Dawn found her vanquished and weakened. She was also beginning to feel deeply the pangs of thirst and hunger.
At last, she started as she heard steps, soon followed by Bridget's voice:
"Well slave have you deckled to submit to your mistress?"
The word "slave" set up a reaction of revolt in the mind of proud Mabel. She had enough strength left to shake her head in refusal.
The maid laughed and Mabel suddenly felt the lash of a horsewhip on her buttocks. The girl had never been horsewhipped before. Perhaps because it was striking already wounded flesh, the horsewhip made her suffer still more than, the dog-whip, the birch twig or the cane.
Bridget horsewhipped her with all her strength. Mabel wanted to scream and beg for mercy but she was prevented from doing so by her gag and she had to endure the terrible punishment till the end. At last, Bridget stopped and asked:
"And now, what have you decided?"
At the end of her physical resistance the girl nodded her head in submission, whereupon the maid delivered her from the underskirt and the panties that were imprisoning her head and, like a dream, Mabel at long last saw the light, and the first thing she saw was the vulgarly made up face of Bridget who was looking at her with contempt.
"Slave," the maid said, "have you decided to submit entirely to your governess Miss von Berner?"
"I submit," whispered Mabel, "but please don't beat me! Mercy!"
Bridget shrugged her shoulders and unhurriedly untied the cords that were holding the girl against the rack. Then she stood her up and had to hold her up a few seconds for the girl's legs were like cottonwood.
"Come, follow me!" she ordered.
Behind the maid who was holding her hand as a baby, Mabel painfully walked up the steps and along passages up to Dorothea von Berner's door, who lived next to her own room, Bridget knocked on the door.
"Who is it?" the governess asked.
"It's Mabel, Miss, she's come to submit and I'm bringing her in."
"All right, let her in!"
Trembling, Miss Sun way went into her mistress's room. It was a vast room, luxuriously furnished and cluttered with precious gewgaws. Silk dresses and underclothes were scattered on some pieces of furniture. Dorothea von Berner, sitting in front of her dressing-gown of black lace under which could be seen some patches of white flesh. She was not wearing any glasses and Mabel could not help noticing how beautiful she was.
"On her, Bridget!" Miss von Berner said at last.
"Make her kneel in a corner and keep an eye. I shall deal with her in a while. For the moment, I have my make up to attend to."
During a long; quarter of an hour, Mabel had to wait on her knees, under the severe look of Bridget, until the governess deigned to give her her attention. At last Dorothea stood up and walked up to her victim with a flow and voluptuous step.
"Well, have you decided to be submissive and obedient?"
"Yes."
"Have you understood that your revolts would be of no use and that you are now under my discipline, and that you are but a naughty girl atoning for her past and being re-educated?"
"Yes."
Mabel kept her head down, not daring look up into the face of the governess. She saw only her small feet shod in dainty shoes, and the hem of her perfumed dressing-gown which was caressing her face.
"To-morrow," the governess went on, "your first day of discipline will begin, but before that I shall give you a whole night in order to recuperate your forces. You will be locked up in your room and Bridget will bring you a hearty meal. Ton will have a bat hand cure your behind with some salve which you will find on your bed-table, and you will sleep. To-morrow we shall see if your obedience is genuine and your submission total. Take her away, Bridget!"
Very humiliated, Mabel got up and followed the maid up to her own sleeping-room. Bridget brought up to her a tray containing a copious meal and withdrew after having locked up the door giving on to the passage, as well as the one which communicated with the room of the governess. Dazed with weariness and suffering and with her brain completely empty of thoughts the girl went, to the bathroom, where she took a warm perfumed bath that acted like a balm.
Back in her room, she examined in a mirror her behind and nearly uttered a cry of horror when she saw its state — it was all crimson and streaked with red and bleeding lashes, and bluish with bruises in some ports. Alas, where was her pretty behind of yesterday which was her pride, so white, soft and plump? The girl almost cried at the sight of such a disaster. It took her more than an hour to apply salve with care and rub it in smoothly, and it relieved her pain a lot.
As she was looking for pyjamas, she saw that nearly all her clothes had been removed from the cupboards and that her room had been cleared of all its unnecessary objects — the gewgaws, her gramophone, her cigarettes, the handbag into which she put her money, all that had disappeared. As for the cupboards and dressers containing her dresses and skirts, they were locked.
She managed to find a pyjama in pink silk and a pair of panties which she padded with cotton wool. It made her behind look oddly bumpy. Having donned her pyjamas, she ate voraciously the meal that had been prepared for her and at last, broken up by sleep and suffering, she went to bed.
In her bed, she wept in big sobs like a child, then weariness had the better of her and she sank into a deep sleep, agitated now and then by long nervous shudders.
CHAPTER 3
The following morning, Mabel was awakened by Bridget who entered her room at seven sharp. Of course, the maid had come in without knocking and looked very bold and insolent.
She walked up to the girl's bed end briskly removed all the blankets and sheets.
"Get up, slave, and quicker than that!" she ordered.
Mabel's first reaction was to revolt — she was still half asleep.
"I won't allow this way of treating me, she said.
"Slap" went Bridget's hand on her cheek.
"You don't have to allow this or that!" Bridget admonished. "From now on you are a slave and nothing else. Miss von Berner said you had to obey, so you'd better get up unless you want me to got the horsewhip."
That argument was very convincing and beat down the girl's resistance, for she still had the smarting remembrance of yesterday's punishment.
So she got up abruptly in spite of the, pain still vivid on her buttocks and stood awkwardly in front of the maid, intimidated and not knowing what to do next.
"You are not to wash before the governess says so. You'll just comb your hair and put some make up on to appear presentable when your mistress comes to visit you. And you will have to be completely naked when she comes in, understand?"
As Mabel was not answering Bridget slapped her face again.
"Answer 'Yes, ma'am'!"
"Yes, ma'am."
"All right, slave, do as I told you!"
The maid left the room without looking back and Mabel began to understand with dismay how humiliating her life was going to be, from now on. But, heedful not to be punished again she did as she was ordered. She combed her hair and made up her face, then she took off her pyjamas and her padded panties. She looked at her behind in the mirror and was surprised to find that the swelling and the bruises had vanished; Thanks to Miss von Berner's miraculous salve her behind had resumed its normal aspect, although there still remained a trace of the beatings in the way of a rosy hue crisscrossed by reddish weals.