Worried about Lucinda

I am growing increasingly worried about Lucinda. She may be a tiresome girl at times and often vexes my patience with her wilfulness but that does not mean I do not care about her deeply.

She is infatuated with Master Freddie and a more unsuitable object for her attention she could not have chosen. He may be her cousin, and Sir George’s only son and heir but he is also a philanderer of the worst type. He can be extremely charming when he wants to be, but men like him always are. They are only after one thing. I have seen the way he is around any attractive
young woman. He is the same with Eleanor as he is with Rose the kitchen maid. I don’t believe he has any moral scruples when it comes to women. That might seem like rank hypocrisy on my part when one thinks of the play I have made for Sir George and my encounters with Mrs Kelling, but unlike the younger women whom Freddie prays on I do not have my reputation to preserve in the same way. I have to be realistic, there is not going to be a husband for me. But Lucy stands
every chance of losing her virtue and her good name if she continues down the road that Freddie is trying to take her.

We were in the classroom this morning. For once Lucinda was working quite hard. She enjoys poetry, especially the romantic poets, who appeal to her nature and she had managed to write some insightful comments on the poems I had given her to study. I had her exercise book and when I had finished reading her latest piece of work I idly flicked back through the pages. I was dismayed by what I found. One paged had been almost entirely defaced. Drawn across it were the repeated motif of the initial L entwined the with initial F. L for Lucinda, F for Freddie. She had experimented with different versions of the monogram but it was always the same two letters.

“Come here Lucinda,” I ordered.

She gave a sigh as she got up from her desk and came over to stand in front of me. I pointed to the book.

“What’s the meaning of this?” I asked her.

She shrugged her shoulders. “I was just drawing letters, making them look pretty. I wasn’t doing it in the lesson and you’d already marked that page.”

“That is beside the point. You have defaced this book you naughty girl.”

She glared back at me and I thought she might give me an angry retort but she somehow controlled herself.

“If you are going to act like a silly little girl then that is how I will treat you. Put yourself across my knee.”

She gave a very theatrical sigh but did as she was bid. It is a long time since I have had Lucinda over my knee. More often than not her offences demand a stiffer penalty than a mere spanking and she has become no stranger to the cane and strap. However, on this occasion such measures were not merited. I lifted the skirt of her dress and loosened the ties of her knickers so that I could part them and bare her bottom.

It may have been a long time since I had spanked her like this but I had not forgotten how to do it! The spanking I gave her was hard andprolonged and soon she was gasping and kicking up her ankles. I kept her over my lap for a good ten minutes and did not release her until the whole of her bottom was nicely red and very warm to the touch.

She struggled back to her feet and pressed her hands to her bottom.

“Now Lucinda, let us return to these monograms,” I said.

“What of them?” she said defensively.

“I would hazard a guess that they represent your initial combined with that of Master Freddy.”

She had the grace to blush a little. “And if they do, what business of it of yours?” she replied.

I tried to soften my tone. “Lucinda, you must be very careful with Freddie,” I said.

“There is no need to be careful, he is the perfect gentlemen,” she said loftily.

“That is exactly, what he is not, Lucinda. He may be Sir George’s son but he is no gentlemen. He is very much the ladies man, a rogue and a rake. You are not the only pretty girl in this house who he has eyes for. I have been watching him Lucinda and you are in grave danger of being badly hurt by him.”

“Nonsense!” she said angrily. “How dare you speak aboutFreddie like that? He is kind and lovely and he makes me laugh. What do you know of love and romance anyway? No man has ever paid any attention to you I would wager. You’re simply jealous, that’s the truth of it.”

It would have been easy to rise to this litany of insults but somehow I kept my temper in check. I thought of my lovely Charles and how decorous and chaste our love had been despite the fact that we burned for each-other.

“You are very wrong about Lucinda. I know what it is to have a loved a good man,” I said softly.

“I don’t believe you!” she said, very rudely.

I felt the colour come to my cheeks, and shamefully the tears come to my eyes.

“My Charles loved me dearly and I him, ” I said quickly.

“Then why are you still a spinster?” she demanded.

“Because he was killed in the Sudan… six months before we were due to be wed,” I said softly.

There was a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes as it all came flooding back. A traitorous tear slid down the side of my nose. It was then that Lucy realised that she had gone far toofar.

“Oh… oh Miss Downing,” she said slowly, her face very red “I’m so sorry, I never realised…” her voice trailed off and she looked down ather feet. I said nothing, trying to regain my composure.

“Shall I… shall I fetch the cane?” she asked miserably.

She deserved a caning for her rudeness and impertinence butI shook my head. It would do no good tobeat her, not when I was trying to help and advise her; it would only turn her against me the more.

“No Lucinda, not this time,” I told her “There has been enough pain in this classroom for one day without adding to it. I am not going to beat you despite your rudeness. All I ask is that you think very carefully about what I have told you about Master Freddy. He will break your heart and
ruin your good name if you are not very careful.”

I think she was relieved not have been caned. NeverthelessLucinda left the schoolroom in a very sober frame of mind… and with a rathersore bottom. I would be pleased if either of those gives her the spur to resist Freddie’s advances. But she is young and foolish and if he is determined to have his way with her - I have every fear that she will let him.

I am increasingly worried about Lucinda.