Grushenka. Three Times a Woman Page 4
Ivan had his arms around her, the left one over her right shoulder, the right one in the middle of her back. The tight grasp and the weight of him could not be shaken off. But Grushenka could move her hips and her legs and she made ample use of these when the dangerous shaft came in contact with her love-nest. The Princess, who would have killed any serf not performing her orders, was highly delighted to see this struggle and slipped her hand under her chemise to give herself a soft caress with her fingers. Ivan tried to find his way. He moved his right hand under the buttocks of the struggling girl. He lifted his own behind and tried by crafty pushes to find the entrance, but now one of the maids came to his help. She went around the couch and caught Grushenka's other knee which she forced up against Grushenka's shoulder and moved it so that the virginal love-spot lay unprotected and open. “Now!” shouted all the watchers, and Ivan, well understanding that he was at last in position, lowered his weapon with force. Pressing with his right hand against the girl's bottom, with one firm and slow stroke, he thrust himself in up to the hilt.
Grushenka let out a terrible cry. After that she lay still as a corpse. Ivan moved back and forth several times until, passionately groaning, he felt he could not hold it any longer. He spent. His muscles relaxed; breathing heavily he lay on her, stupidly exhausted.
The Princess was furious, her maids disappointed. They had hoped to see a good, long match, but it was over before it had really started. Certainly there was nothing thrilling in that. “Get out! You brute!” commanded the Princess. “Get back to your stable and stay there!” Ivan collected his pants, dropped his head and left the room like a beaten man. He did not dare to look up or to glance at Grushenka. She lay with a pale face like a corpse on the couch, the middle of her body still raised by the pillow under her. She had fainted and one could see that she was quite ill. With dismay the Princess had her carried up to her room. What sort of girl was this-who could not even stand a poke? That was what she said to a lady at afternoon tea as she was relating the story, and added that the silly peasants were too stupid for words. The lady was not of that opinion. She answered that she often arranged a party for some of her hand-maids and serf-men and that they put on very exciting shows. She promised to invite Nelidowa as spectator to such a party and the Princess graciously accepted. Meanwhile, Grushenka was in her bed, taken care of by Katerina. Katerina was afraid this episode might lead to pregnancy, and though she knew how to handle an abortion, she was afraid Grushenka's figure might change and Grushenka had become very useful. The scenes the Princess used to make because of her try-ons had been avoided since Grushenka had taken her place as a model. Therefore Grushenka had been washed and cleaned and, in spite of her protests, a hot irrigation had been made with water into which Katerina had put a powder. Next a cold wet towel was put between her legs. It did not ease the pain. She still had to overcome the shock which the rape had effected. She was allowed to stay in bed all the next day by the old housekeeper, who muttered, “What a soft girl! What a soft girl!”
CHAPTER FOUR
The weeks after her rape were perhaps the happiest of Grushenka's youth. At least she looked her best and became a ravishing beauty. She was awakened. Her days of dreaming were over and gave place to a lively vivacity and an ever good mood. Many times, full of hell, she played little pranks on the other girls and the tailor folks, and was sometimes punished by having to stand in a dark corner or with a few strokes from the whip. They were not severe punishments. The girl had such an air of good-hearted spirits and happiness about her that no one became really angry with her. The reasons for her change were as follows: A few days after losing her maidenhood, she had had to show her mistress a new costume, a light blue, fluffy affair with many ribbons and laces. The Princess had liked it, and incidentally had ordered the girl to show her sex.
She wanted to see what changes had come from the assault. Grushenka lifted the costume carefully in front, another girl spread the slit of her trousers open while the Princess took a good look. There was no change. Nelidowa was thinking that one poke might not effect a great change, but that if it should be used often, the rosy and thin lips would certainly become thick and vulgar. Hence the order to Katerina that Grushenka was to be poked daily and that Katerina should supply various men in order that the business be attended to properly.
Katerina disliked this new order, for which she could not imagine the reason, but what could she do? She moved Grushenka's bed to a separate room in the basement and, after dinner, gave the girl her instructions. First she gave her a salve and ordered her to smear it every day into her tube. This salve was to kill the sperm. The irrigations, to be taken afterwards, would make doubly sure that she should not get an enlarged belly. Presently she sent a stable boy to the girl's room, a red-haired, freckled, undersized man, who grinned with delight. The sex life of the servants was controlled, but once in a while they were allowed to do some love-making. It was not half enough and they always craved for the opportunity. Very often there was a love match between two serfs and they were sometimes allowed to marry, receiving from the master a shack and a bit of land that they had to till in addition to the land of the owner of the estate. More often, when some girl got pregnant, the master commanded one of his men to marry her. It was always a feast to be allowed to make love and it was usually done in the hay of the stables or somewhere in the fields. A good party in a bed and an order to give her the limit was a pleasure! When the news came to the stable, the men threw dice for the trick and the redhead was much envied when he won. Grushenka was sitting uneasily on her bed; she held one hand over her breasts, the other one clutched her thin dress in front. With a pitiful voice she begged him not to take her, to spare her. The shock from Ivan's handling was still in her bones. But the redhead had other ideas. He threw his wooden slippers into the air, slipped out of his shirt and trousers, and assured the frightened girl that it should be as if it were his wedding night and that he would not need any help like Ivan. Nay, he'd do the job alone and quite thoroughly. As he stood before her, naked, she did not know what to do. She knelt before him and implored him to let her be, but he instead took hold of her hair and pressed her face against his lower body and laughed aloud when she tried to struggle away. Then he lifted her up bodily and threw her on the bed. “For the quick poke in the woods,” he said, “it's all right with clothes on, but I'll have you nude, my little bride. It's so much nicer.” He started to loosen the hooks of her skirt and to tear it off her. Grushenka felt that resistance would not do any good and that her garments would only be torn, and that meant the whip, so she unbuttoned her blouse herself and got rid of her trousers, while her lover-by-command lauded her change of mind. When they lay belly on belly, Grushenka again begged and prayed. She was very beautiful and the redhead had no reason to hurt her. He promised to be careful and explained to her that it would not cause her any pain, that she would, in fact, like it, and that if she followed his suggestions, they could both enjoy it profoundly. The frightened girl promised to do all he said and he proceeded with great care. He tickled her with the point of his shaft for a while and then inserted it by degrees, moving always a bit back and shuffling it in again, each time a little more, until his hair rubbed closely against her well shaven Mount of Venus. He then inquired whether it had hurt and Grushenka answered in a soft, wondering voice, “Just a bit. Oh! Be careful.” But it had not hurt her at all, it was just a funny feeling, not exactly exciting, but almost pleasing. He told her to move slowly up and down, which she did, until he started to heave and to push, finally forgetting himself. Grushenka did not answer his strokes, she was still afraid that it might hurt her again. But she held her arms close to his back, and when he finally finished, she pressed herself firmly against his belly. He had not had enough.
He stayed in her bed joking with her. He played around with her, laughed to see that she was shaved and pinched her bottom, good-heartedly. She discovered with amazement that he was ready again and she did not fight him off when he
put it in anew. This time her fright was gone. She thought, “Really, it's not so bad.” Still she did not get a thrill out of it, although it felt rather pleasant.
Every night after dinner, a man came to her. Sometimes they were elderly and brutal and did not undress, just laid her over the bed, gave her a slap on the behind and disappeared. Sometimes, they were mere boys, who were shy, and Grushenka had a great time teasing them and working them up and finally seducing them many times so that they walked from the room with weak knees. Grushenka learned to love it. She could not say when she climaxed for the first time, but after it had happened, she succeeded in getting the supreme thrill with every man; half a dozen times if she liked her partner. She learned how to make love and soon became a passionate lover. The male servants in the house who had tried her out, praised her with glittering eyes.
What a girl! What a figure! A volcano! These were fine weeks, weeks of thrills, weeks during which her body filled out and her mind became clear, weeks without dreams, full of reality. She looked at other girls with searching curiosity. She learned from them about their love affairs; she studied her mistress with appraising eyes.
Couldn't she manage to get a nice boy as a husband and a little house with some acres and have children too? Why not? She learned who was influencing the master and the mistress, she made plans, she laid eyes on one of the best body servants of the Prince, and though she never spoke with him or had intercourse with him, she believed she had fallen in love with him. All that ended suddenly, and it was again her mistress who effected the change, her mistress who was by right and law Grushenka's destiny. Nelidowa used to start many things, give many orders, and forget about them again. Her mind wandered.
Everything that did not pertain to her lover (of whom we will have to speak later) was done in a haphazard way. But Nelidowa remembered, one night when she came from the bedroom of her husband, that Grushenka was to have been her means for finding out how continuous love-making would change a woman's body; so she sent for her. Grushenka had had a quick and meaningless bout with an elderly man that night about an hour before, and was still awake when the handmaid of Nelidowa came for her. She put a bed sheet around her shoulders and walked nude to Her Highness' bedchamber. (It must be remembered that all people, high or low, male or female, slept without nightshirts at that time, and it is said that Marie Antoinette, some fifty years later, was the first one to create the mode). Nelidowa had just washed herself and sat naked before her toilet table, while one of her maids braided her long black hair into pigtails. Nelidowa was in a good mood and told Grushenka to wait until her hair was done. In a few minutes, she took the nude girl on her lap. She inquired whether Grushenka had been poked daily, whether the instruments had been big and long, whether she had learned to make love properly and whether she liked it.
Grushenka answered automatically, “Yes,” to every question. Then Nelidowa gently opened the girl's legs and examined her. There was no change to be seen. The little love-nest was tender and innocent, as though it had never held big male machines. The lips were perhaps more red, and fuller, but still firmly closed and thin. The Princess moved her more towards her knees, opened her own legs a little and wondered at her own unattractive pleasure garden.
Apparently it was not love-making, but the hand of nature which had made the difference. Everything seemed to go well and the princess was about to send her double to bed again, but in her dissatisfaction with the imperfect loving she had received from her husband, she felt induced to play more with Grushenka's body.
Grushenka leaned closely on the shoulder of her mistress, and allowed her access to her secret parts. She knew that some servant girls were supposed to do this same thing to each other. Lady's love was at that time more common than it is today. It was an art practised with great finesse in the harems, and the Russian household was still very much like a harem. Just when Grushenka began to feel fine, the Princess got vexed that the girl should get a kick out of it, while she herself felt nothing. With her old meanness, she pinched Grushenka's thighs with her sharp finger nails, hurting the tender flesh terribly. Startled and with a cry Grushenka leapt from the woman's lap, holding the injured spot with her hands, instinctively ducking away from her mistress. Nelidowa, upset by the girl's screams, her nerves offended, said the guilty one had to be punished.
As she reached for a leather slipper, her eyes had a gruesome expression. She scolded the girl and made her lie down over her lap.
Cracking slaps fell on Grushenka's backside and thighs, the pain shot in lightning heat with each stroke through her body. The slipper was merciless. Grushenka wiggled and kicked, cried and screamed, then subdued her cries to sobs. Her buttocks and legs felt as if a red hot iron was being applied. The struggling bare form before her eyes did not leave the Princess without feeling. She started to feel rather good, and she acted accordingly. She let Grushenka fall to the carpet, then took hold of her head and forced it between her own legs. One of her hand-maids, seeing what was going on, rushed behind her mistress, embraced her and, coming with her arms from behind, drew her gently back, thus placing her in a position in which to enjoy herself.
Grushenka did not know what to do. Nelidowa took that as obstinate resistance. She let her go and pushed her away with a firm kick of her bare feet. One of her bed-maids immediately took Grushenka's place (the girl said later she had done so to avert murder, so wild were the eyes of her mistress) and with apt and learned strokes she brought the passionate young Princess to fulfillment. Finally she closed her eyes and hung exhausted in the arms of the serf girl who held her. The bed-maids carried her to her bed and put her softly between the sheets. Grushenka slipped out of the room, hoping all would be forgotten the next day. She made up her mind to ask one of the girls how to satisfy Madame in case she should again be called to this duty. The next afternoon it was clear that Nelidowa had not forgotten. Katerina was ordered to appear with Grushenka. The Princess instructed briefly and without explanation, “Give that girl fifty lashes with the cowhide and don't let her make love from now on.” Katerina closed her lips tight. If she followed her mistress' order, the girl would be dead by sunset. She could never stand it. Men died with less than that number of blows.
She led the trembling and loudly sobbing girl to the basement, where in a far corner a room for the punishment of serfs was equipped with instruments of torture. Katerina led her to the whipping block and Grushenka, her eyes full of tears, stripped without resistance and laid herself over the saddle-like middle of the block. Katerina chained her arms and feet to rings. Then she questioned the frightened girl and Grushenka, her head hanging to the floor, related the happenings of the night before. Katerina was thinking hard while she fingered the different whips to find one of lighter weight. She looked at the white body, stripped for punishment, and at the whip, then threw the whip away. “Listen!” she said. “One should not trust such a bitch as you, but I will spare you if you can keep your mouth shut. Right after this you will go to bed and stay there for two days and be sick, and you'll tell everybody that I put a wet linen over you, so as not to blister your skin. If you do as I say, you'll get off lightly, because you did not know better and it was not your fault.” Whereupon Katerina hit her several times with her hand, which did not hurt less than the slipper the night before. “And one thing more. You are going to learn how to love perfectly so that you know better next time. Understand?” Katerina had something on her mind when she made this decision. Nelidowa was using up her maids in quick order and Katerina had always to supply new ones. The Princess, cruel and beastly as she could be (like many people who come from nothing into power), was equally good-hearted and carelessly friendly when she was in a good mood. None of her personal maids liked to stay long with her. The small leather whip with the golden handle was always too near and the moods of the mistress changed too quickly. The way to get away from her was to get married. They sometimes asked her for it outright and got what they wanted, including the men they had picked
for themselves. Sometimes they did what they could to get pregnant and then they were scolded or even put for a few days in a dark room with water and bread. They were never severely punished (oriental women have a religious respect for a pregnant woman) and in the end were usually supplied with a husband. Then it was up to Katerina to find another maid: handsome, with a good figure, well trained in washing and clothing the mistress, alert, keen and also a good Lesbian.
The handmaids lived in one big room where, when not busy, they waited the call of the Princess. They passed their time telling lewd stories, playing with each other, indulging in parties. They were ready for that always, because they wore only light Russian blouses with such a low neck that half of the breast was exposed and wide skirts with no other garments below. Bending down and pulling the skirt up offered the necessary position for the whip, and lying down and pulling the skirt up made ready for a little play with the tongue.
After Grushenka had spent two lonesome days in bed, she was turned over to an efficient instructress in the latter. Three or four young girls, not more than seventeen years of age, were broken in by this woman, who was above thirty and understood her job well. The girls had to give each other a work-out, and then they had to show their ability to the teacher. If it had not been for the fact that this teacher always had a switch in her hand, which she used when she was not satisfied, Grushenka would have enjoyed these instructions.