"Oh, Mademoiselle!"
Mademoiselle had a flat steel ring or disc in her hand, the inside edges of which were serrated or indented like a saw. By means of a watch spring attached to it, it was fixed on to Mons. Priapus, and it was evident to me that if he enlarged himself in the least, the teeth would be into him and the more he grew the further they would penetrate.
"There," said Mademoiselle, having daintily fixed the instrument, "I think this will cure you; but in the drawing room I must direct Elise to replace that bandage you wore when Lord Alfred Ridlington dined with us. And now, Miss Julia, of course you know you must be birched. Beatrice, flog your cousin's bottom for her?"
Beatrice brightened up at the notion of whipping me.
Mons. Priapus grew. I got fearfully pricked.
"Oh, Beatrice, let me go!" I shouted. "Oh, Mademoiselle, it is eating into me! Take it off," I cried desperately struggling, "take it off!"
Beatrice held me tight.
Mademoiselle was pleased to see her horribly ingenious little instrument work so effectually.
"Oh! Do not have me whipped with it on! Oh, Mademoiselle, please!"
"You may appeal to Beatrice."
"Certainly you shall keep it on; it is a capital thing for you. Come, turn over. Who shall hold him, Mademoiselle? and how many is he to have?" responded that damsel.
"You must put the straps across his shoulders, Beatrice. And Maud and Agnes-one at each side-can hold up his skirts. I should order him five dozen, but as he has that little bulldog on in front, we will say three. He'll bite, I expect."
I was strapped down, my petticoats held up, my buttocks exposed.
Beatrice turned back her sleeve displaying and freeing her supple wrist.
He did bite already, of course.
She walked over to me with determination and glee. I knew I should catch it and I did.
To begin with her strokes were delivered very slowly and with great force; and then, instead of spreading them about she continued to administer them as much as possible in the same spot aiming each stroke carefully.
I panted and called out-ended, in fact, by bursting into a paroxysm of sobbing. Of course my contortions and cries were no more heeded by Beatrice and Mademoiselle than if Beatrice had been lashing a feather bolster; neither did Maud nor Agnes seem to pity me.
I had whipped Beatrice, it was her turn now. My goodness! If she whipped me like this when I was married to her!
"There, Miss Julia," said Beatrice, with satisfaction as she concluded and drew the birch through her left hand quite affectionately and gratefully.
The bulldog did bite again, as I writhed on the couch, and it entirely deprived me of the power or wish to express the sensations provoked by my nakedness and castigation before the girls.
"Well, Julia," asked Beatrice afterwards when she met me in the gallery, "did I warm your bottom for you? Does it still smart?"
"Oh, Beatrice!" and I grew red as I looked at her.
"Thank me for the punishment. You deserved it."
"Yes. Thank you for flogging me."
"And you deserve another for daring to flog me?"
"Oh, no! I was obliged to."
"I have nothing to do with that. Do you deserve another for daring to whip me, or do you not?" — stamping her foot.
I grew pale. She had given me a birching I should not forget for a week or ten days and was intending to give me another. I looked at her splendid form.
"Yah!"
"What on earth possesses you, Julia?"
"That damned thing!"
Beatrice shouted with laughter.
"Oh," I soberly remarked, "it is all very well to laugh! It hurts confoundedly, I can tell you."
"So it ought! Will you please answer my question, Julia?"
"Yes, Beatrice, I do; but don't give it me yet."
"Good boy! As a reward you shall have it in a very pleasant way. Your head between my legs, your face upwards, while I hold your legs across my shoulders. You know-you remember-don't you?"
"Yes, under your petticoats?" asked I, slyly, for which I was given a slap.
"Oh! Oh! I can say no more," I was obliged to yell out; for the next moment this cursed contrivance bit me again. "I may have no feelings at all," cried I, clasping my hands to the middle of my lap. "I would sooner wear that diabolical bandage. Who is to whip me, Bee?"
"Oh, Agnes shall do that!" said Beatrice, scarcely concealing her merriment.
"Be it so. I hope you'll take this ring off."
Agnes' whippings were not very dreadful.
"We shall see," replied Bee, going away.
The ring I have since discovered is an American invention intended for the prevention of involuntary excitement during sleep. The teeth instantly wake the sleeper and-well, they at least deprive the act of its involuntary character.
A pleasant state of things! Was I to be permitted no sensations whatever? Again a fresh invention for teaching me a habit of restraint, of continence, by a method which itself violently excited just the contrary.
What my feelings were in the drawing room that night when Beatrice received her remedy for the use of that ill-favoured word and for her unwise defence of it I must leave to be told in another chapter.
CHAPTER 21
That same afternoon in her boudoir when my transports had become more vehement than Mademoiselle liked she had first threatened and then expressed her intention of handing me over to Lady Alfred Ridlington to tame, and Mademoiselle's laws were like those of the Medes and Persians which alter not.
There had been no question that afternoon of my sex, no allegation then of my hermaphroditism. I was then acknowledged to be a boy and in fact the whole point of placing me in Lady Alfred Ridlington's hand was that I was such. Since then however, my sex appeared to have been evaporated under the potent spell of Mademoiselle's subtle magic, of her rigorous treatment, and of the lady's garments in which I was constantly kept. Certainly the petticoats and the drawers had had a very powerful effect upon my constitution. I really hoped Lady Alfred Ridlington would prove to be that Alfred who had taken me in to dinner and afterwards to the conservatory where he had behaved so gallantly and had so delightfully shocked me-a modest damsel-with his fierce masculine nature.
Besides, of what use could I, a girl, be to his wife; or indeed, she to me?
The long summer days went by, and went by happily. We rode, and sometimes Mademoiselle took me for drives, lashing her ponies and making me pay the penalty in that famous dormeuse of hers, with which I became very well acquainted. Indeed, it was the means of imparting to me a wonderful understanding of Mademoiselle's nature, disposition, and temperament.
Maud had resumed her artistic pursuits in her studio, whither, however, I was now never permitted to penetrate alone, and she had to content herself with modelling my bust and arms while eagerly desiring to mould my legs in clay. I was flattered by this appreciation of my form and by the compliment to it.
Beatrice had found an opportunity of inflicting the whipping she had made me acknowledge I deserved.
It was on an evening of unusual beauty whilst Mademoiselle and Maud were rambling in the grounds after dinner in the summer twilight that she had taken me to her apartment and accomplished her purpose.
She was dressed in underclothing of unusual richness which I regarded, rightly or wrongly, as a special mark of favour to myself.
The dainty things were thrown across my head which was clasped by her ravishing thighs and pressed down by her no less ravishing body. I felt upon me that which was to be my wife and the consciousness thrilled me as I explored its recesses with my tongue while Agnes, excited and amused, whipped me with enjoyment as Beatrice held my limbs across her shoulders. The punishment was sweet, but severe, the more so because she would not remove the ring.