Secretaries 3

by Mr. David R. Dorrycott

The Rote family & Bethany Cartwright copyright Mr. Simon Barber. Used with permission.

Louise Witherspoon opened her eyes at the sound of shod feet somewhere above her. How long had she been held in this cage the half breed girl asked herself. Long enough that her surgical wound had healed to a thin red scar. A scar now starting to turn from white to pink. Long enough to know that the only way she was going to get out of this nightmare was either by her own paws, or dead. The option of death wasn’t quite an acceptable choice. Not quite yet. Though after what had happened to the first blackfur that had been brought in after the vixen left, it was a lot closer option than it had been when she first understood her position. That blackfur was gone now, just as the vixen before her had gone. Packed off by the bulldog, for Louise refused to give the lawyer Richard Patterson his name. As long as she called him the bulldog he was an animal. If she called him by his name. That was unthinkable.

Seven or eight days after she had first woken Karen, whom the bulldog now only referred to as Fluffybutt, had spent a night and day in her cage with her while the blackfur was taken into another room. Though those walls were thick, Louise had been horrified by the sounds she had made. Finally they, the bulldog and his butler, had dragged the blackfurs unconscious body out and thrown her into her cage, then takeing Karen they had left. Hours later a shipping crate was dragged down, again by the butler and the bulldog. She had watched in seemingly disinterest as the blackfur was bound, gagged and sealed into that box. Then it had left as it had come. Two days later. At least she thought it was two days later, for she had slept long twice, another blackfur arrived. A mink. She was prettier than the first, and a faster learner. The first blackfur had fought just that much too long Karen had explained. Fought, and bitten the bulldog twice.

A sound of a door opening somewhere, followed by soft padding of four paws on the dirt floor announced that Karen had arrived. She walked on all fours with an ease that Louise still found impossible to believe. The rabbit moved in a smooth fashion, as though nature had always intended her to do so. That Louise was intended to learn that same skill still turned the half-breeds stomach, though she also noted that Karen held in her mouth Louise’s breakfast. Actually her entire food until evening. Setting in on the floor near Louise’s cage she nudged the wax paper bag forward with her nose. Behind her Louise could just see an ominous figure watching from within the shadows. Grabbing the paper bag with her own teeth Louise dragged it into her cage exactly as her own pet dog had often done. Karen smiled at her, then turned and hurried out and up those unknown stairs. Still on all fours.

It had though explained the odd way the rabbit had walked when at work. Her muscles were apparently no longer able to easily support her in true bipedal locomotion. Louise shivered to think that by now her own muscles had adjusted. She hadn’t stood on her own two feet since... Since she had gone to lunch with Karen so long ago. How long ago was that? Weeks, months? Certainly not a year as yet, for Winter had not yet come. Though there were no windows and the lights came on and off at odd times, the underground chamber was neither heated nor cooled by even a simple fan. With her visitors now gone she turned to her wax paper sack, tearing it open just like an animal would. There was a microphone quite evident hanging above her cage. Only once had she made the mistake of opening that bag like an intelligent creature would. Louise learned fast as well.

Food. Table scraps. Old bread. Cold mush that had once been sweet hot vegetables and mashed potatoes. All what one would give an animal. What Karen gave her. What Karen probably ate as well. Still better than the dry food pellets that were her only other choice. Manufactured animal food. Pellets of low grade something that would keep an animal healthy, as long as it got table scraps at least once a week. Louise felt lucky, this was the second meal in a row Karen had brought her a bag.

Across from her the new captive looked on with interest. This one though was a mink, so though her fur was also black she was not of Africa origin as the last had been. Jewish most likely Louise thought. Every Jew she had met was a mink. There was a microphone above her cage as well. Hanging by a twisted pair of wires, it had easily picked up the others voice when she tried to talk to her co-captive. Twenty lashes with a riding crop had stopped that, just as it had stopped Louise from using her paws for what nature had intended them for. Now they just looked at each other. And slept a lot. Sleep was escape.

Escape. Bethany had explained how her friend Nancy Rote had escaped her prison. Though Louise had searched many times, there was no lost key in the dirt around her cage. No thin length of metal to allow her a chance to pick the heavy brass lock. Try as she might, there was no way out of her cage, and the white linen wrapped about the latch gave evidence should any dirty pawed animal try to open it from inside. There were rules. Rules Karen had softly explained to her. Rules who’s breaking could be punished by a whip, a leather strap, docking or even worse. The Room.

“Never talk” Karen had whispered as the first blackfurs screams of agony had frightened both of them. “Yelp like a dog. If you ever talk again Master will beat you until your bones show. Only I may talk, and then only when Master allows. Such as now. If you don’t learn he takes you into the room. No one comes out of the room sane. No one. Stripes, you are an animal now. Act like you are or it will be the room. Stripes you have four choices. Be my perfect pet dog, be trained for the House for others playtime, be broken and sold like that one will be or become pig food. There is no escape. Stronger animals than you or I have tried, and all have failed.”

Louise shivered as she forced herself to remember her first day. The bulldog had brought out a heavy box with glass tubes on it. He’d plugged it into a wall socket, quickly filling the chamber with an acrid stench as the strange tubes had glowed a dull red, one she remembered had purple lights within it. Then he’d sat in the rooms only chair and picked up a bamboo rod, attaching a wire from it to the box. There were two long hat pins, or something like that on the rods end. It carried electricity she discovered quite quickly. Very ugly electricity. Her first scream had near torn her own throat out.

“Rule one. You are an animal. Not a sentient creature” the bulldog had explained, speaking as though he were dictating a letter. “Only purebred whitefurs are sentient beings. Half breeds are aberrations of nature.” Each time he spoke he lanced her naked body with that thing, its long needles unbothered by her still thick fur. “Proven by the fact that very few are able to conceive unless with a purebred. Fluffybutt says your name is Stripes. Learn it. I know you understand words, so you know what I’m saying. Understand this Stripes. Words are forbidden animals. Your paws are for walking on, not holding things. Whomever lied to you and told you that you could use them for other than walking, or that you could be allowed to use words should be hung. Animals walk on fours, not twos like intelligent whitefurs.”

It had gone on and on for what seemed like years, until finally the bulldog had stood, turned to Karen and said “She’s yours to train Fluffybutt. You have one chance. If she fails to learn you lose her and you get punished in the room for your failure. You do understand?”

“Yes Master. Thank you Master.” The pure adoration in that voice had made Louise ill, though she was in too much pain to more than close her eyes. So she learned, listened and learned how to fake her own fall. No longer did she move even one muscle when her birth name was spoken, not even when the bulldog had screamed it in her face. No matter what was done to her she refused to speak, learning to yelp, growl and whine like the dog Major she had once owned. Her experience with Major helped her, for repeating his actions and reactions as she well remembered them seemed to prove to the bulldog that she was truly falling. Then when he took her she offered no resistance, though she threw up after he had left.

And there was the wound. No children, no family. Being half-breed it would have been difficult to find a compatible male anyway, but at least she had once had the chance for children. Louise felt that she now had no reason to live other than that she wanted to see that bulldog dead. Karen though. Louise finally understood that Karen was nothing but a destroyed victim herself. Years upon years of living under the bulldogs crushing control had destroyed whatever woman had existed before. ‘I will escape’ Louise thought as she slipped into a very light sleep. ‘Dear Bethany’s Nancy escaped. Certainly as long as I retain my intelligence I too will have a chance. And Bethany’s Nancy will find me. She is most likely my only hope now.’ Louise knew that she was no Nancy Rote, that only if she could stay strong would the as yet unmet savior release her from this nightmare.

That had been how long ago? Louise couldn’t know. She barely remembered a single visitor, one who had come after a rather serious episode of ‘training.’ One whom she seemed to remember, and who believed that she was letting herself be turned into an animal of her own free will. Later on she could barely notice that eventually odd things began happening. One wake-time equipment was packed up from the room, to be shipped off who knew where. Three large drums of what smelled like gasoline and oil had been brought in another wake-time and taken to the room, while boxes of unseen things had been removed. Then two long sleeps later Karen showed up, oddly walking on two feet, while carrying a leather strap in her paws.

“Come on Stripes. The Master says you are finally trained well enough to come upstairs. And in any case, you are either trained enough or not. I fear that we are out of time. Come out of your cage my sweet puppy.”

Louise eased out of the cage, these last wake-times during the changes she had only been allowed out to answer nature, and to learn how to act with a leash on. As before Karen snapped a long leather leash onto the thick leather collar locked around Louise’s neck. A collar that she had been shown now held a tiny little silver plate that said ‘Stripes, Property of Fluffybutt.’ “Remember, tail high. We are going upstairs now and there is company. Fail and we both are lost forever.”

Remembering her training Louise raised her tail high, though it pained her. Of all her body it was the part she had always been most proud of. Chipmunk by markings and fur, her tail was that of a pure squirrel. It had been the envy of her classmates, even though it took a great deal more effort to keep in order than a standard chipmunk tail Louise had always been proud of it. Lately Karen, or as the bulldog called her, Fluffybutt, had been caring for Louise’s brushing. There was the ex-secretary discovered, at least one advantage to being treated as a pet. Someone else spent the half hour a day needed to keep her fur shining and in order. With one last look at the cowering, nearly broken mink Louise followed her owner out of the chamber.

To find herself in a large basement. A basement much like any other, though cleaner than any she had seen. A heavy, dull thump announced the closing of a door behind her. Looking back Louise saw only a heavy rubble stone foundation. Not even a mark on the ground where her pawprints vanished into it.

“Midnight railroad” Karen explained. “This is the latch.” She pointed at an oddly shaped stone in the wall. Then she gave the leash a tiny tug. It was enough to turn Louise’s attention back into the game she was playing. “Hundreds of blackfur slaves escaped through Creekside during the civil war. What they would think, to know that most such places have since been turned into slave quarters. Hundreds have been broken in Creekside since that war. Almost as many as ever escaped to freedom. It’s the money of course, that mink back there is worth tens of thousands to a certain Arabic Prince. Her family is very prominent jewelers in the Creekside Jewish community, and hated very much by him, as they will not do business with him. She will be shipped out just before sunrise as she is. He will complete her training. You, if I wanted to sell you, your beauty would bring my Master twice as much. Even the blackfur that failed her training more than broke even when she was sold to a Uavapacal businessman. Come now, we are keeping the Master waiting. That is never a good thing.”

A flight of well kept wooden steps brought them up not to the kitchen as was normal up North, but a storage room filled with boxes and shelves of preserves. Two doors lead off, the one to Louise’s right offered scents of apple pie and other remembered foods. The kitchen then. She was instead lead to the other, which entered of all places the parlor. Louise quickly noted that several furs were there, then remembered not to make eye contact with any of them as she was lead to the bulldog, finally ordered to heel beside the still standing rabbit.

“As I explained Sir, any woman can be broken. Given time and the right resources. Correct Louise?” Louise though didn’t move a fur, still looking forward at the knees before her. Behind her was a customer, was she to be sold to him then? Perhaps a better chance to escape. There were at least four others there behind her, though she dared not look back at them.

“I am afraid that I cannot take your commission however” the hated bulldog continued. “You see Miss Rote and that ugly little shrew friend of her’s have finally broken through the Davidson Affair. They now are certain he had nothing to do with the losses. That he was a red herring. That of course leaves myself and of course Mr. Jenkins. I have decided to throw suspicion upon myself next, tomorrow morning in fact. But the papers currently hidden in the back drawers of my desk will not be anywhere as near as good as those against Mr. Davidson. They were rushed, will quickly seen through. I will contact you of course when I have re-established in Omaha and suspicion is no longer upon my house. I do remember your love of doe’s sir and being in the same city will make things much easier.”

“And Precious?” a heavy voice asked.

“Can be easily trained. I can easily see that she wants this. Sir, she must love you very much to have already accepted your brand. Especially there. But I must know in advance how you wish her to be trained.

“This animal here” the second voice asked. “What is her training?”

“Stripes? Quite extensive. She is my gift to Fluffybutt for her years of extremely loyal service. Stripes will accept either sex as a lover without complaint. Eagerly in fact. It no longer attempts to parrot intelligent speech or actions of any kind. As you can see, it walks comfortable on all fours as nature intended. Quite the perfect pet.”

“Precious?” that heavy voice asked.

“Please?” a remembered voice asked. “To be your perfect pet. I will be in Heaven Master”

An image, then a name came to Louise’s mind abruptly at the sound of that voice. ‘Katherine Winston, the most popular cheerleader in High School.’ Katherine. Louise remembered Katherine. She had been a very attractive vixen. They had been friends of a sort. This couldn’t be her. Not Katty. This certainly couldn’t be her. Though they had never been close friends, their friendship had been close enough that Louise knew how strong the vixen’s personality was. A soft padding of shoeless feet on hardwood floors came, missing the tiny clicks one would expect as bare claws tapped on its hard surface. Then a well remembered face was staring at Louise, the vixen having knelt down to look her in the eyes.

“Oh my dearest friend” the vixen whispered. “Had I known that this was your dream as well, I would have informed my master. We could have been a pair.” Reaching out the vixen caressed Louise’s face, the act which educated the ex-secretary as to why there had been no expected clicking. Katherine had been declawed. Katherine had always been so proud of her claws. It was a battle of her mind not to show her horror at such an event. “I never told you, but I always wanted to be your lover.” Then the vixen was standing, moving away. “Master, if Stripes ever comes up for sale. Would you please buy her? She always helped me in school, and though I never said anything to her about it, she was my very best friend. And I always wanted to be her lover.”

“Patterson?” the deep voice asked. “Would you be willing to sell? Once Precious here is completely trained and returned to me?”

“Fluffybutt” the bulldog asked gently. There was though power behind that question, a silent signal Louise had learned to understand, and fear.

“If it is needed Master” the rabbit agreed. Her voce though showed great disappointment to those who knew her well. “Could I earn another pet? Eventually?”

“Certainly. In fact I will be certain that you will have another pet before selling this one. What about the mink? Or a purebred. Say a Racoon? There is one available whom I have had my eye on. She has turned her back on her race, mating with species of much lesser intelligence than herself. This places her outside the rules of Purity. And it would be an elegant strike against Miss Rote. Quite an elegant strike. Her best friend sitting at heel to you, and loving your every touch. Yes, yes. It shall be the racoon. I will have her taken when she returns from her aunts, then shipped to our new location. She will be trained before I sell Stripes.”

“Precious” that voice Louise was quickly learning to hate said. “Outside now, you must need to answer natures call before we leave. I do not desire a messy cage again.”

“Yes Master, thank you Master.” Then the vixen trotted out the door on all fours. Not as elegantly as Karen was able though. Louise hated herself for feeling pride that the rabbit, her owner, was more elegant at acting like an animal than one of her best High School friends.

“I would prefer to send her to the Red Lily” that voice admitted. “But that woman will not maintain any drug regime not prescribed by a Doctor, and I was warned she now well knows what my drug does. Then there is this, she somehow knows when such training is not truly the desire of her student. Still, once you train Precious I will save a fortune in drug costs, and the worry that she might somehow become immune to it.”

“Drug?” the bulldog repeated. 

“I was visiting Europe, business you understand. When I met this wonderful collie who seemed very interested in me. Well, having been taken before by a Frenchwoman, I watched her carefully as dinner progressed and darn if she did not slip a drug into my drink when she thought I was not looking. So I switched drinks with her. It is the most amazing drug my friend. She acted normally even though she answered every question I asked, followed every order I gave her. When I returned home it was with the secret of this drug and several gallons in what appeared to be bottles imported wines.”

“And the woman?” Patterson asked.

“Free to continue her trade. With the understanding that should I need, she will supply more of the drug. After all, the authorities are wondering about the rather high death rate of their upper classes. Precious is under the drugs effects, she has been since two days after she graduated from High School. You see, while I was visiting a relative we went to watch a local football game. She was the head cheerleader. Quite becoming, I simply had to have her and having the drug.” He shrugged. “I wish her trained, I am tired of giving her the drug. I want her mine freely, not drugged. I fear I will miss her dose one day and lose her. She is such a delightful little thing. Why, in a few years I will breed her. I would very much like to see what price old men would pay to have a purebred pup from one of her beauty.”

Patterson stood, walking over to where Louise sat next to her owner. “A drug that makes someone do whatever you say? What if someone else stumbles across her. Decides he or she wants her.”

“That” the other laughed. “Would be useless. I am well aware that without constant doses of this drug she will return to normal. She will not remember anything, for her it will be as though a day had passed. They would find themselves with a very enraged female on their paws. Very enraged. After all, she has given me one pup already. A delightful little girl who I will train to take my place. When she is old enough.”

‘He is a ferret’ Louise finally realized as his scent broke through the perfumed soaps he used. ‘A ferret, and he is keeping her in Omaha. Nebraska?’ She kept silent. Maybe another slip, another clue?

“You see” the unseen fur continued. “Also, very nature of this drug allows me to place conditions in Precious’s mind. She will obey no one but I. Not even her own parents, whom I will admit are still looking for her. I had her leave a note that she was going to New York, to find her future as an actress.”

“Very interesting” the dark hearted bulldog admitted. “Then as I understand it, one could drug a selected target. Order her to act natural, leave a message that she was going elsewhere and walk into her own cage without argument.”

“Which is exactly what I did to Precious. I take it then that you are interested in a business deal?”

Unseen by Louise, Patterson smiled broadly. “Absolutely. Why, we would become rich. You with your drug, I with my training and contacts. As a show of trust, when I am settled in Nebraska I will train your Precious at no cost to you. Thus proving my abilities. Then we may start taking orders from those with more money than morals.”

“I will have to think about that” the ferret admitted. “I only desired to have Precious trained, but the idea of a herd of pretty young things is enticing. Contact me at my ranch when you arrive in Omaha. I will have an answer for you by then. Yet even if I say no, I think I would be quite happy to both sell you the drug once Precious is fully trained, and train you on its use. Now I must go. Until Omaha.”

Springs cried their relief as the ferret stood, when he past across Louise’s vision she saw why. He had to weigh near four hundred pounds. He paused, taking a moment to inspect both rabbit and half-breed. Louise fought not to cringe as his thick paws wandered over parts of her body she preferred not to have touched. Then he and the bulldog were gone.

A paw rubbing her head caused Louise to turn to face Karen. There were tears in the rabbits eyes. “I love you Stripes” the broken rabbit whimpered. “I don‘t want to lose you. Not ever.” She continued rubbing Louise’s fur, the act bringing pleasure to the ex-secretary even though she tried her best not to enjoy the feelings.

Finally Patterson returned, his Butler with him. “You heard?”

“Yes, everything” the Butler answered, and not in the deferred voice of servant to employer. But equal to equal. “What do you think?”

“You saw the vixen, what he has done to a purebred against her will” Patterson answered. “That alone deserves death. I had planned to move to Italy, but this drug is simply too good to miss. You take your toy to Milan, set up shop there. Fluffybutt and I will join you in a month. If I am successful, not only Stripes but Precious will be with me. Find a doctor that can be subverted successfully, I’ll want Precious taken care of as soon as possible. No need to let a shattered purebred breed.”

“Understood. When do you want us to leave?”

“Sooner the better. Now would be best. I’ll have Fluffybutt help me pack. That Rote girl will come and find us preparing to leave as I have already tendered my letter of resignation. Matter of honor and reputation you see. It will take that squirrel about an hour to prove me innocent, then we will apparently leave for San Francisco immediately. By the time those two put the puzzle I’ve created together we will be temporarily set up in Omaha. By the time they track us we’ll be in Italy. Stupid blackfurs should have skinned that squirrel first thing.”

“I agree with you there, but they didn’t. If we ever get our paws on her I will most assuredly do the skinning myself. After cutting her throat and draining her would be best. Okay, we’ll be on the first plane out this afternoon. I’ll leave you the new address at the usual drop. See you in Italy.”

In moments they were alone again. Well, alone if one did not count the bulldog as a person. Patterson walked over to the two waiting women, his paw dropping on Louise’s head as he started talking to Karen. “Until further instructed you are Karen, not Fluffybutt. Pack everything you need. Movers will arrive for the rest tomorrow and ship it to the drop in Italy. Leave nothing important behind.”

“The Jewess sir?”

“Shippers are coming around nine am for her. We already have the money. Now when Rote arrives you know how to act. Oh, put Stripes back into the safe room until Rote leaves. She will probably have me arrested and dragged off, but I doubt it. Movers are due at ten am so we will leave as soon as they arrive and I have set the time fuse. Go put Stripes back into her cage for now.”

“Yes sir.”

And so it was that Louise missed the expected encounter with the two Rote’s, missed her first chance to escape. It was near one am when the rabbit Karen came down, letting Louise out of her cage again. “All’s done. Nancy never arrived, she’s stuck in Court for the moment trying to get a search warrant, and our agent is delaying them as much as he can. Now follow me, I want you around while I pack.”

This time though Louise kept her eyes open, spotting the stone Karen pressed to open that so well hidden doorway. Most of the rest of her night was spent trotting behind Karen while the rabbit packed, then took several cases downstairs to leave on the dining room table. Around three am Patterson returned from some business meeting and started his own packing. His first act was to place two very expensive looking green cases on the dining room table. “Case records and our ready cash” he informed Karen. “Lets not forget them, we need both.”

“Yes sir. Stripes. Guard the cases. Only Mr. Patterson or I may touch them. On your life.”

Giving Karen a tiny smile Louise sat against a far wall, her eyes on the cases. Which she wondered was money, and which records. Records that might be the freedom of uncounted young women. Better to steal the records than the money she decided. She was still trying to determine which was which when Patterson walked into his cooks bedroom and shot her. It wasn’t a loud noise, more of a soft cough, but the scent of gunsmoke and hot blood told the trapped woman exactly what had happened. A locks click told her that there was one room the movers would not be entering.

“That’s the last loose link” Patterson said as he walked past Louise, setting the revolver next to the green cases. “I’ll bring the mink up Karen, you make sure that everything is ready.”

“Yes sir.”

Louise watched in silence as Patterson vanished, knowing exactly where the bulldog was going, and almost exactly how long he would be gone. She had never touched a firearm before, but it couldn’t be hard she thought. Point, pull the trigger, again if she had too, then grab the cases and run. When Karen walked back upstairs Louise made her move. Standing, she tottered carefully to that gun, her legs screaming in pain at the long forgotten act of walking erect. Studying the gun she found no obvious safety, but there was a long tubular item on its front that dragged the barrel down. ‘Silencer’ the chipmunk/squirrel realized. Carefully pulling the hammer back she slipped back into her position.

Karen was the first back, and the first Louise shot. Her first round slammed into the rabbits shoulder, causing her to bounce off the table and hit the floor. Karen was still trying to understand what had happened when Louise placed the muzzle against the side of her head and fired a second time.

Sickened by what she had just done Louise made her way to the pantry. From the noise Patterson was just coming up the steps. Louise waited until he opened the door, then shot him. Once, twice and as he tumbled down the stairs in a bloody mess a third time. Tossing the now empty weapon aside she picked up the minks lease. “Come on. We are escaping” she hissed. For the first time in who knew how long Louise felt free. Oh her fur was sticking out in fear, and her tail was nearly between her legs, but her tormentor was dead. Or would be soon. Stopping in the kitchen Louise took a lucifer and lit one of the waiting oil lamps. This she tossed into the pantry, to shatter and spill its oil. Even if the bulldog was somehow still alive he wasn’t coming up that way.

A quick stumbling walk to the dining room gave her those two green, and very heavy cases. Returning to the kitchen, now filling with smoke, she grabbed the waiting minks leash with her teeth and led both of them outside to the back. The back, and safety. For whatever had been in those barrels was heaver than air, and when the flames reached a certain point the entire house lifted half a foot off its foundation. To then fall in upon itself. In minutes flame was reaching high into the sky, while Louise, her legs now cramping, had found a hiding place near the pond. Beside her the frightened mink huddled close, sharing body warmth and searching for safety from the hell she had just left.

It was near noon when the last police car left. Firefighters were carefully sifting through still smoking embers in hope against hope that someone had somehow survived. Aside from the single firetruck sat a blue roadster, its top up against the weather while two young women sat inside it, sharing a hot chocolate as a thin rain fell.

“Arson” the squirrel asked her companion.

Alpha Rote looked up from the pad she had been writing in. “Possibilityextreamlyhigh” she answered. “Heavyhydrocarbon scent.

Nancy Rote simply smiled. In the time she had known her wife, Alpha almost always shoved her words together. Nancy had long ago learned how to automatically translate what to others seemed to be gibberish.

“A sad event” Nancy sighed. “I had questions of his secretary. Well, we had best walk the grounds. Though the police have, I am certain that they will have missed something. They did so at night with flash lamps. We have the day.”

Finishing her hot chocolate and without a word of complaint Alpha Rote exited the warm roadster with her wife. “Igoleft, youright’ Alpha announced, then took off to the indicated direction. It was Nancy who found Louise and her charge much later. Foot and hoofprints were right outside the little artificial cavern in the brush, yet at least two police officers had passed by without seeing anything and by now even the last firefighter had left. There was only dense smoke turning the fog nearly impenetrable by the time those four made it back to Nancy’s waiting car. Within the half hour both ex-captives were sitting in Nancy Rotes home, covered in warm blankets and drinking hot chocolate while Nancy asked them questions and her step-mother examined them for injuries. Unfortunately her father had returned to the Capital just the day before, leaving her free run of the house. Though a message had been passed on it would be another day before he could return.

“I must call the authorities” Georgine Rote announced after hanging up from her conversation with her husband. “This one has an infection, and the other needs very serious care.”

The other was the mink, Louise though held her paw on Georgine’s. “No. Not for I” she argued. “I am dead, I must remain so.”

“But why?” Nancy’s stepmother asked. “You are safe, free. Your family needs you.”

“My family is dead” Louise explained. “And my uncle believes that I am as well. Besides” her right paw went to her lower stomach. “What male would want me now. Even before it would have been difficulty to find a husband. Now, now I am unable to even hope. People would only pity me.”

Georgine Rote was a mother, a Registered Nurse and a woman. All of these told her that Louise had been hurt worse than any medical help could repair. “Nancy?”

“But of course, call the authorities for the mink. You are certain that there is nothing more we can do for her?”

“Nothing” Georgine admitted. “She needs her family, a good doctor and very importantly. Good psychoanalysis. Holding her here is doing very little good for her. But Louise. What will you do?”

“Heal” the half breed answered. “Move on. Find others like me. Help them. Help my friend in Omaha.” She looked away, out a nearby window. “I killed them both.” A heavy shudder ran down her body. “I am a murderess. They will hang me, won’t they?”

“Only if know you are alive” Alpha Rote admitted. “Nance. Sheisvery goodsecretary. Weneedsuch.”

Nancy Rote looked to her smaller wife, gaging what was happening. “Had we the money. I would be delighted. Alpha. Though we do much need a secretary, we also would need money to support both her and an office. We must return to Songmark. We have but little time to visit Simmons ranch. To discover what is happening there and give Justice to that half-breed stallion. Father cannot protect Miss. Witherspoon. If she will not use her name, then her training is useless to her. No Alpha, there is nothing you or I can do. Not at this moment. Make the call please mother.”

“The green cases” Louise remembered when Georgine went to call for the police.

“What of them” Nancy asked. She had fought to get Louise to leave those expensive cases, yet the girl refused to budge without them. Now they sat in the visitors bedroom, where they had been left after Alpha managed to get Louise washed and dressed.

“He said that they contained records, and money. Miss Rote. Please. If those records tell what happened to the other girls. I had a visit. By an old school friend. She is held on Omaha Nebraska. Drugged. What they have done to her. It is horrible.”

“Alpha, the cases please“ Nancy asked.

Louise watched in silence as Alpha left. “She loves you a great deal” Louise observed after Alpha had left.

“She is a very good friend” Nancy agreed.

“Who wears the same ring as you. And when I said Miss Rote she looked at me the same way that you did.” Louise turned to face Nancy directly. “How long have you been married?”

“What?” Nancy gasped, glancing quickly to see if other than her stepmother had heard.

“And that, Mrs. Rote. Answers everything. They do not know, do they.”

“How” Nancy hissed, her fur bottled from the fear that her secret would come out.

“I am a very well trained secretary Mrs. Rote. Part of that training is to determine the relationship of my employers clients. To inform him. I am no detective Mrs. Rote, I thought our hiding place well protected yet you found us with ease. I am though observant.”

“Thus dangerous.” Nancy looked within herself. This woman had, by dent of pure observation. And probably by listening as she and Alpha had discussed what to do about what they had believed to be two unconscious women. “And you discovered our secret while we thought you unconscious” she abruptly announced.

“Through the heart Mrs. Rote” Louise admitted with a thin smile. “What are your plans, after this Songmark. Bethany told me the public disaster of your life. From my experience I think that I understand some of the unsaid things. What will you do?”

“The Emergency Car and Police are on their way Nancy” Georgine announced as she re-entered the room. “Ten minutes at most. And Miss Witherspoon?”

“Is it possible for you to treat her infection. Successfully” Nancy asked.

Georgine glanced at Louise, then turned her attention to Nancy. “She needs several days of bed-rest. I can lance the wound, treat it with iodine and clean cloth. Carbolized Vaseline will help. A few days bed rest and she will be able to walk without any further injury. But why? She was the victim of a terrible crime. Creekside will help her as they helped you.”

“Meaning that she will not be welcome in the proper homes or buisness’s anymore than I” Nancy almost snapped. “Yes Miss Rote, we understand that it was by no fault of yourself. Still we prefer our sons to marry virgins, not street walkers.” The venom in her voice was unmistakable.

“Nancy!” Georgine gasped. “Well, yes. A lot are like that. But not everyone.”

“No, and I will find a father for my children mother. But I will never marry him. Louise, if what you say is true we will know soon. For here comes Alpha with the cases. Come to my room and we will discuss all our futures. Mother, when the police arrive I will speak to them, but only I. And Louise was never here.”

“All right Nancy, I just hope that you know what you are doing.” Georgine watched as the three women made their way upstairs, Louise swaying a bit from the infection to her tail root. A few more days without care and the half squirrel may have lost that tail. That she was ignoring such pain was a wonder to the older mink.

In Nancy’s room Alpha broke the cases combinations in a matter of minutes. “Cheaplocks” the shrew admitted. One case was indeed packed with money. Both cash and bearer bonds. The other had books in it. Nearly a dozen, with photographs and histories of each girl carefully documented. Alpha went through them quickly, seemingly absorbing the information as quickly as she saw it. Abruptly she stopped, producing a razor sharp knife, then removing a page with Louise’s photo on it. This she offered to the secretary. “Deadnot needsuch” she explained. “Livingdo.”

“There are thousands, tens of thousands of dollars here” Nancy gasped as she dug through the second case. “I will turn the records over to the police. This. This is yours Louise. You can start a new life with this.”

“And you will do what after your Songmark” Louise asked again.

“Hunt these kind down and bring Justice to them. Through the courts, or not. I fear mainly not.”

Louise carefully pulled the green case filled with money towards her. “You will need a secretary. One you may trust with your life. You will need an office. Where communications may come to and be sent. Where records may be kept. Someone who is able to sort through information. Prioritize. Someone with the same hunger as yourself.” She looked at the two women now staring at her. “Mrs. Rotes. I hear-by present myself and my records that you may consider my application for lifetime employment. At the rate on one penny per year.”

Alpha gasped, looking towards Nancy. This woman knew their secret, but wasn’t bothered by it.

“Subject to Alpha’s agreement, I accept your application” Nancy announced.

“Yesyesyesyes” Alpha agreed, throwing herself into Louise arms. This caused the half-breed to lean back on her swollen tail and yelp in pain. “Sorrysorrysorry...” Alpha backed off, frightened that she had badly hurt Nancy’s new employee.

“Believe me” Louise gasped. “I have hurt worse these months. Much much worse.”

Moments later a knock came to Nancy’s bedroom door. “Police wish to speak to you dear” Georgine announced. “I will take care of her infection, with Alpha’s help. Meanwhile you must talk to them.”

“Of course.” Nancy stood, gathered the green case holding those records and nodded to Alpha. “Be right back?’

“Oh kiss her Nancy” Georgine laughed softly. “She’s been waiting for simply hours.”

With a blush of embarrassment Nancy leaned down and kissed Alpha, then hurried off. “Anything for you mother” she stage whispered as she left.

“Children” Georgine laughed. “They believe adults see nothing. Alpha dear, you must help keep Louise from yelling as I work, or the police will be up here in a moment. Then her secret will be lost.”

“Simple” Alpha agreed. Taking off her blouse and bra Alpha stopped any possible sounds by Louise with one simple action. She shoved her right breast into the larger woman’s mouth. “Bite” she whispered. “And Nancy willbeveryvery angry.”

“Well” Georgine giggled. “That is an interesting way to keep someone silent.” She prepared to lance the infection under Louise’s tailroot. “Now dear, this is going to hurt like hell.” And it did.