"All right, then. Now remember what I've told you. Don't answer the door
to anyone, specially after dark. There have been some nasty rumours about
burglars round here last month."
 
"Don't worry, Mum. There have always been rumours and nothing has actually
happened, has it?"
 
"Well, be careful, that's all. I'll have to go now. The bus will be here
at half past three. Good-bye now. Remember, get on with that work!"
"O.K. Mum, I will. Good Bye!, Frances replied, dutifully.

The door to No.7 Burton Road closed noisily and Frances breathed a sigh of
relief. 'She thinks I'm still at school', she thought,' Most of the rest of
my group are staying in Hall. It's nice to be looked after, but I wish Mum
could treat me as a grown up, sometimes.'
 
She looked at her books waiting on the small round folding table and turned
on the television.  There was nothing on that interested her, just kids'
programmes on one channel and  politics on another. She adjusted the radio
until some loud pop music came on, then turned to her books again, thinking
that she wished something exciting could happen.

Frances was seventeen. She had long red-gold hair, braided and wound neatly
round her head. She was quite tall and very pretty. Her figure was quite
suitable for a fashion model, slim, but rounded in all the right places.
Her legs were long, but her flat-heeled shoes did not shape them as a
higher-heeled pair would have done.  Although she wore a bra, she did not
yet need its support, her black jumper would still have been stretched
attractively had she not worn one. She did not have a boy friend, though.
Her beauty was masked by a pair of heavy horn-rimmed spectacles, which she
did not really need and her jumper was camouflaged by a grey overall,
which she wore over a dark grey skirt, long enough to cover her knees.

Her dull thoughts were interrupted by a knock at the front door.

"Excuse me, miss, we have reason to believe . . ."
A policeman in uniform stood at the door as she opened it.

Instead of completing his sentence, the officer pushed her backwards whilst
another followed him into the house, brandishing a gun,, which looked like
the mouth of the Liverpool Tunnel as it was pointed straight at her.

The first one covered her mouth with a huge hand and the other said,
"If you make a sound it'll be your last!"

He had something metallic in his hand which he passed to the first one,
who growled, "Open your mouth!"

Frances was paralysed with fear. She opened her mouth and the thing he was
holding was pressed into it.  He held out his hand to his colleague for a
black leather contraption and quickly wrapped the lower part of her face
with it, then took one of her shoulders and spun her forcibly to face the
wall.  She felt straps being fastened behind her head and the click of
something metal. In her mouth, there was a metal plate under her tongue and
another flat circular plate with rough knobbles all over it, making her
tongue immovable. A thin rod pressed it in place and an attached disc over
her mouth was held there by the leather harness. As another strap was
tightened over her head, her jaw was forcibly clamped shut. The faint
sounds
of protest she made would not have been heard a couple of metres away, even
without the music from the radio.
The men knew what they were doing. They worked quickly and efficiently
together.  The grey dust- jacket came off before she knew what they were
doing. Her hands were grabbed and fastened behind her by steel handcuffs,
tightened firmly, but not painfully, then double-locked to prevent damage
to
her wrists. Her chin was kept up by a stiff collar which was also locked
closely round her slender neck and a leading chain was attached to it.

One of the men spoke: "You'll be in difficulty if you need the toilet in
the next half hour. Do you need to go now?" Frances nodded, as well as she
could against the posture collar. Indeed, she needed to change her
underwear already!

The man said,"Which way, then?"  She led the way, trembling to such an
extent that she could hardly walk. She opened the door, hoping to shut out
the sight of these horrible policeman by closing it, but one of them stuck
his foot out to stop her. "Sorry, miss, I'm not letting you out of my sight
for a moment."

She had to perform in full view of both of them. Her face was deep red with
shame. As she went to pull up her panties, the man put his foot on them.
"You won't be needing those." he said in a flat, matter-of-fact tone.

He pulled her out of the toilet by the leash and brought her into the
living-room where she had been preparing to work.  She saw that all the
furniture had been pushed back against the walls.

The second man said, "Doesn't look as if they were going to have their
party in here, does it?  Anyway, I've cleared the space for the stand.
I'll fetch it in now, but I'd better get this uniform off first.  The neigbours
will wonder what a cop is doing, carrying stuff into  someone's house."
"O.K.," replied the first. "I'll get her ready while you bring it. Let'
have the ankle-cuffs."

The other was busy taking off his outer clothes. He had a pair of blue
jeans under the uniform trousers and without the jacket he looked quite unlike
his former, official self.

Frances shivered again when she saw him undressing. She anticipated  the
worst! However, the man just went out and returned, bringing a big metal
plate and some poles. He set it down on the middle of the living room
carpet and screwed a pole on to an attachment to the plate and two shorter
ones, joined across their tops by a third, just above knee height.

He said, "O.K., it's ready now."
 

The two men took her arms. Her legs were pulled apart and her ankles
attached by leather cuffs to rings which had been screwed to the
plate. She felt the handcuffs being undone and her arms lifted over her
head and pulled backwards, towards the pole, after which the handcuffs were
locked back on, held high on the pole by a spring hook.  She was bowed
uncomfortably backwards over the horizontal bar. The strain on her wrists
was considerable. "Not bad", one of them commented, "the customer ought to be quite pleased with our company's service when he gets here."

"He will be, when we've finished. He's paid for it and we're delivering,
just as we promised. Have you got the shears?" replied the other.

Frances thought,' They're going to cut my hair. Please don't let them cut
my hair!'

But that was not their intention. The device they brought out of a bag they
had brought in was a small, electrical gadget, used by tailors  for cutting
out material for clothes. They quickly found a power outlet. The collar
she was wearing held her head up, so she could not see what  was going on,
but the feel of the tool on her body moved up from her waist to her
neck-line, then up her sleeves. She was naked from the waist up. The
feeling continued downwards and a few seconds later, she was completely nude, stretched over the frame, her hands locked behind the pole with her legs
chained widely apart.

"We'll soon be done," one of her captors told her, "Only a little bit more
and we'll leave you ready for your boy friend"!  Another dip in the bag and
another tool. She felt a cool metal thing between her legs and a buzzing.
They were shaving her!  The other "policeman" was working up a lather with
a large shaving brush in a white mug and as soon as the buzzing stopped, she
felt the warm  brush being applied.

"Hold still! Make sure you don't jump until I've finished!"

The man with the razor held it up for her to see.

"I'd hate to spoil your looks!" and he grinned and bent to his task.

He dried her carefully, then, with the aid of the other man, unlocked the
manacles, lifted her into a standing position and removed the three poles
that formed the frame over which she had been so uncomfortably and
obscenely stretched. They re-attached the handcuffs behind her round the remaining pole and then did the same with a short bit of chain which they fastened on her ankles, so that she was standing upright with her legs tight against the pole.  The leading chain, still attached to the back of her collar, was
brought under an arm, round her body under her breasts, back under the
other arm and fastened round the post and back to the collar at the other end.

The one who had shaved her said, "Just one more thing."

The third pair of manacles was applied to her upper arms, over a hook on
the pole, to bring her elbows close together and prevent her from sliding
downwards. He packed up his tools and took the bag outside, collected the
remnants of her clothing, carefully swept the floor round her and even used
a small portable vecuum cleaner to ensure that he had left nothing by which
they could be traced. He went to the telephone, dialed a number and said,

"We've finished here at Barton Road, where is the other gear to go?"

He heard a reply and said, "Yes, all the lot. We've cleared up, like you
said. I'm sure he'll be pleased. The other is just a delivery, not another
bondage job like this one, isn't it? Right? Be seeing you!" and he rang
off, dialed another number and rang off again after hearing someone speak,
leaving the handset on the table.

"I don't suppose your boy-friend will be long. I know I wouldn't anyway,
knowing what is waiting for him here." he said to Frances, "Good
Afternoon!"

Frances heard the door close and she was alone. She heard the sound of a
van starting up and going away.

Alone, bound, naked and without a hope of freeing herself. Nobody knew of
her plight. Fifteen minutes ago, she had been wishing something exciting
would happen!  The house in Burton Road was very quiet after he'd turned
off the radio.
Frances knew she had a long time to wait before her mother would return the
next morning.  To think that Barton Road and Burton Road could have been
confused!  She could just see the clock on the mantelpiece. Five o'clock!
 
. . . She could hear it ticking . . .

. . . She would be here for eighteen hours! . . .

. . . The phone had been left off its rest. . . .

Then she heard the sound of a key in the front door.  It had to be her
mother; nobody else had a key.
Her voice echoed down the hall : "Frances, Your uncle is sick, they're not
going out tonight!" as she went upstairs to take off her coat, without
looking into the room where Frances was standing.
"I thought I told you not to be on the phone all night! I've been trying to
ring you for the past hour."

'That's my Mum!', Frances thought.