"It's past midnight. You can spend the night and the day as you are. On the day after you will get your whipping."
"Thank you, darling."
"Oh, don't be so bloody humble! Don't you think I feel badly enough as it is'?"
"Honest, I didn't mean! Oh, darling, I'm so sorry." The chains hold me. I cannot touch my darling or give her the heat of my flesh and find comfort in hers. I do take a tentative step, but it is too absurd. I am weighed so that motion is like wading in mud; the links from my collar warn they will soon snub me. I hold out my joined hands in supplication.
"Phemie!" There is an ocean of yearning in Yola's voice. She too takes a step, then determinedly backs away. "If I touch you I'm lost. It's best I go. I'll leave you the candle, it will last most of the night."
"Can I have a blanket?"
"No. You don't deserve that either. I'll leave it folded on the big chest. You can look at it and yearn. If it hadn't been for your James Pollard and your own stupidity you could be warm in bed with me." My angry darling is punishing herself as well as me. She wants me. I know, just as I long for her with a terrible anguish. But the penalty denies us both, and I must serve it. She flounces in exasperation from the dungeon and thuds shut the door and the cruel bolts… In the sparse light of the candle I cannot reach I survey my plight. It is not the first time I have stood thus in this spot. I know the feel of stone and the clutch of chains. I long desperately for the blanket I can behold but am denied; it is part of my punishment. I shrug and sink cautiously to the cold stone. It will take a little while for my body to warm it enough that I can sleep. It is a hard bed for a naked girl. But I am not angry. I deserve this. I do! I do! What is done is done. It is over. At least I thought it was. I did not know then that it was not over at all. It was just beginning.
A girl in chains wakes early in her dungeon. For her there are no delightful stretchings and turnings and relapsing into slumber. You dare not move an inch from the stone now heated by your flesh. It has become precious. You cherish this spot of the exact dimension of your contact. The candle has burned out, and the bit of daylight seeping through the brutal bars of the high recessed small window is more gloomy than its artificial glow, but it is enough for me to see the blanket so neatly folded to torment me. I long for it and rack my brain for expedients by which I may reach it. There are none! Chains are implacable. A chained girl need not deal in hope. A chained girl thinks. It is all she can do. I thought about the whip. Yolanda might not come to my dungeon for a long time, so I speculate as to how she may possibly modify the awfulness of a hundred lashes on my bare skin. I will get the hundred alright, but perhaps she may not make them as hard as if I was to bear a smaller number. It is a small hope, but unlikely. Yola is a stickler for discipline and your word being your bond. I had best not build false optimism. I ponder what I may say or try and do to touch her compassion and her love. But I have both already. I have a sort of pact with myself that I will not make my punishments more painful for my darling than need be. I will keep my tears and my pleadings until desperate pain releases them past the determination of my will. Yola and I have never discussed my pact, but we both know it is there. There is, of course, what we call 'weaseling,' This is any sly bit of conniving by which I may artfully reduce my pains. It is a fun thing we both recognize. It will not do me any good in the penance which confronts me now. I twist my chains this way and that. The night has made them chafe. The collar on my neck is an enemy, It is alive and malignant with the pull of its tethering chain. The collar makes a mockery of the dungeon door, if it was wide open I could not reach it. The chain from the ring-bolt only gives me three or four shuffling paces, I move the metal bands that circle me and find a little easement here and there,I think of the whip curling round my hips; it is part a memory. I have been whipped so often. Sighingly, I wait. I wait a long time. Here and there I know that panic which is implicit in my plight. Am I forgotten? Will I just lie here in these chains! Helpless. It is useless to cry out, my voice will not penetrate the stone. As the light increases I know the day no longer young. I am hungry. When Yolanda comes she is a small, female whirlwind exuding disturbance. When she clasps and kisses me it is as though we face a sundering. Her lips arouse me so that I strive to clasp her too, but my chains deny. For urgent moments we feast before she uses her keys to free my neck and my ankles. Her orders are breathless.
"Bathe and make yourself pretty, Phemie. Rush, rush!" She is half way to the door when she remembers and turns. "Oh, and put something on." In the scented warmth of the bath I forget the dungeon and the whip. I am pleasantly excited. Whatever portends now is certain to be better than what was promised. In my room I hastily garb myself in such lovely expensive trifles as my chained hands will allow me to fasten. I have just brushed my hair when Yola enters. I pose for her.
"Good!" Her eyes sparkle. "Oh, Phemie darling!" She lets the sentence die while she finds the chains for my feet, the ones that match those on my wrists: costly, gorgeous and cruel. I am still admiring them and kicking one foot tentatively to get their feel again when she unlocks my linked hands and replaces the sapphire bond with shining functional handcuffs. "I'm striving for a certain effect-" She backs away and surveys her work. I walk beautifully with chained feet. I've had lots of practice. The handcuffs give me only slightly less freedom than the metal they replaced.
"You poor darling! Hungry?"
"Starving."
"Good! Lunch is ready. We have company." I clink my way beautifully. I am secure in the knowledge that nothing of my slavery can embarrass me any more. I ask no questions. I am savouring the surprise I know Yolanda has prepared me for. The surprise is James Pollard.
"You wear handcuffs with a flair, Miss Carstairs." He has risen from his seat and now takes my cuffed hands and kisses each. An old world courtliness goes along with his boyish grin. I stand, nonplussed, and look to my Mistress for help. "Mr. Pollard is an associate of Roland Bolling, Phemie dear." She breaks the news as though it explains everything. I am about to ask who he is when he's at home, when I remember: Roland Bolling is famous. He makes vast sums from vast enterprises. Yola's father had known him.
"Mr. Bolling has heard of you," says James. I am not interested in Mr. Bolling. Hunger makes me aggressive. "Do you know what you let me in for yesterday?" I demand sulkily.
"I have already told him." Yola dismisses the subject. We seat ourselves for the lunch which I attack in a most unladylike manner until I catch Yolanda's eye and slow down. Mr. Pollard keeps an interested eye on my handcuffs as though wondering how I'll manage.
"I plead ignorance of your penalty, Miss Carstairs," James says without contrition. "Had I realized… " He embraces us both with a glowing smile. "I am endeavouring to incline Miss Harding to leniency."
"Phemie will receive her punishment in full, the fault was hers." Yola is keeping well on top of things. James might have been speaking of the weather. "I was wondering if her penalty might be reduced to… shall we say… a bare fifty." He is amused by his own pun, then adds: "With me watching, of course." I cannot explain or understand why I am suddenly one huge blush. Mr. Pollard examines this maiden manifestation with the same intent interest he had devoted to me from the start. Yola and I use Eliza Dolittle's famous exclamation in unison: "Not bloody likely!" He deals with his lamb chop unperturbed. "All in the way of business, of course," he says casually. "We'd expect a demonstration." Yola and I exchange a mystified glance. Her voice holds ice. "What on Earth are you talking about?" He is enjoying himself, he affects surprise. "Why, Mr. Bolling, of course. He wishes to purchase Miss Carstairs " It is a small bomb. Even I stop eating. "Are you trying to be offensive?" Yolanda is giving Mr. Pollard both barrels. "The suggestion you have just made is not funny." My blush has vanished. With sudden certainty I know Yola is afraid. We feel each other's vibrations. I too feel a cold hand upon my heart. James Pollard no longer seems a boy.
"No offense intended." He waves airily. "Business is a nosey influence. It is known that the delightful Euphemia has been purchased once. So why not twice? It's an honest approach."
"Euphemia is not for sale."
"Does she have anything to say about it?"
"No."
"She really is a slave then?" His voice is eager.
"Mr. Pollard, you are a guest here because Roland Bolling knew my father. May we, please, talk of something else?" Their use of my full name made me feel like merchandise. I was actually scared of something I could not name. "Go away, James Pollard," I said as coldly as I could manage. "All you do is get me into trouble. I'd never dream of leaving Yolanda. If she threw me out I'd come back. Whatever's between us is none of your business."
"You enjoy your chains?" His voice is mocking.
"Go away."
"And you'll enjoy your hundred strokes with a whip on your bare skin?" He was pushing hard.
"Oh stop it! Yola, make him go." It was as though I had said nothing. His voice was suave as he turned to my Mistress: "We were thinking in terms of seventy-five thousand pounds, Miss Harding. Money is terrible, you can't ignore huge sums. The silence was hard to bear. I dared not look at Yolanda.
"Cash, of course. Immediate delivery." He was intent as ever. My darling is disturbed, her fear comes to me in waves. I realize there is something I do not understand. "What do I have to say to stop this nonsense?" She asks. Her voice sounds tired.
"Just the single word, 'Yes'." He says it as though no other word could possibly be used. She stares him in the eye. "The answer is no. The discussion is ended. I mean it. No!"
"One hundred thousand pounds, Miss Harding." I gasp. My darling seems to freeze. James Pollard calmly spears a potato. The atmosphere is electric. The cold hand clutches me more tightly. "Why?" Yolanda puts all our puzzlement into the single word. He shrugs. "You've a right to ask that." His grin encompasses us both. "Fairly simple really. Money is only tokens in the world of Roland Bolling, but Miss Carstairs is quite unique. He believes he can use her talents and her temperament to advantage."
"How?"
"As a bribe."
"Loan her out to some old lecher in return for a business advantage? Is that it?" He had the grace to squirm. "Substantially yes, though you do underrate the charm of those she would divert."
"Does she divert them in bed?"
"Primarily, no."
"They would torture her?"
"You spread things a bit thick," he complained. "I am under the impression the dear girl is spiritually attuned to such a role."
"I absolutely refuse," I tell him firmly. He gives me his full attention. "Your ankles are chained, your wrists are handcuffed, Miss Carstairs… " His implication is obvious. I am a slave and have nothing to say about my disposal. The knowledge that he views me as such thrills me with an excitation I know well. I will not admit it to him, but I am what he believes. But with the thrill there comes the fear I sense in Yola. "You'd keep me chained up in between tortures?" I enquire icily. James Pollard dismisses the whole conversation with a disgusted wave of the hand. "We're snipping at each other. Suppose I've shocked you a bit. Working for Bolling I'm inclined to take things for granted. Sorry and all that. Should have wined and dined you a bit first."
"But whatever made you suppose I'd sell Phemie?"
"Double your money. Nice profit."
"How do you know-" Yolanda intercepts his involuntary glance at me. "Phemie, you told him? Oh Phemie!" I have hurt my Mistress. I long to die.
"My fault. I made her drink too much," James intervenes. I look at Yola, bereft, desolate, putting all my message of penitent love into my eyes. "Add it to my list," I implore contritely. "I deserve anything." I will not name a punishment before the male, but my Mistress will understand. Pollard laughs at us. I expect we look a dejected pair. "Eat and drink a bit," he advises cheerily. "And before you toss me into the street figure it out for yourself: Beautiful girl wears chains at receptions and parties. Chains are for real. Beautiful girl is owned by a beautiful Mistress who paid a lot of money for her because of unusual circumstances-" He raised his hand to check protest, "Yes, we know the story of the purchase. Nothing to be ashamed of. Then add to that the recent admission of a hundred lashes about to be administered to back and… well… to the person of said beauty. It does add up, y'know."
"But it's our own affair! I'll admit we've got a bang out of how people are mildly intrigued by Phemie's chains. But what you are asking is pure presumption."
"If I made you an offer to buy Castle Glynt you would not be offended by an honest approach."
"That's different!"
"It isn't, y'know. Principle's the same." I had become more and more aware of my chained feet and the handcuffs on my wrists. I wished I could shed them. Their prisonment of me gave validity to James Pollard's argument. The motions of the lunch table caused my handcuffs to glisten and clink. Another time I would have been proud of my skillful coping but now I longed to hide them in my lap.
"You're scared, aren't you?" He had sensed my disquiet.
"That means Miss Harding actually could sell you and you're nervous."