Chapter 2

By the time Pamela Reddick came down an hour later Joanna Swanne had had three cold Tuborgs, and listened to her sister Cynthia expounding The Territory. It was a very special place, with a certain "scene", a way of life all its own.

She herself, as she listened, felt weepy and hot and wet. She realized she too had perspired freely in that swift upstairs moment. Perhaps it was her state-they had said she would be unstable for a while-but while Cynthia chatted on, she suffered a profound and soul-searching fantasy in which she felt herself breaking down, suddenly bursting into tears, turning to her sister and shouting: All right, then, I confess it. I practically came up there just now, so bend me over and give me six of the best or the worst or whatever you like-whatever you do, beat me hard. Please!

"What?"

Pamela came down. The girl had put on tennis things, a short crisp pleated skirt and clean sneaks, and she went cheerfully, if somewhat shyly, up to her mother and kissed her cheek.

"Thanks, Mumsie."

"No hard feelings?"

"Except where they hurt most!"

They laughed and hugged. Joanna looked on, trying to swallow. It seemed inconceivable that this happy, insouciant teener had just been writhing under the flailing of a long, glistening willow wand. There was a trace of redness round the eyes, that was all.

Cynthia read her thoughts. "Hardly the picture of oppressed childhood, would you say, Jo?"

"I must say," she stammered awkwardly in reply, "she does seem awfully phlegmatic about it all."

Pamela laughed. "I didn't feel ... phel-mag-tic ... whatever you said ... at the time, Auntie."

"No resentment?" Cynthia asked.

" 'Course not, Mother." The girl frowned. "That second dose really brought me to my senses."

Cynthia slipped a hand in the girl's white panties. "Still beating warm, eh?"

"And tingling, Mummy."

They grinned together with complicity.

"Darling, do you think you would ... since your aunt has never seen...."

"Oh, sure."

She turned, flipped up her skirt behind, drew down her tennis panties, and bent. Joanna saw a strong series of red lines drawn, as if with a ruler, across the boyish buttocks. These parallel stripes darkened into angry ridges on the right, where several had overlapped. The whole bottom seemed covered. She stared, aghast yet attracted-fascinated by her own fascination.

"Blue, black, purple, yellow, green," chanted Cynthia, observing her closely, "they'll turn all colors of the rainbow, in fact. Pam was right to keep on clothes. I could have placed much better. Also, I was long."

"Long?"

"Yes. These strokes, here," she pointed, "lapped too far over on the right. We call that hitting long. The tip should ideally fall well into the right side of the buttock, but not round the hip."

"It stung like billyho, all the same, Mother."

"Why don't you write a letter to the New Statesman about it, dear." Cynthia patted the outstretched flesh. "Now run along, you young monkey."

"You find this method effective?" Joanna asked as the girl adjusted her dress.

It was Pamela who answered-"All I know is, I don't want any more like that in a hurry."

"Juvenile delinquency is unknown in The Territory," Cynthia said dryly. "So is adult-delinquency, come to that."

The girl snuggled up to Joanna. "Auntie Jo, do you think ... I mean, I was hoping you might give me another lesson perhaps?"

"Well, yes," Joanna answered, "if you're sure you feel like it."

"Oh I always play better after a few stripes across the fanny," was the answer, accompanied by a squirm. "Thanks a heap. I'll get my racquet and be out on the court." She darted off merrily.

"Playing with you," Cynthia said, "is going to bring her game up a lot. You still play darn well, Jo."

Joanna stood up slowly and straightened her skirt. "Just now ... what did you mean by that word?"

"What word?"

"Experience."

"Exactly what I said."

"You mean?"

"Absolutely. I get it myself. Bare ass and all."

"You ... like it."

"I hate it."

"Then why ... ? "

Cynthia shrugged almost pityingly. "Oh Jo, it's nothing I can explain. It's a ... thing. It's The Territory. Currently we have no complaints. To feel totally subject to someone, to obey rules and regulations under penalty, you don't know how wonderful that is for a woman. How exciting. Incidentally it makes sex about eight hundred times more sensational. You feel well and truly fucked if you get it up you after a hiding. Here," she ended, reaching for the side of her slacks, "do you want me to prove it to you?"

But Joanna was already taking the stairs two at a time. "Have to change," she called back hastily, and there was a catch in her voice as she did so.