1.
“Ivo, stop that!” Agnese cried, almost doubling over with laughter. “How can I get my work done if you keep making me laugh so much?”
Ivo ignored her pleas, continuing to strut up and down the field of rye in the stiff-legged way that was a near perfect imitation of the way the Baron went around his estate on the occasions when he deigned to leave his elegant house to inspect one project or another that his laborers were working on. He held one finger under his nose to indicate the Baron’s moustache. He spouted some pidgin German about the lazy Latvians, words they had often heard it said were ones the Baron used frequently.
View attachment 1050179
Agnese wiped the sweat from her forehead with the sleeve of her embroidered blouse. “Ivo, it’s still morning and it’s already hot and this field is so large. If we don’t finish, we will be in big trouble.”
View attachment 1050181
Ivo put his scythe down and brushed the cuttings of rye aside, reaching out and grabbing Agnese by the arm and pulling her towards him. “No!” she protested. “Not now! There is so much work to do.”
View attachment 1050180
Ignoring her pleas, he pulled her against his body and kissed her hard on the mouth. She resisted at first, but he could feel her relaxing, leaning in towards him. Throwing caution to the winds, he reached under her blouse, feeling her soft breasts.
She reached out to push his hand away, but without much conviction, so he left it there and kissed her again. This time, she barely resisted at all. She could feel his hard cock pressing into her belly, the tension in his body matching the rising excitement she felt.
“Ivo, we mustn’t,” she whispered.
“But I love you, Agnese,” he protested. “We will be married as soon as I finish the cottage I am building. I know it is taking a long time. I have to scrounge all the materials because the Baron pays us so little, but I will finish it soon. I promise. Then we can make love whenever we want.”
He kissed her again, his hand trailing down her front to her stomach, the fingers playing with waistband of her skirt.
“Your father likes me,” he said. “He gave his approval for us to marry as soon as we have the cottage.”
She nodded. “I know that, Ivo, but we should wait.”
He pressed himself into her. “I can’t wait. I want you so much.”
“But the harvest,” she said.
“Damn the harvest!” he shouted. Agnese looked around quickly, scared that someone had heard him, but the other workers were far away. “We slave away like animals in the field to make the Baron rich and what do we get? I can’t even afford to buy wood and nails to finish our house.”
Agnese nodded. “I know that, my love. But what can we do? We can go to Riga, but how would we live there? What would we do? “
“Maybe we could go to Canada or America. There is land there for anyone who wants it.”
“But we need money for the passage,” she replied.
“Well, then at least come with me now,” he said, his right hand now inside her skirt. With his left hand, he guided her hand to the front of his trousers. “You can feel how much I want you. I can’t wait.”
“I want you, too, Ivo,” Agnese said.
“Then come with me. Everyone is in the fields now. The granary is empty. No one will see us. We will be quick and back here at work before anyone notices.”
Agnese shook her head no, but he took her hand and she followed him across the field of waving grain, crouching low, so that they would be as invisible as possible. She looked carefully in all directions but the workers had moved down to the far end and no one seemed to notice.
When they reached the end of the field, they ducked quickly into the forest and made their way under the trees parallel to the edge of the field until they reached the open end of the granary. They looked around quickly. There was no one there.
View attachment 1050182 View attachment 1050183
They headed for the big pile of straw that was left over from the last harvest. Ivo knelt and pulled Agnese down onto the impromptu bed. They pulled as much of the straw over them as they could.
Urgently, unable to wait any more, Ivo pushed Agnese’s skirt up above her waist with one hand as he pulled his pants down with the other. Gingerly, she reached down to touch his penis. “You see what you did, Agnese?” he asked. “You’ve made me so hard.”
She smiled at him. “Be quick, before anyone finds us,” she begged.
He didn’t need to be told twice. He moved on top of her, the tip of his erect penis poised at the opening of her wet pussy. He pressed his hips forward about to enter her.
Suddenly, a big boot was kicking away the straw that covered him and a large hand grasped Ivo’s shirt, pulling him away from his intended target. “Well, well, what have we here?” Juris said. Agnese stared up into the face of the Manager, who was accompanied by two of his assistants. “You two are supposed to be harvesting the rye and here you are fucking like a couple of rabbits. We’ll see what the Baron has to say about this.”
He pulled Ivo to his feet. Ivo’s cock was still hard, but began to wilt. Quickly, he pulled his pants up.
Juris stared down at Agnese, who was too shocked to move. “What are you waiting for, you whore?” he shouted. “Get up and pull your skirt down and try to look like a decent woman for once.” She quickly complied, too frightened to speak.
One of the Manager’s assistants took hold of Agnese’s arm, while the other grasped Ivo’s arm in a vise grip and they followed Juris towards the grand house where the Baron lived. They went around the house to the servant’s entrance behind the kitchen. “Wait here,” Juris ordered. “The Baron won’t want riff-raff like you dirtying his floors.” His assistants kept a firm hold on the two lovers.
Agnese glanced down at her skirt and blouse, which each had several pieces of straw stuck to them. Ivo’s clothes were similarly decorated. They waited for quite a while, sweating under the hot sun.
Agnese couldn’t hide her fear. She had only had occasional contact with the Baron, usually at Christmas, when the workers lined up to receive blessings from the Minister and small baskets with a few treats from the Baron so that he could consider himself a good, benevolent Christian. But, never had she been called to see him for an instance of misbehavior.
And she knew this was a serious matter, one that would almost certainly mean a visit to the whipping post in the center of the village. She shivered at the thought. She had seen people suffering there often enough, the women stripped naked in front of the whole village, everyone staring and pointing at them. She had watched as the Manager’s assistants tied them to the rough wood. She had heard them howling as the cruel birch scored the soft skin of their buttocks.
She trembled at the thought that soon that would be her.
Finally, the Baron arrived, looking angry. Agnese was near tears even before he spoke. She understood enough German to sense that he was greatly displeased at her and Ivo. Juris translated, so there would be no doubt in their minds.
“The Baron says you are thieves. This is his grain and if the workers abandon the field work, the grain could rot. So, you are stealing from him. You must be punished and all the village must watch, so they will know what will happen to them if they do the same.”
He turned to Ivo. “You will be whipped, 40 lashes. This Sunday, at the whipping post.” Ivo did his best to look dismissive, but Agnese could tell that he was frightened.
Then Juris looked at her. “You, Agnese. For shirking your work you will get 30 strokes with the birch at the whipping post this Sunday.”
As much as she had expected to hear something like this, actually hearing it with the ring of finality caused her to feel faint. Her heart was pounding. She started to speak, to protest, to beg forgiveness, to promise not to do it again.
Juris scowled at her. “I’m not finished. Agnese, you are a filthy slut who lured him into this. No decent woman would lie with a man she wasn’t married to in a bed of straw. For that you get an additional 30 strokes.”
Hearing this, Agnese burst into tears. She fell at the Baron’s feet, clutching at the bottom of his trousers. “Please, please, I beg you!” she implored in German. Then, her skills in the language exhausted, she began pleading in Latvian, “I am so sorry. I will never do it again.”
The Manager grabbed her by her blouse and almost lifted her into the air, slamming her down onto the ground. “How dare you touch his lordship?” he shouted. “How would you like 20 more with the birch on your whorish ass?”
And Agnese might well have gotten those 20 extra strokes, except for the fact that the Baron was a busy who had already devoted more time to these worthless peasants than they merited and had turned on his heel and was already heading back into his house.
“Now get back to work, both of you,” the Manager shouted. “If you make any more trouble between now and Sunday, I’ll see that your punishment is doubled.”
Next time, I will have to hire the Goodyear blimp!
