Renewal

Happy though I was to have become my Master's bride, and enjoy the delights to be found in his arms, the sweet total surrender of letting a man take possession of one's body, opening it, thrusting deep, penetrating and ploughing it to his, and therefore to my, pleasure, there was a snake in our Eden.

With my dear husband's eyes unable to distinguish more than a slight difference of daylight and darkness, I must do everything for him; select his clothes, help him to dress, aid him with his ablutions, cut his food, put his glass near his hand. All this service I gladly gave, and guided him on his walks about the estate, telling him how everything did, being his window on the world, my eyes his eyes, though what they saw could only be conveyed in words.

I would read for him the papers that concerned the let farms, the tenancies of the cottages and a thousand other matters of business but, though it was a service, it also became, first, a responsibility, next, a position almost of authority, a condition so dangerous to the female nature and which, by reason of Mr Rochester's infirmity, could not be neutralised by a Master's rod.

As the months passed, my unhappiness increased. On a dreadful day, I caught myself putting him aside, as I scanned the rent roll for discrepancies, telling him to wait while I completed the list. He appeared not to notice my disrespect, and unfeminine behaviour, waiting patiently until I declared the list accurate and satisfactory, but I went to bed that night full of remorse, seeking to make up for my unforgivable behaviour by an even greater tenderness to him, and even more complete giving of myself to his hard body, but the poison in my conscience would not cease its burning. At last I begged leave of my Master to go on a visit of a few weeks.

"What! Do you tire of me so soon that you would rush up to town to sample its delights?" he cried. "I would be hard put to it to remain calm with you away."

I could not endure his reproaches, and told him all my fears. In particular, how my necessary usurpation of authority was not conducive to a female's health of mind, and the unhappiness it brought me without the corrective influence he would have once exercised, searing my flesh to make whole my mind.

"And how will leaving me cure your sickness?" he enquired more kindly, but still with an underlying anxiety that cut me to the bone.

I explained. I would send for Diana and Mary, who might serve him as well as I, though I hoped they would not take my place in his bed or, if they must, for his necessary comfort, they might try and treat it purely as an act of charity, and not conceive a continuing taste for it. His wants made sure of, I would take me to Lowood, where I would commit myself to their knowledgeable hands, to be broken of my growing selfness, and made aware of my proper station as wife and companion.

"May I have your permission to essay this?" I asked humbly, "I would not be away longer than a month. I would make it less, but my plan involves some considerable preparation, before the final cathartic consummation."

"So long as you come back to me unscathed, you may do as you wish," he generously allowed.

"I cannot guarantee to come back unscarred," I said, "for I have been too long without the necessary discipline of the rod, and only the most severe and searching application is likely to be effective. I shall tell them they must do nothing to cripple me but, beyond that, they must be told that there is no limit to what may be done to me. I have grown too strong-willed for mild measures, and only the harshest and strongest treatments will suffice, for I must be broken utterly, if I am to be made whole again after, but I will advise them that I must be left able to serve you fully, and my body must not be so impaired as to limit your pleasure in it."

With this he pronounced himself content, and I was given permission to write to the Superintendent at Lowood, explaining my requirements, and offering a suitable fee for my keep and treatment. Matters were soon settled, the more easily since the Summer vacation was upon us, and the staff and servants would be available, nor would the presence of an adult in the establishment disturb the pupils.

A week later, Diana and Mary arrived. It was soon settled that they should fill my Master's lack of me by sharing his bed alternately, Diana as the eldest, going first, each tending to his wants that night, and the following day, before the other relieved her of her duty.

In some strange way I was more reassured to have the two of them parcel out the duty in this way, than have either look to his wants on her own. That same day I left for Lowood.

I had conveyed the generality of my requirements before hand by correspondence, but much remained to be settled. Miss Temple sat me in her study, called for tea and scones and, after a little of that polite enquiry that is a necessary prelude to proper conversation, asked me to lay out the exact nature of my problem, the precise details of its proposed cure, and the limits that should be observed.

With no more ado, I laid out my plan, while she made neat notes on a little pad.

"My problem is simple," I explained, "but so deep rooted that the curing of it will take time and effort, which is why I have come to you. I am grown confident, self-reliant, and capable of governing the estate without the aid and guidance of a man. These might be accounted virtues, if I was still subject to a decent discipline, a Master's rod on my buttocks, his strap across my palm, his crop across my shoulders, so that, at all times, I had no doubt of his authority, and the care and support it promised. But my own dear Master is prevented by infirmity from carrying out this duty, and I have become disused to the healing power of the whip on female flesh, making her nature whole, where self-will has corroded it. I see nothing for it but to be broken entirely, so that I may be set right."

Miss Temple sighed, as she poured more tea. "Oh, that more women could see their needs and faults so clearly, and the means to correct them. What precisely do you have in mind?"

"Firstly, this over proud spirit must be humbled. You must set me to the most degrading tasks in your establishment, kept in the starkest of surroundings, the solitary cells might suffice when not actually engaged in labour, and fed on a corresponding diet; bread and water, or perhaps kitchen scraps, would do. I should serve thus, with daily punishments, for ten days or more, for I have a will most unbecoming in a woman, and nothing less will even soften it. You must aggravate and prolong the treatment if you do not detect any returning humility in me. After this first preparation, you may proceed to those excruciating torments that were such a memorable feature of detention here."

"And still are," confirmed my hostess, passing me one of her delicately fluffy scones, "it is always so amusing to watch the little darlings faces, as they squirm on their carrots, or fidget after a session on the wedge."

"And so must I," I confirmed with conviction, though my heart was pounding, and my belly nauseous at the thought of the physic I was prescribing myself, "but not for ten, or even thirty minutes at a time. You must mount me on those penitential seats of learning until I scream, faint, or beg for mercy, and then show me none. Give way to my pleas, and I shall live to err another day. You must leave me whimpering and breached, my resistance shattered."

I could scarce speak as I uttered this dreadful doom upon myself, but struggled on in strangled tones, "it would be as well that you spared my buttocks at this point, so that they may recover to a less ravaged state for the final act. If a whipping is felt expedient, my back and hands will still be available."

"And then?" Miss Temple left the question hanging in the air, her teacup raised half way to her lips, one delicately curved eyebrow arched in interrogation.

"And then you must flog me to the blood and beyond. A flogging to put all others that have been, here at Lowood, in the shade. There is no limit set to what you may inflict save only, that any scars I carry be not visible in the ordinary way, and there is no risk of my being crippled in the long term, such that my service to my Master be impaired in any way. It is accepted that, for some weeks, perhaps a month or two, I might not be able to move without halting, but there must be nothing to diminish Mr Rochester's pleasure in my body, once the first injuries have healed."

"I think that is all quite clear," Miss Temple said, putting aside her notepad, "Will you have another scone? No? Then shall we begin. Kindly stand, and remove your clothes."

I set aside my bone china cup, and rose at her bidding. My fingers went to my hem, and I pulled my pearl silk gown over my head. The strings at my waist loosened, my petticoats descended to the floor with a whirr of silk and taffeta. I bent and scooped them up, laying them carefully on the chair, where now lay my gown. Next the tight lace of my corset. My fingers fumbled for a moment, though I tried to hide my mounting agitation, then the tension round my hips, and under my breasts, eased, and the stiff confection of whalebone, steel and satin, eased away.

As I folded it, too, on the chair, I felt my slightly heavy dugs swing loose, enjoying their unrestrained freedom. Soon they felt cool as well as loose, as my shift rose over my head, and the air caressed my swelling bosoms, their thick teats, already aroused, hardening further, at the evidence of their exposure, and their vulnerability to the torments promised them.

With nothing left to do above my waist, my hands now went to my drawers, untying the bright ribbons that held them, so that they too, slid down over my thighs, until I could stoop and lift them off the floor. I went on one knee, and then the other, to unbutton the little polished boots in black leather, whose heels helped raise my slightly inadequate stature to a more becoming height, then I rose again, to stand on one leg at a time as I peeled off the stockings of black silk that were all the covering left to me.

Now I stood quite bare before Miss Temple. Her tone, indeed her whole manner, changed abruptly.

"Go to the cupboard, Jane, and fetch the best rod. You should have a taste before you are taken away."

I needed no telling what cupboard, or which might be the 'best' rod. How many times had I fetched it, either for my own correction, or that of a pupil I was in charge of. I opened the door and made my selection. A heavy smooth length of some oriental jungle plant; the type introduced by Mr Brocklehurst at a time when he considered the already severe discipline of the school should be tightened up by a couple of turns of the cruel screw that governed it. There had been screams from even the hardiest of the fair delinquents who came to suffer it, and it was held in much awe. They were not alone. I felt sick in my belly as, naked, I crossed the room and offered the rod to Miss Temple in the approved manner, dipping to one knee and proffering it on the palms of both outstretched hands.

"Assume the position," my erstwhile hostess, now my chastiser, ordered in a commanding voice, and, again, I needed no further direction.

There was the Turkey rug, set where there was clear room all around it, for an arm to swing, a rod to fly. Standing on the precise part of the pattern where each candidate for correction had to place her feet on pain of extra strokes for her default, I bent and clasped my ankles, feeling the slight fattiness of my spread buttocks stretch, the skin made even more tender and easily scored by the action.

"Eight strokes, Jane," pronounced my executioner, "and you shall have the same on waking and sleeping each day of your sojourn here, until it is time to let your buttocks heal, so that you may bring them clear to your final reckoning."

It was a salutary beating. Miss Temple had lost none of her skill and force in the interregnum, since I had seen her last. The first stroke surprised me so by its ill-remembered venom, that I squealed in agony, and my fingers dug into my ankles as I fought to absorb it, and the surging flood of pain that followed. If this was what I had to suffer, every morning and every evening of my stay, I would be a sad and contrite creature by the end, never doubt it.

I was still moaning when the second stroke caught me, slicing in just beside its fellow, sending me up on my toes as I rode the pain. Another and another burrowed into my fatty underhang, the wood seaming to have teeth of steel to rend my flesh. I had become unused to this treatment, forgetful of just how much this healing correction could hurt, cutting into one's very soul. By six I was crying out, my scream merging into a grunting sob and, when I was finally commanded to rise, after the eighth flaming brand had been laid across my throbbing nates, the tracks swelling to thick bruises the colour of crushed blackberries, hot and full of blood, my eyes swam with tears.

I knew I had been soundly beaten and, oh, the relief. It is not good for a woman to go without the feel of the rod in her hinds for too long, or she forgets her station, and loses the comfort of a Master's correction and control. Now I felt at home again, as if returned from an exile. I hurt dreadfully, but I felt a strange happiness.

After I had kissed the rod, and returned it to its place in the cupboard, I stood to attention on the mat of correction, my back straight, my hands at my sides, fighting the urge to clasp my wounded bottom and try and squeeze out the pain that raged in it. Miss Temple gave a pull on the bell cord and, after a minute, one of the female servants entered.

"Take Miss Eyre to the detention cell," she ordered, "she is to be secured close, with no privileges. I will give you your further instructions later. Meanwhile all you need to know is that she has been given over into my charge entirely, and you will take no orders from her, nor listen to any plea she may make. Secure her tight, and return."

The servant curtsied in acknowledgement of her instructions and, gesturing to me to accompany her, left the room. I followed, naked and sore, still keeping my hands from my scorching buttocks, though I longed to cradle and comfort them, but that would not serve my redemption, and I kept them to my sides, though my fingers twitched continuously.

That night I slept on straw on a stone floor, a chain locked around my neck, the throbbing in my hinds only slowly subsiding, and a sickness in my belly at the thought that the strokes would be repeated the next morning, and evening, and every morning and evening for the days that stretched ahead. I did not dare think of the other torments that awaited me, let alone the ultimate flogging I had committed myself to.

There would be, could be, no turning back now. I had entered the tunnel that led to salvation, and would only exit it when I had passed through the fiery furnace, and been cleansed of my pride and presumption; had regained that proper submissiveness that is the hall mark of the true woman.

For ten days I endured the rod, morning and night, sometimes managing to take it with the stoic passivity that submission to discipline demanded, sometimes screaming, when my resistance was low, but always taking it; I had no other choice. I came to dread the sound of footsteps along the corridor, as I lay on my straw in the early morning light, to cringe from the rod in Miss Temple's implacable hand, to whine and sob as I was made to bend and present my inflamed, bruised and welted buttocks for yet another hellish laving.

For twelve hours each day I worked naked, always under the eagle eye of one of the domestics, armed with a vicious strap to encourage my efforts, scrubbing hard floors on my hands and knees, carrying water and coals to the furthest parts of the buildings, emptying the night soil, washing heavy cloths by hand, dragging back-breaking loads of wet linen sheets to the line, toiling over them with the ponderous flat iron in scorching heat, no rest save short breaks for my meagre diet of bread and water, or to attend to calls of nature.

My longing for the twelve hours of solitary rest on my straw was tempered by the knowledge that, to gain it, I had first to submit to another terrible eight searing cuts of that 'best' rod that Miss Temple wielded so expertly, and so mercilessly. Gradually my spirit was moulded into something like the quality of acceptance that was necessary for me to be cured of the assertiveness and independence with which I had become infected, but it was nearly a fortnight before Miss Temple decreed that I should move on to the next stage of my rehabilitation.

Now, although any unoccupied moments were still filled with the arduous domestic labour of my first weeks, the emphasis was placed on those trials and torments that had so troubled the great girls, myself included, when sentenced to serve a term in 'detention', for we were not only detained, but detained under such conditions as to make each fair culprit quiver in her belly, and clench her knees together, merely at the recollection.

Each day for a week, I was taken to the room where such sentences were served and subjected to some form of torture, for it could be described as none else, that would rack my body and, especially, those parts that proclaimed me woman, for this was an establishment for females and, I, one guilty of offences against the proper behaviour and bearing of my sex.

The first day I was set on the bar, a yard of iron, its section square, an inch a side, and twisted like a corkscrew. It was set in the wall, projecting horizontally about four feet from the ground. I was bitted, with a cruel piece of cold iron set in my mouth, pulling my lips back at their corners, a loop of chain joining the ends behind my head. My hands were tied behind my back, the cord securing them taken to the chain from the bit, dragging my head back until I could only look upwards.

Pinioned thus, I was made to stand on two stools, astride the bar, and lower myself, until the most intimate part of my person touched the bar. The grim domestic in charge of the arrangements parted my nether lips, and I was made to set my inner moistness on the corrugated metal edge. When the stools were removed, the bar sank into this tender flesh with what ghastly result only another woman can imagine. I faced a blank wall, my head thrown back by the bit and its hawser and the arc of my body was completed by a strut projecting from the wall below the bar, at a level with my knees, forcing them back just as my shoulders were forced back by the tension on my neck.

It was a position of the most appalling agony, one's whole body set in terrible tension as one essayed, in vain, to find some way of easing the grinding torture in ones fork. At detention we great girls had been taken down after twenty minutes, weeping and unable to close our thighs properly, nor walk without a stiff legged spraddled gait, but, this time, I had to endure four full hours.

The room where these exercises were conducted had only small high windows and, with these close shuttered, I was left in almost compete darkness, to contemplate the iron in my vulva that penetrated to my very soul. When they came to take me down, I was racked with sobs, their broken hiccuping only adding to my torment, as they rocked me on my iron saw edge. Let down I could only writhe on the floor, clasping my aching groin. The tension of trying vainly to control my pain had set my muscles and every part of me, my shoulders, my belly, my tight stretched ribs, each contributed its share of protest. It was some minutes before I could stand, and then only with aid, and I had to lean on the burly domestic to regain my cell, my legs hardly able to support my weight, my thighs parted, my knees stiff, waddling with the gait of a goose, trying not to inflate the awful pains that still racked my poor female parts.

Another day I was put on a 'carrot', a ribbed wooden pole, as great as the most endowed male member, and set in a saddle shaped stool. Trussed with bit and wrist restraint as usual, I had to advance my shrinking anus to the tip of the pole, then sink my weight upon it until it penetrated my sphincter. Mercifully it had been anointed with grease, or it would have surely torn me, so large was it, and so strongly shaped, with its ridges and deep whorls fashioned in the dense hard wood. I shudder to think how I might have fared if I had not specified that I was to receive no hurt that could not be cured before my Master felt the loss.

Once it was fairly entered, my legs were kicked away from under me, allowing my whole weight to fall on the monster, driving it sharply up into my gut, and I screamed as I felt it drive against my entrails.

It was so large and long it pressed hard against my organs, seeming to reach almost to my lungs, so that I could only breathe in shallow pants. The position was intolerable, but had to be tolerated, for there was no way of escaping it, or even alleviating it, my ankles having been tied tight under the stool, and there was worse to come. Every half hour or so, when the domestic visited to check my state of misery, she would work a lever projecting from under the stool, whose effect was to raise and lower the prong. From several minutes at a time she would pump the lever up and down in a barbarous buggery, seeming to suck my guts out of my body, as she plucked the invader from its deepest intrusion, then ramming me to the gills as she sent it plunging home again.

Each buggering made me scream in pain, each session left me weary and near collapse, though the latter was denied me by the security of my confinement on the monstrous organ. After four hours I was again helpless to stand, my cramped legs quite unable to support me. Moreover, for days, I could not pass a motion except in agony that made me groan and left me with tears running on my cheeks.

And so the days passed, each bringing a new torment. My twice daily beatings, of eight fearful cuts each, which had reduced me to a cringing wretch after nearly two weeks, had ceased on my transference to the perils of the detention room, in accordance with my agreement with Miss Temple that I should go to my final flogging with a relatively whole buttock.

After the repeated barrages of eight full blooded cuts, morning and evening, my normally somewhat soft and slightly fatted posterior had become tumescent, hardened and ridged, its once white surface laced and lined with thick welts of all hues from blue to brown and green, the bruising going deep, making a hard underlayer where I had been soft and pliant, my flanks scabby where cane tips had dug in, breaking the skin. The whole mass was tender and aching in the extreme, every fresh cut into it a torture that sent me writhing and screaming, even the thought producing a groan, a cringing flinch.

Now the twice daily exercises had ceased and I was healing fast, but do not think, because I was spared these cuts to my buttocks, to make room for more and worse, I was not whipped. I had agreed that I might be flogged on other parts of my person, while my buttocks recovered, and so I was. Not a day passed without I was put to the triangle, for my shoulders to be lashed with a long leather whip, had to hold out my flinching hands to receive cut after cut from a thin stinging cane.

On one occasion I was made to sit on a stool, my arms secured, my bit in place. I was kept from undue movement by a thin wooden spindle set in the stool, and penetrating my sphincter; not the torture of the 'carrot' but salutary enough, and preventing any untoward movement. Braced back as they were, my arms left my breasts free and thrusting prominently before me. the anxiety of my position, and the dread of what was planned, for I was not usually informed of my fate each time, had caused my teats to harden, a frequent enough occurrence with me, and they stood darkly engorged, throbbing with the blood pulsing inside, standing out from my out-thrust globes like babies thumbs.

My whole body quivered when Miss Temple herself approached bearing a long, but very thin and whippy cane. I knew at once what she planned, and made a mew of fear and protest, but would not, even then, cry out for mercy. She stood above me and smiled down into my upturned eyes, but said not a word. She did not need to do so for I understood only too well what she planned and despite my earlier weakness, held her eyes, and made such nod of assent as my strained neck permitted.

With my head tilted back I could not see all her movements clearly, but the thin line of the cane was full in my vision. I watched in awful fascination as it rose, hovered, then fell. It passed below my sight and a lance of fire flamed across my proffered breasts. I shrieked, and twisted my upper body as much as my bonds and the prong in my anus permitted for it was excruciating, the pain unbearable, the sensation such that my body seemed to crawl and squirm of its own volition, quite out of my control.

As I steadied, the narrow outline of the cruel instrument entered my line of sight again, and swooped down onto the throbbing globes. Six times the cane cut me in the soft white flesh of my breasts, three times above the nipples, three times below, then Miss Temple came to stand where I could look into her eyes once more. I moaned as the tip of the cane touched, first one nipple, then the other, but nodded my submission.

She moved to one side, and I could see neither her nor the cane, but I heard its passage as it flew down towards my tender points. It hit the teat that stood so proudly and vulnerably on the left breast. My shriek had barely ceased to echo around the chamber before I heard the air parting again, and the gristly stub on my right breast flamed, my body jerking as I screamed afresh. Miss Temple came to stand before me again. With gentle delicacy she laid the tip softly on first the left, then the right dug. Again I controlled my writhing features enough to nod.

I was trembling uncontrollably as she went to my side, my whole body tensed, my heart pounding, a small nasal whining escaping me. The rod sang its thin keen note, and anguish exploded in the already wounded teat. I shrieked, I howled, I flung my head about, although it added to my torment, the bit cutting into my mouth. When I had regained myself a little Miss Temple crossed over. When I had ceased to scream and writhe, and was aware properly of my state, I sat on my penetrating perch and rocked, sobbing and moaning by turns.

My last visit to the detention room, I spent the whole appalling day set on the bar. It was the longest day of my life and, indeed, seemed to last several lifetimes, lifetimes in which I went from hell to hell and never could escape. I had no respite in all that dreadful ten hours. Sometimes I shrieked and pleaded, sometimes I sat as still as I might and did no more than groan, sometimes I relapsed into a hot red world of near unconsciousness, but always, always, the bar pressed into my tender flesh, the agony set in throughout my body, my strained limbs shrieked and protested their own torment. I was but barely conscious of them taking me down, and remember nothing of being returned to my cell.

The next day nothing happened. I lay in my straw, nursing my wounded vulva, eating the bread and water I was given three times a day, free from toil, free from torment, but not free from fear itself, for this was just the lull before the storm. I was being rested so that I might face the tempest that would burst on me tomorrow or, rather, so that I would have the strength to remain conscious throughout and escape none of its rigour, none of its healing power. I wanted it and I feared it. I lay in my hard bed cringing from the pain to come, yet resigning myself to it gladly, for it would return me to my Master whole and sweet again, fit to love and serve him.

Morning came, and with it, both the domestics who had guarded me, worked me, flogged me, set me on the varied instruments of suffering I had endured, and bearing with them, to my astonishment, the clothing I had discarded so long ago in Miss temple's study.

"Come," they said, "you are to be made ready," and they brought water and soap for the first time in my incarceration. They washed my filthy body, for I was rank with stale sweat, old tears, my hair matted and lank. They dried and combed it, brushed it back to something of its usual gloss. When they came to dress me, I recoiled.

"How so?" I cried, "Am I not to be flogged today?"

"Indeed, yes," they assured me, "to the blood, but you have a visitor, and it would not be seemly for you to appear as you were, and naked."

A visitor? Who could it be? But I was too wrought up by my coming ordeal to speculate further and meekly allowed them to dress me. I was given a good breakfast in the comforting warmth of the kitchen. Bread and water, certainly, but also hot tea, with sugar, porridge with rich milk, and an egg and some butter with my bread. Clearly I was to be nourished to keep up my strength, so that I might go the whole distance without falling by the way.

Despite my taut nerves, and the twitching of my belly, I made a good meal, but the tension was becoming unbearable. Twice I had to use the pot to empty my bladder. The bell indicating a call from Miss Temple's study tinkled on the kitchen wall, and it was with relief that I obeyed my gaoler's command to rise and follow, but it was not to the study she led me, but the Duty room, that scene of salutary corrections, fierce enough to draw cries from even the staunchest 'great girls' after a swingeing sixer, or terrible eight, with the duty cane. At the door she knocked and, without waiting for an answer, opened it and thrust me through. The door closed behind me, as she left me to my fate.

I dropped to my knees, as the occasion demanded, and looked up, expecting Miss Temple and her cleansing rod. Instead my eyes encountered a pillar of black, a tall austere column topped by the forbidding features of the Reverend Brocklehurst in person!

"Sir," I stammered, foolishly, "I did not think to see you here. I thought you in Scotland," for had not Miss Temple told me just that when, naturally, I had enquired after him during those polite exchanges, all those weeks ago, while we were sipping tea, before settling the exact nature of my reformatory correction.

"Indeed, Jane, I was," the Great Man replied, "I had undertaken a tour to spread my own theories on the education and correction of girls, and to learn from some of the stricter Dominies with experience in the field. I was able to convince several that our penal canes are more corrective than the tawse or strap they favour, and thus have made a small start on bringing its benefit to the Scottish girls in their schools. However, when word reached me that you were to be broken by the rod, that the normal bounds of its use were to be set aside, I abandoned all my arrangements and returned poste haste, to conduct the operation myself. Miss Temple has kindly lent me the use of the room. I have brought my own instrument."

I followed the direction of his glance and saw, balanced on a small table, a deadly length of polished whalebone. It was known of, of course, in our little scholastic community, but no-one I knew had had experience of it, it having been declared too wounding for the tender buttocks of growing girls. As if reading my thoughts, they must have been only too obvious on my fearful countenance, Mr Brocklehurst continued.

"I do not think you have experienced this rod, Jane. It was considered too fierce for young girls' soft flesh, and I conceded the point, allowing that it might be more beneficial in any case, to award a larger number with a more normal cane, since the correction would be prolonged to the good of soul and body, but you are a grown woman, with well developed parts," he shot a glance at my figure as I knelt still before him, "you will be able to take the full force without danger to health, and we are agreed your tally is unlimited, as many as is needed to break your rebellious spirit, and render you as docile and submissive as a woman should be."

"You do me much honour, Sir," I blurted out, shaking with a mixture of emotions, fear, appreciation of the honour he paid me, dread of what he was capable of doing to me, the searing of the soul, as well as the body, that he accomplished so inexorably.

"Then we shall begin," he ordained, "bare yourself to the rod, Jane. Strip your buttocks so that it may search them out, cut into your soul, break your stubborn will. Remove those flimsy protections that cover your hinds and present your flesh for the cleansing."

I did as I was bid. I could see now how wise Miss Temple had proved, in having me bathed and dressed, fed and in my right mind, my toilette complete, before sending me to meet my fate at Mr Brocklehurst's iron hand. It would not have done for him to have had the offence of my befouled and sweat stained body presented to him rank and naked, while the very act of stripping myself of my coverings before him sapped at my obstinate will.

I removed my garments one by one, until I stood before him in my stays and stockings, all else below the waist gone, my trembling buttocks quite bare, as were my thighs to the garters at my knee. He offered me the ivory hardness of the whalebone to kiss before it started its work, and I pressed my lips to its polished thickness, my legs turning to jelly, my belly squirming, those fatty roundnesses that would, no doubt, bear the brunt of his attack, clenching behind me as if trying to hide in one another from the terrible visitation to come.

"Let us see how far your obstinacy will take you before it bends," he said, in considered tones, "you shall take your strokes bending, a dozen at a time. Should you flinch from the rod, it will not be counted. When you admit failure, I shall secure you, so that the exorcism may proceed despite your weakness."

I advanced to the familiar board, over which 'duty' strokes were customarily taken. It was a strong timber structure of horizontal planks, well braced, and coming to about hip height, but equipped with a movable leaf that enabled it to be set to suit each girl condemned to it. The leaf carried a padded leather boss, against which one pressed ones pubis. At the base the wood protruded in a shelve carrying two slots, about half a yard apart, into which ones ankles slotted. One then bent forward, the boss under your belly, forcing one to rise slightly onto one's toes. The top of the board was furnished with a stout, spring loaded bar, which could be hinged down to press into the small of ones back, canting up the pelvis, making the buttocks, and especially the underparts, open and accessible to the rod.

Ordinarily it was not thought possible that a girl could endure four strokes or more of the dreadful 'duty' cane and hold herself still, so we were always secured to the board, by the bar, and rods across the slots holding our ankles, our hands either held by the duty prefect, or holding grimly to a bar set low down on the far side of the board, but this time I was to be bereft of the comfort of any restraint, and made to offer myself voluntarily until my courage failed.

I set my legs apart, my ankles in the slots, pressed my throbbing pubes against the sweat stained leather of the boss and bent to grasp the bar below.

Oh, how many times had I done so before, but never in such fear as this. Before a stroke had fallen he had reduced me to quaking terror, my soul already pleading, though I tried to put as brave a face as I could upon it, taking my place quietly, and keeping my stretched buttocks from clenching as best I could though, despite me, they still flinched, giving little fatty quiverings of fear as I waited for him to proceed.

With deliberation, he removed his jacket, and undid the cuff of his right sleeve, rolling it back until his sinewy arm was exposed to above the elbow. He took up the rod and gave a trial cut or two through the air behind me. My buttocks clenched of their own accord at each thrumming whirr as it sliced the air. In a moment it would slice my nether flesh as fiercely. There was stillness for a moment, and then the thrumming came again. At its end all hell broke in my buttock, the flesh there seeming to have been pressed by a bar of red hot iron. My body rocked under the impact, my fingernails scrabbled at the bar. I gasped sharply and hissed between my teeth at the surging pain that followed. He held me thus for quite fifteen seconds, to let me savour it fully, then dealt me another such.

The first had fallen quite high, across the fullest part of the buttock; he had no need to proceed from a lower point for there was no limit to the number of strokes I might be given. The second fell a bare half inch below the first, he was going to cover all the ground, and the effect was no less.

Stroke by stroke he laid on the first dozen, taking me from above my centre down to the very crease. I could not maintain my first resistance very long and by five or six was in such agony I rewarded him with a strangled cry at each cut, sobbing gasps filling the intervals between, stretched out until he judged I had the full benefit, before extracting the next vocal tribute.

At the end of a dozen, he let me rise for a moment to gather my breath, then ordered me into position for my second tranche. I set myself as best I might, but the rod was a brute, and it could not go on for ever. Soon I was screaming openly, and despite my resolve, my hands flew to my beaten rear on the eighth of that set, costing me a further stroke, and again on the next. I took fifteen to complete that dozen. I was crumbling now, and could scarcely manage two strokes in three the next round, shrieking my pain at every stroke, and needing eighteen to reach the end of the dozen.

By now my buttock was a solid beaten mass, the thick welts merging to form a blue black pad across most of the under curve, from greatest width, right down into the crease below. I pleaded with him to secure me for the next, but he refused.

"No, Jane," he replied, "you must be defeated if you are to be saved. Bend again and present your buttocks. Only when your control is gone will I proceed to the next stage. For now you still have too much will remaining."

Sobbing and tear stained, my face red, my hair in disorder and my behind in torment, I bent for him once more. Again and again he cut me, the rod slicing excruciatingly into tumefied flesh, where, already, bright droplets showed where the devastation wrought by the rod had caused the skin to give way. I could scarcely manage to hold my position well enough to keep my score advancing, jerking upright with a scream in my throat, my head thrown back, my fingers seeking the burning wounds in my rear, but still he would not grant me the boon of bondage.

My dozen became two before I had another respite, and still he would not grant my tearful plea for the blessing of restraint. Crying helplessly, I forced myself to go down again, to stretch the stiffening bruises in my haunches, opening up the ground for the rod to fall on. He held me sobbing there for a long moment then struck. I shrieked my way through three atrocious strokes, three whistlers that lifted my whole body with their force, then collapsed on the floor, my legs giving way from weakness, clasping my wounds, and totally defeated.

Now he accepted my surrender. Grabbing me by the hair, he dragged me to my feet, and threw me over the board again, first raising the boss a notch. He spread my ankles and set them in the slots, shooting the bolts that held them fast. He forced me to bend by a further tug on my hair, tying my wrists down tight to the lower bar. The upper bar closed over my back, canting up my pelvis and causing me to go up on my toes. The air on my vulva informed me how exposed I was behind, how open to his view, how vulnerable to that terrible rod.

Now everything was out of my hands and will, poor broken thing that it was, and all I could do was lie there as he hewed my buttocks, as a woodcutter fells a tree in the forest.

Stroke after stroke cut in, each drawing a scream of agony from my defeated throat. He thrashed me on and on, my wounds opening until the blood flowed down my thighs, basting every part from the fatty fullest, down to the crease and beyond, lacing my thighs with finger thick welts, that lamed me for weeks thereafter. Only when my shrieks and screams became so hoarse as to be almost inaudible did he cease.

I remained conscious throughout, though my world was limited to my own body, and a red mist around it, in which I seemed to float as sheet after sheet of searing pain enveloped me. I was no longer conscious of myself as self, only as thing, a mewling cringing animal, governed by pain. I had passed from wilful woman, to will-less woman, to Mastered woman, and was the better for it.

I was scarcely conscious of being taken down from the board, nor of the domestics carrying me out to where John waited with the carriage to take me back to the manor-house. Someone forced cordial down my throat, before laying my broken and bleeding body on the cushions of the conveyance, and after that I remember only the painful jolting of the road, and a feeling of being whole again, fit to return to my Master.

It was evening when our long ride ended at the door of my loved home. I had recovered enough for my mind to clear, but my body still hurt, nor would my limbs function as they ought. John stopped the carriage at the foot of the steps that led to our front entrance, and opened the door for me. He would have helped me out, even carried me to where my Master stood, peering with his poor sightless eyes towards me, at the top of the steps, but I waved him away. This was something I must do myself, cast myself at my Master's feet, proclaim my repentance and penance and beg his forgiveness for my wicked breach of what a woman owes in submission and deference to her mate.

I slipped from the carriage, but could not stand. Never mind. I would crawl, it would be more proper so. On my hands and knees, clad only in the corset and stockings I had worn for my flogging, my hair dishevelled, my raised and naked buttocks displaying the appearance of raw meat, I dragged myself up step by step, until I reached my Master's feet.

Considerate as ever, he had understood my need and made no move to send me help, but let me abase myself as a true woman will. I covered his boots with my kisses, put my arms around his dear knees, and confessed my sins, declared what penance I had performed, avowed my heartfelt repentance, and my resolve that I should never offend again, and begged his forgiveness, which he readily accorded me. Absolution came in his arms and his bed, which Diana and Mary had tactfully vacated, retiring to their own rooms to leave us together to our reunion and reconciliation.