Return to the Chateau by Pauline Réage Read Free Book Online Page B

paintings-and the thongs of the whip he kept stuck in his belt. At the foot of the easy chairs there were stools, and O, following the example of the other three girls, sat down on one of them with her dress spread out in a broad arc around her. And it was from this lowly position that O looked up at this statuesque, unmoving man standing directly opposite her. The silence was so heavy you could have cut it with a knife, and O was afraid even to shift the folds of her dress: the crackling of the silk would have been too loud. She gave a cry at the sudden sound that broke that silence. A swarthy, thickset young man in a riding outfit, a riding crop in one hand, his boots adorned with golden spurs, had entered the room by straddling the windowsill.
    “What a pretty picture,” he said. “As sensible as you are well mannered. But what are you doing here all alone? Is there no one here to appreciate your charms? I’ve been watching you through the window for a good fifteen minutes. But the beauty in yellow,” he added, running the tip of his riding crop over O’s breasts, “yes, you,” he said, “you haven’t been as well mannered as the others, have you?”
    O got to her feet. Just as she did, Monique came into the room, her purple satin dress tucked up in front at her waist, beneath which a triangle of dark fleece marked the beginning of her long thighs which O had previously seen only from the rear. She was followed by two men. O recognized the first. He was the one who, the previous year, had outlined to her the rules that governed at Roissy. He recognized her too and smiled at her.
    “Do you know her?” the young man who had preceded them into the room wanted to know.
    “Yes,” the man said. “Her name is O. She is marked by Sir Stephen, who took her over from Ren=E9 R. She was here for a few weeks last year, when you were away. If you’d like, Frank . .”
    “You know, I just might,” said Frank. “But do you realize what your O’s been going? For the past fifteen minutes I’ve been watching her without her being aware of it, and during the entire time she was staring at Jos=E9, but not above his waist.”
    The three men laughed. Frank took O by the nipples and pulled her toward him.
    “Tell me the truth, my little whore, what was it you were staring at with such desire, Jos=E9’s whip, or his prick?”
    O, flushed and burning with shame, losing all notion of what was allowed and what was forbidden at Roissy, tore herself loose from the young man’s grasp, jumping back and screaming, “Leave me alone! Leave me alone!”
    He caught her as she stumbled over an easy chair and brought her back to her former position.
    “You’re wrong to try and run away,” he said. “The whip. Jos=E9 is going to give it to you before you know it.”
    Ah, if only she could keep herself from moaning, from grovelling and begging for mercy! But she did moan and cry and ask to be spared, she twisted and turned trying to get away from the rain of blows, she tried to kiss Frank’s hands, the hands that were holding her while the valet flogged away. One of the blonde girls, together with Noelle, helped her to her feet and straightened out her skirt.
    “Now I’m taking her’ said Frank. “I’ll let you have my opinion shortly.”
    But when she had followed him into his room and was naked in his bed, before he lay down beside her he said:
    “I’m sorry, O, but your lover also has you whipped, doesn’t he?”
    “Yes,” O said, then hesitated, as though she had intended to say more but had thought better of it.
    “Go on,” he said. “Speak your mind.”
    “He doesn’t insult me,” O said.
    “Are you quite sure he doesn’t?” Frank said. “He’s never called you a whore?”
    O shook her head, and even as she did she realized that she was lying. Whore was indeed what Sir Stephen had called her when he had taken her to the Laperouse restaurant and given her to the two Englishmen, when he had stripped her naked