Spank: The Improbable Adventures of George Aloysius Brown (22 page)

When I have recovered my composure, put my clothes on and put the horse back into its paddock, Scarlett Dolor is sitting at her workbench.

"
Tea time
'
s over, my sweet,
"
she tells me.
"
But I can offer you a glass of wine?
"

Without waiting for an answer, she wheeled to her fridge and pulled out a bottle of late harvest Sauterne. I recognized the label. She didn
'
t buy this one at the supermarket.

As we sat sipping wine together I asked her how she had become paralyzed.
"
Horse riding, my sweet,
"
she explained.
"
Or, more specifically, falling off during a hunt.
I broke my back, but not my spirit.
My interest in discipline came later. The smell of leather, the snap of the crop on a horse
'
s shanks stayed with me, is still with me. The whistle of the whip is the mantra of the horsey set. Ever been to a hunt ball? Believe me, my sweet, there are more trousers around ankles after the dancing stops than there are foxes in an unguarded henhouse.
"

She looked at her watch.

"
You had better leave. I
'
ve got a visitor coming in an hour. Julian says you will have something for me to look at by the end of the week.
"
She wrapped the cane in tissue paper and put it in a slim cardboard tube lined with velour. Then she tied a ribbon around it and presented it to me with a smile.

When I left her flat it was raining, one of those downpours that blows horizontally making you wield your umbrella in front of you like a shield. Head down I was running towards the shelter of the tube station and I never saw him until we collided.
The impact knocked the breath out of me and the cardboard tube flew from my hands and rolled into the gutter.

"
You okay?
"

Head still down, I nodded assent, while gallantly he retrieved my parcel. Only then I looked up to thank him and found myself staring into the eyes of R.C.Montgomery.

He was first to react.

"
My God, Catherine. I don
'
t believe it. I never thought I would see you again It
'
s been what…. five years? Are you finished university? I
'
m still in
Hong Kong
, on home leave for a month. This is amazing.
"

My hair was tangled by the wind and rain and I imagined I reeked of sex, but if only to get out of the rain I allowed myself to be bundled into a coffee shop and now we are sitting in a corner booth warming our hands on a latte, my precious parcel propped up against the wall.

"
It
'
s not your birthday,
"
he said.
"
I remember that date, last day of school for both of us. Have you taken up sword fighting?

"
It
'
s just a poster,
"
I told him.
"
Canaletto.
I love
Venice
, don
'
t you? When I wake up in the morning the first thing I see is the
Rialto
Bridge
.
"

And that was how it began. We started dating. Within a month I had joined him in
Hong Kong
. When Julian agreed to my taking a leave of absence, I couldn
'
t wait to phone Jen. A year ago she emigrated to
Australia
to work for a pharmaceutical company in
Sydney
doing research in organic plant compounds. I miss her terribly.

"
I don
'
t know Cat,
"
she said, after I had told her what had happened, how we ran into each other and his invitation to join him in
Hong Kong
.
"
It
'
s certainly a great opportunity.
Hong Kong
'
s fabulous.
But there
'
s something about this that bothers me.
"

"
Like what?
"

"
Like his depression after what happened in
Iraq
.
"

"
He says he
'
s over that. He
'
s fine.
"

"
I hope so, sweetie.
Still, if it doesn
'
t work out you can always come to
Sydney
. Or I
'
ll come to
Hong Kong
to visit you. I miss you.
"

"
Me, too. It
'
s not the same here without you.
Did I tell you I
'
m writing a book?
"

"
No. That
'
s exciting. What sort of book?
"

A romance, of course
"

"
Of course. What
'
s it about?
"

"
I
'
m not sure yet. I
'
m still working on the outline.
"

"
Well,
Hong Kong
would make a perfect setting. Love among the lotus blossoms. What could be more romantic than that?
"

And for a while it was. Life is good for ex-pats if you have housing and money and RC has both. His penthouse apartment is on the Peak, the social summit of the
Hong Kong
scene. Across the harbor, sprawling Kowloon-side bristles with skyscrapers housing millions of people in warren-like units that stretch all the way to
China
. And yet here we are emperors of all we survey.
We lie in bed luxuriating under the covers and flip the remote to raise the blinds, revealing, seemingly to our eyes only, the lights of the city laid out before us like diamonds. Far below, bobbing at anchor in the crowded harbor, freighters, cruise ships and rusting
China
coasters seem like playthings in a celestial pond.

We are as giddy and carefree as newlyweds. On Sundays we go for dim sum with his Chinese colleagues in one or other of the huge downtown restaurants and afterwards, to walk off the meal, we hike for miles on the Hong Kong trail over the Dragon
'
s Back to
Big
Wave
Bay
on the other side of the island.
The trail winds across scrubby hillsides through stands of bamboo with views of the old
village
of
Shek O
, across the South China Sea to
Tung
Lung
Island
and the
Clearwater
Bay
Peninsula
. We sometimes see kites or eagles hunting, riding the thermals. It is hauntingly beautiful. This is the
China
of the ancient tapestries and it is inconceivable to us that we can be so completely alone in the most crowded place on earth.

If we feel less energetic we drive the company Mercedes to the Hong Kong Cricket Club, where RC has a membership, and play tennis or lounge by the pool sipping Singapore Slings like characters out of the colonial past.
RC works out every day, preserving the lean muscular body of a man half his age. The problems he suffered during the
Iraq
war are happily a thing of the past, although strangely we never discuss what happened between us during my last days of school. Yet not quite all has been lost to the past.
Sometimes, when I
'
m in the bathroom getting ready for bed I hear the soft opening refrain of Ravel
'
s Bolero and it never fails to make my heart race.

He has taught me a simple digital code and we use it to text messages to each other to spice up our day.
It makes me hot to confess my most intimate desires to him
knowing
that he alone can read
them and I imagine him sitting in his office, or even in a meeting, or the metro, casually scrolling my messages up and down.. I tell him, as if he doesn
'
t know, that I can
'
t wait to assume my favorite position over his knee so he can stroke and caress my bottom or run his fingertips up and down my spine. Later, when fantasy becomes reality and I am in the position I crave we are totally at ease with each other. Keeping me waiting heightens the sexual tension between us. When he is ready he pushes down on the small of my back holding me firmly in position. I am his captive, his submissive angel, and I know he is about to begin. In response, I moan with desire and rise up to meet his hand.

But sometimes, sensing the intensity of my desire, he is rougher, suddenly grabbing me by my wrists and thrusting me over the back of the love seat in our bedroom. I am utterly defenseless in his grasp. Then he stands behind me, with a single tug ripping off my panties, discarding the shredded garment at my feet.
Now I brace myself for what I know will be a harder spanking which he administers until my cheeks are burning red. Then he enters me noisily from behind. When we are both sated, he gently
turns me,
kisses the tip of my nose and carries me to bed, laying me on my tummy so he can rub soothing
balm on my stinging buttocks.

I buy thin cotton panties by the dozen.

Strangely, there is no suggestion of his own need to be punished.
Something in my head says, don
'
t ask, so I never question him about it. But one day I was idly skimming through the ads in the morning paper looking for rattan furniture for our balcony when a display ad for the Wang King Rattan and Camphorwood Chest Emporium on
De Voeux Road East
caught my eye. At the end of the ad in 6-pt type, it read:
"
Also available, products by RattanAmour.
"

I can hardly believe my eyes, Scarlett Dolor exporting to
Asia
? I don
'
t believe it, the Stradivarius of Discipline (a slogan I came up with) now for sale on the streets of
Hong Kong
.
I am suddenly weak-kneed as memories of the extraordinary encounter with Ms. Dolor flood back. I can hear again the swish of rattan, feel its sudden sharp sting, the pain slowly giving way to a feeling of intense pleasure.
I had come up with the brand name, RattanAmour, (where fine art meets serious pain) and built an entire web campaign around it.
Then a wild thought intrudes on my reverie. His birthday is approaching. I would buy one as a gift for RC, a surprise, a link with the past and, dare I say it, on the right occasion it might serve to punish me too. I shuddered deliciously at the prospect.

Next day I stroll down from the Peak to board a tram in Central, just another foreign tourist going shopping in
Hong Kong
. The trams are a throwback to the 1930s,
green painted clanging antiquities that have somehow survived into the 21st century.
Forget the luxury malls and the international high-end bling of Central, this is how to enjoy Hong Kong, at street level, trundling eastwards towards the
Happy
Valley
racetrack and the
Wong Nai Chung Gap Road
that winds over the mountain to
Repulse
Bay
. Here
you are totally immersed in the sights and smells of what
'
s left of old Hong Kong: Bamboo scaffolding framing highrise buildings, delivery boys on bicycles buried under impossible loads, honking taxis,
pushcarts,
a jumble of advertisements
in Chinese and English – the Fuk U Kee Umbrella & Toothbrush Manufacturing Corporation side-by-side with Welcome
Market.
There is chaos on the streets. My tram narrowly misses a pair of skinny farm boys, a bamboo pole slung across their shoulders, carrying a squealing pig to market.

The proprietor of the Wang King rattan furniture emporium is a veritable smilin
'
Buddah, perched cross legged on a rattan glass-topped desk. He is wearing baggy shorts and a grubby white vest that only partially covers an extravagant pot belly. The locals seem to eat constantly day and night and this one is slurping from a bowl of noodles, gold teeth flashing.

"
Welcome, Missee,
"
he says.
"
Good stuff inside. You wan
'
cold beer, cup of tea?
"