F Campbell - Margo

"You come highly recommended by Mr. Ross, Miss Davis. This ensures your entry. May I bid you welcome."

"Thank you. I – I'm afraid I'm not too well informed."

Mildred Harridance sighed. Henry Ross was up to his old tricks. But if he had chosen the girl, there must be something to her.

"Rossland Academy comes closer to being a prison than a school, my dear. Were you aware of this?"

"Well… in a way." Margo Davis fingered her bag and looked beseechingly for aid. "Mr. Ross told me I could come and talk to you today, and if our interview was unsatisfactory to either of us, I could simply go home and the whole matter would be forgotten." She paused diffidently. "But he also said that if I chose to stay, the decision would be binding for a period of years. I'm twenty-one. Mr. Ross said something about me staying here until I'm twenty-five."

Mildred Harridance nodded. "That's correct. You will make your choice today, and should you wish to come to us, you may return home to make your final arrangements it's up to you."

The shrewd, ageless eyes studied Henry Ross' choice. He ran true to form. There were few flat chests at Rossland, and absolutely no excess weight.

"I should explain the unusual nature of your circumstances here. Since we have pupils here to be taught, then obviously we must have those to teach. We contrive to have neat blend of both. Your duties would be primarily as a mistress. But every mistress is subject to the same disciplines as those beneath her. In short, you can either punish or be punished. There is one other most unusual facet of the establishment. I want you to consider it carefully. Everyone here, except myself, is the perquisite of Henry Ross. You will be totally available to him in all ways. He can punish you or make love to you." Mildred Harridance shrugged and permitted a small, quiet smile. "Usually he does both."

They sat in silence as the moments ticked by. Mildred Harridance understood the vital importance of the girl's decision. The girl herself was assessing the endurance of her flesh against the prudence of the check. She spoke hesitantly.

"I'd be a fraud, Miss Harridance. I have nothing to each of any value to girls the same age as myself. Would I not fit in better as a pupil? Mr. Ross told me that most of the girls here are at Rossland because of the wish of their parents. But are there others in the same class as I am in? Mr. Ross wants me here to amuse himself when the mood strikes him."

"That is correct, Miss Davis. I see your point. We can easily make you a pupil instead of a teacher. But I will warn you, as a pupil, you will be subject to more constant disciplines and a good deal of feminine jealousies and intrigues than you would have as a teacher. I suggest you try the teaching role first. It may surprise you. It has the virtue for Mr. Ross, upon his visits here, of you being demoted from your teacher status to become his plaything. Spiritually, Rossland belongs more in Victorian England than modern-day America."

Margo was still nagged by a seeming inconsistency. "But it would seem to me that the whole idea of the school is a waste. If Mr. Ross wishes to keep a girl like me as a prisoner for his amusement, why is this not then simply a prison? Why bother with the pupil-teacher relationship?"

Mildred Harridance laughed at the young naivet? "My dear, consider it a mansion full of females! Without the influence of the school and its teachers, the dear things would be bored stiff, subject to endless intrigues, animosities, plots, and illicit pleasures. As it is, we keep them occupied. We give them standards, and most sincerely teach them behavior and deportment. They emerge at the end of their sentence a far better personality than when they came."

Margo looked at the older woman, and momentarily she envisioned Norma Boulter. They were remarkably alike. She wished it was Norma Boulter who owned Rossland instead of that strange, austere man with whom she had had only a brief interview. But since she had found a rapport with one of these women, she could do so with the other.

Without more hesitation, she said with forthright resolution, "My affairs are already in order. I looked after that. I choose to stay here now."

Mildred Harridance smiled. She pressed a button on her desk.

"You need your head examined! Don't you realize you've sentenced yourself to four years in prison?"

The girl looked at Margo with a mixture of irritation and pity. She was entirely naked and unconscious of the fact as a nymph a woodlands scene. But she had taken possession of the new girl from Miss Harridance with total assurance. She laughed now at Margo's quite obvious perplexity, and then continued.

"Oh, you mean my not having any clothes on. You'll have to get used to these things, Margo. I'm a mistress, but I'm going to be punished later this evening. Girls who are sentenced to any punishment at all are instantly made nude." She laughed without bitterness.

"It sort of advertises to the school that if they haven't already been instructed to come and watch, they are at liberty to do so. My being naked says I am on exhibit." Her eyes narrowed shrewdly. "Are you here for money, or because you have no choice?"

"Money," Margo replied. "I thought you knew."

"I guessed. That's why I told you that you need your head examined. There isn't enough money in the world to pay a girl for being in here for four years." Then came a short, bitter laugh.

"I was sentenced to five years, and I've only done two. Welcome to the club."

"You told me to take my clothes off – must I really? I'm supposed to be a mistress."

"You'll be a mistress when you've done your thirty days. By that dine, you'll wish you'd never seen this place. Look, Margo, I'm terribly sorry, but I've got to put leg irons on you. That's the first thing."

Margo drew a deep breath. This was the beginning. She already knew about the leg irons, so it was no great shock. She removed her clothes under her companion's watchful eye, folded them neatly in a pile, and put them where she was directed. Even undressing in front of this girl was embarrassing, and she could see that she was trembling slightly as she extended on bare foot.

Dully, she conceded, "Yes, I know about the leg irons. I've been told. But if it's only for the first two weeks?"

"By the way, this is the armory. It's where we keep the stuff. If you look around the walls, you'll see it's a real cringe-crinkler. Oh, and I'm Jean Evans." She let out another bitter laugh. "They haven't gotten around to giving us numbers yet. Look, I really am sorry about this leg-iron business. They're not the kind the police use, or the kind you buy in stores. They are especially made for the Academy. The metal bands are wider and the links heavier. Miss Harridance says they have an aesthetic quality – maybe she's right. All I know is that when they're locked on your ankles, you don't moved around very fast, and they make the most embarrassing noises at the wrong moments. I suppose you do realize a girl can get them put on herself at any time if she does something to warrant it. It's not just for the first two weeks."

In wonder, Margo looked down and watched the shiny metal anklet clasp tight on her flesh. Jean had tried two other pairs first, but one was too large and the other too small. It was explained that girls' ankles varied enormously and that the Academy stocked shackles for every size. The pair now chosen was snug and tight, and heavy enough not to be easily forgotten. First one leg and then the other. The naked girl shackled for the first time in her life took a tentative step, then another. She looked at her companion in dismay.

"But, Jean, I'm… I'm hobbled!"

"That's the general idea, sweetheart. You know you can't run away. You also walk damn good and slow. By the way, watch out for swear words. You can get punished for them."