Robert Coover - Briar Rose & Spanking the Maid

Sometimes he stretches her across his lap. Sometimes she must bend over a chair or the bed, or lie flat out on it, or be horsed over the pillows, the dresser or a stool, there are manuals for this. Likewise her drawers: whether they are to be drawn tight over her buttocks like a second skin or lowered, and if lowered, by which of them, how far, and so on. Her responses are assumed in the texts (the writhing, sobbing, convulsive quivering, blushing, moaning, etc.), but not specified, except insofar as they determine his own further reactions — to resistance, for example, or premature acquiescence, fainting, improper language, an unclean bottom, and the like. Thus, once again, her relative freedom: her striped buttocks tremble and dance spontaneously under the whip which his hand must bring whistling down on them according to canon — ah well, it’s not so much that he envies her (her small freedoms cost her something, he knows that), but that he is saddened by her inability to understand how difficult it is for him, and without that understanding it’s as though something is always missing, no matter how faithfully he adheres to the regulations. ‘And—?’ ‘And be neat and clean in your—’ whisp- CRACK! ‘— OW! habit! Oh! and wash yourself all over once a day to avoid bad smells and—’ hiss- SNAP! ‘— and — gasp! — wear strong decent underclothing!’ The whip sings a final time, smacks its broad target with a loud report, and little drops of blood appear like punctuation, gratitude, morning dew. ‘That will do, then. See that you don’t forget to wear them again!’ ‘Yes, sir.’ She lowers her black alpaca skirt gingerly over the glowing crimson flesh as though hooding a lamp, wincing at each touch. ‘Thank you, sir.’

For a long time she struggled to perform her tasks in such a way as to avoid the thrashings. But now, with time, she has come to understand that the tasks, truly common, are only peripheral details in some larger scheme of things which includes her punishment — indeed, perhaps depends upon it. Of course she still performs her duties as though they were perfectible and her punishment could be avoided, ever diligent in endeavoring to please him who guides her, but though each day the pain surprises her afresh, the singing of the descending instrument does not. That God has ordained bodily punishment (and Mother Nature designed the proper place of martyrdom) is beyond doubt — every animal is governed by it, understands and fears it, and the fear of it keeps every creature in its own sphere, forever preventing (as he has taught her) that natural confusion and disorder that would instantly arise without it. Every state and condition of life has its particular duties, and each is subject to the divine government of pain, nothing could be more obvious, and looked on this way, his chastisements are not merely necessary, they might even be beautiful. Or so she consoles herself, trying to take heart, calm her rising panic, as she crosses the room under his stern implacable gaze, lowers her drawers as far as her knees, tucks her skirt up, and bends over the back of a chair, hands on the seat, thighs taut and pressed closely together, what is now her highest part tensing involuntarily as though to reduce the area of pain, if not the severity. ‘It’s … it’s a beautiful day, sir,’ she says hopefully. ‘What? WHAT—?! ’

Relieving himself noisily in the bathroom, the maid’s daily recitals in the next room (such a blast of light out there — even in here he keeps his eyes half closed) thus drowned out, he wonders if there’s any point in going on. She is late, has left half her paraphernalia behind, is improperly dressed, and he knows, even without looking, that the towels are damp. Maybe it’s some kind of failure of communication. A mutual failure. Is that possible? A loss of syntax between stroke and weal? No, no, even if possible, it is unthinkable. He turns on the shower taps and lets fall his pajama pants, just as the maid comes in with a dead fetus and drops it down the toilet, flushes it. ‘I found it in your bed, sir,’ she explains gratuitously (is she testing him?), snatching up the damp towels, but failing to replace them with fresh ones. At least she’s remembered her drawers today: she’s wearing them around her ankles. He sighs as she shuffles out. Maybe he should simply forget it, go for a stroll in the garden or something, crawl back into bed (a dream, he recalls now: something about lectures or ledgers — an inventory perhaps — and a bottomless hole, glass breaking, a woman doing what she called ‘the hard part’ … or did she say ‘heart part’?), but of course he cannot, even if he truly wished to. He is not a free man, his life is consecrated, for though he is her master, her failures are inescapably his . He turns off the shower taps, pulls up his pajama pants, takes down the six-thonged martinet. ‘I have been very indulgent to you up to now,’ he announces, stepping out of the bathroom, ‘but now I am going to punish you severely, so pull up your skirt, come! pull it up!’ But, alas, it is already up. She is bent over the foot of the bed, her pale hinder parts already exposed for his ministrations, an act of insolence not precisely covered by his manuals. Well, he reasons wryly, making the martinet sing whole chords, if improvisation is denied him, interpretation is not. ‘Ow, sir! Please! You’ll draw blood, sir! ’

‘Neat and clean in habit, modest—’ WHACK! ‘— … in carriage, silent when—’ Whisp- SNAP! ‘OW!!’ ‘Be careful! If you move, the earlier blow won’t count!’ ‘I–I’m sorry, sir!’ Her soul, she knows, is his invention, and she is grateful to him for it, but exposed like this to the whining slashes of the cane and the sweet breath of mid-afternoon which should cool his righteous ardor but doesn’t (once a bee flew in and stung him on the hand: what did it mean? nothing: she got it on her sit-me-down once, too, and he took the swelling for a target), her thighs shackled by flannelette drawers and blood rushing to her head, she can never remember (for all the times he has explained it to her) why it is that Mother Nature has chosen that particular part of her for such solemnities: it seems more like a place for lettings things out than putting things in. ‘Well? Silent when—?’ ‘Silent when he is angry, willing to please, quick and—’ swish- CRACK! ‘— and of good disposition!’ ‘Sir,’ he reminds her: THWOCK! ‘SIR!’ she cries. ‘Very well, but you must learn to take more pleasure in your appointed tasks, however trivial or unpleasant, and when you are ordered to do anything, do not grumble or let your countenance betray any dislike thereunto, but do it cheerfully and readily!’ ‘Yes, sir! Thank you, sir!’ She is all hot behind, and peering over her shoulder at herself in the wardrobe mirror after the master has gone to shower, she can see through her tears that it’s like on fire, flaming crimson it is, with large blistery welts rising and throbbing like things alive: he’s drawn blood! She dabs at it with her drawers, recalling a dream he once related to her about a teacher he’d had who called his chastisements ‘scripture lessons,’ and she understands now what he’s always meant by demanding ‘a clean sheet of paper.’ Well, certainly it has always been clean, neat and clean as he’s taught her, that’s one thing she’s never got wrong, always washing it well every day in three hot lathers, letting the last lather be made thin of the soap, then not rinsing it or toweling it, but drying it over brimstone, keeping it as much from the air as possible, for that, she knows, will spoil it if it comes to it. She finishes drying it by slapping it together in her hands, then holding it before a good fire until it be thoroughly hot, then clapping it and rubbing it between her hands from the fire, occasionally adding to its fairness by giving it a final wash in a liquor made of rosemary flowers boiled in white wine. Now, she reasons, lifting her drawers up gingerly over the hot tender flesh, which is still twitching convulsively, if she could just apply those same two fairies, method and habit, to the rest of her appointed tasks, she might yet find in them that pleasure he insists she take, according to the manuals. Well, anyway, the worst is past. Or so she consoles herself, as smoothing down her black skirt and white lace apron, she turns to the bed. ‘ Oh, teach me, my God and King, in all things thee to …’ What—? There’s something under there! And it’s moving …!