Gynecocracy

CHAPTER 14

At least an hour and a half of this excruciating torture and fear!

Then there was a gleam of light outside my door, which shone through its chinks, and I hailed it with the un-calculating hope of despair.

Whoever carried the light did not pass the door. She came in. It was Beatrice! What a mercy! Her curiosity had brought her and her flat candlestick in on her way to her own room. Elise had told her she might safely count on half an hour with me, as Mademoiselle had only just gone to her apartments with Lord Alfred Ridlington. With Lord Alfred Ridlington! I had heard him say she might do what she chose with him, but I never dreamt he would be taken au pied de la lettre. Was she chastising him? I heard no sounds; yet the room was not so distant. What was she doing? Incarnating his love, his babies? Horrid thought.

"Oh, Beatrice!" I cried.

Beatrice looked very beautiful! She was flushed with dancing, her cheeks were aglow, her eyes sparkled, her bosom heaved, her form was dilated with pleasure, and vivacity shew in her every movement, mischief in her every glance.

"Oh, Beatrice!"

"Well, Julian," she laughed, putting down her candle and giving her skirts a whisk, "a nice day you have had; you must be quite tender."

"Beatrice," I repeated, "for goodness sake, for the sake of all you hold dear, if you love me, at any price-"

"Good gracious, Julian! Whatever is the matter?" she asked with maddening equanimity, calmly sitting down near me. "I know you have been smacked and sent to bed. I have heard all about it from 67

Maud. I know you spent the afternoon with Mademoiselle in her boudoir, and I have come to hear all about it from you. I know you were birched in the morning-a fine day you have had-your first too, but whatever can be the matter with you now?"

"Oh, Beatrice, you know you and I were friends from the first," I began, frantically.

"I know you spoilt my gown, you clumsy boy, at luncheon," she rejoined, determined to preserve her sangfroid.

"Yes, but I have paid for that."

"And I am glad to see you have not forgotten it! Shall I give you my own idea of the punishment it deserved? Slaps, indeed! One dainty soft one on each cheek! A nice punishment. Look here!" lifting her delicate leg and taking off and brandishing a slipper menacingly at me. "Look here!" giving me more than a glimpse of the paradise under her petticoats, as she lifted and retained her foot across the other knee. "Look and tremble. You have settled scores with Mademoiselle and Elise; now you have me to reckon with."

"Oh, Beatrice, do not jest, do not make sport of me. It is unkind; it is much too serious. It is a matter of health."

"I have heard of people dying for love. What is the matter with you-shall I kiss you? Will that do?"

"Yes! Yes! But first-first-"

"First what?" she enquired, astonished.

"First, unfasten me!"

"Anything more in a small way? Unfasten you? A fine time I should have then. No; certainly not."

"Oh, I promise, I promise, I swear I will not touch you. I promise to let you do me up again. On my honour I do. Unfasten me just for a minute. There's a closet near, I know."

Beatrice went into a fit of laughter, stopped, and laughed again; took out her handkerchief to wipe her eyes-laughed till she cried, and then laughed again.

"Poor boy," she said at length; "I understand now."

"Will you?" I gasped.

"On one condition," she replied.

"Any condition-any-name it!"

"Don't be in such haste. On condition that you give yourself to me body and soul for five years. Give yourself to me to be my absolute slave. So do all I tell you and nothing that I forbid you, whatever the consequences, Mademoiselle, your father, your mother, Maud, Agnes, and perhaps, most important of all, yourself, to the contrary notwithstanding. If you will promise this on your honour, perhaps-"

"Elise," I suggested.

"Oh, you are not so hard up as I thought; however, Elise and I are fast allies."

I felt like Jacob selling his birthright, but I glanced at her and thought I might have a worse fate, and the exigencies of the case did not leave room for much hesitation. She was a lovely girl. What a bust and pretty head, what bewitching hair, what grace, what a splendid form, what a splendid little foot and ankle to have on one's neck! But five years was a serious matter. "Whatever do you intend to do with me, Beatrice?"

"Never mind; I won't discuss the question. Yes or no."

"You want me to leap in the dark," I said, reproachfully.

"Do as you like. You see me, and where you are leaping to," she said with a smile of entrancing archness.

"Very well. I will. You will undo me directly?"

"Consider, Julian."

"I have considered. Yes, for five years, I promise."

"Absolutely?"

"Absolutely."

"On your honour?"

"On my honour."

"Very well. There is a kiss," stooping over me, "to ratify and seal the bargain. You are mine now," she added, standing over me, "to do what I please with, and you must do nothing without my leave-you understand," and she looked lovingly into my eyes, "and whatever it may cost you if I refuse."

Then, with a sweep of her arm, she threw the bed clothes off me, unbuckled the belt, pulled up the nightdress without any ado, and unfastened the bandage. She did not stop to look. She gave me new life with my freedom.

"Run along, Julian. I give you five minutes! No more!"

On my return, I felt much better, and was able to contemplate my position, and the price I had been obliged to pay for a freedom to 70

which the natural rights of humanity entitled me. I felt a little injured. This contract with Beatrice was indeed immoral, and I dreaded to think what Mademoiselle would have to say to it. But then I looked at Beatrice. What do girls care for immorality? What indeed! Nothing; unless it serves their purpose to care or to seem to care.

Beatrice's first order, when I returned and the door had been shut, was to tell me to take off my nightdress. She blushed as she bade me do so.

Now Mademoiselle was all very well, and Elise too. They were hardened sinners. But Beatrice, a mere girl, younger than myself. What harm I might do her! How degrading, too, to me.

I hesitated, and she reminded me of my oath.

"What about your honour, Julian?"

I still hesitated.

"Must I summon Elise to help me to enforce my rights?"

I looked at her.

"Yes, my rights," she repeated, stamping her little foot.

"Beatrice!"

"Take off that nightdress directly."

"How can you wrong me by talking about Elise?"

"Very well then, do what I tell you," she said laughing. I did not laugh, needless to say. I wanted to have another kiss, to get into bed as I was, and to wish her "good night." I was tired, and with reason.

No prospect of that, as I soon found. We looked at each other for a few minutes. She was inexorable. And before that girl, in her ball dress, which shew all her bosom, with her bare arms and smiling countenance, the personification of grace, beauty, and girlhood, I had to divest myself of my sole garment, and stand stark naked. She gazed at me from head to foot, whilst I covered my face with my hands. A woman, I suppose, would have adopted the attitude of the Venus de Medici.

"A fine girl you are, Julian, with a big thing in front of you," she said presently, blushing all over.

She then passed her hands over my shoulders and my body, along and between my legs, made me walk up and down the room, lift my legs, stand with them apart, bend over and touch my toes with my fingers, whilst she contemplated me from behind, sit down, kneel down, and go on all fours, and kiss her feet.

"How you have been punished!" she said. "Your- bottom-is black and blue. Tell me, you have had your bottom punished?"

"Indeed I have, Beatrice, severely."

"You must say it; come."

"Say what?"

"Say you have had your bottom punished-those very words; and ask me, your dear Beatrice, to pity you."

"I have had my-bottom punished, my dear Beatrice" (what a thrill these senseless words caused me and her also). "Please, pity me."

"Lie across that chair then, with your head on the carpet and your feet on the ground."

I adopted the degrading posture, and she stood near me, speaking consoling words and rubbing the afflicted part with her soft hand. She did more than rub it.

"How naughty you have made me feel. I was bad enough when I came in. I must see, what consolation you can give me. Lie across the bed on your back, with your head over the edge."

I did so. I felt like a dog turned upside down. But what could I do with this uncompromising damsel? She stood over me, purring deliciously, and handling me, looking into my eyes, which were fixed somewhat reproachfully on her.

"Do you like that?" she asked.

Reply was unnecessary, and I was a little indignant.

"Now you must please me," she went on.

I knew what was coming. I had not spent the afternoon for nothing. I felt that I was beginning to understand women and their little ways. They were all alike. Precisely the same words, too.

She lifted up her skirts and threw them over my breast, put my head between her legs, and held it there, and rubbed herself against my mouth. I knew what to do, and did it. She was much smaller there than Mademoiselle, and there was a wall inside, beyond which I could not get. Her throbs were also more pronounced. She moved herself, she rubbed and pressed me more severely, and used her hands more freely. Added to which, she applied her tongue to me, and sucked what she was playing with in her mouth, stooping over me for the purpose.

She stopped once or twice, and slightly withdrawing herself, and lifting her soft, warm, garments, looked at me, and asked whether what she was doing gave me pleasure, and whether I liked my task.

I replied, "Immensely," and so I did.

She recommenced; the crisis arrived! Remembering my lesson about a lady's choicest favours, I did not hesitate to swallow, and, indeed, swallowed willingly what she shot into my mouth. She was not content until she had made me come also in her mouth. I did not like the idea of doing it and tried to prevent myself, but her hands and tongue were too much for me.

A moment after, Elise entered, and found me in the position I have described, prone on my back on the bed, enveloped from my breast upwards in Beatrice's skirts, which lay across me; my head out of sight under her petticoats, between her taper legs, and my face still closely pressed against her body.

"Pretty goings on," exclaimed Elise, nonchalantly. "I am sorry to interrupt your amusement, Miss Beatrice, but the half hour is up, and you must not remain longer. One minute, though. I must help him to recover. Put his legs across your shoulders, Miss; yes, and lift them up-one over each. Now clasp your arms round them and hold them firmly. Now, Master Julian-"

Smack, smack, smack, smack, smack, went Elise with her open hand and all her strength on my defenceless and sore bottom. I was quite powerless, effectually deprived of the use of my legs which Beatrice clasped just below the knees. My feet reached just a little way beyond her neck, and I was unable to spring up, as her own legs tightly encased my head. My posture not only admirably exposed me, but also drew the skin quite tight. I wriggled and struggled, for the slaps were stinging ones, but Beatrice easily held me. Her position gave her such a purchase. I ground my face into her. It was my only consolation.

"There," said Elise at length, "now he will be fit for Mademoiselle."

Beatrice then let me go. She was on fire, and well she might be.

"Good boy! she said. "You have done me so much good. I feel quite revived."

"Has Mademoiselle done with Lord Alfred Ridlington?" she asked Elise a moment later, with a curious little emphasis on the "Lord."

"Yes," Elise replied. "Sent him off scarcely able to sit down in his carriage."

"Good gracious," I thought as I lay on the bed quite naked and equally careless of what these two young women who had so intimately acquainted themselves with all my secret anatomy thought or said, "so he has been punished after all, and he must be a man then! Well, I am glad he did not escape scot-free."

"Now, Julian," said Beatrice to me as Elise began fooling with my legs and pulling them about, "I have one thing to say to you. I heard Maud announce that she wished to have you as a model for an Apollo. Now mind! That I forbid, positively!"

"Don't you think I am fit for it?" I asked mischievously.

"Never mind my reasons; remember I forbid it. Good night, dear," kissing me.

"And, Elise, let him wear a pair of my drawers tomorrow, instead of Mademoiselle's," she added.

"Yes, Miss, certainly; that is" (aside) "if he wears any at all. Good night, Miss."

"Good night," and Beatrice went.