Chapter 10: I see the whipping post again

First thing next morning it poured with rain. Not the fairly gentle rain such as we normally have in England, but hard, heavy stair-rods of water that flattened everything in their path. It only lasted a little over an hour and then the sun came out but for most of the morning the atmosphere was hot and sticky. It made the sores on my back and bottom itch but I knew better than to scratch them. Sumala's did too and several times I caught him surreptitiously trying to rub his back. I reprimanded him and received the "Yes ma'am" salute and a broad smile.

Riku and a number of the IT staff didn't come into work until it was all over and things had begun to dry up so for the first couple of hours we almost had the office to ourselves with only the overnight staff remaining on duty. Everyone treated it as a normal occurrence for the time of year. "The main rainy season finished in mid-April but we get these little rains storms from time to time," one told me. "We're okay up here, its those that live in the valleys that have to worry as they get the run-off from this plateau."

"That was a little rain storm?" The man smiled and nodded, "In the wet season it could last all day." I soon noticed the road below the window that had been awash, was rapidly drying up and after another hour there was little to show of the downpour.

Muniba was late coming too. We'd decided she was giving us a miss that day and were at work when she entered the office. For a few moments she looked at what we were doing and then, in front of everyone, made us undress and proceeded to examine us. Knowing we were being watched still embarrassed me a little even though all of staff present had seen me naked. Perhaps it was the way Muniba was drawing attention to my sorest places by touching and commenting on them. A flash went off during my examination and when I turned, Sumala had the camera in his hand and was grinning. "You're taking your job too seriously," I yelled at him but that only drew laughter from the others and the 'Yes ma'am' salute from him. I got my own back when he was examined and I held the camera.

The nurse seemed satisfied with our progress and then dropped a minor bombshell. "We need to start you doing some exercises to work your back and arse muscles a bit." Many of the staff watched with a morbid fascination at the sight of our bruised bodies although, when I looked in the mirror earlier I thought the purple colour had faded a little but I still walked slightly bent over and with slower steps than normal. The exercises were like a slow motion gym class. Lifting arms sideways, upwards, frontwards and bending from the waist and the knees. Several times I was forced to cry out but she made me continue and several times I heard Sumala groan. Roger, as we expected, cried out loudly until the whole office including Riku laughed at him. The exercises made my tits wobble and I guessed that excited the men. Sumala got an erection, which the nurse flicked painfully a couple of times, causing him to groan but it went down. "We don't need that getting in the way," she grinned. Some of the girls sniggered and I thought, "That's worth remembering if Roger starts getting out of hand," but when I looked round I noticed that several of the men in the office had the front of their shorts pushed forward. Seeing that it was work time, they couldn't do anything about it. None of the girls were fazed by the sight and completely ignored it.

I certainly didn't feel any better for the exercises but I suppose they did some good. At least I now knew that I could move my arms more than I had without doing any damage to my back, even if it was painful. Worse was to come. "At lunchtime I want you to walk around the Market Square and back. I'm sure Riku will understand if you have a long lunch hour. You're working for an English magazine anyway and can call it research or something."

"You want us to walk there and back... ? That's a mile or more! I can hardly get from our room to here!"

She laughed at my expression of horror. "Well I suppose I could ask a couple of the guards to march you there at bayonet point."

"You're cruel!"

"No, you might even enjoy it." I could hear her chuckling as she headed for the door and then she turned, "And don't forget to dress properly!" The rest of the staff were all highly amused and Riku had to remind them to get back to work.

She proved right again. We did enjoy it and after the first two or three hundred yards walking became easier and even Roger stopped complaining. As we neared the square our progress slowed when people recognising our white skin, stopped to talk with us. Many of them had witnessed our whipping and frequently showed concern for our welfare, particularly Sumala's and mine. Roger though, was pointedly ignored I did feel sorry for the way they shunned him. I really couldn't understand the way their minds worked. A few days previously they had no doubt cheered when the whipping master laid the cane across our bodies and yet now they were concerned for our welfare. To my mind it didn't make sense but I came to the conclusion that they believed the punishment was necessary but once it was over, everything should be done to minimise its effect.

I made sure that we took a wide detour around the whipping post but no one was being punished, even so, just the sight of it and the surrounding stands, made my blood run cold. We dallied, or at least I did, at the colourful market stalls and I bought a few small items. Fortunately one of the girls in the office reminded me to take some money and before leaving England we had obtained £200 worth of Malawian kwacha, which were valid in Tumali although they also had their own version of the currency, rather like Scotland has its own British pound notes. We hadn't worked long enough in the IT office to be paid for our supposedly 'civil service' jobs. They worked on the old British system that paid you for the first week when you had worked the second but Shelumba had given us an advance payment so with that and what we'd bought from home, we were comparatively rich and could have probably bought the entire contents of the stall and still had some change. I wondered if we would be expected to haggle over the prices like in many middle-eastern countries but Sumala said, no. It seems honesty extended to market traders and the price they asked was always a fair one.

Almost as we left the square and started the return journey a woman stopped in front of me. "It's good to see you're able to get about again," she said. The voice and the face were vaguely familiar and then it came to me. She was the kind woman who gave me a drink and the cushion and held me while Roger was being caned. I burst into tears and gave her a hug while the others looked on with bemused expressions. I of course thanked her profusely and assured her that I would look for her when we came to the market again. In turn she invited me to her home and pointed in a direction that was away from the way we'd come. "Another day, ' I told her. Sumala seemed to delight in being in charge of my camera and took photos of us.

"What was all that about with Wyche?" Sumala asked when we were on the way again. I told him and asked about her. "She's been barren all her life but in her way she is as good at healing as Muniba is. Uses herbs and potions she collects from the forests and many prefer her methods to the modern ones.

Over an hour late we returned to the office and received a good deal of ribbing as to why we were so late but it was all very friendly. "Did Suma take you into the forest? Were you arrested for having white tits? Can we ask the nurse to order us to walk our stiffness off at lunchtime?" and so it went on.