Inner Circle (21 page)

Kathy nodded, and said softly, “Yes...yes, I know.” She spoke as if to herself, “When I am trained. When you have trained me.” She hadn’t taken her eyes from the huge black dog who continued to whimper, looking at Frederick, then at her, then back at his master.

In a low voice Gruber, standing at Kathy’s side, said, “Tell us the truth, Mrs. Ryan, why have you come here? Why have you traveled all this way? The truth, Mrs. Ryan, say the words.”

Kathy heard herself speaking with a voice that that seemed to come from someone else, “I…I’m here because of him, because of the dog. I’ve come here to let the dog smell my…smell my cunt.”

“And how do you propose to let him do that?’ Gruber said softly.

“With your permission, I’ll go up to his cage.” She paused, trying not to think of what she knew she was going to say. “Yes, up to his cage. I’ll press against his cage. I’ll lift my dress, and open my cunt to him. I’ll stand there letting him smell me. It will be just as you said.”

“But if he smells you he will want you.”

The huge black beast still lay on the floor looking up at her. “Yes, I know. I know he will want me.” Staring straight ahead, she spoke in a flat monotone, “That’s exactly the point, isn’t it?”

Gruber glanced at his nephew and nodded. “This beautiful face you’ve made up so carefully. Did you apply the lipstick and eye shadow for us? Did you brush your black hair and paint your fingernails and toenails for us?”

“No.”

“And did you select this revealing dress and the provocative shoes for us?”

“No.”

“For whom, then, did you come all this way and meticulously prepare yourself as if going to a lover.”

“Him,” she said, “Negra.” When he heard her speak his name, the dog stood and pushed his nose through an opening in the crisscross wires of his cage. He was much larger than she’d remembered. If he were standing next to her, his massive head would be even with her breasts. His hair was as black and shiny as her own. Frederick had placed a small raised platform in front of the cage. From under it he pulled three steps. The dog paid no attention to him. His eyes were riveted on Kathy.

Gruber released Kathy’s arm. “Go to him, Mrs. Ryan, if that’s what you want.”

“Yes, it’s what I want,” Kathy said more to herself than to the men.

Unsteady in the heels, her legs trembling, she mounted the steps. The dog whined and shoved his snout harder through the small opening. Kathy stood before him for several moments. Slowly she raised her dress until it had gathered up over her hips and around her waist. Her pussy was dripping wet, the dog’s nose reaching higher.

“Tell him, Mrs. Ryan,” Gruber directed.”

She closed her eyes, “I’ve…I’ve traveled a long distance and...and... made myself beautiful for you,” she whispered, her words almost inaudible, “Is this what you want? Do you want it Negra? Do you want me?” Negra whimpered beneath her and she groaned, thinking she was going to cum.

“Down, Negra!” Frederick shouted. The dog dropped to the floor, whining. Kathy had to hold onto the cage to keep from fainting. Gruber went to her side and helped her down. She collapsed on the stone floor and sobbed uncontrollably. Frederick was about to yell at her, but Gruber put up his hand, “Let her be, dear boy. One step at a time.” He took his nephew’s arm and guided him to a dark corner where a bar had been set up. Mrs. Foster stood behind it, a slight smile on her face, waiting to serve them.

In the shadows behind the bar sat two large young black women. No one spoke to them nor did they speak to each other. If Kathy’s encounter with the dog interested them, they didn’t show it.

Kathy still lay huddled on the stone floor. Her body had stopped quivering and the sobs diminished. Gruber congratulated himself, “I think it went rather well,” he said. Frederick nodded in agreement. Gruber held his glass out to Mrs. Foster, “Did you bring her cosmetics?” he asked. She put Kathy’s make-up case on the bar and propped at mirror next to it.

“Mrs. Ryan,” Gruber called, “you’ll catch cold lying on those damp stones. I suggest you come over here and celebrate with us. You needn’t crawl. We are much more civilized than the foreigners you’ve been associating with.”

Pushing her dress down from around her waist, Kathy struggled to her feet. As she started toward them, they all heard a low throaty growl coming from Negra’s cage. “Quiet!” Frederick shouted. The growling stopped. Frederick turned toward his uncle, “I think Mrs. Ryan has made a friend, a protector. The damn dog is jealous of us.” Both men laughed. There were three leather covered bar stools. Gruber and Frederick had left the middle one for Kathy. She tried not to look at either of them as she crossed to take her place between them. Frederick shoved the cosmetic case in front of her, “You look pathetic,” he said.

The mascara had streaked her cheeks and her lipstick was little more than a red smear. Mrs. Foster set a pan of warm water before her along with a small washcloth. Kathy rubbed her face vigorously. When she dried it and attempted to apply the eye shadow, her hand shook so much she had to stop. Gruber smiled, “Have a drink first. If I recall in your time with Abul you developed a taste for bourbon.” Mrs. Foster poured Jack Daniels over ice and added a little water. Kathy wondered if it was drugged but decided that now it didn’t matter. She drank quickly. When she put down her glass, Gruber patted her hand, “Just lipstick,” he said. She painted her swollen lips and coated them with gloss. Mrs. Foster refilled her glass.

Before drinking, she turned to the older man, “Doctor Gruber, how could I have done that? I’ve never…I mean I couldn’t dream of…”

“It’s Hamlet who tells us that “the readiness is all”. Several months ago we presented you with a threshold you were unwilling to cross. Tonight you stepped over it.”

Kathy shook her head, “But the notes, the bells, you put me in an hypnotic state. You forced me. I certainly wouldn’t have done such a thing unless you were making me do it.”

“I won’t deny you were drugged this evening and during your sleep we played the notes. If we hadn’t you would have been home in Pennsylvania by now.” He looked across at Frederick. “I had made a promise, so I simply couldn’t let that happen.” He stared at her until she had to look away. “However, I remind you, Mrs. Ryan,” he continued, “I cannot make you do anything under hypnosis that you are strongly opposed to, anything that runs counter to your basic nature.”

Frederick leaned toward her, “What uncle means is you wanted it.”

Kathy finished her drink. “I wish I were dead,” she said.

“Well, that’s a bit extreme,” Gruber chuckled. “However, I think you may wish to atone for your behavior here tonight. You devout Catholics never seem to lose your need for penance. It allows you to feel clean again.”

It was awhile until Kathy responded. “Yes,” she said, looking down, “that’s quite true.”

Gruber nodded at Mrs. Foster who opened a cabinet behind her and withdrew a leather whip. She placed it in front of Kathy who stared at it and then nodded. Mrs. Foster held the handle up to Kathy’s lips. Kathy kissed it.

“Ask for it,” Frederick sneered.

Looking into her empty glass Kathy said, “Please whip me.”

Frederick signaled the two muscular black women who emerged like ghosts out of the dark shadows. They led her to the center of the room about ten feet from Negra’s cage. He stood up and began to whimper and whine. One of the women lowered a pair of ropes from pulleys in the ceiling. Attached to these were handgrips much like those used in gymnastics. Kathy reached up and clasped her hands around each grip. Gruber called to her, “Your assistants are members of our household. They don’t say much, but they aren’t stupid. The shorter one is Nora, the other is Mona.” Nora had clamped an iron bar over the knuckles of Kathy’s right hand and then her left hand. There was no way she could release herself from the grips. When she was secure, both women pulled on the ropes until only the tips of Kathy’s toes touched the stone floor. The dog’s whimpering grew louder.

She heard Frederick’s high pitched giggle, “Negra remembers the whip. God knows he was almost beaten to death with it while he was growing up.” He turned to his uncle, “Do you think that in some dim recess of his brain he thinks we are training her to become just like him: loyal, and obedient, and completely devoted to his masters?”

In a whisper only Frederick could hear, Gruber smiled and said, “Perhaps, dear boy, the lucky beast thinks we are in the beginning stage of training her to become a mate worthy of him.” Both men chuckled.

Nora had taken a pair of scissors to cut away Kathy’s dress, which she then stripped, from her. “See if she’s wet, Nora,” Frederick said. The woman drew two thick fingers along the crease of Kathy’s slit and held them up. They glistened with her secretions. “We knew she would be,” Frederick shouted. “The whip excites her.” Under the bright lights, Kathy’s pale body gleamed. “Mrs. Foster has been waiting a long time for this,” Frederick called out. “She is excellent with the whip but even better with a thin cane. “Ask again, Mrs. Ryan. Beg her.”

“Please,” Kathy said in a small voice, “Please, Mrs. Foster. I beg you to whip me.” The whip was short and knotted along the lower third of its length. Before approaching the shackled woman, she dipped it in the bowl of water Kathy had used. Smiling, she once more held the handle to Kathy’s lips. Obediently, Kathy kissed it.

Mrs. Foster was in her fifties and slight of build, but she was wiry. She stood behind Kathy. “Present,” she said. Kathy tried to push her ass out, but since only the tips of her toes touched the floor she was unsuccessful. “Present!” Mrs. Foster shouted. Desperately, Kathy tried again but failed. “Very well, then, since you are being obstinate, I’m going to whip you until you bleed, and then I’m going to cane you until you bleed still more.”

She brought her arm back and with a whistling crack that sounded like a shot in the stone walled room, her whip left a livid red mark across Kathy’s ass cheeks. Kathy screamed in pain. Immediately the dog, Negra, began barking. The blows came in quick succession, each hard enough to drive Kathy forward and each left a welt that swelled and reddened. Although Kathy had been whipped often and hard at the Facility, that was nothing compared to this. She screamed until she couldn’t scream any longer. Meanwhile, the dog continued his uproar even after Frederick shouted at him to be quiet.

Mrs. Foster didn’t stop her hate raged beating until Kathy hung unconscious before her. Nora, held smelling salts under her nose, to which Kathy groggily lifted her tear stained face. She looked across at the two men, but couldn’t focus. They were grinning. “Good work, Mrs. Foster,” Frederick shouted. “But I take it you aren’t finished?”

Nora had handed Mrs. Foster a thin flexible cane, which the perspiring woman held up. “Not quite finished, sir,” Mrs. Foster said.

Kathy tried to find her voice. Out came a raspy whisper, “Please, I beg you, please, no more.” For an answer, Mrs. Foster brought the wicked cane down across the backs of Kathy’s legs. It left a mark that began to immediately welt. The dog was barking furiously and clawing at the cage. The cane pushed Kathy over the limit. She could only grunt with each stroke.

Before she lost consciousness again, the strange thought came to her that if Negra could get out of his cage, he would kill Mrs. Foster and possibly Doctor Gruber and Frederick as well. The last thing she heard was his frantic barking and the tearing of his claws against the wires of his enclosure. Once more she hung limp from the ropes. Her ass cheeks and her legs were crisscrossed with violet welts that seeped blood.

“Good show, uncle,” Frederick chuckled, “except for that damn dog. He’s never disobeyed me before.” The two black women laid Kathy on a stretcher and were preparing to carry her up the stairs and back to her room. They’d revived her somewhat, but she couldn’t speak and didn’t open her eyes. Negra lay on the floor of his pen, whimpering.

As the men rode up in the elevator Doctor Gruber said, “I’ve never seen Mrs. Foster like that. She positively hates our new acquisition.”

Frederick agreed. “It’s going to take some time for those cuts to heal. I hope they don’t leave scars. When we exhibit her she must be flawless.”

“Yes,” Gruber answered. “The beating was worse than I expected. In the future, we must remind Mrs. Foster to control her passions somewhat. As to the welts, I’m sure my healing salves will leave her alabaster skin as smooth and silky as it’s always been.”

“How long till we can renew her training?” Frederick asked.

“In two days, I should think.”

The elevator door opened into the Doctor’s study. Frederick turned to his uncle. “Thank you. This, as you know, means a great deal to me.”

Gruber placed his hand on his nephew’s shoulder. “I realize it does, dear boy. It’s beginning to interest me as well.”

Chapter Nine

During the next two days, Kathy was tended to by either Mona or Nora. A cot had been brought to her room and the two black women alternated twelve hour shifts. For the first day and night, Kathy lay on her stomach. Every few hours the healing salve was applied to her lacerations. On the afternoon of the second day she was given a bath and by that evening, although it still hurt to walk, the welts had become pink lines crossing her ass cheeks and the backs of her legs. “One more day and they will be gone,” Mona informed her.

On the third morning, she woke feeling much like her normal self. She ate the huge breakfast they’d brought her, took a long hot shower, and was pleased to see the marks, just as Mona had predicted, were gone. Mrs. Foster had not appeared nor had Kathy heard anything from Doctor Gruber or Frederick. Except for soothing quiet jazz during the day, the speakers had remained silent. The conviction that she was once again herself and not haunted by Gruber’s petit-sonata, made her determined to escape. The black gown, heels, yellow suit, sandals, and suitcase were still in the closet just as she’d left them. As Nora and Mona came and went, they never locked the door. Perhaps she could sneak out and simply start down the road toward Rhinebeck.