The Instruction of Olivia

by Geoffrey Allen

  He left her and went out into the yard to enjoy a cheroot; women as a general rule didn't much care for company when they needed to relieve themselves.

  How old was she? Eighteen, and thieving to keep herself alive. Girls much younger than she were known to take off their drawers for a hot pie or a night's shelter. Why, he thought, should she be an exception? The town was full of them. Yet, when he'd called her a harlot there had been no reaction, neither had there been when he'd pressed himself close. Perhaps the girl was just plain stupid. He finished his cheroot and went back into the cell, and saw Olivia sitting on the bench just as he'd left her.

  'Have you considered my proposal?' he asked seriously.

  'Indeed I have, sir. And I would rather face being buried alive than submitting myself to any further indignities. From now on I shall live a good and honest life. I shall never steal or give you just cause to chastise me. I am sure that after I have proved my worth in the House of Correction you will feel justified in reducing my sentence, and—'

  'And I am quite sure,' said the exasperated magistrate, 'that the constable was correct in his assumption! You are indeed an imbecile and will serve out your full term!'

  With that he left her rubbing her bottom and staring after him with mystified tears staining her cheeks, completely unaware of the fresh horrors which awaited her at the hands of men far more ruthless and determined than he.

  Chapter Two

  Herded like cattle, Olivia and three other young women were driven across the police station yard and into the back of a van. The journey to the House of Correction was not a long one, but far enough to allow a quick witted or dexterous criminal to effect an escape. The driver who was solely responsible for their delivery had been duped on more than one occasion by a woman pretending to be sick, only to find that as soon as he opened the door she was off like a hare, and his meagre wages correspondingly reduced. To completely eliminate that risk Olivia and her companions were shackled together hand and foot with chains and, as a double precaution, were further hindered by being made to sit upright against the van wall while he passed iron collars around their necks and fastened them to hooks.

  The passengers journeyed on in silence, lulled by the monotonous creaking of the axels and clip clop of hooves, until at length they halted outside a lonely inn.

  'Here we go,' said the girl sitting next to Olivia as the door swung open.

  'Are we to drink?' Olivia asked innocently, straining her parched throat against the iron ring.

  The girl snorted with derision and turned her weary head to a crowd of onlookers gathering at the door. Slowly they edged forward and one by one clambered into the van. The last closed the door and blocked out the window with his jacket. The driver, who had collected a penny from each of them, set the horse in motion, heading at a leisurely pace across the desolate moor.

  How odd, Olivia thought, that a prison van should stop to pick up passengers as if it were a public omnibus. Perhaps here, in the remote countryside, there was no other way to get about, and with the prisoners shackled it would make little difference either way.

  In the semi darkness one of the passengers knelt at her feet and began kindly stroking her numbed calves. Then he eased apart her ankles as far as the chain would permit, running his hand further up her leg, caressing her knees, manipulating them between fingers and thumb.

  'Better?' he whispered.

  'Much, thank you,' she replied, grateful for his concern.

  'And your bottom, how does that feel? Sore I expect.'

  'Very sore,' she said, shuffling uncomfortably and nudging the girl next to her, who had already lifted her legs and was having her thighs soothed.

  'Mayhap I can help that too,' the voice whispered, drawing closer.

  'It's not that sore,' she said, edging backwards into the van wall.

  But the kindly man would have none of it and, placing his hands under her thighs, he lifted her clear of the seat and slid his hands under her bottom. Olivia sat down again and nearly choked. His hands were touching her bare buttocks, the fingers curling into her crease, seemingly going ever deeper.

  'I'm quite all right there, thank you,' she said firmly.

  He ignored her. 'No, I don't think you are, so you just keep still, there's a good girl.'

  Olivia couldn't keep still. The tips of his fingers had wormed far into her crevice and were getting alarmingly close to her bottom hole. Blushing with embarrassment she turned to her companion who, offering no protest to the head buried in her cleavage, rolled her head from side to side, breathing in great gulps.

  It wasn't quite the same situation on the other side of her. There, the girl was writhing and panting, and although trying to escape the hands which lovingly stripped away her upper garments, exposing her breasts and fondling them, she seemed to be surrendering as if there were little she could do. The girl nearest the door had gone strangely quiet except for murmuring groans, punctuated with short, sharp gasps.

  I mustn't appear ungrateful, Olivia told herself, these simple country folk had willingly offered their comfort to those they knew were far worse off than themselves. The fingers continued to explore her crease, kneading and pinching her flesh, gradually restoring life into her dead cheeks.

  'I feel much better now, thank you,' she said, as the man slid his hands away.

  'I ain't finished yet,' he replied brusquely, bringing them over her flanks and into the join of her legs. 'Now, lift your arse.'

  'I'll do no such thing.'

  'You'll do as you're told.'

  Sighing with resignation, Olivia raised her bottom from the seat. His hand went quickly into her groin, stroking her fleece, passing under her legs, and making free with her private parts. He went on rubbing to and fro until she felt dizzy and uncomfortably wet.

  'I'll have to sit down,' she apologised, 'or this ring around my neck will surely throttle me.'

  'Bugger the ring,' he muttered, reluctantly taking away his hand.

  Olivia lowered herself gingerly back onto the seat. For some inexplicable reason the temperature inside the wagon had soared and sweat trickled down the sides of her face.

  'What's the matter with you?' he asked, genuinely concerned.

  'Air, for God's sake, I need a little air.'

  He obliged her at once by loosening the buttons of her dress, and kept on loosening them so that when he'd finished it fell open from collar to waist.

  'You're so thoughtful,' she sobbed, and then looked down. 'Was it really necessary to release me that far?'

  'You said you needed air,' he reminded her, taking both breasts in his hands and gently squeezing them.

  'Why don't you fan me instead of doing this?' she protested, pulling at the chains.

  'If you don't shut your trap I'll fan you with the flat of my hand.'

  Olivia gritted her teeth and let him go on mauling her. She had come to the conclusion that he wasn't very intelligent, treating her breasts in this fashion had very little effect in the way of reviving her; if anything he was making matters worse. It didn't help her state of mind when she looked at her companions who seemed to be in an advanced stage of collapse. The girl nearest the door had swooned with her mouth wide open and was uttering fearful groans.

  'Christ, help me,' she muttered, turning her head to Olivia. 'Have courage, I'm sure we'll be there soon.'

  'I'm there already,' she whimpered, gazing with glazed eyes. Olivia gave her a sad, baffled look and turned back to the man who was still worrying her breasts with painful squeezes and pinches on her nipples.

  'You've made me more sore than ever I was before you came into this dreadful wagon,' she complained. 'I don't believe you're trying to assist me at all.'

  The man took away his hands abruptly, just as the van rumbled to a halt. The door opened emitting a glare of bright sunshine that made everyone blink and swear, except Olivia who vainly tried to conceal her nakedness by bowing her head and letting her hair cascade over her sweating chest.


  'You'd be a lot more sore if it weren't for them chains,' he said rudely, clambering out of the van.

  The door quickly closed again and they set off at such a rate the van nearly toppled into the ditches that lined the road to the House of Correction. Through the now unconcealed window a grim building appeared on the horizon. It disappeared behind some trees and came into view again but larger and more foreboding than before. There was nothing around it for miles and Olivia found herself wondering why the van had dropped its passengers in such a remote and distant place. It never occurred to her that they would be picked up on the way back and would repeat the same exercise over and over again. Neither did she realise that the chain that prevented her legs from opening had been her saviour. The girl, for whose life she had so feared, had made a remarkable recovery and seemed none the worse for her ordeal.

  'We're here,' she announced gloomily, as the van slowed to a crawl.

  The driver reached for a bell rope and gave it a sharp tug. Somewhere inside a bell boomed and a minute later came the rattling of bolts and locks. The van proceeded slowly under an arch and into a cobbled quadrangle surrounded with high walls topped with spikes. They set off again through another arch and came to rest outside a huge black studded door.

  The driver unhooked the iron rings from their necks and stared malevolently as they rubbed their fingers over the mark left in its wake.

  'That mess in your drawers, how did you get that?' he said, addressing the girls at random

  'It was the journey,' one of them replied. 'It made me wet myself.'

  'And that goes for all of you. Understood?'

  They nodded in unison, except Olivia who returned his staring eyes.

  'That's not true. It was that man who made me mess myself, putting his hand where he had no business, undressing me and making free with my person—'

  'I don't think you heard me!' said the driver, slapping her face.

  'I wet myself,' she said sullenly.

  Satisfied with that, he pushed them out onto the cobbles and rapped the knocker of the nearest door. It was answered by a girl of their own age, dressed in the drab, grey rags of the prison.

  She told them that the board wished to speak with them forthwith as was customary with new entrants. Following her up a steep spiral staircase, Olivia was thrown into confusion. She didn't know a board could speak, so far the ones over which she had prostrated herself had not uttered a word. Up and up they went and at each step the girl exhibited an awkward lurch of her hips as if one leg were shorter than the other, then when they reached the top she could see the reason. What fearful instrument could possibly leave those welts? she wondered, for the girl's bottom showed clearly beneath her tattered skirt the evidence of a recent and brutal flogging which had left her half crippled. She walked on along a corridor until she came to a pair of double doors.

  'Remember not to speak unless spoken to,' she said nervously, and then knocked, waited for the word of command, and went in with the others trailing behind.

  'The new inmates,' she announced, dropping a painful curtsey. Then, turning a wincing face to Olivia, said solemnly 'Bow to the board.'

  The board consisted of three men and a woman looking very grand in their dark blue uniforms with shining brass buttons and an air of moral superiority. The girl who had led them there bowed so low her skirt audibly ripped, revealing the tops of her thighs and, to Olivia's profound astonishment, a pouting pudenda freshly shorn.

  'Get out, Smithers!'

  At the sound of the woman's voice Smithers fled from the room rubbing her bottom more readily than before.

  'I wish I could say that I am pleased to make your acquaintance,' said a bewhiskered gentleman in a high chair. 'But unfortunately that is not the case. The world is full of miscreants like you, who, despite strenuous efforts of the courts, return again and again to their lives of crime. There can be no doubt that this way of life is of your own choosing, and that its rewards have hitherto outweighed the punishment. That sorry state of affairs will now be rectified.' He rustled a piece of paper on his desk and looked up, eyeing the girls in turn.

  'Olivia Holland, who is she?' Olivia raised her hand. 'Two dozen,' he said.

  Olivia did a quick mental calculation. 'But sir, I'm only due a dozen.'

  'Are you assuming that the magistrate is in error? Because if you are, you are insolent, and for that you will receive another half dozen, making thirty four in all.' Olivia wondered where the extra four came from but thought it wise not to ask. He read out the other names on his list and laid down his paper.

  'The tiresome task of flogging your backsides we shall deal with immediately, and after that you will be shown to your place of work. Kindly remove those filthy rags.'

  'We have to take off all our clothes?' one of the girls exclaimed agog.

  'Idiot!' returned the matron, getting up and rushing towards her.

  She placed her long skinny fingers under the girl's collar, and with one jerk of her elbow, ripped it clean from her back. Hardly had the girl recovered from the shock when she was spun round and the exercise repeated at the front.

  'The old story,' said the gentleman in the high chair, 'no drawers, I see. But it will make our task all the more easier. The last one to disrobe will receive an extra six strokes for her trouble.'

  A frantic hurrying of unbuttoned skirts now ensued with such rapidity that in a matter of seconds the girls were rendered completely naked.

  'The Judgement of Paris,' chuckled the third gentleman on the board. 'But in their case I think I would forego that choice, just look at them.'

  The gentleman in the high chair was looking, as was the matron and both with eyes that settled emphatically on Olivia's slender body. It was not a pleasant feeling seeing where the direction of their eyes lay.

  'Mrs Priestley, take them to the punishment room, and please ensure that these wretches receive their just deserts. Don't spare them.'

  'Indeed I will not, sir,' the matron replied with obvious relish, her eyes still roaming over Olivia's bottom.

  Halfway along the passage, the girl leading the way stopped abruptly at an open window overlooking the quadrangle where small groups of women and girls were busy heaving coal from a cart.

  'Do we have to walk across there naked?' she asked incredulously.

  'Those are the rules,' the matron replied smugly, 'to teach you humility and obedience, but one look at your stupid faces tells me that you possess neither. But you will soon learn, of that you may rest assured.' She was about to give Olivia a swift kick in the rump, but stopped short. 'What did you do to deserve that?' she inquired, noticing the birch marks.

  'I stole a loaf of bread, miss.'

  'A thief, no less, and doubtless an artful liar into the bargain. In my opinion, the magistrate let you off lightly, which is more than I would have done.'

  Then she did kick her, and so hard that Olivia flew down the corridor like a bullet. If it was designed to put fear into the rest it certainly had the desired effect. They rushed past Olivia and darted down the staircase, leaving their stricken companion to follow as best she could.

  Almost bent double with shame, Olivia hobbled across the cobbles oblivious to the fact that none of the coal heavers paid her the slightest heed. The matron came close behind, pausing now and then to slap the face of anyone within reach. The girls headed for a low, squat building on the other side of the quadrangle wherein the flogging of the inmates was duly performed.

  'You're first,' said the matron, indicating a small, redheaded girl.

  Trembling from head to toe, she made her way to a peculiar wooden construction that closely resembled a painter's trestle, except where a plank might have rested were chains with iron rings on the end of them.

  'Step up and put your wrists through those,' the matron ordered.

  Sally mounted the bottom rung and stretched her thin arms upwards to the rings. Her wrists slipped easily through and the matron, ensuring that there would be no possibilit
y of them slipping out again, secured them by turning a key. The new inmate was clearly terrified at the prospect of another flogging. Olivia, watching to see how matters would progress, saw at a glance that her boyish buttocks and narrow back were unused to sustained punishment. Far from having learnt to relax and so soften the blows, her cheeks tensed making them all the harder and more susceptible to the searing pain soon to follow.

  The instrument whose cruel marks Olivia had seen on Smithers, was a cat o' nine tails, whose leather straps were worn to a high gloss from so much use.

  'Brace yourself, wretch,' said the matron, as much for the benefit of Olivia and her companion as the girl on the trestle.

  To Olivia's astonishment, the matron faced not the girl, but the opposite wall, then suddenly, with the speed and agility of a ballet dancer, swivelled round on her heels sending the whip ricocheting into Sally's quaking bottom. The whole trestle shook from the blow and when Olivia opened her eyes it was to see Sally's cheeks covered in a mass of stripes. If one stroke could deliver that, she thought, what would be left after a dozen, or two or three? This would be no light flogging, but a severe example designed to strike terror in the hearts of those who witnessed it.

  'See and remark how we punish our transgressors,' the matron announced, raising her arm for the next blow.

  Olivia could see very well. What had been pale, translucent skin was now a blazing scarlet. Between each stroke was not a finger's width of flesh unmarked; and between each stroke Sally's body leapt away from the frame until she hung there, feet dangling lifeless over the bar.

  The matron clicked her tongue. 'Fainted. The girl's fainted. You, fetch that bucket.'

  The girl next to Olivia scurried across the room and brought over a pail, which the matron emptied across Sally's back and bottom. She stirred slowly into life, emitting a low, deep groan, which the matron judged was enough to continue the punishment.

  The thongs lashed around her flanks, curling round her upper thighs and licking into the pit of her stomach. For a moment the trestle rocked on its legs, threatening to collapse.