Portrait of a Disciplinarian (2 page)

Turning back into the corner, she hung her head, feeling every bit as rueful as her mother might have hoped, but far from repentant. Her principal emotion was irritation, because it was all so grossly unfair. It wasn’t her fault at all, but she was sure that the beastly Freddie Drake wouldn’t be standing in his living room with a hot red bottom on show to the world. Admittedly, once he’d realised what was happening he had done his best to help her escape, and it wasn’t his fault that the alley he’d suggested she nip down had had two constables coming along it the other way in response to their sergeant’s whistle. That had just been bad luck, and it had also been bad luck that the inspector at the police station had recognised her from the time before.

So she’d been pinched, and Freddie had not only got away but had the immortal crust to come to the magistrates’ court and pay her fine, passing a few choice remarks about delinquency in the modern girl to the very sergeant he’d so narrowly avoided in the alleys of Hammersmith. He hadn’t even been particularly sympathetic, giving her the briefest of hugs before making an unpardonably rude joke about what she’d have to do to pay him back the five pounds, and going on to describe how Cambridge had won the boat race by ten lengths to secure their fifth victory in succession.

At the memory of his behaviour her lips moulded into the same petulant expression she had worn while having his penis rubbed between her bottom cheeks. Then they softened again. Despite her very genuine resentment at his cavalier treatment, it was impossible not to feel a thrill, a deliciously naughty, thoroughly improper thrill. They had misbehaved, in a way that would have utterly scandalised their friends and relatives, and that felt wonderful. So, she was forced to admit to herself, had his cock, as he rubbed it so energetically up and down in her bottom slit.

Besides all that, she seemed to have earned the worst fate of all: being sent down to the country, where she would be unable to prevent Myrtle Finch-Farmiloe either from securing the coveted position of club secretary for Gaspers or from forcing her beastly attentions upon Freddie. He, Stephanie was certain, would be unable to resist, as among Myrtle’s numerous faults were a dark, slumberous beauty and a nasty habit of appearing coy yet mysterious whenever men were around. Then, too, Myrtle didn’t get spanked and never had been, which had always provoked a sharp sense of inferiority in Stephanie. If the committee at Gaspers found out that Stephanie not only still got spanked but did so frequently, her chances would become slimmer still. It was essential to be in London.

‘That’s long enough, I think,’ Lady Truscott stated, closing her novel with a snap. ‘You may come out of the corner now, Stephanie, and first thing tomorrow morning you will go down to Devon, where you will stay until further notice.’

Stephanie’s first move on being given permission to come out of the corner had been to reach for the buttons of her union suit, intending to put her bottom away first so that she could hide it from the attention of the parlour-maid, which was suspiciously intense. At her mother’s words she froze, then opened her mouth wide in protest.

‘Mother!’

‘I’ll have no nonsense,’ Lady Truscott replied, suddenly stern.

‘Yes, but Mother –,’ Stephanie blustered.

‘Stephanie Amelia!’ Lady Truscott snapped.

Stephanie winced, painfully aware of the implication of having both her Christian names used. Another word and the parlour-maid was likely to be told to fetch a cane, and maybe even to hold Stephanie while she was beaten, a prospect far more painful and humiliating than a simple spanking. She made a face, but remained silent as her mother went on.

‘You will go to Devon, and remain there until further notice, as I have said. To Driscoll’s, I think.’

‘Driscoll’s?’ Stephanie echoed. ‘But Mother, please …’

‘To Driscoll’s,’ Lady Truscott said firmly.

‘Why not Stukely Hall?’ Stephanie demanded.

‘Your great-grandmother is ninety-five,’ Lady Truscott explained patiently, ‘and your grandmother has requested absolute calm, something that seems to be an impossibility with you about. You are going to Driscoll’s.’

‘How many of my aunts are there?’ Stephanie asked.

‘Only two,’ her mother replied. ‘Three if you count your Great-aunt Victoria. Lavinia, Edith and Rosalie are at Beare.’

After a moment of calculation Stephanie winced again. Three aunts could mean only one thing: more spankings. Possibly the cane, too.

‘I want you well away from bad influences,’ Lady Truscott went on, ‘and that dreadful club of yours. I suppose you were with that awful flapper Myrtle and Roberta Drake?’

‘Not at all,’ Stephanie replied. ‘I was escorted by Mr Frederick Drake.’

Her mother gave a cluck that indicated as low an opinion of one Drake as of the other.

‘Your sister is at Driscoll’s, of course,’ she continued, ‘so I will be sending Vera to keep an eye on you.’

Stephanie’s face grew sulkier still and she cast a dirty look at the parlour-maid, who now looked the picture of dutiful service as she curtsied to Lady Truscott.

‘May I at least take the two-seater?’ Stephanie asked.

‘I suppose so,’ her mother answered. ‘It’s only getting in the way here.’

‘I don’t mind doing without a maid,’ Stephanie volunteered, made bold by her mother’s acquiescence.

‘Vera will go with you,’ Lady Truscott said firmly. ‘And Vera, if Miss Stephanie doesn’t behave herself, I think you know what to do.’

‘Mother!’ Stephanie exclaimed in horror.

‘Yes, Lady Truscott,’ Vera supplied, her voice thoroughly smug. Stephanie wondered if there was to be
any
female member of the household who was not allowed access to her bottom.

The two-seater took the brow of Shapely Down at very nearly sixty miles per hour and, as the view of Dartmoor spread out before her, Stephanie’s mouth curved into a satisfied smile. It had been a good journey, and a fast one. She’d had the car up to seventy-five on the long straight outside Salisbury and, more importantly, she was on her own. It was, she felt, jolly clever of her to wait until her father was in but her mother was out, and then insist on taking so much luggage that the maid was obliged to follow by train. Her father had indulged her, as always, and the awful Vera had been left with no choice but to comply. The consequences were likely to be both painful and humiliating in the long run, but Vera obviously intended to make full use of her permission to smack Stephanie’s bottom anyway, so it made little difference what excuse was used.

The thought did nothing to remove her smile. This was her own land, and it was impossible not to enjoy the breeze in her hair as she tried to take the two-seater over the seventy mark again along the straight past the Warren House Inn. Every detail of the vast sweep of Dartmoor was familiar, each tor familiar by name and the site of many a childhood expedition, while many of the places within view related to a family history that went back before records were kept.

It was in Postbridge, where she was forced to slow down owing to some fool who had stopped his cart almost in the centre of the road so that he could unload thatch, that a direct ancestor known as Devil John had wooed and won Alice Eden, after disposing of a rival suitor by inserting a fox’s brush up the unfortunate man’s bottom and giving him a quarter-mile start on the
hounds
. Then, invisible beyond the shoulder of White Tor, there were the ruins of the Pargade House, where Arabela, a great-aunt, had shot a man for compromising her sister’s honour.

Stephanie wasn’t sure of the details of either event, having had the stories related to her by her grandfather when he’d had considerably too much to drink, but she heartily approved. She couldn’t see Devil John or Arabela putting up with the likes of Vera Clapshott, although she didn’t suppose Devil John or Arabela had had to put up with five widowed aunts either. It was jolly inconsiderate, she felt, for all five of their husbands to have managed to get themselves killed during the war. One or two, perhaps, would have been understandable, but five began to look like clumsiness.

As she accelerated up the long slope out of Postbridge she was earnestly wishing that she didn’t stand just four feet and eleven inches in her stockings and that she had rather fewer aunts. The five widows were bad enough, but Great-aunt Victoria was the worst of all, one minute as jolly as anything and the next flying into a temper over something as trivial as letting one of the dogs take a bite from a teacake. After all, the silly old woman should have seen a bite had been taken out of it before putting it in her own mouth, and there really hadn’t been all that much drool on it.

She put her foot down on the accelerator at the memory of the incident. Victoria Truscott had exceeded all bounds, dishing out a bare-bottom spanking in front of not only an assortment of aunts but Stephanie’s grandparents, her little sister Hermione, a maid, the butler and a local farmer who’d come to see about purchasing some seed turnips. Among the embarrassing moments of Stephanie’s life it ranked seventh: worse than what Freddie Drake had done to her, but hardly to be compared with being unexpectedly mounted by George Hamilton Gordon, when only the fortunate interposition of a pair of stout flannel pyjamas had
prevented
her virginity being taken in a manner that didn’t bear thinking about.

Now feeling distinctly cross, she kept her foot down as she passed along the slope of Bellever Tor, reaching sixty miles per hour as the bridge over the Cherrybrook came into view. A heavily laden dray had stopped there, so that the driver could relieve himself into the stream. Stephanie jammed her foot on the brake, felt the wheels lose their purchase and shut her eyes tight as the car hit the wall, burst through it, bucked violently on the rough chunks of granite and slithered sideways down the slope into the Cherrybrook, depositing her – really quite gently – in the deepest part of the stream.

Slowly, Stephanie stood up, and spat out a newt that seemed intent on making a new home of her mouth. She removed her driving goggles and opened her eyes. Above her, the drayman was looking down, his weather-beaten face set in astonishment, his fly unbuttoned, a large, brownish penis held in one hand with a single yellow drop hanging from the tip. Their eyes met.

‘You want to be careful, Miss,’ the drayman advised.

Temporarily bereft of speech, Stephanie could only shake some water from her hair and retrieve her hat before it floated away downstream. The drayman, apparently keen to make conversation, put his penis away and went on.

‘Terrible dangerous corner, this one. You’re lucky not to be scat all abroad to flibbits. Why, it can’t be no more than seven, maybe eight year ago that fellow from Princetown gaol, doctor he was, and should’ve known better –’

‘Please could you help me out, if you don’t mind?’ Stephanie interrupted.

‘Why, certainly, Miss,’ he offered, and began to make his way down the bank.

Stephanie took his hand and allowed herself to be pulled from the water. She had lost a shoe and was
drenched
to the skin, but her first concern was for the state of the car. It lay sideways, half under water, the front crumpled from her impact with the stone wall, which fortunately had been partially demolished by some earlier accident. It wasn’t as bad as it might have been, and there had already been several dents in the fender, so with the services of a good mechanic she might even get away with it altogether, as long as she could get the car out of the river and back to Postbridge. She noticed that two powerful Shire horses were harnessed to the dray.

‘Would you be a sweetie and pull my car out?’ she asked, aiming at the drayman a smile few men had ever been able to resist. ‘Your horses look terribly strong, and I’m sure they could pull my little car up the bank, and maybe you’d be kind enough to take me into Postbridge?

He nodded thoughtfully.

‘I dare say.’

‘Would you?’ Stephanie ventured after a pause. ‘I’d be awfully grateful.’

‘I dare say,’ he repeated, then paused as if reflecting on some deep matter. ‘But how grateful, that’s the question, ain’t it?’

‘Ever so,’ Stephanie promised, then she paused too.

She’d had a bite of lobster at the Crown in Sherborne and filled the tank in Moretonhamstead, which left her with very little money until she got to Driscoll’s. In any case, the thought of telling her aunts what had happened made her lip twitch and her bottom cheeks tighten. Retrieving her bag, which had somehow been thrown out of the car and come to rest beside a large cowpat, she dug inside. There was a half-crown, a threepenny bit and a handful of copper. Also a five-pound note, but she would need that for the repair.

‘Would um … three shillings and tuppence-farthing be all right?’ she asked.

‘Three shillings tuppence-farthing?’

‘It’s all I have on me, I’m afraid.’ Again he was quiet for a moment, but this time his eyes were fixed on where her dress was plastered to her chest, showing the low half-egg mounds of her breasts, each topped by a largish nipple made protuberant by the cold. She bit her lip, all too aware of the quality of his attention and hoping that his thoughts weren’t going in the direction they seemed to be.

‘I wouldn’t say it’s all you have,’ he remarked, his voice now sly.

‘I really can’t image what you mean,’ she replied sulkily.

‘Well, my dear,’ he went on, bolder now, ‘you’ve a fine little pair of devil’s dumplings up front, for one, and I’ll bet you’ve a nice round sit-upon behind and all.’

Her worst fears confirmed, Stephanie made a face, wondering just how beastly the drayman wanted to be, and whether she should make an offer or wait for him to propose something. Judging from the behaviour of both Freddie Drake and George Hamilton Gordon, men liked to rub their cocks between a girl’s bottom cheeks, but she couldn’t bring herself to say the words, especially as the drayman might not keep to the agreement, but push it up her instead. He spoke again before she could find her tongue.

‘So how about you show me them,’ he suggested. ‘And while you’re at it, you could take John Thomas here and pop him in that pretty mouth of yours.’