Industrial Espionage
by "Charles Spencer"
Part Two: Interrogation
She had even managed to doze off by morning and did not hear the door open again. She jerked when she felt hands start to unravel the tape and blinked in the sudden light. Mellors went to the windows and pulled back the curtains. Daylight streamed in and her eyes streamed suddenly in the brilliance. She looked out to see if anyone was looking in but then remembered they were on the first floor overlooking the park. No-one would see her. Her thoughts came back to the present as she felt Mellors undo the ropes holding her to the seat. He pulled her to her feet then undid her leg ropes. Her legs were very unsteady due to the time she had been tied up and she knew she could not attack him yet. Her arms anyway remained bound.
He took her shoulder and pushed her out the door and down stairs to the main hall. Was it only last night she had crept in through the window in the utility room at the back and up these same stairs. Mellors pushed her on down the narrower back stairs to the basement pausing to pick up a riding crop from a hook on the way. The basement was cavernous with white painted walls and a high vaulted ceiling. On one side was a large wine rack half-full of dusty bottles but of more importance to her was his Lordship, standing on a step ladder right in the middle of the room looping a rope pulley over an old butchers hook in the timber joist. She shuddered at the thought of what lay in wait.
“Ah my dear, how nice to see you again. Sleep well I trust. Now we must continue from last night, as I need to know what you were looking for and what that blasted Miss Hall knows about me. Are you going to tell us or do we have to get a bit rough.”
She was still gagged so shook her head rapidly and mumbled ‘No No no never’. He did not understand the mumbles but took them to be ‘no’ as he had expected. She was obviously a tough girl and presumably well trained.
“Undo her arms Mellors, then hands in front.” Soon she was strung up with her hands above her head stretched to the pulley so her toes just touched the ground. Already the strain was like fire in her arms. As Mellors finished tying her legs at ankles and thighs with coils of rough rope, Lord See untied her gag and pulled it harshly from her mouth. She licked her lips in apprehension and tried to regain control of her voice.
“ Now we will continue from last night and I didn’t sleep well so my temper is short. I wish to know why you were looking through my file on my connection with Sheik Abdulla and his business. Why Ms Hall is so worried about my lifestyle and contacts and what you think we ought to do with you now.” Janey kept her mouth shut and thought quickly. She was now in very dangerous waters and needed to think of a way out. Even if she told him everything she didn’t believe for one minute he would then call the Police or let her go.
“I am waiting patiently here, Janey Davis.” Lord See smiled thinly as he could see the turmoil on her face." Let me help make up your mind” he picked up the riding crop and, borne of long practice, flicked it across her smooth bottom. She yelped and tried to jerk away.
This carried on for some time; after half an hour he was fed up with her screams and gagged her again, this time with a ball gag tightly buckled. He also moved over other parts of her body including her breasts It took two hours before she hung sobbing in her ropes defeated. Mellors and Lord See sat back and listened with mounting interest at the story that pored from her lips.
Fanny Hall had been after Lord See for years ever since he had messed up one of her bodyguard protection jobs on a politician’s wife by going to the papers about misuse of public funds. Since then she had been keeping checks of his public and private business deals; publicly he acted as “fixer” for companies wishing to do business in the Middle East due to his extensive contacts with high level royalty for which he took large commissions. Privately, she was sure he also provided girls for the Arab Sheiks; girls who disappeared into the Arab palaces and were not seen again. White Slavery some called it. The girls were not the usual showgirls but well to do, educated career girls who ceased to occupy their usual life in England and were never heard of again. He always chose wisely with girls who had announced an intention to travel abroad so they were not missed for months by which time the trail was very cold.
She now had sparse details of some eleven women over a seven year period but he had chosen wrongly for the last but one. The daughter of one of her best friends for whom she was Godmother. It became “personal” and she had stepped up her work to find proof. She had sent Janey into the house to find something in the files to satisfy the Police.
At the end of this sobbing litany Lord Peter nodded slowly, “ She’s getting very good you know, but I’m still five steps ahead. Now presumably she will send someone round to check if you got in or not. I would in her position. You also need to be cleaned up and kept out of sight. Bring her upstairs, Mellors.”
Mellors knelt to untie her legs then loosed the rope around her wrists. She sagged and almost dropped to the ground with fatigue. “Stand up bitch and get up those stairs. Keep your hands up so I can see them all the time.” She looked at him bleakly but saw no sympathy in his eyes as she turned and staggered drunkenly to the stairs. “Hands Up missy. NOW” She had forgotten and smartly raised them up wincing with the pain as she did so. It was difficult climbing the stairs with her hands held high especially as her legs were still very wobbly but slowly she managed it.