"Welcome home, Phemie," said my Mistress, Yolanda. We kissed, we cried, we nuzzled, we bit. Abandoning our flood of incoherencies we made lesbian love within the constrictions of our chains. It was awkward, but we were compelled by a sudden feverish desire that made light of fetters and links and a measure of helplessness. To have my beloved Yola again was good, good, good! I revelled in her flesh and in the pungent scent of her — all else forgotten! Our devouring reached such an intensity that when it was over we slept. How strange a reunion! Never had a Mistress welcomed back an errant slave girl in so great a depth of humiliation. My darling knelt on the stone and played with her shackles. They were heavy and secure. I had worn them often enough by her decree. Now she was a more helpless slave even than I. She told me of her hatred of the span of links that fastened her to the wall. It allowed her a few steps, but that was all. She could not walk half way to the door. She stood to show me her full panoply of prisonment, kicking at the chain which joined her feet, holding wryly for my inspection the fetters upon her wrists, raising a captive hand to feel the metal about her neck, a band purely punitive since it was joined to nothing. "They've got me, Phemie," she confessed wanly. "And now they've got you too. It's what they wanted… both of us."
"But James-"
"They'll probably send him back to his precious Roland Bolling with an admonition to keep his mouth shut."
"You don't think…" She shrugged resignedly. "No, they won't kill him. This lot don't need to. Bolling will tell him to behave and shut up. Bolling's probably fed up to the teeth with slave girls."
"You're not a slave girl, darling." Yola raised her chained hands. "Aren't I!" It was then I saw her marks. "You've been whipped!" It was as though I uttered sacrilege. She smiled at my consternation. "The fainter ones are from your boyfriend's fun the day he and his louts took you and whipped me. The fresh ones are because I was considered far too haughty in my insistence that I owned this Castle. I was told they would teach me a lesson. I suppose they did. Oh Phemie, when I think of all the times I've whipped you!" Once more we wept together. This time I laved my darling's wounds with my tears and my wet lips. I never even thought of mine. We finally got around to the facts of why Miss Harding and, Miss Carstairs were chained in a dungeon. We would have preferred to make love on and on and on! But you can't, can you? I mean, there comes a time… I told Yola my adventures. I know I'm a wicked little something or other but I just couldn't bring myself to tell about the male thing and me. With my darling in that dungeon those huge male organs piercing me again and again just didn't seem real. They were gone! Why hurt this girl I loved, and to whom I belonged. I told of my captivities, that was enough. I made her laugh with my story of my handcuffs and how Fate seemed determined I should wear them behind my back forever. A girl with whipmarks does not have to prove anything she tells. They are a scarlet testimony of anything she admits. Through all my chronicle I had been aware of Yola's troubled eyes seeing beyond me into something else, some thing she did not wish to talk about. Abruptly, I broke the thread of my chatter and eyed her demandingly.
"What is it, Yola, you haven't told me? What is it? Whose prisoners are we?" We were kneeling on the stone, facing each other. She gazed at me with what seemed an infinite pity, and spoke a name…
It began a long time ago as girls count time. A travel folder and a wish to get away. Alone! A two week holiday that would be pure adventure without the nag of girl friends or boy friends or relatives. I was terribly young. It was my first time. I chose the wrong place. Someone had hinted, but I had just laughed. The travel agent had just shrugged and said there were always stories about any place. Any doubts I started with evaporated in the excitement of the flight. The North African resort of my choice was colorful and smelled to high heaven. It had a lot of flies and men who wanted to sell you dirty postcards. It also had the most exciting shops. They were run by the most villainous chaps you've ever seen; so evil in appearance you could feel quite sure they'd be ever so nice if you got to know them. I mean, no villain is deliberately going to look like one. The chap who kidnapped me was positively hideous. Since I'd insisted on being alone it wasn't much of a trick for him. He handed me a brass pot to admire, then while my hands were busy he draped a rug over my head and tied a cord around tight. He then put me in a big wicker basket, the kind used for laundry, and some men carried me away to slavery. I could not see a thing, but from sounds and motion I could guess. In the dark in that damn basket I was frightened almost out of my skin. I knew for sure I'd be taken to a brothel and broken in by a huge nubian, but the only mental picture I could think up was the reassuring smile of that blasted travel agent. To the woman who released me I was just another job of work in a hard day. She did not have too much English, and seemed unwilling to use what she had. "You are now slave girl," she said brusquely. "You will please to behave."
"You don't think I'm going to stay here, do you!" I demanded angrily. I was so frightened I was brave. She just smiled quietly and motioned with her head. I looked around and got the message. It was a very large stone room. The windows were barred and the door was closed. The woman went to one wall and took a whip from a nail where it had hung waiting, presumably for me!
"You needn't think you're going to use that thing on me!" I affirmed with a fine British confidence I did not feel. She used it on me with great competence and a frightening absence of emotion. To her I was a silly child. I was clothed, so she contented herself with my legs which were bare. I skipped and ran and howled, but she was always there. She slashed away at me until I was reduced to a pleading bundle on the floor. The only way I could think to shield my legs was to sit on them the way a hen sits on her eggs. The woman's name was Lotta. After the whipping of my bare legs I treated her with great respect. I gave instant obedience to her slightest word. I had no idea where I was. The wicker basket had been loaded into a truck and the journey had been long. Between the basket and having my legs whipped I was more than ready and very surprised by the modern bathroom. Lotta stood by watchfully while I made myself very clean. There were oils and perfumes she poured in the water for me. You can guess what was coming. I never did get my western clothes back. With the help of a giggling native girl who looked at me with the most avid speculation in her wise eyes, Lotta bedecked my nakedness with some pretty odds and ends and bangles that made me feel twice as nude as nude! I was then escorted to The Presence. He was old. Hawk faced. Arab. I liked him instantly, there was something paternal about his lined face and bright intelligent eyes. He said, "Good afternoon, Miss Carstairs." In perfect English. As I said, I was very young. Instead of returning his greeting I said frostily: "The police will make a frightful fuss about this, y'know." He inclined his head, just fractionally. "You will give me much pleasure, child. You shall have no regrets." I muffed everything. I said the first thing in my mind: "But you're old!" Surely grandfathers didn't ravish maidens! His eyes clouded momentarily, but his voice remained even: "I must ask you to forget escape, the police and the past. None of those things exist for you now. All in my house welcome you." I was a pompous little pussycat. "If you let me go now I won't press charges," I said in the manner of the best fiction.