An English Girl in the Middle East

Story by R.T. Mason from Janus 36

Marilyn Birling, aged 24, stepped off the plane and the heat hit her like a solid wall. At least that particular concept of the Emirate was confirmed; it was very, very hot in a way that had to be experienced to be believed. By the time she had completed the short walk to the airport building she could feel herself perspiring under the crisp white linen blouse and skirt, the latter a full calf-length out of deference to local sensitivity.

Her husband, Bob, met her in the airport lounge, an emotional greeting for them both, for Bob had been out here for four months, by far the longest time they had been apart in the five years of their marriage. Now he had got an apartment sorted out, Marilyn would be here with him for the rest of his three-year appointment. After that, who could say? At least they would have a sizeable nest-egg for the future because these Middle Eastern contracts certainly paid well for a qualified engineer.

‘God that heat!’ she exclaimed when they were sitting in the airport lounge after that first emotional reunion, necessarily restrained for Bob had warned Marilyn that excessive public displays of affection were frowned upon.

It was pleasantly cool inside after the searing heat she had just encountered and Marilyn gave thanks for the air-conditioning. Under her demure white skirt Marilyn was wearing nylons, not pantyhose, and she could feel the cool air now blowing pleasantly on her bare upper thighs. The nylons were for Bob’s benefit. She knew they really turned him on and she was anxious to ensure that her husband was functioning at his maximum potential once they were alone, though after a four month absence such additional stimulus was hardly necessary.

Marilyn looked around the airport lounge. A fair number of Europeans, one or two Africans, but mostly Arabs, men and women, the men in both native and western dress but the women all in some sort of voluminous garment completely concealing their shape. ‘I wonder what they wear underneath’ she thought to herself. Perhaps the younger ones wore fancy nylons, even scanty silk briefs? Were there still harems, she wondered. One thing was certain — it was going to be very different from Surrey!

Different… exotic… even scary? She gave a little shiver.

The nylons and the pink lacy suspender belt fastening them were indeed appreciated. Bob made her keep them on, plus her white patent leather high-heel shoes — but nothing else — when they made love virtually as soon as they reached the apartment. It was wildly exciting, this strange exotic place and, of course the abstinence occasioned by those long weeks apart.

In truth not a 100% abstinence by both partners because Marilyn had been screwed once while Bob was away but that was a guilty secret she didn’t want to think about now.

After sex and a quiet cuddle she got up, stripped off those few remaining items of clothing and went for a shower. Still dripping, Marilyn went to the fridge and took out a can of beer. Towelling down, she sipped the beer while critically gazing at what she saw in the full-length bathroom mirror. Quite tall, 5’9”, and well-endowed in the bottom and boobs department but her waist and belly nicely trim and taut. In a few years she might have to watch those. She made a face. It was an undeniably pretty face; good bones, her mother said, also a soft full mouth and big blue eyes, all in the frame of that thick, curling shoulder-length blonde hair.

Suddenly she stopped the towelling and self-admiration, to look for the first time at what she had unthinkingly taken from the fridge.

‘Bob,’ she called through to the bedroom, ‘This beer. Isn’t alcohol supposed to be verboten here?’

----//----

He had laughed and told her no one worried about that, not in private at least. And that was what the other expatriates told her too, the other English women out here with their husbands and the one or two American girls. Don’t worry about it, they’d said, you can’t do it in public obviously but otherwise go ahead, everyone here enjoys a drink.

Well they ought to know, she thought. Anyway there was everything else to think about; this new exotic town, half still in the Middle-Ages, half ultra-modern air-conditioned, all under that implacable blazing sun. There was also their house-warming party.

Bob had arranged that they would give a party for the various friends he had made since coming out here and the second Friday after Marilyn’s arrival had been set as the day. This early date barely gave her time to get organised so there was no time to worry about the business of the legality of alcohol. Inevitably there was going to be plenty of it at the party; beer, wine, spirits. A friend of Bob’s was arranging all that.

There were around 20 people, just about filling their smallish apartment. Europeans and locals, the latter all in western dress including the two women. Marilyn had met virtually all of them already, at other parties and informal get-togethers, and the party went very well. There was one little incident, though, when it was getting rather late and possibly a number of the guests had had too much to drink. One of the men caught Marilyn alone in the kitchen.

His name, if transpired, was Dr Ahmed Kareem and he was one of the few people Marilyn had not met before. He was in his forties, stockily built with a heavy moustache. He came up behind her and said, in accent-less English, ‘Congratulations on a wonderful party, Mrs Birling,’ then he put his arm around Marilyn’s waist.

With a nervous laugh she twisted away but then two firm hands grasped her bottom, a cheek in each hand through her tight blue silk dress.

She gasped. ‘Do you mind!’, she said angrily, struggling loose and assuming he’d had too much to drink, though he seemed sober enough as he then firmly pushed her into a corner.

‘Don’t be alarmed, Mrs Birling, I merely wished to satisfy myself as to the firmness of that beautiful bottom. A compliment in fact. Turn round, please, for a moment.’

‘You’ve got to be joking!’ Marilyn spluttered, shocked at the effrontery of a man she didn’t know expecting her to stand still while he groped her at will.

He was still trying to get her to turn round when someone walked into the kitchen. Dr Kareem desisted but whispered in her ear, ‘Some of you English ladies are very haughty. I say this in spite of being your guest. Sometimes I think you all need — what is your expression — taking down a peg.’

Then he left her alone. Weird man, she thought, but he could go after some other girl’s bottom if that turned him on. A bit later she noticed he was taking flash photographs of certain guests, apparently as mementos of the occasion, but soon after he came up to Marilyn and Bob saying he had to leave. He seemed in a good enough mood, courteously shaking both their hands. She decided not to make Bob angry by telling him about the incident, assuming it was all finished.

But of course it wasn’t.

Two days later she got a phone call in the morning after Bob had left for work. It was the creepy Kareem saying he had something important to discuss which was best not done on the telephone. Marilyn rolled her eyes and grimaced, then told him she was very busy. Kareem insisted. He was an important official, he said, and the matter was very pressing. So most reluctantly, and a little fearfully, Marilyn invited him round.

He didn’t immediately try to grab her, as she’d expected. Instead when he’d been invited to sit down he took a thick envelope out of his pocket. It contained a sheaf of photographs which he laid down on the coffee-table. Pictures taken at the party. Various people, including Bob and Marilyn, in typical party attitudes, all with drinks in their hands.

‘Good photos, eh?’ he grinned, as Marilyn looked at him quizzically.

‘All strictly illegal though. The government of this country views such goings-on in a very strict manner. Do you know the penalty for such transgressions, Mrs Birling?’

Marilyn had indeed heard accounts of what could happen, before she came out. You read it in the paper from time to time. That was before Bob and everyone told her everyone drank. She began to tremble with fear.

Dr Kareem continued remorselessly, confirming her worst fears, ‘The cane, Mrs Birling. The cane — applied in a manner which, I am sure, to an English person would appear most savage. Even though you British have your own tradition of the cane in many of your schools. But I can assure you, Mrs Birling, this is nowhere near the same! Tell me, Mrs Birling, when you were a naughty schoolgirl did you ever receive the cane on that delectable bottom of yours? That bottom you were so primly hiding the other evening?’

Marilyn began to sweat with fright. ‘Look, this… this is getting a bit ridiculous. No of course I didn’t get anything like that at school and everyone knows that drinking goes on among the ex-pats here, and that it is accepted.’

‘Oh no, Mrs Birling. Not so, not at all. The fact that visitors to this country break the law does not mean that it is accepted. Our law is infrangible. Indeed, our government is increasingly keen, if it can catch transgressors with incontrovertible evidence, to make an example of them. Shall I tell you what a woman such as yourself, giving this kind of party, might expect?’

Marilyn did not want to hear, but he told her all the same, his fleshy mouth relishing the words with an all-but-theatrical effect.

‘A lead filled cane, Mrs Birling. A cane with has had hot lead poured into the end to give the tip a nice heavy weight. Then the rest of the cane is reinforced. It does an awful lot of damage to a female bottom. You could be given anything up to twenty strokes by one of the female prison officers. Your bottom completely bare, of course, and two other officers holding you down over a caning bench. I guarantee you, Mrs Birling, that after that you would not be able to sit down for two weeks. I doubt you would wish to hold any more alcohol parties after that!’

Marilyn jumped up and strode in agitation to the window. Outside, at the corner, a goat was rooting in a rubbish bin. It was definitely not Surrey but a very foreign and very frightening country. She tried to keep her voice steady.

‘I-I don’t know why you are telling me all this. No one is going to see those pictures. I-I don’t know why you took them.’

All at once he was behind her, breathing in her ear. ‘The reason, dear lady, was that you are clearly not a woman who is prepared to be co-operative unless a little persuasion is exerted. So therefore if necessary I can send them to the relevant government department. I would be commended for doing my civic duty. And then, Mrs Birling, I’m afraid both you and your husband would be severely dealt with. Most severely I think you will find.’

Marilyn felt herself on the brink of tears. She suddenly felt a little faint. ‘I-I don’t know why you are being so… so beastly.’ she stammered.

She felt his hands on her waist. She thought she really did know what he wanted. he wanted to screw her, just as Bob’s boss back home had done. Two weeks after Bob had come out here, Mr Moorcroft had taken her out to dinner and then back to his place for coffee and that’s where it had happened. ‘Just what a lonely young wife needs when her husband’s away,’ he’d whispered while pulling down her knickers as they lay on the sofa. But it had just been one time and she’d been so ashamed of what she’d done. But it was obvious the unpleasant Kareem wanted the same and equally clear that she would have to give in. She felt the tears welling in her eyes as, at the same time, his two hands slid down to cup her bottom. Caressing the soft cheeks most insistently…

‘What I want, Mrs Birling, is this lovely bottom,’ he whispered, his hot breath in her ear.

Marilyn made a forlorn moan that sounded like ‘Nnnngggghhh’ and then began to cry.

‘What I am going to do is warm it up a little. Nothing compared to what a prison wardress would give it, of course. I am not a sadist, Mrs Birling. But I do love to tingle a pretty woman’s bottom, with the cane and also with the strap.’

Marilyn could scarcely take in what he was saying. ‘Nooo’ she said weakly, trying, with a sudden lurch, to twist away from the mauling, groping hands. But the hands would not let go and the horrible smarmy voice of this hateful man continued as he casually groped her bottom.

‘Be sensible, my dear girl. Take my advice, I know what our prisons are like and I fear that caning your bottom is not all the guards would do to you. And don’t forget your dear husband — he would be severely punished too. For him maybe as many as 50 strokes.’

She stopped struggling. What was the use? She felt as if all the breath had been knocked out of her body. His hands went to the zipper at the waist of her beige calf-length skirt and in a few seconds it was pooled around her feet.

Underneath, Marilyn was wearing brief pink knickers, plus those nylons with the straps of the pink lace suspender belt crossing firm, full thighs. With her cream-coloured blouse and her white high-heeled court shoes she was an enticing sight. The liquid brown eyes of Ahmed Kareem roamed greedily over her body. His voice was now thick with excitement and there was no hint of doubt or hesitation in his fierce tone.

‘A lovely sight, Mrs Birling. Now I want you to take the panties down yourself. Let me say you are not getting the cane or the strap today as I don’t have them with me so I shall save those pleasures for later. So today I will be content with spanking your bare bottom. So now do as I tell you and slip your panties down.’

He had backed off and was now sitting on one of Marilyn’s upright chairs. His smooth olive complexion was distinctly darker than when he had come in. Marilyn’s face was bright pink. She was trembling all over. She mumbled, ‘Now look…’

But she knew there was no way out. No one was due to come round that morning and, even if someone did, it would only delay the inevitable because with those pictures in existence there was nothing she could do. She couldn’t possibly get them from him physically — and anyway there would be negatives. Trying to blank everything out, and looking away from him, she forced her hands to go to the waistband of her brief nylon knickers.

She took the knickers down to her nylon tops, exposing her thick, light-brown bush, then had to hobble forward. He took hold of her arm and pulled her down. She was over his lap in the classic spanking position, head down and bare bottom up like some naughty schoolgirl over her father’s lap — if fathers even did that sort of thing nowadays. Certainly Marilyn had never suffered this humiliation before. She had never even considered such a possibility.

She gave a suppressed gasp as a hand was suddenly at her smoothly bare bottom, patting and squeezing in a way that made her squirm. His left arm was gripped round her waist. Then the groping stopped. A slight pause. Then she gave a yelp as the first smack landed!

It really hurt, splatting down with all his force on the nearside cheek. The hot glow was still developing when, Splat! — the hand landed squarely on the other cheek. Marilyn let out another gasping yelp, her injured bottom squirming. It was still wriggling, and so were her legs, when the third hard smack splatted down.

The spanking seemed to go on for ever. It was extremely painful and desperately humiliating, the more so as after a few minutes she was in tears again, crying like a baby. A baby with a full-grown, slightly over-sized and now bright red bottom that was wildly jerking and twisting on Kareem’s lap in a vain attempt to alleviate the effects of that stinging right hand. She was in a state of severe shock.

When he had finally had his fill of her, he simply removed his left arm that was restraining her while continuing to deliver those excruciating smacks to her bottom and thighs with his right hand. Marilyn’s own jerking and writhing slid her off his lap and she finished up in an undignified heap on her own carpet.

She lay there for a while sobbing heartily before slowly struggling to her feet. She then pulled up her knickers and her skirt. Dr Kareem was collecting up his pictures.

‘Very nice, dear lady, very satisfying. I find so many of you English ladies have the most lovely bottoms. Today, of course, was just my little appetiser. The main course will be with my cane and strap.’

He left after forcing a tongue-probing kiss on the reluctant Marilyn. When the door closed she sat down and simply burst into tears once more.

----//----

She had recovered slightly by the time Bob came home in the evening but was still feeling nauseous and sore. She had entered a nightmare with no obvious end in sight. She tried to be her normal cheerful self but it was almost impossible. When it was time for bed she had to be careful because in the bathroom she saw that her bottom and the backs of her thighs were still distinctly red and blotchy-looking. She put on a nightie, something she didn’t usually bother with.

In bed she found herself hot for sex, an escape from the reality of what had happened. Fortunately Bob was, as ever, ready and willing but he commented on her unusual degree of arousal. In truth, she felt quite desperate.

‘What have you been doing? Reading sexy books all day?’ he grinned as he pumped hard into her.

Marilyn bit her lip, thinking of tomorrow. When she had to see Dr Kareem again, this time at his apartment.

----//----

The next morning at 10 a.m. she presented herself at Kareem’s as instructed. She was wearing a blue skirt and blouse, brown flat-heeled shoes and was bare of any hose. He received her in a plush-looking lounge.

Flushed and close to tears, Marilyn blurted out the plea she had been rehearsing. ‘Please! Can’t I persuade you not to do this and to give me the photographs? Can’t I please appeal to your better instincts?’

He laughed loudly. ‘My better instincts, Mrs Birling, tell me you have a most beautiful bottom, indeed one of the finest it has been my pleasure to become acquainted with. Perhaps, in a few years, it is plump enough to go slightly to seed, but right now it is perfect. That is what Allah has provided women such as you for, Mrs Birling, to give pleasure to men. But first, before we commence let me at least offer you coffee.’

Marilyn considered briefly then shook her head. There was no point in prolonging the agony.

She was made to take off her skirt and then her white nylon knickers, this time right off not just down. She stood miserably in just the pale blue blouse and her flat-heeled shoes as he came close. Two hands fondled Marilyn’s sumptuous bare rear. They were more than impertinent, they were masterful.

‘I am amazed, my dear, that your husband does not make better use of this splendid part of you. Caning a woman’s bottom is one of life’s most exquisite pleasures. How sad that he does not appreciate that.’

Then her tormentor was going to a cupboard, to come back with a three-foot long, crook-handled rattan cane. Marilyn paled, her mouth dry.

Dr Kareem held it in front of her then swished it through the air. ‘This is my instrument of pleasure, Mrs Birling. My favourite instrument in fact. I also enjoy the strap but the cane for me is exquisite. I love the way it sinks into soft female flesh.’

This couldn’t be happening, Marilyn told herself. But then he flicked the cane against her bare thigh and the sharp stingy pain told her that yes it was happening!

‘So let us get started!’ he ordered. Marilyn was made to bend over the back of an upright chair, her head on the seat, her hands gripping the front rungs and her legs wide apart. She gritted her teeth as the cane tapped once then twice across her bare, out-thrust buttocks, and felt consumed by shame.

A pause, then, THWACK!…

Marilyn gave an anguished yell. The pain was murderous, a quite different order of magnitude from the spanking. Her stricken rear did a frantic dance as somehow she held onto the rung.

There was no let up in the sickening pain when THWACK!… it landed again, like a red-hot iron searing her bottom. A second frantic yelp burst forth as Marilyn went into another bottom-writhing dance. And no wonder for he was caning her with all his strength.

He gave her eight in all. They were all the same, each one a mind-boggling flame which left its bright red stripe across her plump, pale flesh. The stripes extended from the crest of Marilyn’s bottom to halfway down her thighs. Her nerves were shattered. When he had finally finished Dr Kareem dropped the cane and ran his hand lovingly over her tortured flesh.

‘That’s the ticket, eh — as you English say — Mrs Birling? That’s how a young woman should be taught discipline. Bringing her to heel is, I think, your English expression.’

It was over. Marilyn fought to control her sobs, and the fierce pain that throbbed and smarted through her nerve ends. Somehow she managed to struggle into her knickers and skirt again. Then, excruciatingly, she had to sit and drink the coffee she refused earlier.

Afterwards she had to stand and bend over a table. Kareem lifted her skirt and pulled her knickers down again. This is it, Marilyn told herself, now he is going to screw me. But he didn’t, merely fondled her bottom again. Running his fingers lovingly along those red weals which now decorated her pale flesh…

----//----

Back at their own apartment Marilyn was like a zombie, not knowing what to do with herself. Her bottom was an unceasing throbbing pain mass. When Bob got home she realised she had not prepared dinner and they had to go out to eat. Sitting down was agony and Marilyn spoke only in mono-syllables. The caning still filled her mind and when it was time for bed she hardly knew what she was doing. It was then Bob found out what had happened.

She knew the cane marks stood out very much in evidence on her bottom and thighs and she had gone into the bathroom to undress, but, in her distracted state, she had quite forgotten to lock the door. Bob wandered in — and stood aghast.

She grabbed her clothes to try and hide her red striped backside but it was obviously too late. There was an awful scene, at the end of which Marilyn burst into tears and told him everything that had happened. The whole story.

Hearing it Bob felt stunned, as if someone had hit him on the head with a hammer. It was not credible, but it had obviously happened because there were the awful purpling-red weals on his wife’s bottom and thighs to prove it. In the ferment of emotions that filled him, one quickly became paramount — an urge to go out and find the man who had done this to his wife and strangle him.

In fact Bob Birling hardly knew Ahmed Kareem. The man had come to his party as a friend of a friend and Bob knew little about him except that he was a local man. Then he remembered hearing that his friend had said Kareem had high government connections and that put a very different complexion on things.

Bob pictured briefly what Kareem had threatened — 20 strokes of a lead-filled cane across Marilyn’s bottom and perhaps more than twice as many for himself. It was not an idle threat because everyone knew that such things did happen. And Kareem had photos. He could have the Birlings indicted any time he wanted. That murderous urge became tinged with a sudden tingle of cold fear.

Bob did not go out and look for Ahmed Kareem. Instead in the bedroom he took Marilyn over his lap and applied cold cream to her injured rear. As he did so other emotions running round his head were joined by another one. Sexual arousal. What had been done was sickening but, lightly rubbing his cream covered hand over his wife’s ripe buttocks, Bob realised that in spite of everything it was also very exciting. He found himself imagining the scene, Ahmed Kareem wielding his cane…

‘What are we going to do?’ wailed Marilyn who had stopped crying but was still producing intermittent sobs.

Because, of course, Kareem hadn’t finished with her. He wanted her to return in two days’ time. When Marilyn had pleaded she would still be sore he agreed to postpone it by a couple of days, but that was all.

‘He…He’ll just want to keep on doing this,’ she muttered.

Bob bit his lip. The murderous impulse had been replaced by a chilling reality. Like Marilyn, there was little he could do. The photos were an unbeatable trump card and Kareem was not going to surrender them until he was good and ready. So Bob and Marilyn could leave the country forthwith but apart from that there was no alternative but acceptance. For Bob to pull out of his contract now would be nothing short of disaster.

Unhappily, Bob spelled it out. ‘It’s up to you,’ he said.

Marilyn got off his lap to sit gingerly on the bed. She looked bleakly at her husband.

He repeated, ‘If you want me to keep this well-paid job, you’ll have to let him do it.’ He added lamely, ‘Perhaps after a short while the novelty will wear off…’

----//----

So it continued, the cane or the 18-inch-long, three-tongued leather strap at least once a week. Marilyn and Bob didn’t tell anyone else, though she found out that Kareem was caning at least one other English girl. They also stopped discussing it with each other but Marilyn came to realise that, although Bob must hate being in this position, having to let Kareem do this to her, that wasn’t his only reaction.

She soon came to see that her husband was also getting turned on by what was happening. Not saying anything, but he always made a point of examining Marilyn’s caned or strapped rear when she’d been to see Kareem, and then he wanted sex right away. For her part Marilyn found she was also ready for sex after a good caning or strapping. She told herself it was a way of forgetting what had happened, the only escape from it. She couldn’t admit that she might possibly be sexually aroused after a beating. It would be entirely inconsistent with all her beliefs.

So it continued, for almost seven months, then one day, after he had not seen her for two weeks, Kareem asked if she wanted the photos back. Marilyn had sensed that his interest was tailing off but it still came as a shock. She had got into the habit of these visits and, although still telling herself she hated it, had in fact come to accept what was happening. She asked if this meant she didn’t have to come any more.

He laughed and said she had earned her release. He gave her all the prints and the negatives and presumably she could have walked out there and then. But when Kareem suggested a strapping as one final au revoir, Marilyn meekly took off her skirt and knickers and bent herself over the chair in the usual way.

Marilyn, like her husband, had come to enjoy a love-hate relationship with Kareem’s cane and strap. It still hurt like hell but there was now undeniably a sexual thrill to it. Primarily her thrill was in the act of submission, the basic one of bending down for him and baring her bottom. Marilyn felt that thrill both when she was gasping under the actual impact and also reliving it when she was in bed with Bob. Not having Dr Kareem to dominate her any more would, she realised, leave a gap in her life.

When Kareem had finished with the strap and Marilyn was getting dressed, he told her he had found someone else. He gave the name of a young American girl Marilyn knew vaguely; a pretty, shapely young blonde. It was ridiculous but Marilyn felt a pang of jealousy.

She went home with a mixture of emotions, Kareem having said he would still like to whip her occasionally and then groping her bottom as she walked out of the door. In her handbag she had the photos and also another man’s name and phone number. A man Kareem said would love to meet her. A rich man and a real bottom enthusiast.

----//----

Marilyn did nothing for two weeks during which time there was no call from Kareem. She should have been relieved that it was all over but instead she felt a sense of restlessness. Several times she looked at the card Kareem had given her and each time she put it back in her handbag. Finally, one afternoon, Marilyn rang the number.

She met him by appointment in the private room of a restaurant, a tall distinguished looking Arab of perhaps 60. He had keen dark eyes and a soft voice which spoke with the assurance of wealth. After coffee he said he would like Marilyn to spend a weekend at his place in the country. There would be £500 before she went and another £500 afterwards if he was ‘fully satisfied’.

Marilyn left without saying yes or no, her brain in turmoil. Her mind was racing with sexual excitement and when she got home she simply couldn’t contain it. She lay on the bed and allowed her feelings to run wildly out of control. In bed that night, again with a sense of intense arousal, she told Bob. His penis immediately responded to this news.

Holding it, Marilyn whispered, ‘He wants the same as Dr Kareem. It’ll be caning and whatever else he punishes me with. I don’t think he wants to screw me.’

They then made love with a wild, desperate intensity. Afterwards after some minutes of silence, Bob said, ‘You can go if you want to. But don’t tell anybody…’

Marilyn, lying on her back, shivered. Her thoughts went back to that day she had stepped off the plane and then that feeling of excitement in the airport lounge of being in a strange, exciting place. That feeling had been fully borne out in the involvement with Dr Kareem which had explored new depths to her psyche.

The last few months had shown Marilyn Birling a new and exciting world. A world that might only just be beginning!