Strange Captivity
by F.E. Campbell


Gail often wondered how much of Ma Billings sadism was deliberate. Sending 
her to the barn for the cord, and then making her carry it, could be 
unconscious laziness, or it could be sly and effective humiliation. Either 
way it was shaming. Gail shrugged resignedly. The name of the game was 
shame! The alliterative slogan fit. She toyed with an alternative, using the 
word pain instead of shame. They were equally applicable. 

It could have been pleasant in the woods had the errand been other than it 
was. Ma Billings did not belong. Her passage had an air of complaint, of 
being put upon. Her heavy breathing was loathed and feared. It held a 
forbidding strength. She sweated easily, and her sweat was sour. 

"Think you'll ever learn, honey?" Ma Billings voice was affable without 
warmth. 

"It doesn't matter, ma'am," Gail said listlessly. She hated the 'ma'am', but 
it was obligatory. Ma Billings didn't rate a title. 

"You're a damn sensible gal," Ma conceded. "Surprising you don't bellyache 
more. You ain't got no bed o' roses." 

"Would it do me any good, ma'am!" The girl's voice was only faintly bitter. 

"Yup! A wise little trick. I told Billings last time he was down, I said: 
That little ass o' her'n 'ull take a lot o' whupping." She looked sideways 
with a bright eye. "Think you'll last it out, kid?" 

Gail allowed herself a wry smile. "I have to, don't I! If I don't make it, 
the fault will be more yours than mine, ma'am." 

"Ain't aiming to be sassy, are you?" 

"No, ma'am. But I want to last it out. I want to terribly." 

Ma Billings coarse laugh was pleased. "I'll help you, Hon'. Ain't killing no 
goose with golden eggs. Take her just so far, I says to Billings, I ain't 
aiming to kill the gal. Billings, he don't want no corpses hanging around 
come election time." 

"How... how am I doing, ma'am?" The question was shy, diffident and absurd, 
but the girl with the cord had to ask it. 

"Ain't never had a gal o' your class. Silly bitches most of 'em; not that I 
didn't enjoy giving 'em a bad time. But you're different. You and me got a 
long way to go, Honey." The older woman stopped and looked around. "This 
ought to do. Been here before, ain't you?" 

Gail had been there before! She stood now in the same hesitancy that still 
afflicted her at such times, the pathetic last minute hope of reprieve or 
easement. 

"Well, shuck it! Don't just stand." 

Her hesitancy abruptly dealt with, Gail slipped out of the single sheath. 
Beneath it she was naked. She no longer cared about Ma's devouring eyes. 
Stripped, she knew what she must do. The sapling had been used before. She 
pressed her back against it and crossed her wrists behind the slender trunk. 

Ma Billings tied her. The wheezing breaths again heaved their protest 
against effort. But the shrewd fingers were strong and deft. The crossed 
wrists of the passive girl were criss-crossed by the cord and tightly 
joined. There was no final knot. The wrists secure, the remaining cord was 
passed twice round the trunk and knotted where no searching finger could 
find it. "Don't want you sitting down, honey, or going 'round and 'round." 
Ma Billings laughed as though at a witticism. 

The older woman backed away and surveyed the girl she had made helpless. She 
nodded in satisfaction as at a job well done. "I'm going in to town. If I 
ain't back, one of the kids'll be along to let you loose in time for you to 
make supper. Use the rest o' that ham and them greens I readied." 

"Yes, ma'am." 

Ma Billings chuckled. "Think you can get loose, kid?" 

Gail made the futile struggle required of her. "No, ma'am, I'm quite sure I 
can't get loose." The heavy woman made a slow circle of the sapling and the 
naked girl it held. She tested the tight cords with probing fingers. "Guess 
you'll do," she acknowledged. "Have a real fun day, honey." Chuckling at her 
own satire, she ambled back to the ranch house. Gail's single garment draped 
over one arm. She disappeared among the trees. Her naked captive was left 
alone. 

Always it was a bad moment. A girl, naked, tied to a tree in a wood alive 
with potential harm. She had once protested. But Ma Billings had laughed to 
scorn the hazards of insects, rodents and other wild things of the trees. 
They were a hazard of punishment. That was why she was there. It was 
unlikely that any of them would ever bother her. But still... ! The 
mosquitoes were the sure and certain element. Not many in the day. But by 
evening... ! The other hazard was the improbable passing of a stray human. 
The naked girl wanted that least of all. 

Gail twisted against the strictures that held her captive to the tree. She 
had no hope of finding them sympathetic. Ma Billings used cord upon the 
slender wrists with great competence and a little cruelty. But it was worth 
a try. She did it every time before settling into apathetic acceptance. 
There had been past occasions when she had fought the cords frantically for 
as long as they were upon her, then been taken back to the ranch with cut 
wrists from which blood had flowed. But that was past. 

It was infuriatingly frustrating to have to stand against the tree all day, 
held only by her wrists. An observer from the front might have wondered why 
she made no move. No bond was visible. This was one more instance of not 
being sure whether humanity or a cruel wish to frustrate dictated the lack 
of further bindings. Her feet were free, her body was free. But the tree 
held her as surely as if she was swathed in rope. 

Gail settled herself against the trunk and surrendered to her thoughts. That 
she should spend the day tied to a tree no longer disturbed her equanimity, 
naked or not. Ma Billings had a wide repertoire of discomforts and a fertile 
ingenuity for their infliction on any female unfortunate enough to be 
delivered into her hands. Standing thus was, for the captive girl, a 
relatively pleasant day. She could think of worse. It would get tiring after 
awhile since Ma had foiled her hope of being able to sit. But this was part 
of the game. A girl was never quite sure... To a captive, time passes 
slowly. It seemed long before she heard the sound that quickened her pulse. 
Her nudity tensed. Footsteps could be good or very, very bad! She watched, 
anxious, every sense alert. When Neil came into view she relaxed and exhaled 
a sigh of relief. 

He was a shy boy. Perhaps seventeen to her twenty-two. His first discovery 
of her long ago had been a quaint embarrassment of tragicomedy, until their 
acceptance of each other had led them to the informality of their present 
acquaintance. But he was still shy, apt to be diffident in his approaches, 
faintly shamed by the prohibitions upon them both. 

"Hi, Gail." He tried not to see her nakedness, thus was doubly conscious. 

"I'm glad you came." She hoped she did not sound too eager. A day alone with 
her tree could seem forever. 

He sat on the old stump and looked only at her face, his own flushed. She 
was secretly amused that he was so much a gentleman. "Neil! Look at me. If s 
not our fault I'm naked. I'd sooner you looked at me properly than somewhere 
up above my head." Since she had come to realize he would never help her 
escape, she got what amusement she could from teasing him. 

He obeyed. The intense avidity of his gaze made her blush. She watched him 
with an almost maternal affection. "I'm the first woman you've seen naked, 
aren't I?" she challenged. 

Neil nodded, engrossed. "You're very beautiful. I'd never have known." 

"What about the gatefolds?" Gail asked curiously. 

He grinned awkwardly. "A fellow doesn't really believe in 'em. We gawk and 
think: Oh sure, some guy with a lot of dough will get her. But we never 
will." 

"You've got me." 

"Not really," he disclaimed. "I can just look." 

"You can touch. Why don't you?" She always pushed him. 

His blush deepened. "Because I'd want to untie you," he admitted frankly. 

"Untie me then! Please, Neil. Help me. Get me out of the State!" At a risk 
of losing him, she always tried. 

He shook his head vehemently. "Nobody messes with Everett Billings. You know 
that. We'd both be hurt. Besides, there's my folks." He looked at her 
appealingly, and added, "You said it was for just a year, and two months 
have gone?" 

"How'd you like to be tied to a tree for ten months!" Gail demanded 
brightly. She would not be bitter with this boy. 

He grinned sheepishly. "You're not tied to a tree all the time." 

"Half the time it's worse! These are the good days. Honest, Neil, I'm 
scared. They say a year. But it's just their word. I don't see what's to 
stop them keeping me here forever. Ma Billings would like that, and if this 
husband of hers has all this influence, all this political pull, then Neil, 
I haven't a hope!" 

She had touched him. She could tell. When he spoke, it was an affirmation. 
"If they cheat you like that I will help," he said fervently. "But they 
won't. The Old Girl likes a change." 

"Does everyone know about them? And about me?" 

"Pretty well," he conceded grudgingly. "Calling you the hired girl makes it 
O.K." 

Gail considered. "So here we have a frustrated middle-aged woman whose 
husband stays away most of the time and she's taken up sadism as a hobby. He 
provides her with pretty girl subjects on whom she works out her 
animosities. It's a case for a psychiatrist." 

"Better not tell her that." 

"Think I'm crazy! She'd half kill me. She's stayed away from the whip for a 
week. Haven't you noticed, no fresh marks! I'm careful what I say. And I'm 
damn careful to butter her up with plenty of 'ma'am's'. Gosh, I hate having 
to do that." 

"She's a bit pathetic," he ventured. "Most people feel a bit sorry for her." 

"Am I supposed to?" 

"Well hardly." He eyed her shrewdly. "But you do have her figured out." 

"Doesn't make anything hurt less." Gail's voice was bitter. "Are you hurting 
now?" He was suddenly anxious. "Oh sure!" she admitted resignedly. "But it's 
no more than I can bear, and there's nothing you can do about it." She 
grinned at him cheerfully. "Unless you want to untie me. Wouldn't you like 
to?" 

"Of course I would. Don't tempt me." 

"I'd let you tie me again when you go. I'm very well behaved." 

They shared laughter. Most of their times together had come to be spent in a 
wry repartee about her condition. "Ma Billings would know. No one could get 
the knots back just the way she does 'em. I bet the Old Girl checks. What 
would you tell her?" 

"Oh all right, I'll suffer," she said good humouredly. "But let's try it 
next time just to see if she can tell. You don't have to worry. It's me 
who'll get whipped if she catches on." 

Neil looked at her with youthful adoration. "You're wonderful! I don't think 
I could handle what you're having to take. You aren't scared...." 

"I'm angry. I'm angry at myself for letting it happen, and I'm a damned 
sight angrier that it's even possible to happen. If it hadn't happened to me 
I wouldn't believe it." 

He nodded understandingly. "I suppose it's the same with me. I'm awfully 
glad I came by that day and found you. I come now whenever I can, hoping 
you'll be here. Do you mind? I mean, does it help?" 

"Oh please! I need you. You're all I've got. Everything else is insane." 

"Are there other places she ties you? Places I could come?" 

"I'm forever tied one way or another. She loves to tie me. But this is the 
only spot, so far, that you could come to. She puts me out here because I'm 
scared of animals and beetles... and maybe the wrong kind of man. I was 
scared out of my wits the first time. That amused her." 

When it came time for him to go, she was more bereft than usual. "Neil...." 
He tensed, tremendously aware of her. "Put your hands on me. Now! I want you 
to." He obeyed her, dazed with wonder. Her nipples hardened beneath his 
fingertips. She moaned. "Kiss me, Neil!" 

He kissed her, his hands cupped upon her breasts. 

"Now go." She panted. "Go quickly. If you don't you'll be seduced into 
freeing me. I don't want you to free me for that reason. Go." 

When he reached the trees he turned, hoping she would call him back. "Thank 
you for coming," she said fervently. "Oh, thank you - always come." 

He made a diffident motion with his hand and quickly plunged out of sight. 
He was still a boy. 

It was very lonely with him gone. There was now nothing to look forward to. 
Just the hours and the hurt of the cords upon her wrists. Gail tugged, 
making them hurt even more. It served her right! It served her right! She 
desisted and stood submissive in her bonds. The tree possessed her. 

It was Curtis. Gail hated Curtis. He carried her slip of a dress, so she 
knew Ma Billings had sent him to release her. He would release her, but not 
immediately. With Curtis it was never immediate! For twelve years old he was 
a very wise little lecher. "Hello, tit girl," he greeted amiably. "Hello 
Curtis." Her role must be forever humble. 

Ostentatiously he cut a switch and trimmed it. "Just in case you want to be 
uppity," he informed her cheerfully, cutting the air to make her wince. 

"Your mother will be angry if you mark me." 

"Yeah, but that'll be afterwards," he leered. "Open your legs. I want to see 
your slit." 

Awkwardly, Gail obeyed: one leg on each side of the tree to which she was 
bound. She faced him, hating, but obedient. She had long since abandoned 
heroics. He manhandled her sex until she was gasping. Then bit her nipples 
until she pleaded. She knew he wanted her to plead, so she did it as quickly 
and humiliatingly as she could contrive. Curtis was satisfied. He did not 
switch her. Gail was grateful. The boy often threatened to whip her, but had 
never done so. Perhaps. his mother had warned him off her own preserves. But 
Curtis was an opportunist. He began to pluck her pubic hair. One at a time. 
Slowly and painfully. 

"Please, Curtis, don't do that. It hurts." 

"You don't care about the hurtin'. You're just scared o' havin' a bald 
cunt," he jibed. 

Gail kept silent while he amused himself. It was surprisingly painful. He 
extracted each hair very slowly so as to cause her the maximum pain and 
shame. He was his mother's son! She always wondered why the little horror 
did not rape her. She supposed his mother must have warned him there too. Ma 
Billings would not enjoy a pregnant prisoner. 

But Curtis was on a mission. Gail got a scant satisfaction from the fact 
that Ma Billings progeny were almost as much afraid of their mother as 
herself. Reluctantly, he abandoned his pubic sport and untied her hands. As 
always, it felt impossibly good and wonderful to be free. Even to massage 
her wealed wrists was a privilege, a privilege of short duration since 
Curtis grabbed her right hand and slipped a fresh loop about the wrist. 

"You don't have to do that," Gail protested. " 'Course I don't. But you 
ain't goin' to stop me." He was very certain of what he could get away with. 

Gail shrugged. It was not worth a fight, possibly a few cuts with the switch 
and an argument with Ma. It was easier to allow the urchin to lead her back 
to the ranch house on a tether like a dog. It amused him, and her own 
capacity for shame was sadly depleted. It did not matter. Nothing mattered 
anymore. 

She was half way through the preparations for the evening meal, when Ma 
Billings returned and chained her ankles. Gail made her obvious protest. 
"You don't need chain me, ma'am. You know I won't run away. I've agreed to 
my sentence." 

"Mebbe' that's so," Ma conceded doubtfully. "But the less chance you got to 
run, the less you'll be thinking on it. And anyway, you know damn well I 
like to see a gal chained. I'd have 'em all well ironed if I had my way." 

"What about you when you were my age?" Gail asked archly. She had discovered 
that Ma Billings, when in the right mood, was not adverse to repartee. 

"Got tied in the barn mostly," Ma admitted. "Never got tied without a 
licking neither. Won't say it never done me good. Little Heller I was in 
them days," she added with pride. "That's afore Billings showed up." 

"Would you say being... well, punished like that got you started into 
finding enjoyment in... in, that sort of thing?" Gail poured potatoes into a 
pan. 

Ma Billings chuckled sardonically. "Doing a bit o' that screwball analyzing, 
ain't you! Never had no truck with it. Don't matter a damn what starts 
nothing. If I get a charge out o' whipping your ass or tying you to the 
corral rail what the Hell... ! That's what matters. I like it so I do it!" 

"But you couldn't if you weren't... well, sort of privileged." 

"Sure does help, honey. I ain't denying that. Billings being what he is does 
sorta' put me in the catbird seat with you gals. Quite a few of you he's put 
my way." She paused reminiscently. "He don't want to shove it into me no 
more, Aggers I get my jollies outa' you. 'Spose he's right enough. Wouldn't 
want to trade back. I got the best of it." 

"Are all the girls sentenced to one year, ma'am?" 

Ma Billings laughed sourly. "You sure do hate to have to call me ma'am, 
don't you, honey! Yup! Most of 'em gets a year." 

"Don't some of them choose to stand trial and take their chances? Don't some 
think prison might be better than the things... the things you enjoy?" Gail 
shook a frying pan vigorously. 

"That what you're thinking?" Ma's voice was sharp. 

"No, ma'am, just curious." The chains on Gail's ankles clinked pleasantly as 
she walked to a cupboard, her steps short and hobbled. 

"Like we told you in the first place, that there Prison Farm ain't no bed o' 
roses. Gal gets in there she don't always get out on time," Ma informed 
darkly. "But you get set on finding out, we can always arrange it. Want I 
should tell Billings, honey?" 

"No! Please... I'm just curious. I'm sorry, ma'am." 

"You better be. And forget them silly notions 'bout being innocent. No one 
gives a damn. Billings or me says you're guilty, gal, then you're guilty as 
Hell. Better believe it." 

"Oh, I do!" Gail could say this with fervent truth. 

"Hate me bad, kid?" 

It was a question Gail had asked herself and found no answer. Ma Billing's 
brand of sadism hardly ranked with Torquemada's. It was actually an amiable 
cruelty in search of a strange eroticism. The honesty with which she 
discussed her aberrant recreations disarmed. Yet she was quite ruthless. She 
was unpredictable. 

"No ma'am." Gail almost winced as she used the demeaning token of respect. 
"When I first met you I chose what I am doing rather than go to prison. I 
don't think I could have done that if I had hated you." 

Ma Billings brightened. In some ways she was very human. "Smart gal! Said it 
from the start. You're special. Damn funny," she mused humorously. "I like 
you. But I get more kick out o' slicing into your ass than I ever done 
whaling them others. How you figure that one?" 

The girl in chains did not figure it. But she knew a polite interest was 
expected in a subject dear to her mistress's heart. "I think innocence 
always provokes us," she offered slowly. "It's probably the contrast. It's 
sort of routine and half expected to thrash some girl who's been a perfect 
bitch, so there isn't all that much novelty in it. But if you whip a perfect 
innocent her outrage alone, her bewilderment, the moral hurt that almost 
equals the hurt to her skin, it's a fresh and rare emotion." 

Ma Billings was gratified. It was as though she had been accorded 
recognition for a scientific breakthrough. "Damn good, honey. Next time I 
take a switch to you, we'll discuss it stroke by stroke. You got a head on 
your shoulders." She laughed ribaldly, "As well as the cutest little butt I 
ever laid a cane across." 

Gail took out the roast. It was time for supper. She wished her feet were 
not chained. It is hard to serve nimbly with linked ankles. 

For the captive girl the ranch evenings were dull. Had it not been for 
fatigue they might have been tedious. But by the time she had finished the 
tasks imposed, Gail was ready enough for sleep. The last chore was rarely 
finished before nine. Sometimes she was allowed to watch television for an 
hour. But this privilege was uncertain. She was taken to her room when Ma 
Billings felt like it. 

It was a simple ritual, hatefully shaming. Ma Billings motioned with her 
thumb and followed her domestic treasure up the stairs. Gail's room was 
surprisingly ordinary. It was neither penal nor plush. Reaching it, Gail 
immediately discarded her single covering. Naked, she then performed the 
next mandatory act. Thrusting out her right foot she watched Ma lock the 
heavy shackle on the slender ankle. It was a snug fit. It had been made for 
her in the ranch blacksmith shop. From it an equally heavy chain ran to a 
massive ring sunk in the floor. Once a girl's ankle was thus secured she 
could forget escape. The tether allowed the captive to use the bed and walk 
to the dresser and a clothes closet. But it denied her the door or the 
window. 

Though safely prisoned for the night there still remained an unknown. Gail 
masked her apprehensions as she waited. Ma Billings chuckled with enjoyment 
of the suspense. It was a game she played nightly with her captive. With 
deliberate slowness she opened a dresser drawer and extracted a pair of 
handcuffs. She toyed with the chrome admiringly. "Mighty handy things, 
these," she said as though speaking of a household convenience, which 
indeed, for her, they were! "Billings brought me several of 'em last time he 
was to home." She chuckled, "Compliments of the State Police I expect. He 
don't pay for nothing he don't have to." 

The naked girl eyed the shining metal. It was hard to control her features 
from mirroring her loathing. But she had been bitterly taught to accept what 
she must with good grace. There were far worse things than handcuffs! This 
regular evening play that gave pleasure to the older woman held an element 
of considerable uncertainty. Gail might not be cuffed at all; or she might 
be made to wear them normally so that her wrists were simply joined. Her 
hands could be fastened behind her back. Or, if Ma was in a playful or 
vindictive mood, the metal bands could be made to hold their victim in a 
myriad of uncomfortable or shaming ways. One wrist locked to one ankle would 
not preclude sleep, but it was a punishment. There had long since ceased to 
be pretence that the girl's security was at stake. The handcuffs were placed 
upon her solely for Ma Billing's erotic enjoyment. It did something for her. 
It did a lot. 

"Turn around, honey." Ma was maintaining her benign mood. 

Equally determined to give no offence, Gail almost eagerly obeyed, placing 
her hands submissively behind her back. A small inhalation of breath was her 
only acknowledgement as the cuffs bit at her wrists and were clicked tight. 
"Thank you, ma'am." She kept her voice even, almost grateful. This, too, was 
mandatory. 

It was done. The captive girl was ready for bed. Ma Billings waddled happily 
away. She did not bother to lock the door. 

Pensively the chained girl moved to stand before the mirror. What might have 
been the considerable clanking of her ankle chain was muted by a frayed rug 
thoughtfully provided for that purpose. Gail's passage about her room might 
otherwise have been noisily obtrusive. The heavy links accompanied her like 
a shadow. 

She would have liked to brush her hair. The mirror accused her of 
untidiness. She tugged fretfully at the handcuffs in a reflex motion utterly 
futile. She could do nothing. Why, oh why, could Ma not have cuffed her 
hands in front! It would still be shaming. But there were so many things a 
girl could do. She shrugged resignedly and grimaced at herself in the glass. 
She would take what comfort she could from the knowledge that her condition 
could be worse. It was no fun trying to sleep with her hands chained to the 
rail above her head. Beside such ingenuities, her present lot was mild. 

Gail had come to understand the pathetic consolations of captivity. They 
were small, but so eagerly sought, so avidly enjoyed. That the bands upon 
her wrists be one notch tighter or more loose was a major victory or defeat. 
That she be chained or free while she washed the dishes was a thing of much 
concern. The life of the slave girl she had become was measured, not by 
hopes of happiness, but only by varying degrees of discomfort or restraint. 
To be allowed to sleep without her hands in limbo was a gala occasion. She 
lived by comparisons. 

Dejectedly, Gail sat upon her bed and reflected bitterly on what might have 
been. If she had not done this or not done that! If only she had not stopped 
her car at the Sunshine Motel. Or if she had driven on to the next town. Or 
if she had not taken the key and gone away to supper before opening the 
fatal door. Such small decisions. Yet they had changed her life. Almost they 
had robbed her of life. 

The shock of finding the dead man had been traumatic. There he lay across 
the bed that should have been hers. The manner of his dying all too obvious. 
But she remembered most of all the creeping horror of realization that she 
was suspect. Remembered how she had cringed and flinched that first time 
they handcuffed her. Remembered the claustrophobic terror of the little cell 
and the larger bare room with the angry sweating faces and harsh demands. 
There had been the phone call, the eyes coldly assessing her, the cryptic 
exchange of words and leers. She had been almost grateful when, after hours 
of bleak fear, her cell door had opened to admit the huge figure of the 
bluff hearty man with his facile bonhomie and his incredible offer: Be a 
slave girl to his wife at their ranch, be a servant, a housemaid, a cook. 
Accept restraints and punishments without complaint. Just for a year. For 
only one year... 

Billings had shrewdly watched her incredulity, her instinctive revulsion, 
her flinching from the word punishment and his quite frank description of 
what those punishments would be. "She'll whip your ass, honey, and tie you 
up every way from Sunday," he had assured her genially. Then, when she was 
about to utter a heated rejection, he had described her alternative. He had 
described it with cold clinical detail. Described what would be done to her 
and how old she would probably become before she returned to the world of 
sanity. All the Billings would ask of her was twelve months. It wasn't all 
that much... was it... ! 

The next day she had voluntarily chosen the journey to the Bar-B-Ranch. 

Gail idly kicked her foot and watched the chain respond. She pulled at her 
prisoned wrists. She reflected bitterly that she would never know the wisdom 
of her choice. She had no means of gauging her salvation at Billings' hands. 
Or, conversely, how cannily he may have inveigled her into a needless 
slavery. She had no knowledge of prisons. But she thought it unlikely that 
any of them would be as physically cruel as Ma Billings or would work her as 
hard. On the other hand she had read stories of this State and this County 
and their penal inhumanities. At least at the Bar-B there were human 
contacts, not all hostile. Ma Billings herself could be strangely 
sympathetic between her cruelties and her demands. Almost she was to be 
preferred to a uniformed jailer and the cold impersonality of a 
penitentiary. And there was always the record. At the Bar-B she was not a 
criminal. 

It was a strange captivity. She was chained and she was bound. Sometimes she 
was locked into this compartment or that device. Yet, often enough, there 
were opportunities to run. It was casually accepted that Ma's inflictions 
were for Ma's pleasure. If the captive was foolish enough to run away during 
those odd periods when she was not restrained she was welcome to do so. It 
was understood that the police would catch her, and that retribution would 
be swift and awful. Among the more terrible penalties mentioned was that her 
sentence might then cease to be only a year. 

She examined the threat. It dissolved her courage. Only the knowledge that 
it would one day end had enabled her to act the perfect prisoner thus far. 
She clung to a belief that the Billings would keep their word on her 
indenture. But she could never free herself of a nagging certainty that 
should they resolve to keep her chained forever, there was nothing to stop 
them doing so. In such a case there was only Neil. Would the nice boy have 
the courage... ! 

Speculations were fruitless. Gail lay back and struggled and twisted herself 
beneath the covers. Handcuffs had long since ceased to impede her slumber. 

Morning brought Dulcie, half asleep, resentful. In an almost somnambulant 
state, she unlocked the shackle from the captive ankle and joined Gail's 
feet with the chain hobble. She removed the handcuffs and returned them to 
the drawer. Mutely, the Billings' teen-age daughter, having performed her 
six A.M. duty, bemusedly made her way back to bed for whatever sleep she 
could manage before the breakfast call. Gail never failed to be amused by 
the perfunctory manner of her daily release to go about her eternal chores. 

It was one of the few good moments. Her feet were prisoners, but the rest of 
her was free. She stretched and luxuriated in flinging wide her arms. She 
stole what time she dared before the mirror and in the bathroom. She donned 
her scanty dress and clinked her short-stepped journey to the kitchen to get 
the family breakfast. 

Ma Billings was practical in the matter of extracurricular business. It was 
not until all work was done that she produced the banana skin. Seeing it, 
Gail's heart sank. 

"Found it down between the fridge and the wall, honey." 

The bond maid quailed. The offending object would have been placed by one of 
the children, or even by Ma herself to justify a punishment. It had not been 
there before breakfast. Gail had become alert in watching for such traps. 
They were frequent. It was useless to protest them fraudulent. Such protests 
were listened to with sly smiles and earned only additional impositions of 
whatever it was she was about to suffer as punishment. She had once wondered 
why they bothered. But she understood now that placing her delinquent added 
savour to the punishment she would bear. It also gave scope for the ever 
mandatory humility with which she must accept a guilt that was not hers. 

"I'm very sorry, ma'am. Shall I fetch the cane?" 

"Was thinking about the whip, honey," Ma Billings said mildly. 

To be whipped for a banana skin! But it was nothing new. Gail smiled 
brightly and said demurely, "Thank you, ma'am. Where would you like to whip 
me?" 

"On the ass, of course!" Ma seized the obvious, and roared with laughter at 
her feeble wit. 

"In the barn, ma'am. Or out in the yard?" The Bar-B held many suitable 
places where a naked girl could be tied for punishment. 

"What say the barn, kid." Ma's voice had become eager. 

"Thank you, ma'am." 

They walked together across the yard. Two females bent upon the business of 
the ranch. Gail never ceased to wonder at the incongruities of her 
condition. Only her chained feet marked her as different from the woman who 
matched her steps. On the way they passed the whipping post. It was frankly 
and unashamedly that. It stood, stark and menacing, in the center of the big 
space. A girl was fastened to it when an audience must be impressed. Tied to 
it, a hundred eyes could watch her shame. Gail knew it well. 

The barn was large, but little used. The Bar-B was less a ranch than a 
country home. It provided a useful facility whereby Ma could enjoy her 
quaint proclivities, and was an ideal rearing ground for Congressman 
Billings' considerable issue. 

"Guess you'd like a bit of a change, honey?" Ma Billings looked 'round the 
huge structure with a speculative eye. 

Gail had learned that 'a bit of a change' was rarely for the better. But her 
"yes, please" sounded grateful. Ma Billings nodded thoughtfully. Her eyes 
brightened. "Get them leather wristlets, honey, and stand in the aisle." 

Standing in the spot where she would receive her stripes, Gail stepped out 
of her scanty sheath and held out her hands. The wristlets were a concession 
to the frailty of female flesh. When they were strapped tight, neither 
suspension nor struggles would cut the skin as would rope or cord. They were 
most practical. Each held a metal ring incorporated in its construction. 
Gail watched them strapped upon her passive wrists. This was the true 
beginning of her day. 

The barn held two rows of stalls. Between them the aisle was wide. The girl 
about to be punished reflected bitterly that there would be plenty of room 
to wield the whip. The older woman, intent upon her task, was tying separate 
ropes to each ring. Then, with much tossing and looping and tugging, she 
achieved the effect envisioned. The naked girl stood, dead centre, her 
captive hands strung high and far apart by long lengths of rope that held 
her to stand remote and alone and frighteningly vulnerable. 

"Can you move much, honey?" Ma sounded as though it mattered. 

Gail's feet were still chained. The shackles did not interfere with what was 
to be done. Obedient to her mistress's inquiry, Gail essayed a step forward 
and back. They were a matter of only a couple of inches either way. The 
ropes were tight, but their very length gave the prisoner latitude for a 
small swaying motion which she obligingly demonstrated to Ma Billings' 
satisfaction. Actually, she was utterly helpless. 

"Give you a chance to wiggle a bit," said Ma the beneficent. 

Gail preferred not to have a chance to wiggle. She would do it. But it was 
demeaning. "Thank you, ma'am," she said without hope. 

The whip sliced her shoulders and bit a breast. The shock was severe. She 
had allowed Ma Billings' bit of humour to mislead her into the supposition 
that it was her bottom which would receive the inflictions. She passionately 
did not want to scream, but she could not suppress a vivid moan of wild 
surprise. The whip was a cruel and awful thing above the waist. 

The woman with the whip was panting, not from effort but with a savage 
excitation. The scarlet weal that was forming across the white shoulders was 
a thing of beauty on which her eyes focused in rapt ecstasy. She waited for 
the maximum effect then struck again. 

Once more the naked recipient of the stroke managed not to scream. Gail 
vented her agony in a frantic plunge forward against the ropes away from the 
thong that, this time, had duplicated its cruelty beneath her other 
outstretched arm. Her lips uttered an involuntary cry of desolation that she 
could not contain. But she did not scream. 

She could not know it at that moment, but she was exquisitely beautiful. The 
woman who owned her stood back and watched the writhings of the ivory 
loveliness so totally held and exposed. Across the strained back another 
crimson emblem was forming its tribute to the lash. The ropes vibrated and 
swayed against their naked victim's struggle. 

"Cat got your tongue, kid?" Ma Billings was a firm believer in screams. A 
good scream showed a girl's appreciation. She made the whip sing its song 
once more. 

Gail screamed. Even though it was required of her she would have screamed 
anyway. There is always a point somewhere when the screams begin. The whip 
demands them. It is a foolish girl who doubly suffers because of pride. To 
take six across her bottom in silence may be a small victory for the 
sufferer. But with a naked girl tied fast the whip will always win. Gail's 
panting cries continued while the red stain spread across her skin. 

Five strokes! A mild enough punishment as such things go. At the end of them 
Gail's "thank you" was quite sincere. She knew that by Ma Billings' caprice 
her punishment could just as easily have been ten. There were no schedules, 
no established precedents. She stood still, breasts heaving, back on fire, 
the ropes pulling inexorably at her arms. 

Ma Billings herself was loath to move. The formation and progression of the 
weals across the whiteness of the girl's back held, for her, an irresistible 
fascination. The sound of the hurt panting breaths was pure magic. The 
tossing of the helpless head was a mute affirmation of her possession of 
this girl who stood helplessly awaiting her pleasure. She could whip the 
little trick to death, she mused comfortably. 

Cut and cut until the female thing hung limp and lifeless, bloody and seared 
and mute. But what waste! Ma knew a good thing when she had it. She was not 
about to ruin it. She sighed with an ineffable happiness. 

"Might as well leave you like that for the day," she mused cheerfully. 
"Ain't likely to think up nothing better." 

The captive stood as naturally as her bonds would allow. She looked 
pitifully at the woman who had whipped her, but she managed a wan smile as 
Ma Billings thoughtfully dried the wet cheeks, then patted them maternally. 

"Kids can get their own lunch," Ma said. "I got a few things to do. But I'll 
be back in time to loosen you or I'll phone young Dulcie." 

It was the usual: her captive day. Gail did not wish to stand as she was, 
but knew there would be no help for it. She managed a bright-eyed smile. It 
was always best to keep Ma Billings pleased with her. The strangeness of 
smiling after she had been whipped was an anomaly she had deliberately 
accustomed herself to. So many things were mandatory with Ma. 

"You're a damn fine gal, kid." Ma Billings took a final look of approval at 
her masterpiece, her daily work of art and of love, before she reluctantly 
turned and waddled from the barn. 

For Gail it was an accolade. 

The tree had been better. It was something to lean on. Today would be 
tiring, her arms would ache, her shoulders were strained, her wrists would 
hurt. She would just stand there naked without ability to ease any of her 
hurts. The pain of the whip would gradually decrease leaving only 
tenderness, so that in the end the pose she must sustain all day would be 
the worst punishment of all. The work she must perform mutely was tiring 
enough. Sessions such as she would now endure made her trebly weary. But she 
was a bond maid. She was by no means the first to suffer in such ways. 

But it was a wretched way through which to spend the long hours. She 
reflected wryly that quite probably she did look beautiful in this enforced 
worship of the sun. But she could not see herself and there were no other 
eyes. Neil would not come to the barn. The Billings children lacked 
aesthetic appreciation. She would just stand, knowing that Ma Billings would 
be remembering her with satisfaction that she be thus beautifully bound by 
her own hand. It was a sad reflection that she was sacrifice to a 
middle-aged woman's loneliness and frustration. Yet her pain was not 
fruitless. It gave Ma happiness. What strange twists life could take! 

She thought of Kevin. How badly had he been hurt by the letter she had been 
forced to send! She thought of herself and men. For the year of her sentence 
there would be a vacuum. Her punishments did not consider the intangible yet 
most vital loss of all: a year of life. A year taken from that time when a 
girl is most ardently alive. Gail knew that because of this deprivation she 
had come to sublimate Neil and his boy's earnestness, his obvious adoration. 
That he was so much younger than herself was becoming of less and less 
moment. He was male! She reflected with wry humour that, held captive long 
enough, she might even find the attentions of the objectionable Curtis 
tolerable... if only he was not all prodding fingers and curiosity. 

Dulcie came at noon. She looked a lot better than she had done at six A.M. 
Gail knew that under normal circumstances she would have found the teenager 
attractive and likeable. But nothing was normal at the Bar-B. Dulcie closed 
and bolted the barn door from the inside. That meant she had a mission. She 
said a perfunctory "Hi" and stood admiring her mother's work of art. "Really 
got you fixed, hasn't she? She whip you too?" 

Not the least of the Bar-B's phenomena was the awareness and acceptance of 
Ma Billings' favourite sport by her brood. Gail often wondered how their 
personalities would develop under exposure to a daily diet of naked girls 
tied and whipped and chained. Girls who, sometimes under stress, would plead 
for help and for release. Already, Dulcie and Curtis had graduated from 
acceptance into a sly participation. 

Dulcie nonchalantly circled the pinioned nakedness, stopping to admire the 
five weals across the white back. She traced them with her finger and 
laughed as their owner winced. "Why she stop at five, Gail?" 

"I don't know. I never know," Gail retorted testily. "You tired... standing 
like that?" 

"Yes, terribly." 

Dulcie studied the naked captive hungrily. She was obviously carrying a 
heavy weight of decision. She rid herself of it in a single sentence, "If I 
let you down for an hour will you lick me?" 

Gail had seen it coming. Dulcie was a highly sexed and precocious moppet. At 
times such as this she had total control of a woman's body. The demand was 
not surprising. But its answer was not easy. Gail was not naive, a prude, or 
without experience. An hour of release would be glorious! But she was not a 
pushover. And, once started, where would such a liaison end? And what would 
Ma Billings do to them if she found out? But there was an insidious appeal 
in the idea of an ally, someone tied to her by a bond stronger than pity. 
She temporized, "Your mother would murder us." 

"Ma won't know," Dulcie said equably. Then, as a helpful afterthought, "I'll 
whip you if you refuse." 

"You wouldn't dare. Your Ma would see the marks on me." 

Dulcie smiled quietly. She found rope. While one end of it was being cinched 
around her waist Gail had the feeling her resistance pleased the youngster. 
When the other end snared an ankle and tugged it off the ground she had an 
inkling of what was in store. "Your mother will be mad at you." The threat 
might be an empty one. But it was her only weapon. When the small task was 
done the naked girl stood on one foot. The other was joined to her waist and 
bent up as far as the ankle chain would allow, far enough for Dulcie's 
purpose. 

"Ma ain't going to look on the sole of your foot," the youngster said 
smugly. 

Gail watched unhappily while Dulcie went to the tack room for a crop. She 
was utterly at the youngster's mercy. The sole of her captive foot screamed 
a mute protest at what was about to happen. She twisted and tugged, but was 
more impotent than ever. 

"Alright, I'll do it," she capitulated. At least the child would know she 
had not been willing! By such slender threads does a female cling to 
integrity. 

"You put me to a lot of trouble. Don't see why I shouldn't give you a few 
licks," Dulcie grudgingly suggested. 

"Oh, please, Dulcie! It will hurt terribly." 

Dulcie's arm flashed. The pinioned foot seemed sundered by the blow. The 
pain was so great and of such a new and unexpected intensity that Gail 
screamed and screamed again. Surely such agony was not possible... ! 

The child who had delivered the blow stood enthralled by its effect. Her 
victim was utterly demoralized. The naked girl moaned and writhed in the 
most satisfying ways. When her louder noises subsided, she moaned and sobbed 
in complete surrender: "Oh Dulcie! Not again... please! I'll do whatever you 
want. I will, I will! Oh, please...." 

"You'll do it nicely? You won't be sulky?" 

"I won't be sulky. I promise." 

"As much as I want?" 

"All you want, Dulcie. Everything. And I'll let you tie me again after." 
Gail was defeated. 

Dulcie snickered. "Ain't no need of that. I thought of something." 

The 'something" was effective and took no chances. One at a time the long 
ropes to Gail's wrists were loosened and re-tied at a height of four feet. 
She was made to kneel, the ropes tugged tight. She was as helpless as she 
had ever been. Kneeling, her arms horizontal, tautly stretched to either 
side, she knew herself well positioned for what she must do. "You promised 
to free me," she complained. "No need. This will do fine." 

"But I'm tired. You offered me a rest." 

"I offered you a chance to lick my clit. You aiming to be difficult?" Gail 
was close to tears. It was all so unfair. But she was frightened. This 
moppet, in ignorant exuberance, might do her more injury than would Ma 
Billings. "No. I'll be good. I'll be nice to you. It's just that I really 
truly am tired." 

Dulcie was faintly touched. "I thought kneeling would give you a rest?" 

"I suppose it does, a bit. But I can't even kneel properly with one foot 
tied up to my tummy." 

"I want it like that so's I can whip it if you don't behave," Dulcie pointed 
out reasonably. 

"Please take the rope off it. Honest, I will please you. I will! You can 
whip me terribly if I don't. You've got me fixed, Dulcie. I can't do 
anything except what you want me to." Gail was becoming desperate. Another 
blow across the sole of her foot was unthinkable. "Oh alright then," Dulcie 
agreed doubtfully. "Ill let your foot down. But I'll leave the rope round 
your middle. You start acting up and I can have you back the way you are in 
no time, and I'll give it to you good." 

The captive sighed with relief as her foot fell to the floor. Kneeling was 
better than standing. She would console herself with a prisoner's philosophy 
that half a loaf was better than no bread. She watched Dulcie strip naked. 
It was done with surprising ease. The girl wore no more than Gail herself 
was allowed. There was a pert femaleness about her nudity that was 
tremendously appealing. The kneeling girl watched the advance of the dark 
hairy triangle and smiled brightly to show herself willing. Her lips parted. 
She moistened them with a wet tongue. 

For Dulcie, her noon hour was excitingly wonderful. 

Power and lust are heady stuff for a teenager. Amidst her testacies her mind 
was busy with future plans. A treasure like Gail was not to be wasted. For 
Gail herself, the sixty minutes brought no relief from weariness. Her tongue 
was now added to the list of what was tired. Again and again she longed for 
the use of her hands. She pleaded for their freedom, pointing out how 
greatly they could enhance joy. But Dulcie was adamant: perhaps another 
time. Not now. Gail dare not persist. 

Rightly or wrongly there was a bond. Gail did not know whether to be glad or 
ashamed. The two girls had shared an essentially female happiness. It could 
not be forgotten. Gail sensed the thoughts in the youngster's mind. It would 
happen again and again. Perhaps a weapon was being forged. She stood passive 
and willing to be rebound as Ma had left her. Standing taut and helpless, 
her eyes sought those of the girl she had pleasured. Knowledge and 
understanding flashed between them. With a sound akin to a sob or a moan, 
the girl who was free fell to her knees before she who was tied. Strong 
young hands felt and clutched, eager lips sped to their task. Gail gasped in 
wonderland. 

Dulcie was more than kind. 

Alone again, tautly held, Gail was preparing herself to reflect through the 
hours of the afternoon when Curtis appeared. "You're supposed to be in 
school," she accused, her heart sinking. "No class for an hour," he exulted. 

With Curtis it was always a battle of wits. She dared not be as curt and as 
brusk with him as she wished. She was too vulnerable. He had access to her 
for an hour. It would take all her wit to counter his lechery. She kept a 
cautious silence. 

"You and Dulcie been up to something." His eyes were wise. 

"She came and talked to me." 

"I bet she did!" He walked 'round her nakedness. "She give you them licks 
with a whip?" 

"That was your mother." 

He grinned, complete master of the situation. "I seen what you and Dulcie 
done. There's knot-holes and the windows. You sure did make her squirm." 

"So run along and tell Mummy." 

"You done it for Dulcie, you can do it for me." 

Gail was about to point out that girls and little boys are different, when 
she realized that, for what Curtis had in mind, the difference would not 
matter. She fell back on the comforting obvious. "I can't do anything for 
anybody tied up like this." 

He snickered. "I can soon fix that." 

The naked girl knew a sudden terrible yearning to be free. To be herself and 
not naked and tied so that her body was a plaything for children. Even for 
an hour or two... ! She gave the avid urchin her best smile and dropped her 
bait, "If you untie me I can give you a lot more than I gave Dulcie." For 
extra measure she added archly, "And you'll be giving me something too." 

She saw him tense, saw the excitement take possession. "Aw shucks!" He said 
disgustedly, "I untie you, you'll run like Hell." 

"I can't. My feet are chained." She raised one foot and rattled the links. 
She caught his attention. Curtis was confronted with The Great Adventure'. 
His eyes lingered on her pubic hair. "You asking me to fuck you?" He was 
glimpsing Paradise. 

"Of course! I want it as much as you do." Gail felt certain that even at the 
age of twelve the male ego was susceptible to flattery. 

"You ain't going to tell Ma 'bout this?" 

"Good Heavens no! She'd whip me." 

"Me too," said Curtis the realist. "How 'bout if you have a baby?" The idea 
obviously pleased him. 

The hazard of pregnancy was not included in what Gail had in mind. "I'll 
have to take my chances," she told him heroically. 

Curtis was hooked, but was still covering angles. "Ma will throw a fit if 
she comes home and you ain't fixed the way she left you?" 

"She'd whip me terribly," Gail craftily agreed. "That's why I'll want you to 
tie me like this again. We just have to do that." She gazed at him in 
earnest complicity. 

The youthful satyr nodded thoughtfully. He could see no impediment to his 
excursion into lust. He had covered all the loopholes. With determined 
eagerness he shed his clothes and went to work on the ropes that held his 
partner in lubricity. 

Gail was excited, not with passion, but by the stakes for which she played. 
Assessing the active naked youth with his rigid sex she realized he would be 
no easy mark. If only her feet were not chained! But they were chained! She 
would have to take her gamble. Failure must not be thought of. She must be 
stronger than he was! She had to be. 

When the last ropes fell away and she stood free, they eyed each other 
awkwardly as though they were indeed adolescents embarking for an unknown 
sea. Divergent as their intents might be, the approach of each was similar. 
Smiling at her companion all the while, Gail massaged and flexed her stiff 
and aching arms. She would need them. Gauging the expression on her 
ravisher's face she lay on her back on the floor and held out her arms. 

Gail had to choke back a giggle. It was too absurd! The youthful Curtis came 
at her like a strutting cockerel. His gaze, mesmerized, never leaving the 
dark triangle between her legs. He knelt and fell forward to impale his 
conquest. 

It was her moment. Twisting, she snared his legs in her ankle chain. While 
he was still shocked by her sudden motion she had him face down. Twisting 
his right arm up so that he yelped, she reached for rope, her knees with all 
her weight upon his back. 

Without surprise and the boy's preoccupation with his lechery, she might not 
have succeeded. He was strong and ruthless. Her chained feet were a 
frightening handicap. But she did succeed. After an ebb and flow battle made 
vivid by Curtis's threats and outraged curses, she had him securely tied. He 
lay, crimson faced and glowering as she rose to her feet, his maleness still 
comically erect. "You'll get the whipping of your life," he assured her 
sourly. 

"So will you," his erstwhile victim retorted complacently. 

Curtis's mind worked craftily. "Untie me and I'll just go to school and you 
can do what you damn well please." 

Gail wished she could trust him, but knew she could not. Had her feet not 
been chained she would have taken the chance. But the first tussle had told 
her plainly that she might not win the second. The rampant Curtis could stay 
where he was. Thoughtfully, she tied his already bound feet to a stanchion, 
then made her way to the door, followed by a stream of abuse and threats, 
some of which she feared might actually be made good. 

It was a strange feeling, her closest approach to freedom since coming to 
the Bar-B. For a moment there was exaltation, an intoxicating awareness of 
possibilities. But deflation was instant. What hope of escape was there for 
a naked girl with chained feet! Miserably, she looked down at the heavy 
metal bands about her ankles and their equally heavy joining links. Only Ma 
Billings had the key that would get them off. 

But she would not too easily accept defeat. If, by some effort or ingenuity 
she could rid herself of the irons, the actuality of escape might become 
real. If she could reach a highway and hitchhike out of the State she would 
be beyond the malign influence of Billings and his cohorts. At the mere 
thought, her heart soared. She tried the blacksmith shop. But the tools were 
valuable. The door was firmly locked. She hastened to the house and to her 
room. Scrambling into a dress and shoes, she stumbled her hobbled way to 
Ma's own bedchamber. The search was long. Everything must be left as though 
undisturbed. Failing to escape, it would be wise to minimize the punishments 
she supposed inevitable. With little optimism she began her search of the 
big house. 

A hall closet yielded a glass jar containing half a dozen assorted keys. 
None of them fit her shackles, but following a faint hope she took them to 
the blacksmith shop. One of them gained her entry. She stood perplexed by 
the anvil, the forge and the array of tools. She wasted a good deal of time 
in fruitless efforts to pick the locks with assorted bits of metal strewn 
upon the bench before she noticed the hacksaw. When she essayed its use, she 
almost wept in frustration. Because her feet were joined she could place 
neither of them in a convenient position. At best she could use the blade 
awkwardly and with little power. Her first disappointment came with the 
discovery that the tool would make no headway on the shackle itself. The 
band was too big and too curved. She could cut herself but not the metal. 

Gail considered. With perseverance she might be able to sever the chain from 
the anklets. Successful in that, she would then go out into the world with 
heavy metal bands locked upon her ankles. They would be no impediment to 
motion, but would proclaim her condition. Yet fashions today were strange. 
Perhaps with a twisted scarf or some textile trifle she could achieve a 
semblance of normalcy! Freedom had beckoned too brightly to desist now. She 
fitted the serrated blade against one shackle ring and made her first 
effective thrust with the saw. 

"Aiming to do a bit of traveling, honey?" Ma Billings voice queried 
sardonically. 

Shocked dismay sent the saw clattering to the floor. Gail's heart made a 
similar descent. Turning from her awkward crouch she found the doorway 
filled by Ma Billings hefty bulk. That lady's eyes were viewing the 
escapee's consternation with pleased amusement. "Cat's away, the mice can 
play, eh, kid!" 

Gail buried her face in her hands and wept. Fate was too cruel. The day had 
turned into disaster. Ma Billings watched her captive cry. She enjoyed 
tears. What greater tribute could the defeated girl pay her. When they 
turned into dry sobs she picked up the hacksaw and minutely examined the 
shackles. "Looks like I come home 'bout the right time," she observed 
cheerfully. "Saved you spoiling a good pair o' leg irons and making an 
asshole outa' yourself, honey." 

Gail kept within the sanctuary of her hands. She had nothing to say. No girl 
could have been caught in more flagrant guilt. She could think of no words 
to offer in mitigation. She had lost her freedom because of a few bits of 
metal on her ankles. It was too, too cruel! 

"Them irons saved the day, kid," Ma observed reflectively. "Damn good thing 
I had 'em on you. If I hadn't you'd be high tailing it up the highway and 
getting yourself into all sorts of trouble... real bad trouble. Maybe I'd 
better get a heavier set on you just as a reminder." 

"Yes ma'am," the tearful prisoner sniffed. 

"Yes ma'am my arse!" Ma Billings exclaimed. "How the Hell you get loose?" 

Gail told her. 

Ma Billings listened unperturbed. She admired enterprise, especially that of 
her own progeny. "You mean you got young Curtis hog tied in the barn?" she 
chortled. 

"What else could I do, ma'am!" 

"Could have given the lad his first bit o' tail." She roared with laughter 
at the sally. "Imagine you got a bit to spare." She wiped her eyes and 
handed the cambric to Gail. "Here, honey, dry them tears and lets go have a 
look at the young buck." 

The helpless Curtis had no eyes for Gail. They were focused in apprehension 
on his mother's approaching bulk. "She done it to me, Ma." He made it sound 
like a charge of high treason. "What you aim to do to her, son?" Ma was 
enjoying herself. "I wouldn't have hurt her, Ma. Honest!" 

"Didn't figure she was no virgin, eh!" The subtlety of the remark was lost 
upon the crimson faced youth. "She asked me to let her down for a rest," he 
offered hopefully. 

"That why you took your clothes off?" Chuckling with an immense amusement, 
Ma Billings took Gail's arm and led her towards the door. 

"Hey, Ma! I'm all tied up," Curtis proclaimed the obvious. 

"You sure are, son. And you can damn well stay that way. Teach you a lesson. 
I got things to talk about with this fool girl." Ma jerked her captive's arm 
and headed for the house. 

It was typical of Ma Billings that she insisted on coffee. Making it, Gail 
had no illusions about the respite. They would sit sipping it while she was 
sentenced to some horrible penalty. Ma Billings liked her cruelties to be 
good natured. The hated chains clinked and clinked in triumphant reminder of 
their victory. 

"I won't make any excuses, ma'am," Gail said despondently over her cup. 

"I'd listen if you had any, hon'," Ma said big heartedly. 

Gail tried, her voice uncertain. "When I came here, ma'am, it was understood 
that I should treat you with respect and that I must accept the things... 
the things you would want to do to me -" 

"Like whipping your ass," Ma Billings broke in helpfully. 

"Well... yes. And all the rest...!" Gail eyed the older woman doubtfully. "I 
suppose I was sort of sentenced. Or maybe we could call it some sort of 
verbal contract. But - and please don't be offended at this - I don't think 
it included the things your children want to do to me. You see," her eyes 
made a genuine appeal, "when you leave me tied for the day, they can do 
anything they like. I'm completely at their mercy." 

"What they been doing to you, honey?" 

Gail hesitantly described the juvenile interest in her femininity. "You see, 
ma'am, I've been scared to tell you. I'm scared now. If you reprimand them, 
they can get revenge by giving me a really bad time." 

"The little so and so's," Ma reflected thoughtfully. Feeling in her bag she 
brought forth a small plastic object Gail recognized all too well. "Here, 
you'll get one of these a day. I can't stand guard over that cute little 
slit of yours." 

It was a declaration from which Gail could garner no comfort. But she 
swallowed the little red pill. One more hazard of her captivity had reared 
its head. "What are you going to do to me?" she asked dolefully. 

Ma Billings poured them both more coffee. "What you think I should do, 
honey?" 

"I suppose I have to be punished." It was an acceptance rather than a 
question. 

"Damn right you do! How'd you like to be whipped?" 

From anyone but Ma Billings the question would have been rhetorical or 
absurd. Somehow she clothed it in normalcy. With pounding heart the 
delinquent girl strove for the same tone. "I expect I should be whipped, 
ma'am." 

The older woman nodded, pleased. "That looks after stealing my keys and your 
little act with the hacksaw, honey. But you ain't no business tying up my 
kid. What about that?" 

"But the little monst -" 

"The little monster what, honey?" Ma's voice was sweet as syrup. "He was 
trying to rape me." 

"Who talked him into taking them ropes off you?" Gail flushed. "He... he had 
to... to get at me. I was frightened. They had tied my foot up so they could 
whip the sole. You wouldn't see the marks." 

"They?" 

"Dulcie started it." Gail felt a tattle tale. She cringed at thought of the 
children's wrath. "I'll be damned!" Ma slapped her knee in hearty approval. 

"Had yourself quite a day." She considered briefly, "Makes a couple more 
rumps I'll have to tan." Momentarily she pursued a quiet thought. That hurt 
much? I mean on the sole of your foot?" 

"It's so awful I can't describe it." 

"Good! I'll try it on you sometime." Ma sounded pleased as with a new 
recipe. "But right now you got a score to settle for Curtis and for young 
Dulcie, bless her heart. Got any ideas?" 

"I was helpless, ma'am. They could do what they liked with me." Gail felt a 
great weight of injustice descending on her shoulders. 

"You was helpless when I left. But when I come home I find you damn near off 
and running," Ma said darkly. "Can't tell me you didn't have no hand in 
that." 

Punishments! Forever punishments! Because there had been guilt these would 
be doubly awful. Instinctively the chained girl looked appealingly at the 
woman who held her in thrall. "Please, ma'am, don't hurt me too much. I know 
I've earned a whipping. But... but, I'm so tired...." 

Perhaps Ma Billings was touched. It was hard to tell. "You run along and get 
the supper, kid. We'll leave your little rewards until tomorrow. You ain't a 
bad girl. Just need a bit o' breaking in. One of these days I'll get you 
real gentle." 

"Oh, thank you, ma'am." Gail was genuinely grateful. At that moment her 
courage was not equal to being whipped. She rose, her eyes meeting those of 
the other woman. "I'm... I'm frightened," she whispered brokenly. 

"And so you should be, kid! So you should be!" Ma Billings approved warmly. 

It was quaintly formal and reminiscent of another age. The whipping post 
became a thing of another century. The barnyard became a Barrack Square. The 
six Billings children stood in line, the four youngest mightily intrigued, 
the two eldest crestfallen and sullen. To one side stood Gail, clothed but 
desolate. To the other the masterful bulk of the mistress of proceedings, Ma 
Billings herself. The post dominated them all. 

Ma clapped her hands twice. With military precision Curtis and Dulcie 
marched forward to the place of execution. The boy slipped out of his 
clothes, positioned his hands and stood abject while his sister fastened 
them. Dulcie accepted from her mother a handful of willow switches, trimmed 
and peeled, and with vigor and enthusiasm she proceeded to lash the exposed 
youth from waist to knees. The victim protested vigorously and howled 
lustily, but with a noticeable absence of threats. His sister wore out her 
stock of willows one by one. Her chagrin when the last one shattered was 
comical. She gave the impression that she had only gotten nicely started on 
an enjoyable task. 

Once more the hands of authority gave the signal. With noticeably less 
panache, Dulcie released her brother, divested herself of all covering and 
took his place at the post. Curtis, his features now transformed with a 
vicious joy, fastened her brutally. The watching Gail realized an absence of 
affection between brother and sister beyond anything she had suspected. The 
girl's cheeks were already wet with tears of anticipation at her brother's 
revenge. 

But Ma Billings had her own ideas about sibling relationships. She motioned 
Curtis to dress and to retire to the ranks and, herself, descended on the 
palpitating bit of femininity tied to the post. Dulcie watched approaching 
doom with manifest dolor. 

Of the two, it was Dulcie who put up by far the best performance. Gail felt 
certain Curtis had been favoured. She was sure the withes now used were 
longer and more numerous. They split and shed in all directions under the 
force of Ma's lusty attack on her daughter's squirming nudity. But Dulcie 
had courage, or pride, or perhaps her refusal to scream or plead was her own 
way of besting the boy who had made so vocal an outcry under her own hand. 
When the last switch was discarded, the teen-age nakedness was vividly 
striated and concerned only with her pain and her sobbing. Released, Dulcie 
quickly dressed and rejoined the ranks of her grinning brothers and sisters. 
Family justice was complete. 

Gail stood, shamed and uncertain. She had not been briefed. But a couple of 
nods from the woman in charge told her what to do. Listlessly, she shed her 
clothes and placed her hands, one on each side of the post, and watched Ma 
Billings tie them very tightly indeed. She was now ready to be whipped, but 
a quick glance told her that her flogging was to be different. No willow 
switches for her. Ma held a whip, a tapered snake-like horror that was 
frightening to see, let alone feel. But it was when Ma beckoned Curtis that 
Gail fought her bonds. 

"You tie my boy up, he gets to whip your ass," Ma Billings explained 
pleasantly. 

"He'll kill me," Gail protested wildly. 

"Don't be silly, kid. Just warm you up a bit. Hurt a damn sight worse if I 
do the job." 

Gail was by no means sure. There was a ruthless viciousness about Curtis 
that she feared. She turned pleading eyes to the older woman. "He won't do 
it properly. He'll hit me in the wrong places." She blurted out her fear. 

"It won't hurt your little twat to get a lick or two, honey. Don't take on 
so. The boy's got to learn sometime. Ain't right he should practice on his 
sister," Ma said consolingly. 

It was outrageous! Impossible! But it was going to happen. She was to be 
whipped naked by a vindictive boy. She burned with shame. The childish eyes 
in the ranks would be glowing in enjoyment of a gala day. To them she was a 
woman. It is not often in a child's play they see a woman stripped and 
flogged. Gail felt certain Dulcie's eyes would sparkle most of all. 

"Can I wale her all out, Ma?" Curtis asked excitedly. 

"Sure you can, son. But no funny stuff. Watch it!" Ma Billings admonished 
ambiguously. 

"Please...!" Gail put all the pleading she could muster into the single 
word. But its poignancy was lost in a wave of agony. Curtis had brought the 
supple length down squarely across her naked shoulders so that it curled 
beneath a raised arm and snapped across her breast. She screamed in a 
mixture of shock, pain and outrage. 

"Stay off her tit, son." Ma's voice was stern. "You flick her tit again and 
you go back there yourself." The tied girl beneath the whip had cause to 
wonder if indeed Ma Billings would have hurt her more. Curtis was not adult, 
but he was vigorous and male. His arm was swift and strong and sure. The 
whip bit at her flesh with a professional skill. Denied her breasts, he sent 
the thong curling into every other female secret she possessed. Every third 
stroke shamed her in its searching of her sex. The rest were competent 
strokes that marked her from knee to neck with weals that Ma herself might 
have viewed with pride. 

"Slower! Oh please! Give me a chance." Gail was frantic under the swift 
succession of cuts. 

"Take it easy, son. The gal wants to make it last," Ma advised equably. 

The blows slowed so that their recipient could catch her breath between 
them. Gail wondered, in her haze of pain, if this would be better or worse. 
But it was what she had asked for. She could not complain. She had quickly 
abandoned hope of emulating Dulcie's silent acceptance of pain. Dulcie had 
not felt this whip. There could be no comparison. She screamed and moaned 
each time her skin was slashed. There was something personal about each 
blow, as though the boy was remembering his hours tied upon the floor of the 
barn. After an eternity of pain there came a pause. 

"How you feel 'bout the idea of escaping, honey?" Ma asked kindly. 

For a moment the rhetorical query did not penetrate the whipped girl's 
consciousness. At that moment escape seemed as distant as Betelgeuse. It was 
only when she realized the blows had stopped that she knew she had best 
answer. "I'm sorry I tried, ma'am. I won't try again." 

Ma Billings laughed and ran her hands up and down the wounded flesh of the 
girl shrinking at the whipping post. "You'll try, honey. You'll try. 
Escape's a disease little girls have. It's incurable. But a little touch up 
with a whip sort of keeps it under control. It does help, doesn't it, 
honey?" 

Humiliation! Gail accepted it full measure. "Yes ma'am, it helps 
tremendously." Ma was in full stride. She was feasting. "I sorta' think it 
would be nice, honey, if you was to tell the kids the way you feel 'bout how 
silly you been. And mebbee toss in a bit of thanks for the trouble we're 
taking with you." 

It was a royal command. There was no doubt of that. But even in her pain 
Gail shrank from it. The children already regarded her as their rightful 
perquisite. She had no wish to demean herself further. And anyway, what 
could she say that would not sound childish and inept. 

"Liven her up a bit, Curtis," his mother suggested. 

The livening-up blow around her hips would have endowed an elephant with 
eloquence. Gail took a deep breath and stripped her pride as naked as her 
body. "I have been a silly girl," she started out hesitantly. "I deserve to 
be punished because I tried to escape. I won't try again. I deserve to be 
punished because of my ingratitude. The pain of being whipped is terrible. I 
can't tell you how terrible it is. But I am glad to suffer it to teach me a 
lesson. Thank you, Curtis, for whipping me so well. You are very clever at 
whipping a girl. Far more clever than I thought you were. I am very sorry 
for what I did to you yesterday. Thank you for punishing me for being so 
wrong." 

Gail paused hopefully. Surely she had dragged herself in the mud enough! 
Such childish twaddle! Yet, after all, they were children. Ma herself would 
relish any humiliation of a girl's flesh or spirit. Once more she accepted 
shame. "But most of all I have to thank you, ma'am." She managed a quivering 
smile for the woman with the whip. "You are so kind to me to have me whipped 
like this. I'm sorry to be such a trouble to you. You are teaching me such a 
wonderful lesson. I'm tremendously grateful." 

"You sure are welcome, honey," Ma said as though it was an exchange of 
compliments. She handed the whip back to her son. "Carry on, boy. You doing 
her a world of good." 

The girl tied to the post was aghast. She had cherished a hope that her 
shaming recital would earn release. What more could she have said! She 
screamed again as the lash recommenced its exploration of her skin, she 
screamed and screamed and fought her bonds in a frenzy of despair while the 
cunning thong licked and cut and screamed its own savage song of joy. When 
it stopped again, and while she stood limp and panting, Ma Billings paid 
tribute. "You sure do put on a damn good show, kid. Never seen better. The 
way you brace them feet of yours against that pole and tug like Hell is 
something to see. And the way you howl! I ain't heard nothing like it no 
place." She patted the sweating shoulder of her captive. "Be mighty pleasant 
to whip you all day. But I ain't gonna' be hard on you. The boy's doing 
better than I thought." 

Hard on her! Despairingly, Gail looked over her bound arm at the smiling 
face of the woman to whom what was taking place was a normal day at the 
Bar-B. The woman whose bliss was commensurate with her captive's agony. 
Blinking at her tears Gail sobbed, "Please don't have me whipped any more. I 
don't think I can stand it." 

"You're a good girl," Ma approved. "You just ain't got no idea how much o' 
this you can stand. You're doing fine." 

The blows returned. Curtis gained in vigor and cunning as her own strength 
waned. He was now frankly, and presumably with his mother's approval, aiming 
for her loins. 

Every stroke sent the end of the lash snapping to wound her within her 
thighs or across her pubic hair. Gail began to weaken and sag against her 
tied wrists. 

"Maybe that will do for right now," Ma Billings judged. She turned to her 
brood. "Run along to school now, kids. Show's over. You done real good, boy. 
I'm proud of you." 

Proud! The word of praise hurt Gail as another blow. By such standards the 
children were trained to torture. What hope for her was there left, naked, 
and at their mercy daily! 

Ma read her thoughts. "Don't you forget, honey. A pair o' them got a licking 
too. I ain't going to have you abused." She chuckled sardonically, " 'Cept 
by me, of course. Them kids ain't going to hurt you 'less I tell 'em to." 

Gail nodded. It was a faint comfort. 

"Good gosh girl, you have learned a lesson, haven't you!" Ma Billings was 
studying her shrewdly. The captive girl's face was eloquent of hopelessness. 
"You wouldn't run away now if I told you to." 

"No. I wouldn't!" Gail stated it as an implicit fact. She was still gasping 
and panting in the aftermath of her agony. She looked at Ma's earnest face 
and tried to smile. It was not a success. 

Ma Billings fell back on her universal specific. "You stand still, honey," 
she suggested unnecessarily. "I'm going to get us a cup of coffee." 

Agony and farce. One countering the other. Stand still! What else could she 
do! Yet Gail was glad of the respite. She had been terribly whipped. She 
knew herself demoralized. She wanted to stop sobbing before Ma returned, but 
the dry spasms shook her again and again. What she could see of her body was 
cruelly striped. She shuddered to think of her back. She was a palpitating 
tenderness. Looking up she saw that her wrists had blood on them. 

Why had she been so cruelly punished? It was far worse a whipping than she 
had been given previously. There could be little doubt that she had 
committed the unpardonable sin. To attempt to escape was evidently Ma's idea 
of the ultimate transgression. Gail looked bleakly at her future. For the 
rest of her sentence she must expunge escape from her mind. But with it went 
all hope. She was amazed at how vast a vacuum was left in her small world of 
pain and shame when that hope was gone. When all she would do henceforth was 
accept. She would offer her wrists and ankles to be bound, her body to be 
chained. She would concoct the humiliating litanies required of her and 
recite them with spurious fervor. She had become a slave. 

"Nothing like a good cup o' coffee," Ma said as she held the cup to the 
grateful lips. 

She dragged up a couple of boxes, placed the refreshment on one and sat on 
the other. "May as well leave you like that for the day, honey. Good as 
any." 

The captive had expected to be left bound to the post as she was. It was an 
obvious thought. If she stopped tugging at her cut wrists it would be 
bearable. She had not expected to be freed. There was no disappointment. "Is 
my punishment over, ma'am?" 

Ma Billings regarded her benignly over a steaming cup. "You ain't going to 
get whipped no more, kid," she stated noncommittally. The naked girl was 
afraid to ask what else might be done to her. Perhaps it was best she did 
not know. She sipped more coffee from a proffered cup and gulped at a 
doughnut. How strange this woman was! Gail sensed her loneliness. 

"D'you miss not getting fucked, honey?" Ma asked affably. 

The irrelevant query was like a blow. Not in cruelty, but in its shrewd 
observation. Gail missed Kevin with all her being. A girl who denied all men 
is but half alive. Yet she blushed. She supposed, angrily, society demanded 
that blush, but her involuntary response left her annoyed with herself. But 
Ma must be answered. She managed a demure, "Yes ma'am." 

"It's a bitch, ain't it?" Ma agreed. "Don't get much myself no more. But at 
your age if they'd took it away from me I'd have gone right up the wall." 
She masticated quietly for moments, then continued as from a deep 
conviction. "Us gals need our arse kicked when we're still young. When I 
think o' all the tail I give away free it breaks my heart. We get this damn 
fool love notion out of a pair of hot pants, and while it lasts, we can't do 
enough for the guy. When I think of all the things I done for Billings and 
the rest o' 'em...." She sighed, leaving in the air a vision of feminine 
frailty brutally betrayed. "Screws them little whores up in the State 
Capitol now he does...." She pondered a moment. "You want he should screw 
you, honey?" 

Ma was disconcerting. Gail got out a "No thanks, ma'am," as quickly as she 
could. 

"Billings ain't bad, kid," Ma reproved as though wishful that her offer be 
recognized at its proper worth. 

The captive managed another blush. 

"I got a deal with the rotten bastard," Ma explained placidly. "He don't 
touch my girls and I don't beef 'bout his. But I took a liking to you. I'd 
make an exception in your case if your cunt was getting too hot to handle." 

"You're sweet, ma'am," Gail responded feeling ridiculous. "But I'll wait." 

"What you got to wait for, kid? You only nicely got started on that year of 
yours. Your slit's going to be crying out loud before them ten months is 
gone." 

Ma Billings was coarse. She made nice things seem ugly. But the girl tied to 
the post grudgingly recognized a shaming truth. If we deny our bodies, they 
wreak their own revenge. Her two months in chains had told her this with 
vehemence. She was young, she was healthy, she was beautiful! Shifting 
awkwardly in her bonds she agreed. "I'm sure you're right, ma'am." 

"Don't be so prissy, kid. You want a cock shoved in that bush o' yours, say 
so." 

"I want to like the person who... who does it." It was hard to get down to 
Ma's level. 

"Horsecock, honey!" Ma pronounced vehemently. "This love bit is pure balls! 
Believe me. I know. So's this nobility kick you gals get 'bout your age. 
Give all for love! Give is right: that's all you do. You give! The bastards 
take. A gal's better off with a good vibrator. Want I should lend you one?" 

As usual it was pure nonsense. Half an hour ago she was being whipped within 
an inch of unconsciousness. Now she was being served coffee and doughnuts 
and her glandular urgencies were being catered to with affection. But she 
must show gratitude. She must! "Thank you. That would be nice, ma'am." 

"Got a good big head on it," Ma explained proudly. "I've had a lot o' good 
outa' that plastic dink. Want I should stick it up you now?" 

The victim of benevolence groaned inwardly. To stand tied to a whipping post 
with a mechanical contraption inducing orgasms one after the other was a 
dream for Salvador Dali. Gail was still debating a tactful rejection when Ma 
Billings came up with inspiration. 

"I got a better idea, kid. Let's you and me go in the house. Young Dulcie 
tells me you got a real sporty tongue." 

So it had come! The naked girl had sensed it hovering throughout the past 
two months of her captivity. She had been surprised that Ma had not thought 
of it before. Gail looked desolately at her corded wrists and down at her 
chained ankles. How did a girl fastened like this say no to anything? Hell 
might have no fury like a Ma Billings told her person repelled. The whipping 
would start afresh. But Dulcie was one thing, Ma was something else again. 
The captive was still struggling with indecision when Ma Billings read her 
thoughts. 

"You close your eyes, kid, and there ain't no difference between Dulcie and 
me. Same as with men when you get right down to it. Some's bigger and some's 
smaller." 

"Yes ma'am," Gail said inadequately and noncommittally. noncommittally 
"Think I don't wash it?" Ma asked belligerently. 

"It's something I've never been used to doing, ma'am. I had to do it with 
Dulcie because she was whipping my foot," Gail protested unhappily. 

"If having your foot whipped makes it easier I can certainly oblige, honey." 
Ma's voice was getting grim. 

"Oh please! I didn't mean that. I'll do whatever you want." Gail was 
desperate. She wanted no more whipping. 

With her typical inconsistency Ma seemed touched by her captive's abject 
helplessness. Without further words she came behind the slender naked figure 
tied to the post and circled it with her arms. One large palm found a 
breast. A wise and knowing finger sought its way through the pubic hair and 
into the warm wetness, wherein nestled the bud that could be made to flower. 
Cunningly she went to work. 

Gail tensed at the unexpectedness of what was being done to her. She pulled 
at her pinioned wrists and threw back her head in surprise. She was cheek to 
cheek with the older woman intent upon her task. She bit back an outraged 
protest. She had best watch her words. This was delicate ground. 

"Relax, honey. This one's on the house." Ma's voice was a whisper in her 
ear. 

Relax! What else could she do? Tied as she was she was delivered into any 
caprice Ma chose. Almost instantly Gail knew herself in the hands of a past 
mistress of an art. Unprepossessing as the older woman might be, she was 
nonetheless more skilled in eroticism than any teenager. Under the 
lascivious finger, the victim had a sudden vision of the girl Ma must once 
have been: ardent, alive, desired. She felt a fresh pity for this woman who 
seemed determined to bring her to orgasm, as she stood tethered to the post. 

How strange a rape! How sad a love! Neither term was right. What was 
happening was a possession, the using of the body of a slave. But Gail was 
young. She was vividly healthy. Strive as she would, she could not achieve 
detachment. The sly finger had its way with her, so that she was soon 
writhing and moaning to Ma's infinite delight. 

"You're hotter'n a firecracker, honey," Ma Billings approved. "You're too 
good to waste. I ain't going to let you pop." With hasty determination she 
freed the hurt wrists, took one of them in a firm grip and led its owner 
towards the house. 

To be captive is to endure. To endure is to adjust. Often it is helpful to 
be mute. Gail had learned these precepts in her captivity. She used them 
now. She gave and she received that which was demanded by her thralldom. She 
drew what comfort she could from the reflection that it was better than 
being whipped. Added to this was an irritatingly guilty memory that at times 
it had been much, much better! 

Ma kicked away the shackle and tossed the pillows from the bed. "Lay on your 
back, kid," she ordered. 

Gail draped her single garment across a chair, revealing her cruelly striped 
nudity. There was that in Ma's voice which brooked no demur. Gracefully, but 
with inward tremors, she disposed herself as directed. Ma took the girl's 
right wrist and, pulling it up against the head rail, handcuffed it to the 
top corner of the bed. She then served the left hand in the same way. Gail 
lay with her arms stretched wide upon the sheet above the level of her head. 
If her ankles were similarly secured she would be spreadeagled. But this was 
not done. 

"May not be the most pleasant night you ever had," Ma admitted. "But you 
earned yourself more than the whip. You can tell me in the morning how you 
make out." She gave a broad and inexplicable wink and left. 

It was not comfortable. The metal on her wrists was tight. Its mate had been 
clipped safely below the mattress out of sight. She could move her arms and 
shoulders very little. By inching back she discovered she could raise her 
head against the backboard, but not very far. Any pull against the handcuffs 
hurt. There was no advantage. She slipped back to her original position and 
considered how well she might sleep. The first realization was that she was 
very, very, bare. Ma had forgotten to throw a blanket over her nakedness. 
The second told her she would know an increasing ache from her wracked 
shoulders. If she did not struggle, the handcuffs would not hurt, but in 
sleep she would snub them constantly. Gail knew herself in for a depressing 
night. 

Dulcie and Curtis arrived together. They closed the door behind them with an 
air of purpose, then stood beside the bed gazing down at the naked female 
body spread and fastened for their delectation. "She can't do nothin' but 
kick," Curtis exulted. 

"We can easy stop her doin' that," Dulcie contributed. 

It was another of the awful moments, unforeseen and uncontrollable. Gail 
looked up askance at the intent young faces and knew herself delivered into 
hands that would show little mercy. "Does your mother know you're here?" she 
asked without hope. 

"Ma sent us," Dulcie explained succinctly. 

"I'm going to fuck you good!" Curtis was male bombast epitomized. 

"Don't mind him," Dulcie giggled. "I won't let him hurt you, at least not 
too much. I'm going to have a go at you too." 

Her brother eyed her belligerently. "I'll fuck you too, Sis, if you're goin' 
to be a smartass." 

"Dreamer!" Dulcie mocked. "Go on. Get on with the job. I want to watch." She 
retired to a chair and sat down, obviously prepared to enjoy herself. 

Their naked and helpless victim was aghast. So this was Ma Billings' idea of 
a punishment! It was exactly the sort of thing that would appeal to her 
bawdy humour. She would shrewdly know, too, how it would humiliate and 
shame. Gail thought bitterly, yet thankfully of the pill. To be impregnated 
by this lustful child! It was too bizarre. "Don't you dare touch me!" It was 
an instinctive exclamation. Even to herself the words sounded impotent. 

"Don't be silly," Dulcie advised. "We're going to touch you plenty." Curtis 
had slipped out of his clothes. His striped and scarlet buttocks were an 
additional incongruity. He appeared to have a permanent erection. With gaze 
riveted on the sacrificial sex he clambered upon the bed. Gail's flashing 
kick caught him in the centre of his chest and sent him sprawling to the 
floor. She had instinctively taken the defensive act without thought of 
consequence. Now she quailed. 

He was on his feet in an instant, furious, yet glad of an excuse for his 
next assault. Withdrawing the belt from his discarded pants he began to 
slash savagely at the helpless nudity that had repelled him. "I'm gonna' cut 
you to bits," he hissed delightedly. 

"Stay off her tits, Curtis!" Dulcie warned. "You know what Ma said." She 
turned to Gail: "Ma says we can make you squeal if you want to play the 
'Miss High and Mighty' bit. I'll lace into you same as Curtis if you're not 
a good girl when I want you to be." 

Dulcie's admonition was heard through the rain of blows that Curtis was 
delivering with vicious satisfaction. Gail was frantically using her 
flailing legs to foil as much of his accuracy as possible. But she was 
learning the bitter lesson that a girl tied as she was tied can only defend 
one portion of her person at the expense of another. At last in utter defeat 
and knowing herself inevitably lost she sobbed, "Oh stop it! Stop it! I'll 
be good. I'll keep still. I'm sorry!" 

Curtis desisted, the limp belt dangling from a ready hand. "That's better. 
Now you're going to get five good ones square across your cunt just to teach 
you to behave. After that I'll fuck you." 

"I'll behave, Curtis. I'm sorry. You don't have to hit me anymore." 

"I don't have to." He sarcastically emphasized the word 'have.' "But I'm 
going to. What's more, you're goin' to ask me nicely. Come on. Get talkin'." 

More shame! But Gail was frightened. She did her best. "Please, Curtis, will 
you use your belt to hit me hard across my cunt five times?" Gail longed to 
weep. 

"You done that real nice," Dulcie admired. 

"Arch your back up so I can get in some good licks," Curtis demanded. 

Gail did her best, but without spectacular result until Dulcie thoughtfully 
pushed the discarded pillows beneath the raised hips. "Now if you make her 
spread her legs you ought to do alright," she advised her brother from the 
depths of her feminine knowledge. 

Without waiting for the shame of being told, Gail followed the teenager's 
advice. Her hairy sex was revealed in all its glory and pitiless 
vulnerability. Curtis was enthralled. "Good thing you come, Sis," he 
breathed in grudging tribute to the inferior female. "I ain't never seen one 
that good before." 

"You ain't seen much o' anything," his sister sniffed, cutting him down to 
size. "Go ahead. You got your cunt. Slap it good." 

"Maybe we ought to tie her legs apart like that." Curtis was savouring the 
eroticism of female flesh. 

"Nah! She's too scared to kick again," Dulcie declared complacently. Let her 
have it good. You'll see." 

"Honest! I'll behave," Gail agreed abjectly. She could not face more 
wounding of her skin beyond what she must now accept. 

Curtis cut the sex of the naked girl with precise and salacious accuracy. It 
taxed his victim's control to the limit to remain spread and quiescent while 
her triangle of pubic hair was flogged. Had it been a crueler weapon than 
the boy's belt she could not have done so. He moved back and forth to 
extract the utmost advantage from the shaming posture of the girl chained to 
the bed for his amusement. When the last of the five blows had fallen, he 
stepped back to feast his eyes on what he had done and on the feminine vulva 
so wantonly displayed. 

"Say, I've got to have a go at that," Dulcie declared firmly. 'This is too 
good to miss." She turned to the quivering girl commiseratingly. "Sorry kid. 
I ain't never whipped a cunt. Wait 'till I tell 'em at school...." She took 
the belt from her brother's unprotesting hand. "Only five, Gail. Just five. 
I promise." 

Just five! Gail moaned and closed her eyes. She did not wish to see the 
eager faces or the flailing strap as it sliced the air to cut into her 
defenceless flesh. The blows fell again and again. The teenager's arm was as 
strong as her brother's. Through the searing sting of the inflictions, Gail 
came face to face with the shaming knowledge that she would obey this 
prurient pair. What they would do to her would be a punishment in itself. 
But she wanted no more of straps or whips or canes. She was exhausted with 
pain. She had had enough. 

"Should I leave them pillows under her ass while I fuck her?" Curtis's 
respect for his sister's judgement had been enhanced. 

Dulcie giggled. "Sure you should. Gets you an extra inch. But let's see how 
wet she is." 

Gail kept her eyes closed as the girl's hand explored her lubricity. The 
whole area of her loins was aflame with the aftermath of the belt. She 
passionately wished it could be left alone to heal, but knew her wish 
futile. 

"She's dry as a bone," Dulcie confirmed. " 'Bout all you could expect, I 
'spose. Tell you what, Curtis. Go get Ma's vibrator and the vaseline. We can 
have a bit o' fun loosening her up." 

Curtis, whose respect for his sister's knowledge of feminine mysteries was 
increasing momentarily, donned his shorts and sped on his errand. Dulcie 
continued her massaging of the lips so openly offered for her enjoyment. "If 
you're going to get fucked, Gail, you might as well enjoy it," she said with 
the wisdom of one woman to another. 'I'll try and get you started. That 
thing of Ma's is quite a size." 

It was indeed! The girl who was to receive it within her inmost recess 
watched forlornly as the plastic was daubed with lubricant. She was thankful 
for Dulcie. Left to his own devices, Curtis's mating onslaught would have 
been pure pain. Looking at the object about to be thrust within her, Gail 
was by no means sure that pain was going to be absent now. Yet, in a strange 
acknowledgement of sisterhood, Dulcie was kind. It was with gentleness that 
the impalement was completed. Curtis stood by and watched in rapt attention, 
almost in awe. Dulcie pushed the switch. 

The children stood and watched. After thirty seconds of fighting nature Gail 
gave up her battle for immobility and silence. Both were impossible. 
Uncaring of shame, the tortured girl allowed her reactions to find full 
vent. Curtis and his sister were vastly entertained. "Wait 'till she's had a 
come," Dulcie whispered excitedly. "She'll go plumb crazy." 

So that was it! Gail miserably knew she should have guessed. They were going 
to leave the buzzing prong within her until the surfeit of sensation drove 
her wild. Far beyond pleasure into something akin to pain. She tugged at the 
handcuffs. But what was the use! It was a token gesture. It would gratify 
the children far more than it would relieve her. 

"Now, just to make it really wild." Dulcie giggled, "We'll get one on each 
side of her and suck her tits. It'll blow her mind." She threw off her 
scanty garb and dived upon the bed. 

Gail moaned and wept and pleaded. She flailed and threshed her legs striving 
to dislodge the torture between them. She heaved and tugged at the 
handcuffs. She bounced her hips. In none of it was there surcease. The avid 
lips drank steadily at her nipples, sometimes biting, sometimes caressing 
with the tongue, but always keeping her on the outer limit of sensation. 
Orgasm after orgasm drove her into paroxysms of writhings and pleas that the 
busily vibrating monster be taken from her. Finally the batteries died, 
leaving it as exhausted as herself. When it was withdrawn from her warm wet 
sheath she longed only to sleep. But she knew this was but the beginning. 

"She's wet enough now," Dulcie judged. "Go to it, boy." 

Curtis went to it with gusto. Utterly depleted, Gail felt neither his weight 
nor his friction. Overstimulation gave him but moments of fulfilment before 
he gasped and spent his vigor. "Oh damn, damn, damn!" he muttered 
disgustedly. 

"Never mind, boy," his sister consoled. "You can have another bang later. 
You won't have a limp dink long. Now it's my turn." 

With a professional skill that left the chained girl wondering, Dulcie took 
a pillow from beneath her hips and used it to raise her head. She then 
positioned herself so that her young bush was almost in the captive's mouth. 
"You better do it good, honey," She said with complacent satisfaction. 

Gail did it good. It was the first time she had not looked forward to Neil's 
coming. Gail stood naked against her tree, immersed in a new and frightening 
shame. The Bar-B and its family had an endless repertoire of shocks designed 
to rob a girl of courage and respect. The flow of them were as constant as 
the clutch of chains and the bite of cords. 

She was handcuffed quite simply. She had been made to face the relatively 
slender trunk and embrace it. The handcuffs had been clicked upon her wrists 
so that she must maintain the embrace as though the tree was a living thing 
she loved. To prevent her falling to her knees or in some way contriving to 
recline, a metal collar was locked about her throat. Its chain rose above 
the lowest bough. There it circled the trunk and was padlocked. It kept her 
no more prisoner than did the handcuffs, but it compelled her to stand. Gail 
reflected bitterly that its intent was probably more to humiliate than to 
secure. The collar round her neck made her seem tethered like an animal. 

It would be a day like the others. A captivity accentuated by bonds. There 
was something wickedly final about handcuffs. Idly she raised them close to 
examine them and their grip upon her wrists. They were shining attractive 
bracelets closely joined. They had been tightened to the point where the 
metal circlets faintly indented the skin. She was more comfortable than when 
bound. But she was even more implacably captive. She leaned her cheek 
against the trunk and thought of Neil. Her only link with normalcy might 
come sauntering through the trees at any moment, and she was afraid. Shamed 
into fear. Fear of what he must inevitably discover and the inferences he 
would draw from the discovery. He might well turn from her in disgust and 
walk away. She considered ruefully that if at this moment she could walk 
away from herself she would wish to do so. 

Ma Billings had done the awful thing to her with typical goodwill. There had 
been no warning. The command to "Bend over, honey," had been her first 
inkling of something untoward. The careful and skilful insertion of the plug 
in her rectum had been so outrageous, yet so clinical; she had failed to 
protest until after the bizarre impalement had become a fait accompli. Even 
then she cherished the illusion of some medically normal reason for what had 
been done to her. That the woman who had done it failed to respond to 
question or complaint was no more than normal for the Bar-B. There had even 
been the possibility of vulgar humour. But all hopes of rationality had died 
when Ma Billings produced the harness. The whipping had been too recent, her 
wounds from it still too sore, for Gail to have the courage to resist. She 
accepted Ma's cheerful, "Don't worry none, honey, you'll live," and stood 
passive while the straps were buckled about her loins. One 'round her waist, 
another from back to front between her legs. The latter, passing through a 
slot in the base of the thing within her, held the plug inexorably pressed 
home, divided her sex and made walking painful. Ma tightened buckles 
thoughtfully until Gail flinched within the cutting embrace of the leather 
bands. The thing was neat and cruel. 

"But why...?" Gail was genuinely puzzled. 

"Well, this ain't supposed to be no summer vacation," Ma reminded. 

"But, is it a punishment? Or have I got something wrong...?" 

Ma Billings guffawed. "I ain't never seen a gal' got less wrong than you, 
honey. Let's say I don't want you to feel lonely. With little Peter up your 
ass you'll always have a friend." 

"There's nothing little about what I'm feeling." 

"Come night you won't know he's in there, kid." Ma found amusement in 
referring to the intrusion as a personality. 

"It all hurts. Is it supposed to?" 

"Sure is, honey. Now we take a little walk. A get acquainted stroll you 
might say." Ma Billings chortled happily. 

The little stroll had ended at the usual tree and with the familiar 
handcuffs. Now Gail stood, hurting, shamed and apprehensive. Now she would 
wait. But the waiting would bring no reward. It was but one more period in 
punishment. 

Neil was amused that she seemed to peep at him 'round the bole of the 
sapling. "They think of the damndest ways to fix you," he exclaimed 
cheerfully. Taking his familiar seat, his eye caught sight of change. "How 
come there's heavier chains on your ankles?" 

"I tried to escape." 

Suddenly he became aware of the myriad whip marks with which the naked girl 
was emblazoned. His boy's brow furrowed; his eyes narrowed in disbelief. 
Rising, he came close, circled the tree and stood so that they were eye to 
eye. "They did that to you... ? Ma Billings...?" His voice was incredulous. 

"I was a bad girl. I tried to get away." She would not tell him of the other 
things. 

With reverence, the boy took her chained hands and kissed them. It was a 
discovery of her he had never previously made. He kissed them again and 
again as though suddenly aware of hunger. Leaning forward against her tree 
Gail watched his tribute to her pain. She responded vividly to his touch. 
That someone should be kind to her! It seemed almost impossible... She 
longed to embrace this youthful male who was her only friend. How good it 
would be to throw her arms around his neck instead of having them chained 
'round the trunk of a tree! She realized, with a pang, how much these brief 
encounters had come to mean to her. 

With a new sense of purpose Neil knelt and examined the metal bonds upon the 
slender ankles. "But these are awful things!" he exclaimed. "There's no way 
of getting them off." 

Gail was painfully aware of the brutality of her new hobbles. Their 
excessive weight had dragged at every step she had made as she accompanied 
Ma Billings along the path through the trees. Their drag upon her every 
movement said clearly that escape should be forgotten. No girl could escape 
anything with so great a weight of metal made an integral part of her. As 
though to emphasize the start of a new and different day, she had been taken 
to the blacksmith shop immediately upon rising. A lewd and jocose Ma 
Billings had made frequent reference to the previous night as she busied 
herself with tools. Gail disconsolately sat upon a box and, in obedience to 
a laughing order, placed her shackled feet across the anvil. She watched her 
familiar fetters unlocked and thrown upon the bench and replaced with the 
massive metal bands and links better suited to a mammoth than a girl. 

"Just so I don't forget the key, honey. Or them damn kids o' mine don't pull 
no tricks, these little trinkets won't come off nohow," Ma had told her as 
she inserted rivets and smashed them flat with frightening blows of the 
heavy hammer. Three rivets in each anklet! There was something frighteningly 
final about the tight clasp of the metal that had no lock or key. "But they 
won't come off at night?" It was Gail's first thought. 

"Right, honey. But you'll still be chained to the ring like always. Real 
permanent they are. Only way you get 'em off is in this here shop. Even then 
it'll take a bit o' pounding. Them rivets ain't small." 

The first steps had convinced Gail that her new chains were impractical. She 
had looked at Ma Billings and shaken her head hopelessly as she had made 
limping hops with her weighted feet. But a girl can adjust. She had managed. 
She would continue to manage. But she would never escape. She supposed if 
she did not try to run the hateful things would not hurt her too much. They 
were tight enough they should not chafe. 

"I think Ma wants to make it plain to me that I have to forget escape," Gail 
explained unhappily. "After yesterday I am going to try and put it out of my 
mind. Unless you can think of something," she added wistfully. 

Neil looked at her earnestly. The touch of his lips had created something 
new between them. "I almost have to think of something...." The words 
emerged from a mind busy with thought. "You can't go on like this. A girl as 
beautiful as you." 

"You can't help me now. Not with my feet chained like this." 

He waved the objection aside. "Oh it's possible alright! There's tools for 
everything. The problem's the same as always. How to get you out of the 
State. You mustn't be caught... not by the police." 

Her eyes were tender, watching his concern. The whip had seemed to drive 
escape from her mind. But the decency of this troubled boy revived it. 
Perhaps no punishment ever entirely kills the captive dream. If Neil had 
resources and set his mind to the task escape could become reality. She 
yearned. 

"Could you... could you get hurt?" she asked uncertainly. 

He waved that objection aside as he had waved the other. "Oh, I suppose so! 
But it's my people really." He made a sheepish grin. "Dad's a friend of 
Billings. They have business interests... and I suppose you could say we 
were neighbors. You know how it is." Gail knew. It was unfair to the boy. A 
venture weighed with too many hazards. Perhaps tomorrow she would have more 
courage. Today she hurt too much for optimism. "Don't do anything," she 
counseled. "But see what you can plan. And anyway, I may not be hurt so bad 
again if I behave." 

"Behave!" He was angry. "Having to try and walk with your feet chained like 
that...." He looked at her in distress. 

Gail saw the puzzlement enter his eyes as he specifically noted her harness 
for the first time. Circumventing question and answer she told him in simple 
words exactly what it was. Shamed, she watched the blush take possession of 
his face. 

"I thought it was some... some sort of dress. I'd no idea!" 

"Why should you have!" Gail's voice was bitter. "Don't worry about it. As Ma 
said! I expect I'll live." 

"But it isn't locked. Is it?" 

Gail thrust her handcuffed wrists into view. "It doesn't need to be. I can't 
touch it." 

"But I can!" Neil was vehement. 

"Don't!" Gail knew her own cheeks suffused with red. 

"Please! Leave it...." Seeing his surprise, she explained awkwardly: "Don't 
you see. If you... well, remove it, you'll have to put it back. Ma would 
half kill me if you didn't." She grinned at him ruefully. "I don't think 
you'd enjoy doing that, and I wouldn't enjoy it either...." 

For moments they looked at each other in shy embarrassment. Then, 
spontaneously, they laughed. The Bar-B sometimes overreached itself and 
lapsed into the ludicrous. 

Memory of their laughter sustained the naked girl through her afternoon 
after the boy had gone. 

On the following morning subterfuge was shattered. "This one's bigger," Gail 
said with certainty. " 'Fraid that's so, honey," Ma admitted, buckling the 
strap so it hurt. "Why, ma'am?" Gail felt certain she knew why. "They get 
bigger all the time," Ma said conversationally. "It's... it's to make me 
available for men, isn't it?" 

"I never said so," Ma declined defensively. "Is it... is it for Curtis?" 
Gail felt her cheeks flame. Ma Billings guffawed delightedly. "Damn, if that 
ain't an idea! Want to try it out?" 

"No, ma'am, I don't. I don't even want what... what I've got!" 

"Well, you got it, kid. You oughta' be grateful. Getting fixed up with a new 
facility, you might say." 

The captive girl was suddenly assailed by frightful visions. "Am I going to 
be made into a whore?" Fright sloughed off niceties of terms and titles. 
"Hell no kid! We ain't short of dough." 

"But men are going to use me?" 

"That's one way o' putting it," Ma conceded, then brightened. "Might say 
there's two ways o' putting it." She laughed uproariously at her own wit. 
"Which way you prefer?" 

Gail suddenly realized it was a question she might have to take seriously. 
Loathing violation in the front did not indicate a preference for the back. 
Both were repulsive. 

"You ain't going to get no big belly out o' a cock up your arse," Ma offered 
comfortingly. 

Gail looked at the laughing woman pleadingly. "Must this happen to me, 
ma'am? I don't want it. I don't want it at all." 

"Ain't you forgetting yourself, kid?" 

"I agreed to be punished, not raped." 

"You sooner have Curtis fuck you?" Ma asked slyly. 

"Yes!" Gail was angry and vehement. "If I've got to be... to have the filthy 
business, yes I'd sooner have Curtis." 

"Calm down! Hold it, kid," Ma Billings soothed. "Bit of a shock I'll agree. 
Ain't too pleased 'bout it myself. But I figgered if we can keep your front 
just for you and me, we ain't either of us going to miss the back. See what 
I mean, honey?" 

Incredibly Gail saw what she meant. She saw it all too well. What insanity 
that gratitude was expected of her that she be sodomized! Yet, in a choice, 
it could be the lesser of two evils. "It's your husband, isn't it, ma'am?" 

"The son of a bitch!" Ma agreed with deep feeling. "When will he do it to 
me?" 

"Ain't in no hurry, are you," Ma rejoined sarcastically. "Best forget 
Billings for awhile. You got a few plugs to work your way through before our 
favourite Congressman comes looking for votes." She tightened the final 
buckle. Looking up, she patted the captive's cheek. "I'm sorry, honey. 
Dammit, I'm sorry as Hell. It ain't my idea." 

Gail believed her. With purely instinctive generosity she leaned forward and 
kissed the forehead of this strange coarse woman whose thrall she had 
become. "It's time to fix me up for the day," she said brightly. 

There is a euphemism for everything. 

It was miserable inside the crate. But of course it was meant to be! Gail 
constantly had to remind herself that suffering was implicit to her 
condition. Complaint came so easily to the lips of a girl who had once been 
free. Complaints bothered Ma, probably a guilty conscience Gail thought 
amusedly. But in response to them she was often cruel. Prudence was best. 
The crate was one probably once used to contain a traveling boar so that he 
might bestow his favours on amorous sows. It had protruding arms on each 
side so that it could be carried as a Sedan chair. It had been cleaned so 
that it no longer smelt of its one time occupants, but the ignominy 
remained. 

Crouched within her small prison, Gail reflected that the boar had probably 
found it better adapted to his dimensions than did she. Obeying Ma's 
instructions she had sat on the floor at the end of the open crate and edged 
herself backwards within until she was able to bring her knees under her 
chin, and Ma could lower the end-gate and lock it with the inevitable 
padlock. Since the crate was of heavy open lattice construction, she had a 
good enough view of her immediate vicinity. Since the crate was in the barn, 
that view was not extensive. Ma had feasted on the sight of her naked 
crouched captive, made her usual caustic comments and gone her way. To the 
girl in her tiny prison the day stretched long. 

It was all that did stretch. She herself could not. The wooden cage exactly 
contained her and that was all. She could not even hold her head upright, 
but rested her chin on her knees in a pensive pose lovely to behold but 
tiring to maintain. Gail had learned to distrust the first hour of these 
punishments. It was often deceptively bearable. But soon the aches and the 
cramps and the weariness would have their way until she longed to scream or 
fight the frustrations of immobility. Ma Billings parting remark on the 
present occasion had been: "Be a nice change for you, honey." It was not 
until the barn door had closed that Gail understood how sardonic the comment 
had been. 

There was always the little something extra. The cord, the strap, the chain 
or whatever it might be that, seemingly innocent, finally invoked its own 
specific pain or ache. Gail wondered if they were accidental or whether Ma 
Billings craftily devised them for her discomfort. It was not a question she 
dared ask. The crate was no exception. To sit for a number of hours might 
seem no more than a bore. But it did not take an hour for Gail to plumb the 
possibilities. The first was her shaming harness. Sitting, as she was, on 
the peak of her bottom it cut her with double venom. But, still worse, was 
the ugly thing thrust within her that the strap held. It, too, proclaimed 
its dissatisfaction with her pose. She longed to ease her position with her 
hands. By so doing she could help herself. But this had been denied. To have 
her wrists handcuffed before her was a rare privilege. It had sparked 
optimism. But the crate had imposed a disposition of her captive hands. She 
had no choice but to hold them so that she hugged her bent knees with her 
prisoned arms. No matter how she tried, there was nothing else she could do 
with them. Thus they were lost to her. To ease her seat or find relief by 
lifting her weight was a joy denied as was the need to stretch her legs. The 
only benefit she could derive from her chained hands was to strive to dry 
the cheeks that finally became wet with tears. 

"I got let our early," Dulcie said. She eyed the naked girl within the crate 
with avid curiosity. "You hurting in there?" 

"Yes. Want to let me out?" 

Dulcie giggled. "Come off it. Nobody gets outa' anything Ma puts 'em in." 
Bright eyed, she reviewed possibilities. "If I got a sharp stick I could 
really make you squeal." 

Always pain! The Billings family was obsessed with pain. The naked captive 
groaned inwardly. Outwardly she took a small gamble. 

"Why do you like hurting me, Dulcie?" 

The teenager treated the question as begging the obvious. To her the answer 
was clear. "Well, why wouldn't I?" she asked suspiciously. 

"I've never hurt you." 

"You ain't never had the chance. Bet you'd whip the ass off me if you could. 
You would, wouldn't you?" 

"No." 

Dulcie treated this tampering with the truth with the contempt it deserved. 
"I sure got a bang outa' belting into your cunt when you was fastened to the 
bed," she confessed almost with pride. 

"If you get me out of this crate you can whip me now," Gail baited. "I'm 
handcuffed. I can't fight." 

Dulcie wavered, enticed. "Ma leave the key on a nail somewhere?" she asked. 

"Not that I could see," the captive admitted. 

"Wouldn't be safe anyway," Dulcie judged. "Ma don't want us kids whipping 
you 'less she says so." 

"Dulcie, you got well whipped with those willow switches. Did you enjoy it?" 

Gail had asked the question rhetorically. But the teenager gave it her full 
attention. "You know how it is with us girls being whipped," she said slowly 
and defensively. 

"I only know it hurts more than I can stand," Gail countered hotly. 

"You sure do make a lot of noise," Dulcie agreed as though puzzled by 
unseemly behavior. "But your slit gets wet, don't it?" 

"Good Heavens no! You found that out last night. Remember?" 

"Figured that might be just because we was whipping your cunt. If your ass 
gets striped, don't your quiff get damp?" Dulcie seemed puzzled by 
confrontation with a physical infirmity. 

Gail blushed. Yesterday had been too much. But on other occasions when Ma 
Billings had used the whip less harshly... there had been times...."So 
what!" she demanded. More irritated with her own feminine frailty than with 
Dulcie's question. 

"Ain't no fun while Ma's laying it on," Dulcie admitted. "But when she got 
through with me at that there post yesterday I was horny as Hell." 

Fifteen! The girl was more knowledgeable than most whores! Gail was both 
repelled and intrigued. "If that's the way being whipped works with a girl, 
then I should whip you and you should whip me and we'd both be sexually 
excited?" she probed. 

"Why of course." To Dulcie it was a statement of the obvious. 

"And what would we do then?" Gail was amused. 

"Don't be silly. You know damn well what we'd do. Dive into a sixty-nine or 
get young Curtis to fuck us." 

"Can he manage two girls at a time?" 

"Pretty well," Dulcie said reminiscently. "Curtis gets a second hard on 
right quick. 'Specially if you play with his balls." Gail was aghast, but 
fascinated. "You mean... you and Curtis -" 

"Oh sure. Ma watches me pretty close and Curtis, he's handy. He's pretty 
good really. He's best the second time. He's always so damn excited he pops 
off too quick the first." 

The voice of experience! 

"Tell you what," said Dulcie in a friendlier voice than she commonly 
employed with the prisoner. "Sometime when Ma's away you and me we'll have 
ourselves a time. But it will have to be when she's fixed you right or else 
left the key handy. How 'bout that?" 

"I'd love it." Gail lied. She needed an ally and would get one anyway she 
could. There was an engaging naivete about Dulcie that made it hard to be 
angry with the girl. 

"I could set you free, y'know, if I really wanted to." Dulcie left the words 
hanging in the air when she went away. The girl chained in the crate was 
uncertain if they were a statement of a fact or nothing more than a child's 
boast. 

"I often been real mean to you, honey," Ma Billings told Gail in the 
cheerful tone of a woman admitting benevolence. "I'm going to give you a 
nice easy day." 

They had walked to the barn. The size of her new and larger anal companion 
made Gail thankful it was no further. She had not seen the object that 
penetrated her, but was sure it must be monstrous. Each day brought her 
fresh wonder at the accommodative quality of feminine faculties. She took 
the plugs for granted now. They had become a part of her ways at the Bar-B, 
just as had the heavier chains that weighed upon her feet. Dragging at the 
metal, she asked wistfully. "On my birthday, ma'am, could I have my feet 
unchained so I could run twice round the yard. I've forgotten what it's like 
to even walk properly. It would feel so good?" 

"That's a deal, honey," Ma Billings agreed heartily. "I can imagine that for 
a youngster like you it's rough not being able to stretch them pretty legs." 
She chuckled. "Mind you, kid. They're doing you good. Leastways, they're 
keeping fool notions about escaping outa' your head. They are, aren't they?" 
she demanded with sudden concern. 

"Yes ma'am. Thank you. I'd have to be crazy...." 

"Good!" Ma Billings approved such sincerity as she detected in her captive's 
voice. Them chains is a bit of a nuisance, and I'd actually like it better 
if I didn't have to have 'em on you. But I can't think of nothing quite as 
safe." 

"Couldn't you keep me handcuffed?" Gail asked wistfully. 

"Hell, girl, you could still run." 

"Behind my back then, ma'am. I can't do much like that," Gail pleaded. 

"You don't like them things on your feet, do you!" Ma chuckled. 

"They make me walk like an old, old woman with arthritis," Gail admitted. "I 
suppose I'm feminine enough to hate that. Besides, they're wearing out the 
blankets on my bed," she added plaintively. 

"Honey, you're kinda' sweet. Damn funny how it works...." Ma added 
ruminatively, "The sweeter I find you the more I want to beat your bottom or 
hang you up by the thumbs. You figure that out?" 

Gail was of the opinion that nothing about the Bar-B could be figured out by 
anyone. But she did not like to say so. "If I gave you sexual relief every 
day, would it help?" she asked hesitantly, feeling she was offering her all. 

"You mean lick my clit?" Ma asked suspiciously. 

"Yes." 

"I can make you do that anytime anyway," Ma pointed out pragmatically. "And 
I can tell you right now it wouldn't do you no good. After a good come there 
ain't nothing like whipping a gal's ass to put me in the mood again. You 
might end up a damn sight sorer than you are now." 

It was all quite hopeless. Gail looked brightly 'round the barn. 

"Pretty simple, honey," Ma explained. "You lie on your back in that there 
stall." 

There was straw. Gail lay on it. "Get your feet as high as you can up the 
partition. You'll have to edge your ass up against the base." 

Gail managed a jack-knife. Flat on her back, she gazed up at her slender 
legs and feet at right angles. Ma had helped her lift her heavy ankle chain. 
"One o' the times I wish you didn't have these damn things," the older woman 
puffed. 

The naked girl watched Ma Billings separate the chained feet as far as they 
could go, then fastened their linking chain to the top rail of the partition 
with a separate chain wound 'round and 'round and locked with a padlock. 

"Don't trust them kids," Ma said darkly as she pocketed the key. She 
examined her recumbent captive with satisfaction. "Just one more thing, 
honey." She produced the handcuffs. "Let's have your hands, girl." 

Thankfully, Gail extended her wrists. If this was all, she did indeed have 
reason to be grateful. She watched the metal bands click snug upon her 
slenderness. 

"If I wanted to be mean I could put 'em behind your back," Ma pointed out 
modestly. 

"Thank you for being kind to me, ma'am." Absurd! But her gratitude was real. 
Behind her back the handcuffs would be misery. 

"Quaint position, ain't it, honey? Sorta' cute." It was indeed! "Has it any 
significance, ma'am?" The holder of the quaint position quavered. 

"Hell no! What can you do like that?" Ma guffawed at a sudden vision. "Like 
to see young Curtis get his dink in you now! And don't matter how you try 
you ain't gonna' be able to reach them feet o' yours. Not that it would do 
you any good." Ma sobered for a moment. "Just occurs to me, honey. You could 
unbuckle that harness and get the plug out. Aim to do it?" 

Gail shook her head. "No ma'am. I'd be scared. I could never get it back." 

"Maybe the kids would help you. Little buggers!" 

"I wouldn't want them to," Gail affirmed with distaste. "Honest, I'll be 
good. Isn't there some way to lock it on me so nobody will be tempted?" She 
looked appealingly. "I couldn't stop the children if they decided to take it 
off...." Gail stumbled over the implications. "I know it sounds false, but 
I'd much sooner it was locked on me. You'd be terribly angry if you came 
back and found it draped over a manger." 

"Damn right I would, honey. But I'm gonna' leave it like it is. I'm sorta' 
curious." Ma Billings looked down at the naked girl she owned. She stooped 
and picked up the handcuffed hands and imprinted on them kiss after kiss. 
Letting them fall she turned towards the door. "Have a good day, honey," she 
said with what may have been a false jauntiness. "You too, ma'am." Gail's 
voice, also, was uncertain. Everything at the Bar-B was pathetic. "Damn her, 
she's gone and chained your feet," Dulcie exclaimed petulantly. 

"She took the key with her," Gail said with inward satisfaction. 

Dulcie laughed joyously. "But it doesn't matter," she said, sharing her 
discovery. "Poor Curtis couldn't get into you. But I can. And, what's more, 
you can get into me. Oh honey, Ma's slipped a cog." 

Gail held up her handcuffed wrists. "What about these?" 

"Oh pouf! They don't matter. Hold 'em over your head. Or maybe if you get 
'em around my legs you can get some use outa' them. Oh honey! A perfect 
sixty-nine!" 

The perfect sixty-nine went busily to work. Gail had given up concerning 
herself with guilt or what she should or should not do. She was a vessel 
that others used. Her will was set aside in some dim and distant storage 
reserved for the abandoned principles of slave girls. She found the teenager 
unexpectedly sweet, and wondered at the infinite miracle of being female... 

"You two having fun?" Curtis asked with menace. 

"Go away," said his sister. Curtis found a bit of strap and swung it 
viciously across Dulcie's rump. Dulcie howled. Gail wished herself 
elsewhere. 

"You little bastard!" Dulcie raged. She took a swing at his grinning face. 
It missed. 

"I ain't hard to get along with," Curtis assured the two girls jauntily. 
"First! fuck Dulcie, then honey here gives me a real good blow job. After 
that I run along. You can stick your tongues in each other's cunts all 
afternoon for all I care." 

Dulcie looked down at her helpless partner in lust. "Oh damn, honey. Let's 
please the little shit and get rid of him." She turned to her omnipotent 
sibling. "Alright. Stick it into me and get it over with." She lay down 
beside Gail and spread her legs. Don Juan shed his clothes and took 
possession. Gail lay still, speechless and impotent. The Bar-B defeated her 
every time. 

But for the naked captive the worst was yet to come. She had found an 
unsuspected joy in the girl, but the boy was something else again. Curtis 
grunted and gasped his short journey into orgasm. He was allowed but a short 
recuperative respite before Dulcie irritably pushed him to his feet. Despite 
herself, Gail's eyes focused on the wet and slimy flaccidity she must now 
accept within her lips. Seeing her distaste and realizing his own power over 
the chained girl, Curtis's male organ began a quick recovery. On her back, 
naked and without defense, Gail opened her mouth to pay a slave girl's 
tribute to the male. She would have loved to bite, to grind her teeth until 
they met within the turgid flesh. Instead she busily sucked Dulcie's 
secretions and sent her tongue upon its age old task. 

"He's not a bad kid. But he's always horny," Dulcie said of her brother 
after he had gone. "He'd fuck me six times a day if I'd let him." Her eyes 
sparkled their curiosity. "Tell me, honey. Could you taste me on his prick? 
I mean, was it different?" 

The chained girl had found a friend. She was not about to lose her. "You 
tasted gorgeous, darling." It was not until after she had said it she 
realized it was true. She and Dulcie had found something! For diversion she 
raised her handcuffed wrists and studied them. Diffidently and with 
hesitation she asked, "Do I taste sweet?" 

Her answer was instant. A wild and naked girl inserted her legs within the 
embrace of the chained hands. Two full and sensuous lips buried themselves 
within her pubic hair. A wise and questing tongue found that which a male 
can seldom find. Gail writhed in ecstasy and lapped savagely at the sex upon 
her mouth. 

"You and young Dulcie been up to tricks?" Ma demanded suspiciously. 

Gail's mind worked swiftly. There was nothing to betray! She dissembled 
craftily. She had no wish to be punished or to be the cause of punishment. 
The plug had not been removed. Only a strap, and it had been buckled back in 
the identical hole. "Curtis and Dulcie came at noon," she admitted wearily 
and with spurious indignation. "They sucked and bit my nipples until I 
howled." She looked up piteously at the older woman's intent gaze. "Why does 
everyone want to suck a girl's nipples, ma'am?" 

"Damned if I know, honey. Often thought I'd get mine bit off," Ma admitted. 
She looked down at Gail's breasts. "Yours are damn lovely, kid. If it wasn't 
that I have to kneel in the straw I'd have a go at 'em myself." She sighed 
reminiscently. "Tits and twats. That's what the world is made of, far as I 
can see." She sighed again with a touching dolor, "Spose it's time for you 
to get supper." She searched within her clothing for a key. 

"Dammit, I can't get you out of that fix!" Dulcie was annoyed. 

"No one can get me out of this fix," Gail agreed miserably. "Your ma seemed 
to think it's cute." 

"I been in there myself," Dulcie admitted. "It ain't no fun." 

"Who thought it up?" 

Dulcie giggled. "I think it was Pa. I remember once when I was quite small 
he had Ma in there. Gosh she was mad." 

Gail was unhappy. Who wouldn't be, she reflected miserably. Ma Billings had 
lifted a shutter in the barn wall. The opening revealed slots designed for 
female neck and female wrists. The shutter was turned. It, too, had slots. 
Slipped into place and locked it became a set of old-fashioned stocks 
incorporated in a barn wall. Its victim looked out upon the yard. Her head 
was there. Her hands were there. But the rest of her was inside and out of 
sight. The effect was bizarre, both for the prisoned girl and any who beheld 
her shame. 

Dulcie pushed and pulled. She went inside and pushed and pulled. When she 
returned to the captive's view she motioned dejectedly. "No way, honey." 
Finding a box, she sat and grinned ruefully at the prisoned head and hands. 
"Ma won't be late today. So we won't have lost all that much. 'Spose it's 
bound to happen sometimes." 

Gail wriggled to demonstrate her helplessness. "It's a damn funny sensation. 
I keep thinking about all of me that's back there inside and all the things 
that might happen... Snakes and mice and -" 

"You need to think of Curtis," Dulcie advised sagely. "Time I got fixed like 
that the little bastard clipped clothes pins on my tits and put a sucking 
calf in the same stall. It damn near chewed me to death." 

Gail was curious. "Does your Ma do much of... of this sort of thing to you?" 

Dulcie laughed cynically. "She did before you showed up." She giggled. "I 
was damn glad to see you. Took the heat off me. There's been other girls 
like you, of course. Leastways they ain't a bit like you, but they got here 
for the same reasons. Ma worked on 'em good, but they was a miserable lot. 
Most of 'em didn't have good tits and they cried more than you do." 

"Does your mother sometimes whip you just for amusement? Or does she always 
have a reason?" 

"Reason!" The teenager laughed gaily. "It ain't hard to find reasons for 
skinning a fifteen-year-old girl." She sobered suddenly. "You want to 
escape, honey?" 

The eternal question. Gail was afraid, but knew she could never turn her 
back on it. "How, Dulcie?" 

"I know where I can get a tool. It's called a bolt cutter. It will cut the 
links of your chain." 

"What then?" 

"There's a man...." The girl was suddenly eager. "I don't like him, but he'd 
drive us through where they couldn't touch us. He'd want paying. But not 
money. You and me both got what he wants." 

"When?" Gail asked hesitantly. 

"I'll talk to him," Dulcie said matter-of-factly. She giggled gleefully. 
"Right now I just thought of something." She disappeared inside the barn. 

If Gail had not known it was coming the shock would have been devastating. 
The wise small hand came from behind up between her legs and cupped the soft 
damp mound. Fingers found a nipple and began to play. She squirmed. Soon she 
was squirming with delight. She closed her eyes and surrendered. The hands 
strayed and searched. Soon soft lips replaced the cupping palm. A wet and 
probing tongue went busily to work. Gail drifted into the glowing world in 
which the Bar-B did not exist. She travelled far and long... 

Gail did not see Ma Billings. The approaching woman observed and guessed. 
Softly, she entered the barn and emerged a moment later with a wriggling and 
protesting Dulcie who she led by a firm grip on one ear. "Seems like I can't 
trust neither of you," she said grimly. 

"Oh Ma!" Dulcie exclaimed. "It weren't that bad...." 

Gail kept discreetly silent. Her heart went out to the scarlet-faced girl. 

"A twitching twat," Ma said vehemently. "Go and get old Baldy." She freed 
the pinched ear and gave her daughter a push. Dulcie departed, weeping. 

Gail had no choice but to watch. She did so with a cringing curiosity. Old 
Baldy was an aged and amiable horse kept for the amusement of the children. 
By the time the still weeping girl led him to the barn Ma Billings had 
produced a saddle. The prisoner eyed it with puzzled interest. Its seat had 
been divided laterally to allow the incorporation of a narrow one-inch board 
that reared its sharp-cornered edge several inches above the leather. It had 
been neatly and competently done, so that any rider foolish enough to sit 
astride the tampered seat would find themselves in danger of being cut in 
two. The girl in the stocks realized why Dulcie wept. 

Old Baldy slept peacefully while Ma Billings cinched the saddle. The tearful 
Dulcie returned from a mission within the barn with cord and rope. "If you 
got pants on, take 'em off." Ma was not to be trifled with. "Oh please Ma! 
Let me keep my pants." Ma Billings grabbed her daughter's ear and shook it 
so that Dulcie howled. The pants came off in one swift motion. Mother and 
daughter gazed at each other without sympathy. "Must I get up there, Ma? I 
ain't been that bad." Dulcie was young enough to still believe in hope. Her 
tears continued as her crossed wrists were tied behind her back, and while 
ropes were looped to dangle from her ankles. 

A girl with her hands tied behind her back cannot mount a horse. Ma tossed 
her daughter into the saddle with ease and quickly joined the ankle ropes to 
cinch them as tightly as she had cinched the saddle itself. Dulcie was 
firmly held astride. Ma Billings tugged at the girl's clothing to ensure 
that none of it would provide easement for the girl whose naked bottom was 
squarely upon the board's unyielding edge. "Might say that's getting to the 
bottom of your problem," she observed jocosely. "I ain't standing around to 
listen to your beefs. I got things to do. Have yourself a time, kid. Just 
you remember: Cunts ain't always fun." She strode towards the house. 

Gail was appalled by the agony on Dulcie's face. Yet when she considered 
what was hidden by the girl's brief dress she knew that agony to be real. "I 
can't stand it! Oh Gail... help me. I can't... I can't!" Dulcie's moaning 
wail was close to hysteria. 

Old Baldy was unperturbed by his burden. He snoozed happily. Dulcie did 
nothing to waken him. Motion would double the awfulness of what she was 
suffering. She looked down at the anxious and impotent face in the stocks 
and sobbed, "I don't deserve it... Oh, not this, not this...."She flung her 
head wildly from side to side. "Oh Gail, it's cutting me in two. I can't 
stand it. Nobody could stand it. If this horse moves I'll die." 

Ma Billings was soon back. She paid scant attention to her moaning child. 
Her eye was fixed on Gail. She carried a small box. "Wouldn't want to say it 
was all young Dulcie's fault, would you, honey?" Her voice held intent. Gail 
squirmed. She was resentful that Ma Billings should so terribly punish an 
act she herself performed with zest. No doubt the older woman's anger arose 
from a sort of jealousy or possessiveness that must find a vent. But it 
would not be safe to reason or to try and analyze. To cross the angry woman 
would be to ask for pain. "I expect I was partly to blame, ma'am." She paid 
the lip service Ma demanded. 

Ma Billings looked up irritably at her moaning daughter. Without warning, 
she gave Old Baldy a hearty slap on the rump that woke his daydream and sent 
him ambling off across the yard. Dulcie screamed and screamed again. Baldy's 
trot was a bone-shaker. 

"It won't kill her, if that's what you're worried about," she told Gail 
shortly. "The kid's cunt crazy. This'll really teach her she's got one. Next 
thing I gotta' do is teach you yours don't belong to her, too. Been using it 
pretty regular I suspect." Ma disappeared inside the barn. 

Gail twisted against the wood that held her. Back out of sight her body was 
delivered naked into hands that would hurt it. She knew a tearful and 
frightening helplessness. If Ma would hurt her own daughter as she was 
doing, what might she not do to her! Exclamations of anger filtered through 
the wall. Ma had found the loosened strap of Gail's harness that Dulcie had 
been given no chance to buckle. The girl in the stocks gasped as the hated 
plug was withdrawn from her rectum. Punishment was close. Fastened as she 
was, almost anything could be done to her. 

When it came she longed to protest, to cry out her shame and indignation, 
voice her pain. But how can these things be made manifest to someone who is 
not there! Ma Billings was busy tugging at straps on the body of a girl 
sundered by the stocks. She was also replacing one plug with another. Gail 
knew now what was in the box. She thought she knew, also, that this fresh 
horror was beyond her body's capacity to accept. But Ma Billings was expert. 
The unseen enemy was gently pressed and turned so that, fraction by 
fraction, it entered the warm passage in which it was not welcome. From time 
to time Ma stopped as though to give the maiden flesh a chance to stretch 
and to absorb. Gail shrewdly guessed that what was being inserted within her 
now was the last and final one of a succession that Ma had cut short. This 
one, as she was, would be a punishment. No doubt it would achieve the 
desired result as well as if it had come a month later. It would simply 
shame and hurt her more. The persistent but unseen manipulation continued 
until the strap could be passed through the ring and the buckle made fast. 
The captive girl was impaled more brutally than she had ever been. This one 
hurt. 

When Ma Billings once more stood face to face with her captive the two women 
stared at each other without need of words. What had been done was 
understood and accepted. A girl had disobeyed. A girl was being punished. 
Gail could think of protests. But what was the use! She was helpless as it 
was possible for a girl to be. Probably Ma Billings would have returned to 
the house and left her in quiet contemplation of her misery had not a sound 
intruded upon their silence. 

It was a strange and poignant sound. A sound infinitely disturbing in that 
it belonged nowhere in normalcy. It was a cry of desolation. The keening 
wail of a girl lost in pain. Gail's eyes sought its source in the distant 
picture of old Baldy and his tortured burden. The horse was quietly ambling 
here and there seeking tufts of grass. Dulcie's face was turned to the sky, 
her head thrown back in agony. From her mouth had come the incoherent sounds 
of suffering desuetude. Gail could not bear the sound. 

"Please don't punish Dulcie any more, ma'am." How feeble it sounded! 

"She'll get her busy little ass cut for a couple of hours," Ma said with 
grim decision. 

It was asking for trouble. But the girl in the stocks could not help 
herself. "Please, ma'am. I beg you. She meant no harm. I feel so guilty...." 

"Do you now!" Ma sounded interested. "Maybe you'd like to change places with 
the little so and so?" 

It was typical Billings. Gail twisted uneasily within her bonds. This one of 
those questions for which there was no right answer. "Yes ma'am. I'll take 
her place. She's so young...." 

"I'll be damned!" Ma Billings exclaimed admiringly. "You gals would drive a 
poor old woman like me to drink. You're heavier than her. It's going to hurt 
more. Your little quiff ain't going to like it." 

"No ma'am. I understand. I expect I'll make as much noise as Dulcie. I'm not 
very brave." 

"Any female what sits up in that saddle of her own accord has to be either 
brave or damn stupid. You stupid, kid?" 

"Oh please ma'am! Take her down. I expect I am stupid. But stop those awful 
screams. I can't bear them!." 

The older woman assessed her captive with shrewd amused eyes. The situation 
piqued her interest. Obtaining a battered bowl from the barn, she beat it as 
a drum. Old Baldy cocked his ears and ambled back to base. He was rewarded 
with oats. Dulcie's pain wracked features implored her mother hopefully. 

"This damn fool gal says she'll take your place, kid. You want her to?" 

Gail had never seen such glory on a female face. Dulcie returned to life. 
But the glory died. The hurt girl shook her head in negative of more than 
the question. "No! Oh no! It ain't right. No one oughta' have this done to 
'em. Oh ma! Let me down...!" 

"You got a coupla of hours up there." 

Dulcie's moan seemed endless. It went on and on. Suddenly it ceased. 
Indignant eyes flashed down upon her mother. "Gail can't take my place. You 
know she can't! Not with her feet chained the way they are. Ohhhh... you're 
cruel!" 

How absurd! Nobility for nothing! She felt foolish. She, of all of them, 
should have remembered the obvious. But the weight on her ankles had become 
a part of her. Ma Billings slapped her leg and roared with laughter at their 
oversight. When her merriment had run its course she looked at Gail 
appraisingly. 'Tell you what, honey. You want little hot pants off that 
horse, you ask me real nice to whip your ass." 

"Please whip my bottom, ma'am." The words were not hers but Gail spoke them 
automatically. 

"I never said nothing 'bout bottoms." Ma was being difficult. 

It was a time for screams or acid retorts. But such luxuries are not for 
thralls. "Please whip my ass, ma'am." Gail loathed her abject compliance. 

"That's better, honey. You can do it when you try. 'Bout how many licks 
would you say?" 

"As many as you wish, ma'am." Surely that could give no offense! 

"That ain't what I asked, honey. But I'll make you a proposition. The kid's 
got herself a couple of hours. I'll knock off thirty minutes for each ten 
you ask for on that neat little can o' yours. The limit's thirty. Little 
sweetheart's got to have a half hour regardless." 

"Don't do it!" The weeping Dulcie was suddenly vehement. "If I got to stay 
here at all, ain't no sense in you taking a whipping." 

"Chip off the old block," said Ma Billings proudly. 

"Please cane my ass thirty times, ma'am," said Gail with no pride at all. 

Old Baldy quietly munched his oats while two girls shared agony with their 
eyes. The awfulness that was happening to Gail was invisible to both. It 
evidenced itself by swishing fleshly sounds within the barn and by the pain 
wracked features of the girl whose behind was being flayed with a whippy 
riding crop. In the end, Gail's lips moaned out the most vivid admissions of 
all while her bottom was being cut and cut again with ruthless skill. The 
girls in their separate agonies tried bravely to smile at each other from 
time to time. The swishing sounds went on and on. 

There were three of them. Gail named them by their physical attributes: 'Big 
Nose', 'Gutsy', and Congressman Billings who was simply Congressman 
Billings, or 'Everett' to his friends. They had wasted no time in using her 
and her physical facility that Ma had so capably enlarged to accommodate 
their massive masculinity. Their approbation was both shaming and 
disturbing. 

"That's what I call a real piece o' ass!" Guffawed Big Nose. 

"Don't you never part with this little ass-hole, Everett boy," counseled 
Gutsy with deep feeling. "Ma done a damn good job on you, girl," affirmed 
Congressman Billings with pride. "Nicest little arse I ever stuck my pecker 
into." 

Gail supposed it was a party. Three bluff hearty men, with Ma making an 
appearance when invited. They had business to discuss, but she and her 
enlarged anal passage had been provided as recreation for the warriors. She 
stood, naked, in the centre of the big room for their approval. What was 
shame! A thing she had heard of long ago. 

"I always liked good firm tits," said Gutsy. 

"Fine crop o' cunt hair," from the representative of Government. 

"D'you have to keep them bloody great chains on her feet, Everett?" from Big 
Nose. 

Billings patted the slave girl's back with paternal pride. "You know what 
would be real nice, honey. You shuffle them chains off to Ma and bring us 
back some nice cool drinks on a tray, real proper and serve 'em real 
professional. Don't hurry, kid. Don't want you tripping." Another warm 
hearted pat before the punch line, "And have Ma give you that there long 
riding crop she uses...." 

Gail tried not to show the cringe. But it was there, deep inside. The riding 
crop! Used on her naked skin by men like these! They could slice her to 
shreds. It might be no more than a threat to ensure her perfect obedience. 
Or just a pleasantry. But nothing at the Bar-B had ever been less than real. 
She clattered her chains upon her errand. 

When she had been told of The Visitors' and what was expected of her, Gail 
had made up her mind to be 'a good girl'. She had long since resigned 
herself to the use of her body by others. Now it would be best that she 
neither sulk or protest. She had become a slave girl. By being a good slave 
girl she might avoid stripes. Perhaps there might even be some humour or 
goodwill... ! For a serving girl the heavy fetters were a disabling 
handicap. But she did her best. 

First she had to place the tray upon a table. Then she dutifully kissed the 
wickedly limber riding crop and, with knee bent, proffered it to the Master 
of the House. Congressman Billings accepted the thing with which he would 
correct her misdeeds, with a beaming smile and some perspiration. He was 
impressed. His visitors watched in rapt delight. Gail cursed her chains. 
Their linkage was too close to allow her to kneel while holding a tray of 
drinks. But she managed a curtsy and a smile. Each man admired her breasts 
while they reached for their glass. 'Tell you what, gal' said the owner of 
the Bar-B in a fine hearty burst of bonhomie, "you trot along and get 
yourself a good stiff drink and join us. Dammit, you're alright." 

She could not trot. But she got the drink. She then had to stand and sip so 
that they could enjoy her nakedness. The atmosphere was convivial. "Someone 
cane your ass, gal'?" Big Nose inquired. "Yes, Sir. I was disobedient." 

"You mean you actually have to do something to get your ass whipped?" 

"Yes, Sir. But I do get whipped quite often." She hoped his anxiety would be 
relieved. 

"You wearing all that hardware on your ankles on purpose, honey? Or for some 
good reason?" Gutsy obviously disliked her chains. She could imagine why. 

"I tried to escape, Sir. These chains are my punishment and to prevent me 
trying again. They are riveted on my ankles. They can't be removed except 
with tools." 

"Everett get a yen for your Cat, honey, and they'll come off damn fast!" 

There was a general guffaw. Gail permitted herself an appreciative smile. A 
Congressman's erection might be a pathway to freedom. She sipped her drink 
gratefully. She hoped she would be allowed another. She did not explain that 
intercourse was possible even for a girl with chained feet. 

"You keep them there irons on that little girl, Everett," Big Nose advised 
with sincerity. "You got yourself a treasure in this cute little kitten. 
You'll be a damn fool if you ever let her go." 

Gail's heart fluttered. It was the ever recurring fear that, for her, there 
would never, never be release. 

"How long you with us for, honey?" Billings asked as though he had actually 
forgotten. 

"There are about another nine months of my sentence, Sir." 

"Hell's Bells, Everett boy, that there nonsense don't mean a thing," Gutsy 
adjured earnestly. "Keep the little trick permanent. There's fifteen years 
o' good clean fun in that little ass o' hers. If I had her I'd make damn 
sure she never got away." 

"How's Ma keep a'hold of you, kid?" Big Nose asked seriously. "I am chained 
to a ring in the floor of my room every night, Sir." 

"Yeah, but what about the days?" She did not want to tell them. They had 
enough ideas without Ma's. But it was useless to dissemble. Billings knew 
the truth. "I am here to be punished, Sir. After my work is done Mrs. 
Billings ties me in some way so that I'll behave." 

Big Nose slapped his thigh. "Dammit, Everett, you got yourself a set-up for 
sure!" He grinned in sudden inspiration. "It's a ranch, ain't it! The Bar-B. 
Why don't you slap your brand on the little filly?" 

The silence proclaimed the interest. To brand a naked girl! Delectable! 
Drinks were gulped. The captive herself took a long swallow. She wished Big 
Nose had kept his inspiration to himself. 

"We got the irons," Billings admitted. "Ain't used 'em in a long time." He 
turned his benevolent attention on the quaking captive. "How you like to 
wear my brand, honey?" 

A good old Bar-B query. Gail reflected bitterly. She had a terrible 
intuition that her flesh would bear the hated name. She did not wish to wear 
Congressman Billings brand burned in her skin. But how to say so! "I am 
frightened of the pain, Sir." 

"Could give her a knock out drop." Gutsy was interested. 

"Piss on that!" Big Nose disposed of humanity with contempt. "Best to have 
her watch the makings, and then hear her howl." He turned to Gail. "You 
wouldn't mind, would you, kid?" 

"No Sir." No one hearing the two words could doubt their insincerity. 

"Give you ten-thousand for her, Everett?" Gutsy's voice was hoarse. 

"That'ud 'bout cover a couple o' fingers," Billings rejoined meditatively. 

"Alright! Twenty." 

These men wanted to buy her! A female slave, purchased for cash. If one of 
them did it would be the end! She would never again know freedom. Certainly 
not within the span of her youth! Gail was frozen in terror. 

"There ain't enough dough in the State to buy that little filly," the Host 
stated fervently. 

"Fifty-thousand," interjected Big Nose as though disposing of the matter 
once and for all. His eyes sought Billings. What he saw there caused him to 
say, "O.K. Billings. One-hundred-thousand dollars for the girl." His voice 
was cold and hard. 

Gail was aghast. So great a sum that he might whip her and use her rear 
entrance! She almost felt flattered. 

The silence was electric. Gutsy watched the two principals with curiosity. 
He said nothing. His bid was dwarfed. 

"Holy cow, Harry! You almost make me take you seriously," Billings 
grudgingly admitted. 

"Take me seriously, Everett." 

Billings obviously did take the offer seriously. His captive girl quailed as 
she watched his face reflect his thoughts. She saw herself as good as sold 
into a lifetime slavery, and wondered if a male would whip her less than 
would a woman. Certainly her body would be used more than it had ever been. 
Her present owner temporized. 

"Look, Harry, we come out here to relax. I ain't runnin' no slave market. 
Give me time. I ain't saying no and I ain't saying yes. 'Sides, Ma's 
concerned. You know that." He turned to Gail: "More drinks, honey. And one 
for you too. Bet you're needing it after what you've been listening to." He 
slapped her bottom playfully. 

Gail could not know what had been said in her absence. The subject of the 
sale of her body had been dropped. Goodwill reigned. She made her round with 
the tray. Her breasts and pubic hair were scrutinized, her nipples pinched 
by questing fingers. She resumed the position where her nudity showed to 
best advantage. She sipped her drink and waited for something to be done to 
her. Of one thing she was sure something would be done. The fraternal 
atmosphere was expansive. "Let's whip her ass," Gutsy suggested 
thoughtfully. "Nothing to stop us slapping on that brand," contributed Big 
Nose. 

"How's about another 'round from the rear?" Billings offered as though 
anxious to minimize wear and tear on a valuable asset. 

The Congressman's thought found favour. The tenor of the talk had stimulated 
tired libidos. The slave girl herself was a delicacy sufficient to whet any 
jaded appetite. 

"Guess you better bend over, honey." The Congressman's order was only 
faintly apologetic. 

Gail retrieved the glasses and, with her own, placed them aside. In the most 
exposed part of the floor she spread her legs to the limit of her chain and 
touched her toes. 

"Be a damn sight better if the kid didn't have all that stuff on her feet," 
Gutsy complained. "Can't really spread herself. And she does try...." 

"Didn't have to ask for help getting in there, did you?" Billings chaffed. 
"Spread her any more and we'd lose you." 

They flipped coins to determine the order in which they would use her. Gail 
paid little attention to their small boy chatter. What did it matter! She 
thought fleetingly of the incredible glory of freedom. Then braced herself 
as the first impalement thrust her forward. She was actually thankful for Ma 
Billings plugs. Once more she knew that all things are comparative. She 
tried hard not to moan. 

As the rounds of drinks followed each other in slow succession the whip 
became inevitable. Reference had surfaced here and there throughout the 
conversation. The listening girl found herself genuinely puzzled by the 
fascination the weal of a whip upon a naked girl had on all men. If there 
were exceptions she had not met them. She had sensed that even Neil had been 
sexually excited by her striations. And it wasn't just men! There was Ma, 
and there was Dulcie. How many placid females walking any Main Street 
cherished a secret wish to whip one of their own! A slave girl's cry under 
the lash must always have been mankind's most potent aphrodisiac. Gail 
glimpsed the possibility that perhaps one-hundred-thousand dollars was not a 
penny too much! 

"Got anything else besides that riding crop?" Big Nose asked casually. "I 
sorta' got a hankering for something that curls around." 

"This curls round her arse real good," Billings assured him. "Ain't aiming 
to stay on the girl's arse. That's kid's stuff." 

"We don't want her cut up," Billings warned. "Wasn't thinking of a 
blacksnake," Big Nose assured placatingly. "How 'bout them special ones for 
her tits and twat. Never got around to trying that?" Gutsy said with 
interest. 

Congressman Billings smiled at the naked girl who was beginning to be 
thankful for her drinks. "Bloodthirsty pair, ain't they, honey! Ma got 
anything you think would tickle you up about right?" 

"Yes Sir." 

"Go get 'em, sweetheart. And fill the glasses." 

Gail was frightened. These huge men spoke of whipping her as though she was 
a grateful participant. The idea of the brand was still hovering. She sought 
counsel from Ma Billings. 

"Ain't nothing I san do, honey," Ma admitted, "Your best bet is to go along 
with their dam fool ideas as though you think they're bloody clever for 
thinking 'em up. You know, the dewey-eyed bit. If you can work a bit of 
charm off on 'em it might save your hide a mite." Ma sniffed disparagingly. 
"But then they'll take it out on your asshole. Sorry, kid, there just ain't 
no way this can be your day." 

"But those huge men? With whips... ! They'll kill me." 

"Not with Billings there, honey. And anyway, men are mostly blowhards. Where 
in Hell did they get the notion 'bout going after your tits?" 

"I think it was because they didn't want to cut up my back." 

"Well, that's something anyway." Ma looked puzzled. "Where you sooner get 
it, honey? Front or back?" 

"I don't want it at all." Gail was close to tears. 

A sudden and strangely maternal Ma Billings took the chained and naked girl 
into her capacious arms. A large rough hand patted a smooth white back. "I 
treat you rough enough, kid, but these arseholes of men are somethin' else 
again! A gal' just can't keep up with 'em, and that's a fact. Not even 
me...!" There were a few moments of silent thought. Then, "Look, Sweetheart, 
I don't want them nice breasts of yours messed up. Don't suppose you do 
either. Tell the boys I ain't got no special whip for tits but that I'm 
sending one that will make you yelp without putting you in the hospital. You 
can take back that one I used on you last week. You know, the one with the 
white handle." 

Gail knew! Even the white-handled one was barely humane. She would scream. 
But she would probably survive. Ma went for it while she busied herself with 
Southern Comfort. 

The return journey was an agony beyond the drag of her chained feet. Her 
hands carried the tray. The whip that would give the men pleasure hung from 
one wrist. She reflected bitterly she was a neat package equipped for man's 
ultimate joy. Upon or within her body they would find their heart's desire. 
It took a steely determination to smile. But she respected Ma's wisdom. If 
charm could save her she would charm... 

"I think you will find this satisfactory to whip me with, Sir." Gail 
tendered the hated thing with a smile and bended knee. She kissed it gently 
as though with love. 

Congressman Billings' beaming smile was s the one usually reserved for 
blocks of over a hundred votes. He took the whip without seeing it. His eyes 
were on the naked girl. "Ever play poker, honey?" he asked with seeming 
irrelevance. "Yes Sir." 

"Gonna' give you a chance to make a couple of bucks," said Gutsy. 

"The boys didn't feel they wanted to lace right into you with this here 
whip, honey," Billings explained big heartedly. "So we're having us a poker 
game for exactly one hour. You win you get the cash. You lose you get marked 
up a bit. Stakes is a dollar a stroke." 

"Oh, what fun, Sir." Gail hoped her eyes sparkled. 

"You ain't got a hope, kid," Big Nose warned dourly. "We're good." 

"But it's sweet of you to let me try, Sir." Gail rewarded him with a smile 
that would put up her price by thousands. 

"This gal' keep on the way she's going, I'll start bidding again." Gutsy 
shook his head in incredulity. He looked keenly at Gail. "You stay this 
polite while your rump gets roasted?" 

"I'm afraid I scream, Sir. I'm only a girl." She batted eyes of innocence, 
admiring his maleness. 

"Stud. Jacks or better. Five dollar limit," Billings announced. "Mustn't let 
the little lady get in beyond her strength," he guffawed heartily. 

Gail had played poker for tokens twice at parties. As she accepted the 
proffered chair she knew herself delivered to the whip. She had no hope of 
winning. But the potency of Southern Comfort was an ally. The men were happy 
and underrated her. After an initial loss of fifteen strokes, she was soon 
ahead fifty dollars. She moved her feet frequently to make her chains clink. 
The sound enraptured her companions. She frequently toyed with her hair so 
that her lifted arms displayed her breasts. She wanted, passionately, to 
win. 

She supposed the game honest. She judged that Billings was on her side and 
allowed her to win when he could comfortably do so. But Gutsy and Big Nose 
were out for her hide, an appropriate expression, and bantered back and 
forth with gusto. Gail's mind was computing constantly, not for what she 
might gain, but with her possibility of loss. The loss of a hundred dollars, 
for someone who had it, was not tragic. But to lose a hundred strokes... ! 
It was frightening. To lose two-hundred or more was a real possibility in 
such a game. She wondered if these men had knowledge of the frailty of 
female flesh. Anything over twenty strokes was a frightful punishment. They 
were probably envisioning her insouciantly wiggling her bottom at them under 
an infliction of hundreds! 

In the end the game thrust at her a typical Bar-B decision. It was the last 
pot. It found her the breathlessly thankful possessor of enough dollars to 
show herself willing. Unless an obvious winner, she would toss in her hand. 
Money was useless to a slave girl. She would not risk the lash upon her 
back. But Fate was cruel. It gave her a pair of aces up and showing. 
Forbidding eyes compelled her bids. When all cards were dealt, hers was the 
highest hand against Gutsy with a pair of fives and Big Nose with a possible 
straight. Billings had thrown in his hand. 

Gail longed to pass the bid, but knew herself trapped by her two aces. Her 
cash was gone. The brisk bidding had debited her with twenty strokes, the 
limit she believed she could bear from these muscular arms. She bid two 
more. Gutsy raised it ten. She stayed. Big Nose raised it twenty. Gail could 
have wept in frustration. She hated the two aces that made her continued 
participation mandatory. She felt fairly certain she was being bluffed. If 
she met the twenty it would end the game. She would be a quite considerable 
winner with unmarked skin, or a loser who must bear fifty-two whip strokes 
somewhere on her person. She bid the twenty. 

Gutsy turned up a third five. 

There was no hurry. Gail was sent for more drinks, including a large one for 
herself. As she served she knew the men were savoring her fate. Fifty-two 
strokes upon the skin of a naked girl. She dared not think. But she kept 
smiling. If only she could make them feel pity... ! 

"Where's the best place to tie you, honey?" Billings asked genially. 

"The whipping post in the yard is much the best, Sir. It exposes me 
completely and gives you space to swing the whip so as to hurt me as much as 
you wish." She made her smile show a pleased interest in what was about to 
happen. "Of course, Sir," she added thoughtfully, "it is a bit public. I 
don't know if you wish the family to witness my...." She dragged the 
sentence out deliberately whilst looking with bright expectancy at her three 
companions, "... my... punishment." 

"I'll be a son of a gun!" Gutsy breathed huskily. 

"I don't believe it! That gal' ain't possible!" Big Nose affirmed. 

"If you would prefer to whip me in private, Sir, I would suggest the barn. 
It also offers more varied positions." 

"Positions!" ejaculated Gutsy. "Holy horny toads...!" 

"This I got to see!" said Big Nose fervently. They chose the barn. It was a 
quaint procession. She was made to carry the whip and to lead the way. The 
three men sauntered slowly behind her fettered progress. Gail hated her 
chains. They robbed her of poise and dignity. She hated, also, the remarks 
of her admirers. 

"Look at that little butt go from side to side," from Gutsy. 

"It'll go every which way if you curl it 'round her hip to snap at her 
cunt," Big Nose advised. 

"Leave the kid's nips alone," Billings adjured. "There's lots o' the rest of 
her." 

The naked slave girl forcing her chained feet to lead her to the whip had 
never felt more lonely. 

"Would you like to tie my wrists to an upright, Sir? Or do you prefer to 
suspend me?" Gail was going all out to please. She fetched them rope and 
cords. They hung her by her wrists. "She'll kick real pretty at the end o' 
that rope," Gutsy approved. "Sooner have her legs apart," Big Nose observed 
thoughtfully. After much debate they lowered her the several inches it took 
to place her toes on the floor. Then they tugged her feet as wide apart as 
her chain would allow and tied them. She felt trebly nude. "That damn chain 
sure does screw up anything you want to do to a gal," Big Nose complained. 

"Spoils the effect," Gutsy agreed. 

"I'll agree, boys, we could stretch her little twat twice as wide," 
Congressman Billings confirmed regretfully. 

"Dammit, Everett! Let's take the blasted things off her. Ain't that big a 
job." He laughed sardonically. "The poor gal ain't going to run far with us 
around." 

"Hell, why not! Ma can put 'em back on after we've gone. If she wants to, 
that is." Billings chuckled lewdly. "Maybe the old lady will see how much 
better the kid can be if she can stretch her legs. Back or front, it helps." 

Legs, waist, shoulders, the three men shared her weight. Triumphantly, as 
with a great prize, they carried her in procession to the blacksmith shop. 
Spirits ran high. It was a festive occasion. Gail passionately longed to be 
rid of her chains. Her ebullience would have matched theirs had it not been 
for her knowledge of that which awaited the freedom of her feet. But even 
with that knowledge her heart sang. A voice within her cried, "Free! free! 
free!" True, the men would tie her to be whipped, but before and after there 
would be moments when her person would be untrammeled by restraints. How 
small a thing it was; yet to a slave girl it was a victory. 

For a little while she was a Queen, the box her throne, the anvil her 
footstool. She watched the preparations to free her ankles with joy and some 
trepidation. The men whose thrall she was had imbibed enough alcohol to 
impair their competence with drill and punch and hammer. But skill is 
instinctive. One by one the rivets that had prisoned her fell before the 
onslaught of the pounding metal. When the heavy anklets fell to the floor, 
it was as though Gail had been given wings. 

"Wanna' run round the yard, honey?" the Congressman asked, grinning. 

"Oh, could I? Oh please!" She was a child, pleading for ecstasy. 

They watched benignly, sensing their power and possession of the nude 
loveliness that leaped and threw wide her legs in an abandon of physical 
release. Gail had been constantly aware of the brutal imprisonment of her 
ankles. But not until this moment of wild unfettered motion had she realized 
the full enormity of the loss Ma Billings shackles had imposed. She longed 
to flee, to fly, to never be bound again. But she savored the privilege 
granted, savored it to the full. Then, with racing pulse but heavy heart, 
she returned obediently to the men who would whip her. "Thank you! Oh thank 
you!" Her words were a glowing sincerity. Her sparkling eyes surveyed them 
all. 

"You're a damn lovely girl." Gutsy's words almost held emotion. 

There came an awkward silence as though none wished to shatter a mood. 
Gutsy's tribute was from the three of them. Gail wished her painless freedom 
might last forever. Mute, in a memory of something ethereal, the three men 
and the captive girl walked toward the barn. 

"She looks prettier if you stretch her arms same way as her legs. Make an 
'X' out of her," Big Nose suggested thoughtfully. 

It was done. Few words were exchanged. They went about the task of binding 
her with an intent purpose that held reverence for a naked girl who had 
become very much flesh and blood and very female in a way they had not 
glimpsed before. Through their haze of drinks they understood the privilege 
of whipping this palpitating femininity. For a little while they were gods. 

Fear had returned to Gail. Cold cringing fear! She looked up the taut 
columns of her stretched arms to where the rope circled her hurt wrists and 
held them high and wide. She looked down across her concave tummy and to 
each side where her thighs and legs were strained apart by ropes that pulled 
her ankles so widely separate, that her pubic hair proclaimed itself 
wantonly as if demanding scrutiny. Gail knew herself delivered utterly to 
the whip. She looked from one to the other of the three who watched, their 
faces rapt, their breathing heavy. "Please don't hurt me too much...." The 
words slipped from her as the innocent plea of a child. 

It would be wrong to say that the men who were about to whip her were 
untouched by her appeal. But, with a strange perception, Everett Billings 
told the truth. "Honey, ain't none of us wouldn't want to kiss you and let 
you go. Trouble is you're just too damn beautiful. Loving a gal' like you 
ain't enough. It don't say it all. You rate more than getting a man's dink 
shoved in you here or there. We almost got to whip you. Ain't no other way 
of saying what we feel." For the naked girl there was small comfort in the 
quaint encomium. 

"Do we wale her all out?" Big nose ventured conversationally. 

"Hell no! You'd cut the gal' in two." Billings wanted no damage to such a 
valuable property. 

"Want to do a bit more than tickle her up though," Gutsy contended. "We 
gotta' make her yelp." 

"Ain't going to be no trouble doing that, the way we got her fixed," 
Billings assured him earnestly. "With them little legs spread the way they 
are you got some damn interesting targets." He turned his attention to Gail. 
"Can you move, honey?" 

Obediently, Gail demonstrated her helplessness by the struggle she knew they 
desired. She fought the ropes, but managed to flutter only her shoulders. 
Her feet were firmly staked to the floor. She could scarcely move at all. 
"No, sir. I can't move." She looked at them piteously. "I'm frightened." 

Congressman Billings was well used to dealing with those who were anxious 
and disturbed. In a fine paternal fashion he patted the naked girl's bottom 
and tweaked one nipple. "Don't you worry none, honey. You're in good hands 
with me and the boys. Tell you what sweetheart, you got fifty-two licks 
coming, we'll make it an even fifty." He made the concession as though 
ceding title to the island of Manhattan. 

Even with the first stroke Gail screamed. Big Nose wrapped the lash across 
her back so that it curled 'round and bit at her ribs. Stretched as she was 
her skin was taut and doubly receptive to pain. Absorbing her agony, the 
captive's mind reiterated again and again, fifty, fifty... fifty! 

But Gail had an ally. Whether his motives were humanitarian or financial it 
might be hard to know. But Everett Billings wanted no maiden prostrate from 
a flogging. "You know what I think, boys," he suggested. "We've all of us 
whipped an arse or two. But we got something special here. What say we use 
her twat for a target! We ain't using it for nothing else," he guffawed 
heartily. "Takes a bit more skill to get up there between her legs. It's for 
sure we'll never get a little filly in no better shape for it." 

The idea appealed. Gutsy aimed but missed. The thong instead wrapped 'round 
a tractioned thigh. It evoked a gasp of pain from Gail, and good-natured 
jibes from his companions. 

"Skill's what counts, fellers," Billings boasted, and sent the seeking 
leather in a neat snap upwards from the juncture of the wide-spread legs. 
Gail moaned exquisitely as his reward. She tugged and twisted so that for 
reverent minutes her audience was content to watch her tortured nudity. 

"You got something there, Billings," Big Nose acknowledged. "I'll have a go 
at her little ass in a minute. But let's see what I can do with a quivering 
quim." He laughed at his alliterative wit, and managed an upward slash that 
evoked from the tied girl a response that held him spellbound in lust. 'This 
little gal go on acting this-a-way and I'm going to have to go 'round her 
back with something else besides a whip," he admitted, almost with regret. 

Once again Gail knew incongruity. To feel gratitude that her sex be whipped! 
Yet, excruciating as it was, it was better than a brutal flogging. She 
writhed and moaned in payment for their attentions. If she could contort 
lustfully enough it would divert their minds from more damaging pursuits. 

But not from lust! As the fifty strokes bit and gouged at her tenderness, 
her eroticism so stimulated those who did the whipping that each in his own 
time expended himself within the facility Ma Billings had so assiduously 
prepared. Bound as their subject was she was nonetheless vulnerable. She 
could be used. For her, pleasure was not implicit in the act. 

Gail could not doubt that Billings had contrived a compromise in her 
whipping. She would survive the fifty strokes. But, even so, she would 
suffer bitterly in shame and pain. The lash deliberately seeking the lips of 
her vulva was a terrible thing for any girl. Yet, mostly, no more than six 
inches of the thong made contact with her flesh. It sought her secrets and 
punished them shamefully, but it was less devastating than the full length 
of the leather curling 'round her slender nakedness. The Congressman 
shrewdly sold the advantage of prolonging the whipping so that every stroke 
could be aimed and wagers made on accuracy. After all, they had a target for 
which he coarsely coined the term of 'Heifer's Eye.' When they freed her, 
Gail was bathed not only in the sweat of pain and fear but in a great 
thankfulness that it was over. She knew not what else these men might do to 
her. But the whipping was done. It might not recur. She even welcomed 
Billings' hand upon her arm as they walked back to the house and he promised 
jovially the biggest damn drink she'd ever seen! 

When the whipped girl was sent for the inevitable drinks, Ma Billings' 
reaction was a quaint contrast of concerns. Consternation over the bruised 
skin of the loins vied with disapproval of ankles on which there were no 
chains. "The dirty bastards!" she mused angrily. "The sons of bitches! Beat 
hell out of your cunt, then let you run. You going to try high-tailing it up 
the road, honey?" 

It was a question Gail had been asking herself. The absence of the chains 
upon her feet changed all her attitudes. Something impossible had become 
possible. It was a rebirth. An excited hope had sprung to life. She 
temporized with the obvious. "Oh ma'am! After being whipped like this! I 
wouldn't dare. They'd kill me." 

"They aim to put them chains back on your feet?" 

"They said when they were through with me." 

"Humph! I suppose that'll have to do. Them damn men and their stiffs! Don't 
you run, honey. You'll wish you hadn't...!" 

The drinks were large and well received. "We're going to have a nice quiet 
time, honey," Billings assured her. "We want you to stand out front where we 
can all get a good look. Sip your drink and sort of revolve. Real slow, 
keeping still in between. So's we can admire that lovely hide o' your'n. 
You're really something, honey! You surely are." 

Gail supposed she could not complain. It was not a demanding task. Shame no 
longer counted. Let the silly fools feast on her nakedness and the marks 
they had etched upon it. She was hurting, but only from what was past. She 
sipped her drink. From time to time she made a half turn. She made no effort 
to shield herself. She was theirs. She would not try to cheat. Billings in 
his own strange way had tried to be kind. She was tired. But she stood erect 
for their enjoyment. She sipped and dreamed of freedom. It was when her back 
was turned to her audience that she heard the snore. Tensed and curious she 
turned. The Southern Comfort and the labours of whipping a girl had exacted 
their toll. Three large satiated men lay back in their chairs asleep, mouths 
open, heads lolling in unconsciousness. Her heart pounded in a sudden 
terrible knowledge that here again was a moment 'of decision she would 
remember all her life. 

She was free! 

The possibilities flashed. Free! But naked, her skin wickedly marked. She 
was in the house. Ma and the children were around. Could she reach the road 
and run? Run, run, run... It was a fifty-fifty chance that she could do so 
unseen. But suppose... ! She thrust the doubts aside. She must think 
positively or else go now to Ma and ask humbly to be chained that she be not 
tempted. If Ma handcuffed her decision would cease to be a burden. Gail 
realized the measure of her slavery in that the abject idea held appeal. The 
beautiful simplicity of being chained! No decisions, no regrets. She rebuked 
herself. Here was a chance such as she would never have again. When Ma 
replaced the chains upon her ankles she was doomed. Doomed to the other nine 
months or perhaps even to life. Forever there would be the whip... 

It was not until she had tip-toed from the room out into the yard that she 
saw the cars. The Bar-B held no hazards of theft. The keys were in the 
locks. With an excitation such as she had never known she slipped behind the 
wheel and started the motor. With a car there was hope. The gas tank was 
nearly full. It might take her from the state. Surely her striated skin 
would gain her a sympathetic hearing somewhere! She shifted into drive and 
gently stepped on the gas. No one had appeared to question the movement of 
the car. She headed for the highway. 

Gail had never known such exhilaration, such a sense of soaring in space, 
such a knowledge of victory. She felt the surging power of the motor. It 
spelt freedom. Behind her was the whip and the chains. There could be no 
turning back now. The road beckoned. In a few miles there would be a 
freeway. 

She was bothered by her nudity. It was a strike against her. A swift glance 
failed to show a rug. Perhaps there would be something in the trunk with 
which she could cover her nakedness from a disapproving world. But she would 
not stop now. Faster and faster. Her foot was heavy on the gas. The miles 
sped by. 

She had no money. She could not buy fuel. It would be a race between the 
miles that separated her from the state-line and the contents of her gas 
tank. She debated the practicability of bartering her body to some 
astonished service station owner in return for gasoline. She had little 
doubt that she could find a buyer for what she had to sell. But it would 
take time, and would he stay off the phone after she had gone? The gallons 
and the miles slipped by. She prayed. 

The road block was suddenly in view beyond a bend. No car could back or 
turn. It was cleverly placed. She skidded to a stop yards from the police 
car. The ditches offered no hope. They were too steep. The uniformed giants 
bedecked with their accoutrements were figures of doom as they sauntered to 
accost her. 

The moment had its element of farce. They ordered her from the car and to 
put her hands on its top and spread her legs wide before they realized the 
impossibility of a naked girl hiding arms. 

"It's her all right," one of them said with finality. "I'll drive the car 
back and take her along." 

"Arrest me," Gail pleaded. "I've been kidnapped. I want a lawyer." 

They looked at her with a faint compassion, but with a far greater interest 
in her body and the whip marks. Her words were lost. They grasped her arms 
and handcuffed her wrists behind her back. Desolation enveloped her. 
"Please... I've been tortured. Can't you see? Don't take me back." 

"Looks like the Congressman takes his fun where he finds it," one said to 
the other. They laughed. 

Gail was propelled back into the stolen car. Her hands cuffed behind her 
back felt so cruelly familiar. She was being taken back into slavery. "Don't 
take me back," she pleaded. "They'll whip me, and worse. Oh please... ! Be 
human. Look at me...." 

They looked, and enjoyed what they saw. But they made no answer to her plea. 
She was not for them. She was no longer of the world. She belonged to the 
Bar-B and to the man who had the power...."Better use these on her feet. The 
poor kid's desperate." The second officer held out his handcuffs. 

Gail sat miserably in despair as the metal bands were clipped on her ankles. 
She was now totally helpless. Escape had, once again, become an impossible 
dream. Ahead of her lay a retribution so awful she dared not think of it. 

"You are taking me back to hell," she said simply to the man at the wheel. 
"Please, please let me go." 

The car was in motion. Backing and turning. The driver spared her a glance. 
It roved from her strained face down to her breasts. He was young. He felt 
her femaleness. He was also honest. "Sorry, kid. If it was anyone but who it 
is, I'd proposition you. We drive in the trees and I let you go. I know the 
score. But not with Billings. For sure not with Billings! Lady, you ain't 
got a hope." 

Gail wept. She sobbed in an abandon of grief. To have come so close! And 
now... ! She dared not think of now. In silence the officer let her cry. 

She was delivered back into bondage in an atmosphere so tense it could be 
felt. The officer unlocked his handcuffs from her wrists and from her 
ankles, made a brief salute and left with his companion. Gail stood naked 
before her inquisitors. For the moment her body was free of bonds, but she 
sensed a deeper imprisonment than she had ever known. Billings and his wife 
studied her in a pregnant silence. She stood, listless and bereft of hope. 

"What the hell else could you expect?" Ma demanded accusingly. 

"That was a damn fool thing to do, honey," Billings offered morosely. "Get 
them chains back on her feet," Ma demanded. Gail said nothing. There was 
nothing to say. "Don't fret 'bout them irons, Ma," the Congressman placated. 
"We'll get 'em back on the little filly in good time." 

Ma obviously had her own ideas. But Billings was boss in his own house. He 
took the escapee by the arm. "You come along, honey. The boys and me got a 
little talking to do 'bout you." He led his captive away from a glowering 
Ma. 

"Whip her ass," said Gutsy as though the act was obvious. 

"She's had a pretty good going over already," Billings defended. 

Big Nose laughed. "You two ain't got no imagination," he jeered. "The little 
trick ran away. This is cattle country. What you do with strays?" He looked 
around for effect to his proclamation. "You brand 'em. That's what you do." 

The silence bespoke approval. Each man was seeing the naked girl strapped 
down and hearing her scream as the red iron entered her smoking flesh. Gail 
stood before them, numb with misery. "Would you do that, Everett?" Gutsy 
almost pleaded. "Hell, why not?!" Billings was displeased with her escape. 
"Got a sort of logic to it," Big Nose clinched. Gail knew for sure. She 
would be branded. Even to her the logic was obvious. They had talked of it 
before. Now it would be certain. Perhaps she should feel lucky if that was 
all they did to her! "Please," she pleaded desperately. "Not today! Not 
today!...." 

"Kid's sorta' played out," Billings acknowledged. "Well all enjoy it more 
tomorrow. Give her time to think on it...." 

Gail was spread-eagled on her bed and tied fast. Never again would there be 
freedom or hope of freedom for her. She would always be suspect. She would 
always be bound! When they had tied the last knot and left her there 
helpless and alone, she wept bitterly and fought in frantic futility against 
the cords. 

Before nightfall, after she had tended the tied girl's needs, Ma Billings 
sat beside the tautly stretched nudity on the bed. Looking down at her 
frightened captive Ma emitted her usual heavy sigh. "Honey, you ain't got no 
sense. What you do it for?" 

Gail sensed compassion. "At my age, wouldn't you have run?" She looked up in 
desperate appeal. "You're right, honey. I'd have run. But that don't change 
nothing. You're in for a bad time." 

"Please, couldn't I be chained instead of tied like this? I'll never manage 
to sleep. I'm so tight." 

"You'll sleep. Being tied this-a-way is the beginning. You ain't going to be 
very comfortable for quite some time, kid." 

"Will they really put a brand on me?" 

Ma Billings nodded somberly. "They'll brand you." She grinned in wry 
amusement. "You practically asked for it, y'know. They might never have done 
it if you hadn't headed for the border." She smiled down at the helpless 
girl. "Try not to think about it. It's bad, but I expect there's worse 
things. You'll live." 

They surveyed each other in a silent feminine communion. "Please, ma'am, 
don't put those chains back on my ankles." It was a plea Gail had to make. 
The heavy fetters had come to symbolize a lifetime slavery. Even with all 
its disasters the day had been good for the few hours she had spent without 
bonds. 

"Hell girl! How am I to keep you if I don't? You'd head for the hills every 
day." 

Gail understood. The problem was real enough for both of them. Miserably she 
offered, "How about parole? If I give you my word...?" 

Ma Billings grunted with small humour. "I thought o' that one myself, 
sweetheart. But I wouldn't wish it on a dog. You'd try and keep your word. I 
know you would. But every day you'd go through hell, again and again. The 
thought o' them little feet o' yours twinkling down the road would wear you 
down." 

Gail glimpsed truth. But still! "I'd sooner have that, ma'am, than those 
chains. They make me feel so... so hopeless!" She smiled winsomely at the 
older woman who possessed her. I'll be very obedient. I will... honest!" 

Ma bent and kissed her and went away. Once more Gail wept. In the night she 
slept. 

* * * 

"On her ass, for sure," Gutsy enthused. 

"Seems like a natural," Billings agreed. "But there's a thing or two against 
it. The kid won't be able to sit down for a month. And a gal's ass is made 
to be whipped. We can't go whipping a fresh brand." He grinned expansively, 
" 'Sides, the kid wants to be able to admire it herself. She don't want to 
have to back up to a mirror." 

"Above her right tit," Big Nose said with certainty. 

Gail cringed. Free of restraints, she stood with the three men in the barn 
as they discussed their Devil's work. Before her was the heavy wooden bench 
to which she would be tied. To one side was the perforated bucket with its 
glowing embers in which were buried the two irons that would burn through 
her skin so that she would wear their emblems all her life. She kept silent. 
It was too late for pleading. It was too late for anything... She listened 
breathlessly to learn where upon her body the crimson metal would sear. 

"Naw! That'd spoil a good thing," Gutsy countered. "Could she take one o' 
the irons each side of her cunt?" 

"Spread your legs, honey," Billings commanded. 

Gail obeyed, but suspected the notion impractical. After prolonged fingering 
the men agreed. "Want to do a good job for the kid," Big Nose conceded 
magnanimously. 

"Ain't but one place that's good all round," Billings judged weightily. 
"We'll put it on her thigh. Something to work on there, and it ain't going 
to be in the way o' nothing," he guffawed happily. "Any feller aiming to get 
a piece o' tail is going to know who she belongs to." Decision was 
unanimous. "Climb aboard, honey," Congressman Billings invited. In a maze of 
quivering apprehension, Gail stretched her nakedness upon the bench. It was 
hard and unyielding. She wondered if it had been made for such a purpose. 
The men tied her down with much care and forethought. She must not move. As 
the cords were shrewdly tightened, Gail knew she would not move. The timbers 
on which she lay were spaced with narrow apertures between so that the cords 
could circle and hold any part of her anywhere. When her ankles were made 
fast and her small waist cinched down, they took her hands and stretched 
them back behind her head. Tied thus they were lost to her. Obedient to 
their need she struggled, but scarcely moved. 

"Now a good one just above her knee," Billings decided. 

It was beastly. There was no doubting the purpose of this final stricture. 
Her thigh must not move when the glowing metal entered her skin and smoked 
its message for all to see. No matter how she surged in agony this cord must 
hold her still. They looped it twice and cinched it down far, far too tight 
so that she cried out in pain. 

"Won't be for long, sweetheart," Big Nose assured her jovially. "Have it off 
in no time." He patted her cheek paternally. 

He had diverted her. She had not seen. The iron found her flesh and burned 
its way slowly through her skin. 

Gail screamed many, many times. 

The three men watched and listened. This was their harvest. Their time of 
fruition. In the exquisiteness of a naked girl's agony they found their own 
Nirvana. The white limbs fought and bulged against the cords. But the girl 
did not move save for her head. She flung it madly from side to side. Her 
gaze passed over them without lingering, for in them was neither hope nor 
mercy. In her martyrdom to the brand Gail was utterly alone. 

Neatly and with care they pressed home the second iron. 

When they had looked and listened to their heart's content, they loosened 
the cord that bound her knee. Then, quietly without a word, they went away. 
Perhaps it was some rough decency, or perhaps they had reached a surfeit of 
ecstasy that prompted them to leave the branded girl to her moans and to 
herself. For several minutes she did not even know they had gone. 

When her thoughts again became coherent Gail found herself strangely glad to 
still be bound. She could not see her brand. She could not touch it. Thus it 
was not there. The agony in her thigh might go away. In such sad ways do 
naked slave girls find solace. They have much need of it. She was glad, too, 
to be alone. She wanted no leering faces moist with lust. Since the men had 
come she had been branded a hundred times by avid eyes. The male trio's 
preoccupation with her nudity had taught her much of the eternal hunger of 
Man. That she had been used to assuage it briefly was no comfort at all. 
Soon they would hunger again with an appetite that could not die. Beneath 
her hate there was sorrow. They were so driven! 

She hurt. A sickening searing hurt. But it was no worse than she had 
dreamed. Perhaps there is an ultimate pain beyond which we cannot go. Gail 
tried to arrange her thoughts. She was branded. So what now! Was she to be 
punished more for her escape! From things said it seemed quite possible. She 
miserably considered the whip. A girl can be whipped endlessly if her 
scourgings are sufficiently spaced. The burning iron had not erased her 
memory of the thong. Perhaps even today it would seek her flesh. 

Gail tested her bonds. They too hurt. She was tightly tied. She could not 
move. She had not expected to, but it was the ritualistic try. A girl always 
tried. She would lie upon the bench until they chose to come for her. She 
had no hope they would come without intent. In fearful obedience she would 
accept whatever it was in passive complacence. A brief vision of freedom 
crossed her mind. She quashed it. 

But they came without intent. All they wanted was a serving maid. "Ain't no 
one does it as good as you, honey," Billings assured her as the last cord 
fell away and he helped her to her feet. For a minute she stood, dazed and 
without restraint. Her eyes sought those of her masters. But they were 
focused elsewhere than on her face. Fearful of what she was to see she 
looked down at herself, beholding the scarlet indentions of the cords 
wherever they had held her. Then, in unquenchable fascination, seeking her 
brand. 

It was clear and precise and properly spaced. A perfect "B". She might one 
day escape from the Ranch, but never from its symbol. She would belong to 
the Bar-B forever. Her heart pounded, her breath caught in a gasp of emotion 
as she looked at the burnt black fringe at the edge of her wounds. It was 
her skin. It had been burned crisp as toast is burned within a toaster. But 
deep within her flesh was the real wound that looked as wounds do. It was 
not pretty. It would not be pretty for weeks or for months. But no one could 
doubt the proclamation of ownership. The emblem was not small. Gail was 
owned. 

"Prettiest thing I ever see," Billings breathed huskily. 

"Damn remarkable girl we got here," Big Nose said thoughtfully. 

"Gives me a hard on just to look," Gutsy contributed with reverence. 

Ma Billings viewed her captive's brand with lively interest. She was miffed 
at being excluded from the male rite. Angrily, she dispensed Southern 
Comfort in the glasses on Gail's tray. "It's a damn nice job, honey," she 
conceded. "There'll come a day when you'll be proud of it." She made another 
intent examination. "I'd better put a bandage on there for you, kid, but 
them fool men will want to feast their eyes. That there mark on your hide 
will keep 'em happy all afternoon. Your little asshole will probably get a 
bit o' wear and tear. Bound to affect 'em that-a-way." She straightened up 
and gripped her prisoner's arm, her eyes were unblinking. "Listen, gal'. 
Them bastards go to sleep again and you run, there'll be Hell to pay. I 
don't like you being free the way you are." She shook the captive arm. 
"Honey, you willing to promise me you'll behave?" 

A week before, such a promise would have been hard to make. But not today. 
The naked girl patted the hand that held her. "I promise, ma'am." Then added 
with a rueful smile, "It's not so much that I'll be a good girl. But I'm 
just too damn tired and I hurt too much." 

The two women found trust in each other's eyes. Gail picked up her tray. 

By Bar-B standards, for the captive girl, the afternoon was good. The men 
used her as the mood took them. But, mainly, they were content to sip the 
drinks she served and to feast their eyes on her nakedness and their work 
thereon. She posed for them and sipped the drinks they insisted she enjoy. 
They were immensely pleased with her as one is pleased with engaging pets. 
Gail stood and dreamed, or ran her errands. Even in her pain the freedom of 
her feet was a minor miracle. Sometimes the men's conversation slipped by 
her ears. But when they spoke of her she listened. 

"We was going to brand her anyway," said Gutsy. 

"You aim to let her get away with that running off caper?" from Big Nose. 

Billings laughed knowingly at their concern. "You boys would wear the poor 
gal' to a frazzle," he reproved. 

"It's a lesson I'd teach her," Gutsy affirmed. "If she's going to run every 
time you take the ball and chain off, she'd plumb wear me out." 

"We'll put Ma's chains back on her tomorrow before we leave," Billings 
announced. "Poor kid ain't going to run in them things." 

"I can't even walk!" The protest burst out of Gail spontaneously. 

They were amused. They enjoyed her sudden anger. 

"You sure do hate that clutter of hardware on your feet, don't you, honey?" 
Billings commented shrewdly. 

"Yes." Her answer was uncompromisingly emphatic. 

They laughed. She was fun. "But how they going to keep you down on the 
farm?" Gutsy chortled. 

"I'd give my word!" Gail raised her chin proudly. "And if I wasn't treated 
too cruelly I wouldn't break it either." 

"You got an 'if in there, kid," Billings admonished. 

"There's no need to be too cruel to me." Gail was sulkily defensive. 
"Everybody can have pleasure from me without that." 

"How 'bout a bit o' punishment for that escape act?" Billings probed. 

Gail wondered if she had struck a chord of sympathy. She would be 
reasonable. "Yes. If you think I deserve it, Sir." 

Three indrawn breaths paid her tribute. 

"That there girl's a treasure." Gutsy's praise was from the heart. 

"You got a decent cane, Everett boy, well lay it across her little butt," 
said Big Nose, enraptured. Billings grinned good humouredly. His gaze rested 
on the branded girl almost with affection. "We ain't going to do nothing 
drastic," he proclaimed. "She don't get branded every day. But this running 
off thing she's so hot on needs a cure. No running and jumping, that's the 
remedy. Our little lover girl's going to spend the night tied to that post 
out in the yard. Tied tight!" He turned to Gail, "You won't like that, will 
you, honey?" 

"No Sir." True, she would not like it. But it was better than she had 
feared. If only it would be Billings who would boss her for the nine months 
she might survive! She let him see gratitude in her eyes. 

"I'm thirsty as blazes," Big Nose hinted. 

Gail picked up her tray. 

They went to sleep. It was perhaps inevitable that they do so. They were 
replete with their alcohol and with her flesh. They were comic in their 
somnolence. But their captive dared not wake them. Nor did she dare the 
escape of the previous day. She believed she knew what was best to do. She 
went to Ma. 

"They're asleep again," she informed flatly. 

"And you come back to me instead of taking off?" Ma was pleased. 

"Yes ma'am. But I'll have to go back there and stand the way they want me." 
She paused and looked at her companion with a faint and rueful smile. 
"Please help." 

"What you want me to do, honey?" 

"Handcuff me. Behind my back." 

For a moment Ma Billings was nonplussed. Then, in approving sympathy, she 
laughed in genuine amusement. "Dammit, sweetheart, I think you got the right 
idea." She looked shrewdly at the naked girl who had made the strange 
request. "You don't want to stand there and be tempted, do you?" 

"No ma'am. With my wrists handcuffed behind my back there's no use me 
thinking of escape." 

Ma slapped her thigh in enjoyment of the situation. "I ought to refuse," she 
affirmed. "Ought to test you. See how good your word is. But Hell... ! This 
is too good to miss. See those silly bastard's faces when they wake up and 
find you like that. It's the easiest slap in the face I can give 'em!" 

Gail turned and placed her hands behind her back. There was always something 
frighteningly final about the clasp and snap of the metal bands upon her 
wrists; this time was no exception. But she was pleased. She had pleased Ma, 
she had removed herself from temptation. It would be fun to see the faces of 
the men... She tugged. "One notch tighter please," she pleaded. 

Chuckling with pure enjoyment, Ma made the handcuffs very tight indeed. 

Gail's pose was tiring. But it had become fun. She realized how great was 
her relief that the branding was done. It might hurt for days or weeks. But 
the awfulness was over. Added to this was thankfulness for the night to 
come. That a girl might be grateful to be tied naked to a post in a ranch 
yard throughout the hours of the night was a thing so bizarre that few would 
believe. Yet it was so. Gail had expected to be mercilessly whipped. Despite 
the pain of her brand her heart was lighter than it had been for two days. 
Such was the Bar-B. 

The handcuffs stayed. Once awake, the men had sheepishly changed the shining 
things from back to front so that their serving girl could continue her 
duties for their comfort. 

"Dammed if they don't suit her," Gutsy applauded. 

"Gal ought to wear 'em all the time," Big Nose approved. 

"I'm a' going to tell Ma that's the way to handle the filly," Billings said 
emphatically. "Gal ain't going to cut no capers with handcuffs on her little 
flippers. Damn sight better than that hundred-weight of scrap iron she was 
toting around." 

Gail was a guest at supper. Her hands were linked. But it was comparative 
freedom. They even let her bathe without a guard. She had long known that 
whilst handcuffs prohibited much, they also allowed a great deal more than 
might be supposed by a girl who had never worn them. She tidied herself and 
even used cosmetics. Perhaps it was silly for a girl who would spend her 
evening and night tied to a post, but she was female. She felt better. Not 
happy, but better. 

Gail pressed her naked back against the wood and passed her hands as far 
behind the post as she could get them. Her head was high. Her eyes roved 
reflectively from one to the other of the men who held the cords with which 
she was about to be bound. She was passive, but proud. It was only evening. 
Still light. Bound now, she would stand against her post for many, many 
hours before morning brought release. Perhaps this punishment she was about 
to suffer would demand and extract more from her than she had thought. But 
the die was cast. Cords circled her waist and were pulled very tight indeed 
until she was one with the timber that would companion her through the 
darkness. She relaxed. Her wrists were being competently dealt with by Big 
Nose. She felt sure Gutsy was tying her ankles tighter than he need. 

She would have no need to consider the hazard of escape. 

Each kissed her before returning to the house. Strange kisses from strange 
men. The kisses of an uncle, a grandfather, a cousin. No fleshy act, no 
thing of lust, but an accolade, a tribute. Perhaps the fumbling bussing was 
a thank-you for raptures given. There was no fingering or pinching or 
slapping. They ambled away and left her solitary, tied to her post in the 
waning light. 

Gail did not cry. At moments like this tears came easily. But she shed them 
not. She was still buoyed with the same relief that had sustained her 
through the afternoon. She did not relish the approaching night. But it was 
a hurdle to cross. Tomorrow the men would leave. Her life would revert to 
housework and being tied to a tree. She wondered if Ma could be converted to 
the idea of handcuffs instead of the weight of irons upon her ankles. 

It was a melancholy time. No matter how she tried, Gail could not sustain 
her optimism against the gathering dusk. She was lonely and she hurt and she 
was tired. Tied as she was she could hope for no more than cat-naps through 
the night. She was neatly tied. No more rope than would keep her totally 
secure. Ankles, wrists and waist. Her hands were bound in such a way as to 
hold her tight against the post. But her chest and shoulders suffered no 
cord. "You breathing against a rope all night, honey, it'll have you cut in 
two by morning," Billings had told her genially to explain a seeming 
humanity. Again, Gail knew gratitude, but it might have been easier to sleep 
with her shoulders held. Slumber is hard for those who stand. 

Total darkness brought fear. One by one the lights within the house went 
out. By midnight the naked girl was stranded alone in a sea of black. She 
felt adrift. Delivered to a Stygian and unfamiliar world. Objects seemed to 
move. The yard was peopled with eyes she could not see and creatures she 
could not name. But she could not move. She surrendered her nakedness to 
them and stood bound to her stake as thousands of others had stood in 
centuries past. She fell asleep. 

The hand upon her mouth wakened her. It was firm and strong. It muffled her 
startled cry. Big Nose stared back at her in amusement at her wide-eyed 
alarm. "Quiet now girl. Take it easy," he said gently. 

They took stock of each other. The man's demeanour eased her fear. It was 
replaced by puzzlement. Had he come to have sport with her body quietly on 
his own! "You want to get to Hell out of here, honey?" It was part 
statement, part question. Gail nodded. Her panting "Yes" seemed superfluous. 
"You want to go with me? Right now?" He meant business. But what business! 
Suspicion flared. He laughed quietly. "Don't trust me, do you, kid! Can't 
say I blame you. But look! We're not loaded with time. Here's what I'm 
offering 

" The doubt and hesitation on her face stopped him in mid-sentence. He said 
tersely, "I want you. I'm going to take you. Now! You can come willingly 
with a deal. Or you can come fighting without one. But you'll come." 

Gazing at the intensity of his expression, Gail knew herself within the grip 
of a new force. "What do you want?" she asked without optimism. 

His voice was urgent. He was a thief in the night, with no time for 
niceties. "You've got nine more months to put in here. I'll cut it in half. 
You'll be free by Thanksgiving. With me you won't be branded, you won't 
scrub floors. What do you say?" Gail writhed inwardly as well as against the 
cords that held her. Her mind raced. Big Nose had shown her no mercy. He had 
wanted to put a brand upon her breast. Everything was wrong! She wanted to 
turn to Ma Billings for the only female sustenance slavery offered. "Go 
away. Please leave me alone. You'll get us both in trouble." Her voice was a 
cry of anguish. 

"You're going to fight?" The question held regret. 

"Oh, don't be silly!" she wailed. "Do I look like fighting! I can't move. If 
you want to kidnap me, go ahead. I can't stop you and I won't fight you. I'm 
tired of the whole silly business." 

She sensed his disappointment. He had wanted justifications. Absurdly, Gail 
felt sympathy for his frustration. He had envisioned a grateful slave or a 
fighting female. "I wish you'd forget the whole thing," she said wearily. 
"But if it's something you have to do, then get on with it. I'm just going 
to stand still." 

His movements were decisive, planned. A noose 'round her neck, tethering her 
loosely to the pole. Then the swift cutting away of all her bonds. Gail 
stood free save for the tether. But she knew that, had she wished to fight, 
it would have defeated her. A naked girl cannot win against a powerful man 
when her neck is captive. Hard hands turned her and brought her arms behind 
her back in a compulsion she knew all too well. Her wrists were tightly 
tied, palm to palm. She gasped in pain and unvoiced protest as the cords 
found her elbows and bit savagely into soft flesh until her forearms were 
joined as one. He loosened the rope from the pole and used it as a leash to 
lead her to the car. 

It was nothing Gail had hoped for in her thoughts of escape. No glow of 
victory, no thankful turning of the back. She found Big Nose difficult to 
assess. She might be exchanging one slavery for another infinitely worse. 
She sat passively in the front seat while he tied her neck rope to a 
handrail behind. Whatever this man might be, he had her. She was his 
captive. The cruel bite of the thongs about her elbows told her of the 
futility of struggle. She would go where he wished to take her. 

Big Nose eased into the car beside her, started the engine and drove as 
noiselessly as possible from the Bar-B. When they were on the road that 
would take them to the highway, Gail twisted to sit sideways facing her 
abductor. It was more comfortable. With elbows tied she could not lean back 
against a seat, now she used her shoulder. Her branded thigh was held away 
from harm. It stared at them accusingly. The driver took a long approving 
look at his new captive. 

"Name's Harry Rattery," he said pleasantly. 

"What do I call you?" his slave girl asked without interest. "Master? Or do 
you prefer Sir? Or just plain Harry?" 

"Feeling your oats, ain't you, kid! You wouldn't have talked like that to 
Everett Billings." 

"Does it matter! I end up branded or whipped or something awful no matter 
how I act." Gail was in a mood to push her luck. She pushed it further. "I 
suppose you'll whip me?" 

"Yes I will." He was quite forthright about it. "I'll whip you for 
discipline, and I'll whip you because I like to see you squirm. Both good 
reasons." 

"For you they are. But I'm sick to death of being whipped. It's beastly. You 
men don't know how it hurts. You think it stings a girl a bit and she howls 
because she's a girl." 

"I can see we are going to have some interesting talks, honey." The Big Nose 
who was now Harry Rattery seemed more human. He gave her a swift keen 
glance. ""Just in case it bothers you I'll tell you now that I left our 
Congressman my check for a hundred-thousand. You may have been kidnapped, 
but you haven't been stolen." 

Gail wanted to respond. But she couldn't. It was too bizarre. The huge sum 
made her slavery frighteningly real. Harry Rattery was willing to pay 
because she had been neatly extracted from the stream of life and placed 
within a captivity that belonged a millennium ago. He could make her utterly 
his own in a way impossible with other girls. She had been kidnapped. But 
who cared! Perhaps not even the Billings! The cords bit at her, the brand 
burned, the rope chafed her neck. Tentatively, she angled. 

"All that money to possess me for a few months?" 

Rattery chuckled sardonically. "I offered you a deal. You turned it down. 
Now it's for life." He could do it! A cold hand clutched. Never again to be 
free! It was the thing Gail feared most. She tried to sound careless. 
"Couldn't I change my mind?" 

"No," he spoke seriously. "You'd have to try and change too much. I want 
totality. Utter obedience. An involvement beyond saying 'yes'." 

"I'm not likely to please you then?" 

"You will. I'm talking about an ideal, a dream. Not getting it doesn't spoil 
the other. You know _ 'half a loaf...." 

Gail was puzzled. "Where's your hill-billy speech?" 

Harry Rattery chuckled. "Just three boys having fun on Everett's ranch. Like 
putting on an old shirt and pants." 

"And whipping a helpless girl!" Gail was still bitter. 

"Don't play that tune too long, honey. It makes one damn good reason for 
striping your hide." 

"You'll never be short of reasons, Harry," Gail ventured recklessly. "You 
can make me do or be anything you want with the whip. You don't even have to 
use it. I'll say yes before you start." 

"You want to make it 'Harry'?" His tone was thoughtful. 

"Sure. Why not! Incidentally, Harry, how about taking this lousy cord off my 
elbows? It hurts like fury, and I'd be just as helpless with only my wrists 
tied." 

He laughed delightedly. "You're deliberately being too big for your 
breeches. Why?" 

"It just feels so damn good," Gail admitted. "I've been saying 'ma'am' and 
'sir' and 'yes' for so long. Sure! I know! You'll beat me into being abject. 
But give me the time it takes to get me to your prison." She eyed him slyly. 
"I suppose there'll be dungeons and chains and things?" 

"How else can I keep you from running?" 

"That's right. Make it sound like my fault!" 

"I hadn't planned on lacing into you first thing. But you're going to make 
me." 

"I'll take that for granted. Now! How about easing up on my elbows?" Gail 
made a pixie grimace and added the one word: "Master?" 

"Your elbows stay. So can the 'Master.' I like it." 

"Yes Master." She was provokingly demure. "And cut the sarcasm. It'll cost 
you." 

"Thank you, Master." She was honey and cream. "I like it," Harry Rattery 
admitted. "But I'll still take it out on your rump. If I give you an inch 
you'll twist me." 

The darkness sped by. Gail knew herself invisible to all save the man at the 
wheel. Doubtless they would reach their destination before daylight 
disclosed a bound and naked girl in his car. Rattery was safe. Kidnapping a 
girl was the simplest of acts. 

"If you don't untie my elbows I'll cry." 

"Go ahead. They're your tears." 

Gail had fully intended to make good her threat. But the salt drops refused 
her summons. "Alright! I won't then!" she said angrily making a virtue of 
necessity. "But if you're so damn unkind, how do you expect me to love you? 
That's what you want, isn't it?" 

He turned again, surveying his prize with more than approval. "Where did you 
pick up that bit of wisdom?" he asked soberly. 

"It's true, isn't it! All you ridiculous males long for girls to throw their 
arms round you in worship. But you never do anything to earn it." 

Harry Rattery made a sound of disgust. "It's a bitch! A man never grows out 
of it. What would I have to do to make you love me?" 

"Untie my elbows." 

They shared a chuckle. "If I believed you, I'd do it." He sounded seriously 
sincere. 

"Well, all fooling apart, I would feel a little warmth if you did untie me," 
Gail assured him defensively. 

"You'll stay tied," he told her slowly as though considering the decision. 
"Actually, I'd enjoy being a nice guy and loosening your elbows. But it's a 
wrong way to start. You need a halter. That's why I tied you like that. The 
pain keeps you knowing who and what you are. It works too, or you wouldn't 
keep harping on it." 

Was he right! Grudgingly, she supposed he was. If a slave girl was kept in 
pain she would constantly know herself slave. It was a thing easy to forget. 
She was still tingling with a residue of euphoria from her release from Ma 
Billings chains. She mused quietly for a minute before the agonies and 
stresses of the day took their toll. She fell asleep. Seeing what had 
happened, the man at the wheel smiled gently as though well satisfied. 

There is an exhaustion of the mind, the spirit and the flesh which can 
produce slumber drugged by weariness. So it was with Gail. She was aware of 
motion, of sounds, and of being lifted and carried. But she clung to her 
dark warm unconsciousness as does a child whose parent moves them in the 
night. There was a sense of comfort she made no effort to analyze as she 
drifted back into the deep safe darkness that held neither whips nor chains. 
From a great need she slept on hour after hour. 

Her awakening was gradual. It had come from satiety. Nothing had disturbed 
her. She was laying on a flat hard surface. She felt the rough wool of a 
blanket. Lifting a hand to sweep the hair from her face, the other followed. 
She was handcuffed. Kicking her feet she found them free. She was still 
naked. She sat up. 

She was in a shining metal cage that occupied the centre of a vaulted stone 
chamber. Windows high in the walls provided ample light, but gave no view. 
The air was warm. This was all: the cage, herself within it, and a blanket. 
She looked at the handcuffs snug upon her wrists. She shrugged. At least 
they were not behind her back. That was always something for which to be 
most thankful. She examined the Bar-B brand upon her thigh. It was red and 
angry. She wished it was bandaged. Slowly she got to her feet and stretched. 
She felt rested and replete. 

The cage in which she was captive was beautifully constructed. Its door 
barely distinguishable from the rest. Gail shook the bars. It did not move. 
She examined the lock and knew she would never open the door by her own 
efforts. She walked the small circumference of her new prison. It was small. 
She judged its diameter as no more than eight feet. It was circular, a 
simulation of the conventional bird cage, its peaked top well above her 
head, but not reaching the ceiling. The bars of the cage were substantial, 
their metal of steel, chrome, alloy... she could not tell. It had about it 
the quality of chaste femininity. It was a girl-cage. 

Gail tried all the bars. They were firm. As do most prisoners, she ended her 
tour by holding one with her joined hands and gazing wistfully at the 
freedom beyond. She supposed a cage might be better than a dungeon. But it 
would be more frustrating. Surveying the floor, her heart leaped at the ring 
and the outline of a trap. It responded easily to her tug. She blushed at 
what she found. It was a flush toilet within a small concrete well that 
would accept her feet but no more. With a mixture of thankfulness and 
apprehension she used it, her eyes anxiously upon the closed door of her 
stone prison. The act, within a cage, was strangely shaming for a girl. 
Suppose the door had opened! But it did not open. It was a monolithic 
forbidding door, made to be closed and locked. Perhaps it would never open! 
As Gail closed the trap and let the ring fall back into its channel flush 
with the floor, the significance of the facility she had just used struck 
her with frightening logic. She need never be taken from the cage! She could 
be kept in it for life if someone so desired. All her other needs could be 
dealt with through the bars. For life! Gail shuddered. So easy, so 
plausible! Was that what Rattery wanted! She remembered the lines of an old 
song: "A bird in a gilded cage...." 

Why the handcuffs! She could never escape the cage, so why chain her hands! 
But that was part of it; the same as the cords 'round her elbows that still 
left their pink indentations in her skin. The handcuffs would be the 
constant reminder. With her hands linked by the shining metal she would 
suffer awareness of slavery always. She would not forget. 

Would the door suddenly open and Harry Rattery come and look at her through 
the bars of her cage! She shrank from the thought. She felt many times more 
naked than standing face to face or within the confines of a room. It would 
be the incongruity of being free to move but unable to shield herself from 
public view. The airy openness of this confinement seemed to make her more 
vulnerable than bonds. 

It was lonely. Having exhausted exploration, Gail reclined on the blanket. 
She was aware of hunger and a wish that someone would come. For three months 
she had been a prisoner at the Bar-B, but nothing there had conditioned her 
for this cage and its implications. She knew that, if left alone long 
enough, it would be easy to panic. To shout to make someone come, if only to 
beat her. But would they come! Would anyone even hear! She could see herself 
frantically tugging at the bars... 

It was a woman: in her thirties, charm and poise and a wide-lipped mouth and 
calm amused eyes. She carried a tray. Her voice was unhurried, casual, 
educated. 

"You may call me Grace. It is my name. No, I will not remove your handcuffs. 
No, I will not let you out of your cage. Yes, I will whip you, but not now. 
You may eat and talk to me naturally. We are two girls together. You may ask 
questions. I will answer those I wish. You will notice the small horizontal 
aperture close to the floor. I will pass this tray through it. There is 
food, and there are dressings and medication for your brand." 

Hunger vied with curiosity, and for a short time won the battle. But Gail 
was female. "Where's Harry Rattery?" she asked, munching busily. "Sudden 
business. Don't know when he'll be back. You're mine." 

"Are you Mrs. Rattery?" 

"As close as anyone ever comes." There was an undefinable emotion in the 
voice. 

"What are you going to do with me, Grace?" How strange to use a name! 

"Train you. In obedience." 

"Does that mean I get whipped twice a day?" 

"Three times if you deserve it." Grace's voice was amused, but very firm. "I 
might even stretch it to four." 

"You'll take me out of this cage then?" 

"Not necessarily. This cage can be your whip." Grace smiled enigmatically. 
"You look delightful in there." 

"You know about the Bar-B?" 

"Harry told me, and about your brand, and about your enhanced facility at 
the rear." 

Gail flushed. "He didn't need to tell you that." 

Grace laughed. "You mean because I won't be using it! Don't worry. I won't 
bandy it around." 

"Is that all he wants me for? To use... to use that?" 

"Good gracious no! This cage has been here for ages. Waiting for you." 

"Waiting for me?" 

"Harry had a dream. You're it. He always knew he'd find you." Gail pondered, 
puzzled. "You mean you don't mind! You'll let him keep me around?" 

"Why not! I'll share you; that's a small dividend." Once again there was the 
small emotion in the voice. "Besides, I can't stop him. And I'm damn sure 
you can't." 

"How'd you like to be locked in a cage?" Gail asked slyly. 

Grace laughed cheerfully. "You don't suppose I haven't been, do you! I once 
spent a month in there without the door ever being opened. Handcuffs and 
all...." 

"What on earth did you do! To earn it, I mean?" 

"Slapped his face." 

"That's all!" 

"With Harry Rattery that's too much. Watch it, kid! But the training will 
help. I'll whip you into the desired pattern. Quite literally!" 

"Grace," the captive girl searched for the right words. "Why won't you let 
me go? You could set me free. So easily...." 

"There are a lot of 'why's' about your imprisonment. You can answer them as 
well as I can." 

"It's for life, isn't it? He'll never let me go?" 

"I can't begin to answer that one. You'll have to ask Harry." 

"Please let me go! Please... ! While he's not here. You could! Oh, can't you 
understand! It's my life I'm pleading for. I don't want to spend it locked 
in a cage." 

"No, I won't let you go. And from now on, every time you ask you'll be 
punished. Forget it. I'd think you'd be thankful for the cage. Must be 
easier to take than the Bar-B." 

"I'm sorry. You're right. But it's claustrophobic. Perhaps I'll get used to 
it." Gail was anxious to placate. 

Laughing, Grace retrieved the tray. "Get used to it, honey. I've got the 
key. But if I use it you'll smart. Your training includes looking sweet 
behind the bars. Practice. You're a natural." 

The girl in the cage looked doubtfully at the closing door. It thudded shut 
with an eloquent finality. On the basis of first things first she went to 
work with the dressings on her brand. The handcuffs imposed a challenge when 
it came time to wind the bandage. But, using both hands and teeth, she 
achieved a result of which she was proud. The neat white band upon her thigh 
seemed a feminine badge of distinction. A further search beneath the trap in 
the floor disclosed a small hand bowl and a faucet. She could wash and she 
could drink. There were even towels. She longed to knot one about her loins. 
But did not dare. But when all was done, she remained a naked girl in a 
cage. She made herself as comfortable as she could upon her blanket and 
considered her plight. Except for the ache of the brand, she did not hurt. 
That was something! Apart from the bandaging, the handcuffs did not matter. 
She could wear them as bracelets. That they were joined mattered not within 
the cage. Outside the bars they would deter resistance. Handcuffs, for Gail, 
were an understandable facility of her slavery. She would wear them without 
protest. For the rest, she could see only that she had exchanged Ma Billings 
for Grace, and Harry Rattery for the Congressman. The cage was better than 
the Bar-B barn inasmuch as, in the barn, she was tied or punished, in the 
cage she was relatively free. But she reserved judgement on the cage. It had 
a quality all its own. It had a power over her that she sensed but could not 
define. 

Its power grew. She found herself walking from side to side, grasping the 
bars and pressing her face between them as though there was something to 
see. But there was nothing. Stone walls, and windows that showed only the 
sky. A door that might stay implacably closed. She was a caged thing, quite 
alone. She thought of all the living things that were kept in cages all 
their lives. She was ready to weep for them and for herself. Surely they 
could not feel the oppression of their small latticed prison as she was 
feeling hers! But supposing they did... ! 

Walk and sit; walk and sit! Press against the bars or ignore them. Dream... 
let her thoughts wander! But to what end! She wanted only freedom. The steel 
upon her wrists and the steel of her cage made a mockery of freedom. It was 
like wishing you had a million dollars. She examined hope. For naked girls 
in cages, in dungeons or in chains, hope is the cruelest thing of all. Hope 
is those few dry crusts that prolong starvation. It denies you but will not 
die. It beckons tantalizingly as a mirage in the desert of captivity. For 
Gail, hope had been sustained by Neil, and Dulcie, and an occasional kindly 
glint in Ma. Billings eye. Now Grace would nourish it with a pleasant smile 
and a cultivated voice. 

There was no hope! 

It was a long, long afternoon. When the light slowly waned, the captive girl 
was forced to face a thing she feared. She passionately wanted Grace to 
come. But Grace would not. She was getting hungry. But there would be no 
food. She did not want to be alone through the dark hours. But she would be 
alone. She would huddle upon the blanket within her cage, and when the new 
day dawned she would still be there, the cuffs upon her wrists, gazing with 
fading hope at a door that did not open. Slowly the potency of the cage 
seeped into her being. Grace had said it doubled for the whip. Gail 
understood. Miserably, she knew that if she was now offered a choice she 
would buy her freedom from the cage with stripes. But there was no choice. 
The cage possessed her. 

Time had become nebulous. The hours were lost to her. She would never know 
the time. The hours of darkness or of light would be her only divisions of 
the day. She was captive within a vacuum. Gail told herself it did not 
matter. Even if she could number each hour, none would have significance. 
The time at which she be fed was of another's choosing and might never be 
the same. But to be so adrift was frightening. Time was one more anchor she 
had lost. 

She slept when darkness came. Fitfully, strangely conscious of the cage. In 
the moments when she woke she tried not to look beyond the bars. There were 
ghosts in the black shadows. The bars would hold her secure, but would not 
hold the demons of the dark at bay. She buried her face in her naked arms 
seeking sanctuary. How small a weapon of defense was sleep! 

Daylight brought both hunger and fear. The previous day had provided only 
the one meal. Evidently hunger was a part of being in the cage. To keep her 
hungry was a deliberate act. She supposed it was to keep her humble and 
anxious to please. The fear grew with the daylight. Each hour the door 
remained shut made it seem less likely that it would ever open. She knew, 
cringingly, that it did not have to open. Grace could feed her every second 
day, or every third day, or not at all. Grace could leave her in the cage 
alone with her thoughts, her fears and her hunger. Gail glimpsed herself 
becoming amenable to anything. Her need to get out of the confined yet airy 
space was becoming compulsive. 

"Sad feeling, isn't it, honey!" Grace's amused voice came from a door opened 
silently while the prisoner's eyes had been elsewhere. 

Gail was ashamed of her eager thankfulness. Life had returned. Grace brought 
hope as well as food. Her instinct was to voice her thankfulness. But 
prudence intervened. Best not be too abject too soon. But she ate with zest. 
Hunger brought no shame. 

"Want to get out of the cage, honey?" Grace asked casually. Gail sensed the 
question did not herald release. But she played the game. "Yes!" She made 
the one word as emphatic as she could. 

"You know you're not going to, don't you?" 

"I know." Her admission was grudging. Grace was having fun. Over the coffee 
cup her eyes sought the woman who held the key. "Why are you keeping me in 
here? If you let me out I'll be obedient. I'll do whatever you tell me." 

Grace leaned against the bars, looking in as a prisoner looks out. "There 
are subtleties about being a slave girl that I'm sure you've glimpsed," she 
said cheerfully. "You've just offered your all. But it has no market value. 
It's not really yours to give. You are a piece of valuable merchandise being 
polished and improved. You won't enjoy the polishing, but you're not 
supposed to." 

"If you leave me in here long enough I'll start getting queer in the head." 

"We tell ourselves that. But it doesn't happen. Remember, I know." 

Gail looked up at the soft quiet eyes. "Were you left alone like this? All 
day?" 

Grace laughed ruefully in retrospect. "Harry was an absolute bastard. I 
never knew. He'd leave me a day, or even several days. I thought I'd go 
crazy once, it was so long. When he showed up I did everything, pleaded and 
begged and got on my knees. But he just smiled at me as though I was an 
interesting specimen. Another day he'd be in here half the time talking. But 
he always kept me hungry. Being hungry does something to a girl. Makes us 
realize our dependence on the holy male, I suppose." 

"Do you have to keep me hungry?" Gail looked up pleadingly over the last 
morsel of her food. 

"Of course! It's part of the cage. It has its effect. Can't you tell?" 

Gail could tell. "Please let me out for five minutes," she asked 
spontaneously. 

"Doesn't seem much to ask, I know, honey," Grace mused. "I used to ask Harry 
all the time. But it breaks the chain. Undoes the work already 
accomplished." She laughed reflectively. "I even asked to be taken out and 
whipped, or hurt in some other way. Anything at all so long as I could 
stretch my legs and not see things through bars." 

"Take me out and whip me please!" It was a cry of agony. 

Grace tensed. She studied her prisoner intently. Gail's plea had touched 
her. Perhaps she remembered... 

"Alright," she said without emphasis. "If it means that much to you. Are you 
sure it does?" 

Gail was suddenly not sure at all. Why add pain, probably quite terrible 
pain, to the isolation of the cage! But she had asked, and her wish had been 
granted... 

"Thank you, Grace." Her words were humble and sincere. She would show 
neither weakness or ingratitude. That she was prepared to pay a most 
terrible price for a few minutes beyond the bars was irrelevant. "I'll hurt 
you, you know. I won't play at it?" 

"Of course! Why not! That's always the deal, isn't it." 

"You're handcuffed. But you can still act up. Are you going to?" 

"No. Honest! It would be silly. I couldn't win." 

"I'll cane your bottom." Gail shrugged. "Whatever you wish, Grace." 

"You're a cool one, honey." The older girl's voice held interest. "If it was 
not for all those marks on you I'd suppose you didn't know what you were 
letting yourself in for." 

Gail returned a wry grin. "You'll tie me, won't you please? I'm not very 
good at standing still while... while it happens." 

Once more, quite suddenly, they were two girls together laughing at 
incongruity. There was a warm complicity in the opening of the door. 
Stepping through the aperture was unreal. Gail could scarcely believe it was 
happening. "If it wasn't for my handcuffs I'd hug you, Grace." The 
declaration was real, without affectation. 

Suddenly the captive hands were raised and a sleek head inserted itself 
between the prisoned arms. "I can hug you, sweetheart," Grace assured her 
captive ardently. She proceeded to do so. Lips met lips in an unsuspected 
hunger, assuaging a loneliness deep within each female heart. Their kisses 
went on and on. Gail's chained hands fought to clutch and hold in frantic 
joy. 

"You are still going to be whipped, honeypot," Grace's lips whispered into 
the pink ear they were nibbling. 

"I know. It doesn't matter. I'm... I'm glad." At that moment the naked girl 
wanted only the woman in her grasp, and whatever things that woman might do 
to her. Over a soft shoulder she beheld the empty cage. It looked defeated. 

"You know why I'm going to do it, don't you, darling?" The whisper held 
mischief. 

"Of course. It's because you want to. Why not!" Gail asked happily. 

"I'll love whipping you. I'm ashamed." Grace was not ashamed at all. 

"Don't be," Gail giggled. "Everybody else has. You might as well. Besides, 
it's s small thing to pay for getting out of that damn cage. Will you let me 
out regularly?" 

Grace's arms tightened about the slender nakedness. "When I'm through with 
you today you won't ask that." 

Gail closed her mind. She wanted to think of nothing beyond that moment. Her 
need of human communion was so great that cages and whips seemed as nothing 
compared to the reality of being held and feeling the warmth of lips against 
her own. 

"Harry's thought of everything." There was half an apology in Grace's 
deprecating laugh. "You put those cute little ankles in the circles." From 
the vantage point of her cage Gail had been aware of objects as fixtures of 
the larger stone chamber. The purpose of most was obvious enough. They were 
implicit to her condition as was the cage itself. She accepted them as no 
more than to be expected. She viewed, now, the neat metal facility bolted to 
the floor. Its leather strap was obviously awaiting her. Its purpose left 
her more curious than afraid. Obeying Grace's injunction she placed her 
ankles as directed and watched as they were tightly strapped and buckled by 
deft strong fingers. 

It was beautifully simple. The small frame held her feet six inches apart so 
that she stood. And that was all she would do: stand. She was, in actuality, 
rooted to the floor. "I'm not going anywhere, am I," she conceded ruefully. 
"It's a neat idea." 

"Nice for our first time," Grace agreed. "I could fasten you in all sorts of 
ways. Some of 'em so you couldn't even wiggle. But standing there with just 
the ankle clamps and handcuffs you can hold on to as much dignity as you 
feel you want to. Comfy?" 

"I suppose I am," Gail admitted wonderingly. "Do you want me to just stand 
like this to have my bottom caned? Or do I bend over?" 

"We'll do both. We may as well make a fun thing of it, even if it does hurt 
you shockingly." 

"And afterwards, do I have to go back in the cage?" 

"Of course! Remember my warning, darling. Don't plead." 

"I won't. I promise." Gail forgot her claustrophobia in this fresh glory of 
someone to talk to. That that someone was about to give her exquisite pain 
seemed curiously unimportant. 

From a cupboard, Grace produced the implement she would use to punish the 
naked helplessness that stood so straight and unconcerned. With an impish 
grin she handed it to the waiting girl. "It's going to kiss your bottom, 
sweetheart. The least you can do is return the compliment." 

Gail took the slender springy length in her chained hands. Her eyes glinting 
mischief at the watching woman. She raised it to her lips and kissed it 
lingeringly. Awkwardly with her joined hands she made it cut the air and 
whine. With a moue of distaste she returned it to the waiting hand that 
would use it to stripe her flesh. The two girls smiled at each other in an 
infinite wisdom. They were female. 

In darkness we seek the light. In agony the dark is kind. We seek it that 
others shall not see our pain, and because, within its shroud, we will not 
watch the thing we fear. Gail buried her face in her hands as the cane she 
had kissed whirred its knifing of the air to find her flesh. 

She took the first two strokes without a sound. She bent and twisted under 
the impacts, but managed not to cry aloud. Handcuffed, she could shield 
nothing. But she was grateful for her hands. It was a new sensation that 
they be relatively free while she was whipped. But her feet were lost to 
her. She could not move from where she stood. That, too, was strange. Her 
fettering was ingenious and imaginative. The cane bit at her cruelly. She 
knew she would not long be stoic. 

"You're quite delightful, you lovely honeypot." Grace lowered her cane and 
examined its work. "You mark beautifully, Gail. I wish you could see your 
stripes. They're coming up wonderfully." 

Gail came out from behind her hands. She was pale and her breathing was 
uncertain. She was close to tears. But, as something to be shared, she 
twisted and turned to see as much of her punished bottom as is ever possible 
for its owner to behold without the aid of a mirror. What she could see, 
coupled with what she could feel, assured her the total effect must indeed 
be something to exclaim over. 

"Now, how about touching your toes for a few, darling?" 

"That's an order, isn't it?" the captive asked sadly. "You do know, don't 
you? It hurts twice as much bent over." 

"It does indeed, sweetheart. I know!" Grace agreed brightly. "Now, over you 
go. I want a nice round tight bottom. I also want you to take the first one 
without a quiver or a sound. Let's test your character. After that you can 
howl and twist all you want. You can even straighten up. Just so long as you 
bend right down again." 

Gail supposed it could be worse. But not much. Grace was hitting her 
expertly and hard. To remain without response for even one stroke was a 
Herculean task. She clenched her teeth and bent forward to greet her 
fettered feet with her fastened hands. Almost instantly her world shattered 
into a myriad sensations. All awful. All unbearable. For moments she was 
consumed and destroyed. But she did not move. She made no sound save for the 
breaths indrawn and exhaled through flaring nostrils. She waited impatiently 
for the next that she might scream. 

"You're quite wonderful, darling. And, incidentally, you may stand up." 
Grace was breathing fast. She was excited. 

Gail had lost count. It was not until Grace's words impinged her 
consciousness that she understood the cessation of the scalding inflictions 
on her bottom. Gratefully, she straightened. Then, pathetically and in 
futility tried to touch her wounds. Failing in this instinctive motion she 
apologetically met Grace's quizzical gaze. 

"I'm sorry... ! About the noise... I always do it. I can't help it. Maybe 
you should gag me." She smiled winsomely as though a gag was a welcome 
trifle. 

Grace kissed her with a deep sensual enjoyment. "You are quite something, 
honeypot. I shouldn't have started this. I don't want to stop. How much can 
you stand?" 

"I don't know." Gail managed a pale giggle. "Do you have to hit me so hard? 
I mean, is there some sort of standard you have to live up to? Gee, it 
hurts!" 

"Harry and I talked about that," Grace told her. "He says that if you don't 
do it right why do it at all." She shrugged resignedly. "I didn't have much 
to say about it since I was on the receiving end. But yes, I suppose it's a 
policy of the house. Sorry, Sweetheart." She looked shrewdly at her captive. 
"Think you'll want to get out of your cage tomorrow?" 

Gail found the question easy to answer. "Right now the answer is no," she 
admitted. "But I'm scared in that cage. Tomorrow I'll want out. I'm almost 
sure of it." She looked at her Mistress pathetically. "Couldn't you come and 
see me sometimes? Must I be left all alone and hungry?" 

"House rules again, honey. I'm not an unfaithful servant. I do what I'm 
told. I'm brainwashed, I suppose...." 

"What will he... I mean, Harry Battery, do with me when he comes back?" 

"What will men ever do with a girl! We both can think of two things. 
Probably I shouldn't mark your skin too much after this. You belong to him. 
But he has a thing about that cage. He may not whip you at all. He may just 
stand and feast his eyes. You look damn sweet in there. I can sort of 
understand how he feels." 

"It's true, isn't it! I could be in there for always?" Gail's handcuffed 
hands flew to her lips as though stifling a cry of desolation. 

There was a touch of cynicism in Grace's chuckle. "I wouldn't worry too 
much. If Harry looks at you naked in that cage long enough he'll take you 
out and do things to you that may make you wish you were back in there. All 
joking apart, Honey, if it wasn't for boredom that cage would be a good 
place to be. I sometimes wish I was back in there myself. And now, darling, 
are you going to watch me hit you, or are you going to politely look the 
other way?" 

Gail politely looked the other way. 

It hurt just as much. 

It was an awkward moment for both when the strap was loosened from the slim 
ankles. Gail kicked in experimental relief and again tried to reach her 
flaming bottom. But between them was the cage. Gail knew she should 
resolutely march into it without waiting for the order. But it was the last 
thing she wished to do. Grace held the reins of authority. The captive 
treasured every moment she could squeeze from her jailer's tolerance. They 
looked at each other and grinned. 

"O.K. Honeypot." Unmistakably it was the dread command. 

Gail could not end it easily. Her handcuffs impeding an attempted embrace, 
she did manage to kiss the woman who had whipped her in kindness. How 
strange to be grateful for a thrashing! But a slave girl's life is all 
anomaly. She was deeply grateful for what she had found and been given in 
this time beyond the bars. Grace hugged her soundly and with fervour. "Get 
back in there, honeypot, before I do something I'll be sorry for." She gave 
her charge a gentle push. 

The act of stepping through the door was one Gail would always remember. It 
was as though the daylight was quenched, as though all hope had been left 
behind, as though she would never again feel the touch of lips and tender 
hands. She told herself manfully that she was being fanciful. But within the 
bright chamber and within the bright and shining cage the light had dimmed. 
The captive stood disconsolately and watched Grace close and lock the door. 
She looked at her chained wrists and at the surrounding bars. She watched 
the woman who was now her only friend go to the door and close it behind her 
with a soft thud. Gail sat upon her blanket and wept. Wept with a bitterness 
beyond the power of the whip. She belonged to the Cage. It possessed her. 
She would never, never escape! 

Why tell of the hours and the days! They passed as all things pass. Gail 
could never believe they would. But they did. Naked in her cage, with the 
handcuffs firmly clamped upon her wrists, she fought her battles with 
loneliness, with hunger and with fear. Through it all she came to love the 
woman who kept her there. So strange a love! So inverse an emotion! But such 
is slavery! Gail was a slave girl. Throughout her days within the silver 
cage, she came to know it as she could know it in no other way. Perhaps, 
within the omnipotence of those who owned her, the Cage made sense. It held 
and moulded her. 

Between the captive girl and the woman called Grace there grew a rapport. 
Both were lonely. Both in separate ways were owned. Despite desperate pleas 
that grew in intensity day by day, Grace refused to again whip or cane the 
girl in the cage. The door was not again opened. Grace feared herself and 
the temptations of her captive's scented flesh. Or perhaps it was her 
Master's anger that she feared. But whatever it was the door remained 
closed, and the naked girl within the bars had to be content with the press 
of lips between the bars, the touch of a questing hand, or the feel of 
breast against breast as the cage separated them. The Cage won every battle 
and every round. 

But the awareness that grew between them told Gail of the final day. Not 
necessarily that she would leave her cage, but that Harry Rattery would 
return to claim that for which he had paid so high a price. Gail wondered, 
bitterly, if her rectum had shrunk back to normal from lack of use. She 
would soon know. If it had, she would probably be whipped. All 
disappointments are a slave's fault. There are no extenuations. 

Grace saw no reason to keep her captive uninformed. Before the day itself 
she told Gail of their Master's return. On the morrow it might be he who 
carried in the tray. Gail reflected he would more likely carry a whip. But 
she did not care. If only he did not sit and look! She did not want to be a 
lovebird in a cage. 

The naked handcuffed girl cherished her own laughter at the absurdity of her 
excitement. By no stretch of her imagination could Battery's return bring 
aught else but stripes upon her skin or shame upon her psyche. Yet she 
welcomed him. She supposed that this, too, was the function of her silver 
cage. It made the little bird within its bars so very grateful, grateful for 
anything. She was hungry for food and for change. She watched the door. She 
watched the door as though its opening meant freedom instead of a deeper 
slavery. 

Dulcie was naked. Dulcie was bewildered. Dulcie was far from home. Dulcie 
was handcuffed, hands behind her back. Whoever had propelled her within the 
chamber pulled tight the door behind the shrinking teenager's back. Dulcie 
looked about her with an infinite astonishment. An amazement more than 
shared by the girl inside the cage. When their eyes met and locked, the 
newcomer uttered a cry of joy and of relief that gladdened the captive's 
heart. 

"Gail! How come? Why!" 

Gail told her. 

The teenager clutched the bars as though as anxious to enter within them as 
was the caged girl to get out. "I knew you'd gone, but I didn't know how," 
she panted. "Oh Gail! You look darling in there!" 

"I don't feel darling. How on Earth did you get here?" 

Dulcie grinned imperturbably. 1 told you I'd get away. It worked out sorta' 
funny." She giggled. "I propositioned Harry. He went and told Pa. Know what 
Pa said?" 

Gail shook her head. 

"Pa said for him to take me and whale the daylights out of me until I grow 
up." She giggled again. "That's what he's been doing." 

Gail saw, now, that which she had not noticed. The teenager's skin was 
plentifully coloured by the marks of cane and whip. It might have been 
supposed such striations would have dampened her ardour for escape from the 
Bar-B Ranch. But her sparkling eyes and excitement belied the premise. "But 
where have you been? Are you a prisoner?" Gail was nonplussed. 

Dulcie turned her back and wiggled her chained hands. "I suppose I'm some 
sort of prisoner," she conceded carelessly. She turned back to the cage, 
eyes glowing. "That Harry Rattery! He does the damndest things with these 
handcuffs. He's had me fixed more ways than Friday. But mostly he shows me a 
bang-up time." 

Gail's question must have shown in her eyes. Dulcie produced more giggles. 
"Oh sure, he screws me! That's what you want to know, I can tell. 
Super-dooper, ain't he!" 

Gail was about to make an icy retort, but thought better of it. Curiosity, 
however, triumphed. "Where... how -" She broke off in confusion. 

But the teenage captive was impervious to shock or shame. She laughed 
delightedly. "He calls me his cunt kid. He tried in back, but Ma never fixed 
me the way she done you, so it didn't work too good. Harry's awful anxious 
to get at you. He likes you. He thinks you're something special." Again the 
giggle. "I'm pretty sure he's going to give you a real bad time." Dulcie 
took a quick glance at the cage. "I say, can't you get out of that thing?" 

"You don't think I'd be in here if I could," Gail said bitterly. 

The youthful visitor walked the circumference of the silver prison, eyeing 
all she saw with obvious approval. "You really look cute in there, Gail. I 
think it's sweet. Why are you handcuffed?" 

"Why are you!" Gail exclaimed cynically. "We are handcuffed to keep us in a 
proper frame of mind." 

Both girls turned, startled. Harry Rattery entered. He wore a wide smile and 
carried a tray. With incredulous amusement he watched Gail attack her daily 
meal. "You always that hungry?" he inquired. 

"Why wouldn't I be! You left orders to starve me. Please let me out of this 
cage." 

"Well, that's a fine welcome! Ain't you glad to see me?" 

"I would be if you let me out and fed me regularly." 

"How about I whip your ass?" Gail shrugged, unconcerned. "If you have to. 
Just so long as I get out of this canary cage." 

"You ain't going to get out, honey. Not talking that-a-way." Big Nose was 
back. 

"Please, dear Master, let your little slave girl out of her cage so she can 
adore you." Gail's sarcasm was nullified by a mouthful of food. 

"That's only a little better," Rattery conceded. He turned to the adoring 
Dulcie. "You ever aim to treat me offhand like that?" 

"Take my handcuffs off, Harry, and I'll treat you real good," Dulcie 
promised without shame. 

"See what I mean?" Rattery demanded of Gail. 

"She's got enough whip marks to say yes to anything." The eating girl was 
unimpressed. 

"Maybe you need a few, honey?" 

"I'm sure I'll get them. Part of the curriculum, I understand." Gail speared 
a potato. "Forgive me for starving. That's been part of the curriculum, 
too." 

"There's a lot of that there curriculum you ain't even seen, honey," Harry 
Rattery assured her darkly. He opened the cage door and motioned to the 
wide-eyed Dulcie. "In you get, kid." 

Obviously intrigued as though given a privilege, the teenager stepped 
daintily through the aperture. Stopping beside her owner, she asked, archly, 
"Aren't you going to take off these lousy handcuffs, lover boy?" 

Rattery slapped her bottom. "No, I'm not. Get in there. Some short rations 
would do you no harm." 

Dulcie stepped beside the eating incumbent. She turned saucily and stuck out 
her tongue at the grinning Harry. "There! I don't care! I like handcuffs. 
And anyway, it's her you've come to whip, not me." 

Harry good humouredly ignored the pert youngster who was so obviously 
unafraid of him. He beckoned to Gail. "This way, honey." 

"You wanted to get out of that cage." He made to shut the door. 

"Oh alright!" Gail abandoned the last of her food and dived for the narrow 
space. After her the door slammed and the lock clicked. Dulcie was caged. 
Gail managed a reasonably genuine smile for the man whose bidding she must 
now do. Without being told, she walked to the clamps and placed her ankles 
within their circles. "I expect this is it, isn't it?" she asked 
diffidently. 

Rattery was pleased. "Guess you were just hungry," he conceded. "Doing much 
better now. Not that one, honey, those there." 

Gail followed his gesture. Close by there was not one, but two, of the 
restraints. These were made for individual feet. Without a word she changed 
places, placing her ankles where they would be fastened. Blushingly, she 
realized she was widely straddled. Trust a man! Shamed, she watched the 
straps clutch and tighten until she could not move from the obscene posture. 
Rattery must have enjoyed her whipping in the barn. Her silky triangle was 
now again similarly exposed. It would be beastly to suffer while Dulcie 
watched. Docile, she extended her cuffed wrists for whatever he wished to do 
with them. 

"They're O.K. honey. Leave 'em be." He was grinning with a vast enjoyment at 
her confusion. 

Suddenly Gail understood. Her cheeks that had been pink now flamed scarlet. 
"Oh no! Please, no. Not in front of -" 

"Nothing the kid hasn't seen before, honeybunch," Big Nose consoled. "Fact 
is she's sorta' interested." 

"You've promised her...!" Gail accused. It was taking all her will power to 
refrain from covering her sex with her joined hands. "But, please! What 
about me? It's horrible." 

"Well then, what d'you say to the cage for a month with meals twice a week, 
sweetheart? Would you like that better?" The helpless naked girl looked at 
the male who held the power. He owned her. He could do what he liked. He was 
watching, with undisguised amusement, the emotions flit across her face. She 
glared in fury and shame, but said no word. She bent forward and touched her 
toes. It was only when she had shut her eyes that she heard the metallic 
zing of a zipper thrust down all the way. She clenched her teeth. She knew 
her posture perfect. All she had to do was think of something else and to 
pretend that Dulcie was not there. 

When the act had been done, and then done again, Gail lethargically 
straightened up from the obscenity of the bend into the equal obscenity of 
the stretch. She covered her burning face with her linked hands and waited 
for the whip. But it did not come. Her feet were freed. She was put back in 
the cage. A replete Harry Rattery took the tray and left his female 
playthings to watch his departure through the bars. It was suddenly very 
quiet. The huge chamber seemed empty. 

There was little to be said. Dulcie saw the misery on her companion's face, 
and refrained from comment. Soon the clutch of the cage imposed its cold 
hand upon the youngster's equanimity. Rising to her feet she made the small 
round of their prison. With her hands cuffed behind her back she could not 
clutch the bars. Instead, she pressed her body and her face against them as 
though to test their substance. Then, satisfied that she was caged, she sank 
once more to share the blanket with the girl who had watched her exploration 
with a wry amusement. They grinned companionably, unwilling to voice fear. 

"He handcuffs one of my wrists to his bed every night," Dulcie volunteered 
brightly as though to fill an awkward conversational gap. "Sometimes it's to 
the rail so I can be in bed with him. Sometimes it's to one of the legs so I 
have to sleep on the floor. When he does that I'm never sure whether he'll 
give me a blanket or not. I'm not allowed to ask. I mustn't ask for things 
that really matter." 

"If you do, he whips you?" Gail asked. 

"Oh sure! I suppose that's the deal, isn't it? I've got to behave." 

"But your parents! They're willing to let him own you?" Gail was horrified. 

The youngster managed a chuckle. "Well, they ain't all that concerned. You 
know that. But Harry and me ain't about to tell 'em he shoves it into me. 
They probably figure he does anyway. I'm sure if I beefed I'd get whaled 
from all directions." 

"Were they angry about him abducting me?" Gail was genuinely curious. 

"Yeah, 'specially Ma. But Pa got that there cheque, and Rattery can do him a 
bit of good in business. You know how it is." 

"They aren't likely to come and rescue us?" 

"Hell, no! Harry's got himself a couple of what he calls 'little fillies,' 
and that's the end of it." 

"But for how long? When do you go back to the Ranch?" 

Dulcie shrugged without concern. "Dunno'. Maybe never. Harry's got dough. He 
can look after me." 

"Like a pet kitten, you mean?" Gail was aghast. 

"That's what you are," the youngster pointed out demurely. "I wouldn't bet 
either of us would ever get free. You thought about that?" 

"All the time. It scares me. We're so damn helpless. Look at us now, locked 
in this cage. Both of us handcuffed. We don't have a chance." 

Dulcie digested the thought. "It's been sorta' strange with me," she 
confided slowly. "Harry's been hauling me around the country while he does 
his business. Mostly he keeps me handcuffed and naked. But sometimes he lets 
me dress. Two different times he takes off my handcuffs, gives me clothes 
and gives me money and, sweet as pie, tells me I can go home or anywhere 
else I please. No strings. Free as a bird. It was quite a lot of money, too. 
Not just a couple of hundred." She wrinkled her brows in retrospect and made 
an apologetic grimace. "I didn't go anywhere. I can't tell you why. But I 
didn't...." 

Again the silence. Gail could understand the teen-age child clinging to the 
stability of the man, the male with money. "Have you regretted not running?" 
she asked. 

"Have I ever! But I don't mean all the time!" Dulcie hastily amended. "When 
he's whipping me or hurting me some other way. He tied me up and hung me by 
my wrists once, that sort of thing. But when it's over I know I wouldn't run 
even if I got another chance." She mused silently, then continued 
hesitantly. "It's funny about the whip. Afterwards, you don't seem to mind. 
It makes me horny as blazes." 

"Think he'll offer me the chance?" Gail asked bleakly. 

Dulcie's look of compassion was sufficient answer. "Could be we're both in 
the same boat," she confessed slowly. "But I'm pretty sure Harry's going to 
hang on to you. He likes you, and you're valuable. I heard some talk. If he 
ever got tired of you he could sell you for one hell of a lot of money, 
probably more than he paid." She paused and grinned wryly at sight of 
something Gail had glimpsed long since, "Seems like us girls is awful 
expensive. You know, luxury goods." 

"I wish I was a man," Gail sighed wistfully. 

"I don't!" Dulcie proclaimed emphatically. "Think of having to make all that 
money! Us girls got it good." She looked around speculatively, "I bet this 
cage we're in cost a fortune." She sobered suddenly. "Think we'll ever get 
out of it?" 

"Does it frighten you?" Gail was curious. 

The younger girl considered. "Yes," she said slowly. "It's worse than a room 
or a cupboard or something. Maybe because it's so small." She groped for 
expression. "I'm already believing I'll never get out. It would be easy to 
figure that Harry would never have spent all this dough for just a coupla' 
days. Birds never get out of cages." 

They would have touched if they had possessed their hands. 

"I wasn't all that nice to you back at the Ranch," Dulcie offered 
tentatively. 

"Nobody was. You were as nice as any of them." 

"What with Ma the way she is it all come sorta' natural." Dulcie was 
apologetic. "You never got nothing worse than I did, 'cept for the men. Pa 
was the only one ever whaled me." 

"You mean your Ma actually tied you in the barn and out in the trees the way 
she did me?" 

"Sure! Ma got a kick outa' it. Not much I could do. After I got used to it I 
didn't really mind." Dulcie grinned at a memory. "That boy, Neil ever find 
you?" 

Gail blushed. "Yes. What's his story? Why wouldn't he help me?" 

" 'Spose I'm the story," Dulcie confessed ruefully. "He's nice. I'll never 
forget how shocked he was that first time. He had me untied before I could 
stop him. He never did get me tied back the same way. Ma raised the roof. 
She tied me in the barn for the night and wore out four switches on my bum." 
She paused, thinking back. "It's awful, ain't it, not to be able to move, 
and hurting, and knowing nobody ain't going to come." 

"Your mother, did that to you?" 

"Well, you know Ma." Dulcie produced her giggle. "She may even have thought 
it done me good. Anyways, a couple of days later she took me back out to the 
tree. This time she was going to fox whoever it was that had let me loose. 
She used the handcuffs. You know, you put your arms 'round the trunk like 
you loved the damn thing, and she handcuffs your hands the other side. You 
stand there having a love affair with a tree. I was naked. Trust Ma for 
that. Poor Neil! I thought he'd flip. Gosh! I wish I got that big a charge 
outa' seeing a guy without his clothes. I had three things he wasn't suppose 
to see. So he kept looking at 'em, even though he tried not to. 

"He'd been coming every day, hoping I'd be there. Boys like to play the big 
hero bit. But when he saw the handcuffs it was a bit of a let down: No key, 
no hero! But he come up with something I was nutty enough to fall for. We 
was to put an end to Ma's fun and games once and for all. He goes dashing 
off to get some tools." The erstwhile damsel in distress grinned 
reminiscently, "I wish we had them tools right now. Wasn't no time before 
them handcuffs were twisted and cut up and Neil and me was on our way to his 
home. It wasn't far. 

"His folks' name was Horton. His Ma was nice. She managed the shock of 
seeing me in Neil's sweater and nothing else, but was concerned as all get 
out when she gets the whole story. Wouldn't hear of nothing but that little 
Dulcie trot right back home to Ma. When I got it figured, I could see there 
wasn't no way the Hortons were going to get in dutch with Congressman 
Billings. Right about then I'd have given all I had to be back rubbing my 
little twat against that tree. I even felt mad at Neil for wanting to be a 
hero. All he'd get was an argument, but I couldn't bear to think what would 
happen to me. 

"Ma gimmie what she called the three-day treatment, a day hanging up by my 
wrists, a day in that lousy hog crate, and a day spread out on my bed so I 
couldn't even twitch. Before and after and in between she wore out enough 
switches on me I thought I'd never get my skin back," Dulcie chuckled 
ruefully. "Ma even went over to the Hortons' and made 'em pay her for the 
handcuffs Neil had buggered up getting me loose." 

They exchanged rueful glances of commiseration. Two girls naked in a cage, 
sharing a common pain. Owned. Each knew the other would have clasped them in 
a feminine embrace. But the wearing of handcuffs is not conducive to such 
intimacies. Gail kissed the youngster who suddenly seemed warm and appealing 
and lost. Surely this exuberant child would not be compelled to share the 
same lifetime of servitude in which she was held! Yet they were together in 
the cage! The cage would take the child as it had the girl. 

When Grace came, she carried no tray, nor did she smile. Seeing her, the 
captives instantly knew something was wrong. An electric tension followed 
her as an aura. She carried an unmistakable air of purpose. Without a word, 
she unlocked the cage door. The wondering girls emerged and stood, waiting 
and obedient to instruction. There was none. Instead, the older woman freed 
their wrists of the handcuffs and eyed them enigmatically. Her voice was 
sombre. 

"I haven't minded you," she spoke to Gail. "But this poor damn kid is one 
too many." She turned to the wide-eyed Dulcie, "You're too young, child. 
Sure, I know Harry's jollied you along. You've been having a ball. But it 
wouldn't last. I'm bailing you out." 

"I don't want to be bailed out," Dulcie protested sullenly. She showed no 
gratitude for her freed wrists which she was massaging tenderly. 

Gail was tense with a wild hope, an incredible surmise. Seeking Grace's 
eyes, she found in them a confirmation of her most ardent dream. "I'm 
setting you free," Grace told her quietly, but there was no joy in her 
voice. The silence was brief, but heavily charged. The mind of each of the 
trio was vivid with the implications of this act which would change their 
lives. Yet only Gail knew exaltation. A brilliant sunshine of hope and 
gratitude irradiated her world. Freedom... ! 

"Harry pushes too hard," Grace offered in explanation. "Probably I'll regret 
what I'm doing, so let's get it over with. I want you both gone. He won't be 
back for a few hours. I'll give you clothes, money and a car. This way...." 

It was like a dream, urgent, passionate, every moment vital. The three 
females used few words. There was no need. Dulcie's plaints were stilled by 
the manner and purpose of her older companions. For both the stakes were 
high. She sensed that, for them, this was a game she had best not disrupt. 

It did not take long. When the car keys were placed in Gail's trembling hand 
she felt a surge of compassion for the woman who placed them there. Each 
could plainly read in the features of the other the compelling emotions that 
made the moment possible. Gail took her savior's hand and gripped it. Then, 
in a moment of deep and compulsive sympathy, flung her arms around Grace's 
neck and whispered in a choked voice, "Thank you. Oh, thank you!" Both women 
were close to tears. Even Dulcie was subdued. 

Fate was kind. It took them to the state line without incident. It even took 
them a couple of miles beyond before the flat tire brought them to a halt. 
But it was no tragedy. Gail's heart still sang with the glory of release as 
she and her less enthused companion sought the spare and the jack. Her 
spirit's song was a reiteration: Free, free, free! 

"What the devil am I going to do?" Dulcie wondered aloud as she, willingly 
and competently worked at nuts and bolts. 

It had been the essence of their conversation during the drive. The last 
refuge the youngster wished to seek was the Bar-B Ranch. "You'd better stay 
with me," Gail told her with decision. I can easily look after you until you 
decide what's best to do." She heaved the spare out onto the pavement. 

They worked at the dusty disagreeable job in silence. Passing cars, noting 
their competence, did not stop. Gail hurried, not so much from urgency, but 
still under the momentum of escape. Until she got back to the home she had 
left three months previously, she would be a fugitive. Excitedly she kept 
thinking of the state line and the wonderful moment of crossing it. Prison 
doors are not always of metal or of wood! So intent were they upon their 
task that they did not notice the car that drifted silently beside them 
until it stopped. When she looked up from the costive wheel, Gail's heart 
was clutched by the icy hand of fear. The car was black and white. 

It had happened before. Such confrontations possess an inevitable sameness. 
The two officers were polite and firm, and very curious. They were 
principally concerned with Gail, and treated the indignant but quaking 
Dulcie with tolerant humour. The girls submitted to the humiliating search, 
hands on car roof, feet wide. But when the handcuffs came into view, Gail 
protested. "You're out of your jurisdiction. This is not your state." 

"That's right, lady. Hands in back, please." The bored voice plainly said he 
could not have cared less. 

"But you don't have to do that! We're not criminals." 

The spokesman laughed. "Ain't the way we heard it, ma'am. Got you down for a 
two-forty and a one-eighty-nine. And there's always driving without a 
license." 

In sudden panic Gail knew that once the shining metal was on her wrists all 
hope was gone. No escape, freedom lost, the glory cast into the dust. 
Defensively, she backed away. 

"Don't need the cuffs on Miss Billings, do we?" the second officer asked 
casually. 

"Cuff her. She's got a record for running," the spokesman said gruffly. His 
eyes were still warily on Gail. She sensed herself as the real quarry. 
Dulcie was eyeing her own captor with undisguised interest. 

"Don't let him, Dulcie. I refuse to be handcuffed," Gail affirmed with a 
finality that sounded naive even to herself. 

The officer eyed her with amused tolerance. "Lady, you want I should say 
please?" 

Gail was close to tears. These stalwart males with their harness and 
accoutrements could subdue a girl with one hand. If she ran, they could 
catch her. If she fought, they would hurt her and tear the clothes it had 
been so good to wear in the hours past. The whole tenor of her life was 
frustrated helplessness. For her, the word freedom represented a tenet 
unavailingly denied. The pink circlets upon the flesh of her wrists told of 
the handcuffs' long possession of her hands. Hers was no maiden shrinking 
from a humiliation previously unknown. It stemmed from a purely instinctive 
conviction that as long as her limbs were free there was hope, a hope 
relinquished and forever dead once the metal circlets were locked upon her 
wrists. A flashing mental picture of Battery's silver cage told her that 
these amused young men were unwittingly returning her to an imprisonment for 
life. Yet, how to tell them! They would never believe. She tried scorn. 

"Are you afraid of us? What harm can we possibly do you!" 

"Lady, there's going to be one of us and one of you in each car. You decide 
to get uppity when we're going down the highway and we'll end up in the 
ditch or a smash-up. It's just plain common sense to put the cuffs on you." 

"But not behind our back!" It was a cry of agony. 

The policeman was touched by her vehemence. He was, after all, but little 
older than she. Her female allure had an aura to which he was not 
impervious. Dubiously, he considered her plea and conceded. "ma'am, you want 
'em in front, O.K. But you'll have to wear the chain belt to keep 'em 
there." His voice was patient, but only just. 

Gail cringed. A chain belt! She remembered pictures in the press of 
prisoners in transit. Even for murderesses it had seemed a degrading 
exhibition. She had always felt sorrow for their shame. Her whole being 
revolted. A chain round her middle confining her cuffed hands might be 
something from Ma Billings. But from these smart uniformed men! She could 
not bear the thought. Yet, and she understood the absurdity of it, in their 
shoes she would think as they did. Their point was valid. A prisoner free of 
all restraint was a hazard and a threat. With a weary hopelessness she 
turned and put her hands behind her back. 

Dismally she watched as Dulcie, too, was handcuffed. It was only too evident 
the teenager relished the compulsion of the male hands. She looked happier 
than at any time since she was put in the cage. Her eyes sparkled. For her, 
this was adventure. 

"You take Miss Billings back with the stolen car," the spokesman directed 
his companion. He turned his eyes to Gail. "You'll come with me in the black 
and white." She could have sworn she detected pity in his voice. 

When they were in motion, Gail arranged herself for comfort as she had done 
once before with Harry Rattery when her arms had been captive behind her 
back. "Where do I go now?" she asked listlessly. "Is it jail this time?" 

"Not exactly." He sounded embarrassed. 

If it was not jail, then it had to be the Billings and the Bar-B. "Have you 
any idea what you are taking be back to?" she asked without hope. 

"I'm not taking you back to anything, lady." His voice was firm on that 
point. 

Gail was puzzled. There was something in his voice that boded ill. But she 
was still more concerned with liberty than destinations. She offered woman's 
oldest bribe: "You don't have to take me. You could let me go free if you 
wanted to. Drive up a side road and do whatever you want to with me. I'll be 
nice to you." Even as she said the words she felt soiled by her only weapon. 

He shook his head and gave her a quick sideways glance of compassion. His 
voice became officially formal. "That's an offer we get from at least half 
the women we pick up, ma'am." Then, as though sharing her disappointment, he 
added, "Wouldn't really work that way anyhow, I could do anything I wanted 
to you without even taking the cuffs off. You couldn't complain. No one 
would listen. It's such an old ploy. You'd have paid for something you 
didn't get." 

Gail supposed she should feel gratitude for honesty. But she would sooner 
have been free. "Is Congressman Billings really all this powerful?" she 
asked dully. 

"Pretty well," the officer conceded. "We live with it. It's nothing new 
y'know." 

"You'll let me be whipped every day for the rest of my life because he's a 
little tin god?" Gail asked bitterly, hoping to shock. 

The man beside her shifted uneasily. "I just don't believe it's that bad," 
he said defensively. 

"Take my clothes off, then! I'm covered in whip marks." 

"Another bribe, lady?" he sneered. 

Gail was about to make a tart rejoinder when she realized they were 
travelling in directions unfamiliar. "This isn't the way to the Bar-B!" she 
questioned suspiciously. 

"You're not being kidnapped," he said shortly. "Don't be scared." 

"But where are you taking me?" 

He refused to answer. When she became demanding, he told her abruptly to 
desist. He drove steadily and fast into the country as though anxious to be 
rid of a distasteful task. When, at length, they turned into the driveway, a 
discreet but clearly legible sign told the captive all she needed to know: 
"State Prison Farm For Women." It was terse and to the point and very 
frightening. 

Gail was formally delivered as one live female body. She was accepted by a 
large fat man behind a desk. He and the officer were on familiar ground. A 
paper was signed. "Give you any trouble, Len?" The fat man eyed his new 
prisoner with interest. 

"She sure does argue," Len admitted. "That's all." He grinned in a shared 
understanding. "Nice girl. Don't treat her too rough." 

"Hell boy! You know what she's here for, doncha'!" 

The policeman grimaced. "That! No, no one told me. But then, why would 
they!" He looked at his former captive commiseratingly. 

Their female prisoner quailed. There was that in their voices which made her 
feel expendable. 

"I've never been sentenced," she affirmed stoutly. 

"Dammit, she talks!" The fat man affected surprise and gave her his full 
attention. "Honey, on this here farm, little girls like you don't talk 'less 
they're spoken to. If they do their ass gets to hurting." 

Gail knew herself lost. She had heard of such places. But the heady stuff of 
freedom had not yet dissipated itself. She was in despair. "I have been 
illegally arrested in another state. I have not been tried or sentenced. I 
cannot be legally consigned to this place. I demand to be set free." 

The fat man was vastly entertained. "You hear that, Len! Beats all, don't 
it." 

"And take these handcuffs off me. They're not serving any useful purpose 
now!" She might as well die for a sheep as a lamb. 

The fat man opened a drawer, rummaged and produced handcuffs which he tossed 
to Len. "Fair exchange, boy. Little Flossie here liable to slap my face if 
we let her loose." 

"You've no right! Take these handcuffs off." Gail was recklessly burning 
bridges. 

"I'll leave you to it, Andy," the officer proclaimed hastily as though 
anxious to disassociate himself from an awkward situation. He looked at Gail 
as though wishing to say something encouraging, but was forced to be content 
with a lame, "Good-bye, Miss. And good luck." It was obvious he had little 
hope for her continued well-being. He exchanged compliments with the fat man 
and was gone. Gail stood before the desk. She was still handcuffed. She was 
now desperately afraid. 

"Seems like you been a real bad girl," Andy said conversationally. 

"I haven't, and you know it. I haven't been convicted of anything." 

The fat man sighed pleasantly. Gail could envision his enjoyment of all the 
women and girls who had stood as she stood now. To them he was a deity. "You 
ever have your ass whipped real good?" he inquired as though anxious to keep 
a record straight. 

"Yes. You know where I've been kept prisoner." 

"Honey!" he reproved. "You weren't no prisoner. You was a guest." It was 
typical of her condition. She would never be allowed an identity. She was a 
female body. "I suppose I'm a guest here?" Her voice was desolate. "Honey, 
you got the right idea." 

"And, as a guest, I can expect to get my ass whipped?" 

"You're doing just fine, kid." It was all so hopeless! Gail longed to 
scream. A piercing keening exclamation of protest against a male world in 
which she was two breasts, two nipples and a vagina with some pubic hair 
thrown in for good measure. "Why must I be forever handcuffed?" she asked as 
though her curiosity was genuine. 

"You know damn well why," Andy said tolerantly. "Keeps you from wondering 
which way to run. Saves us from having to do a Karate chop on you three 
times a day." 

He could rationalize anything, of course. But Gail tried again. "What 
happens to me now? What are you going to do to me? I got the impression I'm 
here to be punished?" 

"That you are!" the fat man agreed heartily. "We aim to give you a real bad 
time. We got our orders." 

"Haven't you any mercy or sympathy or kindness?" 

" 'Course we have, honey! Every so often one of us will give you a couple of 
orgasms instead o' the whip." He laughed genially. "What more can a gal' 
ask!" 

"Is everyone here... I mean the girls. Are they all like me?" 

Andy considered. "Damn good question," he agreed. "I'd say 'bout half of 
'em. Silly little bitches didn't know which side their bread was buttered 
on." 

"Is there anything we can do or say?" 

"You mean so you can get outa' here? Not really. The guy you've been mean to 
sets a time for your... well, let's call it your education. We do our best 
to help you see the light." 

"You torture us?" The fat man was unperturbed. "Them's your words, honey, 
and I won't deny 'em. It ain't no picnic here for a little trick like you," 
he guffawed coarsely. "You shoulda' said yes." 

Gail had no more repartee. It was all banalities. She was here to learn a 
lesson. A lesson about the wish and the futility of escape. She would be 
brutally hurt. Perhaps she would learn the lesson. At the end of her 
unspecified incarceration she would be a girl without will, anxious only to 
obey. How much better it would have been to have resigned herself to the 
Bar-B, or the silver cage. In the eyes of the fat man behind the desk she 
beheld that which she dared not face. 

He had picked up the phone and was chuckling into the receiver. "Hey Thelma, 
come on over. Len just delivered us the Billings dame. You know, I told you 
the deal. She's all yours." Still chuckling at some private knowledge he 
eyed his prisoner sternly. 'Thelma don't take no nonsense, honey. So take my 
advice and don't give her none. You're in deep enough shit without getting 
her mad at you. Four things to remember here: You call the Wardress, that's 
Thelma, ma'am. You call me Sir. You do what you're told. And you don't make 
no complaints. If you get a sore ass I don't want to hear about it. That 
understood?" 

"Yes sir." Gail wished herself dead. In this place she sensed a bondage 
beyond any previous experience. 

"A pretty piece," Thelma approved. "But then what the hell else! For sure, 
Billings ain't picking no dogs." She gave her new possession a shrewd 
scrutiny. "You ready to get your little butt tanned, sugar?" 

Thelma was well designed for her post. She would handle the average girl 
with the same ease that the policeman would have done. A short whip hung at 
her side, suspended from a leather belt that also supported handcuffs. The 
Wardress contrived a more official appearance than did her superior at the 
desk. Once again, the captive girl understood the logic of the handcuffs 
locked upon her wrists. At that moment the compulsion to resist, to make a 
last minute dash for freedom, to slap a leering face, was strong enough that 
she might have done any one of those things to her sorrow. But, handcuffed, 
she was safe and they were safe. How strange a set of values a prisoner 
lived by! 

Thelma's grip upon Gail's arm was authoritative as she led her new prisoner 
across the yard. "Ain't goin' to give you no heart to heart talk, gal'. You 
know what the deal is. I know what the deal is. We both know it ain't fair, 
there ain't no justice, and you don't deserve it. But that don't make no 
difference. You're here for a bad time, and I'm goin' to give it to you. 
O.K.?" 

"Yes ma'am." The captive could think of nothing else to say. 

"I ain't goin' to shoot you no line of crap, kid. Beating your butt when you 
ain't done nothin' to deserve it don't bother me none at all. I'll enjoy 
every moment. I'm a real bitch. Good natured, mind you, but still a bitch. 
And we got a lot of little dillies here you won't like either. I'll enjoy 
givin' you them, too." 

"I'd like to behave, ma'am," Gail ventured cautiously. "I don't want to be 
punished." 

"Come off it, kid," Thelma guffawed as at a shared joke. "Sure you behave. 
You'd better! But it don't help you none. 'Cept you get things twice as 
rough if you don't." 

It was an unattractive structure, long and low. A dormitory. Rows of single 
cots lined each wall, an aisle down the centre. 

"Bit early for the rest of the girls," Thelma said as she unlocked Gail's 
handcuffs. "But a bit o' extra bed won't do you no harm. Off with them 
clothes." 

The command was inevitable. A girl to be punished was first stripped. The 
captive expected no less. But she parted with her clothes with the same 
reluctance as that first time long, long ago. They were a symbol of a 
freedom she no longer possessed. Whilst removing them her eyes sought the 
bed in curiosity. Along with the rest it held an anomaly. The beds were 
longer than normal. At the side of each, up towards the head, there rose a 
grooved metal stanchion bolting the whole solidly to the floor. Its top was 
perhaps eighteen inches above the level of the thin mattress. One on each 
side of the cot, they conveyed a sinister message to the now naked girl. 

"Figured this little notion out myself," Thelma announced with pride. "Don't 
use it regular. Ain't none o' the girls said they liked it." Reaching under 
the cot she pulled into view two shaped planks, the holes in which told 
their own story. She slipped one of them into the metal grooves and thrust 
it down hard against the mattress. "There you are, sugar. You're sleeping on 
your tummy tonight. You can see where to put your neck and wrists." 

Gail could see all too well. She longed to protest, but was mindful of 
Andy's warning. It would be a bad start. She wondered if what was about to 
happen to her might not be as dreadful as it looked. Unhappily, she lowered 
her slenderness upon the bed and obediently fitted her neck in the larger 
circlet, pulled her hair forward beside her face, and put her already chafed 
wrists into the smaller apertures. Instantly the top half of the stocks was 
grooved and fell into place, the whole was heavily thrust down by Thelma's 
brawny arm; there were a couple of ominous clicks that told the naked girl 
she would not move from the position she was now in. She was prisoner of a 
simple set of neck and wrist stocks attached to a cot. Neat and effective! 
She wondered unhappily if it would be possible to sleep. 

"Mostly you gals don't have to sleep this-a-way," Thelma explained placidly. 
"But the gadget's useful for special occasions and special gals'. You're a 
special gal." 

"I can only move my feet," Gail complained politely. 

"You'd be surprised, sugar," Thelma said helpfully. "That little ass o' 
your's will romp around real cute when I start lacing into it." 

Gail's breathing stopped, her heart pounded. She had been more vulnerable. 
But she had never felt more vulnerable. It was a frightening sensation to 
look down at the mattress a few inches away, yet be unable to see what might 
be done to her. With neck and wrists snugly and cruelly held as they now 
were, she could make no effective motion. Now, to be whipped! Why, oh why! 
"Must I be whipped, ma'am?" She fought to keep feeling from her voice. 

Thelma considered. "Well, I suppose you must, sugar, since you put it that 
way. I got my orders to keep your little rump well marked. But apart from 
that, it's the custom here to give a new girl ten good ones just to get her 
in a proper frame of mind. Sort of an introduction. Works out real good...." 

The naked girl flat on the cot, head and hands held immovably in the wooden 
gyves, knew panic. She was beautifully positioned for the whip. She could be 
cut to pieces, and who would care! This wardress woman owned her now more 
surely than Ma Billings had ever done. There had been stories about the 
State Prison Farm For Women. Stories in the press of awful things done to 
recalcitrant girls. They had seemed unlikely at the time. But now! 

Gail knew a panicky need to plead, to try and make this insensitive woman 
understand the awfulness of what she was doing, to see it as an act wrong in 
all senses of the word. Perhaps to touch some spark of pity. She felt so 
small and juvenile and naked beneath the cynical eyes and the arm corded 
with sinew. 

The thongs cut her squarely. Her hips bounced beneath the impact. She surged 
her shoulders against the stocks, but her only movement was the flailing of 
her legs and an obscene writhing of that portion of her being whipped. Agony 
was implicit in all. 

"You done that real nice, sugar," Thelma sounded gratified. It was evident 
the whipping was to be a long drawn out affair. She would enjoy every stroke 
and every sound. 

The punished girl moaned and cried her way through two more wicked slashes. 
She was striving desperately not to scream. She hated to hear herself 
scream. It was the most degrading thing of all. She could not control her 
instinctive movements save that when a new stroke seemed near she would try 
to close her legs. Even on her stomach there were secrets revealed should 
she spread wide her legs. 

Gail jerked and gasped as a searching hand thrust itself into her soft flesh 
and cupped her sex. "Nice and wet," Thelma approved. "I do like a girl to 
get a damp cat after a few with the whip. Shows she's alive." 

The naked girl had never understood why her sex should so betray her beneath 
the whip or the cane. She was far from joy. But it happened. She did not 
care. If this woman was pleased what did it matter! If her contortions had 
achieved sexual arousal it had come without intent or knowledge. 

"I'll give you one right straight up lengthways, dear," the wardress told 
her victim pleasantly as though wishing them both to share everything to the 
full. The lengthy stripe cut the supine girl from her shoulders to the 
crease of her buttocks as though seeking intimacy with every vertebra of her 
spine. She screamed and screamed again. Pain mingled with desolation in the 
hopelessness of her cries. Her legs beat a furious tattoo upon the cot. 

"Lovely... lovely!" Thelma breathed. Her appreciation of what she heard and 
saw might have been likened to an adjudicator at a festival. She was a 
connoisseur. "How about another like that, sugar?" she asked encouragingly. 

It was a terrible thing for the whipped girl to know that a right word or a 
wrong word could double or halve her pain. She emitted, heartbrokenly, the 
few words that came most easily, "Oh please! I'm sorry for anything I've 
done! I'm only a girl... only a girl," she sobbed brokenly in her anguish. 

It is possible the wardress felt pity. We will never know. At least she made 
a change. "Tell you what, sugar, press down hard with your tits and bring 
your knees up under your tummy, arch your back and stick your butt up high." 

For a few dazed moments Gail failed to comprehend that she was being told to 
do something actually possible. But the whip lash idly trailing down her 
backbone encouraged her to try. At the end of much shuffling and panting she 
was obscenely crouched as directed. Her bottom was invitingly protruded, its 
skin stretched so tight the pain of each cut must inevitably be doubled. Her 
posture was cruelly strained against the unyielding stocks. 

"You make a damn pretty picture, honey. Too bad you can't take a peek." 
Thelma sounded genuinely pleased with her creation. She playfully tugged at 
a tuft of her victim's pubic hair that had strayed backwards." 

"Nother thing I like 'bout you is that black fleece. I do admire a gal' who 
grows enough hair to hide her slit. Now, you ready to get tickled up a bit?" 

"Yes ma'am," Gail lied. 

"This way's one Hell of a lot better. Gets you off the mattress. I can give 
you a real wrap-around. I'm damn sorry you can't see how good you're fixed." 
It was impossible to tell if the comments were well intentioned or designed 
to heighten suspense. The pinioned girl felt herself cringing in the wait 
for what was about to be done to her. The knowledge that she was not yet 
half way through the introductory flogging was bitter and alarming. Gail was 
almost choked by the outpouring of her own voice as the blows cut her taut 
flesh. She screamed, she pleaded, she moaned. The strokes did indeed wrap 
around. They marked her from hip to hip. Now she had lost the relief of 
threshing legs. So tightly was she tucked into a ball that she had become 
simply a quivering receptacle for the seeking lash. She sought 
unconsciousness, but it would not come. 

"Don't know when I ever enjoyed a gal' more, sugar." Thelma's tribute was 
warm. "You and me's goin' to see lot of each other. You got a way with you, 
a damn pretty wiggle." 

The wardress sat upon the bed beside her victim. Gail could not see her, she 
was held too tightly, her vision too restricted. "You stay the way you are, 
honeychile," Thelma ordered pleasantly. "Don't flatten out until I give the 
word. You're really somethin' the way you are." Firm fingers made the naked 
girl gasp as they followed the path of the whip upon the quivering flesh. 
Instinctively, with a knowledge born of the past months, Gail knew where the 
questing hand would end its journey. When it was thrust between her legs to 
find the lips that awaited it, she tensed stoically for the inevitable. "You 
got a beautiful wet quiff, honey. Want I should pleasure it?" Thelma asked 
casually. 

"No thank you, ma'am." 

"I'll do it anyway, sugar. Expect you're a bit shy." Thelma chuckled 
unashamedly." 'Sides I like it. That's what counts. Get just the right spot 
and a girl critter will gasp as good as slicin' her bum with a whip." 

Gail kept silent. She endured. The fingers were highly skilled. They 
extracted from the helpless girl the full responses desired. She moaned and 
gasped most satisfyingly. She was still grappling with the aftermath of pain 
and pleasure when her companion left the shed. 

It was some time before Gail realized she was alone. Cautiously, she 
relieved herself of the crouch. It felt good to lie flat again and to know 
that cruel eyes were not feasting on her nudity. But there was little 
comfort in her plight. The yoke upon her neck and wrists was unyielding in 
its imposition. It was strange and frustrating to turn her prisoned head 
from side to side and see the small hands held neatly as though severed from 
the rest of her. Indeed, that was the whole effect! Behind her was a nudity 
with all the sensitivities and vulnerabilities of its femininity. But it was 
divorced from her by the stocks. Divorced from all save pain shame. 

She could not tell how long she lay helpless and wondering before the big 
room filled with the chatter and motion of those it would house for the 
night. It was infuriating to lay motionless and unable to see or raises her 
eyes in greeting. Her ears were alert. "Hey! We got a new one!" 

"Who cares! Silly bitch shoulda' stayed at home." 

"Say! Look at her tail! Thelma really went to town." 

"Got a sore ass, kid?" The question was followed by a hearty slap and 
laughter at her wince. 

A girl came into Gail's limited range of vision. A girl attired in no more 
than a gunny sack in which holes had been cut for arms and head. Her hair 
was damp from a shower. She grinned matter-of-factly as though Gail's 
situation was normal. "I'm the next bed. Name's Nancy. Don't feel bad about 
the spot you're in. We all got it. We all keep on getting it too. It's one 
of Thelma's favorites." Suddenly a pillow was thrust under the captive 
cheek. "Here, this will be better. It's lousy without a pillow." 

Gail could have shed tears of gratitude. The pillow helped, as did the human 
voice of a fellow captive. Her thank you was heartfelt. A new exclamation 
reached her. 

"I bet she's Congressman Billings girl. Whatsa' matter, honey? You don't 
want to bend over?" There, was laughter. 

Gail told her story to a changing panorama of peering faces. None were 
shocked or surprised. The comments were revealing. 

"Ain't nothing as bad as this place, kid." 

"You should have let him ream your ass. Thelma will probably bung a cucumber 
up it." 

"Wish I could sit in a cage all day. Helluva' lot easier than hoeing spuds." 

"You think you got whipped! Take a look at us!" The speaker lifted her sack 
to reveal a bottom vividly striped. Others joined the demonstration to 
position themselves where the recumbent girl could see a succession of 
lifted sacks and welted flesh until she felt herself drowning in a sea of 
punished girls. 

"We're all about the same age?" she queried. 

There was laughter. "What you mean is we're just the right age, kid," a 
voice mocked cynically. ""Just the right age for being screwed; and there's 
lots of ways a girl can get screwed, believe me! Most of us are here because 
we didn't do it at the right time with the right guy." 

"We are all being taught to lie down and spread our legs on command," Nancy 
interpreted soberly. She laughed a bitter laugh. "I'd do it right now if it 
would get me out of here." 

"But... but -" Gail felt herself blushing -"aren't any of the girls, I mean, 
aren't they -" 

"You mean criminals!" Nancy laughed, coming to the rescue. "Oh sure! There's 
a few. They're the lucky ones. The rest of us get it really rough." 

"How long do we have to stay?" To Gail this question was paramount. 

Nancy shrugged resignedly. "Ain't no general rule," she admitted 
regretfully. "Most of us would be good little girls at the end of the first 
week. But it don't do no good. We are here because some bimbo is mad at us 
and wants us broken. Depends on the bastard that sent us here. Could be a 
month or a year. Probably depends on how big a hard-on he gets when he 
remembers us... if he ever does!" 

A new voice interpolated. "Let's have our bit of fun with her before Thelma 
shows up." 

"Sorry kid," Nancy explained regretfully. "It's a sort of initiation. The 
girls don't get much fun. They give a Rookie a bad time while she's 
helpless. They used to whip her, but now we don't have anything to do it 
with. So they'll try and drive you wild with their fingers. You're lucky 
you're face down." 

Gail was still digesting the information when the first fingers found her. 
They were not content with the most obvious centre of her vulnerability but 
inserted themselves beneath her breasts to tease the nipples she could not 
shield. Soon she was enveloped in sensation, a helpless quivering nakedness. 
She heard her voice moan with pleasure and plead with satiety. But the 
erotic play went on and on until she was limp and palpitating and 
distraught. She could never claim that her first evening at the State Prison 
Farm for Women was a bore. 

They were regimented. They formed lines. They marched here and there. 
Ablutions, breakfast, work. All in silence. Always under the eyes of 
wardresses who, if they were not Thelma's twin, could have passed for it. 
Each wore a whip and a holstered gun. The girls treated them with immense 
respect. Fear was alive within the ranks. 

There was a small sad feminine coterie that was forever a rearguard watched 
over by a single woman. Their gait was slow and hobbled because their feet 
were chained. These were the ones who had transgressed. Nancy explained in a 
hissed whisper that the shackles were the least of their discomforts. 

Gail had joined the gunny sack parade. It had been tossed to her without 
comment. She wore it without gratitude. No one pretended that the jute 
garment was other than part of their punishment. It was also very easily 
discarded, a facility particularly appropriate to the activities of the Farm 
for Women. 

They hoed potatoes. To a girl unused to such exercise it was extremely hard 
work. To any girl, it was demeaning and hard on the hands. Gail was soon 
sweating and feeling a kink in her back. The tempo was far from casual. No 
one seemed to set it. But if a girl lagged she was checked by a watchful 
wardress. Gail noticed that the curt reprimand instantly spurred the laggard 
into renewed vigor. She soon discovered why. 

Inexperience coupled with a natural curiosity caused her own unwilling 
efforts to falter. A cheerful authoritative voice instantly made a 
horrendous suggestion, "How's about you shuck that there gunny sack, 
honeypie?" The simple words delivered in the pseudo friendly voice were more 
frightening than a bellow. Here was vicious intent: the savoring of a girl's 
anguish. Gail turned and instinctively pleaded. "I'm sorry. I'm new. It's 
all so strange...." 

"Do tell!" The voice was still that of a next door neighbor. "Well, honey, 
we promise you gal's a trade, so here's your first lesson. Off with the 
Christian Dior." 

"Are you going to whip me?" Gail quavered. She felt that surely there must 
be some way of halting this frightening charade. 

"Why, honey, how'd you guess!" The voice held admiration for such 
perspicacity. 

"Please! I've said I'm sorry. I will try harder." 

Again the broad pleased grin as of good news shared. 

"That's a big comfort to me, girlie, to hear you say them words." The 
commendation was warm. "Makes us old hands feel appreciated. Least we can do 
is help where we can. Like a bit of encouragement f"rinstance. You wouldn't 
want me to have to ask you to strip again, would you, child?" 

What was the use! This was now her life. Far best to test what tolerance she 
could purchase with humility before she tried revolt. She said her humble 
and futile, "Thank you, ma'am." Then drew the hated jute over her head. 
Letting the shaming garment fall to the ground she stood naked for all to 
see. No one stopped hoeing. 

The wardress unhooked from her belt, not a whip but a slender riding crop. 
"Thelma give your ass a good welcome yesterday, didn't she, honey?" 

"Yes, ma'am." 

"Your little butt real tender?" 

"Yes, ma'am." 

"Be sorta' a shame to whale it again now, eh?" 

"Yes, ma'am. Thank you." Gail knew she was being played with. "I'm a sucker 
for a well mannered gal'," the wardress admitted expansively. "I took a 
likin' to you. So I'll let your little seat have a rest. How'll it be if you 
hold out one of them nice little hands?" 

Gail was aghast. Always a shock. Never the rational or the expected. "You 
are going to whip my hands?" she asked, wide eyed. 

"That's right, sugar. Never mind the thanks. I know you're grateful." 

"But... but, I have to use my hands for the hoe!" 

"That's the whole idea, sugarpie. When you're hoeing them potatoes you'll 
appreciate a little reminder all the time 'bout keeping up the speed. See 
what I mean?" 

"Yes... thank you, ma'am. But why have I taken off my, my sack?" 

"So you can ask sassy questions, gal'. So's you can bend over and touch your 
toes and get a little something extra for bein' nosey." 

It was no use! She could never win. Fearful of further sarcastic humor, Gail 
bent down and received a vicious cut that bedded itself upon Thelma's 
already purple work. She managed not to scream. 

"That sorta' answer your questions, honey?" 

"Yes. Thank you, ma'am." Gail straightened up apprehensively. 

"And now the little hand. Palm up nice and flat." The woman made it sound 
like a special treat. 

The scalding cut across the palm was unbelievably painful. It reduced the 
naked girl to a paroxysm of writhing agony that was watched by avid 
sparkling eyes. 

"My, my! Sure is nice to see a girl what appreciates a good lick across her 
hand." The tribute sounded truly gratified. Unhurriedly it was followed by 
the inevitable request, "Now the other one, girlie. You sure do hold out a 
pretty little palm." 

It was in Gail's mind to deny her ability to accept another such blow. But 
she mustered enough courage to hope that one on each hand must surely be 
enough for a first time. Bravely she thrust out her arm and received another 
cut of agony to match the first. 

"Think that'll help your speed, child?" 

The punished girl straightened up out of her world of pain. "Oh yes! Oh, 
thank you." Her thanks were not for the strokes but their cessation. She 
dived to pick up the hoe with numbed hands. 

"Don't forget that there dress, honey. Wouldn't want a couple more for 
indecency, would you!" 

Blushing, the hurt girl donned the sack that hid her femaleness. She plied 
the hoe. But now she worked in pain. 

The farm day did not run an even course. Whilst no one dared stop work when 
one of their fellows ran afoul of authority, there was no one of the 
prisoners who failed to see the succession of punishments that were doled 
out for delinquencies, real or imagined. The wardresses displayed a cruel 
and varying ingenuity. Gail cringed hollowly throughout the correction of 
her nearest neighbor, a slender dark haired girl accused of injuring the 
roots of the plants she worked upon. Gail wondered if she herself had seemed 
as pitiful. 

The girl was beautiful. Obedient to the fatal command she stood naked in 
wide-eyed tragic fear before her inquisitor. "Please don't whip me, ma'am." 
She spoke the sad words as though they were a threadbare prayer. She had 
probably said them many times. Gail could see the whip marks with which the 
girl was plentifully decorated. 

"Why shouldn't I whip you, sugar?" Always the polite and kindly words! 

"I... I, didn't mean to. I'm sorry. Honest, ma'am, I won't do it again." It 
sounded lame. The girl knew it sounded lame. 

"Where you like to have it, sugar?" 

The girl twisted, obviously in an agony of fear. "Please ma'am! Oh please 
don't whip me again. I've been whipped so much." It was a cry of desolation. 

"You ain't suggesting you never deserved it...?" 

"Oh no, ma'am! I wouldn't do that. But please! Could I be let off this 
once?" The plea was pitiful. 

"What you here for, honey?" The tone might have been solicitous. 

The naked girl shuffled her toes in the loose dirt. Her reply seemed ejected 
by force of will. "I'm here to be punished, ma'am." 

"Well then, child, we're on the right track, ain't we?" 

"Yes ma'am." She was close to tears. "What you do to earn the punishment, 
kid?" The tormented nudity obviously writhed. "I... I made someone angry, 
ma'am." 

"Can't very well let you off then, can I?" 

"No ma'am. I'm sorry for bothering you. Please whip my back. My bottom got 
it twice yesterday." 

What happened then almost brought Gail's labours to a standstill. The 
slender girl stood erect and naked. She clasped her hands behind her neck 
and waited for the lash. She took her five terrible strokes in moaning 
desolation, but did not break pose. When they were done, she gave her thanks 
and resumed her garment and her work. 

There were rest periods. The prisoners sat. Water was passed around. Almost 
without fail, and presumably as a sort of floor show, a girl was punished at 
these times. By now Gail had come to realize that few, if any, of the 
punishments were justified. They were dealt out in this manner to maintain 
discipline and because the method gave scope to their guard's sadistic 
enjoyment of their work. If a girl got this for nothing, what might she 
expect if she truly erred! 

This one was a nubile blonde with sulky lips and well marked skin. She 
removed her sack without waiting to be told. "I didn't do nothing," she said 
resentfully. 

"There we are then!" her wardress exclaimed jubilantly. "You ain't done no 
work, you get licked!" 

"You know that's not what I meant." The blonde had either courage or 
privilege. 

"Where you want to get tickled, sweetheart?" 

The victim shot her guard a glance of pure venom. "I don't want to get 
whipped, not anywhere. I'm already covered. Why don't you go easy! Carstairs 
don't want me killed. He'd blow the lid off this place if he saw me marked 
up like this." 

"Visiting day next week. We could arrange for him to have a good look, 
honey. You like that?" 

The girl about to be whipped seemed willing to burn her bridges. "O.K. Show 
me to him. Naked!" 

"Will do, honeychile. Now, where you want 'em?" 

"I don't want them. There's no space left on me." 

"Come on, now! I can see spaces." The voice held a terrible portent. 

The blonde girl visibly cringed and in an involuntary gesture, instantly 
corrected, glanced down at her own nakedness. All present understood. 

"Nice pair of tits," the wardress commented conversationally. 

The naked girl fought to keep her hands at her sides. "Cute little cunt 
inside that bush. I could make it twitch a bit." 

The blonde began to show chinks in her armour. Suddenly, as though for the 
first time realizing what awaited her, she fell to her knees and begged. 
"Please, please, ma'am, don't whip me. I can't stand any more." 

Watching the vivid tableau, Gail was ashamed of the wetness within her 
loins. Why! Why! Why! The agony of a naked girl was so beautifully erotic 
that it aroused lust. In this knowledge she could ask what hope there was 
for girlhood! If to whip a girl gave such ecstasy, what hope was there for 
any girl anywhere! The girl herself might consider her own suffering well 
justified if it gave joy to so many! Her mind switched back to the pleading 
prisoner. "I ain't hard to get along with, girl. Where will you have it? 
Tits or twat?" 

The blond captive was slow to reply. It was obvious she had given up hope of 
reprieve, and was concentrating on the cruel choice. "Between my legs," she 
said brokenly, and stood up. 

"Stretch 'em wide then, honey." 

Manfully, the blonde girl obeyed. Automatically, from previous beatings, she 
clasped her hands behind her neck and thrust out her breasts as though it 
was the twin mounds that were to greet the thong. 

"That's real nice, kid," the wardress approved warmly. She turned to survey 
the mass of intent faces. 'Take a look girls. That's the way to stand when 
you get your cunt whipped." Determinedly she swept back her arm. 

It was terrible to watch. It was intended to be terrible. Even the first 
upward cut upon the exposed loins brought the girl to her knees, contorting 
and moaning in the dirt. But the most evident act was her swift return to 
her original pose. Her acceptance of her agony was total and complete. Her 
pleas had failed. She accepted what she must. Each stroke dissolved her into 
clutching and writhing. But always she remembered in time and again took her 
stance. Gail's heart went out to her. 

It was but one of a number. A wardress decided to whip a girl's breasts. She 
had chosen her subject well. The weeping girl was heavily endowed. Her twin 
treasures were quite beautiful. No doubt that was the reason for the 
attention they received. It was also the reason for their owner's desolation 
at what was to be done to them. 

"Not my breasts! Oh, not my breasts! Oh please!" She was quite young. 
Perhaps she still believed in mercy. It seemed evident that her breasts had 
not been whipped before, though it was quite evident the rest of her had. 

"And why not, sweetheart?" Always the honeyed words of false hope. 

"Oh ma'am, please! My breasts! Not a girl's breasts! Not to be whipped!" 

"Would you sooner I just cut off your tits?" Cool and casual. The child 
burst into an emotion of sobbing. "I can tie you if you prefer, child. I can 
play with your tits until they get hard and stick well out, and then I can 
hold a lighted match under them...." 

The captive girl cried in agony. "A match soon burns down, sweetheart. It 
wouldn't be that bad, would it." 

The naked girl wept. She was beyond words. 

"Well, honey. Which you want? Can't stand here all day." 

Perhaps it had happened before. This awful moment would come to all who were 
captive within this place. The weeping girl faced reality. Her face 
contorted by grief, she stood erect, clasped her hands behind her neck, and 
thrust out her breasts to their utmost limit. She threw back her head and 
waited for the whip. 

"You'll remember 'bout standing still, eh?" 

"Yes, ma'am. I'll remember. I won't move." It seemed an impossible 
assurance. 

"One at a time, honey. Does a better job...." 

The whip sang and danced across its twin targets. Gail watched spellbound. 
The child whose breasts were being punished was incredible. It was as 
though, in her pleading, she had exhausted her will to resist, had passed 
over into a world beyond agony. She stood erect and lovely as the whistling 
thong bounced her softest flesh and changed its color. She moved little 
other than to sway and flinch under each blow. Her eyes were closed to look 
sightlessly at the sky and see a vision of her own that others did not 
share. Terrible sounds emerged from her lips, but she did not scream. When 
it was done she remained standing in the same pose as though unable to 
believe her pain was over. Her breasts were a latticework of erotic 
tracings. 

"Snap out of it, girl. Or d'you want me to start again?" The guard cut the 
air with her whip menacingly. The girl snapped out of her trance. "Thank you 
for whipping my breasts, ma'am." She said it as though she meant it. 

The work resumed. There was no end to it. Gail's hands hurt, both from the 
chafing of the hoe and from the whip. Her back hurt. She ached with 
weariness from muscles rarely used. She longed to be anywhere but where she 
was. The inevitable happened. 

"This ain't no resort hotel, honey." The sarcasm was heavy. 

Gail tried truth as defense. "I'm sorry, ma'am. I'm not used to the work. 
I'm terribly tired." 

"Like to lie down, honey?" There was a lewd chuckle. "Take your sack off. 
Give you somethin' to lie on." 

Hopelessly, Gail obeyed words and motions. Watchfully and tentatively she 
lowered herself and lay upon her back. 

"Legs up and back, sugar, until you can hold your ankles." 

She might have known it would be vile. Having grasped her ankles she found 
herself upon her back with legs so widely spread and strained back that all 
of her inmost secrets were laid bare and open. For a fleeting moment she 
thought that only a man could want her thus. 

"Ever have your cunt whipped, sweetheart?" 

"Yes, ma'am, I have." It was as though she had scored a point. 

The wardress was unperturbed. "Bet you wasn't in this position though?" 

"No ma'am." 

"Ain't it a dandy? I can slice right in there." 

"Yes ma'am." It happened suddenly without volition. There is always a last 
straw. Something snapped. Gail returned to the primitive. She leaped to her 
feet and ran. Revolt on the Prison Farm must have been rare. Neither guards 
nor prisoners moved to stop the naked girl as she fled across the field. She 
was free of the group before shouts and thudding feet announced dismay and 
anger. Gail's feet thrust at the soft earth towards a destination unknown. 
It was less an attempt to escape than a revolt against pain and obscenity. 

As an escape it had never had the remotest chance of success. Reaching the 
inevitable high wire fence Gail leaped upon it with clutching fingers and 
toes. But she was flung backwards by the force of the current with which it 
was charged. Sobbing, she ran beside the wire. Surely there must be a gate, 
a tree, a culvert... anything! She was in the grip of panic. 

Three of the Wardresses had deployed. They converged. The chase ended with a 
game of hide and seek around the buildings of the prison yard. Abandoning 
flight, the fugitive sought to hide. They caught her easily when she could 
run no more. 

"Thought you was tired, sugar?" Always the sarcasm! 

They wasted no words, but marched her to the blacksmith shop and riveted 
chains upon her feet. Gail sat in mute misery and watched the metal fitted 
and welded round her ankles. They were ugly things with nothing to commend 
them save that they would hold her captive. She thought of Ma Billings, and 
could have wept. Once a girl's feet were chained together she had lost all 
hope. 

Her guards must have believed this too. They returned to the field, telling 
her to follow as fast as she could. She stared at them in disbelief that the 
chains could be her only punishment. Surely she would be terribly whipped! 
They interpreted her amazement and assured her blithely. "Don't worry none, 
kid. You ain't goin' to be cheated outa' nothin'. You gets it tomorrow. The 
full treatment." They walked away, laughing. 

Gail hobbled after them, weeping and wondering. Her chains clanking dismally 
in the dust. 

The chained girls were a sisterhood. They were segregated. For them no 
dormitory. Only a bare shed with a concrete floor in which were set the 
metal rings to which they would be chained for sleep. The chains varied. Out 
of the five girls shackled, three were secured by a metal collar, the chain 
to which was but a bare three feet long so that they could not stand. 
Another girl was fastened by the collar and a band about one wrist. Gail, 
because her transgression was fresh and she must learn a lesson, was chained 
at neck, both wrists, and a band about her middle. The tethers were short. 
She could do no more than grovel on the floor. They were heavy and brutal 
things that a girl must hate, their function to punish rather than hold. 
Each girl slept upon the concrete naked, their sacks taken from them. 

Her companions were kind. They consoled. Gail learned that she would wear 
the chains upon her ankles for as long as she stayed at the farm. She was an 
"Escaper". The chains would ensure she did not run again. She learned, too, 
that the heavy shackles she now bore would lessen as the days went by until 
the night when she would be fastened only by her neck. But it was the other 
thing she learned that was most devastating. 

"We've all had it," one of the girls told her reflectively. "It goes along 
with getting our ankles chained. They make a real big thing of it so as to 
deter the rest. You know, they make an 'Example' of us. That 'Full 
Treatment' Emma promised you is a Ceremony that takes place before the staff 
and all the girls. Sometimes the bastard who sent us here shows up to gloat. 
Tomorrow they'll tie you to a post out in the yard and give you fifty with a 
special whip. The idea is that the whip and whoever uses it stops just 
barely short of killing you." 

The four chained maidens looked at her in sorrow. Each had suffered what she 
must suffer. Gail looked at them piteously in a great need of communion. She 
held out a hand, heavy with links. Her closest neighbor tried to reach it, 
but could not. "That's part of the beastliness," she said morosely. "Us 
chained girls can't touch. They chain us purposely to make sure...." 

It was almost military. The inmates were lined up with precision. The staff 
was smart in uniform. They formed three sides of a square about the posts in 
the centre of the huge yard. Gail was the last to arrive. She was led grimly 
to the place of execution by the firm grip of Thelma's large hand. It was 
not until she had completed half the journey that she realized there was not 
one post, but two. Fastened by her wrists to one of them was the naked 
figure of Harry Rattery's mistress, Grace. 

The State Prison Farm for Women was indeed a place of vengeance! Gail drew 
the gunny sack over her head, tidied her hair as best she could, and stood 
naked awaiting instructions. Then, under Thelma's guidance, she raised her 
hands so that one of them could be strapped firmly on each side of the grim 
hulk of timber that would thwart her struggles to escape the whip. When she 
was helpless, she turned to Grace who stood no more than ten feet distant. 
In the tied nudity Gail saw a mirror of her own condition. They smiled at 
each other once, then looked away. 

The fat man, Andy, read a proclamation. It was beautifully official, and 
cringingly frightening. With verbiage trimmed, it said simply that a girl 
named Gail Sommers was to receive fifty strokes in punishment for an attempt 
to escape, and that another girl named Grace Willows would be given fifty 
strokes for delinquent behavior. 

At that point, possibly as a sporting diversion, Emma and Thelma took the 
stage. They tossed a coin. The winner whipped her victim first. Emma won. 

When only the first lash had curled round the lovely nakedness of the girl 
bound as she was bound, Gail knew for sure that the tossed coin affected far 
more than the two wardresses. To have to watch the whipping of another girl 
in the knowledge that she herself would suffer the same agonies within the 
space of a little time was a punishment in itself. In this sense it was Gail 
who had lost in the flipping of a coin. Her agony of both the spirit and the 
flesh was limitless as she beheld what was being done to the girl who had 
been kind to her: the same torture for which she waited helplessly. 

There was blood. But only small flecks where the tip of the lash had bitten 
beyond intent. It became evident that Emma's purpose was to strike the white 
skin as hard as possible without cutting it. She was undeniably competent. 
But it was evident, too, that the girl's breasts would not be immune. If the 
end of the lash found them, so be it! She whipped slowly with careful pauses 
so that the watching eyes could learn their lesson or enjoy the erotic 
delight of a naked girl beneath the lash. 

It was incredibly erotic! Gail sensed the atmosphere. Beyond her own 
suspenseful fear she, too, could not be unaware of the elemental quality of 
what was taking place. It was pure beauty and pure horror. But the point at 
which they merged was indefinable. They stood in a great openness; yet, 
spotlights might have been playing upon the nakedness of the girl tied to 
the post whose body was now plentifully striated with weals. Grace was the 
star. Grace was the cynosure of every eye. Grace, without knowing it, was at 
the moment the most beautiful thing in all the world. Grace radiated an 
eroticism that all could feel in every pore of their being. 

Poor Grace! She knew not, nor cared, for any feelings but her own. If she 
was beautiful, or if she was erotic, she could not have cared less. But, 
unconsciously she gave of herself in an incredible giving. Gail, watching, 
wondered if she, when it came her turn, would writhe and twist and moan with 
such abandon. She watched every part of the whipped girl strain and tug 
against her wrists in a fruitless attempt to evade the curling lash. In a 
frenzy of despair Grace planted a foot against the post to lever against the 
straps upon her wrists: those two simple bands of leather that compelled her 
to stand naked to accept the whip. Gail looked at her own wrists, similarly 
fastened, and shuddered. 

When the fiftieth stroke had wealed the soft flesh, Grace hung limp, perhaps 
grateful now for the straps about her wrists from which she could droop in 
agony and fatigue. She continued to sob and to whimper. Every part of her 
was marked by vivid stripes. Her punishment had been that of a felon in 
centuries past. Brutal! 

In the knowledge that it was now her own turn to feel the whip, Gail's heart 
thudded with a sound she feared others might hear. She knew she would 
scream. She cherished no hope that she would emerge from her punishment with 
any emotion intact. Already she was driven and reduced by fear, fear of 
agonies no naked girl should have to bear. She looked appealingly at Thelma, 
but received only a broad appreciative grin of pure enjoyment. Thelma had 
been given the whip. She was curling it lovingly back and forth between her 
fingers. She held it up for the trembling girl to see. "You'll love it, 
honey. You'll love every stroke," she whispered with a warmth that bespoke 
an insane sincerity. "I'm going to make this sweet leather snap right into 
you. Honey, you tell your tits and twat that here I come." She raised her 
arm and swept it back. 

The flogging of Gail Sommers had begun. 

They shared a cell. The Prison Farm had everything. It was a plain bare cell 
of concrete and a barred front. A narrow cot was against each wall. But the 
sharing had been diabolically designed. Only a sadist, or perhaps Harry 
Rattery would have thought of it. Gail and Grace were naked, their only 
clothing the livid lines of the whip upon their skin. Each sat upon her cot. 
Each wore a leather gag helmet padlocked at the back of her neck. The wrists 
of each were handcuffed behind their back. A metal collar locked upon each 
slender neck tethered them to the wall. They had freedom to lie upon their 
cot. That was all. They gazed at each other in utter desolation. They could 
not speak. 

It was too cruel! They had so much to say, but could make no sound. They 
longed to touch, but they were tightly chained. Never had two beings been so 
close without communion. "You'll be able to have a nice long talk," the 
wardress had chuckled after she had slammed and locked the barred door. They 
had looked at her with hate and hopelessness. Gail noticed that Grace's 
ankles had been chained as had her own. They spent the most frustrating 
hours of their lives before they wept, and then weeping they fell asleep. 

The Prison Farm for Women did not easily forgive. When Gail and Grace were 
delivered to the chain gang the following morning, they were made to hold 
out their hands to have handcuffs locked upon their wrists. They still had 
not been given no chance to talk. Gail longed to comfort and to warn the 
bewildered Grace of the hazards of their workday. With linked hands it would 
be doubly difficult to use the hoe. The threat of the whip would never be 
far distant. It seemed impossible that they would be whipped again after 
their flogging of the previous day, but Gail feared it all too probable. 

With chained feet and chained hands the work was doubly miserable. No matter 
how she tried, Gail knew her wrists would be sadly chafed by night. Before 
the morning was ended the inevitable happened. Grace dropped her hoe. 

"Fingers need limbering up a bit, honey," Emma's suave and helpful voice 
suggested. 

Grace swiftly retrieved her hoe and looked uncertainly at the woman who had 
flogged her the day before. "I'm sorry," she quavered humbly. 

"Ain't I got no name or title, girl?" Emma was out for blood. 

"I'm sorry ma'am." Grace's voice betrayed her knowledge she was lost. 

"Maybe if you hold your hand out I can loosen up them fingers for you." A 
stranger might have sworn the words held kindly intent. 

Grace raised her cuffed hands. She looked questioningly from them to her 
tormentor. 

"Them cuffs won't bother us none, honey," Emma advised heartily. ""Just you 
stick them pretty hands well out front. Pull back on one, palm up on the 
other." 

Gail watched in fascination. Emma was right. Being handcuffed in no way 
impeded the whipping of a girl's hands. Hesitantly, the girl to be punished 
raised her arms. It became easily possible to offer a single stretched palm 
for the cut of the crop. Grace stood, statuesque in misery. The crop whirred 
and bit. Its victim fell to the ground, twisting in agony in the dirt. 

"No one said nothin' 'bout sitting down, honey." The inexorable sarcasm 
prodded. 

Grace looked up fiercely. "You rotten bitch!" The words were ejected from 
between tight lips as though each was a bullet. "I can't take that! I can't. 
You don't have to treat us like this. I'll blow your rotten prison sky high 
when I get out of here." 

Emma beamed. "When you figure to get out, honey?" 

The quiet query was like a blow. No girl there could be certain she was not 
at the Prison Farm for life. Grace raised her joined hands. "You have to 
give us a break. You just have to! No girl can work like this." 

"You can and you will, sweetheart. Up! And out with that flipper." 

It was heartbreaking to watch. Grace looked hopelessly at the handcuffs upon 
her wrists and at the heavy chain linking her ankles. She could not fight. 
She could not run. She could do nothing but obey. Disgustedly, she got to 
her feet, held out her hands once more and received a scalding slash that, 
again, sent her to her knees. 

Gail was suddenly stricken in horror. A crop rapped against her knee. "You 
retired from business, sugar?" Thelma inquired. In her absorption with her 
companion's ordeal Gail had stopped work to watch the cruelty. 

"Let's make things a bit easier for you," the wardress said expansively. 
"Hold out your hands, honey." 

Gail watched dubiously as her handcuffs were unlocked. She had no hope for 
what was about to happen. "Off with the sack, little darling." Naked, Gail 
allowed herself once more to be handcuffed. "Little hands still sore, 
sweetheart?" 

"Yes, ma'am." 

"Then let's have a little change. You keep working, honey, till I get back." 
Thelma made for the buildings. 

Grace, too, was allowed to resume her task. With bruised fingers and hands 
and the chains upon her wrists hoeing was well nigh impossible. But she 
tried. Gail felt sure neither of them had yet plumbed the depths. 

Thelma returned with a largish zipper bag and a broad smile. She winked at 
Emma and suggested, "Yours first, eh?" 

Continuing the motions of hoeing, Gail frankly watched Emma grasped Grace's 
hair and pulled forward and down. "Bend well over, honey," she invited. 

The unfortunate girl had no choice but to obey. A moment later her head was 
between Emma's ample thighs, her neck held as in a vice. Her bottom was 
reared, her legs were rudely kicked as wide apart as their chain would 
allow. Gail began to guess what was in store. 

But she had underestimated the resources of the Prison Farm. From the bag, a 
gleefully grinning Thelma produced a huge tuft of what appeared to be 
ostrich feathers spouting from a sizeable rubber prong. She also produced 
vaseline. 

Grace struggled and protested. But to no avail. She was held. The operation 
that would degrade and render her ludicrous before her fellow prisoners went 
competently forward. Admittedly, it was done with reasonable care. The ugly 
protrusion entered its warm sheath under skilful guidance and practiced 
hands. But to a girl who had never been spread it would be agony. Its 
frontal knob would ensure the sphincter muscle's firm retaining grip upon 
the mockery of a bird's plumed tail. But it would be bitterly painful to the 
girl within whose rectum it found refuge. The beastly work was concluded 
when Grace's handcuffs were removed so that the sack could be discarded to 
leave her nude, and then locked back on her wrists with an extra tight grip. 
Scarlet faced, she stood in her plumed nakedness, uncertain what to do. 

"Reach round and pull it out if you don't like it, sugar," Thelma suggested 
cheerfully. 

For a moment Grace stood, undecided, off balance, not knowing. Then, 
following a natural instinct, she did the wrong thing. She reached back to 
tug the intruding alien thing from her body. 

The laughter was not limited to the merriment of the wardresses. Most of the 
captive girls found it hard to keep a straight face. Even the agonized Gail 
could appreciate the comic absurdity of what she beheld. No matter how she 
tried, Grace could not reach the thing she sought. The handcuffs tight upon 
her wrists defeated her. She could touch a fingertip to a feather. But could 
grip nothing with sufficient force to achieve her purpose. With or without 
permission, she would have no choice but to wear her badge of shame. 
Blushing vividly she picked up her hoe. Tears of chagrin bedewed her eyes. 

"Record says you can take the big end o' a baseball bat, sugar," Thelma 
informed her next culprit. "Billings had you spread, eh?" 

"Yes, ma'am." Why deny! 

"They come in all sizes. Got you a real goodie." 

Gail surveyed the 'real goodie' with dismay. Without previous experience she 
might have insisted on the impossibility of its entrance within her. But Ma 
Billings plugs had left her astounded by a girl's infinite capacity. "You 
don't have to hold me," she said dejectedly. "I'll be a good girl and 
behave." Spreading her ankle chain taut, she leant forward and grasped the 
anklets themselves while the greased horror was inserted slowly inside her 
body. When she, too, stood with averted gaze, shamed eyes and scarlet face, 
she made no move to reach the plumed tail that rose pertly from her behind. 
She would wear it and be damned to them! Why make herself more of a clown 
than need be! 

What is a breaking point? A last straw? A final insult? There is no single 
answer. Perhaps for the two girls from whose bottoms reared the upstanding 
tails of feathered plumes, it was the snickers, the sly glances, the ribald 
remarks of their guards. Their shame was much enjoyed. Their pain was 
internal and could not be seen. But their blushes were on view for all to 
see. That they were compelled to continue their hoeing made their shame and 
their pain doubly potent. Motion hurt. It also sent their tails into weaving 
to and fro or a rise or a dip that enraptured those who had put them there. 

It came about suddenly. Their work had brought them close. Grace turned and 
seized Gail's appendage and dragged it from its anchorage. She turned about 
and offered her own. Instantly Gail seized it and pulled. The plumed tails 
lay discarded in the dirt. Two furiously angry girls confronted their 
guards. The hoes had suddenly become a weapon. They were raised in menace by 
chained hands. 

Anything might have happened. But the prison farm was used to crisis. Thelma 
chuckled gleefully. "You two gals sure do love trouble." She gave tribute. 
"What you want to do? Have a fight?" 

The absurdity of fighting was borne upon the militant pair by their own 
intelligence. They might hurt a guard or two. But, chained as they were, 
they had no chance. Whatever their success might be it would but add to 
their later punishment. They slumped, but kept a wary eye upon those who 
threatened them. 

"Tell you what, gals," Thelma advanced reasonably. "Any way you play it you 
two are going to end up in front of Andy's desk. What you get sentenced to 
depends on how much damage you done. You ain't done much yet. I can clean up 
them asshole tails real good so you can wear 'em again. But what counts is 
Andy. You wanna' go and talk to him?" 

Always the unexpected! At that moment Gail could have believed that Thelma 
felt sorry for them. Perhaps she did! The naked girl found her fury off 
balance in the face of sweet reason. Speak to Andy? Why not? Could their lot 
be worse? Perhaps somehow they could get through to the fat man. Perhaps get 
word out beyond the prison fence. She sought Grace's eyes and found consent. 
She lowered her hoe. 

Thelma laughed, pleased by her diplomacy. "You don't need no guard, kids," 
she assured the delinquents cheerfully. "All that expensive metal on your 
hands and feet, you ain't goin' no place outside the happiest farm in the 
county. You amble off now and tell Andy your story. Better make it true. 
I'll check. You tell a lie and I'll have the skin off your ass. When he's 
told you your sentence, you can come back and work out the day. Ain't never 
no hurry 'bout puttin' a gal in solitary. One day's as bad as another." 

Sweet reason on a prison farm! Behind it, horror! Gail and Grace dropped 
their hoes and began their hobbled walk to the superintendent's desk. 

"It was because you freed us, wasn't it?" Gail asked guiltily. 

Grace shrugged. "Yes. But what does it matter? Harry would have goaded me by 
one way or another eventually. It happened with you. That's it! Don't feel 
bad." 

Gail was puzzled. "But he's fond of you. He must be. How long would he have 
you kept in this beastly place? How long will he keep me here?" 

Again the resigned shrug. "I don't know," Grace admitted. "If I have to 
guess I'd say a month." She laughed cynically. "Not because he wants to 
limit our punishment, but because he'll want to use us again. Remember, what 
you have isn't all that common." 

"But is he willing to have us brutalized like this? In a month we could be 
half-dead." Gail was puzzled. "He paid all that money...." 

"I honestly don't think he knows about this place. Probably Billings doesn't 
either. They're thinking we are being whipped and humiliated. But not like 
the way it is. They expect to get back a chastened little girl, not a 
physical wreck." 

Andy was unperturbed, both by their factual admission of their guilt and by 
their pleas for contact with the outside world. He nodded enjoyably through 
all they had to say. "Well gals," he adjudicated genially. "Don't feel too 
bad. You ain't the first. You won't be the last. You're in for a bad time. 
But you'll live. I ain't goin' to be too hard on a couple of sweet things 
like you. We'll call it a week in the black hole on bread and water and full 
chains, and then at the end of it, and just to get you back into the swing 
of things, fifty apiece at the whipping posts out in the yard. Full dress 
parade in your honour. Now you say your thank you's real pretty and trot 
back and tell Thelma what the deal is. She'll think I'm going soft. But to 
hell with it! I like you both." 

It was all a phantasmagoria. The two naked girls left the office, dazed. The 
mind of each obsessed by visions of the horror they would now endure, the 
pain their flesh would have to bear. It was all so casual. It was all 
impossible! Thelma would laugh. Tomorrow they would be shackled together in 
the dark. A darkness that would go on and on. After it the whip. They would 
think of the whip throughout the seven days. The prison farm gave its girls 
much to consider. 

The car was unobtrusively parked beside a shed, its ominous black and white 
and all its appurtenances logical in a prison yard. Gail recognized its 
number. It was the car the policeman named Len had used to drive her here. 
No one was in it. No one was in sight. Its driver must have passed them 
unseen behind a building. She stopped dead. She had glimpsed hope. Limping 
to the window she extracted the keys from the ignition and opened the trunk. 
It was empty. Replacing the keys where she had found them, she exclaimed 
urgently, "Come on! Both of us in the trunk. It's perfect. If we can get to 
a police chief maybe he'll listen. The chap who drives this car is a decent 
guy." Awkwardly, she inserted her chained person into the open space. Grace 
doubtfully followed. The two of them filled the trunk with naked girl and 
clinking chain. But there was room. Two pairs of handcuffed hands slammed 
down the lid. 

For chained and naked girls, a ride in a car trunk is far from joy. There 
were moments during their journey when Gail regretted her inspiration. She 
regretted it doubly when, finally, the car stopped; they hammered their 
handcuffs against the metal, and the lid was lifted to disclose a startled 
male face she had never seen before. 

They were lifted from the trunk by an officer who doubted what his eyes 
beheld. "Where's Len?" Gail asked timidly. 

"Len's on vacation." The officer laughed. "Bet he wouldn't have gone if he'd 
known." 

"We'd like to see the Chief of Police." 

"So would we, lady. He's on vacation too." The officer's eyes flitted back 
and forth between two pairs of conical breasts. 

They were in a small enclosed yard. They were alone and unseen. "Think we 
could go inside and get rid of these things fastened on us?" Grace asked 
reasonably. She held up her cuffed hands. 

There was something wrong. Gail knew it instinctively. The officer was 
surveying them with a knowing scrutiny. "From the prison farm, aren't you?" 
he said without emotion. 

"Please contact Congressman Billings," Gail pleaded. "He'll tell you what to 
do with us." 

"I bet he would," the officer said without enthusiasm. "C'mon, let's go talk 
to Jake." 

"But... but, we're naked," Gail quavered. 

"I sorta' noticed that," the officer acknowledged dryly. "C'mon, this way." 

They followed him, chains clinking, features crestfallen. There was 
something wrong. 

"Bung 'em in a cell!" Jake exclaimed enthusiastically. "Ain't every day we 
get manna from heaven." 

The driver of the car answered to the appellation of Tosh. "Won't nobody 
ever know," he agreed. "Them folks at the farm will bust a gut." 

"Guess you girls been screwed before?" Jake conjectured pleasantly. 

Jake nodded musingly, his mind hard at work. "O.K. But we'll call him when 
we're ready. Not before. Right now you girls just don't exist," he guffawed. 
"So far as poor old Jake and the girls go, you're somewhere out in the wild 
blue yonder. He won't think of us." 

The naked girls understood. They were indeed manna from the skies for an 
isolated detachment. These men could own them utterly. "At least take these 
blasted things off our ankles," Grace demanded irritably. "We sound like a 
tank corps walking around. If you insist on using us, we'll all enjoy it 
more with our feet free." 

Tosh examined their fetters. "I'll be damned! Those bastards out at the farm 
riveted 'em on." 

"That takes tools and time. To hell with it!" Jake said grimly. "We can 
screw 'em all we want the way they are." 

Gail's heart sank. She supposed copulation was better than being flogged. 
But there was something ugly about these men. They were out of a frying pan 
into a fire. She lifted her locked hands. "At least take these off... 
please!" 

"Why should we? They keep you in line." 

"But we're not going to fight." 

"Damn right you ain't! Not the way you're fixed." 

"Look at the marks on us," Gail pleaded. "Can't you feel a bit of sympathy?" 

"All I can feel is a hard-on," Jake admitted. "The way you are you're the 
two sexiest dames I ever seen. I'm going up town and buy me a whip. This is 
too good to miss." 

Gail was desperate. "Fine then! Whip us! We won't say a word. But phone 
Billings." 

The officers laughed and escorted them to a cell. 

"The dirty bastards!" Grace ground the words between her teeth in fury. 
"They fuck us both and now look! We're worse off than ever." 

It was much later. The naked girls could not know the time. Each stood on 
tip-toe, hands cuffed to the bars above their heads, their breasts 
protruding outside through the bars of their cell. 

"They didn't need to do this to us," Gail mourned. "We did what they wanted. 
You're right, they're bastards." She strained her naked slenderness upwards 
to relieve the cut of the metal on her wrists. "As pretty a pair as I've 
ever seen!" It was a new voice, a new uniform. "Name's Sam, ladies. Pleased 
to meet you." 

"Are you fucking us too?" Grace asked bitterly. 

"I aim to, miss. But right now I want to use this little item." Sam held up 
a quivering length of the Tackmaker's Art. 

Gail's heart hammered. A whip! Always a whip! Did men think of nothing else 
when they thought of a naked girl? "Well, I suppose we're nicely fixed for 
it," she invited sourly. 

"Help yourself." 

It hurt as nothing else had hurt. The pain was less, but the shame was more. 
Two naked girls were being whipped within the sacred confines of law and 
order. The metal bands upon their wrists held them, strained and nude, for 
the officer's convenience. He whipped them at leisure. He whipped them with 
a tremendous zest and enjoyment. 

"Something I've always wanted to do," he confided engagingly. 

"Will you let us down when you're through?" Grace asked without hope. "It 
hurts like hell standing like this." She moaned in agony as the withe bit 
squarely across her rump. 

"I'll consider it," Sam assured them in a voice that plainly said he would 
do nothing of the sort. 

"We'll do anything you want," Gail promised abjectly. "But please let us 
down. It's awful." 

"How 'bout this?" Sam asked. He brought the limber horror squarely down 
across her strained shoulders. Gail screamed. 

"There must be something... something you want more than anything else? 
We'll do it for you. But stop whipping us... Oh please! Please let us down. 
We'll be nice to you." Grace had abandoned all feminine reticence. 

"Hell, lady. You're doing all you can for me right now," Sam assured her 
affectionately. "Don't know when I ever felt so good with my clothes on." He 
whipped her shrewdly across her thighs with a cut that evoked from her a 
most satisfying scream. 

"But you can't whip us forever," Gail pleaded without conviction. "Please 
stop. There's other things." 

"Nothing near as good as this," Sam exulted. With great accuracy he lashed 
her so that the tip wrapped 'round her thigh." 

He whipped the two naked handcuffed girls joyfully. It went on and on, until 
Gail began to believe it might go on forever. 

"Better hold it, Sam." It was Jake's voice. "Billings don't want no dead 
meat. For that matter, neither do the rest of us," he added thoughtfully. 
"Girls as cute as these got a lot o' uses." 

The handcuffs were unlocked. The two girls allowed themselves to slump to 
the floor. They wanted only rest and a chance to massage their hurt wrists. 
The two officers surveyed their captives with satisfaction. "Better let the 
night boys in on this. Give Roddy and Mick a call. They can have a turn 
before we hoist 'em again," Jake ordered casually. 

"But why 'hoist us?'" Grace wailed when Sam had gone on his errand. "We do 
everything you want. Maybe we can do a lot more if you keep those damn 
handcuffs in your pocket. Why have we got to stand on our toes?" 

Jake laughed. "You just said it, lady. Keeps you on your toes. Nothing makes 
a gal mind like a session on the bars. We know. We got experience." 

"I just bet you have!" Grace retorted acidly as she rubbed the indentations 
on her wrists. "But you've hung us up once. It hurt plenty. Why do it 
again?" 

"Because we're just plain bastards, lady," Jake admitted with pride. "A gal 
looks damn pretty when she's fixed like that, and her little ass is handy 
for any of the boys to tickle it up." 

"That wasn't tickling. We were flogged." 

"Well, Sam might have gone a mite overboard. I'll tell the boys to go at you 
a bit easy." 

"Thanks a lot!" Gail retorted dryly. "When are you going to phone Billings?" 

Jake considered. "Like I said, we're a bunch of bastards. We'll have fun 
with you 'till the day before the chief is due back. Then you're home free; 
matter of about a week." 

"A week on our toes and getting whipped. You're supposed to be policemen!" 
Grace was infinitely bitter. 

"Could take you back to the farm?" Jake suggested thoughtfully. "Don't 
hesitate to ask." 

There was the thud of heavy boots. "See, what did I tell you?" Sam exulted 
at his two burly companions. "Two nice as little tricks as we've ever had." 

"I suppose we lie on our backs now?" Grace asked coldly. 

"Tell the truth, lady, we'd like to try the other way 'round." Mick had the 
healthy exuberance of a big puppy. 

Gail sensed her companion's fear. "If that's what you want," she said 
bravely, "you can do it to me. I've been... well, I've been fixed." 

Four pairs of avid eyes examined her delightedly. "The Congressman shoved a 
bung up her," Jake supplied indelicately. 

"You'll enjoy me there, I promise." Gail was determined to take the heat off 
an apprehensive Grace. She rose, smiled sweetly, and bent well over. "If 
you'd take these damn chains off our ankles it would be a lot better for 
you." She hoped they would take the hint. 

We can rationalize anything. Everything can become commonplace. Gail 
regarded what was done to her then as one of the lesser violations. She 
could bear their thrusts without pain. She heard their grunts with contempt. 
From such a coupling the girl emerges victor. For her, the tumescent male 
within her rectum is without significance. She invited their attentions 
again and again. Never failing to tell of the greater delights she could 
have given had her feet been without their hampering chains. The absurd and 
gleeful males spent themselves within her, enraptured by something new, an 
erotic experience beyond their wildest dreams. Grace watched in wonder and 
loathing. 

"Well, ladies. We got work to do. Up you go again," Jake ordered brightly 
when the last vestige of concupiscence had been assuaged. 

Gail shrank from the unfeeling command. She turned on him indignantly. 
"Look! I tried to be nice to you. I was nice. You all enjoyed me. Can't you 
be a bit kind too and give us a break?" 

"Don't push, kid." The voice had lost some of its bonhomie. 

"Well, if you must chain us to the bars, can't you do it at waist level so 
we can stand properly?" she bargained desperately. 

"Up, the both of you! No more yapping." 

There was no choice, no chance to fight, nothing but obedience. Dejectedly 
the two naked girls stood and offered their already chafed wrists. Gail 
watched the steel band circle the slenderness below her hand and click 
tight. Passive, she rose on her toes and lifted her arms. Looking up she saw 
the empty cuff passed round a bar above the crosspiece that would keep it 
there. Hating the act, she pressed her other wrist within the open jaws and 
saw the shining metal close in a firm tight grip. A few moments later the 
girls were alone, their nakedness stretched and strained against the bars as 
though seeking an escape that wasn't there. The sound of heavy footsteps 
died away. Ankle chains clinked as the captives sought a comfort the 
handcuffs denied. 

"The dirty rotten bastards!" Grace muttered vehemently. 

"We've got to get out of this," Gail said tearfully. "There has to be some 
way!" 

A door opened and closed. There were sounds. The chained girls tensed, their 
self pity set aside they listened, alert. 

She was a nondescript girl of perhaps eighteen. She carried a broom, a mop 
and a pail. She was not surprised, "The boys told me," she explained in 
answer to their wide-eyed stare. "There's usually some poor damn girl around 
somewhere." She gave them a comradely grin. "Helps me out a lot. When they 
ain't got one they screw my ass off." 

"Do they always keep them the way they've got us now?" Gail demanded 
incredulously. 

"Mostly. Pretty good way, really. Can't do much, can you?" the girl asked 
reasonably. She obviously saw nothing to criticize. 

"Would you get a message out for us. I'd get you money?" 

Grace asked. 

"Stuff it, sister. I listen to that talk, I'd be standing the way you are. I 
got a good thing going here. I ain't about to spoil it." 

"What's so good about mopping floors?" 

"My name's Hetty, and I'll show you what's good 'bout my job. It's this." 
Without haste, the girl laid down her burdens, then in one swift motion 
clamped Grace's nipples between thumbs and fingers. 

Grace yelped in surprise and pain. But she was helpless. Her breasts had 
protruded through the bars. They were freely available to anyone in the 
passage. "Please, don't do that!" she pleaded. "Not you too...?" 

"And why not!" Hetty sounded offended. "The boys don't begrudge me a bit of 
fun. Here, I'll pinch 'em harder. Maybe you'll enjoy it." 

Gail watched in frustrated fury. "Stop it you little bitch!" She could no 
longer keep silent. "She's never done you any harm. You don't have to treat 
her like that." 

Hetty raised smoldering eyes. "Bit big for your britches, ain't you, lady?" 
She released Grace's nipples and turned her attention on Gail. 

To plead or not to plead! To struggle and hurt her wrists or to stand still 
and accept! Miserably, Gail stood and watched approaching punishment. Her 
eyes on Hetty's eyes and on Hetty's hands. Both were merciless. Before she 
was touched she could have moaned. When her defenseless nipples were clamped 
and pinched, she did moan in hopeless misery. Her ankle fetters clinked 
musically as she made the only motion she could that did not hurt. "After 
awhile I'll tickle your clits," Hetty assured her prey. Her voice left doubt 
if it was threat or promise. Her torture of the two nipples she held captive 
increased. Gail screamed. 

Hetty was pleasantly social as though visiting old friends. She was cruel as 
children are cruel before they understand cruelty. "I got me a real good 
idea for you two," she announced suddenly. "Be back in a jiffy." 

The 'good idea' was instantly obvious. Four spring clip clothes pins! 
Simple! Cruel! Demeaning! "Look, please! Don't put those on us," Gail 
begged. "Isn't there something we can do or say that will please you without 
torture?" 

"You lost your marbles, kid?" Hetty asked pleasantly. "You ain't got nothing 
I want more than I'm getting off you right now." 

"You put those things on me and I'll scream my head off," Gail threatened. 

"Go ahead, lady. Scream," Hetty advised indifferently. 

Gail screamed. Grace joined in with cries for help. After much clamor a door 
opened and a male voice inquired, "Want any help, Hetty?" 

It was useless. No one cared. This girl would use them as others had done! 
Hetty had stood, smiling quietly at their abortive seeking of aid where no 
aid was. Her fingers toyed idly with the small domestic instruments of 
torture they would soon wear. "I don't mind if you wiggle," she said 
amiably. "There just ain't no way you can stop me putting these on your 
tits." 

Hetty's statement was so obviously true that neither girl had the will to 
fight. Gail looked down cringingly as her right nipple was bitten and 
clamped, then watched again as the small open jaws approached her other 
breast and took possession of their passive prey. The small objects hurt 
bitterly. They stuck out pertly and aggressively in a way that shamed. They 
made the breasts seem wanton, demanding attention. Neither girl had the 
faintest possibility of removing them. They exchanged glances of despair. 
Hetty went about her work, leaving them alone with their pain. 

Mick, passing on an errand, stopped to admire. "Please take these things off 
our breasts," Gail asked him humbly. "Hetty put them on us. She's no 
right...." He laughed and flicked one of her pins with a heavy finger so 
that she winced. "Poor kid's got to have her bit of fun," he admonished 
cheerfully. "Likes her clothes pins, Hetty does." He went blithely about his 
affairs. 

It was some considerable time before Hetty returned. "Guess you'd like to 
get them pins off your nips?" she suggested brightly. She listened to their 
fervid affirmatives before she said, "You'll wear 'em awhile yet. But I am 
going to take 'em off." She grinned at their puzzlement. "I take 'em off but 
put 'em right back on in a different position. It hurts much more that way. 
See, I'll show you." 

She showed them. They stood abjectly while their nipples were introduced to 
a fresh torture. Without experiencing it, they would have found it hard to 
believe that what this girl was doing to them could produce so much pain. 
But as each of the seeking jaws found its new bite upon their flesh they 
gasped in shock at the intensity of sensation. 

"Bet the boys didn't screw your cunts," Hetty affirmed, no doubt from some 
personal knowledge of her own. "With these on your tits your little clits 
ought to really be ripe. Let's see how good you are." She inserted a knowing 
finger within Gail's waiting vulva and plied it cunningly with female skill. 

Like so many of their punishments it went on and on. The hoyden went from 
one to the other, snickering with a lewd joy at the responses they could not 
quench. It was a very feminine torture. Between their nipples and their damp 
sex the captives were kept in constant agony. They tried hard not to moan. 
But a girl is a girl is a girl... ! 

It passed in the way that punishments do. They were fed. They were allowed 
to sleep. They slept handcuffed, but without pain. Morning brought 
breakfast, Sam, and disaster. When he cleared the dishes he crudely grasped 
Gail's left nipple and squeezed. Instinctively, she swung her cuffed hands, 
the metal on her wrists striking the male Adam's apple with enough force to 
send him gagging and clutching to the wall. She quailed at the sudden 
savagery in his eyes. There was a terrible silence while he got back his 
voice. With frightening venom he ejaculated: "You bitch! You absolute 
bitch!" He gathered the dishes and was gone. Both girls were trembling. Sam 
would soon be back. "Sure, I know. She hit you, Sam. But we can't cut the 
girl to pieces," Jake argued persuadingly. "Just forget the idea of 
stringing her up and going to work with that whip." 

"I'm going to hurt her," Sam insisted doggedly. 

"O.K.! O.K.! But let's spread it out a bit. How's about making her a 
five-way girl." Gail cringed. Sam brightened. "O.K. But I've got to be in 
Court." 

"I'll get Hetty in to warm her up. You can take over later." 

"Let's fix her now. I got time." Sam was avid. They 'fixed her'. It was 
really very simple. Gail's hands were cuffed behind her back. Cursing the 
trouble, they got tools and removed the chains from her feet, immediately 
replacing them with loops of rope about her ankles; these led to rings high 
in the wall. Both officers pulled until Gail's legs were widely and 
obscenely spread and her hips were raised off the floor. Most of her weight 
rested on her shoulders and upper arms. She could make no effective motion. 
"A damn pretty picture!" Sam approved. Jake merely smiled. They went away. 
But before they left they thoughtfully passed Grace's hands behind her 
through the bars and cuffed them there so that she must stand and watch. "Be 
a real education for you, honey," Jake assured her affably. Their laughter 
drifted back to the captive girls. 

Hetty arrived in short order. She was glowing. Her eyes sparkled at the 
sight of Gail's gaping secrets. "Curious 'bout the five ways?" She laughed. 
"Look! I'll show you." She held up a small short single thonged whip, a 
miniature, but still a thing of menace. The bound girl felt her flesh crawl. 
She cringed. She knew! 

As always, the unexpected! Hetty's wrist flicked the wicked little thong 
across the exposed sole of her victim's anchored foot. Gail cried out in 
pain and shock. "Number one," said Hetty. "Let's try for number two." She 
hit Gail's other sole and elicited another yelp of pain. Delightedly, the 
excited teenager struck the shockingly exposed centre of her victim's sex. 
How's that for number three?" she inquired with interest. "Guess where the 
next two go." She took up a new position. Gail looked up at her beseechingly 
in the knowledge that her naked breasts pleaded for the thong. Hetty 
carefully rewarded them with number four and number five. "There! You're a 
five-way girl!" Hetty announced jubilantly. 

The naked girl lay helpless and watched herself whipped. The girl who 
wielded the thong went slowly from number one to number five with methodical 
precision. No single stroke of the short lash injured, none was impossible 
to bear, no stroke mattered. But in their unceasing cumulative effect they 
were diabolical. Gail wept in the desolation of her misery. Sometimes she 
moaned or cried out in protest. Hetty smiled and whipped steadily. They had 
all day... 

Jake's entry was a small explosion. "O.K. Hetty, girl. You can run. Chiefs 
coming back." He was joined by a sweating Sam. The two men lost no time in 
freeing their torture victim and the girl cuffed to the bars. In a matter of 
moments the two naked girls, their wrists handcuffed behind their backs, 
stood beside the patrol car while the lid of the trunk was raised. "Sorry 
'bout this, girls," Jake said with evident sincerity as he lifted the 
helpless Grace within the empty space. 

Gail was frantic. "Please don't take us back to the Prison Farm," she begged 
tearfully. "Keep us here and hurt us and... and... the rest! But don't take 
us back there. They'll half kill us." 

Her plea met only laughter. She was lifted and deposited beside the equally 
distraught Grace. The lid slammed shut. 

It seemed a long, long time. But in the motion filled darkness the naked 
girls could measure nothing. They strove to comfort each other. But their 
old familiar enemy, the handcuffs, denied them. Always the handcuffs! Gail 
reflected bitterly as she tugged at the metal bands. The handcuff and the 
whip! They had become the symbols of her life. She kissed Grace's foot 
against which she lay. A captive girl is grateful for the smallest joy. 

The ancient hulk of machinery rusted peacefully beneath a tree. The naked 
girls, each with a single wrist handcuffed to a sturdy angle iron, blended 
naturally within the sylvan scene. They waited where a chuckling policeman 
had chained them. "Don't you run away with that there harvester," Jake had 
admonished as he clicked shut the cuff that kept them captive. They watched 
him drive away. They examined their captive wrists and shrugged hopelessly, 
grinned at each other in rueful resignation, and waited for something to 
happen. It was over an hour before Ma Billings came into view. She was 
smiling happily. She carried cord. She kissed Gail warmly, and patted 
Grace's cheek. "Talk about casting your bread upon the waters and getting it 
back...." She greeted them cheerfully. Looking at the perplexed Grace, she 
said with deep satisfaction: "I'm going to keep you as a bonus, honey. I 
surely am." She winked broadly. "Some cop I never heard of phoned and said 
I'd find you here. I owe that guy... Turn around, sweetheart. I ain't taking 
no chances." 

How strange is slavery! Gail knew only happiness as she passively allowed 
her elbows to be painfully tied with cord. Ma had already unlocked her from 
the old machine and joined her wrists behind her back. Even the tether 
'round her neck felt good. It was held by someone who would not hurt her 
more than she could bear. The captive girl watched as Grace was similarly 
enslaved. She smiled to show that all was well. 

"Y'know, honey, I was thinking only yesterday. You just got eight more 
months to go. Ain't hardly nothing." Ma sounded wistful. Pulling on their 
tethers she led her slave girls back to the Bar-B, Ranch. 

Only eight months...! 


THE END
