Blushing at Both Ends (4 page)

‘I hate you, you bastard!' she whispered fiercely. ‘I hate you! I hate –' as our lips met in a passionate kiss.

Much later, as we lay together in a warm post-coital haze, Jenny murmured, ‘Paul?'

‘Mmmm?'

‘You know – Leslie's father sends him away on business a lot . . .'

‘Mm-hmmm?'

‘Well – I still think you'd make a lousy husband – but you're not too bad as a lover.'

‘Thanks a bundle . . .'

And, still later: ‘Paul?'

‘Mmmmmm?'

‘You were a rotten bastard to spank me so hard.'

‘You deserved it, my sweet.'

‘No I didn't! Well – maybe I did. But it still hurt awfully.'

‘Should damn well hope so.'

‘Beast! But, you know, if you didn't do it
quite
so hard . . .'

‘Mmmm?'

‘I think I might – almost – get to like it . . .'

So here we all were in church, watching Jenny and the gross Leslie plighting their troth – no other term could
encompass
such an overblown affair. Choir, bridesmaids, ushers, grey toppers, morning suits – and a bishop, no less, officiating. The full caboodle. Trust Isobel Cunningham to go for broke.

Gazing at the white satin that hugged the curves of Jenny's glorious rear end, I got a mental image of that delicious bottom as I'd seen it last night – bare and blushing beneath my punishing palm. Were those lovely cheeks still smarting a little? I wondered.

I couldn't suppress a chuckle at the thought. Flicky, fetchingly kitted out as chief bridesmaid, caught the chuckle and the direction of my gaze and flashed a conspiratorial grin, miming the rueful rubbing of her behind. Just as I thought, the little minx
had
been listening at the door. And enjoying every minute of it, I bet.

But then, so had I. And from what Jenny had said it seemed I might have the pleasure of spanking her, and bedding her, pretty often in the future – if I wanted. The prospect had its attractions, that was for sure. But, then again, did I really want to be Mrs Leslie Porchester's bit on the side?

No hurry to decide. In the meantime, I realised joyfully, a weight had fallen from my heart. Last night's little escapade had cured me; the pain Jenny had caused by jilting me was revenged in the pain I'd inflicted on her bottom. There was still an ache in my heart for her, and probably always would be, but I was free of my obsession – free to look elsewhere. At the thought I glanced involuntarily round and caught Flicky's eye again. This time, there was a definite hint of encouragement in her smile. Maybe because she wasn't wearing her usual baggy T-shirt and jeans, I noticed the once skinny teenager had filled out very pleasingly in all the right places and promised to be just as pretty as her sister.

Well, why not? And just think how that would infuriate dear Mummy . . .

But first things first. The bishop had droned his way to the punchline, the organ was pealing out corny old Mendelssohn, the bridal procession was filing out of church. Now for the reception, and the crowning moment of my secret vengeance – the joy of publicly assuring Leslie Porchester, in the presence of his newly wedded wife, just how lovely she looked as a blushing bride.

3

‘Reader, he spanked me': the
Missing Chapter from
Jane Eyre

MANY READERS OF
Jane Eyre
must have suspected there was more than met the eye in the relationship between Jane and Mr Rochester. On his part, all that tyrannical striding about and slapping his riding crop; all those sly, almost cheeky, retorts from her. Then there's Rochester's evident love of role-playing: at one point he gets into bondage gear, with fetters on his wrists; another time he disguises himself in drag. Just what
was
going on
?

The recent discovery, in a disused potting-shed at Haworth, of a bundle of forgotten manuscripts casts revealing light on the matter. Among them was a chapter evidently intended as part of
Jane Eyre,
which Charlotte Brontë decided – or perhaps was persuaded – to omit on grounds of delicacy. From the context, it may originally have stood between the present chapters 17 and 18. The Camden Institute for Disciplinary Studies is privileged to have been granted first publication rights to this revelatory document. Brontë criticism, it's safe to say, will never be quite the same again
.

That night I was restless, and could not settle to sleep. Mr Rochester's look, and that half-uttered sentence, so strangely truncated, preyed on my mind. What could he have intended?

I had heard the stable-clock strike two, and sleep was at last stealing upon me, when a strange distant sound reached my ears. I roused myself in my bed and listened more intently. It seemed – indeed, it surely was – singing. No words that I could distinguish, but a female voice intoning a melody full of wildness and yearning, and of far-flung lands lost and longed for. There was an infinity of desolation in that voice, and I felt my own heart touched by it.

Whose voice could it be? Surely none of Mr Rochester's guests – cool, poised Blanche Ingram, chattering little Amy Eshton – was capable of such poignant tones. Besides, their rooms were situated in another wing of the house, far from earshot.

Consumed by curiosity, I rose, donned a robe and ventured out into the gallery. The singing, though still some way off, now sounded more distinctly; it came unmistakably from that gloomy third storey that Mrs Fairfax had shown me when I first came to Thornfield Hall, and where I had heard the strange laugh.

Quietly I ascended the stair and entered the low-ceilinged corridor. The voice seemed very close now, as if its anguish could reach out and touch my cheek, and candlelight gleamed from below one of the heavy oaken doors. But, as I cautiously approached, careful to make no sound on the uneven floorboards, the voice seemed to recede, and the light with it, almost as though the singer had sensed my presence and withdrawn into an inner chamber.

Very cautiously I tried the latch. It yielded, and I entered the room. It was indeed empty, though there was a sense – and a scent – of some recent presence; an air of something languorous, and musky, and strangely exotic. I felt at once disappointed and relieved not to have discovered the singer; for though her song was eloquent there had been an uncanny, even dangerous, quality about it too, as if the mind from which it issued were not in true balance.

Yet there remained a mystery: whither had she fled, the singer of the night? No other door was visible save that whereby I had entered. The window was ajar, and for one brief eerie moment I could fancy she had changed to a bird, and taken wing. Then I recollected my better senses; Jane, I told myself, this is sad nonsense. The singer was human, even if deranged; and human beings require doorways to pass from room to room.

One wall of the chamber was hung with tapestry. I walked over and lifted it, and the mystery was solved. Two doors lay concealed behind the hanging. One I tried; it was locked, but the latch was warm, as if a hand had touched it but lately. The other opened to me – and revealed a treasure-house of many hues.

Dresses and undergarments –finery such as I had rarely seen, even on the backs of the elegant ladies who visited Thornfield –filled the closet to overflowing, and billowed forth as I opened the door, as if craving liberation. Bold bright colours, like the plumage of birds from some tropical forest; sumptuous fabrics, fine silks and organdies, muslins and velvets, tricked out with brocade and lace; and all imbued with that same warm drowsy scent that spoke to me of rich spices on far shores, and of dark eyes that sparkled in the dappled shade.

I know not what imp of perversity possessed me, but as if under some strange compulsion my hand reached out to these priceless trappings. Deep within me there spoke a saner voice, saying, ‘Jane, such as these are not for you; there is danger and the taint of luxury in the very weave of them. Touch them not; shut the closet; leave.' But I could not; the desire was too strong for me. Disregarding the voice of prudence, I lifted out from its hanger a corset of rose-pink silk frothed at the bosom and hips with snowy Brussels lace, such as might have graced the figure of a king's courtesan.

Nearby, there stood a looking-glass, dusty and crazed with age, but yet clear enough to serve its purpose. I stepped to it and by the refracted light of the full moon held the capricious garment up against me. My likeness, in my borrowed plumes, gazed back at me transfixed. ‘Can this be I?' it seemed to ask, incredulous.

Before I knew it, I had slipped off my plain sleeping-robe and donned the frivolous confection. It was fashioned for a woman a deal taller than I, and of fuller contours; but such was the craft of its designer that it fit me more than well enough, imparting to my figure an outline of unwonted voluptuousness, narrow of waist and rounded both above and below. I turned, glancing over my shoulder to consider the rearward aspect of my novel garb, and caught a glimpse of pale seductively exposed hemispheres. Jane, thought I in disbelief, had you but been endowed with a wardrobe such as this, even you may have been tempted to turn wanton.

Moving as if in a dream, I returned to the closet and once more plunged my arm into its depths. This time my trophy was a dress of emerald-green shot-silk, a wondrous creation that fell like a waterfall in layer after layer of gathered flounces. The queen of some remote sea-girt isle might have sallied forth clad in such a shimmering verdant glory.

Once again I turned to the glass with my latest adornment, holding it to me by the shoulders and waist. The transformation was yet more startling. With my face shadowed in the oblique moonlight, and my loosened hair flowing to my shoulders, I might almost have been the belle of some colonial ball.

Such was the lustre of the dress, it seemed to glow in the half-light, and as I gazed at my image in the glass it was as if the illumination in that low drab chamber had imperceptibly increased. I must have become lost in a reverie, for it was only after some moments that I realised that the room was indeed growing lighter; and
that
the source of this alteration was not the dress I held, but the glow of a candle-flame approaching along the corridor and nearing the open doorway. A spasm of alarm seized me; I stood rooted and unable to move, or even to turn myself around, as a dark broad-shouldered figure armed with a riding crop loomed in the aperture. I was discovered in my flagrant misconduct – by Mr Rochester.

I expected to see anger on his visage; but, as he raised the candle to throw light on me where I stood with my back to him, I was amazed to see his expression in the glass was one of horror, as if faced by some doppelganger, or a revenant from a long-lost past. At this I turned to confront him, and as the light struck my face his gasp turned to something between a growl and a chuckle.

‘What! Jane!' he exclaimed, regarding me in my purloined finery. ‘What the devil are you doing here? And rigged out like this!' He examined me more closely, seemingly more amused than wrathful. ‘You surprise me, Jane,' he observed. ‘You harbour more capacity than I had imagined for vanity – and for mischief.'

Mortified by the hint of mockery in his tone, I could only hang my head and blushingly murmur my contrition. ‘I am sorry, sir,' I said. ‘It was inexcusable, I know. I was carried away by curiosity.'

‘So I see,' he responded. ‘As for sorry, Miss Eyre, that we may come to. But for the moment you had best return these draperies to the closet. No, stay –' as I started forward. ‘Better you retain the corset, and resume your night-robe over it. Then replace the dress whence you found it.'

He considerately turned his back while I effected these changes. In my confusion I had wholly forgotten my half-clad state; and my blush deepened as I realised that my posterior nakedness must have been visible to him on his entry, and then in the looking-glass throughout our colloquy. Hearing me shut the closet, the emerald silk once more incarcerated in its depths, he turned.

‘And now, Jane,' he said, offering his arm, ‘I think it as well that we quit this place, and its associated temptations. Allow me to escort you back to your room, where we may discuss this night's escapade in privacy.'

Our removal passed in silence; from shame on my part, while Mr Rochester seemed musing on how best to requite my transgressions.

Once we gained the seclusion of my chamber, he sat down on a chair and gazed broodingly at me from beneath his heavy brow. ‘Well, young lady,' he remarked at length, ‘what am I to do with you?'

‘I fear you must dismiss me, sir.'

‘Dismiss you – for such a peccadillo? No! But you have been miscreant, no question of it, and your curiosity might have brought dire consequences upon you, and on others too. You are habitually so grave a person, Jane, and so sagacious beyond your years, that I often forget you are yet scarce more than a child in years; not yet nineteen, indeed. Tonight you regressed; what you did was no more than the thoughtless naughtiness of an inquisitive half-grown girl, and I feel it can be most fittingly requited as such. Come here, Jane.'

With this he reached out, grasped my wrist and drew me to him. At first I was uncertain what he intended; and, by the time I knew it for certain, it was too late to utter more than an incoherent gasp of protest. The next moment, to my great disconcertment, I found myself prostrated face-down across my master's lap.

Reader, he spanked me.

I blush to recall it; though not so vividly, perhaps, as my defenceless posteriors blushed beneath his punitive palm. Yes, defenceless; for, prior to executing my chastisement, Mr Rochester lifted back the hem of my robe, tucking it up beyond my waist and exposing, to my inexpressible shame, the naked orbs of my hinder parts.

Now was I amply requited for my vanity. The frivolous corset, designed at once to flatter and to tantalise, not only left my bottom quite bared and unprotected, but also plumped it out, enhancing its natural curvature and disposing it, I doubt not, the more temptingly as a target. Mr Rochester evidently relished the sight, for he stroked the tender globes – causing me to tremble as much at the intimacy of his touch, as from apprehension of the discomfort that this same hand would soon, I feared, inflict upon the parts it now caressed.