with you, I'll let you go this time. But if I hear that you have not been perfect, I won't waste my time and my strength on your back again, which is much too tough for my leather whip anyway, but I'll send you over to the police and let you have twenty-five lashes with the knout. That will cure your laziness, you tramp.” (It must be inserted here for the understanding of the modern reader that in Russia servants were sent with a letter and a small fee to the nearest police station, where the requested punishment was inflicted, usually the knout over the back or over the Buttocks. The servant then brought back to his master a receipt for the money and a short account of the punishment inflicted. This custom prevailed even in the larger cities until-the end of the 19th century.) “What do you think this couple want a girl for?” asked one of the girls as they cleared the place up. The question remained unanswered. Grushenka moved about in the semi-darkness of her cage. She didn't dare cry out for help. She was hungry and thirsty.
She remembered that the other booth had some water on a comer table.
She groped around, found a similar table and a silver bowl with water in it. She drank in big gulps and returned to the couch. The minutes were creeping. She heard voices and laughter in the booths next to hers, but she did not care to peek. Then, to get her mind off her own anguish, she went back to one of the peepholes. The scene was worthy of her attention. The woman customer in the room presented an odd appearance. She was about thirty years of age and seemed to be more bony than muscular. She wore a riding costume with straight lines, closely fitted on the neck and wrists. She had very intelligent eyes, a hard mouth and no color in her cheeks, which gave her a very unattractive appearance. She had secured a lovely model from Madame Laura and had certainly paid enough to amuse herself with her.
The model was a natural blonde of medium height with full breasts and an innocent look in her face. She was quite feminine and, although twenty years old, appeared almost childlike. The woman was busy taking off the girl's bodice. She took the soft, milk-white breasts in her bony hands and admired the small nipples. Rubbing them against her cheek and kissing them playfully, she mumbled: “You're a good girl, aren't you? You would not allow those brutes, those men, to touch you.
Would you?” “Oh, no, never!” answered the girl. “Never! I only wait on ladies! Madame Laura would not even allow a man to look at me.” “Yes, such soft breasts, such small nipples, untouched, lovely child,” continued the customer. Becoming more emotional and kneeling down before the girl, she undid her long drawers and took them off her with a caressing gentleness unexpected in a woman with such large hands and feet. She then proceeded to rub her cheeks against the Mount of Venus, going up and down the sides of the girl with tender strokes of her hands. The girl looked into the mirror, unconcerned with what the woman did to her. She teased her breasts a bit, arranged a curl which had left its place and moistened her lips with her tongue to make them look fresh and jolly. She opened her legs mechanically when the woman inserted the index finger of her right hand into her grotto and began to kiss her belly and the blonde curly hair which flowered around the entrance to that enticing cavern.
She gave in readily when the woman moved her over to the couch. There she stretched herself out, rolled and tucked a pillow under her head, let one leg fall down on the floor and bent herself in such a way that her open slit lay on the edge of the couch, readily willing to take what was coming. The woman now began systematically to make love to her, interrupting her tongue-play over and between the lips of the delightful spot with many poetic little outcries, as if she had found a preciously chiseled piece of jewelry. But the owner of this little masterpiece did not seem to be impressed. In fact, when her customer pressed her mouth vigorously to the spot and started to suck with great force-at the same time taking firm hold of the buttocks and pressing them forward towards her strongly working tongue-the blonde rubbed her nose arid smoothed her hair as if she were not even present at the treat which was being given to her love parts. Of course, now and then remembering what it was all about, she put her hand on the head of the lesbian worker, moved her buttocks around in slow convulsions and ejected deep groans. But, getting bored with her own behavior, she quickly forgot to participate. Grushenka was baffled at this coldness- or, rather, insensibility-of the blonde. She sympathized with the excited woman, who now pressed her knees hard together, wiggled her behind in the air, got red in the face and began to sweat in her tight fitting garments. Finally she groaned and the blonde, taking this as a sign that the climax was near, made a last effort and moved strenuously against the sucking mouth with simulated sighs of lust. The woman customer got to her feet, her whole face wet-probably from her own saliva-while the blonde lazily brought some water and a towel and cleaned the moist and perspiring face. Her customer no longer found her the peak of loveliness. “Well, that's that!” the woman said. “You lousy slut, lying on your back for everybody who pays the price. Brats like you should be whipped daily for an hour until they give up their brazen lives and refuse to open their legs for everybody and anybody. You're a Goddamned whore, that's what you are, and not worth the bread you eat. Oh, well, what's the use anyway, you do it for money and here is some.” And she put some money underneath a pillow, apparently as far away as possible, so as not to touch even the skin of the girl's hand. “There, you fat pig.”
And she rushed out of the room. The words had struck home to the blonde and, as she wiped her own love nest dry after the wet attack, she looked her figure over in the mirror with a scrutinizing vanity.
However, Madame Laura rushed in, went straight to the pillow and got the money. “Aha!” thought Grushenka, “Madame is watching also, probably from the other side of the booth.” Madame was not very satisfied with the amount she found. “You really are getting lazier every day,” she turned on the girl. “You have a new boy friend.
Haven't you? And he probably pokes hell out of you. At least you could pretend better than you do. What will happen to your father and yourself if I stop paying him? You won't have a crumb of bread to eat.
But maybe that will do you good, because you're getting fatter every day. Hurry up now and put on some black underwear and the white evening gown with the low neck. There are some customers in booth four. Go on now!” There was nothing more to see in the other booth. Grushenka lay down again on her couch. The time passed. She dozed off until somebody unlocked her door and called her out. It was Marta, come to bring her back to Madame Laura's private room. Madame Laura now had a changed face. She was beaming and full of cordiality.
“My dear girl,” she smiled, “I have given your case a thorough consideration and I agree that you were right to run away from Madame Sophia's service. I am going to help you, and I have a great surprise in store for you. You dress and go home for tonight with your dear friend Marta. Be here tomorrow at noon sharp, and leave it to me. I'll see to it that you'll have a happy future. While I cannot allow myself to harbor a run-away, I'll have a magnificent place for you by tomorrow where you will live like a queen. Quite what you can expect, beautiful as you are…” And so on. Madame Laura even inquired whether they would have something really good to eat tonight or whether she should provide something. And, after the girls assured her they had all they needed, she presented Grushenka with a broad embroidered ribbon, fitting very well with the peasant dress she wore.
The girls curtsied and left the house. Outside, Grushenka related what she had seen, but it was no news to Marta, who had heard of these things but who could not really understand their meaning because she was completely a virgin. But Grushenka lay sleepless and thinking for a long while that night. She mistrusted Madame Laura and would never go back to her. She would have to leave Marta also, without telling her where she was going. Madame Laura would probably hunt for her or send word to the police or to Sophia. Therefore Grushenka would have to drop out of sight. She did not know that Madame Laura had received an answer to her billet-doux from an old gentleman, who had written that he would be pleased to buy such a beauty from Madame Laura but could not come before the next day at noon. He would be disappointed the next day at the noon hour, and Marta would state as her explanation that Grushenka had disappeared, that she must have been picked up by the police. Madame Laura finally joined her in this belief. At least she was satisfied that Marta did not know Grushenka's whereabouts. She was very sore about it, because she would have been able to get a good price for the sale of the girl. However, she did not want to investigate too much, because it was better not to mix into the affairs of a slave girl who had run away.
CHAPTER TEN
Grushenka stretched herself in Marta's four-poster bed. Marta had kissed her goodbye and left for work, admonishing her to be at Madame Laura's at noon. Grushenka slept and day-dreamed. She got up lazily and put on her peasant dress, leaving her fine travelling dress in Marta's closet. She put all her money except one ruble on the mantelpiece, said a word of goodbye to her absent girl friend and left the house with slow steps. She did not want to think of the future. She walked leisurely to the border of the city, went through the gate where some Cossacks
