From the Top Shelf - The Authority on Discipline

Today we again return to Hope Hall, where, if you remember, we last saw Amelia, Clara and Lady Alicia in the drawing room. At the end of the excerpt, the three ladies were on their way to join the gentlemen. (If you would like to refresh your memory, read it again here.)

"Ah splendid! The ladies, at last. Amelia, my dear, and Clara too. May I say you both look radiant."

Amelia stared at the floor as Lord Alex greeted them, and tried not to pout too obviously. She could feel the hem of her smock against her belly, just a little too high. Furtively, she leant forward, in a futile attempt to cover her pussy. There were three men in the smoking room; as well as Jamie and Lord Alexander, who she had expected, there was a well-built man in a dog-collar, who had been chatting when the girls' entrance brought the gentlemen's conversation to a sudden halt.

Lady Alicia bent and placed the handle of Clara's leash in her mouth. "Clara and I have been playing 'fetch'. I'm afraid I had to smack her chubby bottom a little bit. Scamper over there now, mischief, and show Master Jamie your behind."

Clara did as she was told. Amelia glanced up long enough to see that the three men's eyes were locked onto her cousin's still-red rear. Then Lady Alicia clapped her hands together.

"But for heaven's sake, where are my manners? I forgot that you have not been formally introduced. Miss Clara Tattershall and the Honourable Amelia Colinbrooke, may I introduce our rector, the Reverend Richard Dawes. I expect you might have heard of him, for he is rather famous."

Heard of him? Amelia was thunderstruck - of course she had! How could any girl not know the name of the author of Dawes' Domestic Discipline, a copy of which sat on the shelves of every house of quality in the country? Who did not know the name of the man who had written a dozen best-selling works on every aspect of corporal chastisement, with especial regard to the punishment of skittish and wayward girls? The man whose disciplinary skills had been called upon by the highest in the land, and whose cane had been applied, so it was hotly rumoured, even across the bare bottoms of royal princesses.

Amelia was no coward, yet even she might well have preferred not to meet the man at all. To meet him so, half-naked and helplessly bound, was enough to make the bravest young lady quail. There was nothing for it, though. She took a deep breath and looked up, determined not to reveal the extent of her trepidation.

He was quite a handsome man. At least, his visage was less diabolic than she had imagined. He was clean-shaven, with rather short brown hair, greying at the temples. His face was ordinary - except for his eyes. They were grey, a cold slate grey, and there was something about the intensity of his gaze that caused Amelia, just for a moment, to forget to breathe. It was as if the man looked straight into her soul, searched and judged and found her wanting.

He kept his eyes on her for a long moment, and Amelia found herself mesmerised, unable to look away whilst he kept her locked in his gaze. Then he looked down at her lower belly.

"Charming," he said and took another pull on his cigar. Then he looked down at Clara, who was wincing as Jamie stroked her martyred bottom.

"Well, Jamie, it looks like you are teaching them a thing or two."

"Oh, it's early days," the young man said. "And Clara is a good girl really. Would you not agree, Aunt Alicia?"

Lady Alicia murmured her heartfelt assent to this as Jamie gestured with the stub of his cigar towards Amelia. "Of course," he said languidly, " this little minx is a different proposition altogether."

"Oh yes," the Reverend Dawes said quietly," yes, indeed. That I can see. For one thing, the way she is fidgeting, one might conclude she had ants in her pants." He grinned. "That is, had she any pants within which to contain such miniscule arthropods!"

Amelia's cheeks burned as the company roared with laughter. Just as this was fading, there was a tap at the door and Mrs Pritchard entered.

"The secure carriage has arrived, milord. You asked to be informed."

"Quite right, thank you, Mrs Pritchard."

She turned to Lady Alicia. "The new maid has been put to work in the kitchen."

"Would you think me very rude if I were to leave you with Jamie and the girls now, Richard?" Lady Alicia asked. "I also have some pressing staff matters to attend to."

The Reverend Dawes expressed his total satisfaction at being left with Jamie and his two young charges so Lady Alicia withdrew, to the accompaniment of a great deal of rustling.

The Reverend Dawes placed his hand on Amelia's stocking-sheathed knee and sighed. "You mean to tell me she is disobedient? Really, girl! That is shocking!"

What was shocking, thought the enraged Amelia, was that she had to stand in front of this man, naked from the waist down, as he idly caressed her thigh with one hand and toyed with her leash with the other. The Reverend had finished his cigar but was still sitting comfortably as she trembled, partly from fear and partly from a sense of outraged decency, before him.

"Clara here pulled a face or two, but she was obedient in the end," Jamie said. The girl in question was kneeling with her head on her master's knee as he stroked her hair. "Amelia is, I regret to say, refractory, disobedient and very, very stubborn. It will be a long hard road with her, I fear."

"No doubt strewn with thorns, eh?"

Amelia winced as he pinched the bare flesh of her right inner thigh, just above the top of her stocking.

"You know I am setting up a little disciplinary course for wayward girls later in the year, at the Rectory?"

Amelia found herself pinioned by those cold, grey eyes again. Fear suffused her and she seemed to be experiencing difficulty in breathing once again. The hand moved up her thigh, fondling the bare flesh appreciatively.

"Yes, you mentioned it. Just six trainees at a time, is that right?"

"That is correct. More and I might not be able to give each girl sufficient personal attention."

The eyes bored into hers. Amelia felt herself sway. For some reason her knees were reluctant to support her.

"Might do her good," Jamie said thoughtfully.

"Might do her a lot of good." Reverend Dawes gave Amelia a smile and squeezed her thigh. She could not quite suppress a low whimper of trepidation.

"Unfortunately" the Reverend Dawes drew the word out, "it would be impossible."

Amelia breathed again. Her sigh of relief was audible and he cocked a questioning eyebrow.

"I only mentioned the idea to a few friends and I already have a full course and a waiting list." His hand reached Amelia's shaven quim. It was impossible to step back as he held the leash taut. To her surprise, the fingers were gentle, fondling rather than probing. "That damned book, you see." The Reverend laughed, self-deprecatingly. "I get so many requests to demonstrate my methods, I would spend the entire year traveling the country if I acceded to them all. That was the idea of the course, you see. At least for six months I shall get to stay in Hatherby." He laughed but his eyes did not, remaining fixed on Amelia's.

"So your course is to be six months?"

"That's right. Six months...." his fingers rested on her lower belly, and as he spoke he began to press his finger, gently but firmly - one deep prod with every separate syllable, "of most rig-o-rous...disc-i-plin-ary...train-ing." Amelia, if you refuse to obey instructions, it's clear to me that you need to understand the term 'discipline'. Jamie, be a good chap and lend me your cane, will you?"

* * *

Amelia tried to forget about what happened in the smoking-room. She would simply refuse to think about it ever again!

"So pleased to make your acquaintance, madam." The Reverend Dawes had bowed low in mocking politeness - after her total humiliation. "I do hope we shall meet again very soon, my dear."

Lying in her little bed, the memory of his devouring eyes impaled her. How she hated that man! Then she groaned, and pressed her hands harder against her sex. It was as if her hand had taken on a will of its own. She did not want to do what her fingers seemed compelled to do, for she knew the risks it carried if she was found out.

Amelia moaned as the tips of her fingers found their target. Her body writhed in response to her own touch, and her squirming was making the sheets slick with perspiration. The clamminess of the sheets eased by degrees into a much more slippery embrace, as her perspiration provided ever more copious lubrication. The image of the Reverend Dawes' s fingers fondling her sex vied in her mind's eye with the vision of his transfixing gaze. Oh how she hated him! Amelia bucked and moaned as her fingers worked harder and faster. The man was a devil, a brute! She devoutly wished for nothing more to do with him.

Amelia gave a strangulated groan as her legs thrashed back and forth in their enfolding envelope. The point of no return was suddenly upon her. Amelia bit her lip to stifle a scream as her climax started.

"You filthy swine!" she cried, the hateful figure of the Reverend Dawes, cane gripped in his hand, watching as she forced her bare bottom up high, the only thing she could think of as the first shock-waves of her climax began to engulf her. Her cries became completely incoherent as she thrashed wildly in the sheet's moist embrace.