The Bottom Line (12 page)

‘Mandy,' she said curtly, ‘will you come up here, please?'

I got to my feet, realising that I now knew what was meant by being ‘put up', or at least I thought I did.

Slowly I climbed the steps and stood before Lady Merchant, vaguely aware of Vernon, one of the young waiters, leering at me from the front of the hall.

‘Mandy,' she said again, ‘you have admitted that you were out of bounds after curfew and that you entered the house through a kitchen window which had been left open deliberately. Is that correct?'

‘Yes, ma'am,' I said.

‘Very well,' she said. ‘I don't propose to deliver any lectures, since I'm well aware that you will take more notice of your punishment than of any words. You will receive eight strokes of the slipper and four of the crop. You have no doubt been told that you may decline the punishment, but that if you do your employment at this retreat is over. Has that been made clear?'

‘Yes, ma'am,' I said again. ‘I accept the punishment.'

‘Very well, Mandy.' The merest hint of a smile flitted across her lips. ‘Danvers.'

Danvers went and sat sideways on the dining chair, so that his back was facing the hall. Lady Merchant turned back to me.

‘Mrs Manning will administer the slipper and Butler will administer the crop,' she told me. ‘You may consider yourself fortunate. It is only because you are so new here that I have decided not to administer a more serious punishment. Had you been a more senior member of staff, I might have had you caned to show you how seriously we take breaches of the curfew. As it is you will go to your room after the punishment has been completed, you will remain there until the rising bell tomorrow morning, and you will then return to your duties. Is that all clear?'

‘Yes, ma'am,' I said for the third time.

‘Very well,' she said. ‘Go and stand in front of Danvers so that you are looking at his back, with your own back to the dining room.'

As I obeyed the instruction a new panel of lights came on, floodlighting Danvers and the area around him.

‘Now lean right against Danvers' back and stretch your arms over his shoulders.'

I did as I was told and suddenly, in a blinding flash, I really did know exactly what was meant by being put up. Why hadn't I thought of it before? But I had no time for reveries. That icy voice snapped out again.

‘Mrs Manning.'

I could no longer see what was happening, but I could feel Mrs Manning raise my skirt above my waist as Danvers gripped me firmly, his hands locked around my forearms. She must have had a couple of pegs with her because my skirt remained in position as she moved away, and with dreadful finality the moment arrived.

Danvers stood up, lifting me with him. He leaned forward slightly so that I was suspended against his back, my bottom exposed and my feet dangling. There followed a couple of moments of silence and then I felt the slipper land solidly on my flesh. It hurt, but not unbearably. I could cope with this; in fact the pressure under my arms caused the greater discomfort as I was pinioned by Danvers, with my upper arms, my breasts and my belly supporting the weight of my body.

Another blow followed, and another, each more painful than the previous one. While I couldn't stop myself from wriggling involuntarily as each blow landed, within the confines of my position, there wasn't a single moment when I needed to cry, or when I questioned whether I could endure this punishment. I counted them off silently until all eight had landed. Then I heard the boss say something to Danvers and he lowered me until my feet were touching the stage again. The lights dimmed, and in the dining ¬room a dozen conversations were resumed, all of them no doubt to do with the spectacle of which I was the focal point.

‘You can have a breather for a couple of minutes,' Mrs Manning told me in a low voice, releasing my skirt as she spoke. ‘You took that very well but the next part will be far worse. Would you like a gag?'

‘No, thank you,' I gasped. I just wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible, to retain as much of my pride as my undignified position would allow, and to get back to the room I shared with Birgit and Kirsty.

‘Danvers,' snapped the boss again, and the footman took up his sitting position as the spotlights were again turned up. I resumed my position against his back and he slowly stood up, hoisting me again into the air. I could feel my skirt being secured again and then Butler moved in front of Danvers and within my field of vision. In his hand he held a long, thin, rounded instrument made of what looked like leather, with a long tongue at the end.

‘Are you read, Mandy?' Lady Merchant asked me.

‘Yes, ma'am,' I whispered.

‘Very well then,' she went on. ‘Butler will administer four strokes and then you will return to your room, where you will spend the night by yourself. Tomorrow Mrs Manning will minister to you and the whole episode will be regarded as closed.'

I heard her soft footstep as she moved out of sight, and sensed she was standing behind me in a position that afforded her a good view. For several seconds nothing further happened and then I felt something across my bottom. I realised that Butler had rested the crop on me, no doubt to take aim. He moved it twice and flicked it against me, before the sensation vanished. I remember briefly thinking that if they were two of the four strokes I had nothing to worry about, and then the crop landed again - but properly.

I screamed, I jerked, I and would have thrown myself to the stage had not Danvers had such a firm hold. I blinked back the tears. Never in my life had I known such a sensation. It may be true that the body has no precise memory of pain, but it does have a memory of painful incidents and I remembered breaking my arm when I fell off my bike. That had probably been the single most painful incident of my life, but it was nothing compared with the pain of this single blow, which seemed to flash across my bottom from left to right and to be more painful with every inch.

As I caught my breath and swore to myself that I was not going to cry, I could feel the crop again being laid across me. I took a deep breath and gritted my teeth. There were again a couple of exploratory movements, a short pause and another moment of blinding agony, slightly lower than the first one and an extra sensation this time which, I realised, was where the tongue had caught me, almost round the side - an even sharper but less damaging sensation.

Again I couldn't stop myself from screaming and thrashing vainly with my legs, and yet after two strokes I knew I could take it. What I would have done if I couldn't take it never occurred to me, since the sentence would obviously be completed anyhow, and yet I felt very pleased with myself. Halfway through, and after the next stroke I'd have only one more to face.

The third seemed to follow more quickly and was higher again, still across the fullness of my buttocks but on the upper half this time, and with an identical result except that by now I had learned to control my breathing. There was nothing I could do to stop the scream and the convulsion, but I felt I could recover my breath a little more easily. I should have known better.

The fourth and final stroke was much the slowest in coming. Butler seemed to take extra care in aiming and practicing, changing his mind as though adding to the agony of my punishment by teasing me. Four or five times he must have positioned the crop against me before finally withdrawing it, and even then he hadn't finished. When I was expecting the blow to land he simply laid the crop against me, more firmly than before, as though confirming to himself that his aim was accurate. And then he withdrew it once more.

Nothing I had experienced in the previous two minutes had prepared me for the viciousness of this last stroke. I later realised that it had been calculated to land diagonally across the previous three so that, as well as being excruciatingly painful in its own right, it briefly reminded me of the damage done by the earlier blows. My scream this time lasted several seconds and then turned into a pant, and yet even now I managed to hold back the tears. Nothing could have stopped me from screaming after each stroke, but I swore to myself after the first one that nobody was going to see me in tears.

Danvers straightened up and slid me down his back. Mrs Manning un-pegged my skirt again and the lights were dimmed, until I could see just enough to allow me to walk down the steps, across the dining room and out towards the back staircase. Mrs Manning came with me, and in fact took me all the way back to my room.

‘I'll be in tomorrow morning to see how you are,' she said comfortingly. ‘You were very brave up there, so don't worry. It'll soon get better now.'

After she'd gone I lay facedown on the bed, breathing heavily, feeling badly bruised but happy that the ordeal was over and I had survived it with as much dignity as I could have been expected to muster.

It was some time before I ventured into the bathroom to inspect my wounds. There were four stripes across my bottom, two of them running straight but mainly on the right cheek, one covering both cheeks and a fourth crossing the other three at a slight angle. All were ridged and puffy, showing clearly where the crop had landed, with some evidence of bruising, but the fourth was more spectacular, with what looked like a series of blood blisters where the line crossed the earlier strokes.

Despite the discomfort I managed to sleep quite well; in fact I was asleep when Mrs Manning arrived the next morning. She told me to lie facedown, pulled up my nightie somewhat unceremoniously, rubbed cream into my wounds and told me that the bruises would probably last for a week, that I would no longer be conscious of them in a couple of days, and that the skin hadn't actually broken. But there was one question I simply had to ask her.

‘Why do you have to take part in the punishment?' I wanted to know. ‘After all, you're the girls' main friend on the senior staff.'

She smiled. ‘For that very reason,' she replied. ‘Lady Merchant likes to show that all the staff are part of the system here, and that anybody like me who is particularly close to the junior staff has to show them that she belongs to the management.'

I nodded, but she hadn't finished.

‘I have one question to ask you,' she said. ‘Have you upset any of the young waiters recently?'

I thought for a while, and was about to say that I hadn't, when I thought of Vernon.

‘He's asked me several times to go out with him,' I told Mrs Manning, ‘and he wasn't too pleased when I said no. Particularly when I said I'd prefer a night out with the girls.'

‘Hm,' she pondered. ‘I thought you might say Vernon.'

‘Why do you ask?'

‘Oh, nothing really,' she said in an evasive tone. ‘But I suggest you take more care next time you fancy a girls' night out. That's all.'

I thought about this long and hard after she'd gone. Vernon indeed. As I stood up I realised how stiff I was, probably from sleeping in an awkward position, and how much my bruises still hurt. And my mind went back to the previous evening, to the stage, to the punishment I had taken and to the terrifying spectre of the birching block so close to where Danvers had hoisted me. I thought again of Vernon and smiled to myself. So it was him who had told tales out of school, was it? And I pictured him naked and strapped to the birching block as he screamed for mercy, while Lady Merchant stood implacably behind him, encouraging Butler to flog him all the harder. Perhaps one day we'd find out how well he could take it. There must be ways in which that could be brought about.

 

 

 

Lady Romaldkirk was not amused when she learned that Holwick, her butler of over twenty years' standing, was about to hand in his notice. When she further learned that the cause of this tragedy was allegedly the conduct of her daughter, Lucinda, she was very upset. On hearing that the nature of Lucinda's offence was to have instructed Holwick to fuck off, she was furious. And finally, upon realising that Holwick's departure would inevitably lead to the departure also of Thwaite, her housekeeper, she was positively incandescent.

Thwaite, or Alice Thwaite to give her her full name, had been in Lady Romaldkirk's service since she was eighteen. She had been the ideal maidservant and graduated by slow degrees to the rank of housekeeper, her final promotion having been assisted by her engagement to Lionel Holwick, a senior footman at Newbiggin Hall, whose translation to Lady Romaldkirk's butler at the age of only twenty-eight, and shortly after Sir Reuben Romaldkirk departed this life, no doubt to seek in heaven the comforts he had generally failed to find on earth, had proved something of a local sensation.

Lady Romaldkirk rang her bell and, when Thwaite appeared, instructed her to find Lucinda immediately and to send the erring daughter to her mother. As Thwaite was about to leave the room Lady Romaldkirk called her back. She told Thwaite that she wished her first of all to find her favourite hairbrush, the oval one with the inlaid beech handle, and to bring it to her. Then she dismissed her housekeeper and sent for Holwick.

Holwick arrived promptly and was told that Lady Romaldkirk had received his letter of notice with the greatest possible regret. Her ladyship hoped very much that he would withdraw his notice but that, rather than attempt to persuade him to change his mind, she intended to prove to him how very serious she considered his complaint to be, and how extreme the steps she was proposing to take to prevent its recurrence. Before Holwick could answer Thwaite reappeared carrying the hairbrush, which Lady Romaldkirk set down beside her on the couch.