A happy day. My new shoes. Humiliated in a shoe-shop. The secret of the star sapphire revealed. I give in an abject surrender. I end the evening with Violet--blindfolded and beloved.
Everyone from Helen to Doris was as kind to me as it was possible for anyone to be. Helen of course was pursuing her definite policy. She wanted me to enjoy my life as a girl, to love it.
After breakfast Doris was driven off to her school in the neighbouring town of Mark's Cross. I was free from tiresome lessons and long hours in the schoolroom. I took up the newspaper and settled down on a cushioned chair in the veranda. Violet who was a few months younger than I was sat down beside me. Helen joined us with a smile upon her face.
"What do you girls want to do this morning?" she asked. "You won't want to stay in and I should be very glad, since I am busy, if you would drive down together to the village and take some messages for me."
"That will be jolly," cried Violet and she looked at me with a smiling face. "I shall love going out with pretty Denise."
"Then I will order the car for eleven," said Helen.
What a change for me! For two years I had never gone out except with a governess who made us walk two and two and forbade us to talk. Now Violet and I were to drive alone! Thus began a delightful day of freedom for me. The freedom was certainly tempered by some dainty tyranny exercised by Violet. But she was so sweet and loving that I adored being tyrannized over by her. For instance just before the time when we were to start she came to me and said.
"I think the idea of such a short skirt is wonderful. But this trip to town calls for a hat and gloves, I am sure, and although those little black shoes are no doubt very comfortable I don't think they are smart enough for you to wear when you go out with me."
"Shall I do now Violet?" I asked.
She looked me over.
I extended a two-toned shoe. Violet smiled in approval.
"Yes, such formal shoes suit you Denise. You look delicious now," and she flung her arms round my neck and kissed me rapturously." Oh how silly you are Denise to want to be a man again, when you are such a lovely girl," she cried.
The car was Helen's white convertible. How I enjoyed the sunlight and the fresh air and the country after being cooped up for so long!
The village was almost at the gates of the Park, but the Park itself was two miles long. We drove into the village and parked in the public lot.
"Mind your pretty shoes Denise," said Violet as I got out. "Don't dirty them!"
"The pavement is quite dry," I said.
We delivered Helen's messages at the various homes and at each one got further proof of how much I, Evelyn Beryl, was detested and feared. They were all so delighted at Violet's news that I was to be kept for some time longer at the girls' school.
There was one house especially where the news was welcomed. A little old woman called Mrs. Pettigrew and her big buxom daughter Lucy kept a laundry employing six girls of the village, where all the house linen of the manor was washed.
Sometime ago, just before I went abroad, owing to a statement of mine that Lucy had been insolent to me, I had persuaded my father to take away our washing from the laundry. And Mrs. Pettigrew was nearly ruined in consequence and would have been altogether, had not Helen given it back to her. Mrs. Pettigrew hated me naturally, and when Violet told her that I was to remain at school, she laughed with a vicious satisfaction: "That's a blessed message of comfort for every poor man and woman in this village," she cried. "'Tis kind of Miss Deverel to keep him in the school."
She flung open a door suddenly and showed us a little dark room at the back of the parlour. "But that's where I would like to keep him in his girl's clothes," she exclaimed passionately. "All his life I would like to keep him there fastened in a chair and made to act as girlish and prissy as you could want. We could do it too. Tell Miss Deverel, please Missy! Me and Lucy and my laundry girls, we could keep him safe and quiet in there. He wouldn't get away with these on his legs."
With a horrid laugh she held up a cruel pair of fetters with a very short and terribly heavy iron chain between them. I was terrified. Her face was so threatening, her voice so passionate. She looked like a terrible old witch.
I glanced in alarm into the little dark room.
"Oh! that would be dreadful punishment," I said.
"Ah you don't know him, Missy," Mrs. Pettigrew replied. "He's your cousin I heard and he's nigh as pretty as you, if you'll excuse me. But he's the cruellest conceited young gentleman! That's where he ought to be kept, in the dark room."
Violet had meanwhile taken the fetters in her hands and glanced at me roguishly.
"I would like to see them on someone, she said, and weighed them in her hands. "Lock them on Miss Denise's ankles, Mrs. Pettigrew."
"Oh, no,"I cried in terror. Once I had the fetters on, Violet might take it into her head to lock me in the dark room. I recoiled. Violet laughed:
"Quick Denise!"
"Oh Violet!"
"Obey me! Stand here."
With trembling red-gloved hands I raised my skirt, but Mrs. Pettigrew came to my rescue.
"The fetters want cleaning, Miss. They'd dirty the young lady's pretty stockings. It'd be a shame to lock up such dainty feet. I am sure those little black-and-white pumps have never trampled on the hearts of poor people."
The old woman came to the door with us. "Tell Miss Deverel of my dark room, Miss Violet!" she said warningly. "Me and Lucy and my laundry girls will keep him safe in his girl's clothes."
As we walked away, Violet burst out laughing.
"You had a narrow escape Denise. Oh we must keep you as a girl. Everybody loves you as a girl and everybody hates you as a youth."
"But Violet," I said, "I shall be quite different now. I have had my lesson."
I looked so remorseful and penitent that Violet suddenly kissed me on the lips.
"You are delicious now at all events, Denise," she said, "and perhaps Helen will keep you in petticoats for a long while. Get in!"
I got into passenger side of the car beside Violet in the driver's seat. "Put your hands behind your back and place your beautiful feet together," she said. "That's right."
I blushed and smiled and obeyed. Thus we drove back to luncheon, where Violet told Helen of Mrs. Pettigrew's dark room and heavy fetters. They all laughed except myself. I was beginning to wonder whether after all I should not be happier if I remained a girl. After luncheon Helen said to Violet and myself:
"I want you two girls to go into Mark's Cross and do some shopping for Denise. There is a Flower-show to which you can go afterwards if you like to have your tea. So go and get smartly dressed and I will order the chauffeur-driven limousine for you. I have some arrangements to make about the new houses."
"Can't I help?" I asked. Since the estate was mine I ought to look after it. Helen smiled.
"Of course not, dear! Run along and put on a pretty dress."
"Show me your feet," said Violet. I raised my skirt.
"As I thought," she said. "You don't pay enough attention to your feet, dear."
I protested. "These are lovely shoes," I said.
"For morning wear, perhaps. How high are the heels? I don't believe they are three inches."
"But Violet, heels too high look improper."
"Nonsense," said Violet. "For the afternoon nothing looks so well as a neat tightly fitting pair of dainty bright very high-heeled shoes. Look at mine!" She extended an exquisitely shod foot before my eyes. "Luckily we are going to fetch some new ones which have been made for you and I will have you squeezed into a pair before I take you to the Flower-show, though really I don't know that we ought to go now."
"Oh Violet!" I pleaded.
"I don't see how I am going to find time to punish you for your carelessness about your feet, Denise," she said. "Take care that I never see you again after luncheon without exquisite shoes on your feet."
Violet bought some hats for herself and for me and then we drove on to Binot, Helen's shoemaker.
"You have been making some smart shoes for this young lady. Miss Denise Beryl," said Violet to the girl who came forward.
"Oh yes Madam, some very pretty shoes with smart heels. This way please."
"But the heels are much too high."
"I like them," said Violet.
"They are only a little more than six inches high," said the attendant calmly. "Stand up, Miss, if you please," and I stood up. "But they suit you beautifully."
"I can't wear them really, Violet," I cried.
The shop-girl looked at me sternly:
"I think that young ladies who want to be slovenly and object to the high-heels of their dainty shoes ought to be punished in them."
"And she is going to be," said Violet resolutely.
"Stand up on your chair, Denise."
"Violet!"
"At once!"
I obeyed.
"I will leave her under your charge in this position," said Violet to the shop-girl. "I shall come back in half an hour for her. Will you see that she doesn't move?"
"Certainly," said the shop-girl, arranging my feet with the heels together and the toes turned out. I had to stand on the chair for half an hour in the show-room, while ladies came in and tried on their shoes. Each one naturally asked what I was doing perched upon the chair, and the shop-girl explained my fault.
Violet came back and took me to the Flower-show. We had tea together at a little table in the grounds.
"Show your smart shoes dear," said Violet. "Cross your legs at the knee and let everyone see them. You must be grateful now that I took you to the shoe-shop."
I blushed and said "Yes Violet."
I was girl enough to appreciate the admiration of the men and the envious glances and disparaging remarks of the women. We drove back to Beaumanoir, and with some other girls who came in played tennis until half past six. Then Helen sent for me to her boudoir.
"You have had a pleasant day, Denise?" she asked affectionately.
"Oh Helen it has been lovely," I exclaimed kissing her.
"I am glad, darling," she said. "Now run away, have your bath and get dressed for dinner. Phoebe is waiting for you. I am going out to dinner myself, but I want to see you looking your very prettiest before I go. Phoebe will bring you to my room."
"Now you are ready," she said, "and I am very proud of you Miss Denise, I can tell you. Stand still." She placed one strong arm round my waist, and the other under my knees and lifted me up in the air as though I were a baby.
"What are you doing Phoebe?" I cried indignantly, while I wriggled in her arms. "I am not a child. Put me down on the ground at once."
Phoebe held me still tighter.
"Keep still Miss Denise, and hold your silly tongue or I'll punish you," she said sternly. "I am obeying my orders. Your hands behind your back at once."
I was waving my luxuriously gloved hands in protest, but at the sound of her peremptory voice I obeyed her.
"That's better," she said. "Now press your ankles and feet together! Arch your insteps. Make the most of your beautiful buckled slippers."
Blushing with shame I obeyed her again. I could see myself in a mirror held in her arms, a grown-up young lady in a glamorous evening gown. I could see my girl's feet in their high-heeled satin slippers obediently placed together with the insteps arched, and my legs dangling down over her arm. Phoebe carried me along the corridor to Helen's bedroom and kicked at the door. Helen's French maid opened it. Helen was dressed in an exquisite long gown of pale green chiffon over white satin. She turned with a smile and pointed to a strip of white satin between two mirrors.
"Place Miss Denise on her feet there."
Phoebe set me down. Yes I had never looked so well. My silver gown set off my fair hair and skin to perfection. I was happy too. There was a colour in my cheeks, my eyes sparkled. I had had a joyous day of fresh air, exercise and freedom, and now, dressed for dinner, I was conscious of a voluptuous feeling of well-being and delight. My dress was short enough to give a glimpse of pink insteps in shimmering cobwebs of nylon silk stockings and to show my feet which in their slim little glistening pointed slippers without embroidery or bows, but with only the big oval diamond buckles for ornaments, looked more slender and elegant than ever.
"You look sweet dear," said Helen. "Let me see how prettily you can walk in that frock!"
A strip of white satin was unrolled on the floor by the maid.
"Keep on the strip," said Helen; and I walked, turned, and came back, pointing my toes and flashing my slipper-buckles. The dress rustled deliciously about my ankles, and I could take only the tiniest steps.
"My skirt is so tight that my legs are really tied together," I said smiling at Helen, "and I have an extra half an inch on my heels."
"I know," replied Helen. "But they look lovely. And after all you are not going to play tennis in that pretty frock. In fact darling I am going to tie you still tighter."
She was smiling radiantly. She held in her hand a white satin strap with a diamond buckle.
"Sit down on this chair, and give me your beautiful feet."
I had learned enough to know that obedience must be prompt. I extended my feet to Helen, who kneeled on one knee and took them on to the other knee.
"But Helen, what have I done?" I asked.
"This isn't punishment dear," she replied as with her white-gloved hands she delicately crossed my slim ankles.
"But it is very, very important that there should not be the slightest mark even on the white soles of these exquisite new high-heeled slippers when you have your conversation with Aunt Priscilla."
Why I wondered? She adjusted the gleaming strap round the crossed ivory ankles and bound them daintily but tightly together. Oh how delightful the sensation was! The blood rushed into my face.
"Now to keep your gloves clean." She tied my hands in the same way.
"There, darling, now we are certain that you won't walk and soil the shoes," she said. "Be very obedient to Aunt Priscilla." She kissed me and Phoebe once more lifted me in her arms. The voluptuous thrills which had been coursing through my veins redoubled. With my white shoulders and bosom I looked in Phoebe's arms like some wonderful doll, except that my bosom heaved rather spasmodically. Phoebe in order not to ruffle or tear my dress had raised the skirt, so that not merely were my buckled feet and crossed tied ankles visible, but my stockinged legs as well to half way up the calves. I saw myself in the glass.
"Oh Helen!" I murmured, my eyes swimming with languorous vague longings. I was pricked by desires which I did not understand. A world of them were expressed in my sigh. Helen smiled. It was her policy and wish to keep me tonight of all nights stimulated by passionate yearnings. She provoked and increased them now. She caressed with satin-gloved hands my legs, sliding her hands up over the smooth shining stockings under my dress to my knees and garters.
"The garters are of white satin dear, with big bows and buckles?" she asked.
"Yes Helen,"I answered blushing.
"You are very happy tonight, Denise, aren't you?"
"Oh yes, Helen."
Phoebe carried me downstairs to the drawing-room and placed me on a sofa propping up my back with cushions, and drawing down my dress so as to cover my ankles.
"Now lie like that! Don't put your feet to the ground Miss Denise," she said.
"I won't, Phoebe."
I was left alone, and in a few minutes Violet came in looking very pretty in a red velvet gown. She leaned over the sofa and looked down at me. A tender smile and a blush came upon her face. Her little gloved hand caressed my satin slippers.
"Do you know, Denise, that I am falling in love with you--not because you are a youth at all, but because you aren't, because you are a girl. I am in love with you just as girls are with one another," and after this strange utterance which excited me and flattered me, she cried.
"Oh, you have got your hands and feet tied! How delicious! I must look." She turned back my frock, and asked me why. I explained.
"I wonder what Miss Priscilla is going to do to you tonight," she said slowly. "I am jealous of her."
She bent her head down and kissed my lips a long ardent kiss. Then she drew a breath of pleasure and I smiled.
"Violet, that was lovely," I said.
She bent down again passionately, lifted my bound feet and I felt her warm lips pressed upon my insteps. Oh a delicious spasm of emotion shook me. My hands tied in front of me in their gleaming smooth satin gloves fluttered. Oh, how my passions were excited! Doris and Miss Priscilla, dressed in a high-necked black silk robe and flat square-toed shoes, joined us. Netta announced dinner. Phoebe carried me in and placed me in a chair and freed my hands. A clean white satin footstool was placed under my bound feet and we dined. How I enjoyed that dinner. I had Violet on one side of me; her kiss seemed still to burn and tingle on my insteps and at times she dropped her napkin, and as she stooped down to pick it up, she would give an affectionate squeeze to my slippers or legs. Even Miss Priscilla's face looked pleasant. I was carried back to the drawing-room where Violet and I had our coffee. Miss Priscilla rose.
"I shall send Phoebe to bring you to my boudoir in five minutes Denise," she said. "I am just going to see that all is ready. Meanwhile put on your gloves and button them carefully. Perhaps Violet will help you."
"Of course I will," cried Violet. She kneeled by the sofa and with caressing fingers drew on my long delicate shining gloves and buttoned them up to my shoulders, smoothing them over my arms, so that not a wrinkle should show. Then she pressed my hands passionately.
"I should love to tie them together, just as your feet are tied, only ever so much tighter."
I blushed.
"You may if you like," I said eagerly.
"There's no time now. Someday when we are alone I will."
"But Violet, you said you loved me," I remarked with a smile. She frowned in perplexity.
"I do too Denise. Yet, yet, do you know what I would really love. I would love to see you dressed just as you are now in that beautiful evening gown tied to a chair in Mrs. Pettigrew's dark room with those buckled satin slippers and slender ankles in the chains, while the laundry girls teased and taunted you."
My face grew scarlet.
"Oh Violet, that would be dreadful," I cried, and yet the picture her words evoked fascinated me strangely!
Phoebe came in for me and carried me up the stairs to Miss Priscilla's boudoir which was furnished in the Empire style with an elegance out of keeping with her Puritanical appearance. A small fire was burning cheerfully and to keep the room from growing too hot, the window was open upon the summer night.
"Untie Miss Denise's ankles."
I was placed standing in a blaze of light on a square of white satin between two great mirrors, so that I could see myself back and front. Miss Priscilla drew up a chair and sat facing me, but a little on one side so as not to obscure from me my reflection in the mirrors. Phoebe went out of the room.
I was excited. I was a little frightened too. I looked at Miss Priscilla timidly. She crossed one leg over the other, showing me her ugly flat shoes and lisle-thread stockings.
"Lift your dress Denise! A hand on each side of your skirt! Lift it prettily above the ankles. That's right. Press your high-heels tightly together and turn out your toes! That will do. Now watch your pretty reflection in the mirror, while I talk to you and above all never lose sight of your slipper-buckles and your beautifully shod high-heeled feet."
I blushed rosily and smiled, "Very well, Miss Priscilla."
"Now listen to me Denise!" she went on, "some day you will be allowed to lay aside your dainty frocks. I think it's a great pity, Helen and I are determined however that we will not have a repetition of your outrageous conceited conduct, of your untidy ways, and your disrespect."
"I am cured of that Miss Priscilla," I said humbly.
"Perhaps," she replied calmly, "but we mean to make certain of the cure. We mean that you shall always willingly submit to the rule and authority of women.
"Always?" I asked in dismay.
"Always."
I hesitated.
"Miss Priscilla!"
"Yes."
"It seems natural to me that I should be kept in subjection," I said timidly, "so long as I am wearing girls' corsets and lingerie, gloves, earrings and necklaces and dresses, girls' nylon stockings and shoes and slippers with high-heels. I don't resent discipline at a lady's hands while I am to dress in this way."
"Come that's better. You are improving Denise."
"But when I go back to trousers it would be so undignified to be under a woman's authority, especially a young woman's like Helen."
"You can easily escape the indignity by remaining in your satin slippers."
"I know," I said weakly. "But I must be a man. I must have a career."
Miss Priscilla laughed.
"Meanwhile, Denise, even in your satin slippers you are not as obedient as you profess your willingness to be. For you are looking straight at me instead of at the reflection of your diamond buckles."
My eyes sought my feet in the mirror.
"I am very sorry. I forgot," I said humbly.
"That is no excuse Denise," said Miss Priscilla placidly. "Perhaps it is time to reinforce the lessons of the past two years." She raised her gloved hand before my eyes...and I again gazed into that large and mysterious star sapphire ring. I could not look away and I fell into that strange halfworld, where Miss Priscilla's words became all I heard and all I was compelled to obey.
"Your body is becoming quite rigid, Denise," she told me. "Look at your lovely slippers--you cannot look away from them. Their beauty fascinates you, enthralls you. All your attention is upon them. Now--perhaps you want me to explain how all this is possible."
My gaze remained riveted on the silver-and-diamond loveliness of my shoes as I responded. "Yes, Miss Priscilla."
"You do not recall any of this, because you were commanded not to, but in the months before you left for your girls' school, Helen and I subjected you to intense hypnotic conditioning, centered on the magnificent ring I am wearing now," she explained. "Its mere appearance before your eyes places you in a trance, a trance in which you are completely subservient to the ring's wearer."
I struggled to turn and look at the ring as she spoke. Instead, she stepped between me and the mirrors. "Your punishment for your current disobedience in even attempting to move is that, from now on, you shall be aware of the source of your humiliation...but still be unable to resist it."
I looked at her common flat shoes and cheap stockings. How extraordinary and bizarre it seemed that an elderly skinny woman dressed so humbly should be so completely in control of a beautiful luxuriously dressed girl. "You may move again," she said, as she stepped aside, allowing my gaze to again focus on my shoes.
"We will go on where we left off. You are to be made a willing slave to woman's authority. The one certain method to make you that, is to make you love your subjection. It is obvious that you do that to a great extent already. It is quite clear that you love to be punished in your pretty frocks even though the punishment costs you tears and humiliation. But to make that love the overwhelming influence of your life, it is necessary that you should be made to associate in your mind supreme pleasure with a picture of yourself, dressed by women's satin-gloved hands, in girls' corsets and dresses, girls' smart long gloves, and nylon stockings, girls' high-heeled shoes and slippers and then with the delightful sensation of exquisite lace-frilled lingerie. Therefore answer me this question. 'Have you ever loved a woman?'"
"No, Miss Priscilla."
She nodded her head with satisfaction.
"Have you ever enjoyed a woman?"
I was scarlet with confusion. I felt too that to answer the truth, "no", would be to give her somehow a hold on me which would be dangerous.
"You must not ask me such questions," I said.
She raised the ring again, so that its reflection was within my vision in the mirror. "Answer me now Denise. Have you ever enjoyed a woman?"
Despite my struggles, my resistance faded. "Never!"
Miss Priscilla's lips smiled with contemptuous satisfaction.
"I thought that anyone so feminine as you would hardly be acceptable. But I wanted to be sure. Had you known a woman dear, you would have been more difficult for Helen and me to deal with. We should not have been able to mold you, or to write indelibly your subjection upon your character as upon a blank page."
Miss Priscilla settled herself in her chair with a look of satisfaction. I felt singularly helpless. I understood that every answer I made, so subtle were her questions, handed me over more and more to her to make me a slave. Yet if I did not answer I was compelled to speak by the mysterious power of the trance-inducing ring.
"I pass to another subject, Denise. When you have admired women, what is it in them that you have admired. When you think of women, of what in them do you think?"
I was startled. No, I could not answer her.
"If you don't answer immediately, Denise, I shall lock a bright little pair of steel handcuffs over those delicate white shining gloves."
My heart gave a jump. I blushed rosily--with pleasure. I saw the little white-gloved hands which so daintily held up my lovely frock. To have them handcuffed by Miss Priscilla! A divine longing filled me. I looked at my little buckled slippers of satin. Oh, to be handcuffed while shod in those fairy-like ball-room things.
The strangest sensations overcame me.
"If you handcuffed me," I said timidly and not replying to her question, "I should not be able to keep on holding up my dress."
"I will prove to you that you are wrong, Denise. She took up a shining pair of handcuffs, thin broad bands of steel linked close together. She actually was going to handcuff me. Oh, the expectation was delicious!
"Let your skirt fall. Now your hands together, palm to palm in front of you."
My arms and hands hung down at once in position, clothed from the shoulders to the finger-tips in the tight unwrinkled gloves of shining spotless satin.
She took my hands and round the wrists fitted the gleaming bands. What a stimulating picture met my feverish eyes in the mirror! An elderly sharp-faced woman, in a black robe, looking just as I should imagine a prison wardress might, chaining the exquisitely-gloved hands of her pretty young prisoner in her glamorous gown and dancing slippers of
silvery satin. Click, click, the handcuffs snapped to. I was helpless. Then she took a long chain with a spring hook at each end. One end she snapped on to a ring on my left handcuff. Then lifting my skirt all round so that my ankles were left visible, she drew the chain tightly round me behind under the upswell of the thighs and fixed the other to
the right handcuff. The chain did thus three things. It held down my handcuffed hands, bound my thighs and kept up my dress. I smiled at my reflection in the glass. I felt and looked so deliciously helpless. Miss Priscilla sat down again calmly watching me.
"Now Denise, perhaps you will tell me what you admire in women."
"Their feet and ankles," I replied shamefacedly.
A gleam of triumph shone in Miss Priscilla's eyes.
"Shod in what way, Denise?"
I hung my head. I had told so much, however I went on:
Miss Priscilla nodded with satisfaction.
"Shod then, just as we keep you shod."
"Yes, Miss Priscilla."
"I thought so, I have watched you Denise. You are a fetichiste-du-pied."
So that is what the phrase meant! How well she knew me! I was dreadfully ashamed.
"But that is not enough, Denise. Don't twitch your pretty fingers. Let the chained hands rest quite quietly against your lovely frock. I have not finished with you yet. The mere sight of a lady's pretty feet in her dainty shoes attracts your eyes, fascinates you, but it does not trouble your passions, as they were troubled last night when you stood in the corner. Am I right?"
"Quite right," I said in a whisper. "But oh Miss Priscilla, don't ask me any more questions: I am so horribly ashamed."
"I must ask them," she returned implacably. "You must remember that you are a girlish young gentleman of enormous wealth, enormous power, and responsibilities for which you are quite unfitted, and that Helen and I are responsible for you. If you ever obtained your liberty you would abuse your power. We are bound therefore to keep you in bondage and for that purpose I must know every detail of your character. Since ladies' boots on ladies' feet by themselves do not arouse and delight you, what does? Tell me at once. What is it that chiefly enthralls and delights you, Denise?"
The question was asked again. Oh, through my tears, I had to answer it! I had to reveal that entrancing, shameful dream-world in which I wander.
"Being forced by ladies to wear lingerie, girls' dresses and little high-heeled girls' shoes myself."
"Is that all?"
"And being punished in them."
"You are delighted now?"
"Oh Miss Priscilla!"
"Answer!"
"Yes."
"Did the idea, the thought of being put into girls' high-heeled shoes and dresses, and punished in them, excite you before it was actually done to you?"
"No."
"When, then, did it begin?"
"After my return from the continent."
"Of course, I knew that you longed for women to dress you in girl's clothes," Miss Priscilla continued calmly. I was astounded.
"You knew that?"
"Of course. Helen and I instilled it in you, upon your return, to prepare you for your years in the girls' school and the time to follow. We have made you what you are, Denise, what you revel in. Will you not thank us?"
Yes, the whole terrible plot which these two women had concocted to turn me into their willing prisoner was now revealed to me; yet I seemed incapable to resist it. "Thank you, Miss Priscilla," I said. Miss Priscilla rose, clasped my waist, caressed my bosom.
"You are not going to give us much trouble, Miss Satin-Slippers."
She took the handcuffs and chain from me.
"Stand in the corner until I am ready for you. Your face to the wall, your dainty heels together, your hands behind you."
I obeyed. I heard Miss Priscilla moving the furniture.
She led me out of the corner where I stood between the two mirrors. I now saw a high stool of solid mahogany. It was seated with a padded seat of white satin and at the edge of the seat, there were white satin straps to tie down the legs above the knees. In the front of the solid stool, a little bar of steel with a ring at the end of it jutted out
for an inch or two just at the place where the ankles would be if anyone were sitting on the stool and a flat back padded with white satin and with arms stretching out in the form of a cross rose behind. So at the extremities of the arms little handcuffs were fixed to hold the arms extended.
"I think your stockings can be drawn tighter up your legs, Denise."
She raised my skirt and carefully straining the fragile stockings up over my knees, shortened the suspenders.
"Now mount on to the stool."
She placed a little gold footstool. I climbed on to the stool by means of it and sat with my legs dangling. She took away the gilt footstool. She strapped with a white satin strap my waist tightly to the back of the stool, and extending my gloved arms one on each side fixed them with the handcuffs to the cross. I watched her timidly.
"You need not be frightened, Denise. I am not going to hurt you."
She fondled my bosom with her kid-gloved hands and actually kissed me with her leathery lips. I was terribly excited. I waited in an extraordinary suspense. Then she tucked up my skirt in front and underneath me until my white satin garters with the big bows and buckles and the lace frills of my panties were exposed. She strapped my thighs down together to the edge of the seat just above the garters, so that my knees showing delicately pink through the filmy sheen of the tightly strained stockings, projected a little beyond the seat and my feet hung down clear of the little steel bar and ring.
"Can you move them? Try!"
I saw in the bright light reflected from the mirror the round legs tapering down in their shimmering meshes of silk to the neat little ivory ankles and exquisitely-slippered slender feet. I tried to move them.
"I can only move my insteps Miss Priscilla," I said smiling. "I can make my shoe-buckles flash, that's all."
"I don't mind you doing that, dear. Watch your beautiful legs and feet!" She took the satin-slippered feet in her hands and began to caress and fondle them as she had fondled my breasts. Oh the feel and the sight of her hand in their white kid-gloves, playing delicately with my shining satin slippers, dusting imaginary specks from the bright buckles, toying with the heels, sent thrills of voluptuous pleasure through me.
"Isn't it ridiculous Denise," she said in a gentle insinuating voice, "to want to go back to heavy boots when you can attract everybody's admiration by the flash of your diamond buckles to the beautiful shape of your feet and ankles and the loveliness of your shoes and stockings."
I smiled and blushed.
"Perhaps, Miss Priscilla, "I whispered shyly.
"I am sure dear," she said.
Her hands crept up to my insteps, patted and tickled them, spanned the bound ankles, rose over the smooth stockings, pinched the calves affectionately, reached the knees. I was trembling from head to foot. I watched my legs and feet in a delicious expectancy. A mirror was tilted underneath them in such a way that the new white soles and satin-covered heels were reflected in the big glass and were made visible to me. Oh, the round soft legs in the shimmering gossamer of the tightly-stretched wonderful nylon stockings, and the white satin strap binding them deliciously together at the delicate ankles! Oh the little feet in their feminine finery, the slim girl's slippers of glistening satin like the strap which bound the ankles, light, fragile, beautiful pointed slippers which ladies made me wear as a punishment! Oh, the arched insteps, the high curving narrow heels! Ladies had perched me up in them, as a punishment. Oh the blazing diamond buckles! Ladies had had them set for me, had sewn them on the exquisite slippers as a badge of subjection, and to attract all eyes to the loveliness of my feet.
Miss Priscilla seemed to read my thoughts. For as she fondled my knees, she said:
"Weren't we right to dress you as the lovely girl you are, should be dressed, Denise? Why should ladies put up with a clumsy youth in ugly trousers, when they can have a prettily-corseted long-haired girl tripping about the drawing-room in rustling tight satin dresses and gowns and light little high-heeled buckled satin slippers which are a positive
joy to their eyes?"
"Weren't we right?
"Oh, yes, Miss Priscilla," I murmured languorously.
"And when we had dressed you and gloved you and corseted you, weren't we right to take the silk-stockinged legs and cross the dainty slippers and bind the ankles with satin straps and the gloved hands with handcuffs?"
I stared at the reflection in the mirror, the beautiful girl with the flushed face and wanton smile upon her red lips and the silver satin high-heeled slippers with the diamond buckles fitting with such perfection over the glistening nylon stockings exposed, bound with satin straps and handcuffs at the mercy of this thin shrivelled old woman in the black plain dress.
"Oh you were right," I murmured languorously. Her caressing hands extorted the admission.
"Reflect," she said "that no lady would punish you with this treatment were you dressed as a youth. It is only because you are corseted and curled and white-bosomed and are wearing satin-slippers with high-heels that you are subjected to its exquisite degradation. Don't you love your subjection?"
"Oh I do! I do!"
It was I, Dennis Beryl, the youth with the great fortune and the lofty ambitions who was speaking. But her satin-gloved bands caressed me. I could give no other answer. I gave up my will, my life to her and to Helen. I leaned towards her as far as my handcuffs and my bonds would allow. I was in an ecstacy. To live satin-slippered and corseted with handcuffed gloved-hands and strapped ankles in beautiful dresses--yes, I learned that night from Miss Priscilla's hands that this was the supreme joy life held out to me.
"Keep me tied and daintily frocked! Oh Miss Priscilla thank you!" and I sank back with a drooping head.
"It is all over with you now. Do you remember how you used to annoy me with your dirty shooting clothes and your heavy noisy boots? No more noisy boots Denise--ever! Only the daintiest little things of patent leather with slender tapping heels for the future. We have finished with Evelyn Beryl."
I was floating back now into the ordinary world of men and women. I was ashamed. I moved restlessly.
She helped me down, removed the straps and chains from my legs and hands. She gave me a glass of champagne, and then, with a disdainful smack on my bottom, she said: "Now take your pretty feet back to the drawing-room."
Ashamed I curtsied low to her and went out of the room. But the venom was in my veins. As I walked down the stairs, the rustle of my frock, the feel of it clinging delicately about my ankles, the gleaming buckles, the lightness of my slippers, the sensation of high slender heels all ravished me. Yes, I wanted to be kept in subjection as a beautifully dressed girl.
"You have been a long time," Violet said peevishly. "I have been here alone and it has been very dull."
She was annoyed. I smiled and blushed.
"What has Miss Priscilla been saying to you?" Here was my chance and I took it.
I flung myself into a chair, crossed my knees and swung a satin-slippered foot indolently to and fro.
"You must find out, my pretty one," I said.
Her eyes flashed dangerously.
"Don't be impertinent, Denise. And uncross your legs at once! Put your heels together and turn your toes out and answer me."
I swung my foot more violently.
"I warn you Denise," she said.
I began to unbutton a glove with an impertinent smile.
"Very well. It is your fault Denise," she paused a moment. "Miss Helen is in charge."
Immediately, I returned to that same obedient state that the star sapphire induced in me. Clearly, Violet had been made a party to my hypnotic subjugation as well.
"Perhaps you will put your pretty feet and ankles together, now." I could not disobey. "We might have had a lovely evening together, Denise, as two loving girlfriends. But you have made it clear you prefer me to be your mistress. Very well, instead of your willing compliance, you shall be compelled to be my attentive companion.
"Kiss me Denise darling," and our lips for a long time clung passionately together.
"Stand there!"
"You are not going to punish me?"
"I am going to see darling whether you will now put your high-heels together and turn your dainty toes out when I tell you to. I am going to blindfold your eyes, stand you up on a chair with your face to the wall, just by the armchair in which I am sitting."
I blushed--but with pleasure. My eyes danced, my lips smiled. She fixed the bandage over my eyes and tied it at the back of my hair. Then she turned me round, clapped her hands delightedly and kissed me ardently on the lips. She led me to the chair. She guided my little satin slippers up onto it. She placed me in position. Then at my side
she sat down in her arm-chair and resumed her book. I stood there for an hour blindfolded with my hands tied, and feeling every now and then her dainty little hand steal under my dress, touch my feet to make sure they had not moved, caress my ankles, play with my slipper buckles and high-heels. Miss Priscilla had done her work well that night. For the hour was an hour of bliss.
TO BE CONTINUED
[Don't forget to pick the man you'd love to see feminized (details here)!]
1 comment:
I have always loved Miss High Heels in all its versions, and this one is delicious! I would love to read of Denise in the clutches of Mrs Pettigrew and her laundry girls!
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