Drusilla

10 Punishment Party

The Albertsons’ downstairs room had been made festive.

Its less agreeable features had been cunningly disguised or removed. Trestle tables formed a “U.” Their napery and cutlery were impeccable. Candle-light and wine lent glamor. In the center of the “U”, so that every guest should have an uninterrupted view of her nakedness, stood Drusilla.

“There’s no reason why you shouldn’t derive some enjoyment from this yourself, Drew,” Quigley had said as he strapped her wrists at each end of the rigid bar that was, itself, a part of an even more rigid column descending from the ceiling. When Quigley touched a button the column rose. It stopped barely short of compelling her to stand upon her toes. Drusilla thought, absurdly, of periscopes.

“Should take out a patent,” said the Master proudly.

“It’s a real innovation.”

“To make me stand naked for everyone to gawk at as they eat?” Drusilla had enquired acidly.

“Can’t tell me you won’t get a thrill out of it,” Quigley had admonished. “I can tell you this, if it’s any comfort, you’re about as lovely a statue as I’ve ever seen. Minnie did a fine job on you.”

“I’m sure they’ll enjoy the ridges on my bottom!”

“An occupational hazard of which you need not feel ashamed,” said Quigley primly.

“I’m going to feel damned good and ashamed of standing and offering all my erogenous zones for a bunch of strangers to sit and look at.”

“They are not all strangers, Drew. There are Minnie and I and the Pendletons.”

“I’m not sure that isn’t worse.”

“The evening will bring some surprises.”

“I bet!”

Quigley had shaken a warning finger. “I’ve told you before, watch that tongue. You’re ideally positioned for a correction.”

“Sorry, Quigley. I’ll try.”

Drusilla’s repentance had been sincere. It was hard to eschew normal retorts with people you had known for a long time. It was harder still to realize that such retorts were punishable by weals upon her skin. But her burning bottom was a helpful reminder, for which she was almost grateful. She had plenty of time in which to consider these matters. Having been safely prepared, she was abandoned to her musings while awaiting the arrival of the guests. The caterers were an unobtrusive husband and wife who affected not to notice her. She rejected the thought of appealing to them for help. It would only lead to another punishment. Wryly she recognized it as a slave decision.

No one had told Drusilla to meet the eyes. She shrank from recognitions. As the tabled filled, she kept her gaze detached and distant. It was her choice to observe far horizons or to bow her head in shame. She had already discovered that to bow her head placed an additional strain upon her arms and neck, so she stood erect, her skin tingling under the impact of delighted eyes.

“A little beauty,” Belinda Pendleton boomed.

“Shouldn’t have parted with her. You’ve made a good job of her, Minnie.”

“Just look at her bottom!” It was a feminine voice, ecstatic. “You never do that neat a job on mine, Timothy.”

“You don’t have as neat a rump.”

“Are you going to brand her, Quigley?”

“I noticed her underarms. Don’t tell me you’re letting her hair grow?”

Drusilla knew herself blushing. Hers was a cruel exposure. Her hands were strapped too high to make possible the crossing of her legs. It was a thing she longed to do to rob them of her pubic hair. But best not. They would find the pathetic effort hilarious.

“You haven’t shaved her cunt, Quigley.” The voice became pedantic: “It was the custom in ancient Rome to depilate a maiden slave’s bush. The theory was that it enhanced their defenselessness, made them conscious of their availability—”

There was a cackle. “Let ’em know they’d had something to hide, eh?”

“If you wish.” The pedantic voice sounded faintly irritated. “We may give some credence to their conviction that, once robbed of their pubic hair, the girls became more amenable, in much the same way as was noted when the first irons were riveted on their wrists or ankles.”

Another cackle. “You tried it out on Helen, Proctor?”

“Of course he has,” a feminine voice proclaimed proudly. “Proctor knows what he’s talking about.”

“Going to show us?”

“If Proctor wishes me to.”

“In this connection, the Romans used another interesting expedient.” Proctor’s drone washed over the facetiousness. “Should the slave girl prove intractable, her head was shaved. But usually the threat alone was sufficient to bring a change of heart.”

“That how he keeps you in line, Helen?”

The feminine retort was crisp and strangely proud. “I’m bald right now. What you’re looking at is a wig.”

There was an excited babble. Drusilla knew herself no longer the prime cynosure. She seized the opportunity to make a quick survey. The stricken gaze that instantly locked with hers almost stopped her heart.

It was Diana Winslow.

Her fellow captive was dressed in a simple white sheath.

Under the pretext of arranging its folds, Diana rose momentarily to give her former slave a view of the belt that circled her waist. A ring at its back held the chain joining her hands, the links slipping back and forth as she used one arm at the expense of the other. With a wristlet against the ring, she would have enough slack to enable her to raise a fork or cup. She could use either hand but only one at a time. When not in use, her hands would be loosely chained at her sides.

It was a desolate communion. They could view each other’s plight with pity. That was all. No doubt Belinda was chuckling. Diana shook her head in impotent despair. The wave of chatter reasserted its authority.

“Well, if you won’t show us yours, let’s shave Drusilla.” She recognized them now. Known for years, yet not known at all! She. would be a doubly delectable morsel, holding a greater potential for shame than a stranger. She and Diana Winslow. To humiliate and bring low the former Mrs. Winslow and the one-time Mrs. Bryce Hammill was an erotic feast indeed!

“I wonder if she’d sit and submit?”

“Hell, no We’d have to tie her so she couldn’t twitch.”

“Either way it would be one hell of a tum-on.”

“Saw some damned potent pictures in a mag’. They had the girl only handcuffed. But she was resigned. She just sat and accepted the inevitable. One guy I showed it to had to go the the bathroom for relief.”

“What d’you say, Quigley? After dinner?”

“I had something else in mind.”

Drusilla was thankful for Quigley’s prim evasion. The pack was in full cry. She could see herself shorn and shamed.

“We could get together in a few days.”

Quigley believed in extracting every essence. “Why don’t you ask Drusilla how she’d behave?” he suggested casually.

“Want to be a baldie, Drew?”

There was a throb in Helen Frobisher’s voice that warned of dark desires. She was sexually aroused. In spite of fear and horror, Drusilla felt a cruel fascination in a vision almost too erotically shocking to contemplate. She refused to answer, glaring her hostility.

“Silence means assent.”

“No! Oh, damn you all! No! You’re a rotten lot of—” Her panicked regard swept the assembly in search of an ally. Minnie’ looked embarrassed. Diana sat with head bowed, not wanting to see.

It was at that moment Drusilla became aware... !

A disorientation. When first strapped tight by her she had faced the open end of the ‘U’. Now she was looking squarely at one of the tables. She had not been aware of moving—in fact, she could not move! She was a fixture. But that to which she was fastened was moving. Imperceptibly, the steel column above was turning... The motion was so infinitesimal she had changed her stance without noticing the compulsion. But the compulsion was there. Testingly, she flexed her prisoned hands against their anchorage. But the motion was inexorable. Quigley was insuring his guests a complete inspection of her charms.

“She doesn’t like barbers!”

“An electric chair would be perfect to strap her tight.”

“It’s the most incredible turn-on, darling,” Helen Frobisher drawled. “You tell her, Proctor.”

“What about shaving her eyebrows, too?”

A sudden silence was reverent with awed approval.

Drusilla longed to hide, hide somewhere where her lovely hair was safe. She strained at the wrist straps, but what was the use!

“That notion deserves a medal.” Belinda Pendleton’s endorsement vibrated with lust. She paused for effect, then added: “If one’s good, wouldn’t two be better?”

Diana jerked erect, eyes wide. Drusilla kicked wildly at nothing and wailed. “No! Oh no, no, no!”

“You’ve hit pay dirt, Belinda. They’re actually paying attention. ”

“You mustn’t! Oh, please! Don’t be so cruel.” Drusilla fought her bonds wildly in the only outlet she had for her despair.

“I think perhaps it is time to eat,” said Quigley gently. Drusilla moved too. Slowly, shamingly, and helplessly.

One after the other, she met the amused regard of men and women who were no longer social acquaintances but initiates of an arcane esoterica whose captive she now was. They could do as they pleased with her. Or as much as Quigley would permit! Helpless and naked, Drusilla wondered if there was any hope in Quigley. Would Quigley allow her to be made hairless and hideous? Would he?

But Helen Frobisher was not hideous! Helen was happy.

The ever present heat in captive loins awakened. Drusilla took a captive peek at something inevitable, something to be DONE to HER! The heat flared anew. It was absurd! It was impossible! But it was so. She wondered guiltily about Diana.

Food inhibited but did not stop the flow of wit and wish. The hounds were worrying a flavorful bone.

“After every last hair has gone, let’s push her in a room with some guy who doesn’t know the score, and see how he reacts. ”

“Use lather and a blade. No electrics!”

They did not hate her. In fact, she was adored! She was a chosen virgin awaiting the sacrificial blade. All were edified. Uncaring now, she met and returned their warm regard. She had become an infinite treasure basking in their adulation ... She wondered idly if she were invited.

Before dessert had been dealt with, Drusilla’s nakedness had revolved four times for their enjoyment. She felt certain that in all the history of the world no female breasts and pubes and bottoms had been more glaringly exhibited than hers. With the coffee, she glimpsed a fresh novelty of Quigley’s hospitality.

Slingshots!

The almost lethal toys were distributed by the impassive pair of servants. Each came with an envelope of pellets. They were joyously received. Diana was omitted from the largesse.

“The rules are simple,” Quigley proclaimed portentiously. “No shots above her nipples, none below the junction of her thighs. There will be an award for any marksman or woman whose aim achieves lodgment within orifice or cleft. I am afraid the targets are limited to the cleft in her gluteal cheeks, her navel, and her chief facility lower down. You may shoot at will.”

There was a round of applause. Before it withered, the first B.B. shot impinged on Drusilla’s left breast. She yelped, more in surprise and indignation than pain.

Quigley announced an addendum: “The subject is permitted such contortions as her circumstances allow.”

It was a beastly kind of giggle, ludicrous and demeaning.

The pellets hurt enough to compel a flinch. There would be no standing on her dignity. Her nipples were the favorite, a satisfying bulls-eye. When a pellet impacted on a pink bud, Drusilla yelped. If they enjoyed her yelp, let ’em! She was past caring. The straps permitted her to make small, evasive twists, but she refused to give them such satisfaction, and anyway, there was no real accuracy. Mostly she stood, wincing when she must, flinching or yelping when shrewder shots achieved simultaneous impacts on tender flesh. Slowly, the spent pellets accumulated around her feet.

Once only, she allowed her eyes to lock with Diana’s.

They exchanged mute misery. Their slavery was total. They had become pets, nourished to provide erotic sport, their nakedness a common property. As she obeyed the compulsion of the column, Drusilla sometimes looked apprehensively back over a wracked shoulder, fearful of some fresh infliction catching her unaware.

A male sharpshooter folded his envelope and inquired hopefully: “Anyone going to look in her cunt?”

“There’s nothing in there!” Drusilla’s assurance was vehement.

“Got any darts, Quig’ old boy?”

“How about whipping her ass?”

They were so happy! Drusilla marveled at the versatility of a girl’s nakedness to provide joy. It was like being loved! She drooped wearily against her belted wrists when the last bit of lead rebounded from her skin and joined its fellows on the floor.

“I think we should move on to the next,” said Quigley. “Next what, Quig’? You got something up your sleeve?” Quigley took the floor. He coughed in the manner approved to demand attention. His mien was that of a senator seeking re-election for the fifth time. “We are privileged this evening to take part in a ritual, a ritual that, regrettably, comes Our way all too seldom,” he informed, savoring every word. “Our charming Drusilla is to be replaced by one of our number who has transgressed beyond the bounds of tolerance.” He paused to generate full impact. Then dropped his bomb. “Mrs. Diana Winslow is to be flogged.”

first a breathless silence, then excited chatter. All eyes turned to the woman who sat with head bowed, striving to hide her face with one chained hand, its fellow drawn helpless behind her back. Drusilla looked from face to face in frantic appeal.

“Quigley, don’t! You mustn’t! Oh, Minnie, don’t let him.”

“Shut up, Drew,” Belinda Pendleton ordered without rancour. “Feel lucky it’s not you. It could be.”

Diana got slowly to her feet. Her chained hands fell, listless, at her hips. She faced the woman who wanted her flogged. In utterly feminine pleading, she threw her pride to the winds.

“Belinda, I beg of you, show me mercy. Please don’t have me flogged.”

There came a round of applause. In some bizarre way it seemed appropriate.

“You won’t die, Diana.”

“It’s too awful a thing to do to any woman.” Diana looked agonizedly at the hungry faces of her friends.

“You’ll be proud of your back—after!”

“But it’s so unfair. I haven’t done anything! Belinda—!”

“Button your lip, girl!” Belinda ordered amiably.

“You’ve done plenty and you know it. Just being you’s enough.” She beamed cordially at all. “It’s going to be such a come down for the darling. I’m willing to take bets she’ll scream beautifully.”

There were no takers. Just an excited murmur of approval. None present voiced a word in defense of the chained and naked beauty who had been a dynamic member of their circle, but who was now a slave.

“All right!” Diana’s voice demanded attention. “If you must use me—” Her gaze roved the room and found no ally. “Can’t you be halfway decent about it? There’s no need to flog me.”

“But, darling, it isn’t going to be a cat-o’-nine-tails. We’ve got the loveliest whip!”

150

“No coddling!” Belinda again took possession of the floor. “I want Diana flogged, and flogged she shall be! I want her humble.”

“But look at me! Can I be more humble than this?” Diana tried, impotently, to raise her chained hands in supplication. The loose white sheath in which she had been clothed fell limply to the floor. Her helpless nakedness was so beautiful it evoked a moment of hushed admiration. The captive Drusilla stared, as fascinated as the rest.

Events moved smoothly. Perhaps they had been prearranged. Helen Frobisher wound a firm hand in Diana’s hair. Others loosed her chains and held her arms. Save for one instinctive motion of revolt, quickly quelled, the captive woman allowed herself to be escorted in helplessness to the place of her punishment.

It was the same with Drusilla. An authoritative feminine hand possessed itself of silken strands, and complained, giggling, “Oh, damn, no handcuffs!”

Male hands loosed her wrists. It was good to get her arms back. For a moment the reprieved captive considered flight. But those who held her would enjoy a tussle. Her breasts and pubes would be harshly handled before she was again tightly bound. She knew her company. She stood passively while the male chuckled: “Damn good excuse to get rid of my tie.” A moment later she discovered how well adapted the male adornment was to female wrists. Hers were cunningly circled, cinched and knotted. The tie felt more secure than rope.

“What about her feet?”

“Let her walk around. She can’t do anything.”

Bereft of her place in the spotlight, Drusilla felt lost. She had become a piece of surplus baggage. It was Diana who was “On Stage.” Unobtrusively, she devoted her strength to besting the foulard about her wrists. Surely... ? But the hands were snug, the knot beyond her reach. She looked longingly at the door. But she had seen it closed and locked. As though carried by a wave, she found herself a part of the circle that would witness her darling Mistress’ humbling. Her own nudity and tied hands received scant attention.

It was strangely formal. The occupants of the room were witness to a happening. Diana had acquired a presence. Belinda radiated purpose. Quigley hovered, watchful for the niceties of the occasion, The rest, including Minnie, were enraptured spectators of a woman’s shame.

When it came to the strapping of her wrists, Diana fought. Drusilla knew the ‘now or never’ compulsion to evade the total helplessness that would deliver her nudity in which the frightened woman sank to the floor against the grappling hands. But the column from above followed her down. Helen’s grip upon her hair dragged back her head. Male fingers were strong in the buckling of the straps round rebellious wrists. Then, before a breathless audience, Diana was obliged to follow the dictates of the column at it once more rose, forcing her to scramble to her feet, and then to stand with arms held high, taut and strained and proudly naked.

“Diana, you’re lovely. Don’t feel badly... ”

“Take her up another inch or two.”

“It will hurt her more if her skin’s well tightened.”

“What about her ankles?”

“Let her have her feet. It’s lovely when they kick.” Drusilla shared the shame. Her own wrists still bore the imprints of the straps. She wrenched at them restlessly in frustration. Agonizedly she beheld her darling stand as she herself had stood. Captive of the column, a vulnerable loveliness available to pain.

Diana knew herself lost. The straps were brutally tight. They would contain her writhings. In the firmness of their clasp she would be able to lift herself from the floor in a futile seeking to escape the lash. Her hurt. eyes sought and found those of her slave. She smiled and shook her head as though in denial that what was about to happen mattered. She closed her eyes and surrendered her lips to a silence that might be short. A mental vision of Ginny crossed her mind. Where would the radiant child be now! Doubtless locked lonely in her own cell. Bound. Frantic with concern for those from whom she had been sundered. Ardently she prayed they would not transport her to witness her mother’s punishment. It would be too cruel.

“The salutary effect of a flogging can be greatly enhanced by the old formalistic rituals employed in the past century ,” Proctor’s precise delivery droned its way to dominance.

“Want her to make a speech, Proc’?”

“Rub her back with salt?”

Proctor was not easily extinguished. “Both suggestions have some merit,” he admonished. “But I had in mind the confessional. It was considered edifying to all that, before the punishment or execution, the convicted person confess his sins, thus obtaining absolution or a degree of mercy.”

“Got anything to confess, Di’?”

“I bet it’s juicy!”

“Hell, she ain’t done nothin’!”

“It was also customary to provide two floggers. A right hand and a left to ensure evenness of application.” Proctor was standing firmly on his Member’s Rights.

“You left-handed, Proc’?”

“What about you, Belinda?”

“What say we get the caterers to do the job on her?” Helen’s consort was unruffled. “There was always present a clerk or factotum to record the strokes. Maintaining an accurate count in a clear voice. I would be most happy—”

“You want Proctor to count your stripes, Diana?”

“Say, Di’, I’m left-handed.”

“Maybe she’d sooner count her own.”

“I bet he got to feel her up!”

“How’d you like to be whipped by a waiter?”

“It was generally supposed the subject was too preoccupied with, ahem, discomfort to pronounce a proper tally.”

Proctor Frobisher’s diction flowed on and on, assailed by quips that halted him no whit, but which made Drusilla long to lash out verbally in defense of the woman she adored. Diana herself refused to respond. She recognized this as part of her punishment for a sin she had not committed. The group was enjoying her and themselves. Nothing she could say or do would influence anything. Her role was to provide them with the manifestations of her suffering so that they would be sexually aroused. She drew scant comfort from the knowledge that some, if not all, the females present had stood as she stood now. She paled and her heart thudded painfully as Belinda and Helen moved to where she stood. Each held a whip. Each one had stripped naked to the waist.

It was immensely dramatic, almost unbearably erotic as the female whippers found their places and measured their thongs against the white and helpless back. To one side stood Proctor, armed with clipboard and pencil, his lean features solemnly stern and righteous. Drusilla had the sense of being transported to another age. The preparations for the flogging of Diana Winslow had become breathlessly impressive.

“One.”

Proctor’s pronouncement and his tick upon the paper were swallowed up in the avid concentration upon ridged flesh and the silent motions by which Mrs. Diana Winslow acknowledged her agony. To Drusilla, they were beautiful and terrible. Hating herself, she knew she was sharing the heated excitation of the rest of those who watched. Her loins were afire even though her eyes held tears. Her bound hands would absolve her from nothing.

“Two.”

The first blow had been Belinda’s, the second Helen’s.

The face of each was alight with glory as she surveyed her handiwork. The whippers stood back to admire what they had wrought. The nakedness of the woman they had lashed paid tribute to their skill with fluid writhings, limited by her strapped wrists, but shocking in their mute testimony to pain.

“Three.”

Drusilla flinched as though the cut was upon herself.

She, too, thought of Ginny held somewhere helpless while her mother was striped for the delectation of the group and the more personal animus of Belinda Pendleton. The suffused bars upon white skin stood out like a beacon across the strained back.

“Four.”

Diana screamed. It was the bursting of a dam of silence sustained by a pride now defeated in the dust. She leaped wildly in her bonds, her legs thrashing, her hair tossed back and forth between raised arms. Her vocal protest spilled over into words. “No! Oh, no! No more! No more! Oh, please!”

“She isn’t enjoying it,” Helen drawled reproachfully. “She’ll love this one,” said Belinda.

Diana did not love the fifth biting cut. She howled in a bitterness of anger, shame and pain. She lunged and surged against her strapped wrists, uncaring of the delight her struggles generated within the loins of her audience.

“I’m almost ashamed. of her,” Helen declaimed with affected nonchalance.

“I can’t bear it! I can’t! Nobody could.” Diana’s voice rose and fell between her moans. “Quigley, make them stop—make them stop—”

“You belong to us, dear,” Helen Frobisher said with unholy zest, and struck again.

Drusilla beheld the incredible. While her beloved Mistress plunged and screamed, Helen Frobisher slowly circled the wounded nude, examining and listening intently, a quiet and secret smile upon her red lips, her eyes aflame with excitement. Standing before the punished beauty for quiet moments, she then leaned forward and kissed and kissed again the face drawn and lined with pain and apprehension.

“Isn’t she exquisite?”

The exclamation called for no answer. The room remained hushed.

“But she’s so noisy! Not a bit grateful.” The room waited. It sensed a purpose.

“I’d like to teach the darling a lesson. Would’ you mind?”

Only Quigley overcame suspense. Quigley was a man always conscious of the proprieties. “We cannot whip Diana more severely,” he reprimanded primly. “Her present sentence is fully adequate. You must remember she is not inured to pain.”

“I said teach her a lesson,” Helen’s voice throbbed. “Please, no more! Quigley, please—please—please!” Diana had ceased to moan. She tossed dank hair back over her pinioned shoulders and looked from one to the other of her captors in helpless appeal. Drusilla sensed her anguished longing to be free.

Casually, as though testing for raindrops, Helen palmed her victim’s vulva. Holding up the wet evidence for all to see, she jibed: “I wouldn’t say our precious pet was exactly dying.”

Drusilla quailed. Her bound hands could not touch her sex. But she knew it would betray her just as had Diana’s. Why was it the whip and the cord affected them both so potently! But it needed only a glance at the feminine faces around her to believe that they, too, were cherishing their own heats and pulsing secretions. Some women were born to it. Perhaps they all were but did not know!

“That’s not fair!” Diana retorted, squirming. “There won’t be a dry slit in the room, and you know it!” Her appeal roved the avid, intent faces. “Please don’t whip me any more. It’s too awful.”

There was no response. Only the smoldering eyes and Helen’s contemptuous: “Crybaby!”

“Then use another whip; not this brute—and there’s no need to hit me so hard.”

“There’s no need to hit you at all, darling.”

The strapped nudity tensed, as did all those who heard the enigmatic words fall in mockery from Helen’s lips. None could doubt a fresh purpose in the woman with the whip. Her eyes scanned her fellow guests as she drawled:

“I don’t find this screamer a satisfying subject—do you?”

“You mean gag her?”

“Get the cat and do it right?”

“Lift her right off the ground?”

Helene was loving every moment. She had the floor. She had the full anguished attention of the woman she had whipped. Diana was gazing at her in pure fear, panting.

“Wouldn’t you all sooner have a girl who KNOWS how to be whipped?”

The question rippled round the room. The implication undoubted but impossible. The young woman who had asked it was exuding vibrations almost tangible.

“Proctor, may I?”

“Of course, dear,” Proctor sounded proud.

Quigley stepped forward uncertainly. “Helen, what the devil! You don’t surely mean—?”

“Oh, but I do!”

“Take Diana’s place? Be whipped?”

“That’s right, darling. I’ll put on a much better show.”

“Helen, layoff. I want Diana flogged.” Belinda was not about to be robbed.

“But, darling, she can be!”

“Then let’s get on with it. If you want your ass tanned after, I’ll be glad to oblige.”

“That would be anticlimax, Belinda dear. Take your pretty crybaby home and be unkind to her, then bring her back for our next meeting. You can take the skin off her back to your heart’s content.”

“You’re so damned horny you can’t bear yourself.”

Belinda was off-balance, uncertain. She was also intrigued by a fresh vista of eroticism.

“I’m quite delightful when I’m whipped. Ask Proctor.” Helen contrived to mix coyness and carnality into a sensual blend.

“My wife is offering you all an immense privilege,”

Proctor droned in faint reproof.

“You mad at her or something?”

“Oh, Proc’! Your own wife? Flogged?”

“Gosh, Helen! You nuts?”

Proctor cleared his throat portentiously. “It is a matter of record that intercourse with a whipped woman is more stimulating. Lying on their lashed back imbues them with an added potency.” He parted with a pint-sized smile. “I must confess to a selfish interest.”

“Let’s whip every ass in the room,” said a male voice “Who gets the job of flogging her?”

“I bet she can’t take it. She’ll howl same as Diana.” Quigley raised a commanding hand. “Let’s take Helen seriously,” he commanded. “Proctor’s right. We’re being offered something way out. We should show gratitude.”

The voices droned on, but Drusilla saw only the motions of the protagonists who held the stage. The column slowly descended. Diana sagged in relief. Her hands’ were unstrapped from the bar and bound behind her back, wrists crossed, the cords cruel and implacable in Belinda’s hands. Diana was pushed aside and would have joined her fellow prisoner had she not been firmly directed to another vantage point. Evidently they were not to be allowed communion.

“And now, my little chickadee—?” Belinda’s invitation was caustic. The eye she cocked at Helen was sardonic.

Helen was radiant. She was in command, not only of herself but of the room. A mischievous confidence wafted from her like perfume. She pivoted slowly to include all, and flaunted a promise:

“I’ll show you.”

Drusilla knew it was beautiful. She could find no other word. It was also erotic—and startling. Startling beyond belief. Helen made herself naked. It was not a “strip” so much as a transformation. She shed her clothes with grace. Nude, she was doubly beautiful. No ribald comment greeted the emergence of her loveliness. With hands clasped behind her neck, she posed for them, thrusting her breast cones and her pubic mound. Having exhibited her body with studied enjoyment, she exploded her bomb.

Drusilla gasped. Her inhalation was echoed by all as Helen’s arm casually rose to place her fingers in her hair.

Bald!

The shaven feminine pate was like a beacon, drawing to itself all light, the focus of every eye. Helen’s discarded wig lay twisted on the floor. That which had been spoken of in jest had become shockingly real, a thing to grip the loins or touch the heart.

After the first gasp of revulsion, Drusilla realized the continuing presence of beauty. Helen had lost much but gained more. Her pubic hair was gone, shaven from her vulva, her belly and her thighs. Her sex was smooth and provocative in its own nudity, a separate part of her possessing its own personality. The thieving blade had left its own legacy of femaleness.

But it was the head, the denuded female head that riveted attention. Drusilla supposed all heads were not alike, and wondered momentarily about her own. Shaved, would she possess this sleek winsomeness! This smooth, feminine curve and plane, shadowed by a hint of roots within the taut treasure that, without Proctor’s razor, might never have been seen! What did it feel like! Her longing to explore its tactility was an agony in her heart. She tugged fretfully at the tie upon her wrists. The shaven Helen was delectable beyond words, an enchantment beyond the norm.

No one spoke. There was no need. The trebly nude young woman placed her wrists within the leather bands and smiled mockingly at Belinda as they were buckled fast with savage strength. The column rose, and with it the helpless hands and arms. The armpits were as devoid of hair as were the pubes.

The depilated darling of the party stood taut upon her toes. Her eyes were heavy lidded in a small half smile, sharing a secret with herself... The room waited breathlessly.

It was one of Belinda’s best. No doubt she was venting her vexation with Diana upon this new and helpless loveliness donated for her whip. The lash cut squarely across the wrenched shoulders to bestow its indentation and its crimson line.

As the shrewd blows found their cunning female nestling places, Drusilla realized she was witness to a small miracle. Helen was there, visible, naked, helpless and whipped. But it was her body and her limbs. Somehow the real Helen had found escape and was present only in the sensual movements that began with the first cruel slash and flowered and bloomed with each successive stroke. It was as though Helen was a separate spirit prompting the responses of muscle and sinew for her own enjoyment as well as for the edification of those who watched.

Drusilla flinched beneath each blow. She was there, strapped to the column. She knew! She found it hard not to simulate each undulation of the shaven nakedness. She longed for a taut, raised arm against which to caress her cheek as the thong cut her flesh. Helen was visibly finding joy in this frictioning of herself. Sometimes it would be her thighs, laved one against the other as her leg rose and fell or swung slowly to achieve maximum contact. When Belinda’s whip found its way between parted thighs they obligingly parted again in a wider separation to invite a second private punishment of shaven skin.

“Perhaps that is enough,” Proctor’s voice was gentle but authoritative.

Belinda paused. She was sweating more than the torso she was flogging. She found a handkerchief in her handbag on the floor and patted beneath her breasts and beneath her arms. Then, amusedly, performed the same service in the exposed armpits of her victim. “I’ve got to hand it to you, honey,” she affirmed admiringly. “You’re good.”

“My wife is superlative,” Proctor conceded grandly. “It will be acceptable that she remain strapped as she is should any of you wish to examine... ”

“I propose a toast,” said Quigley.

The bottles and the glasses clinked. A kindly hand lifted something to Drusilla’s lips. She drained it avidly. When she made to go to the side of her bound Mistress, it was Minnie’s hand and Minnie’s voice, “Here, drink mine, too. But stay away from Diana. You’re not allowed to talk to each other. You’ll be watched.”

Drusilla could have wept. It was all so hopeless. They were tied and had to do what they were told. They would inhabit separate prisons. Things would be done to each that the other would know nothing of. Belinda would be cruel, and in a week would bring Diana back to this room for the flogging she had partly escaped today. By that time she, too, might have earned a flogging! It seemed unlikely one would not come her way... ! Miserably, she turned her attention to Helen.

The whipped beauty was still busy. It was as though the thong was still finding its crevices within her skin. Her sensuous writhing had not stopped. Her cheek was still finding comfort against her arm. From time to time a foot would caress the column of her leg and thigh as high as it was possible for it to reach—and then the other! Helen was in a self hypnosis of sensation. She had enjoyed a love affair with Belinda’s whip. So far as she was concerned, her flogging could have gone on and on—! Drusilla circled and examined the striations. They were many! They were ridged! They were scarlet and purple!

They were beautiful.

Ashamed of her lust, she turned away. She wished she had been vouchsafed panties... Her thighs were glistening wet and she could not rub them dry. Unhappily, Drusilla watched a triumphant Belinda take a handful of Diana’s hair and propel her bound captive from the room. Now she was alone with friends who were not friends at all. She sought Minnie and demanded another drink. Their eyes met above the rim of the glass.

In Minnie’s there was only sympathy.