Lucy cast down her eyes at once.
‘Sorry for disrespecting you, sir,’ she said, as ingratiatingly as she could.
He chuckled. ‘Too late,’ he said, patting her thigh. ‘You’re going to wish you hadn’t let his Lordship go to town on your bum. Bad move, Luce. Anyway, go on. You came back here.’
‘Yes, we came back here and Richard made me strip to my underwear, then he sat me at the kitchen table with his knife and the birch rods, and made me cut off all the rough, sticky-out bits that might break the skin. Then I had to kind of whittle it.’
‘Really? Whittling? Woodland crafts?’ Rob chortled. ‘Amazing, the skills you can pick up in the course of a corporal punishment fetish.’
‘Yes. Then I had to tie them all together with tape, until they were in a big bunch. Well, you’ve seen them before, I’m sure.’
‘Not in real life.’
‘I’ll show you it later. Richard makes me keep them soaking in a bucket of salted water. Stops them drying out, apparently.’
‘Really? And how do you explain a bucket of birch rods in your bathroom to visitors?’
‘I don’t have visitors, apart from you and Richard.’
‘Just as well.’ He smiled, but then he seemed to look at her more closely, a flicker of concern in his cheery blue eyes. ‘You sounded lonely just then.’
‘I’m not lonely. I’m fine. Anyway.’ Lucy wanted to hurry the conversation off this track. ‘Back to last Sunday. Where was I?’
‘In the kitchen.’
‘Uh, oh yeah. So, well, he birched me, basically.’
‘Lucy! You can’t just leave it like that. I need details. How many? What position? How did it feel? I need to know if it’s something I should be seriously considering.’
He put his slender fingers under her chin and tilted it, forcing her eyes up to meet his. His smile always looked so kind, Lucy thought, and yet he was capable of remorseless severity.
‘I had to take down my knickers and bend over the kitchen table,’ said Lucy, her voice quietening now. She still found having to vocalise her experiences difficult and embarrassing. She knew that was why both Richard and Rob always insisted on it, too. Well, partly. That, and the wisdom of knowing your opposition.
‘Legs together or apart?’
‘Together, this time. I was scared of a rod whipping somewhere it shouldn’t. Since it was my first time, Richard allowed it. Next time he’s going to make me stand with my feet hip-width apart, he says. I should trust his aim. I suppose it is pretty good, in general.’
‘So’s mine.’
‘Yes, my dear sir, so is yours.’ She gave him a cheeky smile, enjoying his little chinks of insecurity when they appeared. ‘I got twelve. I didn’t think I’d make it through. The first two or three didn’t really feel that bad, just a bit warm and stingy, but it soon got very painful.’
‘Did you yell?’
‘Yes, I did, I’m afraid. And I very nearly cried.’
‘Seriously? You? You only cry when I’m hideously cruel to you.’
‘I know. It really hurts though. It feels as if it’s getting under your skin. Reminded me of those stories of martyrs being flayed alive. When I looked at myself in the mirror, afterwards, I was quite surprised to see that there wasn’t any blood. Though there were these little red pinpoints, where
I hadn’t whittled quite as thoroughly as I should have done.’
‘They’re still there. It must have looked incredible, just after he finished.’
‘It did. A lattice of long red lines, all cross-hatched and raised, all over my skin.’
‘Fuck. My mouth’s watering. I’m going to have to do that one day. Show me the rods.’
She took him through to the bathroom where they lay, looking perfectly innocuous, like those arrangements of spray-painted twigs in vases, in a corner by the shower.