public affairs in this part of the country! What if they refused to obey me? How could I hope in one night to clear away all the corruption which my predecessor had allowed to come to exist during the ten years of his office? What if I was faced with mutiny? Harry had done his best to console me. He would be there at my right hand. Every one of the two hundred had sworn to obey under the penalty of Excommunication, and that, in the Order of Pain, meant death. Again, some Members would be firmly on my side, Mr. Bing for example, and Mr. Duval, and the redoubtable Mr. Coldstream. And I was not to forget that Sir William L. would be present, incognito of course, for none of the Members knew him except as an ordinary Member. No, in Harry's opinion, my Congregation would obey.
But would it?
I had no means of knowing in advance.
'Is everything ready, Willie?' I said.
Willie, who had been reading the evening paper, looked up. 'Aye,' he said.
The flogging room in the basement had been altered. Willie himself had attended to the installation of the new fixtures. The whipping board had been removed. Metal rings had been sunk into the floor and ceiling. Victims would now be stretched as I had been when I delivered myself over to Willie's doting punishment in the back shop of the boot maker's in Cumberland Street.
New instruments had been provided. No expense had been spared. Somehow Willie's company was a great comfort to me. Here was a Whipmaster of imagination. He was to have his own will with any female member of our organization: to whip, to suck, to dote, to bring religion where religion had not been before. But his loyalty touched me. It was my body which interested him. And it was his. Before all the world, it was his.
For some time now no more cars had arrived. If that meant that everyone had already come, then Harry would soon be sending for me. I pulled up my skirt and lay over a soft leather stool in front of Willie.
'Whip me a little, Willie!' I breathed.
He took a three-pronged leather strap from his pocket and with his full force, gave me six cruel blows across the soft, sweat-smeared surface of my buttocks. And then his nose and tongue were there, nudging, exploring. I raised my palpitating rump so that my slimy cunt came in contact with his darting wet tongue, and to feel it there, at my body's center, strong, hard, and masterful, just that, gave me back the knowledge of my own power, the religious certainty of my commitment.
Someone knocked at the door.
Willie got up and I slipped off the stool.
'Come in!'
It was Harry.
'They've come, Gertrude!'
'All?'
He nodded. 'It's time you put in an appearance. They're all anxious to see you.'
'Where have you put them?'
'In the Temple.'
I nodded.
The Temple was a large, sparsely furnished hall at the back of the house, its ceiling domed like that of a mosque. There was a pulpit and beside it, a large whipping block. Chairs were arranged as in a church, in three segments with two aisles running between. Behind the pulpit and dominating the whole auditorium was a sculpted version of the picture I had first seen in the reception room, the Virgin Death.
'I shall come now. Go and prepare them.'
He bowed and went out.
Willie helped me to dress in the plain toga of black cloth. Underneath, apart from a chain of iron drawn tightly about my waist and the black crown which fell from my cunt against the soft white surface of my right thigh, I was stark naked. My nipples and my navel had been treated with mascara. I stepped into my leather thong sandals and wound my soft black hair out of sight under a tall black turban.
'Be near, Willie,' I said just before I went out.
There was a trapdoor in the pulpit so that the bearer of the Holy Seal could appear suddenly and impressively among the Congregation.
A moment later I was standing high in the pulpit, a green arc-light directed skillfully at me, and below me in the auditorium, a complete silence reigned.
I could see the faces craning up towards me: old faces, young faces, handsome faces, ugly faces, tired faces, fat faces, thin faces, gaunt faces, all alight with anticipation. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Harry, wearing a black mask across the upper part of his face, standing naked and rampant, the Whipmaster at his block. I raised my arms, my long fingers extended, making an impressive cross of my body.
'I am Gertrude!'
'She is Gertrude!' Harry echoed in a deeper voice.
'I am the bearer of the Holy Seal!'
'She is the bearer of the Holy Seal!'
'I am come to live amongst you as Pain!'
'She is come to live among us as Pain!'
Hazel, behind the wings, struck across her quivering buttocks at that moment by the five-fingered-spranger, let out a bloodcurdling scream of agony.
When that died away, I spoke again to the sea of white, straining faces.
'I am Gertrude!'
'She is Gertrude!'
'I am your Painmistress!'
'She is our Painmistress!'
'I am Mistress and Minister to your pain!'
'She is Mistress and Minister to our pain!'
I looked down to the front row and my eyes singled out a plump but pretty, well-dressed woman who sat next to an impressive-looking man with a military moustache.
I pointed my finger at her. She cringed closer to her escort.
'Stand up, woman!' I said.
She hesitated. Her escort looked indignant. But after a few seconds she shifted nervously to her feet. She was really quite beautiful in spite of the slight plumpness. She would be about thirty-five, I guessed. I could imagine the soft white flesh, tremulous and slightly damp under her fashionable dress.
'You are a Member?'
'Yes … my Lady!'
I smiled and stretched out my hand toward her.
'Come,' I said gently. 'For my first Mass I have chosen you to perform the Rite of the Virgin Death!'
A wondering murmur ran through the auditorium. I knew why. Harry had told me that the corruption in our Congregation extended even to the holiest of rituals so that for this particular Rite, Mr. Oakes had been in the habit of employing a professional to be whipped on the block below the sculpted passion of death. Thus my command struck deep at corrupt usage, especially as I had chosen a woman from the front row, that's to say, one who was probably a celebrity or the wife of a celebrity in the outside world.
'I…' Her gaze broke with mine and she glanced at her escort. He was already on his feet and he looked furious.
'Come!' I repeated, ignoring him.
She still hesitated.
The man spoke. He was furious but his voice was restrained.
'Excuse me, my Lady, but this is not the usual practice in our Congregation. My wife…'
'Silence! In this Temple she is not your wife, nor are you your own master, sir! You are the creatures of Pain and by your obedience, Pain will judge you! Sit down, sir, before you offend mortally!'
I raised my right hand, and a beam of white light fell on the gentleman's face.
'Lord E.,' Harry's deep voice intoned, 'you will obey the Seal!'
The woman, terrified, made as if to come forward, but her husband gripped her by the wrist. He turned to face a thin, gray-haired man who sat quietly at the end of the front row.
