"He couldn't be more right! If I'm ever given a chance I'm off to the police. What sort of an idiot does he take me for!"
"I don't think you'll be given the chance, Mistress. I know I won't. He says it's kinder if we don't have chances."
"And is this your reward for being a nice little slave, to be tossed in here with me, handcuffed so you can't scratch a tickle?"
"Azzam says we're good for each other. He wants us to be together."
"Oh Phemie!" Yola looked at me piteously. "He can get away with it, can't he! Oh damn, damn and double damn!" Furiously she fought the chain to the wall as though she believed it might break. In telling this story of me, I come now to an odd mixture of farce, and sadness and laughter. It has been said that a man cannot serve two Masters. I found it true that a girl cannot serve a Master and a Mistress. It's just not possible! The chasm between Yolanda and the Sheik Inman Azzam was so wide I could see only vistas of pain for my darling if that chasm was bridged. I had the temerity to expostulate with my Master about Yola's unsuitability for the role in which he had cast her, and was instantly sent to find Lotta and request her to beat each of the soles of my feet five times with a thin cane. I have never known such agony. Receiving it I understood why she had tied me so tightly. When I was freed I was a very subdued little girl who realized how infinitesimal was her capacity to influence events. I hadn't intended to show my feet to Yola. They hurt when I walked, but in a dungeon you don't do much walking. But when the poor darling let go a burst of frustration and demanded that, with my influence at Court, surely I could do something! I let her see what the cane had done. We both cried together and felt better. I did get a promotion. My handcuffs got changed from back to front. In the front they were purely symbolic. I wore them with immense panache, But they were all I did wear. After Yola had stripped me in the dungeon no one thought it worth the trouble to dress me again. I didn't mind. I know I'm nice naked, and I've got sort of used to it. Jennie was a surprise. She was in the cell with the barred front and barred door. This means that anyone inside is like a goldfish in a bowl. Anyone can get a good look at you and there's nowhere to hide. Lotta sent me down there on some pretext and there she was.
"So you were here all the time!" That was my greeting. She sounded jubilant. Before I could say a word, she demanded: "Get me out of this mess." Jennie was naked, and a very well constructed naked too! Her hands were tied palm to palm at her back and her elbows bound tight together with rope. I could see it hurt. I held up my hands and grasped a couple of bars. Seeing my handcuffs she also took the trouble to notice me. "What are you running 'round like that for'?" she demanded. "And those things on your wrists… "
"I'm a prisoner too."
"Come off it, ducks, yer on the wrong side of bars."
"Miss Harding is a prisoner too."
"Oh her! Is this all part of that fool game you two play?" At that point I was joined by Lotta. I was glad to see her.
"She one of Ashad's?" she asked bluntly.
"Yes."
"She no work for Board of Health — ask questions?"
"No. She's Ashad's Mistress." Lotta looked pleased. The captive said: "Up your arse, love." And gave me a glance of pure venom. Lotta looked through the bars and asked: "You are talking please?"
"And up yours too!" said Jennie. No time was wasted. Lotta got one of the royal guard and between them they carried a writhing and obscene Jennie to the room designed for the discomfort of bad or uncooperative young women. They put a rope from a pulley round her hands and drew them up behind until she was almost off the ground.
"You're pulling my arms out," Jennie gasped. "Good. Now we whip." Lotta never wasted words. "This ain't cricket," Jennie complained.
"Not cricket. Whipping arse." Lotta proceeded with her metronome beat. Jennie expressed colorful character references for all present. My heart went out to her as the cane thudded regularly into her quite nice bottom.
"Where Ashad live?"
"Seventeen Ashenden Square." Jennie's answer was too prompt.
"We know that wrong." The metronome speeded up. The blows became exceedingly cruel.
"Oh, damn you! It's Three two three Elm Terrace."
"Much better. Now the other two: Musad and Narranah."
"I don't know. Let me down." This time only two strokes before Jennie's memory improved.
"The Mermaid Inn at Nettley."
"They come here?"
"How the hell should I know!" Lotta's slash made me wince. Jennie howled. "What's today. Tuesday? That means they'll be here Thursday, damn you."
"Be no ashamed. Lotta hurt. You do well for man."
"Thanks a lot," Jennie moaned. "Now that I've been an absolute bitch, how about letting me down?" Lotta allowed the wracked arms to fail. Her fingertips explored the ridged weals on the perky bottom and found them good. "We lock you up," she announced genially.
"How about taking this' damn rope off my elbows, it's killing me?" Jennie demanded.
"Stay on. Do you good," Lotta decreed. I had to feel sorry for Ashad's wealed Mistress, she'd only been doing her job. I did not envy her the rope on her elbows. When I was put back in the dungeon there had been a change. "That damn Wardress type thinks I've been too comfortable," Yola exclaimed angrily. "And this afternoon I'm going to be whipped." My poor darling! She had been released from her shackles, but now stood against the stone wall, her arms spread wide and raised and chained. It was a beautiful pose, with Yola's loveliness an absolute breath stopper. But as the day wore on she would tire. I knew! I too had stood thus. Adding insult to injury, a chastity belt had been locked upon her hips. It mocked me. I could give my love no solace. She listened to my story of Jennie, but found no joy in it. Shifting irritably against her bonds she eyed me pathetically. "Two days, Phemie, maybe three. Then your desert patriarch whisks us off to slavery. Phemie, I'm scared." I was desolate. To tell my love that Inman Azzam was kind would seem to her an insult. By his order she was chained and would soon be whipped. She would find no joy in the lash. The first and the last stroke to mark her skin would hurt her with equal bitterness. She would feel only injustice and cruelty. I knew that in every moment of this captivity she was longing for release with all her heart. She was not like me.
"I am a happy slave-" My pitiful sentence died.
"And you think I could be. Phemie darling, I know what you're thinking. It's that I should accept and bow the knee."
"Is there no heat in your puss at the thought, Mistress?"
"You have called me Mistress. Mistresses aren't whipped." Without a word I employed my fingers and my lips upon her breasts and nipples until she was panting and tugging at her tethers. Then I stood back and used my small store of courage. "Yola!" She looked at me, startled.
"You are a slave, Yola. You have no choice any more than I. If you give Azzam love, or at least respect, he will be kind." She was furious. "You know, don't you, that if we're ever freed I'll punish you terribly for what's in your mind at this moment."
"Yes, Mistress, I know. I'll understand."
"He'll whip me daily yet you ask me to love him!"
"You have whipped me, Mistress. Besides, in all that time he owned me my whippings were never cruel after the first — or when I misbehaved."
"Are you sure you're not being used as a Judas goat, Phemie?" She had put her finger neatly on my pulse. Before I could frame another plea, the door opened and Lotta beckoned. Her impassive features betrayed about as much amusement as they were designed to proclaim. I followed her, expectantly, to the big room I now thought of as The Audience Chamber. The first thing I saw was another amused smile, this time on the face of my Master. The second thing to claim my startled attention was Daisy.
"I believe you have met?" The Sheik Inman Azzam inquired amiably.