Timmy and the Travellers – Chapter 4

In the last chapter we saw Christy starting to see Timmy in a whole new way. Is that going to change the way the other travellers look at their slave? Let's find out...

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Christy spent much of the following day wondering what he could say to persuade Michael to free his slave. Nothing came to mind: Michael didn't like townies, and now that he had one at his mercy there was no way he would let him go without a fight. And he didn't want to fight with Michael about it - they had been friends for ever, and Christy didn't want to jeopardise that.

At four o'clock he was in the garage with the other three when Timmy arrived.

"Let's go hunting!" cried Danny, enthusiastically. "You were lucky last night - this time you're going to have to suck!"

"Why don't we make it a bit fairer?" suggested Christy. "Let's let Timmy keep his clothes on - that'll make it a lot easier for him to hide."

"Too easy," argued Danny. "I mean, he got away from us last time with nothing on."

"Yes, but that was a fluke, and it only happened because Michael took us the wrong way," said Christy. "If we split up instead of all going the same way we'd be sure to find him - it's too hard to hide in all those brambles with no clothes on."

"Crap! I reckon I could hide from you easily," said Danny.

"Prove it!" cried Christy, who wasn't going to turn down an opening like that.

"Okay - I'll be the escaped prisoner and you lot can hunt me," agreed Danny. "And if you find me inside fifteen minutes you can give me the belt. But if you don't, he has to suck, and not just me - all of us."

"That's not fair," Timmy pointed out. "If Tom - or Michael or Christy - finds you, he won't say anything, because if he keeps quiet he'll get sucked."

"I suppose. Okay, then - you can all stay together instead of splitting up, and I'll give you twenty minutes. If you're hunting, you'll definitely not want me to stay hidden, will you?"

"Well... okay, then."

"Great! Come on, then - I'll strip in the woods, 'cos it'll be easier to get up the drive if I stayed dressed till we get there."

Danny scampered off up the drive and the others followed him. Once they were in the wood Danny removed everything except his shoes, and Christy was surprised to see that he had an erection. Danny flourished it at Timmy.

"It'll be all yours shortly," he said. "Bet you can't wait." Then he turned and ran off.

Michael counted down from a hundred to zero, and then turned to Timmy.

"Okay, you're in charge," he said. "Which way?"

Timmy headed out in the direction Danny had taken.

"By the way," Michael told him, "I promise I'm going to be trying to find him. It'd be nice to be sucked, but I can make you do that any time - but I'd really enjoy giving Danny the belt. It'd be even more fun making him squeak."

"That goes for me, too," Christy told Timmy, unnecessarily.

Tom said nothing, which suggested he'd prefer Danny to win the bet.

In fact Danny was better equipped for this than Timmy had been, at least the first time: Danny and Tom had by now gone some way towards exploring the woods and had found several trees that they could climb. Danny made his way quickly to the one they had been able to get highest into and scrambled up into it. When Timmy had tried to escape by climbing a tree he had only been able to get a short way up, and so had still been easily visible from the ground. Danny, on the other hand, had picked a tree that allowed him to get a very long way up - far enough for the branches to provide a good screen. Unless they knew which tree he was in, he was confident that they would not find him. Of course, Tom would know which trees to look in, but he was confident that Tom would keep his mouth shut in order to claim his reward from the townie slave afterwards.

And so it proved: Tom kept quiet, and the twenty minutes elapsed without them finding him. Once he heard them calling that he had won he climbed quietly out of the tree - like Timmy, he wanted to keep this hiding place unknown so that he could use it again - and trotted back towards the road, only responding to the calls when he was a good distance away from his tree.

"Told you!" he crowed, once they caught up with him. Timmy sighed and dropped to his knees, but Michael stopped him.

"Not out here, it's too cold. Let's go back to the garage."

So they made their way back to the lane, waited while Danny got dressed and then went back to the garage. Once inside Timmy got undressed without being told to and knelt on the floor.

"Not going to beg for mercy?" asked Danny, moving one of the chairs, removing his trousers and sitting down in front of Timmy, his penis already stiffening.

"No," said Timmy. "You won the bet fair and square. I agreed to it and I'm not going to try to get out of it now."

"Good. Get on with it, then."

Timmy had learned a little bit since the last time he had sucked Danny's cock: Christy had shown him how to use his hands to touch and stroke and tickle, and he put all of this into practice. Soon Danny was wriggling about on the chair, holding Timmy's head and breathing heavily.

Christy watched this with interest: he, Michael and Tom had drawn the other three chairs up around the one Danny was using and were watching avidly. Christy was sitting hunched forward to try to conceal the fact that he had a very stiff penis - there was something exciting about watching this, even though a little voice in his head was nagging him that he was supposed to be trying to make life easier for Timmy, not enjoying his humiliation.

Timmy, however, gave the impression that this no longer bothered him: sucking hard and firmly and using his hands to increase Danny's excitement, he soon had the younger boy writhing about on the verge of orgasm, and a few more seconds were all it took to push him over the edge.

"Oh, fuck!" cried Danny, thrusting hard and forcing Timmy's head as far down as it would go.

Timmy waited until his grip slackened and then moved back. Danny's penis was still very hard.

"Was that okay?" Timmy asked, humbly.

"That was fucking magic!" Danny told him.

"Good. Who's next?" asked Timmy.

"Me!" cried Tom, and the older boys didn't argue. Tom took his place on the chair and Timmy set to work again, and very quickly Tom was also brought to a highly enjoyable climax.

"Can I have a little rest?" asked Timmy. "This floor's hard and my knees hurt."

"Of course," said Christy, before Michael could say no. "You'll do a better job if you feel okay, and I want a really good job done, okay?"

Timmy got up and stretched his legs, and Christy made a mental note to try to find an old cushion or pillow to bring round for future use.

Michael and Christy looked at each other. "After you," said Christy. "It was your idea to get a slave, after all."

"Great! Let's see how he copes with this," said Michael, throwing his clothes off to reveal his large erection.

"Gosh!" said Timmy, sinking to his knees once more. "That's really big, Michael! I mean, it felt big last time, when... well... but I didn't really see it then. And... why have you got hair on it? Is there something wrong with it?"

"No, I'm just more grown up than this lot."

"It's puberty again," added Christy. "Getting hair on it is something else that happens when you reach puberty."

"Not that Christy would know anything about that," said Michael, grinning at his friend.

"Oh, shut up," said Christy. "Bite it off, Timmy!"

"I don't think I can get all that into my mouth," said Timmy. "I'll try, though."

As Christy had found out the previous evening, Timmy could in fact accommodate pretty much all of his four and three-quarters inches, and he was sure that Michael's was no bigger than that, hair or no hair. And indeed Timmy seemed to be coping pretty comfortably, and once he started stroking round it Michael's reaction suggested that he was completely satisfied with the service he was getting. He spread his legs wide so that Timmy could get at his balls easily and pushed himself forwards to the edge of the chair to make it easier for Timmy to touch him. He held Timmy's head, but only gently: clearly he didn't need to force Timmy against him.

Timmy had learned enough by now to tease his victim by stopping when Michael was just short of orgasm, coughing and pretending that there was a hair in his throat. He wasted just enough time for Michael's climax to recede and then steadily pulled him close to the edge again, before slipping it out of his mouth to utter a rather unconvincing sneeze.

"Oh, shit, don't stop, please!" begged Michael, and the third time Timmy took pity on him and let him finish. Of course he knew what to expect, and he was not disappointed: a couple of jets of whatever-it-was shot into his mouth, and he did his very best not to react at all. Trusting Christy, he swallowed it down before he let the softening organ slip out of his mouth, and was delighted to see the disappointment on Michael's face.

"Wasn't that okay?" he asked.

"It was brilliant - but..."

"What?"

"Well... didn't anything... happen?"

"Like what?"

"Well... I thought... didn't anything come out in your mouth?"

Timmy managed to look puzzled. "I don't think so," he said. "Why, were you trying to pee, or something?"

"No, of course not! I meant... it doesn't matter."

"Oh. Okay, Christy, your turn."

Christy took his place on the seat and Timmy winked at him.

"Wow! Yours is pretty big, too, even if you haven't got any hair on it. I reckon you might be even bigger than Michael."

He slipped it into his mouth, deliberately letting it hit the back of his throat and uttering gagging noises as a result. He took it out again.

"That's definitely bigger," he said, watching Michael out of the corner of his eye. "I'll have to be careful."

He set to once more, putting into practice everything Christy had shown him, and very quickly Christy found himself getting close. This time Timmy didn't stop to cough, sneeze or anything else: instead he ploughed on, wanting to make Christy get excited as quickly as possible. And when Christy did reach his orgasm Timmy uttered coughing and choking noises, and as soon as he could he slipped the penis out of his mouth and spat copiously on the floor.

"What on earth was all that stuff?" he asked. "It doesn't taste like pee."

"That's my spunk."

"What's that?"

"It's stuff that comes from my balls," said Christy, trying not to laugh. "All mature boys have some."

"Gosh! So that's what Michael meant... but you must have a lot more than him, Christy, because I never noticed it when he did it..."

Christy couldn't help laughing now, especially when he saw the look on Michael's face.

"Baby-bollocks!" he jeered. "You might have some hair, but your balls don't work properly yet... unlike mine, of course..."

"Crap! I'm sure I spunked up loads... "

He stared suspiciously at Timmy, who managed to maintain an innocent look.

"You wait till next time," he said, darkly. "I'll drown you in it."

"Okay, you can get dressed now," said Christy, pulling his own clothes back on. "Look, Mikey... I've been thinking..."

"That's a first," said Michael.

"No, seriously... I reckon Timmy's been a damn good slave. He's turned up every day, and he's done whatever we've told him, and he's taken all his punishments without arguing once. What do you reckon about letting him go?"

"Fuck, no!" cried Michael. "Give up being able to make a townie suck my cock whenever I want? You must be mad!"

"We could find another one."

"Why bother? We've got one already."

"But if we can find another one - would you let him go then?"

"Well, maybe, provided the new one's as good at sucking. But I'm not going to waste my time looking for a cock-sucking townie when I've already got one."

"Okay. I just thought maybe Timmy deserves a break, that's all, since he's been so good - and since he didn't grass us up the other night, too..."

"Well... okay, he can have a break. We'll give him a night off - which day would you like off, slave boy?"

"Tuesday?" asked Timmy. "We finish early on Tuesdays, and it would save me having to wait here for four o'clock."

"Okay," agreed Michael. "You can have Tuesdays off. And if you can find me a new slave - one who you think deserves to be a slave, perhaps - maybe I'll think about letting you off altogether."

"Thanks, Michael," said Timmy.

"But until then you're still our slave, remember? You were almost late this evening - another two minutes and we would have had to give you the belt."

"I won't forget," promised Timmy.

"Good. Off you go, then."

Timmy finished dressing and went out. Christy glanced at his watch and saw that Timmy's bus would be another twenty minutes, which would give him time to catch up, so he wouldn't have to raise suspicions by going straight away.

"What was all that crap about?" Michael asked him as soon as Timmy had gone.

Christy shrugged. "Sorry, Mikey, but I'm sort of starting to like the kid," he said. "He's a weed and that, but he's kept his word perfectly, and you know that townies generally don't think they have to keep a word given to one of us. You know damn well if it had been the other way round we wouldn't keep our word if we'd been forced to swear to one of them."

"More fool him."

"Okay, maybe, but he's done it, and that's what counts. Like I said earlier, he's been brilliant about everything - even when you..."

"Yes, okay, I know that. But I love making one of them suck me off, Christy, and I'm not giving that up - and I bet Danny and Tom don't want to, either."

Danny and Tom quickly endorsed that statement.

"Okay, but if we can find a replacement? Maybe one who can suck you hard enough to actually make something come out of those useless balls of yours..."

"Oh, shut up! I don't know what happened there - I know I shot, loads of it..."

"Yeah, right. I reckon he'll taste Tom's before you make enough to notice."

"Fuck off!"

They grabbed each other and wrestled for a bit, but in a completely friendly way, while Danny and Tom first cheered them on and then joined in, making a four way free-for-all.

"He's right about one thing," said Michael, getting up afterwards. "This floor's hard. We need an old mattress, or something."

Christy left them to it shortly after that and made his way up to the bus stop. Timmy was still waiting for his bus.

"Thanks for trying," he said.

"I reckon we'll be able to get you out of it if we can find someone else. But I don't want to drop another basically nice kid into the same position, so what we need is someone who deserves to be a slave - some little shit that nobody likes. Got any ideas?"

"Not really, but I'll think about it."

"'Kay. Thanks for the acting, by the way - it really wound Mikey up. 'I never noticed when he did it'," he mimicked.

Timmy grinned. "I thought he deserved it for all that stuff about him being more mature than you," he said. "I'm not sure that you didn't really make more stuff than him, anyway."

“You wait till next time I'm at your house. Then I'll show you how much I can really make when I think about it."

"Aren't you coming tonight?" asked Timmy, looking disappointed.

"I can't. I'd really like to, but I can't afford all the bus fares, and if I go missing every night when you go home they'll pretty soon guess where I am. I'll only be able to come a couple of times a week, I think."

"Oh. Well, can we make one of them Tuesdays? We'll have ages, because I won't have to come here first, and I finish early anyway."

"Okay. Here's your bus - I'll see you tomorrow."

The following evening Christy waited for Timmy at the end of the footpath and walked down to the garage with him.

“Have you thought of a replacement slave for us yet?” he asked.

“Not really. I mean, there’s one kid I’d love to see made a slave, but you’d never manage to get him.”

“Why not?”

“Because he lives really close to the school, and it’s in the opposite direction, so he’d never come this way. Plus, he usually walks home with two or three friends. And he’s a lot bigger and stronger than me, too.”

“So why do you want him to be our slave?”

“Because he deserves it. He’s a bully - he threatens little kids and steals their pocket money.”

“Sounds like he’d be pretty hard to handle.”

“He would be. That’s why I don’t think it’ll work.”

“Michael likes a challenge. Making a big strong townie submit would please him, I think - you’re not really much of a challenge, are you?”

“I suppose not.”

They reached the garage, and Danny - who was getting quite cocky after his triumph the pervious evening - issued a new challenge to Timmy. This time Timmy would have to hide naked, and Danny promised to find him inside ten minutes.

“If not, you can give me the belt,” he said. “But if I find you, you have to suck us all twice.”

“Agreed,” said Timmy at once - he was confident his prepared hidey-hole would do the job once more.

They let him walk round to the woods fully clothed, as Danny had done the previous evening. Once in the wood he stripped, replaced his shoes, and sprinted away, making his way to his hiding place by the same roundabout route. Once again he backed carefully into it, but tonight there was one stem that just wouldn’t get out of the way - either it had grown back, or it had simply slipped from its previous position. No matter how low he got to the ground, the bramble still kept hooking onto his bottom.

He was still trying to wriggle past it when he heard voices, and at that point he just took a deep breath and shoved himself backwards. The bramble caught and ripped across his left buttock, and he uttered a suppressed hiss of pain. But he was far enough in now - he pulled a little of his clippings into the opening and lay still.

The voices went past, close enough for him to hear their owners’ footsteps, but nobody did more than glance at the bramble thicket, which was obviously quite impenetrable. Two or three minutes later they started to call that he had won, but he waited until the voices were further away before he wriggled his way out again. Then he made his way back to the lane by a roundabout route so that he would not appear from the direction of his hiding place.

“Fuck, Timmy,” said Tom, who was the first to see his rear. “You’re bleeding. What happened?”

“I lay on a bit of bramble,” he said. “But I thought that I’d prefer not to scream. You were a bit too close.”

“That’s going to bleed all over your pants,” Christy said. “Your mum’s bound to ask what happened.”

“Then I’d better not put my pants on until it stops bleeding,” said Timmy. “You’ll have to help me back up the drive, though.”

So they helped him past the brambles in the drive, and once back in the garage he hung his trousers and pants on the usual hanger. Meanwhile Danny took his own clothes off and lay on his tummy on the table.

“Go on, then, slave boy,” he said, handing Timmy his belt. “Mikey, grab my shoulders, and Tom and Christy can hold my ankles, so I can’t wriggle. Get on with it, then.”

The other three grabbed him and Timmy took the belt and swung it half-heartedly against Danny’s bottom.

“What the fuck was that?” cried Danny. “Do it properly!”

“I... I don’t want to hurt you...”

“Why the fuck not? Next time I get to do it to you I’ll make you bleed some more, you stupid sod. Don’t you think I can take it, or something? Believe me, I can take ten times anything you can offer, Tiny Cock.”

So Timmy did it again, harder.

“Crap!” said Danny, putting his tongue out at him.

Okay, thought Timmy, if that’s what you want... And he swung the belt as hard as he could. It made a satisfyingly loud noise as it hit Danny’s bum, and Danny gave a little hiss.

“Better,” he said. “Slightly.”

Timmy gave him three more, all at full strength, and then put the belt down. The others let go of Danny, who stood up, holding his bum. His eyes were sparkling, but he wasn't actually crying.

"You should have done it hard while you had the chance," he said. "You wait till it's your turn next and see what happens."

Timmy shrugged. "I suppose I just don't like hurting people," he said. "Though there are one or two people I could hurt if only I had the chance..."

"Go on, Timmy, tell them what you told me," invited Christy.

So Timmy explained about the bully.

"Yeah, okay, but how are we supposed to capture him if he never comes this way?" asked Michael.

"I've been thinking about that. I don't think you could grab him the way you managed to grab me - for a start, he's hardly ever on his own, and for a second, he's a lot stronger than me. And he carries a knife, and would probably use it if you got yours out. But... what if he could be caught in the act?"

"Of what?"

"Bullying younger kids."

"Yeah, right. We spot him beating up some little kid and say 'submit or we'll grass you up to the headmaster'? And your headmaster says, 'Here we have the captain of the school football team and all-round star pupil, and there we have a couple of scruffy gippos. Obviously the gippos are telling the truth - sonny, you're expelled.'"

Timmy flushed. "I didn't mean like that," he said. "I meant catch him with evidence. I should know - you used your camera to make sure I did what I was told, didn't you?"

"I suppose. But I don't see how we're supposed to get photos of him when as soon as we set foot in your school grounds someone will call the police. Or were you going to take them?"

"No. Look, I think there's a way... can I meet you tomorrow morning? I can take you there and show you what I'm talking about."

"Don't see why not. What time?"

"Ten o'clock?"

"Okay - we'll wait for you here."

Next morning – Saturday - Michael and Christy met Timmy at the garage. He had cycled today, so they helped him carry his bike over the brambles so that he could store it in the garage. Then he led them up the lane and along the footpath that led to his school. There was no sign of life once inside the gates, but in any case as soon as they were inside Timmy led them off to the left, which was away from the main school buildings. They made their way through an area of rhododendron bushes and then emerged into a small clear space bounded on one side by the back of the cricket pavilion.

"This is where Wood brings the kids he wants to intimidate," he told them. "We're out of sight of the main school here, and the pavilion is only open when there's a cricket match on, and that usually only happens on Tuesday afternoons."

"How do you know this is where he brings them?" asked Michael. "Has he done it to you?"

"Oh, no. He needs me. See, he's not much good at maths, but I am, so he gets me to help him with his maths, and in return he leaves me alone, apart from a bit of verbal teasing, which I can put up with. But I was here with him last time... see, he's got this side-kick, a ratty kid called Truscott, and last week I was here helping Wood with his algebra when Truscott appeared, dragging this kid with him. I got the impression Wood would just have soon waited until I wasn't there, but I suppose he realised I'd never dare tell on him, because he just sort of looked at me and then got his knife out.

"Afterwards he told me that he and Truscott have already gone through the same routine with four other kids, all from two or three years younger than us, and they were going to keep recruiting - which is what he called it - until they had ten or so.

"They'd decided to pick on all the kids who don't have a lot of friends - the ugly kids, the fat kids, the ones with glasses... you get the idea, kids that wouldn't be able to fight back and who nobody would care enough about to stick up for them.

"This particular kid had really big sticking-out ears, which I suppose made him an ideal candidate. Truscott held him from behind while Wood stood in front of him playing with his knife and went into his usual routine.

"'This can be quite a dangerous school,' he said. 'It's really easy to get hurt here, or to have accidents, but me and Truscott hate seeing that sort of thing happen. So we pick out the boys who look most likely to get into trouble and then look out for them to make sure nothing nasty happens to them. It's a sort of insurance policy. What's your name?"

"'Luke Jenner,' said the boy, who looked very nervous.

"'And how much pocket money do you get?'

"' A pound a week.'

"' Well, how this works is that you pay us twenty pee a week, and we look after you. It's quite easy, really: you just come and find me on Monday mornings, give me your twenty pee, and we look after you for the whole week: if anyone picks on you or anything, you just come and find me and I'll sort it out for you. Of course, if you forget to pay, all sorts of nasty things might happen to you.'

"'And don't forget this is a private arrangement,' Truscott said. 'You don't want to mention it to anyone else, or there will definitely be a nasty accident.'

"'Exactly,' said Wood, cleaning his nails with his knife. 'Do you understand all that?'

"'Yes... but...'

"'No buts,' said Truscott. 'We don't like buts.' He let go of the kid and went to his bag. 'Look what I got for my last birthday,' he said, showing the kid his camera - it's like the one you used on me, Michael. 'I'm going to take a photo of you, Jenner.'

"Wood swapped places with him so that he was holding the kid's arms, and Truscott undid the boy's shirt, pulling his tie off, and then undid his shorts and pulled them and his pants down to his ankles. Of course, Jenner tried to stop him, but Wood's really strong and he couldn't do anything about it.

"Truscott pushed the shirt open so that everything was visible - you know what I mean - and then he picked up his camera. Wood leaned forward and told the kid, 'I'm going to let go of your arms now, but you're not going to move unless you want to get a proper beating, okay?'

"He stepped away, and Jenner was too scared to move - he just stood there, trying not to cry, while Truscott took a photo of him.

"'You can get dressed now,' Truscott told him as soon as he had taken the photo. He waited while the picture developed and them showed it to all of us, including Jenner, and you could clearly see everything.

"'Now, Jenner,' said Truscott, 'as long as you don't do anything stupid - like complaining about us, for instance - nobody will ever see this, except us and one other friend who's going to look after it for us. That's so that if anything happens to us - like getting sent for by the head, for example - there'll still be someone around to make some copies and then to make sure they appear on all the school notice boards, or get handed out to all the other boys in your class, or something like that. So it's up to you - keep quiet and do what you're told and nobody will ever see how stupid you look with your shorts pulled down. Okay?'

"Jenner said it was okay, and they told him to get lost, so he ran off, trying not to cry. And on the next Monday morning he came and gave Wood his twenty pence. Wood's not stupid, you see - he reckons twenty pence isn't too much to ask for - nobody will have to steal to find it, or anything like that, but if they can get ten kids all to cough up twenty pence a week, it'll mean that he and Truscott have an extra two pounds a week to spend on sweets and stuff. And I think that's nasty, which is why I'd like to try to do something about it."

"Okay, I probably agree with you," said Michael, "but I can't see what we can do. Even if we did manage to sneak into the school and hide in these bushes, we'd never manage to get a photo without them seeing us - these cameras flash when they take a picture."

"True, but I think we can do better than that. My dad's got a videocam, and I've got a cassette recorder. We might be able to film them in action and tape them, too, and then they'd never be able to deny it."

"They'd find us, or hear us hiding in the bushes, and we'd never get out of the school afterwards without them catching us - and I don't really want to get into a knife fight with a kid a year older than me, especially if he's as tough as you say."

"Look up," invited Timmy.

They looked up and saw a row of small windows in the pavilion wall.

"I think if you were up there you could film and record and they'd never know," said Timmy. "The only problem is getting inside, because it's usually locked. You couldn't use the main door anyway, because it's in full view of the school building, but there's another door round the side which the caretaker uses. I don't know if I could sneak the key out from wherever it's kept - or if we're really lucky he'll have forgotten to lock it. Let's have a look."

He took them round to the side of the pavilion and showed them the door, but the caretaker had not forgotten to lock it.

"I'll have to try to find out where the key is, I suppose," said Timmy.

"Maybe not," said Michael. "I reckon I can probably get in there - it's a pretty pathetic lock. In fact, I reckon..."

He worked his knife between the door and the jamb and wriggled it about, and within a few seconds the door popped open.

"Brilliant!" said Timmy. "Let's go and look."

He led them inside. There was a storage area immediately inside the door, and beyond that a set of stairs that led up to the main room, which he told them was used for teas on match days. There were a number of changing rooms of varying sizes beyond this, as well as a shower room. A narrow flight of stairs led up to two more small changing rooms, but they would be no use because there were no windows to the rear of those rooms. He took them instead into the back changing room, and here they found the windows they had seen from outside. They were quite small, only about a foot high by two feet wide, and they were quite high up in the wall, but there was a large table in the middle of the room, and when they had pulled this underneath the windows they found that by standing on the table they could see out of the windows.

"This ought to work," said Timmy. "The videocam doesn't make too much noise - I think if we're careful we should be able to use it without being noticed. And if we hold the microphone by the window at the opposite end it should be able to pick up everything happening underneath the window.

"I'll see if I can sneak the camera out this afternoon, and the recorder, and we'll have a trial run. We've got a while to get it right, anyway, because they won't be doing any more recruiting before Wednesday: Monday's the day when he's busy collecting money from his existing customers, and Tuesday they don't do anything in case the caretaker's getting ready for a cricket match. So it'll be Wednesday morning break, I should think. You'd need to be here before break starts at quarter to eleven."

"That's still a problem," said Michael. "We'd have to sneak into the school on a school day carrying an expensive camera - if anyone sees us they're sure to reckon we'd nicked it."

"I'm not sure if we can get around that," admitted Timmy. "I suppose I could put the camera in here myself, if I could open the door the way you did, but you'd still have to get here yourselves somehow. Look, let's worry about that later. Put the table back, just to make sure you can move it without making a noise, and then we'd better go."

So they replaced the table and let themselves out of the building. As it was a Yale lock there was no problem locking the door behind them: they simply had to push the door shut and the lock re-engaged easily.

Timmy started to head back towards the gate, but Christy stopped him.

"What happens if we go that way?" he asked, pointing out into the bushes.

"Oh, that's no good, there's a big fence," Timmy told him.

"Let's have a look."

Timmy shrugged, and they pushed their way through the bushes, and indeed there was a chain link fence about eight feet high beyond them. On the far side of this was an alley, and beyond that the fences to the back gardens of some houses.

"If we could get over the fence this would be a lot safer than the gate," said Michael. "I don't think we could, though... but I wonder if there are any holes."

They followed the fence, checking in both directions until it came out into the open away from the bushes, but they found no holes. At one point there were signs that a fox or dog had dug a scrape to wriggle underneath it, but there was a cable along the bottom of the fence that hardly gave at all, and they knew that they wouldn't fit underneath it.

"That gives us two choices," said Michael. "We dig under, or we cut the fence."

"I don't think..." began Timmy, but Christy ignored him. "Digging would be a bit obvious if anyone came past in the meantime, but maybe if we could cut that cable we'd be able to lift the fence far enough so that we could get underneath."

"I'll nick my uncle's wire cutters," said Michael. "If we cut it by the post it won't be so obvious, but we'd still be able to pull it out of the way by the scrape... yes, I reckon that would work. We'll try it this afternoon. Timmy, go home and see if you can get hold of the camera, and we'll get the wire cutters... we'll meet at the garage at two o'clock, okay?"

"Make it half past, or I won't have time to eat," said Timmy.

"Half past two, then."

They made their way back to the gate and slipped out again.

At half past two they met up again. Timmy had a bag on his back with the camera and tape recorder in, and Michael had successfully borrowed the wire cutters. They left Timmy's bike in the garage and made their way back up the lane, and Timmy showed them where the alley came out, a little further up than the footpath from the school. They followed this until they reached the animal scrape, and Michael cut the cable where it joined the nearest post. As he had hoped, once this cable was out of the way they were able to pull the fence up far enough for them to be able to wriggle underneath.

They made their way through the bushes and Michael repeated his trick with his knife, letting them back into the pavilion. Once the table was back under the window Timmy showed them how to work the camera (point it and press a button, basically) and checked that there was a cassette in the recorder.

"Okay, I'll go and pretend to be Wood," he said. "You try to film and record, and I'll see if I can hear the camera."

Michael stood at one end of the room with the camera and Christy hung the recorder on a peg and held the microphone beside the window at the other - they had opened both windows about six inches.

Timmy emerged at the rear of the pavilion and went into his act. He stood in two or three different places, from fairly close to the wall to right up against the bushes, and he gave a running commentary at the same time.

"My name's Wood and I'm big and thick," he told the wall in a normal speaking voice. He moved a little. "My name's Truscott and I'm a sneaky little rat," he said in a quieter voice. He moved once more. "And now I'm some pathetic little kid who can't fight to save his life," he said, even more quietly. He looked up at the window and gave a thumbs up sign.

Michael turned the camera off and Christy unplugged the microphone and rewound the tape. He hit "play" and they listened to the performance. 'Wood' and 'Truscott' were easy to understand, but the 'victim' was harder to make out.

"We'll have to hope nobody whispers," he said. "Did the film work?"

"No idea," said Michael. "I suppose you need a video machine to see it. But I managed to keep him in shot okay."

Timmy came in and they played the tape to him.

"That ought to be okay," he said. "And the good news is, I could hardly hear the camera at all, and the only reason I heard anything was because I was straining to make it out. I'll check the tape when I get home, but if we're lucky this will work out pretty well. And if it does, you two get a new slave - well, I suppose you get two, because you'll be able to get both of them with the tape and film - and I'll be free, and a lot of kids in this school will be a lot happier."

They put the table back where it belonged, closed up the pavilion and went back to the garage, using the gate this time because they didn't want the fence to get too out of shape before Wednesday in case someone went down the alley and noticed. Timmy pulled a photo out of his carrier bag.

"This is our class photo for the year," he said. "That's Wood, and that's Truscott."

Wood was taller than anyone else in the photo, and had light brown hair cut fairly short. Truscott was a sharp-faced kid with long dark hair who appeared to be a couple of inches taller than Timmy, who was next to him in the photo.

"I'd better go," said Timmy. "I'll see you on Monday evening, then we can go over it and make sure we haven't forgotten anything."

He got his bike out of the garage, and they helped him carry it over the brambles and watched him ride away.

"What do you reckon?" asked Christy. "Are we going to do it?"

"I'd have said no until we found a way past the fence. But now... yes, why not? After all, this will give us two slaves instead of one. And while I'm quite happy to give any townie a hard time, if we can do it to a couple of kids who reckon they're tough, so much the better. I like the idea of whipping that big kid until he cries like a baby... Yeah, we're going to do it. And I reckon it'll be fun."

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Hmmmmm............ it's a cunning plan, but is it going to work, or will it all go pear-shaped? Are the travellers about to recruit a couple of much more deserving slaves, or are they all going to end up in deep doo-doo? All will be revealed in the next chapter..............

Bouquets are welcome – I'm reachable at gothmog@nyms.net – but rotten tomatoes will be ignored.

David Clarke