"Say, `You fought well. You won many bouts,"' I said.
"You fought well. You won many bouts," she said.
"Say now, 'Your girl hopes to please you,'" I said.
"Your girl hopes to please you," she said. I then crouched beside her, and took her in my arms. She gasped. "Why are you doing this to me?" she asked.
"I have well earned you," I told her.
"Collect your earnings, yet again," she begged me.
"I shall," I told her.
"Kiss and squirm well, Slut," I said.
"Yes, I am a slut," she wept. "I am a slut!"
"Kiss and squirm," I said.
"Yes," she wept. "Yes, yes!"
"In your arms, you have taught me that I, the Lady Florence, am a slut," she whispered, bending over me. We were in the darkness. The lantern had again burned out. I felt her hair on my chest, the chain, too, depending from her-looped, iron collar.
"I did not know that I was a slut," she said.
"Your excitement, your responses, have proved it," I said.
"I did not know I could have such feelings, or behave in such ways," she said.
I took her in my arms and threw her again beneath me.
"You must never let anyone know that I am a slut," she said. "You are the only man in the whole world who knows that."
"For the moment," I told her.
She stiffened in my arms, frightened. "Let it be our secret," she begged. "Tell no one!"
"Why not?" I asked.
"No one must know that I am sexually responsive," she said.
"Why not?" I asked.
"It would be the ruin of my reputation," she said.
"Surely men have a right to know," I said.
"No," she said. "No!"
I laughed.
"Do not make my sexual responsiveness public," she said, "I beg of you!"
"Why not?" I asked.
"I am a free woman," she said.
"But one that is a luscious slut," I pointed out.
"Respect me!" she begged.
"You will not be respected," I told her. "You will be wanted."
"How much we women are at the mercy of you brutes," she said.
"You do not even know what it is to be at the mercy of a man," I said.
"Oh?" she asked.
"Yes," I said, "you are a mere prisoner."
"And not a slave," she said.
"Yes," I said.
"That shred of pride, at least, I have," she said.
I smiled to myself. As responsive as she was as a free woman, it was hard to even coniecture what her responses would be if she were made a female slave.
"A slut," she said. "is at least higher than a slave."
"Yes," I said, "a slut, if free, is at least a thousand times higher than a slave."
"Yes," she said, and kissed me.
"Are you ready to perform again, Lady Florence?" I asked her, courteously.
"As the slut you have proven me to be?" she asked.
"Of course," I said.
"Yes. Jason," she said.
"Do so, Lady Florence," I said, courteously.
"And if I do not?" she asked.
"You will then be whipped," I said.
"Could you do that?" she asked.
"Yes, and mercilessly," I said. "I will perform," she said.
"And well, and as the slut you are," I said.
"Yes, Jason," she said, "I will perform, and well, and as the slut I am."
"Perform, Lady Florence," I said.
"Yes, Jason," she said.
28 THE ANKLES OF THE LADY FLORENCE ARE NOT BOUND
She lay on her stomach. "Why are you tying my hands behind my back?" she asked.
It was shortly before dawn. With the key I unlocked the collar from her throat. I threw it and the chain to one side.
"It is morning," she said, her head to the side. "Guardsmen will doubtless soon be here."
"I doubt that," I said. "Many estates must have been struck and plundered. Yet, doubtless, guardsmen, sooner or later, will arrive here."
"I am prepared to deal with you, Jason," she said. "Jason," she said, "why are you tying a strap on my throat?" I knotted the strap under her chin. I took the strap, then, and wrapped it several times about her throat, and then tucked in the loose end. It might thus, if unwrapped, if I chose, serve as a leash.
"I do not understand," I said.
She struggled to a sitting position, her hands bound behind her, the dark strap wrapped several times about her throat.
"You have much abused me," she said. "But I am tolerant. I can forgive much."
"Lady Florence is generous," I said.
"Free me," she said. "Untie me. Remove this horrid strap from my throat. It is too much like the leash of a slave."
"It is much like the leash of a slave," I admitted.
"Please, Jason," she said.
"Position!" I snapped.
Swiftly, as she could, she assumed the position of a slave and, this time, automatically, as she could, the position of a pleasure slave.
"You were going to deal with me," I said.
"Please, let me assume another posture," she said.
"No," I said.
"It is difficult to speak with you as I wish," she said, "while I am bound, while I wear leather on my throat, while I am kneeling before you, and in the posture of a slave"
"Speak," I told her.
"I am prepared to be lenient with you," she said. "I am prepared, even, to overlook to some extent your indiscretions of yesterday and last night."
"You are indeed generous, Lady Florence," I said. I smiled to myself. It amused me to hear the rapine to which I had subjected her, and the paces through which I had put her, suitable almost for a slave, referred to as indiscretions.
"I am prepared, even," she said, "to consider permitting you to remain on my estates."
"Why should you do that?" I asked.
"You saved me from brigands," she said, "and from the unspeakable fate of slavery." She smiled. "Were it not for you, Jason," she said, "I might even now have felt beneath my feet the sawdust of a slave block and have been auctioned to the highest bidder."
"Perhaps," I said. Actually I doubted that things would have happened that fast. Most girls are not sold for a few days after their capture, and some girls, if subjected to professional slave training, in a slaver's pens, not for weeks or months. Trained girls, of course, other things being equal, bring higher prices.
"And as a reward for this great service which you have rendered me," she said, "I am prepared not only to overlook your occasional and somewhat casual disregard for my dignity but to offer you a handsome employment upon my estates."
"Such generosity is almost overwhelming," I said. "Your conditions?"
"They are two," she said.
"And what is your first condition?" I asked.
"That you must never speak of my weakness, my sexual responsiveness to anyone," she said.
"But that is Preposterous." I said. "You are helplessly and deliciously responsive. That is an important fact about you. Men have a right to know it. Thev have a right to know the delicious pleasures which may be derived from you."
"No!" she said.
"Ah, but yes, my dear Lady Florence," I averred.
"Do not tell my secret," she said.
"Under the touch of a strong man," I said, "your own body will tell it."
She shuddered.
"Such facts," I said, "about women such as yourself, like their height and weight, and the coloring of their hair, are usually made public."
"Public?" she asked. "About women such as myself? I do not understand."
"What is your second condition?" I asked.
"That you, in my hire," she said, "will obey me in all things, that you will do whatever I wish."
"That I would be, in effect, your hired slave?" I asked.