arse-cheeks. Wedell was looking at her with some interest, from the distance of that endless cane, while the Head's gaze had been converted to a winking glare by the insertion, in her right eye, of a monocle. “Get up.”
“Yes… ohoooooaaaah… Frau Direktrice.”
“Pull yourself together and get up and thank for punishment. Cease this unnecessary exhibition at once.”
Maria forced herself to obey. She had to drag herself to her knees. Half-blind with pain she kissed the tip of the outstretched cane, mumbled the ritual words of thanks, resumed her discarded skirt, curtseyed stiffly to the Headmistress, then stood up to attention, trembling like a jelly all over.
“I had hoped you would do better than this, Daunitz. Do you feel well punished?”
“Th-th-thoroughly, Headmistress.” It was something she could gasp out with complete conviction. Her buttocks felt at this moment like so much molten lead. “Thank you,” she managed to get herself to add.
“You will not be let off so lightly next time. In fact, I shall recommend some training correction for you so that you do not behave like this again. Meanwhile, you bear Fraulein Wedell no grudge, I hope; she was merely doing her duty.”
“None,” she breathed in reply.
“Return to your quarters.”
Maria Daunitz dipped another curtsey, held it, half-slipped, got up and went to the door where she appeared to wrestle with the handle for a moment — then was gone. The Headmistress was left alone with the Pflichtlehrerin of the day. For a time she gave her subordinate a long and level gaze. We-dell's bosom was heaving, her white tunic patched with sweat under the right armpit and in front, its scant skirt perching pertly oft a muscular rump behind.
“Talking of doing your duty, you didn't let up on those last three, did you, Wedell?”
“No, Frau Direktrice.”
“I didn't think you would be so silly as to.”
“It… it was perhaps that… she squirmed so, and I hit too high, at the end.”
“She did wriggle, didn't she?” The Headmistress adjusted her monocle. “Tell me, when did I last order you a flogging, Wedell?”
The undermistress spoke to the wall in front- “Two years ago, Frau Direktrice. Twenty strokes with the switch. It was across the buttocks, thank you.”
“Hm. Well, you seem to have profited from the experience, not to have come back since then.”
“Yes, I have tried to obey orders implicitly, Head.”
“Good. However, I don't like my mistresses to go too long without a reminder of what they themselves are inflicting, so I serve notice on you that I shall be watching you closely this term, Wedell.”
“Yes, Frau Direktrice.”
“Is the Duty Book completed and signed?”
“On your desk, Head.”
“How many did you have at Duty tonight?”
“Five. Kraus, Nagel, von Hoffmansthal, the little Elrich, and Uhlein.”
“Get any of them to 'repeat?' ” Here the Directress was referring to the custom whereby, when a girl did not “take” her Duty cuts in complete stoicism, she received them again afterwards, added to those she had been unable to manage the first visit.
“Uhlein,” said Fraulein Wedell a little more brightly now that the conversation had taken a securer tack. “I very nearly got Nagel to get up, too, but she just held on. However, I think I really hurt Uhlein, the second time. She could barely find her knickers again afterwards, and went out of the door twisting like a belly dancer. I passed her dorm just now, Head, and she was still in floods of tears.”
The Directress thought. Finally she said, “Stand here and wait until I dismiss you.” She turned on her heel and left the room on the opposite side from that taken by the punished junior mistress. This connected with her salon where a tall, big-boned, red-faced officer in a perruque and off-duty clothes reclined with a glass of fortified wine. His tight pale-blue trousers and flounced shirt suggested an immense muscularity of body beneath.
“Dire execution over?” he murmured as the Frau Direktrice entered and closed the joining door behind her. “It sounded salutory, and I am sure was.”
“Yes, I flogged a Prefect and a young mistress. A new one.”
His brow raised over the glass. “Really? Do I know her?”
She shook her head with a laugh. “Nor will you, until at least next term, Karl. I'm not sending Maria Daunitz to you ruffians at the barracks until she's trained.”
“Not even for a flogging, Beth? I've one Corporal who is accuracy itself. And 'tis so entertaining for the young officers, y'know.”
“Did you see that Ritter girl get it, by the by?” asked the now insouciant Directress, serving herself to wine.
“Alas, no such luck. Had to take my squadron out on training at the time. But Leopold-you know him-saw the last part and says the skin was fairly taken off her back by the end. Unfortunately she kept on fainting, despite all the brandy they gave her. No,” he ended on a sigh, “I rather fear she won't throw eyes at our young Prince Fritz again in a hurry.”
“Wedell's outside. If you're interested.”
“I'm always interested,” said Colonel Karl von Schmettau, standing up with a laugh and grabbing hold of Elizabetha Grunkow's stocky bottoms in both hands and lifting her bodily off the floor for his kiss. “And particularly in this!”
She hung glued to his lips for a long moment, feeling the mast of his manhood along one thigh. He put her down and laughed.
“And always ready whenever I see this marvelous randy little rump of yours, Beth. Which is We-dell? I forget. Can't I cane her first?”
“No.”
The Frau Direktrice was thoughtfully peeling down her skintight britches, and the cambric knickers beneath. The man's prick kicked like a mule at the sight of her short but very round buttocks and fleecy mound in front. He hastened to let it free, while she, moving in spraddle-step, placed herself against her ormulu desk, over which she leaned pensively on her elbows.
“Heard any more from Dessau, Karl? I don't suppose so. Heavens, it's been a busy day. Always is, at start of term like this.” She shook herself and arched up her bottom. “Now stick it up me like a good Commanding Officer. You… beast.”
