'Apparently not,' Anne said quietly. 'According to what the witchfinder fellow told people earlier, iron shackles a witch's powers and weakens her. Once she's properly drained of her evil powers she's to be flogged, so they say.'
'Oh, the poor wretched girl!' Harriet cried. 'What agonies she must be suffering. We can't just leave her there, surely?'
'We'd best do just exactly that, miss,' Anne said, 'unless you fancy suffering the same fate as she, which I most certainly don't. The way I hear it, people are already starting to make wild accusations about others just to protect their own hides. No point in drawing attention on ourselves, I say.'
Harriet turned to her, about to argue the point, but stopped when she saw the look of sheer horror in Anne's eyes. The shoemaker's wife had a point, she had to concede, for she was only too well aware that ignorance could be fanned into suspicion and hatred by the simplest and most innocent of gestures. Visions of herself tied to a stake, her most intimate secrets bared for all to see, swam before her eyes. Besides, she reasoned, she had problems of her own to deal with and she would be of no help to her cousin Sarah if she herself became embroiled in something she could as easily avoid by walking away.
'Master Handiwell will have something to say about this cruel folly when he returns,' she muttered, 'but for now, perhaps you are right, Anne. Let's deal with one problem at a time.'
Sarah was surprised when Ross handed her over to the older Adam, who slipped leashes to her collar and Kitty's and led both girls off into the depths of the huge barn. They padded along in his wake, side by side, exchanging glances behind his back but not daring to say so much as a word to each other, as he drew them through the long passageway that bisected the building and then turned into one of the partitioned rooms at the farther end.
'His Lordship has a special guest for dinner this evening,' Adam said, closing the door behind them, 'and special guests get special entertainments. In this case, the special entertainment is you two.' Kitty and Sarah stood stiffly, their wrists once again strapped to their harnesses, their damp hair hanging down their naked backs.
'For tonight's little performance you will be rather differently dressed,' Adam continued, 'but for now, we'll just have an undressed rehearsal. Sarah, or whatever your name is, get your legs further apart and stand straighter, or I'll put an elbow brace on you.'
Without thinking, Sarah moved to obey, sliding her feet to the side and drawing back her shoulders, so that her breasts jutted even further. Adam nodded.
'Better,' he said curtly. 'Now, Titty Kitty, let's have you on your knees in front of her.' He grasped Kitty by her collar, thrusting her downwards to emphasise the order, and with a startled whimper she dropped to the floor.
'Now,' Adam said, 'you can get that little Kitty tongue of yours busy on this slut's cunt. Find her nubbin and work her good and thoroughly. I want to see her wriggling like an eel, but be warned...' he took his crop from his belt and jabbed the end into the valley between Sarah's breasts, '...one movement of either foot and I'll whip your arse with this, understand?'
'Yessir!' The words tumbled from Sarah's lips instinctively, even though the prospect of what was about to happen was so appalling to her, to have another woman touch her down there, let alone with her mouth. But then the alternative, of being thrashed by the powerful overseer, was even worse. Adam grinned at her.
'Don't look so damned horror-struck, girl,' he said. 'It's not so bad and probably just as good as having young Ross's prick up you. Oh yes,' he laughed, seeing the look of surprise register on her face, 'I know all about that. I followed the pair of you earlier, just to see how you'd react.
'Ross has a slightly crude technique and a girl can hardly resist in those stocks, but it's usually a fair indication of what a wench is made of. From where I stood, you ended up riding him as much as he was riding you. Ever had a tongue in your pussy?'
'No, master.' Sarah lowered her eyes, blushing.
'Well, if Kitty doesn't do a good job on you, then maybe I'll have to do it myself, eh? Mind you, Kitty, if I have to tongue the slut, I'll lace your hide with a few stripes. Now get going, girl. Let's see how good - or otherwise - you really are.'
Kitty leaned forward and Sarah instinctively drew her hips back, but was rewarded instantly by a sharp cut across her rump from the swishing crop. She let out a startled yelp, although the blow had not been as hard as it might have been and her body arched forwards again, thrusting her sex straight into Kitty's hungry mouth.
Immediately the big breasted girl's lips closed on her, tongue thrusting into her warm slit and then, as it located her swelling clitoris, clamping onto it with a ferocious suction that sent a column of fire shooting throughout Sarah's body.
'No-o-oo!' she groaned, but another light tap from Adam's crop kept her thrusting forward, pushing harder still into the hot mouth. At the same moment Kitty began to squirm forward on her knees, arching her back and neck until she was almost beneath her target.
'Press down, slut!' Adam barked, and pressed on Sarah's shoulder to reinforce the command. Sarah felt her knees weakening and her weight settled onto Kitty's face, but rather than distracting the kneeling girl this seemed to serve only to encourage her to redouble her efforts.
Her probing tongue flickered in and out, her lips sucked thirstily on the juices her attentions were stimulating, and Sarah could only stand, splay-legged and wide-eyed, unable to believe either what was being done to her nor the effect it was having on her.
'Tongue fuck the little bitch,' Adam chuckled. Then, to Sarah, 'Grind those hips girlie, and start looking like you're really enjoying yourself.'
'Please, m-master,' Sarah stammered, but the rest of what she was trying to say became lost in a gurgling babble, as he moved behind her and cupped his hands around in front to toy with her breasts.
'Not as big as Kitty,' Adam whispered, his mouth nuzzling Sarah's ear, 'but nice and firm and such lovely teats.' His fingers and thumbs rolled her nipples together and another wave of desperate lust swept over her. She heard him chuckle again and writhed in her bonds, but now her writhings were less an attempt to get free than a reflexive response.
Suddenly a new sensation; she felt the rigid heat pressing up between her buttocks, the head of Adam's burgeoning erection probing for that other orifice, and automatically she clenched her muscles, determined to resist this final humiliation. But in the moment of ultimate struggle, a scream tore upwards from her stomach, as Kitty's cunning ministrations brought the reward of a first orgasm and, as any thoughts of focus or concentration were banished in the same instant, to her horror Sarah felt the pulsing phallus beginning to penetrate her.
Anne Billings brought chalk and a flat piece of board from her husband's workshop, laying the latter across the top of the crude kitchen table.
'You'll mebbe think me presumptuous, Miss Harriet,' she said, 'but I'll draw you a chart as best I can and that'll make things easier for you to understand.'
'Please do,' Harriet replied. 'And I'll not think you the least presumptuous. The fact that you're a woman lies well enough with me. These past two or three years I've had cause enough to know how little import men place in the intelligence of women.
'We start here as equals, Anne,' she continued, 'save that you've had time to put some thinking to this. Pray, continue and show me your theory.'
Anne leaned over the board, the chalk shard scraping across the timber surface, talking as she drew.
'This here is the crossroads, by the Drum,' she explained, 'and this line here is the main highway between the coast and London, you see?' Harriet murmured that she understood. 'And here, here, here, here and here,' Anne went on, 'are the places where these four beggars have been stopping the night coaches. See,' she said, marking another line and adding three more crosses, 'these are the others, best as I can remember and here...' she jabbed the chalk at the line denoting the main road, '...is where that robbery happened when the soldiers rode up but a few minutes earlier.
&nb
sp; 'The robbers were riding south along here, and those naval fellows were coming up here.' She added more chalk marks. 'So, between here and here they must've left the main highway.'
'There are very few side tracks there,' Harriet observed. 'There is a very poor lane that leads north and crosses the road before the lane that leads to our own house. As far as I know that has been so little used of late that it's completely overgrown, but I suppose mounted men could push a way through.'
'Aye, horsemen can go where wagons may not,' Anne agreed, 'and if they turned east when they got here,' she added, marking again on the board, 'they would be in Sepley within a half hour. But,' she said, straightening up, 'there are other possibilities. The road up to Grayling Hall lies between where they stopped the coach and where the troopers met the tars.'
'And there are plenty of woods around the hall,' Harriet mused. 'A good place for our thieves to hide out for a few hours, no doubt.'
'Always supposing they knew the lie of the land,' Anne retorted. 'But t'wouldn't be the sort of place to go riding in the dark, not if a body didn't know the area.'
'So, where else might they have turned off?'
'Well, Miss Harriet,' Anne replied slowly, 'I'm not the best authority, but I have lived around these parts all my life and I don't reckon there's anywhere much else. Which means, same as I said, that whoever's robbing these coaches must live very close to Fetworth - or one of the beggars must, at least.'
'I think you could well be right,' Harriet said carefully. 'They were quick to contact me, seemed to know where and when it would be easiest to collect ransom money without being overlooked and were close enough, I presume, to be able to set up certain things.
'I'll know more when Toby returns, assuming he's not let himself get into trouble, but there's something else, too. Whoever has taken my cousin must be holding her prisoner somewhere close by, always assuming they do intend to return her when the ransom is paid. It would have to be somewhere safe from prying eyes, well away from the chance of being stumbled over, yet close enough.'
'Well, there are a few old cottages and huts in the woods, though I'd not want to use any of them for living in, but I reckon they'd serve well enough in the short time.'
'Yes, they would,' Harriet agreed, 'but I just have this feeling that whoever is behind this, they wouldn't risk something as unreliable as a derelict forester's hut. For some reason I cannot explain, I just think they have a base of operations which is far more secure and trustworthy.'
'But where, Miss Harriet?' Anne demanded, pointing the chalk at her rough map. 'There's Fetworth village itself, the church, your own house - which we can forget, of course - and Grayling Hall itself. And I can't imagine four mounted thieves, not when they're carrying a captive woman, risking riding through this village in the dead of night. Even if they did, someone would have seen or heard something and we'd have known about it by now, for sure.'
'Quite,' Harriet agreed. She stood for several seconds, staring down at the chalk-marked board. 'And that, unless we think that Wickstanner would risk church involvement in something like this, which is even more absurd than what he and this awful Crawley creature are doing now, leaves only one other possibility.'
Few people knew the woods, paths, streams and the river in the area as well as Toby, and he was able to take a much more direct route to a spot opposite Priest's Rock than the little boat. Even so, he wasted no time, loping along at a steady pace, determined to find a vantage point in good time before the craft arrived.
However, as he drew closer to his destination he slowed to a walk, stopping occasionally to listen. Whoever was waiting for the boat, be it carrying Harriet and the ransom or just, as was the case now, the sign that the ransom was to be paid next day, would likely be somewhere close by, probably with another boat on hand. Toby paused again, considering what he would do in their shoes.
Grinning to himself, he swung around in an arc, heading for a point slightly upstream from the islet, a sheltered nook from which he had fished many times in his young life. Sure enough, as he slid down through the reeds and bushes, he saw the dark shape of a boat lurking beneath a curtain of willow branches, barely thirty paces from where he was now hidden and about fifty paces upstream from the islet itself.
Whether or not there was somebody in the craft he could not see, for the foliage screened it from the gunwales upwards, but Toby was unconcerned by this. If the boat was empty, whoever intended to use it would not be far away, for as soon as the messenger boat appeared they would need to get out into mid-stream to intercept it and, when that happened, he would have a perfect view of them.
The sun was beginning to set, it was true, but by Toby's calculations the drifting boat would arrive well before darkness fell and, as he looked up at the clear sky and across to where the pale orb of the moon was already becoming visible, he knew that even darkness would not disguise whoever appeared when the time came.
As the sun finally dipped behind the distant hills Matilda began to feel cold, her naked flesh quivering in the light breeze that had sprung up from the south east. She pressed herself tight against the stake and closed her eyes in silent prayer, willing Crawley to return and release her, to give her the chance to move her stiffening limbs and maybe even remove the weight of the iron scold's bridle from her head.
At the same time she knew his return would probably mean the start of the next phase of her suffering, for he had made it clear to the villagers that she would be publicly flogged. Around the edges of the green small groups of people continued to meander slowly, staring across at her naked display, but few wanted to make it obvious that they were looking at her and fewer still approached even as close as the circle of iron pickets.
Only her grandmother had come that near, and she walked right through Crawley's supposed 'safety zone' markers and right up to Matilda, her wrinkled face white with horror and anger, her eyes blazing. Seeing the bridle and recognising it for what it was, the old lady immediately tried to remove it, but the lock held firm and she very quickly realised the futility of her efforts. A further cursory check convinced her that she could not release Matilda from the rest of her bondage, either.
'He'll pay for this!' Hannah hissed. 'By damnation he shall and so shall that lapdog, Wickstanner, or my name is not Hannah Pennywise.' She grasped Matilda's upper arms and hugged her granddaughter.
'Courage, my pet,' she whispered. 'I know what needs to be done and, by all the powers, it shall be done!'
And with that she was gone, hurrying off across the green in the direction of her cottage with her familiar stiff-backed gait, banging her cane into the ground at every other step. Alone again, in her enforced silence, Matilda began to weep, her tears soaking into the inside of the leather mask.
It was beginning to grow dark quickly and a mist forming, its icy droplets settling on Matilda's exposed flesh, so that very soon she was wet from neck to feet and the cold and damp brought on an attack of violent shivering. Hungry, thirsty and tired, she felt herself beginning to drift into a state of near delirium, but knowing, even as she did so, that if they did not come for her soon she would probably die.
Crawley, she thought vaguely, would not be pleased if that happened...
'So, you couldn't see who was in the other boat?' Harriet could not keep the disappointment from her voice and Toby looked downcast.
'I'm sorry, miss,' he said morosely, 'but that big cowl covered his entire head and he had his back to me all the while. Just used a gaff hook to catch hold of the first boat and then paddled back in under them willow branches.'
Standing in the shadows of the stables, behind the Black Drum, Matilda pursed her lips in momentary thought, but it was Anne Billings who spoke first.
'If I understand this rightly,' she said, 'then one of 'em has got to row that there boat back up to the bridge by the mill. All we needs to do is keep a watch and see who brings it back.'
'But that could be almost any time,' Harriet pointed out. 'There are only
three of us and you, Anne, have a husband and two children to attend to, whilst I need to get back to see to my father 'ere long. He is particularly sickly at the moment - so much so that I dared not tell him about Sarah, for fear the strain might make him worse. All I ventured to him, when he asked, was that cousin Sarah had not been on the coach when it arrived here, which is truth enough.'
'I could get some help,' Toby volunteered, but Harriet looked dubious.
'It could be dangerous,' she said. 'For one thing, we have no way of telling who might be in league with these villains.' She looked at Anne, whose emotionless expression suggested that she was sharing the same misgivings. 'You see, young man,' she continued, 'since you went off upon my errand we have had reason to suspect that someone - maybe more than one person - from this village is involved in these robberies.'
'Well, certainly ain't me,' Toby asserted firmly, 'and I knows it wouldn't be either Matt Cornwell nor Billy Dodds, so I'll take them along with me to share the watching.'
'But they're only children!' Harriet exclaimed, and Toby looked suddenly offended and puffed out his chest.
'Matthew Cornwell is only a week or so younger'n me, miss, and Billy will be fourteen afore Christmas. We're not kids no more, Miss Harriet, and we knows these parts better'n most.'
'I could speak with my husband,' Anne offered, 'and see if he would go along with the lads. I know for certain sure that he's no highwayman.' Her face became troubled as she spoke though. 'Problem is, I saw him going along with several other men as we walked back here just now.'
'Going to watch that poor creature being whipped, no doubt,' Harriet muttered, and Anne set her mouth in a firm line and said nothing more.
'I heard 'em all sayin' as how Matilda Pennywise is a witch and the ugly looking cove in the black cape an' stuff was goin' to whip the devils out of her,' Toby said, round-eyed. 'Is that right, miss?'
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