LONGHOLME ISLAND
THE PIRATES OF LONGHOLME ISLAND
Part 2
Trevor Rejoins His Friends
Trevor was a boy who, shall we say, had big hands and big feet and he was beginning to regret the rather skimpy nature of his favourite swimming costume. He was sure that the fact that he quite enjoyed being tied up was by now apparent to whomever was guarding him. Still, at least his mates couldn’t see him and, as it was obvious that his captors were only boys, he didn’t even feel unduly alarmed. He just felt stupid for having been overpowered so easily.
Rob soon came to help his brother deliver Trevor to the others. To see Rob and Roy together, - yes, their surname WAS MacGregor and yes, their parents DID have a puerile sense of humour - one could see instantly that they were brothers. Roy was like a scaled down version of Rob but, whereas the older boy was a freckled, flaming, red-head, Roy was a very pale-skinned blonde or, at least, he would have been if it wasn’t for his extensive tan. Both had mops of tight curls which their school teachers were always telling them to get cut. They hauled Trevor to his feet and explained that they were taking him to join his friends. Being quite quick on the uptake Trevor figured out that they must have been captured as well.
The Pirates Secure the Spies
After they’d been sitting against the trees for about half an hour, Chris and Andy heard the triumphant return of the MacGregor brothers; a noise punctuated by the occasional muffled grunt as Trevor staggered forwards. Trevor was brought next to Andy, and Rob put his own knees into the back of Trevor’s thus forcing him to kneel with another, rather louder grunt.
“You OK, Bruv?” The answer to Chris’s question was difficult for him to interpret. “What have you done to him?”
“Leave it out or you’ll soon find out.”
“Don’t worry, Chris, it sounds like they’ve just gagged him.” Trevor’s attempted confirmation sounded just like his previous answer.
Stewart, who was as dark as his little brother with the same dark, impish eyes, got a rope and tied it none too tightly round Chris’s neck.
“What the . . .?”
“Anyone else getting shagged off with this kid’s gob-shite?” asked Rob as he prepared a length of knotted fabric. The general consensus was that they had, but it was soon remedied by Chris’s being gagged so tightly that his rictus smile would have put the Joker to shame. “That’s better.” After a few seconds even Chris recognised the futility of his attempts at speech and just decided to go with the flow until a better opportunity offered itself. Stewart dragged Chris unceremoniously across to where Andy was sitting and tied him onto the rope as well before completing the line of captives with Trevor.
The prisoners were hauled roughly to their feet and the ropes around their wrists were checked for security. Rob declared himself dissatisfied and told the other three to bind the prisoners’ elbows as well. As each captive’s elbows were drawn together, the rope round his wrists tightened but not to a very painful extent; (except for Chris whom Stuart considered to warrant special attention) the rope simply limited the scope for struggling.
“Now you need to know: this is our island, these are our woods, and you are our prisoners.” With these words Trevor, Andy and Chris felt themselves being led away to they-knew-not-where.
The Cannon Emplacement
It took the Pirates well over half an hour to lead their stumbling, grunting captives across the island to the ancient cannon emplacement. They declined Andy’s suggestion that it would be easier for them if they removed the prisoners’ blindfolds and muttered things about “spies” and offered to gag him as well as the other two if he didn’t shut up.
By the time their trek was over, the visitors knew a lot about the Pirates but Andy was not invited to tell them about himself or his two friends. The Pirates’ parents owned the campsite where Dave and Marian were camped and they also owned the island of which the boys were used to having exclusive use. Thus, Andy and his friends must be spies or trespassers at least. At that accusation, Andy could restrain himself no more. He was soon gagged just like his mates. The Pirates thought that any confessions ought to follow the interrogation of the suspected spies. It was more fun that way.
The Pirates had made a good job of converting the arc of three connecting rooms of the cannon emplacement into a headquarters even though they resembled nothing so much as brick-lined caves. The first room was the largest and was where most activities took place. That led directly to a smaller room which was set up as a store. Leading off from the storeroom was a third, even smaller room. That was to be the visitors’ dungeon. It was pretty dark in there in spite of the narrow, crooked ventilation shaft which drew air through the whole construction. The doors were low for defensive reasons but at least they could be locked and bolted and the whole establishment was dry.
Being early August, there was still plenty of daylight left and the Pirates were in no hurry to interrogate their prisoners so they helped them duck under the doors and lodged them cross-legged in the furthest chamber which they locked while they ate ginger cake and planned the imminent interrogations. The ‘spies’, being blindfolded and gagged, couldn’t get it together enough to work on one another’s bonds and Andy had a very frustrating half an hour trying to locate any of his companions’ bonds to untie.
Chris Is Taken Away
Eventually the Pirates were replete and ready to get down to business. They decided to interrogate “the gobby one” first for no better reason than that Chris had been first in line while the prisoners were dragged across the island to HQ. The two smallest Pirates entered the dungeon and separated Chris from the others. Sometime after they had “escorted” Chris outside, Andy and Trevor heard what was obviously Chris’s raised voice but they couldn’t decipher what was being said. Shortly after that, even more indecipherable sounds reached their ears followed by unmistakable squeals. Obviously, their friend was being tortured.
In spite of the noises from the tormented Chris, Andy saw no reason to waste time. Now that there were only two boys tied together at the neck, he managed to manoeuvre himself to be back-to-back with Trevor. After a lot of fumbling, during which Trevor was once again relieved that his friend couldn’t see his unavoidable physiological reaction, Andy managed to free the tall kid’s hands but, before any further progress could be made, Roy and Dave returned with a grunting and exhausted Chris hanging from a pole.
“Hang on, Skinny’s got his hands untied. Come in here, Rob.” Trevor resented being called “skinny”. Yes, he was slender but he had broad shoulders, reasonably well-defined abs and neat, somewhat square pecs. Why couldn’t they call him “Lanky” or something like that? He didn’t have much time to consider his resentment before Rob and Stuart arrived in the dungeon.
Chris Interrogated
Once the Pirates had dragged Chris outside, they stood him up and took him slightly away from the HQ and forced him to his knees. Rob suggested that Roy should give him water as soon as his gag had been removed, then they could get down to the serious interrogation.
Following his drink Chris balanced the advantages of shouting for help against any possible reprisals. He made what was probably a wise decision.
“What’s your name?”
“Graham Chapman.” shouted Chris, hoping that the other two captives would be able to hear and subsequently be able to repeat his lies.
“Don’t shout, we’re only here,” said Stewart, “Unless, of course, there’s someone else you want to hear you?” Stewart had a suspicious mind.
Rob continued: “Why are you here?”
“We’re on holiday from Surrey. We’re staying on the campsite on the cliff.”
“When are your folks expecting you back?”
“If we’re not back by eleven, we’re in deep doo-doos.”
“Then how come your bashas and sleeping gear are pitched down by the creek?”
Chris knew he’d been sussed. If only he’d thought, all the Pirates had to do was to ask each of their prisoners the names of their friends in order to catch him in his original lie. How could he cut his losses?
“Sorry, my name’s not Graham Chapman, it’s Chris Trescothic.”
“And when are you due back to the camp site?”
Now Chris knew that not only had he been sussed but stuffed as well. “Not until tomorrow.” The Pirates’ demeanour improved noticeably.
“It doesn’t matter what your name is. As far as we’re concerned, you’re “Gobby” from now on. Understand?” Chris declined to respond. “What’s up? Nothing to say?”
“When he does speak, he lies. There’s only one thing for it.”
“Torture?”
“Torture!”
That probably wasn’t the best time for Chris to protest as Roy quickly gagged him once more, pulling the knotted cloth tightly into Chris’s mouth by tying it once behind his neck and knotting the ends again twice in his mouth. That was even worse than before.
“It’s always more fun interrogating a prisoner when he’s gagged. He can’t say anything to make us stop the torture.” Chris was starting not to like the sound of this.
Dave and Roy helped Chris, reasonably gently, to be face down on the ground so that Stewart could prepare him for his ordeal. He took a long, doubled rope, pulled the bight over the free ends thus forming two loops through which he inserted Chris’s left ankle and pulled them tight. He wrapped the free ends twice round both of his victim’s ankles and pulled tight. Stewart separated the free ends and wrapped them twice round Chris’s right ankle: one above and one below the previous loops. It only needed one knot to secure Chris’s ankles but Stewart added a few more counter turns between them just to make sure and finished off with a reef knot. That left an awful lot of rope for other uses.
The younger boys had already made sure that Chris was in a suitable location for torture “just in case it became necessary” and Stewart threw the free ends of the rope over a convenient bough and caught them as they returned. Both he and Rob then heaved on the ropes pulling Chris a short distance across the ground on his stomach and raising his feet about a foot in the air. That left plenty of rope to enable Stewart to tie the ends off between the prisoner’s ankles. The last part of the “preparations” was when Rob released Chris’s elbows. Chris couldn’t figure out why he should do that. Yet!
Rob turned Chris over onto his back saying to the younger boys, “OK, this one’s all yours. Enjoy.”
Chris was about to learn several things but the first three were:
a) Freeing his elbows had made his armpits more vulnerable to the determined fingers of Dave and Roy;
b) Having his feet raised off the ground even by as little as a foot made it virtually impossible for him to evade his tormentors
c) Wearing only a brief cossie, even his nice, new, sky-blue hipsters, afforded no protection whatsoever from tickle torture.
The next ten minutes were enjoyed to different extents by all participants: Dave and Roy were ecstatic that they got first go with the prisoner, Rob and Stewart looked on with pride as they congratulated themselves on teaching their little brothers so well but Chris enjoyed them far less.
After ten minutes, the dirt covered, grass-stained Chris, who had some time ago given up trying to suppress his reactions, was writhing uselessly, squealing and eventually snorting as he desperately tried to draw breath.
“Rest time.” declared Rob.
“Thank god for that.” thought Chris with a sigh.
“But not for you,” Stuart continued, “Change of shift.” Within ten seconds of Dave’s and Roy’s concerted assault ceasing, the big brothers took over. “Watch and learn, Titch,” said Stuart to Dave as he set about his task. Now Chris WAS in trouble. With all the practice the two older boys had had in the past on their own little brothers, they had become tickling black-belts. Having enjoyed hardly any respite between shifts, another ten minutes saw Chris desperate not to wet himself and ready to sell his own mother into slavery in order to stop the torture. Stuart and Rob stopped just in time.
“Now, next time I ask you a question, what are you going to do?” asked Rob.
“Ennn uuh ooo.” answered Chris in between gasping for breath.
“I hope that was nothing rude.” said Rob as he straddled an increasingly desperate Chris, whose normally immaculate, smart haircut was now adorned with not only dirt but enough vegetable matter for a wren to make a nest.
“Ngghhh! Ngghhh!” Chris tried to reassure him as he frantically shook his head.
“Tell the truth?” As Rob’s fingers took their positions in Chris’s armpits, Chris changed from shaking his head to an emphatic nodding. “Good boy, Gobby.” confirmed Rob as he slapped Chris’s cheek lightly twice and dismounted him.
“OK, find the pole, let’s get him back and find another playmate.” Dave got the bamboo pole that they’d brought for the purpose and, once Stuart had untied the rope lifting Chris’s feet from the ground and Rob had turned him over and re-tied his elbows (but not as cruelly as previously), he and Roy threaded Chris onto the pole by passing it between his legs and between his upper arms. With a barely suppressed squeal from Chris, he was hoisted off the ground as Roy and Dave lifted the pole onto their shoulders and carried him back to HQ like some sort of hunting trophy. Chris was glad it was a very short journey.
It was once Chris had been dumped in the dungeon and unthreaded from the bamboo pole, that Rob was called into the dungeon.
TBC