Rectory of Correction (15 page)

 

‘Oh, heavens, what a relief,' Amelia said as she finally got her drawers unlaced and drew them off. ‘I swear these damned things get tighter every day!'

‘They do,' Charlotte put in bitterly. It's that butter-wouldn't-melt bitch Faith. She makes us lace them up tighter every time.'

‘I think,' a quiet voice put in, ‘she is only carrying out the Reverend's instructions. I don't believe she is being deliberately mean.'

Amelia turned. Linnet was sitting on her bed and struggling with her own laces. The girl blushed as she pulled off the flogging drawers, affording Amelia a flash of dark pubic curls beneath her little skirt as she did so.

‘Speaking of sneaking little bitches,' Charlotte's voice cut in, ‘how come you never seem to get the stick, eh, sweetheart?'

Linnet blushed a deeper shade and blinked with doe-like timidity. ‘I do get punished,' she said, her delicate hands clenched in tremulous fists. ‘I got that quirty thing – and it really hurt. You saw!'

‘You don't get as much as some of us, though, do you?' Charlotte's voice had taken on a distinctly menacing purr.

‘That's right, Linnet.' Amelia caught the mood and glared at the girl. ‘Why do you always seem to get off so lightly?'

Linnet blinked at Charlotte, then at Amelia. Finally, in vain, she looked at Arabella for support. ‘I don't know.' Her voice had become a nervous whisper. ‘I do try to be good...'

Charlotte snorted in contempt and Amelia curled her lip. Even Bella shook her chestnut mane at this.

‘I say she is a rotten little sneak who needs teaching a lesson,' Charlotte said quietly.

‘That's right,' Amelia agreed. ‘Let's take the little goody-goody down a peg or two.'

‘Hold on, girls,' Bella said. ‘I am in charge. I'm not getting into trouble for what you two do.'

Hope entered Linnet's expression at this. Amelia looked at Charlotte, then both turned towards Bella, protesting. Amelia did not dare to cross the prefect, but Linnet really did deserve some grief.

Arabella walked across to the door and tried it. It was firmly locked. She bent, affording Amelia a splendid view of the quirt welts on her naked bottom, and peered through the keyhole.

‘Well,' she said, standing up and turning back towards them. ‘It would rather seem as if everyone else is busy, and we have been left to amuse ourselves tonight.' A slow and slightly wicked smile spread across her lovely face. ‘Well, girls, what are you waiting for? Come on, let's get the snooty little slut!'

 

‘Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Very nice indeed.' Jack Campion took a pull on his cigar but kept his eyes fixed firmly on Faith.

The maid blushed crimson. She had been informed that her uniform would not be required and thus she entered, teetering on six-inch heels, wearing only a longline corset of black satin and matching silk stockings, together with her maid's cap and a tiny apron of white lawn.

‘How much would you give me for this chit then, Jack?' the Reverend asked in an amused tone.

Faith stiffened, the glasses and decanter on the silver tray she held tinkling against one another as a quiver ran through her body.

‘Well, girl, what are you waiting for? Serve Mr Campion.'

Faith licked her full lips nervously and stepped reluctantly over to Campion. He had changed for dinner but, somehow, evening dress made him look even more piratical. His hair was too long and his gold tooth glinted too wickedly for the smartest clothes to make him look in the least respectable.

The tray, with its decanter full of brandy, was too heavy for Faith to hold in one hand, and when, as now, there was no table available, the form was for her to enable the Reverend and his guests to serve themselves. This meant bending forward and holding out the tray towards the grinning man.

It was not a comfortable position. The Reverend had rigid views about deportment in his servants, and he had trained her most exactly to carry out his will. Faith stood, trying not to tremble too much, legs absolutely straight and sloping backwards to counterbalance her equally straight torso, which leaned forward from the hips. Even her arms had to be held out rigidly, though the weight of the decanter made this difficult to maintain.

As she bent, she was aware that she was proffering her bottom towards the Reverend Dawes; not something she could ever do without the odd reflexive gluteal twitch. It almost seemed as if she could feel his gaze as heat fanning her naked rear. Today, however, she was more concerned about the man in front of her.

‘How much?'

Jack grinned at her and stuck his cigar between his teeth.

Faith willed him to pour himself some brandy and release her from the growing discomfort of her unnatural stance. But he did not. Instead, the man reached forward, over the glasses and around the decanter, and gripped her breasts.

‘Lesh see,' he said, the cigar still gripped between his teeth distorting his diction. ‘Nishe ripe pair, thish!'

The corset came equipped with stiff quarter cups, which supported Faith's breasts ‘like ripe peaches on a tray', as the Reverend had been known to comment. Above the cups proper, a veil of fine black lace held her breasts firmly, just covering her nipples. Faith had to bite her lip to stop herself from moaning as the man kneaded her breasts gently, pinching the nipples between forefinger and thumb through this lace with professional aplomb, until the little nubs of flesh were stiff and rigid.

Then, with practised ease, he flicked them right out of their covering.

Faith could not suppress a gasp of pain as his fingers pinched her nipples.

‘Be quiet, you silly girl,' the Reverend said sharply.

Nonetheless, Faith was unable to prevent a relieved sigh from escaping as the man finally let go and poured himself a brandy.

‘Do get yourself a decent measure, man,' the Reverend put in. ‘It is the best, from the Comtesse de Lasseque's own private domaine. A thank you for some services I rendered, concerning her favourite maidservant.'

Jack Campion poured himself a large measure of the golden liquid, and sniffed the glass appreciatively. ‘No, don't go just yet, my dear.' Faith had turned to serve the Reverend, but Campion's deep voice stopped her in her tracks. ‘I still have not given your master a price, sweetheart.'

‘Damn these drawers, they are such a blessed bother,' Kirsty muttered.

The reminder of the prefect's presence behind her caused Gretchen's bare bottom to flinch again. Desperately, she tried to concentrate upon her task. This was difficult enough in any case. It was not that scrubbing down the kitchen flagstones was hard in itself. It would have been a dull, slightly demeaning job in normal circumstances. Unfortunately, Gretchen's situation was not exactly normal. Grimacing, she lowered her head to get on with her work.

As soon as she had been issued with her new outfit, she had understood she was destined to spend a good deal of time on her hands and knees. The little corset was not unlike the other girls' stays, though it was black instead of white, but the stockings gave the game away. These were of black wool, gartered with elastics at mid-thigh, and equipped with leather patches on the knees. She had pulled the things on with a heavy heart and then grunted as her corset was laced tight, looking around for the rest of her new clothes.

There were none, unless one counted the heavy leather collar or the cuffs that padlocked on to her wrists and ankles. Her breasts, behind, thighs and sex, all her most intimate and vulnerable places, were bare for the world to see.

‘Please, sir...' she had begun to protest, almost without thinking. The Reverend Dawes quelled her with one steely glare.

‘Hold your hand out,' he had said, taking down a tawse.

Gretchen held a trembling hand out in front of her, supporting it by gripping the wrist. Three wicked strokes cracked across her palm, sending her hopping up and down in agony. The watching girls had not dared to laugh, but she could not but be aware of the way her breasts bounced as she danced out her distress, and she could sense their barely suppressed amusement as she grimaced and groaned.

‘The other hand,' the Reverend had said simply, just as she was hoping that was it.

Another trio of quite pitiless lashes scalded her left hand, and the hot tears ran freely by the third.

‘You will not speak unless spoken to.' The Reverend turned to the other girls. ‘If this trollop so much as grunts at you without permission from now on, she is to be reported to me. Anyone who fails to inform on an offence by her, however trivial, will receive two dozen strokes of the birch.'

These words still ringing in her disbelieving ears, Gretchen had been hauled, the Reverend's strong fingers tugging at a tender nipple, down the stairway to the scullery. Only Kirsty had been instructed to follow.

‘I'm leaving you in charge this evening,' the Reverend had told Kirsty, ‘for Mr Campion will be my guest for dinner. Supervise her closely and use this if she needs correction. Do not bother me. I have business.'

‘This' had proved to be a dark, polished wooden paddle. Gretchen had not liked the look of it at all. However, she soon had other preoccupations. An adapted scrubbing brush was put between her teeth, as if it were some sort of gag or bit, and secured by buckled straps behind her head. A steel chain fixed to the ring in the busk of her corset had been hauled, tight enough to chafe, between her legs and secured to the back. A three-foot long steel spreader bar was locked securely to her ankle straps. Finally, Gretchen's wrists had been pinioned behind her back.

‘Right.' The Reverend looked at her seriously. ‘I want all of this floor scrubbed by tonight.'

There was only one way to do it. She had to stick her bottom back and up, to counterbalance, to have any chance of scrubbing the floor. The chain between her legs was a mere annoyance. The presence waiting silently behind her was what was causing the beads of cold sweat to form on her trembling flanks.

Kirsty, as it was not class time, had been granted permission to remove her drawers, unlacing them with obvious relief. As she was absorbed in this time-consuming task, Gretchen made a serious error of judgement.

‘Oh, dearie me, no,' Kirsty said sweetly enough. ‘Been having a wee rest, have we, petal?'

Gretchen protested in vain. She had been trying, without success, to find a way to move that involved less discomfort. There was a horrid smacking sound of wood on flesh. Gretchen could only guess that Kirsty was slapping the paddle against the palm of her own hand to test the thing. She wondered wildly what it would be like.

‘Get on with it Gretchen, there's a good lass.'

Gretchen gave a gasp of pure relief and bent her head down to go to work, bottom twitching in nervous anticipation.

There was a sound between a splat and a crack and atrocious pain lanced though her left bottom cheek. Another blow, and her right cheek was on fire. Gretchen squirmed and twisted, but found to her terror and surprise that she was not moving even inches from the source of her pain.

‘Och, no, you are nae going anywhere, my sweet.'

Kirsty was standing on the spreader bar, Gretchen realised with mounting panic. And that meant she was completely stuck and totally helpless.

The prefect punished her with relentless precision, taking not the slightest notice of the strangulated shrieks emerging from her gagged mouth. Gretchen simply had to endure it. A rain of strokes lashed her bottom and her thighs, scouring her skin like some sort of scalding rain. She wriggled, she twitched, she emitted muffled cries, but there was simply not a thing she could do to escape the paddle.

 

‘Now keep your mouth shut, or we shall have to gag you,' Bella said.

‘Oh, please don't pinch so. Ouch, that really hurts!' Linnet twisted and struggled to no avail as Amelia and Charlotte held her firmly by the wrists. Amelia took the opportunity the girl's bare thighs and bottom presented to bestow some slaps and pinches, while Charlotte applied equally cruel fingers to Linnet's breasts.

‘This court will come to order!' Bella said firmly.

The girls were a little short of props in their dismal dormitory, but she had done her best. Bella had pressed her flogging drawers into service for a makeshift wig. For a judicial bench she sat on the iron foot of her little bed, and in place of a gavel she gripped one of the canes.

‘The prisoner will kneel.'

Linnet would almost certainly have got down of her own volition; however, she was not given the chance. Amelia grabbed a hank of soft hair at Linnet's temple and used this to force the squealing girl roughly to her knees.

‘Linnet Tremaine, you are accused of being a little goody-goody sneak who has avoided her fair share of floggings,' Bella intoned with mock solemnity. ‘How do you plead?'

‘Ouch, let me go! Oh, please, this isn't fair...'

‘I should inform the defendant,' the prefect said slowly, swishing her gavel experimentally as she spoke, ‘that any plea of not guilty will entail a mandatory doubling of the penalty, should you subsequently be convicted of the offence. Now, stop babbling and wailing, we have not hurt you – yet. Guilty or not guilty, how do you plead?'