The Instruction of Olivia

by Geoffrey Allen

  'Thank God,' she breathed, collapsing onto her side.

  One of the girls pulled her upright again and seated her back on her haunches. Olivia looked up and found her eyes level with Flora's pubic triangle, a wealth of tangled golden curls glistening with sweat. Indeed, her whole body was covered in a fine layer of perspiration, for she had whipped herself to exhaustion.

  'The rest of you, clear out!' she barked in her deep voice.

  The last one to leave closed the door softly behind her and remarked to her lover that it was a miracle that Olivia was still alive.

  When they were alone, Flora knelt in front of Olivia and kissed her on the forehead as lovingly as she might a child in a cradle.

  'I had to punish you,' she whispered. 'You do understand that, don't you?'

  Olivia nodded dumbly. 'I am here as a punishment,' she mumbled sadly. 'But why do you want to lie alongside me and put your fingers in my...' she hesitated, finding it difficult to utter the word considered improper for young ladies to mention.

  'Cunt?' Flora offered.

  'If you like,' although she had never heard it called that before.

  'Because you're so beautiful,' Flora said. 'And if I don't, someone else most certainly will, if they haven't already.'

  'No one has ever touched me there.'

  'Except a lover, perhaps.'

  'No, I've never had a lover.'

  Flora considered that for a moment. 'Are you telling me that no one has ever kissed your nipples or done what comes naturally between men and women?'

  It was Olivia's turn to think about that. The only idea she had about sex was what she had been told at Sunday school. While she pondered, Flora leaned forward and gently kissed her lips, and at the same time flicked her thumb over her own nipples, teasing them to erection.

  'Now, suck these,' Flora coaxed.

  The poor dazed girl planted a quick peck on each nipple, still baffled as to why she was expected to do something that no self-respecting woman could possibly enjoy.

  'I think you're still in need of further instruction,' said Flora, her voice lowering to a gravelly husk.

  'I will not let you touch me,' Olivia retorted, aware now that Flora's sympathy was a mere ploy to lull her into doing things she did not want to do.

  'You might not wish it, but when I have finished with you, you will not be in a position to refuse. Now, return to the dormitory and take this with you.'

  Olivia made her way back; carrying the chain that Flora had used to bind her wrists.

  The other occupants, thinking that the entertainment was over, had retired to their cots, but on seeing Olivia return sooner than they anticipated and with Flora coming up behind, eyes blazing once more, they sat up with renewed interest.

  'Lie on your bed,' Flora instructed.

  'In that?' Olivia replied, looking at the huge wet patch where the pot had been emptied.

  'Are you questioning my authority?'

  Any argument would have been futile; Flora was determined to subject Olivia to more humiliation, and would keep on degrading her until she finally broke.

  'No ma'am,' Olivia sighed, planting her bottom in the midst of the filthy swamp.

  'Isn't this wonderful?' Flora beamed, slapping Olivia's belly and then tweaking her nipples. 'Yet despite all my efforts, she still hasn't grasped it. Have you, dear?'

  'Grasped what?' Olivia asked, wondering what it was she was supposed to grasp.

  'You stupid girl, am I obliged to treat you like a child?'

  'I'm not a child,' said Olivia indignantly.

  'But you behave as if you were, and a naughty one into the bargain. So we have to correct you, don't we?'

  'Do we?' Olivia muttered, a cold chill going through her stomach.

  'We most certainly do.'

  Flora spread the lengths of chain over the stinking palliasse and selected one, which she then wound around Olivia's neck. Then, taking up the slack, she told Olivia to put her hands together, palm to palm as if she were in prayer, and place the fingertips just below her chin. The end of the chain was used to tie her wrists, and the remaining links were laid between her breasts, exactly in the middle.

  Another length of chain was selected, measured for suitability by stretching it across the railings at the head of the cot, and one end secured to the furthest rail. It was then passed again around her neck and taken to the opposite rail, where it was pulled taut, obliging Olivia to shuffle her body up the palliasse until her head bumped the railings

  'Now your legs,' said Flora, taking up another length.

  Olivia spread them, already knowing what Flora had in store. She opened wide, placing her ankles at the very edges of the palliasse, which now began to feel very wet and clammy, sticking to her bottom and sucking into her crease like a pair of soaking drawers.

  'Thank you,' Flora said, in the manner of an omnibus conductor collecting fares.

  The chain pulled on Olivia's ankles, but despite Flora's strenuous attempts they would not reach the railings.

  'Please excuse me,' she said, going behind the railings, 'but I shall stretch your legs until your feet are right up against the posts, which is going to cause you considerable pain, I'm very pleased to say.'

  And with that she rested one foot on the frame, and leaning back, pulled with all her might. Olivia groaned in agony as her thigh almost tore from her pelvis. Then the exercise was repeated on the other leg, leaving Olivia close to a state of near strangulation.

  But there still remained two unused lengths that Flora now put to good use.

  'Lift your bottom,' she said, ready to slid the chain beneath it and at the same time fashioning a large knot at its centre.

  Olivia emitted a painful grunt and managed to arch her back high enough to allow the chain to pass beneath her. When she dropped down again it was to land herself directly on the knotted links, at the base of the spine where the pain would be most savage. Flora then calmly brought the two ends over Olivia's hips and tied them tightly just above her pubic triangle. The last length she decided to use as a whip.

  'Your belly shall be the recipient of this,' Flora explained; flicking the chain over her shoulder, ready to bring it whistling onto Olivia's stomach. 'The purpose of chaining you like this is twofold,' she continued, rather like a schoolmistress. 'Even though the pain I am about to inflict will be very severe, and you may feel it necessary to wriggle, I would not advise it, because if you do, the chain around your neck will pull tighter and strangle you. Secondly, when you are being whipped across your belly, you will suffer twice over; once from the chain itself and once from the knot digging in your spine. If you wish, you may scream as loud as you like. No one will hear you, and even if they did, it would not make the slightest difference. My authority is absolute and you are the lowest of the low.'

  Olivia listened to this speech with a curious mixture of terror and dumb acceptance. The turnkey had made everything perfectly clear; as long as she remained in the House of Correction she would be constantly abused and violated by anyone who saw fit. In short, she would be whipped and whipped, sexually tormented and above all, made to feel as if it were a pleasure to undergo these appalling torments. Well, let them do their worst, Olivia would not succumb, she would remain pure until her wedding day; if she lived that long.

  The chain struck directly across her naval with a hollow slap, and Flora was right in her delivery. Olivia, recoiling under the blow, writhed her bottom from side to side. The chain around her neck almost choked her, and the knot dug sharply into her spine. She was still panting from the shock when another slapped diagonally from waist to hip. Olivia went rigid; her only defence against slow strangulation or a fractured spine. But in keeping her legs as straight as ramrods and her bottom perfectly still, she added to the pain, for now all her muscles had tensed and gone hard as iron. She felt each blow much more acutely than when she was hanging suspended in the mill, for there at least she had been allowed to swing and twist, which to some extent had helped to
allay the pain, but here, all she could do was lie still and suffer it.

  She closed her eyes and concentrated on counting the blows. Five, ten, fifteen, twenty-five. It seemed it would never end. Her belly was crisscrossed with stripes, as were her upper thighs and ribs. Only her breasts were spared, under the protection of her clasped hands.

  The effect of the whipping on the inmates was no less the same as it was in the quadrangle, only more so. Here, in the sanctuary of their dormitory, they were free to indulge in whatever they chose. Some remained, eyeing with relish Olivia's whipped belly and thighs, but most, finding it too arousing to watch any longer, had drifted to their cots where they blatantly indulged in each other; a practice not lost on Flora who, finding the grunts and moans too much to bear, cast aside the chain and knelt between Olivia's open legs.

  'Don't bother to struggle,' she advised, putting her hand into her victim's crotch.

  Olivia shook her head. 'Could you at least take away the chain from under my bottom?' she whispered, her throat parched and sore.

  'I shall have to leave it there, because as long as your bottom is raised I can feel you more thoroughly.'

  Thus, her hand began moving to and fro, the fingers slipping right inside Olivia's slit.

  'You are very tight,' Flora observed, wiggling her fingers and sliding them in and out. 'I can only assume you were telling me the truth after all.'

  Her hand moved faster and faster, while her other went under Olivia's clasped hands and began pinching her nipples.

  'Tell me how you feel now,' Flora panted, her face flushed and hot.

  'I feel only the pain in my back and on my belly,' Olivia gasped, which wasn't quite true.

  Somewhere deep in her womb was a vague hint of arousal; a peculiar tingling feeling that spread through her whipped belly and flanks. But she did not want Flora to know that, for if she did it would be a tantamount admission of defeat; a licence to further her disgusting intentions. And one look at the other inmates told her that she would never sink to their depths of depravity. In the bed next to her lay a girl on her back with her legs open and drawn up to her chest. Between them a tousled blonde head bobbed up and down as fast as Flora's fingers.

  Olivia concentrated on that to take her mind away from what was evidently arising within her own belly. The face on the prostrated girl was fascinating in itself. It had rolled in Olivia's direction, and for a fleeting moment Olivia was reminded of her journey in the wagon when the passengers had come aboard. There she had heard the same noises and seen the same peculiar expressions of parted lips, misty, far away eyes, and the awful groans and sucking of breath.

  A girl in the opposite cot was thrashing her legs in the air and rubbing them against the head of her companion. Suddenly her back arched and there came a heartrending cry and a wild leaping of her shoulders. Then presently, after a lot more groaning and gulping, she lay quiet, her breast heaving as if she had fallen into a deep and satiated slumber. Her companion emerged equally as exhausted and collapsed over her, smiling contentedly.

  Flora, too, betrayed similar sentiments and, panting and blowing like a racehorse, she withdrew her soaking fingers and thrust them directly into Olivia's gaping mouth. 'I think it's actually happened!' she said agog.

  But Olivia didn't hear her. She had ceased to be aware of anything except the chains around her neck and the dull ache in her loins and bottom. Around her the breathless panting started to fade. Her head rolled lazily to one side, and she passed out.

  Chapter Five

  When Olivia awoke the next morning it was to find that all the chains had been removed and she was strangely alone in the dormitory. She sat up and looked around at the empty cots, wondering why she had been left there and not aroused for her labours. The wet patch beneath her bottom had become icy cold and stank to high heaven. Pulling a face, she groaned and got off the palliasse just as Flora came into the dormitory.

  'So, you're awake at last,' she said, coming towards her and looking very grim and purposeful.

  'Did I have to suffer so?' Olivia asked, rubbing the places where the chains had chaffed her skin.

  She was sore, and aching particularly on her bottom and belly and between her legs, which she decided not to rub in front of Flora, lest she be attacked there again.

  'You will suffer whenever you need correction,' Flora replied tartly, wrinkling her nose at the stench arising from the soiled palliasse.

  'That wasn't correction, it was torture. And what is more, I am convinced that your treatment of my body was illegal. Look at me.'

  Flora looked dryly at Olivia's welted belly, and when she turned round she saw the livid indentation where the knotted chain had dug. Her bottom was still a bright shade of red and pink.

  'Perhaps you would care to voice your complaint to the governor, who at this moment awaits your filthy presence in his office.'

  Olivia's hands flew involuntarily to her blazing cheeks. 'Why, what have I done?' she asked, petrified.

  Flora glanced at the patch and then at Olivia. 'You'll see.' And without giving her time to cover herself she dragged Olivia by the wrist out of the dormitory and up the spiral staircase.

  Smithers was down on her hands and knees scrubbing the floor in the passage when Olivia approached. She stopped abruptly and shot her a malicious grin, but a savage kick in the rump from Flora prevented her from saying whatever she was going to say.

  'I am persuaded,' said the governor, rising from his desk and coming round to meet Olivia, 'that you are a troublemaker, and decidedly lacking in both respect and obedience towards those set in authority above you.'

  Olivia looked totally nonplussed. Flora stared directly ahead, standing to attention, legs close together, hands behind her back.

  'I'm sorry, sir, I don't understand. Since my being here I have striven to do my duty and thus far have not met with complaint,' Olivia said meekly.

  'Oh really. Your supervisor tells me that when you were instructed to empty the night soil you refused and went into a tantrum, the end result of which was the soiling of your own cot to the great discomfort of the other inmates who were obliged to inhale its noxious stench, and the result of that is no less than seven of them have been confined to the infirmary.'

  'It's a lie!' shrieked Olivia, staring hard at Flora who remained gazing at the clock on the mantelpiece.

  'But there are witnesses to your atrocious behaviour.' He paused as if a thought had just come into his mind. 'And furthermore, when you were told to get up and report to the laundry, you refused and remained content in your bed of filth.'

  Olivia burst into tears. How so treacherous, she thought, that after all she had endured, Flora could so easily betray her. She had a good idea who were the seven that reported sick; they had been up all night creaking their cots and had used Flora's venom as a way of seeking rest, no doubt aided and abetted by the turnkey herself.

  'What is to be done with you?' said the governor, shaking his head, knowing full well the answer to his own question. The more he looked at Olivia's bottom the greater his urge to explore it.

  'May I suggest she wear the belt, sir?' Flora suddenly piped up.

  'I was going to suggest a sound thrashing, but I can see she's recently had a good dose of that medicine, and by now is probably getting used to it. No, I think you are right, Miss Bellows. Perhaps a week or so of wearing the belt will teach her some manners.'

  Flora could hardly contain herself. 'Shall I fit it, sir?'

  The governor smiled to himself. 'I shall fit it,' he said firmly, thinking that it would be a good excuse and a less obvious reason to fondle Olivia's bottom, together with the added bonus of her private parts.

  'As you wish, sir,' Flora replied, piqued and bowing her way out of the room.

  The belt the governor fetched from his cupboard was more reminiscent of a medieval Inquisition than a nineteenth century mode of correction.

  'This has been designed to cause you maximum discomfort both day and night,' he sai
d, dropping it on the desk.

  Olivia regarded the terrible looking contraption with bated breath.

  'I have to wear that?' she exclaimed.

  'You do, and I shall have the infinite pleasure of seeing you in it, as will everyone else.'

  Olivia didn't know what he meant by that, but parted her legs as instructed while the governor took up the belt. He knelt in front of her, humming to himself as he slipped around her waist a broad iron band, which he fastened over the crown of her buttocks with a small brass padlock. Behind her was another section that was hinged beneath the padlock and able to pass under her legs and would be secured at the front by the same means as of the rear. But fitting it was not quite as simple as one might imagine, for, protruding from the hinged section were two upright metal rods, about six to eight inches in length and an inch and a half in diameter.

  'These,' the governor said to the horrified young woman, 'will be fitted snugly inside you, and you will not under any circumstances, be able to either expel or escape them.'

  Olivia gritted her teeth when the first rod was pushed up her bottom. Happily, she could not see the evil glint in his eyes as he watched her straining to take it all. He could hear her sucking her breath and letting it out with a grunt.

  'How much more?' she gasped, reaching behind and pulling apart her cheeks.

  'Another inch or so,' he lied.

  Up and up it went, the pain making her clutch her hair and pull it until her eyes watered. A long sigh whooshed from her lips when she was at last completely filled.

  'What if I want to go to the toilet?' she asked, just realizing that sobering fact.

  'You will ask permission and someone, probably the turnkey, will assist you, and of course return it afterwards.'