A Mother's Painful Duty

"It is hardly necessary to go into any further detail as to why you are being punished," Mother said.

"No, Mommy," Emily said. .

Her womb felt as though it was turning to water. She always felt this same mixture of terror and exhilaration as she lay like this, knowing there was absolutely no possibility of mercy in this position so completely was she in this implacable woman's power. Her mother was using the hairbrush and soon the sound of Dr Mappamundi's sobbing was blocked out by the loud, persistent crack of wood against skin and Emily could not help shrieking with pain. But in a few moments Mother had taken Emily into a state of agony that was almost beyond pain, a dimension of numb defeat where her soul seemed to leave her body and she swooned into a breathless void of subjugation in which she knew she was obliged to beg for mercy with the certainty only of being refused, thus confirming her mother's complete dominion over her and her own perverse joy in her submission. Mother always had this power over her, as though able at will to lead her as a prisoner into a flat, featureless landscape where there was neither desire nor sin nor any will to be free. When her mother finally stopped beating her Emily lay there, convulsed and frantic with pain, barely aware of her mother's breath on her naked back. Her mother released her grip on her wrist and tapped her on the shoulder and Emily immediately struggled to her feet, humiliated that she was unable to resist dancing around the room holding her buttocks, her mouth open in a soundless scream under her mother's cool, sardonic gaze.

Later, when she was dressed again, gasping with pain, Emily joined her mother and Dr Mappamundi in the older woman's bedroom. Her mother sat in her armchair looking down at them. Emily and Dr Mappamundi were both in agony and unable to sit down, so that they had to kneel on the carpet, placing the two younger women in an appropriately submissive attitude. Mrs Armstrong had attractive muscular legs, which she crossed elegantly at the knees, showing off her shapely, fine-boned ankles, her skirt neither too short nor too long, riding up just an inch above her kneecaps which glowed faintly through the bronze of her nylons.

"Emily, you will be pleased to know that Dr Mappamundi will be staying for a few days," Mrs Armstrong said genially, "while she makes some changes in her domestic arrangements."

" Chris and I may get married," Dr Mappamundi said, giving a painful intake of breath as she shifted to a more comfortable position. Chris was her current lover. "Until that time we can no longer live together and I'm going to ask him to move out."

She groaned slightly as she got to her feet.

"Your mother has rightly pointed out to me the irregularity of my lifestyle. She has also persuaded me that it will be to my advantage if she advises on my conduct on a more long term basis and, to that end, I shall be calling here monthly at least to hold discussions with her."

In spite of her pain Emily burst out in despair "No, Dr Mappamundi, No! Even if I am not free, you are. You are a free spirit."

"Hush, Emily," Dr Mappamundi said, "You are in good hands."

Emily's mother raised her hand to silence Dr Mappamundi and looked at Emily, outraged, her beautiful intelligent eyes flashing with anger Emily dropped her gaze, unable to sustain eye contact with her mother. She couldn't believe what she had done. She hadn't meant to rebel. Although sore, she was always at peace after one of her mother's thrashings, even if it was the peace of utter humiliation and defeat, and knew exactly where she stood. And now she had made this stupid outburst on Dr Mappamundi's behalf. Dr Mappamundi wasn't even on her side now. And her mother abhorred stupidity just as much as disobedience.

"To your room, Emily," her mother said. "I find I am not finished with you yet."

Part 3

When the Spanish maid carried the second suitcase out to Dr Mappamundi's little car she had a smirk on her face and Emily hated her for it. The hood of the car was up and the handle on the passenger door was still broken, so the maid had to lift the bag over the door onto the seat. When Dr Mappamundi came down the stairs she was wearing no makeup and it was plain she had been crying again. Shamefacedly, she kissed Emily on the cheek, then turned to speak to Mrs Armstrong who pointedly ignored her, turning to arrange the lilies on the massive hall table. Dr Mappamundi's shoulders slumped in defeat, then she turned and went out to her car. Before Emily could follow, Mrs Armstrong turned decisively and pushed shut the massive door, leaving the hall in its usual semi-darkness, only lit by a stair window. The crackle-surfaced oil paintings retired again into the gloom and the row of ivory elephants, the colour of decaying teeth, were still on their long march into the darkness below the stairs.

"Thank goodness," Mrs Armstrong said. " Well, nobody can say I have not done my best with her."

Dr Mappamundi appeared to have totally forgotten that Mommy never believed herself to be wrong and that when she made her mind up there was no more to be said. Hysterics and crying were not going to make any difference. It was worse than when any of the maids had been sacked. At least none of them had gone so far as to go down on their knees before Mommy. But that is what Dr Mappamundi had done, pulling despairingly at Mrs Armstrong's skirt and then had collapsed moaning on the ground until Mommy had forced her to her feet and given her a stinging slap across her cheek. Dr Mappamundi's humiliating departure from the house had been almost as great a shock as her arrival, Emily thought as she followed her mother up the broad staircase. Outside, the little sportscar had crunched down the drive with a final, defiant spurt of gravel and an autumn gale lashed the trees of the driveway. A grim ivory warrior sneered at Emily from the window embrasure on the stairs.

Emily remembered that warm morning late in the Summer. Dr Mappamundi had left the top of the little red sports car down as it stood on the gravel overnight. As Emily tried to open the passenger door, Dr Mappamundi said airily "I think the handle's broken, Emily, just climb over "

Emily, wearing a skirt, did not find this easy and Dr Mappamundi zoomed off, spraying gravel from the driveway onto the lawn, while Emily still had one leg hooked over the little door and was trying to arrange her tender bottom onto the leather bucket seat. In some ways it had been very pleasant having Dr Mappamundi staying in the house, although Emily found that the discussions between her mother and Dr Mappamundi were usually a little abstruse.. Dr Mappamundi now swung the little car gaily down the wide, tree lined boulevard, swerved to avoid a refuse lorry, mounted the pavement for a few yards and demolished a two-year old sapling before regaining the road.

This morning she was wearing a dark red suit and a white blouse with discreet red polka dots. Not everyone could wear red high heels, but Dr Mappamundi managed it with aplomb. Emily was surprised her mother had not commented, as she would have done with Emily and, after all, Mrs Armstrong had certainly now placed herself in loco parentis to Dr Mappamundi.

"Emily," Dr Mappamundi said, as she negotiated one of the narrow side streets near the university, "You're very quiet."

"Am I?" Emily said.

Dr Knapp glanced at her quizzically

"Did something happen last night?"

"Such as what?" Emily asked.

"Oh, come, Emily, don't play the innocent with me."

"I h..heard you and Mommy having an argument downstairs," Emily said."I was in bed, remember..You were discussing...."

" Wittegenstein, yes," Dr Mappamundi said impatiently. ""Of what we do not know, therefore we may not speak." But we do know what goes on in that house, don't we."

"Did...did Mommy spank you," Emily asked. "I heard you cry out."

"Yes, I lost the argument and your Mom spanked me..I have no complaint. I was in the wrong and she totally demolished my foolish arguments. She "brought me to book" as she so delightfully puts it."

"Dr Mappamundi, believe me truly, I'm so sorry,"

Her professor made in impatient gesture as she reversed awkwardly into a parking spot and helped Emily out the door on the driver's side, leaving the car at a forty-five degree angle to the kerb.

"No, Emily, I've accepted her right to do that. Don't ask me why. You know we are both now firmly in her charge. But Emily, please say that's all you heard.?"

"I thought I heard you crying - after Mommy went to bed..."

"And?"

"And I. ..I came to talk to you."

"Oh my God, I knew it," Dr Mappamundi said.

She looked back at the car

"Do you think it'll do? Oh, to Hell with it"

She leaned over the car to lift a pile of essays and Emily couldn't help looking at her shapely bottom which in turn reminded her of the professor's first visit to the house.

"Emily, we can't discuss this properly now. Let me see, I have a free period at half two - can you come to my study then?"

"I...I don,t really want to talk about it," Emily said.

"Please, Emily," Dr Mappamundi said. "This is monstrously unfair to you. I really am your friend Emily. Perhaps we can help each other in this."

Emily had one lecture with her friend that morning, but she studiously avoided eye contact. Dr Mappamundi was less than usually concentrated, although she could often be lured away from the subject in hand by some of the more mischievous students, particularly the female ones. A discussion on Kant and Hegel took a couple of side trips in which Dr Mappamundi's monthly periods and the merits of waxing rather than shaving one's legs were elegantly touched upon. Emily's mind was so far astray that she had later to be recalled twice by the lecturer in her English Literature class. At the time appointed she tapped rather timidly on the massive oak door of Dr Mappamundi's study. When bade to enter she found Dr Mappamundi in her leather armchair, in her stocking feet, one foot balanced on the thigh of her other leg while she massaged her toes gently. Her discarded red shoes with the four inch heels stood together on the desk on a volume of "De Summa Theologica." The rest of the desk was covered with files and books and Dr Mappamundi swept them imperiously to one side.

"Emily," she said gravely, "If you know nothing - fine. However, if you do you must prepare yourself for anything your mother may ask you."

"But I haven't done anything wrong," Emily wailed.

"I'm not for a moment saying anyone has done anything wrong, Emily," Dr Mappamundi said in her closely reasoned way "I do hope you won't think so. However your mother is quite likely to punish you severely if she thinks you know anything. She will prove you to be in the wrong and will not let you jeopardise her position in any way."

"I know," Emily wailed in despair.

Dr Mappamundi reached across the desk and took the girl's hands in hers

"Tell me, Emily."

"I went into your room last night. I'm sorry, but you were making a funny noise - I thought I heard you sobbing."

Dr Mappamundi's face was paler than before.

"The door was slightly ajar. I only looked in. And as soon...."Emily began to sob, "as soon as I s..saw I wasn't...wanted.I...went away."

"Emily, to put it bluntly, you saw your mother and I... not to put too fine a point on it, you saw her on top of me, isn't that it?"

Emily nodded in dumb misery.

Dr Mappamundi rose and crossed the room gracefully, on the balls of her feet like a dancer, to collect a coffee percolator and two cups. When she had poured the coffee she appeared to be considering very carefully what she was going to say.

"Last week, Emily, the first time I came to see your mother, you heard me beg her for mercy....."

Emily nodded.

"And you were there, dear Emily, to witness my humiliation. Somehow...I just about got through it. And there was a certain perverse..." here Dr Mappamundi broke off and began biting the knuckle of her left thumb, a characteristic habit when she was considering a knotty philosophical problem..

"Last night, Emily, your mother took me beyond the point of no return. I was frantic, begging her for clemency but this time I was terrified as well. "

Again Dr Mappamundi was silent, deep in thought.

"She made me another of her famous propositions. But first she questioned me closely."

"I don't understand," Emily said.

"She suspected, well more than suspected, and by judicious questioning she established to her satisfaction...." here Dr Mappamundi paused again and made a steeple of her hands as if taking a break for prayer. She could sometimes be maddeningly slow to come to the point and was always so conscious of the need for what she called "cogent reasoning" and "provable propositions"

"The fact is, Emily, that she made me admit what I think she already knew ... that I.. well, I had a...a multiple orgasm while I was across her knees last week. Please don't look so shocked, Emily, you know what an orgasm is."

Emily nodded dumbly.

"I'm not a lesbian, Emily. I did experiment a little as a student and had a brief fling with a female lecturer, but then," she shrugged her beautiful shoulders and spread her hands as if in supplication "doesn't everyone?"

Emily stared at her open-mouthed.

"Perhaps not" Dr Mappamundi said. "Anyway, Emily, I did not initiate anything, so please don't be so cool towards me. Have you ever succeeded in resisting your mother?"

" No, but this is...such a shock!".."

"Emily, how shall I put this? Your mother is..."

"What?"

"She is ... not inexperienced."

"My God," Emily buried her head in her hands.

Dr Mappamundi had a dreamy look on her face. She crossed her arms in front of her and appeared to caress her neat breasts in their warmth.

"I have to tell you this, Emily," she said. "Your mother is a fabulous lover."

Emily stared in disbelief.

"A somewhat selfish one, perhaps," Dr Mappamundi studied her long red fingernails for a moment, " but so superbly sensitive to...to her own needs... goading, spurring on, as it were... "Dr Mappamundi gulped, ".. that she can drive a lover wild, yes, wild in simply trying to...to satisfy her desires. The overwhelming need to...to give her pleasure then becomes one's supreme desire, a desire that is translated into.... Oh, God!."

Dr Mappamundi was for once lost for words, swallowed and licked her dry lips and appeared embarrassed at the way her voice had thickened.

"So is it..... going to continue?" Emily asked.

Dr Mappamundi thirstily drained the cold dregs of her coffee

"If only it would," she said wistfully, taking her red heels from the desk."but she has given me no indication, in spite of my entreaties, that I may merit a permanent place in her bed.". Dr Mappamundi crossed her left leg over her right thigh and slipped on the shoe, then reached for the other one. "For the past week I have had to behave as I were her wilful daughter. " She slipped the other shoe on, then stretched out her feet to inspect them. "Now I fear I may be just her tart!"

Part 4

Emily followed her mother into her bedroom where they sat in the bay window, Emily in a window seat and Mrs Armstrong in the throne-like armchair, which she used to keep a watchful eye on the neighbourhood. Emily was frightened, her throat dry, because of the formality with which her mother had ordered her upstairs.

"Please, Mommy," she said. "I don't know what I've done, but I'm still very sore."

"You have been talking to Dr Mappamundi." Mrs Armstrong said.

"Please, Mommy," Emily begged, "I don't listen to everything she says"

"Now you are lying as well, Emily."

"Mommy, please"

"And do you think you know something you shouldn't, Emily?"

Emily felt her face blush a furious red.

"When your father died, Emily, I could have had almost any man I chose . You know that - I still could. But what did I do? I renounced all personal pleasure in order to bring you and your sister up properly. Is that not so, Emily?"

"Yes, Mommy."

"You have no right whatever to discuss your mother behind her back, Emily, is that clear?"

"Of course, Mommy."

Mrs Armstrong crossed her shapely legs with magisterial calm and looked disapprovingly at a tiny piece of lint she picked from her skirt..

"You are well aware there are major financial considerations involved," she said. "I'm sorry I ever let your sister marry that idiot husband of hers who cannot even control her. I do not think I can consent to your marrying at present- certainly not within the terms of my will at any rate.."

"Oh, Mommy, really."

"You are a pleasant child, Emily, but you are not pretty. Anyone who married you would be doing so for your inheritance. I don't want you to fall prey to fortune hunters."

"Whatever you want, Mommy,."

" Do you love me, Emily?"

"Of course, Mommy."

"Have I been harsh with you?"

"I deserved it, Mommy, I'm sure I did."

"Have I failed you in any way?"

"No, Mommy, but..."

"Come along, Emily, don't hesitate to point out my shortcomings."

"You have no shortcomings, Mommy. It's just that always when I kissed you goodnight, I... I wished you'd put your arms around me - you never hold me. I was never close to you.. except when..."

"You know what an orgasm is, Emily?"

"I'm not...well, yes, I suppose so," Emily said warily.

"Have you ever had one while being spanked?"

"Only very little ones, Mommy," Emily said, terrified to lie. If only she could throw herself on her knees and beg her mother's pardon.

Emily's mother rose and, motioning Emily to stand, astonished her by taking her in her arms. Emily was enchanted at the softness of her mother's belly and breasts against her, the rasp of her rough tweed skirt against her knees. The adored arms of the mother she had always desperately sought to please enclosed her in warm security. She placed her arms circumspectly around her mother's waist and waited for a further indication of how much affection would be shown. Mrs Armstrong then released her and glanced at her watch. Then she stepped down into the main part of the room and, standing by the bed, she unzipped the top of her skirt and stepped out of it. She was wearing plain white satin panties, and a matching garter belt with narrow straps supported her tan stockings. Her figure was far from perfect. She had a prominent pubis and there was a small, muscular depression around her navel in the soft pumpkin squash of her belly and the narrow underwear straps were etched into her hips and meaty thighs. Only her breasts, when she slipped off her blouse, seemed depersonalised and almost formal in her expensive matching bra. Again she reached out her arms to Emily.

Emily revelled again in her mother's embrace, the glorious intimacy of her body. But why had her mother taken off her clothes? And why had she, Emily, placed her hands on the satiny cheeks of her mother's buttocks and not been violently reprimanded for it? Her mother was giving off a strong, feral scent, a rank musk from her armpits and lower body. Her heavy earring grazed Emily's cheek.

"Please don't hurt me, Mommy," Emily pleaded as her mother gently removed her dress and brassiere and led her to the bed. Mrs Armstrong released her own her breasts from the pale chalices of her brassiere and bent to release her stockings, then stripped off her garter-belt with a sigh of satisfaction. She removed her bracelets and heavy earrings, dropping them on the bedside table, then lay down beside Emily, taking her in her soft arms. Emily's skin prickled at the intimacy, almost too much to bear after so long without a caress from her mother. They lay side by side and, though Emily several times felt the urge to fondle and nestle closer to her mother, the older woman insisted she remain completely still, so that, after about twenty minutes she felt herself swooning into the most delicious languor she had ever known. Yet the parts of her body not within the older woman's touch were unbearably sensitive and cried out for union. Mrs Armstrong then gave a deep sigh of satisfaction and began to remove Emily's panties, then rolled her on her back in the middle of the bed. Emily felt herself being mounted so that the soft warm squash of her mother's belly pressed down on hers, and her own tiny mound and pubic hair became fused in her mother's moist and swollen sheath and the dark prickle of the coarse hairs of the older woman.. Mrs Armstrong then hooked her feet over Emily's ankles and held her wrists behind her head with one hand. Then, when she had her prize fully secured under her, she reached up with her free hand to hook the plain cotton panties on the brass post of the bed where they hung limply above Emily's head like a flag of surrender.