Read Online Return to the Chateau by Pauline Réage - Free Book Online

was exactly the same. The cost of a member’s stay at Roissy was calculated the way it would have been at any hotel.
    The second gate separated this central part of the building from a wing they called the little enclosure. It was in the extension of this wing that Anne-Marie lived, and it was here, too, that the girls who actually lived in the community had their quarters. These girls, who belonged as it were to Roissy, were lodged in double rooms, in that each room was divided by a semi-partition against which, on either side, the beds were placed back to back. They were ordinary beds, and not the fur-covered sofa which had graced the room where O had stayed on her first visit. The girls shared a bathroom, as they did a closet. The doors to their rooms could not be locked, and the members of the Club could enter them any time in the course of the night, during which the girls were chained. But aside from this rule by which they were obliged to spend the night in chains, there was no other basic restriction.
    =46inally, on the other side of the third gate, which, as you faced the main gate, was to the left, the second gate being situated to the right, was located the free and as it were quasi-public area of Roissy: a restaurant, a bar, small sitting rooms on the ground floor, with, on the floors above, the bedrooms. The members of the Club were free to invite guests to the restaurant and bar without having to pay any entrance fee. But anyone, or virtually anyone, could purchase a “temporary membership” which was very expensive but gave him the right to two visits. The only rights it gave him, in effect, as guests of members were allowed to use the bar, were to have lunch or dinner in the restaurant, to rent a room, and to use it with a girl of his choice. Each of the above items was payable separately. For the bar and restaurant there were a maitre d’h=F3tel and a few waiters-the kitchens were in the basement-but it was the girls who waited on table. In the restaurant they were in uniform. In the bar, dressed in long silk dresses, with a lace mantilla similar to the uniform scarf covering their hair, their shoulders, and their breasts, they were there waiting to be picked by a member or a guest. The restaurant and bar, as well as the hotel, were financially independent, their income covering their costs. The money earned by the girls was divided according to fixed percentages: so much for Roissy, so much for the girl. Nor were all the girls paid on an equal basis: O learned that she would be paid double the base rate because she officially belonged to a member of the Club, and because she wore irons and bore a brand. Two other girls were in the same category as she, one of whom was the buxom, ivory-complexioned redhead she had seen in Anne-Marie’s quarters. If anyone chose to whip a girl, or have her whipped by one of the valets, there was a supplementary payment. The checks were paid at the hotel office; the tips were given directly to the personnel involved.
    Its close proximity to Paris, its princely yet discreet atmosphere, the impressive buildings and park, the comfort of the installation, the excellence of the restaurant, the theatrical aspect which the costumed girls and the omnipresent valets gave to the place, the combination of freedom and security in any and all relationships, and last but not least the clear knowledge of what took place behind the gates, within the confines of the enclosure, provided Roissy with a large clientele, made up primarily of businessmen, a goodly percentage of whom, at least half were foreigners. The public part of Roissy had no more official existence than did the clandestine part. The term “Country Club” fooled no one, but it often happened that the grizzled man who was thought to be the Master of Roissy, but who in reality was only the administrator, questioned one or the other girl about some short-time customer-not to mention the fact that, in order to receive one of