i

Later, with the good butcher Donnelly dead, Geoffrey Sauls, who had accompanied him into the Courthouse that night, would offer a bowdlerized version of what happened within. This he did to protect both the memory of the deceased man, who'd been his drinking and darts partner for seventeen years, and Donnelly's widow, whose grief would have been cruelly exacerbated by the truth. Which was: that they had climbed the steps of the Courthouse thinking that perhaps they'd be the heroes of the night. There was somebody inside, no doubt of that, and more than likely it was the runaway. Who else was it going to be, they reasoned. Donnelly had been a pace or two ahead of Sauls, and had therefore arrived in the Courtroom first. Sauls had heard him mutter something awestruck and had come to Donnelly's side to find not the missing boy but a woman, standing in the middle of the chamber. There were two or three fat candles set on the ground close to where she stood, and by their flattering light he saw that she was partially undressed. Her breasts, which had a gloss of sweat upon them, were bared, and she'd hoisted up her skirt high enough that her hand could roam between her legs, a smile spreading across her face as she pleasured herself. Though her body was firm (her breasts rode as high as an eighteen-year-olds) her features bore the stamp of experience. Not that she was lined or flabby; her skin was perfect. But there was about her lips and eyes a confidence that belied her flawless cheeks and brow. In short, Sauls knew the instant he set eyes upon her that this was a woman who knew her mind. He didn't like that one bit.

Donnelly, on the other hand, did. He'd had a couple of double brandies before setting out, and they'd loosened his tongue. 'You're a lovely,' he said appreciatively. 'Aren't you a bit cold?'

The woman gave him the reply he'd surely been hoping for. 'You look like you've got plenty of meat on you,' she said, earning a chuckle from the butcher. 'Why don't you come over here and warm me up a bit?'

'Del-' Sauls warned, catching hold of his friend's arm, 'We're not here for shenanigans. We're here to find the boy.'

'Poor Will,' the woman said. 'A lost lamb if ever there was one.'

'Do you know where he is?' Geoffrey said.

'Maybe I do and maybe I don't,' the woman replied. Her eyes were fixed on Donnelly, her hands still playing away.

'Is he here somewhere?' Sauls asked her.

'Maybe he is and maybe he isn't.'

The reply made Sauls more uneasy than ever. Did it mean she had the boy a prisoner here? God help him if she did. There was a gleam of lunacy in her eyes, and in this whorish display of hers. Though he loved Delbert dearly, no sane woman would be inviting him to touch her the way she was right now: her dress lifted so high her privates were on display, her fingers plunged into them to the second knuckle.

'I'd keep your distance if I were you, Delbert,' Sauls advised.

'She just wants a bit o' fun,' Del replied, swaying towards the woman.

'The boy's here somewhere,' Sauls said.

'So go find him,' Donnelly replied dreamily, raising his sausage fingers to fondle the woman's breasts. 'I'll keep her distracted.'

'I'll take you both on if you like,' the woman suggested.

But Delbert wasn't feeling democratic. 'Go on, Geoffrey,' he said, his tone faintly threatening. 'I can handle her on my own, thank you very much.'

Geoffrey had only brawled with Delbert once in his life (over a contested darts match, naturally) and he'd come off much the worse. The butcher was more bulk than brawn, but Geoffrey was a bantamweight, and within half a minute he'd found himself flat on his back in the gutter. Given that he couldn't hope physically to pry Del from his object of affection, he had little choice but to do as the man said, and go look for the child. He did so quickly, so as not to be gone from the Courtroom itself for very long. With his torchbeam lighting the way ahead he searched the passageways and chambers in a systematic fashion, calling for the boy as though for a lost dog.

'Will? Where are you? Come on. It's okay. Will?'

In one of the rooms he came upon what he assumed to be the whore's belongings: two or three bags, and some scattered articles of clothing, along with a variety of paraphernalia that looked vaguely erotic in purpose. (He didn't have time to study them closely. But many months later, when the trauma of this night had receded, his mind would guiltily revisit this litter, and obsess on it, imagining the purpose to which she had put these barbed rods and silken cords.) In a second chamber he found a still more disturbing sight. Overturned furniture, ashes underfoot, fragments of charred debris. What he didn't find was the boy; all the other rooms, and there were several, were deserted. The layout of the place was tricky to grasp, especially in his present state of anxiety. He might well have got lost in the maze of chambers and passages had he not heard Delbert start to shout, or sob maybe - yes, it was a sob - and followed the din

back through the corridors, through the room with the ashes, and that unholy boudoir, to the Courtroom.

And now, of course, we come to that part he kept from telling in its entirety, preferring to risk a lie than defame his friend. Delbert was not, as Sauls would later testify, lying inert on the floor, sobbing to be saved. Supine he certainly was, his trousers and underwear somewhere around his boots, his head and arms thrown back. But there was no appeal in his cry, except perhaps that the woman straddling him, her hands digging into the mottled fat of his belly, ride him harder, harder.

'Jesus, Del-' Sauls said, appalled at the sight.

Delbert's little eyes, upside-down in the wet, hot bulk of his head, burned with pleasure.

'Go. Away.' he said.

'No, no ...' the woman panted, beckoning Geoffrey to her and proffering her breast. 'I can use him here.'

Even in the throes of his delirium, however, Donnelly was feeling proprietorial. 'Fuck off, Geoffrey,' he said, skewing his head around to get a better fix on the competition. 'I saw her first.'

'I think it's time you shut up!' the woman snapped, and for the first time Geoffrey saw that there was something wrapped around Del's neck. From what he could see it looked to be no more than a thin piece of rope with a few beads threaded along its length, except that it moved, in serpentine fashion, its tail twitching between Del's pink tits, its body sliding upon itself as it tightened its grip. Del suddenly made a choking sound, and his fingers went up to his throat, scrabbling at the cord. His red face suddenly got redder still.

'Now, come here,' the woman instructed Geoffrey, sweetly enough. He shook his head. If he'd had any urge to touch the creature, it had been scared out of him. 'I'm not going to tell you again,' she said to Sauls. Then, glancing down at Delbert, she murmured: 'Do you want it tighter?' A pitiful gurgling sound was all that escaped him, but the snake-rope seemed to take that as a yes, and duly tightened.

'Stop!' Sauls said, 'You're killing him!' She stared at him, her face as blank as it was beautiful, so he said it again, in case the bitch in her heat hadn't understood what she was doing. But she understood. He saw that now; saw the look of pleasure cross her face as poor Delbert bucked and thrashed beneath her. He had to stop her, and quickly, or Del would be dead.

'What do you want?' he said, approaching her.

'Kiss me,' she said, her eyes become slits in a face that was somehow simpler than it had been moments ago, as though it were being unmade before his eyes by some invisible sculptor. He would have preferred to clamp his mouth to his own mother-in-law's maw than kiss the moist hole in the whore's face, but Del's life was ebbing away by the gasp. A few moments more, and it would be gone. Steeling his courage, he pressed his lips against the unbecoming flesh of her mouth, only to have her take hold of his hair - what little he had - and haul back his head. 'Not there!' she said, the words coming on a breath so balmy and sweetly scented he momentarily forgot his fear. 'Here! Here!'