accents: “Oh-sir-it is shameful to be laid bare. But-I-cannot-go to prison. I-must-submit. Oh! Oh!”
Then, turning her back to us, she covered her blushing face with her apron, and sobbed.
The girl’s horror at the idea of her bottom being exposed, was deep and unfeigned; for though she was a French chambermaid, she was evidently a modest girl. But I must confess that the sight of her distress added piquancy to the whole affair. It always affords great pleasure, to a “lover of the rod,” to flog a female culprit who appears to feel the shame of the exposure more than the pain of the whipping.
All the time this talk had been going on, Frances had stood looking much interested, but not understanding a word that was said; and she now impatiently asked what I had been saying.
I told her that I had given Annette the alternative of going to gaol or taking a flogging; and that she had chosen the flogging.
“She deserves it,” said Frances emphatically, and with rather a grim smile. Then, eagerly: “Let me flog her. You know I have long been wanting to inflict corporal punishment; and now there is a chance for me. Do let me flog her.”
I smiled; but I could quite understand her desire to whip, and I resolved to let her have her wish. “All right,” I said. “I will ‘horse’ her on my back, and you shall flog her.”
Frances looked very pleased, and at once prepared for action, by taking off her gloves, hat, and jacket. Then she said: “We have got no rod; and I am not going to make my hand sore by spanking her; so you must find something for me to flog her with.”
I looked round the room for some instrument of punishment, and my eyes fell on a pair of small rug straps, each about a couple of feet long and half-an-inch wide. One of them would do very well, as it would sting the culprit’s bottom sharply without bruising the flesh.
So I pointed the straps out to Frances, and told her to take one of them. Annette was still standing with her back towards us, her apron was over her head, and she was crying. Going to her, I laid my hand on her shoulder, turned her round, and drew her hands away from her face; saying: “The lady-my wife-is going to flog you. So your punishment will not be so severe as it would be, were I to flog you. Now, take off your dress and stays.”
“Oh, if Monsieur would please leave the room. I promise not to resist Madame while she flogs me,” said Annette, clasping her hands, and speaking in a pleading way.
“I will not leave the room. I am going to hold you while you are being punished. Remove your dress and stays; and be quick, or I will ring the bell.”
She hesitated a moment; and I laid my hand again on the bell-rope; then heaving a deep sigh, she slowly, with trembling fingers took off the two garments, and stood before us, with her head averted, and with streaming eyes; and as her chemise was cut rather low at the neck, I could see the division between her small, but well- rounded bubbies.
I had made her partly undress, because when a woman is “horsed” for a flogging with her dress and stays on, it 5s very difficult to get her petticoats turned up high enough to bare her bottom in a satisfactory way.
At one side of the room, there was a large pier glass, and opposite it there was a wardrobe with a long mirror; and it struck me that if I stood between the two articles of furniture, I should be able to see the whole of the girl’s body reflected in the looking-glass, and thus be able actually to witness the flogging.
“Now, Annette, I am going to take you on my back and hold you, while Madame flogs you.” So saying, I went to the sobbing girl, who trembled and shrunk away from me, but made no attempt at resistance. Seizing one of her wrists in each of my hands, I drew her arms over my shoulders, and then stooping forward, raised her feet well off the floor, “horsing” her in proper style without any difficulty, for I am six feet in height, and though she was tall, she was not heavy.
“Now, Frances,” I said, “the girl will be sure to kick and struggle when she feels the strap, so you must pin up her petticoats, so that they will not’ fall down in the middle of the punishment.”
Frances rolled the culprit’s petticoats, which were white and clean, up to her shoulders, and pinned the garments securely. She wore her chemise under her drawers, which were tightly stretched over her bottom by the curved position of her body; and as I was between the two mirrors, I could see everything perfectly.
As Frances was untying the girl’s drawers, she sobbed out: “Oh, madame, don’t take down my drawers!” The drawers were untied, and pulled down to her knees. Then she made another appeal: “Oh, please leave my chemise. Do not strip me quite bare.”
The chemise was rolled up and pinned to the petticoats, leaving the girl naked from the middle of her back to the tops of her stockings; and as she felt her last garment removed, she uttered a low wailing cry of shame.
She had a small, but well-shaped bottom, slender thighs, and slim legs, cased in tight, clean white cotton stockings, gartered at the middle of the thighs with black ribbons; her ankles were trim, and she was wearing neat, well-polished shoes. Her olive-tinted skin was very smooth, and it appeared to be fine in texture.
Everything being ready, I told the weeping culprit, who was shivering with shame and fear, that she must try and bear her punishment with fortitude; and not attract attention by making an outcry.
Frances took the strap and twisted part of it round her hand, leaving a length of about eighteen inches to flog with.
“Now, Frances,” I said, “give her a couple of dozen strokes, and lay them on smartly, but not too severely. Begin at the upper part of her bottom and flog down to her thighs, then up again to her loins. Keep cool, and don’t cross the cuts.”
Frances whirled the strap in the air, and as I looked in the glass in front of me, I could plainly see the girl’s eyes dilate with fear, and I also noticed the cheeks of her bottom contract, and the smooth skin assumed a rough appearance. Crack! The long piece of leather fell smartly across the girl’s bottom, and both the olive-tinted cheeks were instantly marked the a long red stripe, the exact breath of the strap; the stinging pain making the culprit start convulsively on my back, and utter a stifled cry. Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Frances swung the strap with a graceful sweep of her arm, and as skillfully as if she had been a practised flogger; laying on the strokes the equal force, in slow time, one below the other, — so that the red stripes were printed on Annette’s skin at almost regular distances apart. She plunged and wriggled, whimpered and sobbed; and I could feel her body quiver, and shrink against my back each time the stinging strap struck her bottom.
I had never before “horsed” a girl; therefore k was a novel sensation, and a pleasing one, to fed her bosom and belly rubbing against my back, and the front part of her thighs rubbing my bottom, as she writhed in pain. Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! She bounced about, twisting her hips from side to side; her flesh twitched at each stroke; she turned her head and looked over her shoulder, with an agonized expression on her face, at the strap as it hissed in the air over her bottom, and she gasped and cried, the tears running in streams down her scarlet cheeks. By this time, Frances had flogged down to the culprit’s thighs, so that the whole of her bottom was prettily marked with alternate red and white stripes.
Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Frances was now flogging upwards. The sharp noise made by the strap as it struck the girl’s firm flesh, echoed through the room; she kicked up her heels in pain, struggling hard to free her wrists from my grasp, and though she did not scream, she moaned, and cried piteously, gasping out in choking accents: “Oh, madame! — madame! Oh, chere madame! pas-si-fort! Oh, — pas-si-fort! Oh-madame! Ayez pitie! J’en-ai-assez! Oh! — Oh-h!”
Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Her moans changed to low, suppressed shrieks, and she threw her legs about so frantically that her drawers fell off, and in her writhes and plunges, I caught glimpses of the black hair in the cleft of her thighs; her struggles becoming so violent that I had some difficulty in holding her in position.
Crack! Crack! Frances laid on the last two strokes with a little extra force, extracting from the culprit two rather loud squeals; and now that the flogging was over, the whole surface of her bottom, from the loins to the thighs, was a bright scarlet colour, as the stripes had overlapped.
Frances threw down the strap, and stood for a moment looking with an amused smile at the marks of her handiwork; then she unpinned the girl’s petticoats and let them fall. I released her wrists, and she stood on the floor, crying, and twisting her loins with the smarting pain of her well-whipped bottom. Her face was red, and she looked very much ashamed.
“Now, Annette, it is all over. You may go,” I said.
She picked up her drawers, and turning aside, drew them over her legs, and tied the strings round her waist; then she put on her stays and dress, whimpering, sobbing, and wiping her streaming eyes with her apron; then she put her cap straight, and hurried out of the room.
The flogging of the girl had afforded me great pleasure; as the whole affair had been so unexpected, and also
