Our story began here.

Mary lay face down on the bed to cry herself out. Until this day she had never really considered the phrase ‘a good cry.’ She wished there was a word for the bitter-sweet experience; she was so sore behind she couldn’t bear it and yet she felt so… so clean. One day she would know the word catharsis, until then she only had this.

Katherine was feeling much the same, only her tears were over now and she felt soul-clean and reborn. She lightly fingered the myriad welts left by the birch, hissing and lip chewing in response to the finger-tip journey across her bottom. Twisting her head back to eye the red-purple welt-swirls rolling across her curves, she was ruefully satisfied.

Then she looked at Mary’s upturned bottom on the bed and felt her tummy tighten for some reason. It was a nice feeling and the sobbing girl on the bed felt like her sister. To Alice she felt closer still, the woman was like a governess to her, a hero.

“Until now I thought the expression won’t sit down for a week was just that, but rather think it might be literally true,” Mary said at last, now smiling through her tears.

“If either of us can sit down this week I will be very surprised,” Katherine agreed. Then wincing she made her way across to the other side of the bed taking very careful steps. “I will be so stiff tomorrow; from past experience I think it may be worse,”

Mary screwed up her face as she moved. “Oh God,” she groaned, “If I could bear it, I would be so liberal with the styptic.”

Katherine rolled her eyes. “Bear it or not I think we had better,” she said.

“Ooh,” Mary rolled her lip down and made a sad face.

Making a pained about turn Katherine took some stiff-legged steps towards the door. “I’ll get it,” she said.

“You do that,” Mary replied and lowered her face back down to the bed and thought about how the air scratched at the skin on her bare bottom.

*

Alice stood in the garden and thought over the previous few weeks. She had certainly earned her cigarette and she blew sensuous clouds of blue smoke and imagined herself a movie star. The girls were ready; whatever they did next they would face the world with confidence and purpose. If they chose to follow in Alice’s footsteps, then so much the better, Katherine was going to be formidable in that regard.

She took another drag on her cigarette and held onto the smoke to savour it. Bad girl, she thought, your one nasty vice, so unladylike. Then she let the blue vapour go with an air kiss and watched it swirl away across the garden.

If Mrs Baxter could see her now… Alice smiled with mischief, but her bottom clenched nervously all the same. It was the one habit from the military she had not been able to break. Even Mrs Baxter’s firm hand had not done that.

Katherine had decided to pour the ‘acid’ styptic onto a flannel and have a first course in private. The burn had been good but the tears had flowed again. She chewed her lip in a strange misplaced ecstasy. “You funny little girl,” she whispered to herself. She thought about how liberal she would be with Mary. It would be kind of fun.

Then feeling better she turned to go back to the bedroom. The conservatory door was open and through it she could see Alice just outside overlooking the garden. The governess was surrounded in a halo of smoke.

“Oh my God, she’s smoking,” Katherine blurted and then just gaped.

It was at that moment that Alice decided to turn and look back into the house and both she and Katherine’s eyes met. Alice felt sick.

Katherine wasn’t exactly crushed with disappointment but it took some of the shine of the day nonetheless. She sighed heavily as she watched her governess hastily press out the cigarette and gather up the butt. She had never seen Alice look so uncomfortable, all poise momentarily gone.

*

Mary had opted for standing up at lunch. As predicted the stiffness in her bottom and thighs was much worse the day after her birching. Luckily after a pillow biting session with styptic, liberally applied to her ravaged bottom by a grinning Katherine, the unrelenting soreness was much better. The small welts that had textured her bottom were now mostly smooth.

Katherine too was reluctant to sit, but her mind was elsewhere and her gaze kept straying to Alice who sat demurely sipping soup from a spoon as by royal appointment.

“You have something on your mind Katherine?” Alice said once the bowl was empty and the spoon was elegantly placed at the correct angle for a completed meal.

Katherine coloured and shot her governess a look. “I am not sure if…” she looked at Mary who was reaching for another bread roll.

Katherine had said nothing to her friend the night before and the fact that Alice had been smoking was so far just a secret between her and Alice.

“Not sure about what?” Alice pressed her.

“It would be impertinent,” Katherine said firmly.

Mary stopped mid mouthful and looked up. She was missing something.

Deciding on another tack, Alice took a deep breath. “I was going to wait until the end of the week, but following a letter to Mrs Baxter… well, you may as well know that you are graduated. On my recommendation you have been accepted as Sinclair Governesses… ladies you have passed.”

Mary screeched and leapt up, all burn in her bottom momentarily forgotten. Even Katherine grinned and for long seconds both women hugged.

“Oh Miss Eden… Alice I… oh my,” Mary gushed.

Alice waited beaming proudly until the girls settled down.

“What next?” Katherine asked.

“Certificates, handbooks, study guides and letters… they will all come in a few days,” Alice shrugged. “If there is a post or task available you may be given details. Else you may be called to the mother house or somewhere else for a seminar or further training.”

Katherine grinned and Mary began bouncing up and down like a kid again.

“It doesn’t mean you will be perfect and you won’t stumble. You will even require a mentor as you go forward. That can be me or another, depending on how you feel. I know I am not perfect.” Alice let the words hang.

Katherine suddenly felt she had been a bit prissy and oversensitive about her discovery of the smoking incident. It didn’t really matter, not now.

“If you do discover wrong-doing among our sisterhood or your future charges, what have you learned to do? Mary?” Alice sounded like an instructor again.

“No compromise. Blister those bottoms,” Mary said with relish.

“You beast,” Alice laughed. Then to Katherine she asked, “Do you agree?”

“Yes Miss Eden, I do,” Katherine felt relaxed now and smiled.

“Then Katherine, do you have something to say to me?” Alice said sharply.

“I saw you smoking,” Katherine accused. “That is not very ladylike and somewhat hypocritical of you.”

“Quite right and I apologise. What do you intend to do about it?” Alice asked.

Katherine swallowed and looked at a still gaping Mary. “What would you suggest, as my mentor I mean?” Katherine said as she turned back to Alice.

“You could write to Mrs Baxter or perhaps request that I do so,” Alice answered without a flicker. In fact she intended to do just that herself anyway and take the consequences.

“That would feel disloyal Miss Eden,” Katherine said bluntly. “I accept your apology.”

“Then I should spank you,” Alice said with a shrug.

“Indeed,” Katherine swallowed, “Shall I fetch a hairbrush?”

“Good girl,” Alice chuckled and then she took a deep breath. “I will write to Mrs Baxter on my own account, it is my duty. However, I feel I have failed you. So if you fetch a hairbrush you might consider which of us it is that deserves a spanking or something harsher.”

“I don’t think… I…” Katherine was flustered now.

“Think it over, when the papers come you will be a Sinclair Governess and until I am formally assigned as your mentor, if you accept me in that role, then we will to all intents and purposes be equals.” Alice said.

Katherine and Mary exchanged glances.

To be continued…