He'd been bloody buggered!
John Pettigrew sniffed and rubbed his face across the pillow to get rid of his tears. Here he was—a grown man—and crying like some child.
But if any man had a right to cry, he did. Damn it! He'd enjoyed the bloody Jerry ploughing his arse. He'd been hard from the moment he felt Stefan Schmidt's pubic bush crushing against his bumcheeks. He'd pushed back to get the man back inside him, just like the woman he'd serviced the last two days. And he'd had an orgasm with the German's dick buried in him.
He'd experimented as a child. He guessed all the boys at Marlborough did when puberty started and hormones began to rage. He'd even let a couple of lads in his backdoor as they had him. But they'd been just lads then—maybe age thirteen. Just first formers.
He was a man now, however. More importantly, he was an officer in the Royal Navy. He'd still had an orgasm whilst being buggered.
Worse, he was erect now, just thinking about it. His dick caught between his belly and the bed covers. One of his own socks stuck in his mouth. Wanting it again. Thank God the German had dressed and left after having his way with him. He'd die of shame if the man saw that he was ready for more.
His legs were bound to the foot of the bed. He tried to pull one leg and then the other up towards his body. He tried to bring them together. Nothing he could think of worked. He was bound spreadeagled and securely.
He'd had sex women. He thought them beautiful, especially unclothed and waiting to be ravished. He'd never felt that way with any boy when he was experimenting in school; he didn't feel that way towards Stefan Schmidt now.
He just wanted the German's hard cock in his bum again.
That made no sense at all.
Either he was a bloody invert or he wasn't. Either he wanted women as sex partners—or he wanted men. Either he wanted what was natural or he didn't. Yet, somehow, he wanted both. And, right now, he wanted the Jerry ploughing his arse again. His body did.
He forced himself to concentrate on his hands. Schmidt had taken the belt off after he'd done the nasty on him and tied each hand to either side of the bedboard. Tight too. He couldn't even move them, much less get his fingers on the rope.
He tried rubbing the rope holding the sock in his mouth against the pillow. He tried to pull his lower jaw back so the damned rope would slip past his lip. The rope rubbed his face but didn't bulge. The damned thing was tied tight behind his head.
He hoped Stefan returned soon, he was freezing.
His bottom felt like he was sitting on a cake of ice. His whole body did. It was cold in Stefan's room. He wished he wasn't naked. He wished he could think of something other than the bloody Jerry sodomising him.
He wished he could reach his erection.
* * *
Dagold switched on the electric torch and, together with Alice, surveyed the corridor before them. Handing her the torch, he pulled bullets from his dressing gown and reloaded the ammunition clip of his pistol.
"Fraü Alice," he said as he snapped the clip back into place, "reload your shotgun. I want you to train it on the single one there near Willi's room while I turn on the lamp and see to Lord Molloy and the other one."
"They all look dead to me," she said in a small voice, the enormity of what had just happening beginning to descend upon her.
"They do, gnädige Fraü, but we would not want a surprise, would we?" He crossed the corridor and turned on the lamp sitting on the table near where Molloy and his murderer had fallen.
"Hauptscharführer Müller!" Jorsten growled as he recognised the German.
"Who?" Alice asked.
"My Graf's sergeant major, Fraü Alice. He is—was—what the Party calls an old fighter, a Party paramilitary since before the Nazis came to power.
Müller was on his back, his eyes staring blankly at the ceiling; his Lordship lay facedown on the floor. Jorsten moved to the two bodies and knelt at their heads, his Luger pressed against Müller's forehead as he reached for the Hauptscharführer's wrist. The dagger slipped from the man's fingers as Dagold felt for a pulse.
He smiled when he felt none. He studied the blood-soaked front of Müller's coat. He nodded to himself. Those interminable days of target practice had proved useful after all. He had hit Müller four times in the chest and once in the stomach.
Dagold turned to Lord Molloy then. He reached for his wrist but knew the man was already dead. Blood still seeped from the wound between his ribs just left on his spine where the Hauptscharführer had stabbed him. There was no doubt in his mind that the dagger had entered the man's heart.
"Ärmer Herr Molloy," he mumbled as he felt nothing and lay the man's arm back on the floor. He looked up at Alice then. "Lord Molloy is dead," he said, his voice a rasp in the stillness of the corridor. "So is his murderer."
"And this one?" she asked through clenched teeth, her face a mask of resolve, her shotgun still pointed at Crooksall's prone body.
Crossing the hallway, Jorsten turned the body onto its back with his foot. He knew the man was dead just from the blood that covered the front of his greatcoat. From the looks of it, both of Alice's shots had hit him in the chest. He felt for a pulse but found none. "He is dead also, Fraü Alice," Dagold told her, looking up at her.
She seemed to shrink before his eyes. Her body shuddered. He stood and moved quickly to hold her. "It is all right, gnädige Fraü. They are dead, and we are safe."
"Are we?" she whispered and buried her face against the breast of his dressing gown. "Are we really? Will we ever be safe again, Dagold? Will this ever be over?"
"You must take control of yourself, Fraü Alice. We must search through the Hall and ensure that it is secure."
He felt her take a deep breath. Her body stiffened against him. She lifted her head and met his gaze. "I'm sorry," she sniffed.
"Are you all right now?"
"Yes. It's just—I never believed something like this could happen in England."
"Miss Murray—she lives here in the Hall, doesn't she?" he asked.
Alice glanced towards the stairs. "Upstairs, in the servants' quarters. She and Cook both do—"
"Are there others here as well?"
"No. Only the two of them."
"It would be best if you awakened her then. We need to secure the Hall. She can arm herself with his Lordship's pistol—"
"I'll take that and give her the shotgun," Alice said firmly.
Jorsten studied her for a moment and she turned back to meet his gaze. "Have you ever fired a pistol, Fraü Alice?" he asked finally.
"My late brother insisted that I learn to fire one—during the Great War."
He nodded. "You'll take Lord Molloy's pistol then. Please bring Miss Murray as quickly as you can."
Dagold had dressed by the time Alice returned with Jane Murray. Cook followed behind them, peeking between her fingers. He had pulled on his coat as well.
"Will you be going out then?" Alice asked when she saw him as she reached the first floor landing.
"After we've looked through the Hall. We need to know if the property is safe as well as the house."
"And we'll need to call in the police," she said.
"Oh, my God!" Jane Murray groaned, staring at carnage at the beginning of the corridor. Cook groaned and ran back up the stairs.
Jorsten quickly glanced to her and followed her gaze to the dead men.
"It is a nasty mess," Alice said, moving to take her in her arms. "But it's all right now, Jane." She turned to Jorsten. "Cook can cut and chop any meat you put in front of her, Dagold, but she's afraid of a little mouse." She nodded towards the carnage. "We've found something else that she's afraid of."
"Miss Murray, can you fire a shotgun?" Dagold asked.
"Me?" the woman asked in surprise, pulling her gaze from the dead men to look at Alice and then Jorsten. "I—"
He smiled. "It's all right. All you have to do is aim it and everything within five metres will be hit."
"I couldn't—"
"We must make sure there's no one else in the Hall, Jane," Alice told her.
"You and Fraü Alice will need to cover me as I look for more of these men. Can you do that, Miss Murray?"
"I—I guess I could," she mumbled, looking down at the shotgun at Alice's side. Fearfully she looked back up at Jorsten. "Do you think they're still here?" she asked in a small voice.
"No," he answered without hesitation, knowing that he had to soothe her doubts quickly. "Anyone who might have been with those two would have heard the gunshots and then our voices and us moving around—they also wouldn't have seen their friends return. They would have escaped—if there were any others. But we do need to make sure—so that we all remain safe."
"I heard them," Alice told them. "I heard them enter the kitchen." She shook her head. "I thought I was imagining it—just an old woman allowing herself to become hysterical." She chuckled at her comment, knowing that she was helping Jane Murray to grapple with the reality of violent death before her. "It was only when I heard a sound on the stairs that I knew I wasn't dreaming."
Her eyes widened. "I opened my door and that's when I saw—" She sobbed. "I saw that man kill Lord Molloy," she gasped, tears suddenly rimming her eyes.
Dagold shuddered involuntarily as he thanked the God above that it had not been him who had stood guard over the corridor when Horst Müller attacked.
He glanced over his shoulder at the body of Maximillian Molloy lying at the entrance of the corridor, shame spreading through him like a gorge. His Lordship's death had taken the murderers just long enough that he and Fraü Alice could kill them.
And, now, they had to be in control of themselves—all three of them—in order to search the Hall. Or Lord Molloy would have died in vain.
He forced his shoulders back and faced the women. "We must be strong now, each of us. There is much to do and no time for us to become hysterical."
He took a step towards the head of the stairs. "I'll go down first and watch my right side. Fraü Alice will follow three steps behind me and watch our left side. Miss Murray, you'll stay here at the top of the steps and watch for any movement. If you see any, aim at it and fire."
Alice squared her shoulders and nodded as Jane Murray muttered a weak "yes, sir". Dagold took the first step and tried to swallow his heart that had somehow lodged in his throat.
"We seem to be clear of them," Alice said as they stood in the kitchen.
"Should I make tea?" Miss Murray asked, looking from one to the other of them.
"Go tell Cook that she's safe and we need her in the kitchen," Alice told her.
Dagold frowned. He would like coffee. That would settle his nerves better than anything. But coffee was one thing the English seemed totally incapable of making. "It will need to be strong."
"No one will be able to sleep then!" Miss Murray yelped.
"I doubt any of us will anyway, Jane," Alice told her.
"While she's making the tea," Jorsten told Alice, "Miss Murray and I can go to the cottages for help."
"I'll call the police then," Alice told him while the housekeeper hurried to get Cook.
* * *
David Rice pulled his watch from his fob pocket and frowned as he looked at the time. Crooksall and that stuck up Hun bastard had been gone more than an hour. His gaze moved idly to Neville's body on the floor.
Blood covered most of the floor on that side of the room. Who'd have thought the kid had that much in him. A line of it had made its way almost to the door before it clotted. And it smelled like an abattoir. Anyone who entered the cottage would know instantly that there had been a murder—even without seeing the body.
If he continued to sit in the cottage, he'd be found out.
That led him to the thought of having to take those thirteen steps up to the hangman's noose. He shuddered and pushed himself out of the chair. What was taking Crooksall and that Hun Müller so long?
He believed in the new order all right—especially cleaning up the race and making sure that whites like him ruled the world, it was their natural-born right to do so. But he didn't believe in it enough to get himself hanged. He understood that was exactly what would happen if he was cornered in the cottage.
If anything had gone wrong up at the Hall and word got back down to the cottages, the farm manager would come for Neville—for both him and Clive to go help out at the Hall.
They'd find Neville, all right. Dead.
They sure as hell didn't need to find him with the body, though. If he tried to escape, he'd be shot like some dumb animal at the charnel house—and he'd hang if he surrendered.
He stood with his back to the dying fire and stared at the door.
It was cold outside and he didn't know how long he'd have to wait for his two companions. If he went out there to wait for them.
If something did go wrong with the scheme—? He'd be quietly warming his hands when the farmhands came looking for the boys. Armed.
It wasn't healthy to stay in the cottage, no matter how warm it was. Rice sighed and put his coat on. He started for the door, making sure that he didn't step in any blood, and pulled on his gloves. Pulling the door to behind him, he slipped unseen into the midnight silence.
He made his way to the toilet behind the cottage and circled it, looking for a vantage point from which he could watch any activity from the cottages as well as movement along the path from the Hall. The important thing was that he not be seen, that he be able to slip away if Crooksall and that Hun weren't back soon. He crouched down beside a bush several yards behind the toilet.
He pulled his watch out and lighted a match so that he could read the time. Almost two hours! He blew out the match. They'd been gone two bloody hours!
They weren't but about a mile from Bellingham Hall—a fifteen to twenty minute walk for healthy men. So, where were they?
How long did it take to kill one Hun boy and take a child from his bed? Not a whole hour, it didn't. Not even if they had to fight the boy and the old woman who lived there.
He shoved his hands into his arm pits. It was cold. A still, numbing cold. The cold of death, it was. David Rice could almost feel the mask covering his face and the coarse hemp of the noose settling around his neck as he sucked in the cold air through his nose and stared up the empty path that led to the Hall.
His ears were burning they were so cold. He covered them with his gloved hands and shivered. He almost didn't see the heavy woman dart along the path from the Hall. He looked up in time to have a sense of something—someone—there where there had been no one. He saw her when she'd passed in front of the boys' cottage, between their cottage and the next one as she hurried along the path.
He stared after her for a moment. Something had gone wrong. That was his one thought as he stood. He saw the man on the path then, following the woman and his rifle held at the ready. Something had gone wrong, and he had to get away. He started for the trees beyond the cottages.
As he made his way around the cottages, he prayed that both Crooksall and Müller were dead. That was the only way that he was ever going to escape the gallows. Tears glazed his eyes and froze on his cheeks as he made his way to the tracks he and the other two men had made as they'd come in.
"Just be fucking dead, you bastards!" he hissed as he began to follow them back to the wagon. "Be dead and carry your tales with you."
Copyright © 2006-2025 David MacMillan
First posted 2006
Updated 2 July 2025