Chapter 11

CHRISTMAS - CONTINUED - MORE FESTIVE JOLLITY!

Miss Berrriman, the retired headmistress, famed in her day for her merciless discipline, was staying with her younger sister, a very recently retired headmistress. As had been the case with Amy and Priscilla, both these ladies had sat attentively through the Queen's Christmas message.

"Wonderful lady!" said the younger Miss Berriman, reverently.

"She should have been sterner with those children of hers!" said the elder. "A good dose of the stick is what they all needed!"

The younger sister smiled indulgently. She knew how Agnes had terrorised so many generations of her pupils, but for herself, she had always preferred a more sensitive and gentle approach, although she had never been afraid to use the cane when needed - far from it!

Muriel - the elder Miss Berriman - glanced up at a picture on the wall. It was a group photograph. Three rows of fresh and wholesome, immaculately uniformed girls stared down at them - and her sister in the middle.

"Quite recent, Agnes? I can't recall seeing that before?"

Muriel got up and went to have a closer look. One girl in particular seemed to fascinate her.

"Yes. My last Sixth. A fine group of girls. They should all go far."

Muriel was unable to take her eyes off the very striking girl that she had first noticed.

"Come here, Agnes, please. Who is that?"

Agnes peered at the photograph.

"Oh! That's Cynthia! Lady Cynthia Beauchamp, to give her her proper name, not that she ever cared about such things! Eldest daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Swaffham. One of my most troublesome pupils of all time! God! But was that girl a handful! Wild was far too mild a word for that little madam! But she was a fine girl, nonetheless, that one, despite her never ending mischief. Straight and true, loyal and determined; I never knew her to tell an untruth - she would sooner die! And ten times as brave as any man ever was. I had the unpleasant duty of caning her for her misdeeds times without number and she never once uttered a sound.

"If that young woman ever set her heart on something there was nothing would stop her. The other girls all worshipped her, but there was only one other that she really befriended - that one there, a grocer's daughter up on a scholarship, called Amy. Those two were quite inseparable! We wondered about them sometimes - the love of Sappho and all that! But Amy showed very early on where her preferences lay! No man is safe from her - not a bit fussy, our Amy! Any thing will do, as long as it has a penis attached in working order!"

"What is Cynthia doing now?" inquired Muriel, as if she didn't know!

"I don't know! Probably married to some chinless wonder! And she is quite, utterly, brilliant - ought to go to Oxford and be a great mathematician, but I think all she wanted to do when school was over was find a man, settle down and produce children. Such a waste!"

Muriel could not take her eyes of this picture.

"Are you sure you know nothing of her career in the last year or two?"

Agnes smiled.

"Of course. It's in this scrapbook of mine! Take a look, Muriel. She married..."

Agnes was interrupted by the telephone. When she returned, she was horrified to see her sister slumped senseless on the floor.

A doctor was called, dragged complainingly away from his family in the midst of all the jollity. He took one professional look at the sick woman and ensured that Muriel was transferred to hospital immediately. He had seen a case like this before and knew that there was no time to be lost. For years after he would tell the story of how he had had the privilege, one Christmas Day, of snatching a dying woman back from the abyss and restoring her to life.

Agnes learned that her sister had been stuck by a viral infection that had almost totally paralysed her. It would be months before she regained the use of her limbs and her voice, although a full recovery was very much on the cards.

A NEW YEAR!

The New Year came and still the Girl gave her tormentors no good reason to use the dread Whip. She copped plenty of damage from the belt and the stick and the switch, but this was water off a duck's back as far as she was concerned. Pain had never been her problem, only the shame of being exposed to jeers and abuse from people she despised. That banquet still ranked as the nadir of her life, when she had been caged, swinging over the festive board, the jeers of men and women of "Quality" ringing in her ears.

Winter dragged its wearisome way. While her friends were in Gstaad enjoying the Winter Sports, she was stuck in the Castle, being systematically tormented and worked to death by an ever more crazed Mistress. And the awful knowledge that, ultimately, the Whip must cut into her smooth skin haunted her every waking hour.

There was much snow that Winter. The early fall in December had been a timely warning of a hard Winter ahead, and the Mistress was unrelenting in her dealing with the poor Girl, who was forced into the bitter cold time and time again to clear the path and keep the garden in a seemly and tidy state...

When, in late March, the weather improved, it was not a second too soon for the rapidly weakening and despairing Girl. She prayed her thanks when Spring finally arrived with a burst of life-giving warmth and the dreary cold of winter was cast away for another year.

The Mistress was happy with the way that Girl was tending to the garden but worried that too much freedom was being given to her. Never mind that she was forced to clean all the floors several times a week and that she never had more than five hours sleep a night, the Mistress bitterly begrudged the power that the Girl had over the garden. She determined to hire another gardener, and one who would not be as soft-hearted as Fitch.

In mid April, the Girl was once more placed under the control of a task master who would ensure that her delightful bottom would be spanked and beaten as much outdoors as in. The Mistress and the two Servants, Jenkins and Huskisson were very happy to watch through the window as the Girl was overseen by the new gardener and whacked far harder and oftener than Fitch had ever whacked her!

Dorothy, who had been sinking into a bit of a depression, perked up amazingly as, day by day, the sweet and delightful sound of leather being viciously applied to flesh came wafting in through her parlour window. Just the tonic she needed!

SUMMER - NOW IS THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT MADE GLORIOUS SUMMER.

"You've been so wonderful to Mother these last months" said Angela. "She is SO grateful to you. You really are a very loyal daughter to her and sister to me! How can we ever thank you enough?"

"By the old cow not leaving me out of her Will" was the unspoken response from the relieved Amelia!

This conversation had taken place two days before and now Amelia was standing on Glasgow station waiting for the Birmingham train. Soon she would be back to her work and the decipherment of that intriguing document!