Cauldron of Fear (22 page)

'Aye,' Jed
joined in, moving closer, 'we've brought the wagon around to the
green, with all the timber for the gibbet. Only takes a while to
bolt it all together and then it's as strong as if it was built to
stay there all the while.'

'But don't you
worry too much, missy,' Silas said, ''cos this ain't no normal
gibbet. You won't dance at the rope's end like most do, oh no. We
drops you, see, and the rope snaps your neck.'

'Usually,' Jed
added ominously. 'Depends if we get it right, with the rope length,
I mean. If not, well, then you chokes to death, just like they
normally does.'

'It's a bit
difficult to be sure, like,' Silas continued. 'Not many people as
knows just how the thing should be done properly. It's a technique
they uses in some places in the east, apparently.'

'Yeah, they
ain't all as barbarian as some people would have us believe,' Jed
added. 'Master Crawley learned of the idea from some Arab, or Jew,
or something like that. Not sure.'

'And you say
this method kills a person straight off?' Matilda asked
tremulously. She had seen hangings in London and the pictures of
the miscreants writhing on the end of the ropes like stranded eels
were still vivid in her mind, as were the strangled squeals and
gasps that had accompanied their protracted demises.

'Humane,
Master Crawley calls it,' Silas said. 'But then he's a man of God
and he wouldn't want a body to suffer out of hand.'

'Is that why
he flogged me?' Matilda snarled. 'Is that his idea of not making
someone suffer?'

'But that's
different,' Jed said calmly. 'That's to purge your sins. And he'll
purge them again tomorrow afore we hangs you, but if you're lucky,
at least you won't suffer on the gibbet. We just knocks out the
board and wallop!'

'Snap!' Silas
said.

Matilda
shuddered. 'Why are you telling me all this?' she demanded, trying
to steady her voice.

There was a
short silence, before Silas spoke again. 'Well, we just thought of
how you'd like to know as how we really only has your best
interests at heart, like,' he said. 'Thought you might take some
comfort from that and also be grateful for us coming here to
comfort you now.' Matilda felt a hand on her breast again, but this
time she did not start from it.

'I see,' she
replied evenly. 'What you mean is, if I offer you a little comfort
in return, then you'll see to it that my end is a quick one?'

'Well, them
wouldn't quite be my words,' Silas said, and she could imagine that
he was grinning widely.

'And what
about the flogging Master Crawley intends to give me first?' she
said. 'Am I to believe you'll dissuade him from that
intention?'

'Hardly,
missy,' Jed chuckled. 'Master Crawley don't get dissuaded from his
course by no one—'

'But we do
have a potion we could offer you,' Silas interrupted. 'A little
something that will dull the pain greatly. It won't knock your
senses cold, but I promise you, you'll scarce feel them
lashes.'

'I see.'
Matilda hesitated. 'And just what am I expected to do in return for
such charity?' There was another short silence and then Silas began
to speak again. In blunt words he explained in graphic detail, and
Matilda felt her stomach lurch.

'No,' she
whispered, when he had finished. 'No, I'll not debase myself such.
Do whatever you wish, for God knows I cannot stop you, not like
this, but as I told your master before, you'll find me cold
fare.'

'Cold fare
maybe,' Silas leered. 'But with a warm purse.' His hand suddenly
grasped her sex, one finger forcing its way between her labia and
Matilda groaned. 'Yes,' he repeated, 'a nice warm purse
indeed.'

'It sounds
most unlikely,' Harriet mused, 'but then why not? In some ways it
all makes perfect sense.' She regarded the three boys across the
kitchen table in Anne Billings's cottage. 'You're sure of who they
were?'

Toby Blaine
nodded. 'Yes, miss,' he replied sombrely. 'I'd swear to that on me
mam's grave.'

'Better wait till she's dead first,' Anne interjected, pouring
broth into the three mugs she had lined up on the hearth. The two
women had waited in the cottage for the boys to return; George
Billings, having returned from the spectacle on the green, had
shown little interest when they tried to explain to him and left
again immediately, heading for the
Black
Drum
.

'The problem
is,' Harriet continued, 'what to do now. The boys are right when
they say that no magistrate would dare order a search of the
Grayling estate. Besides, Roderick Grayling is a proxy magistrate
while his father is abroad.'

'The nobs all
look after each other, right enough,' Anne agreed. She began
placing the bowls of hot broth on the table and the boys pounced
upon them eagerly. 'I reckon the best course is to take what we
know to Master Handiwell. He'll know what to do.'

'If he's yet
returned,' Harriet pointed out. 'For all we know, he may have
decided to stay in Portsmouth overnight.'

'That I
doubt,' Anne said. 'From what you say he'll not leave you alone
with this for longer than he has to. Besides, you'll need his money
to pay these scoundrels, won't you?'

'Aye, that I
shall,' Harriet replied thoughtfully.

'And that, I
think,' Anne continued, 'will be our best chance of catching them.
Pay the ransom as agreed and set a trap for whoever comes for
it.'

'It all sounds
too easy,' Harriet said dubiously. 'Whoever they are, male or
female, they'll know we've had an extra day to work out a plan. I
can't see them being so foolish as to walk into any trap.'

'Well, they've
got to collect the money somehow, haven't they?' Anne
persisted.

'Of course,'
Harriet conceded, 'but I've been wondering why they wanted me to go
with the money in the boat. Why not just wait downstream for it, as
they did today?'

'In case
someone else sees it driftin' and hooks it into shore, miss,' Toby
interrupted, lowering his bowl. 'I was thinkin' about that earlier,
if you don't mind me sayin'.'

'No, not at
all, Toby,' Harriet said, smiling at the lad. 'That's a good point,
in fact.'

'Not only
that, miss,' Toby continued, 'but I had another thought.'

'You have too
many thoughts, if you ask me,' Anne chided, but the smile on her
face was full of warmth.

'Well,' Toby
continued, 'I was thinkin' about how I'd get the money, and without
anyone catchin' me. I mean, yesterday they probably knew you'd not
have time to do much, not with how little time you had to go to the
boat, or even send me. That's why they weren't too careful, I
reckon, though whoever was in that other boat kept their face well
hid, like I said.'

'And anyway,'
Anne mused, 'there's no crime in intercepting a drifting boat. No
way anyone could make any accusations.'

'But
tomorrow,' Toby said, 'they'll expect something - I know I would,
if it was me.'

'So how would
you go about making sure you weren't caught, Toby?' Harriet asked
encouragingly. 'You've clearly been giving the matter some thought,
as you said.'

'Well, miss,'
Toby proffered, his young features creasing into an expression of
thoughtful concentration, 'I reckon, what I'd do is this. When you
gets to Priest's Rock in the boat, you ain't gonna find anyone
waitin' there for you. It'd be too easy to trap them there, see?'
Harriet and Anne nodded in unison. 'So what I reckon,' Toby
continued, 'is that, if it was me like, I'd leave you a message
there, see?'

''Cept you
can't write,' Matt pointed out, and Toby gave him a sideways look
that said more than any words could have.

'
If
I was them
then I'd be able to write, all right,' he said scathingly, 'so I'd
leave you a message, nailed up somewhere so you couldn't miss
it.'

'What sort of
message?' Harriet prompted, though she thought she was beginning to
understand where Toby was going. He really was, she thought, a very
bright lad.

'It'd say
somethin' like go to somewhere else,' Toby said. 'Probably you'd
have to take the boat on down the river, maybe to where it goes
through Kings Woods, 'cause it'd be hard to follow the river on
foot through there. The trees are really close and the undergrowth
is too tangled to get through. I know, 'cos I've been down there
before.'

'And after
that,' Harriet said, 'I suppose I'll be expected to go ashore and
go to wherever they tell me on foot?'

'That's what
I'd do, anyway,' Toby said, looking very pleased with himself.

'I'll bet you
would, too, Toby Blaine,' Anne said, shaking her head. 'The Good
Lord preserve us from the likes of you ever turning to crime!'

Roderick
Grayling continued his meticulous preparations only after he and
Soberton had returned from viewing his dubious collection of art.
Meantime, Sarah and Kitty were left in their enforced mutual
silence, spread lewdly over their respective frames, unable to do
anything but stare into each other's eyes and attempt to give some
sort of communicative support by means of that eye contact.

Kitty, Sarah
thought, seemed curiously calm about the entire situation, but
then, with the previous experiences she had suffered, maybe this
scenario held few terrors for her. Perhaps she too would come to
accept such indignities and humiliations as commonplace: certainly,
if she remained here for long, she knew it was more likely than she
would ever have thought possible only a day earlier.

In one way,
she had to admit, resignation made complete sense. After all, what
use was there in trying to resist, what point in self-blame or
deprecation? None of this was her fault, so why should she feel any
shame, save that which was natural when a woman was forced to
display herself in such wanton fashion?

Perhaps, she
reasoned, the real root of the pangs of guilt that kept assailing
her had nothing to do with any of that, but rather with the way she
had so easily been brought to a point where she actually derived
some pleasure out of her abasement. She was a virgin before being
brought here and had no experience of sex as such, but her natural
curiosity led her to some little self-experimentation, so that she
was only too well aware of the magnitude of the orgasms her base
treatment had triggered.

Did that mean,
she demanded of herself as she sucked upon the awful penis gag,
that she was, in truth, the sort of slut and whore these people
habitually addressed her as? Could every woman be so simply
subjugated and controlled, not just controlled by means of chains
and straps, but controlled on a deeper level? Or was it just
her?

No, she thought, looking at Kitty, not just her. Maybe
women
like
her, but
then what were women like her, exactly? Could she really be held
responsible for the reflex actions of her body? Should she have the
spirit, the determination, the strength of will and character to
resist these primal urges?

Whether
Prudence knew what sort of thoughts were going through her mind or
not, the older woman soon gave Sarah further cause to doubt
herself, for having at first left the room in the wake of the two
noblemen, she now returned and, seeing that Adam and Robin had
similarly departed, wasted no time in availing herself of the
opportunity.

She moved
behind Sarah, one hand reaching out to trace a delicate line down
the length of her spine. Sarah shivered and her back arched as far
as her stringent bondage would permit. Prudence chuckled, a
throaty, animal-like sound.

'You see?' she
whispered. 'You cannot help yourself, can you?' Fingers moved
again, this time cupping Sarah's naked vulva, though gently,
supportively, pressing hardly at all. Sarah made a small mewling
noise and closed her eyes, unwilling to look at Kitty.

'Such a sweet
little puss,' Prudence crooned. 'And such a shame it should be
stuffed with tasteless man-meat, mm? Such delicacies should be
tongue-savoured, not gorged like pigs.' One slender finger prised
Sarah's nether lips apart and slipped inside a tunnel that was very
moist and warm.

'Open your
eyes, little miss,' Prudence said softly. 'Don't hide your shame
so. Look at your friend - she has no false modesty, do you Kitty?
She yearns for Prudence to play with her pouch. Well, fear not my
little sweetmeats,' she sighed, withdrawing her hand, 'I'll take
care of you both later, when these oafish men have had their fun.
With luck there'll be no cock for either of you this night, for his
lordliness won't stoop to poke a slave wench. Oh, he'll bury his
pole in your mouth maybe, but he'll not sully himself on seeding
the lower classes, just in case some undetected offspring of his
ends up in a slave colony on the far side of the world.

'No, unless he decides to keep you, you'll not taste that
particular rod between your legs and dear Roderick's rod
could
never
be
sullied in your alternative hole, though there are many here abouts
who are not half as choosy. No, my guess is that you'll have a far
more tender night, though tender will these lovely moons be,
too.'

Sarah quivered
as cool hands moulded her upthrust buttocks. Strangely, she found
this touch even more intimate than the earlier one, for Prudence's
fingers lingered long, stroking, massaging and etching light lines
with the edges of their nails.

'Ah,' Prudence
declared suddenly, breaking the contact, 'I think I hear footsteps
returning.' She stepped back. 'Now, let's see how right I am,
mm?'

A moment later
the door swung open and Roderick Grayling strode in, with Henry
Soberton, redder still in the face than even before, hard on his
shoulder. Seeing Prudence, Grayling's features twisted into a
devious smile.