would meet with an untimely accident - fatal, of course - or she would never see the light of day again. Not civilised light, at any rate. I'd suddenly seen the future and it didn't look orange. Black, more likely, and the more immediate future was scarcely any better.
'Can't think why the master would want to bother with such a scrawny rump as this,' Meg taunted me, tapping my buttocks lightly in turn. 'Little more than a horse's collar, whichever way he chooses to go in. See this, Polly?' she cried, this time dealing me a slightly harder cut, which made me wince and bite the soft fabric harder. 'I've seen young boys with better arses than this. More meat on a butcher's apron!
'Well, my lady,' she continued, bending close to my right ear, 'I can tell you this is going to hurt you a lot more than it's going to hurt me and a lot more than it would if you had a bit of natural padding. Twelve cuts you're going to get and you can count every one.
'Miss one, or jump one and I'll give you an extra two for every one you get wrong. Polly, you can count as well, at least as far as ten. I know you can manage that, 'cos you've only got to count on your fingers and thumbs and it'll be good practise for you.'
She stepped back away from me and I heard the faint rustle of her uniform skirts as she adjusted her stance. Desperately, I bit down and only just in the nick of time. I heard the cane scythe through the air with a dreadful whooshing sound and then my backside exploded in agony. I screamed into my voluntary gag and bucked like a mad thing and only at the last minute did I remember.
'One!' I gasped, and ducked my head to bite again.
'One,' Polly intoned, somewhere in the far distance. Meg waited for what must have been just a few seconds, though they seemed like an eternity of suspense. At last the awful hissing came again.
'Yeooow! Bitch!' I shrieked.
'Two,' Polly's voice came from afar again.
'Two!' I sobbed in agreement. Swish!
Crack!
'Three.'
'Three-ee-aarghh!' Oh ye gods, Angie baby, come back all is forgiven. Except, as far as Meg was concerned it certainly wasn't. Her arm swung again and she was certainly sparing no effort now.
Shlack!
I writhed up, ropes cutting into wrists and ankles, but those pains fading into insignificance in comparison to my burning buttocks.
'Four.'
Oh hell's fires, another eight to go! 'Four,' I wept, and almost bit through my tongue as number five arrived before I could get the now spit-sodden wadge of bedding back between my teeth.
Shlaa-ap! Five. And on.
Whi-ick! Six.
And on.
And on...
I've already tried to give you some idea of my overall mental state during the first hour or so after I arrived back in those final months of early Victorian England and I know I probably haven't conveyed it very well, but the truth is, there aren't words that can accurately sum up everything that was going through my head right then.
In the intervening years I've tried discussing how I felt and my subsequent actions, but even face-to-face it's just impossible and, if you want the unvarnished truth, I don't think even I know how I didn't just fall apart and end up as a gibbering loony. There's only one explanation I can think of that even halfway works, but I'm willing to listen to suggestions if you can come up with a better one.
Survival instinct, that's my best guess. Animals will gnaw off their leg to escape slow death by starvation in a gin trap and there are well documented stories of otherwise delicate looking mothers who have lifted cars off their children or husbands and sweet little old ladies who have taken on and beaten hulking great thugs. Adrenaline comes into the equation somewhere, I know, but every equation has two sides and in my situation it had to be the opposite of adrenaline.
Nowadays they have things called beta-blockers that suppress nerves and help calm hyper-activeness in people whose bodies don't provide the wherewithal naturally. My body, it seems, is one of those
'Can't think why the master would want to bother with such a scrawny rump as this,' Meg taunted me, tapping my buttocks lightly in turn. 'Little more than a horse's collar, whichever way he chooses to go in. See this, Polly?' she cried, this time dealing me a slightly harder cut, which made me wince and bite the soft fabric harder. 'I've seen young boys with better arses than this. More meat on a butcher's apron!
'Well, my lady,' she continued, bending close to my right ear, 'I can tell you this is going to hurt you a lot more than it's going to hurt me and a lot more than it would if you had a bit of natural padding. Twelve cuts you're going to get and you can count every one.
'Miss one, or jump one and I'll give you an extra two for every one you get wrong. Polly, you can count as well, at least as far as ten. I know you can manage that, 'cos you've only got to count on your fingers and thumbs and it'll be good practise for you.'
She stepped back away from me and I heard the faint rustle of her uniform skirts as she adjusted her stance. Desperately, I bit down and only just in the nick of time. I heard the cane scythe through the air with a dreadful whooshing sound and then my backside exploded in agony. I screamed into my voluntary gag and bucked like a mad thing and only at the last minute did I remember.
'One!' I gasped, and ducked my head to bite again.
'One,' Polly intoned, somewhere in the far distance. Meg waited for what must have been just a few seconds, though they seemed like an eternity of suspense. At last the awful hissing came again.
'Yeooow! Bitch!' I shrieked.
'Two,' Polly's voice came from afar again.
'Two!' I sobbed in agreement. Swish!
Crack!
'Three.'
'Three-ee-aarghh!' Oh ye gods, Angie baby, come back all is forgiven. Except, as far as Meg was concerned it certainly wasn't. Her arm swung again and she was certainly sparing no effort now.
Shlack!
I writhed up, ropes cutting into wrists and ankles, but those pains fading into insignificance in comparison to my burning buttocks.
'Four.'
Oh hell's fires, another eight to go! 'Four,' I wept, and almost bit through my tongue as number five arrived before I could get the now spit-sodden wadge of bedding back between my teeth.
Shlaa-ap! Five. And on.
Whi-ick! Six.
And on.
And on...
I've already tried to give you some idea of my overall mental state during the first hour or so after I arrived back in those final months of early Victorian England and I know I probably haven't conveyed it very well, but the truth is, there aren't words that can accurately sum up everything that was going through my head right then.
In the intervening years I've tried discussing how I felt and my subsequent actions, but even face-to-face it's just impossible and, if you want the unvarnished truth, I don't think even I know how I didn't just fall apart and end up as a gibbering loony. There's only one explanation I can think of that even halfway works, but I'm willing to listen to suggestions if you can come up with a better one.
Survival instinct, that's my best guess. Animals will gnaw off their leg to escape slow death by starvation in a gin trap and there are well documented stories of otherwise delicate looking mothers who have lifted cars off their children or husbands and sweet little old ladies who have taken on and beaten hulking great thugs. Adrenaline comes into the equation somewhere, I know, but every equation has two sides and in my situation it had to be the opposite of adrenaline.
Nowadays they have things called beta-blockers that suppress nerves and help calm hyper-activeness in people whose bodies don't provide the wherewithal naturally. My body, it seems, is one of those
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