Stand By America 1954
Better Dead than Red

Four young American boys are abducted
by KGB agents and tortured to reveal
the secret of the ultimate weapon of war.
Only their grit and patriotism can
prevent a Communist takeover of the
America they love… or so they believe.

After work Marko Plasvik likes to sit on the back steps to his room at Mrs. Cody's roominghouse, smoke a cigarette and look across the valley to Hatley's Peak and what the locals, for reasons every child understands, call the Sleeping Maiden. And now that it's baseball season he likes to watch the boys who often play catch in the neighbour's back yard. He especially likes their son, Jacky, a husky blond, saucy faced kid who looks about fourteen. He's talked to him and his friends a few times and played catch with them a couple of times after stray balls came over the fence. He'd like to have Jacky, or any young boy for that matter, in his room for a little fun, but unlike Cleveland it's not easy here to find boys you can fool around with.

Marko's just lit another Lucky Strike when he notices Police Chief Jarvis knocking on the neighbour's back door. He waves to the chief, he's had a few drinks with him at Bud's Tavern and just last month he replaced his water pump out on the highway to Nashville. No one's home and the chief turns to him, "Hi Marko, you haven't seen the Pruitt kid around have you?" Marko hasn't but they talk over the fence for a while anyway. It seems that some old codger on the other side of town caught Jacky and some his buddies raiding his berry patch and is quite upset. Chief Jarvis is not very concerned, "Jack's a good kid, stays out of trouble. So he swipes a few berries, can't see too much wrong in that. Hell, I used to do worse, but I figure I should tell his dad and let him handle it. They're a good, God fearing family, the Pruitts, I'll just phone his dad later."

It's not long after that the Pruitts arrive in their new '53 maroon Pontiac station wagon and maybe half an hour after that Jacky rides up on his Schwinn. Soon Marko hears the father, Brad, some kind of foreman at the plant, shouting at his son in the kitchen which is no more than twelve feet from the steps. Marko hardly misses a word. Jacky has violated the Fourth Commandment and that is a serious sin. Jacky tries to explain that it was only some berries, and the guy never picked them anyway. Then he hears dad smack the boy and order him downstairs. This has happened before. The boy's going to get a licking.

Marko waits, tosses his butt against the fence, and then as if he's looking for it he peers between the boards into a basement window. In a few seconds he sees the frightened boy come down the stairs followed by his dad with a strap, an old razor strop. He briefly glimpses Jacky's bare ass as the boy undresses. The action however takes place well out of Marko's view but he does hear it clearly. BLAH BLAH BLAH "How many times have I had to punish you for stealing, and still you persist. That is a rebellion against both my authority and God's. You are a wilful child and I am going to beat you until your will is broken. Let us pray... Almighty God, guide my hand so that my son may be directed onto the paths of righteousness and achieve life everlasting.... Now, bend over that table." The beating begins. Marko is thrilled and aroused by the drama. They're loud, slamming blows delivered with righteous anger. He knows from experience they'll bruise deeply if not cut. "Are you truly sorry for what you have done? Are you ready to pray to the Good Lord for forgiveness?". The boy mumbles something. "That's not good enough." Two more loud blows follow and Jacky pleads he is truly sorry, "...honestly." After a silence of many seconds dad announces, "I can tell you're still resisting, your muscles are tense, you're still holding on to your will." The beating resumes, dad spewing righteous invective as he belts his son. It's almost as if the father enjoys his chore. Marko knows that six blows of the heavy strap should be maximum but the father doesn't stop. The boy takes twelve of the pounding blows, shrieking and sobbing uncontrollably near the end. His will it seems has been broken. Marko shivers with excitement, the boy's spunk was amazing, how he would love to hug and kiss him. He glimpses the boy again after, limping up the stairs holding a blood smeared singlet around himself.

The beating's such an inspiration for Marko that he's masturbating at least twice a day for a whole week, dwelling and elaborating on Jacky's strapping. It's been three years since he's seen a boy flogged and he dreams about it often, but he doesn't remember any as powerful as this one, which he didn't even get to see. Maybe it's the boy Jacky, who he's taken a fancy to, but it's also a longing he feels has too long been denied.

Marko had worked as a corrections officer at the Lakeview Boys Reformatory in Ohio for sixteen months before starting his machinists apprenticeship. He'd never thought much about it at the time, it was simply part of the duties of the discipline detail. He was one of two officers who restrained the boys, cinched their ankles and wrists over the horse, and watched while the deputy warden flogged the boys with a long, heavy, perforated strap. After he would sign a witness form and take the boy to the infirmary where he would be kept overnight, more to isolate him from his peers than for medical reasons, though occasionally boys were crippled for a couple of days.

Marko always looked forward to the floggings most of which were carried out just before noon on Saturdays although a week or two might go by without any. They were the most thrilling events he ever saw. Sometimes up to six teenage boys, occasionally younger, would brought to the gym. Marko would observe them strip, take their clothes, examine their bodies for any previous injury and cinch them in place. Sometimes a bit of force was required and Marko didn't complain if he had an excuse to slap a kid around. On the other hand he found it he found it interesting to observe and sometimes soothe the boys beforehand and he liked to look at the Boys' faces, and their cocks which sometimes got hard when they were flogged, and of course their asses as they turned from lovely smooth bums to halfway to hamburger. The boys who took their punishment without begging for mercy, screaming or crying thrilled him the most, it was like a ritual or contest, and as he watched he always secretly prayed that the boy would grit it through. And of course it was even better when it was one of the prettier, more attractive boys who got it. Jacky is beautiful.

He'd always have a great jerk off after watching a flogging and often imagined that he was the one strapping the boy. It was like he was giving the kid something, like making him more of a man, and when he fucks them in his fantasies after, it's like he's really loving them. Marko realizes that he's not that interested in beating or torturing anybody, just boys, especially those he finds attractive. And Marko has to admit that he had a great thing happening at the boys reformatory. When he quit the job, he never thought he'd miss the floggings and actually there aren't many other jobs where you can get to see boys whipped. He realizes how stupid he was to quit. No other erotic image can compete with that of boys stoically undergoing the ordeal of flogging in the well worn paths of Marko's synaptic connections.

Marko occasionally wonders if his fascination with flogging boys is normal as nothing else excites him as much. But then sometimes he thinks floggings are good for boys, toughens them up and teaches respect. And it gives them the opportunity to test their mettle. He doesn't quite feel he has a calling as a flogger of boys, though he's cheaply rationalized things that way on more than one occasion, but simply that he enjoys flogging boys, and boys need to be flogged, and he fits into some grand scheme where it all makes sense. It's certainly a good thing that at least a few men like to flog boys. And it makes sense that those who like to do something be the ones to do it. But Marko is also aware that giving pain to, flogging or torturing boys is a responsible act. Boys, because they are male, need to suffer, need to experience pain so they understand and become better men for it. He believes he has seen whippings ennoble the basest of juvenile offenders.

And boys really should be fucked too, and want to be fucked. It's good for them, it teaches them what women go through he rationalizes, it hurts, he makes sure it does, and they'll be better, more considerate husbands as a result. It's a good thing there's people like himself who'll go through all the trouble you have to these days, to fuck young boys. Some boys have no sense of gratitude. Now Marko's not advocating rape but he believes that persuasion is sometimes helpful, especially if it's painful.

The only person he's ever talked to about this is his older brother Steve. They had both read the novel MANDIGO as kids where the young son of the plantation owner was being taught how to whip a black slave, an unwilling boy slightly older than himself. Marko had remarked that he found the scene interesting and read it aloud to Steve. Steve was fascinated and Marko realized that they shared some kinky ideas. Steve told Marko that once, just for kicks, he and a couple of his buddies had taken this coloured kid to an abandoned shed and stripped and whipped him. "He just hung there with an angry, scared face as we took turns lashing him with a belt, like it really cut and he started to bleed, I'll never forget it. He begged us to stop but we didn't. He said he'd do anything, suck our cocks, you name it. We could tell he wasn't really passed out when we all fucked him after... But you know next time, I think it would be more fun with a white boy, an all American boy."

"Like Marko, black boys don't feel pain the same. You could whip them every other day an' it would make no difference. There's no genuine pleasure in whipping Nigger boys, but white boys, they got sensitive skin, just like us, and you'd know when they's hurtin'. White boys gotta be the best for licking. I've fucked an' sucked a lotta boys since but I never whipped one again. Once this kid let give him five spanks for an extra five bucks but I don't think it hurt him a bit but he sure put on a show."

They talked about finding a boy they could whip, a young boy about thirteen, fourteen maybe, some kid they could have a bit of fun with first then give him a good licking, and a kid who wouldn't just holler his head off, that tends to spoil things. But how to find a kid? Paying a street hustler wouldn't work too well they figured. The kid would have to be doing it for real, like it really mattered and not just for money. And how would you get the kid to take it without too much fuss? And of course you'd want to fuck the kid more after. They discussed other things they might do to him but they wouldn't want to hurt him bad, just mess him up, like he'd be okay in a few days.

Most of all Marko would like to flog Jacky, tie him up and play with him, torture him for hours, and then see how much of a licking he could get him to take. But how to do it so the boy takes you seriously, so he'll put up a fight, and it's like a game as you keep doing more to him. He would have to believe you're something more than a weirdo. Boys his age are not noted for convictions and determination. Then it flashed upon him, PATRIOTISM, the idea suggested great dramatic possibilities.

Marko wouldn't mind fooling around with some of Jacky's friends either like Lance, a slim, muscular boy with dark curly hair about the same age. Lance has hugely long eyelashes and a nice butt for a slim kid, or so Marko imagines. He could be fun to do things to. There're also several boys who hang around with Jacky and he always says "Hi" to them when he sees them on the street. There's Bert, Lance's red haired kid brother and his friend Robby, is it? who's got the most fragile clear complexion, Marko believes the lad's translucent. And he has such a nice round ass.

Since Jacky's beating Marko goes out of his way to be friendly to the boys. He spends much of his spare time fantasizing scenes where he flogs Jacky or maybe one of the others. Scenes where the boy is helpless, and he can inflict calculated degrees of pain, to challenge his fortitude and force him to bend to his will, to make him experience pain in a context he determines, to initiate him into something he does not understand himself. Marko believes that making boys suffer ordeals is... worthwhile, and his pleasure in it is evidence of that. It's part of making boys into men. It is through initiations that men demonstrate their superiority over women. Mens' power derives from their superior capacity for pain and dying. Men will always rule because they're the ones who fight the wars, hunt, work and die in the coal mines.

Then a couple of weeks before school's out for the summer Marko's down at the corner store and runs into Bert, Lance's cute red haired kid brother playing the pinball machine. He buys the boy a Coke and gives him a couple of nickels from his change for the machine. Bert tells him the boys are going on a long hike, they're gonna climb right over the Sleeping Maiden, he giggles, and then take the bus back from Casper Junction where he has cousins, and they're letting him come even though he's only eleven, and that he's bringing his friend Robby. But they're going to be back in time for the Fourth of July celebrations. Bert's a bit younger than Marko likes his boys, but he is cute with his bright hair, freckles and button nose and always seems to have an answer for everything. He could be fun Marko too figures. His friend Robby is a year or so older, taller with a lovely pert ass that Marko wouldn't mind assaulting in a couple of ways. He's bright, but a bit of a sissy, Marko thinks.

Working at the Texaco station and making a lot of trouble calls Marko knows the area fairly well for a newcomer. He knows that the boys' route will take them across the old railway trestle at the narrows on the Hickory Creek Reservoir where he'd been hunting last fall. He shot a deer near an abandoned roadhouse in the military reservation. This gives him an idea, but it's not something he could do alone. He writes to brother Steve and a few days later they talk by long distance and arrange to get together to make their plans. Their plan's not foolproof, it requires some intelligence on the part of the boys, but it promises a couple of glorious days of whipping and fucking spunky boys' butts. What could be more fun than that?

Marko deliberately begins acting strangely, he asks the boys about their fathers' jobs, hints that he knows atomic secrets and says there's going to be some big changes but he's very vague. He even questions if America was right to fight in Korea. The boys become suspicious of him and Bert starts referring to him as Mr. Marxo. When Jacky tells him they're going on the hike Marko pleads that they don't but gives no reasons. His advice is ignored but the boys' curiosity is aroused. On the day before they leave he warns them again, it's not safe he claims.

Marko's brother Steve comes down from Cleveland and they make certain preparations. Marko knows this road up from Connors that used to connect with the old mining spur not far from the old trestle the boys will have to cross. The road is blocked off at the boundary of the military reserve and is overgrown with brush. While technically no trespassing on the reserve is allowed locals have always harvested nuts and hunted in the fall but few enter this time of year, not from the Conners road.

The four boys, Jacky, Lance, his brother Bert and Robby set off just after seven on a dewy morning and follow the Hogan's Gully trail down to the railroad and past the huge piles of coal out of town three miles before they branch off on an old abandoned mining spur that goes up to the headwaters of Hickory Creek beside the Sleeping Maiden. Walking is easy and even with their packs they make good time reaching the reservoir not far above the dam by eleven where they have a lunch of sandwiches they've made.

"Why do yuh think ol' Marxo didn't want us t' go on this hike?" Lance asks as they share a cigarette after. "I think he's probably a Commie spy," Bert states, "and that's why he's askin' us all these questions about what our dads do, and maybe they got their spy headquarters on the Sleeping Maiden, maybe in a cave, and they don't anybody goin' near." Jacky disagrees, "I don't think he really wants to know what our dads do so much, I know mine don't do nothing very secret. I bet he just wants to see if we'll tell him things, and then if we do he'll get us to find out real important things, like being kids we could go places that he couldn't. We could pretend to play along and then turn him into the FBI." "Yeah, that would show them Commies somethin'." Bert declares, "I bet we'd get medals or somethin'." "But what if he brainwashes us?" Robby worries. "Maybe yours, dimwit, but my mind's too dirty." "Anyway, we should keep our eyes peeled for anything suspicious." Jacky concludes.

They make it through the reservation fence and reach the trestle just after one according to Robby's wrist watch. The near end has collapsed and they'll have to climb along the fallen beams which will be awkward with their packs unless they want to walk through the deep mud exposed by the reservoir's low level to where they can get back on the trestle again. They'll climb. It takes them almost an hour, at one point they have to take off their packs to crawl through the collapsed section, before they make it onto the good part where they sit down to rest and eat more sandwiches.

Then two of them notice it at the same time, something, it doesn't quite look like a briefcase at first as it's broken open, half embedded in the mud a hundred feet away. There are no tracks leading to it. "I bet it fell from a plane." Robby's pretty sure but Jacky claims it could've just been tossed there. The question of who should wade through all the muck to get it isn't decided until Jacky takes off his boots and pants; it's almost up to his knees in places. He carries the case back and takes out two big envelopes.

"WOW! Look at this, it's all TOP SECRET and CONFIDENTIAL." Jacky holds up the envelopes. "What's it say?" Bert's impatient. "If it's top secret maybe we shouldn't read it!" Robby cautions. "It says, 'IF FOUND, IMMEDIATELY CONTACT THE COMMANDANT MILITARY SECURITY OPERATIONS AT THE PENTAGON' and inside it's got all these pages like it's some kind of code, all letters and numbers mixed up, and the other envelope has a letter which says it's the formula for a new Lithium Bomb that's a hundred times more powerful than the H-bomb. And there's spies and traitors and KGB agents trying to steal the secret." "WOW!" Bert exclaims, "If the Commies got hold of it they could..." Visions of destruction and a Communist takeover race through their minds. "What should we do?" Lance wonders. "Maybe we should hide it." Robby suggests. "Why should we, we could just take it with us." Jacky replies. Robby's unsure, "I dunno, it's scary, what with that Marko guy warning us." "We should get it to the Pentagon as soon as we can." Jacky states, "We could just go back, but now that we're this far it would be a lot quicker if we went down the old Connors road, and I could phone and get my dad to pick us up." "And if he drove us back in the morning we could still make it up the Sleeping Maiden tomorrow." Bert says.

Jacky puts the envelopes in his pack and throws the briefcase in some bushes and they start up the old rail grade. Marko suddenly appears from the opposite direction. "Well, fancy meeting you boys here, I didn't think you'd come.... By the way you haven't seen something like a brown leather case in your travels?" The boys all shake their heads and mumble 'no.' "You boys better be telling the truth. I have other men here." Steve whom the boys don't know appears briefly in the distance ahead and Marko heads down past them towards the trestle.

The boys huddle and decide to hide the envelopes, they find a rot hole in the trunk of a large oak and memorize a rock near it on the grade. Marko who's circled back observes them. The boys continue on their way trying to appear nonchalant. A hundred yards up the grade where it passes through a cut Steve, holding a large .38 pistol, steps out the bushes, "Comrade Marko wants you to wait until he returns. You may sit but you must keep your packs on." He tries to affect an eastern European accent.

"I told you." Bert whispers to his brother. "Shut up." Jacky warns.

Marko returns in a raging mood, "The lying bastards found it, I could see their tracks. It was right where comrade Commissar said the army courier threw it just before he killed him and tossed his miserable body out of the plane. We must not let our plans be foiled again. OK boys, hand it over." The boys claim they know nothing and Marko searches each boy and his pack. "Comrade Ivan, they must have hidden the envelopes, and we must find out where. They will have to be interrogated... Long live the Glorious Soviet Union and the Peoples Revolution!" Marko takes a bundle of leather thongs out of his mackinaw pocket and ties a length of cord around each boy's wrists and the ties the cords together behind his back. They are marched at gunpoint up the old grade to the old roadhouse where the Connors road used to meet the spur.

"Whad'yuh think they'll do to us?" Robby worries. "I hope not like the Gestapo." Bert says hopefully. "The Russians aren't as smart, and besides, we're Americans and they wouldn't dare." Jacky reassures them. "I bet the FBI 'll be here anytime and zap them."

SLAP Steve almost knocks Jacky over. The astonished boy tries but cannot defend himself and Steve takes his time slapping his cheeks, smacking his nuts and knuckling his ribs making his helplessness obvious. "Maybe now you understand better?" The boy sullenly nods. "You wait, when you get real torture you understand very good. You not be same again after." "Ah Yes, real torture comrade Ivan, I haven't done any real torture since we almost took over Guatemala." Marko sounds cheerful. "Those were the good old days, but I not like torturing women and girls all the time." "I agree, I much prefer torturing boys, Ivan.... And, I've I brought along an extra pack of Lucky Strikes, ever since I heard how effective cigarette burns are on certain parts of the body I've wanted to try it out." "But comrade Marko, Regulations say you cannot use lit cigarette to torture boys." "But Section 7A on methods says branding may be used. We just use cigarettes to burn a hammer and sickle design on their chests. Some day, in Communist America they would be proud of it." "But comrade, Section 18Q on health conditions, subsection 22, say that no lighted cigarette is allowed within ten feet of boys under sixteen, even prisoners. The authorities say it stunts their growth." "Too bad there's no electricity out here so we use hair curlers, I bet they'd work good on lots of places." "Old methods work well comrade, I like beating, whipping, squeezing and twisting."

Marko pushes open the door of the old roadhouse that's been closed and boarded up since the military reserve was established before the war and they enter the gloomy interior of the dilapidated building. When a Coleman lantern is lit the boys can see they're in the old saloon with a heavy bar and a few tables with chairs. The large room with its beamed ceiling has recently been swept out and some provisions, beer and soft drinks are stacked on the bar. The boys are made to sit, and as a precaution against escape in this rocky country their boots and socks are removed, doused with kerosene and burnt in the stone fireplace. A length of cord is tied around each ankle and the ends are tied together, hobbling them to foot long steps. Their packs and jackets are taken off and they're allowed to stand with their hands retied behind their backs. Marko and Steve again frisk the boys probing inside their pants. "I found me a boner." Steve exclaims as he examines Lance. All the boys get fondled, little Robby also has a hardon, at least by the time Marko finishes frisking him but Jacky's remains soft.

"Fucking queers!" Bert complains. "That's tellin' him." Jacky says and the others noisily agree.

Marko looks them over, "Well boys, who wants to be the first to tell me where the briefcase and its precious envelopes are? You would save yourselves a lot of trouble if you tell me now... How about you Jacky?"

"I ain't tellin' you nothin' you Commie bastard."

SMACK Marko slaps his face. "Don't be rude." SMACK SMACK

"Fuck you!"

"That's tellin' him, Jack." Bert encourages. SMACK SMACK

Marko waits until the boys settle down. "We appeal to you in the name of the Glorious People's Revolution to unite with us. Down with fascism, down with capitalism, down with democracy. Communism for a Soviet America.... Well, how about it Jacky?"

The boy spits at him. Marko, taking his time, slaps the boy a couple of times more and then gives him a few hard jabs to his ribs and stomach knocking the wind out of him. "Fuck you, you commie prick." Jacky appears more angry than afraid.

"You're being very difficult Jacky, we're doing this for the working class of America, people like your father. I wish there was enough time to brainwash you, but I'm afraid if you don't tell we'll have to use torture, won't we comrade Ivan. It's up to you." He grabs the boy around the waist and pulls his arms behind him painfully straining his shoulders. Jacky curses and Marko yanks harder until he screams. "Okay Jacky, now where are they?"

"FUCK YOU!"

Marko yanks harder until he's sure the screams are real but he doesn't want to dislocate those lovely shoulders, just hurt the kid and watch him take it. "I really don't want to hurt you, I just want those envelopes, and a Communist America."

"I won't tell, you fuckin' bugger."

"Call me a bugger eh? Now that's funny because I might just bugger you but good if you don't talk."

"Fuck you, I don't know where they are."

"That's not the same as 'I won't tell', is it? I'm sure you do know. And I'm going to make you tell me."

Steve goes up to Lance, grabs his ears and twists hard. The boy shrieks but refuses tell the location. Steve hits him with a series of slaps and punches which leave the boy gasping, but defiant, "You can't make me squeal on my country." A knee to the gut knocks him to the floor and Steve kicks him a few times. 'Fuck yous' punctuate his sobs. The men are secretly pleased, they hope the others will be inspired by the older boys' resistance. Marko holds Robby by the back of his neck and demands to know the location of the envelopes. "Don't tell 'em nothin'." Bert calls out and the other boys encourage him too. When Robby refuses he reaches for the boy's crotch and finding his balls through the trousers he squeezes, the boy grimacing with pain, and sobbing after. Marko repeats the question and adds, "You don't think I can make you talk? Why this is just the beginning." He starts to squeeze his balls again as the other boys watch. Marko is careful as he feels the boy is the weak link and doesn't want him to spoil their fun by blabbing, at least not in front of the others.

"Please stop, I don't know where they're hidden, please!"

"But you do know that they were hidden?" Marko smiles, "Then tell me who knows where they are." He squeezes again leaving the boy sobbing in agony.

Steve grabs Bert, the smallest of the bunch, holds him kicking futilely off the ground by the collar and asks, "Maybe this one knows?" Then he lifts him by the cords tying his hands together behind him twisting his shoulders in their joints and bounces him to increase the pain. Fortunately he only weighs about eighty pounds. Bert moans between his gritted teeth.

"Pick on someone your size, you pinko weirdo." "Yeah, you're fuckin' assholes, fuckin' commie assholes."

Steve twists the little boy's ear and jabs his thumb into the child's puny chest and belly. Bert shrieks and squeals but seems prepared to take more punishment. Steve never realized before that boys this young could be so much fun to play with. Both men go from boy to boy slapping and jabbing them, demanding they reveal the location without any apparent results. "Americans are such cowards, They fear the slightest pain. Good Soviet boys would never tell, no matter how much they were tortured. We do not want to hurt you unnecessarily so we will give you time to think it over for a while." They tie the boys' wrist cords loosely up to nails on a beam so they're not too uncomfortable and go out to the veranda.

"What d'yuh think they're gonna do to us?" Bert wonders, "I hope they don't poke out our eyes or anything." "Or squeeze nuts, that's not fair." Robby adds. "I don't know how much I can take." Lance worries, "But if we talk they'll get the secret of the lithium bomb and then they'll use it on us and take over the whole country." "And we'd all get killed anyway." "We can be brave as any Russian boys, our country's counting on us, we can't let America down, we'd be traitors, never to hold up our heads again." Jacky inspires. "But what if Marxo squeezes my nuts again, I can still feel them aching." "We can't talk even if they kill us, I sooner be blind or balless than a traitor. Like remember that guy in history, 'Give me liberty, or give me death.' If anyone squeals I'll kill them." "And anyway, they can't get away with this, like we're Americans and the FBI will get them." Lance tries to be optimistic, "I bet they're on the trail now. Maybe coming in helicopters like Korea." "I can't wait til the FBI gets Marxo and Comrade Ivan." Robby's feeling brave, "an' see what they do to them." "I'd like to watch Ivan get all his teeth pulled out." "An' his balls cut off, and Marxo too." Lance adds. "We all gotta stick together, and promise not to tell." Jacky asserts his leadership.

"Maybe we should all take an oath, like you do when you become blood brothers." Bert suggests.

"How can we do that when we're tied up, and we don't have any Bible?" Lance wants to know.

"I know what!" Jacky exclaims, "On our honor as Americans. I swear to God, on my honor as an American, that I won't tell the commies nothing." Lance repeats the pledge in his most serious voice. The others follow. Then with improving unison they all repeat it again and again.

The men meanwhile light up Luckies and observe through gaps in the weathered wooden doors. "You sure found some pretty neat kids, Marko. I'm sure looking forward to poking that Lance boy, he sure is pretty with those big hazel eyes, and his ass feels like it was just made for the strap." "I figured you'd like him, what with his rosy cheeks and milkmaids complexion." "Yeah, and make his ass cheeks rosy too. And his kid brother, he's sort of cute, and he's sure got a lot of spunk. I was hurting him good. I'm gonna have a lot of fun with his hide even if he is a tad small. I'll make him howl." "Kids think they're tough at tender ages these days, but how often are they given a chance to prove it. Let him have it but I don't think his buddy Robby could take as much, I'll see. But that was some boner he had. Maybe torture excites him. I'm thinking of some private lessons, see how passionate he'll get to save his balls. And I'm gonna whip his ass good." "Yeah, don't blame yuh, he's real pretty too, and smart. I wouldn't mind a turn before he gets too messed up." "Sure, Jacky's the only one I want as mine. I've dreamt about something like this ever since I heard his dad beat the shit out of him once. That's what inspired me to work on this. I'm gonna take my time and see how much I can do to him and get him to take. And then I'm gonna fuck his tight little ass until I'm blue in the face." They finish their cigarettes. "Looks like we're gonna get a patriotic reception when we go in. You sure got things figured out brother." "Wonderful, isn't it comrade Ivan?"

When Marko and Steve go back in the saloon the boys begin chanting their pledge, "I swear to God on my honor...." The men demand they stop, and when they don't, they start lashing them with switches across their fronts. The boys shift to sporadic cursing. "Well, I see you haven't made up your minds yet. But you will, one of you will tell us the location of the envelopes, won't you?" Marko looks around at all of the boys. "I might even have a candy bar for the boy who volunteers. It would save us a lot of trouble and you a lot of pain. You like candy bars, don't you Bert?"

"You can't bribe me, you commie queer. Fuck off!" SMACK

Marko repeats his offer, doubles his offer to the other boys in turn. "Never. Not even if you kill us." SMACK "Americans are the bravest!" SMACK "I hate reds." SMACK As the boys compete in bravado and exchange reassuring glances a smile of genuine pleasure comes over Marko's face which he tries to convert to a sneer. The boys are going to be more fun than he'd ever hoped. One by one they untie the boys, roughly strip them to their briefs leaving a modicum of dignity that Marko thinks might help their confidence, and this time suspend them from the nails with their feet just touching the floor. They are arranged so they can see each other and communicate. Mutual support will encourage their grit. The men run their hands over them teasingly, stopping to pinch from time to time to demonstrate how helpless they are. Marko studies them, the scene, the tableau, somehow reminds him of pictures of the Crucifixion on Calvary he remembers from childhood, but this is of course much prettier. Lance and Robby's briefs are tented with little hardons. With boys that age it may not really be sexual excitement but the men find it an added thrill. Marko wished they had a camera to capture moments, but then he would have missed much of the fun.

Steve Starts in on Lance, he stands right in front of him, cradles his head with his hands and stares into his frightened eyes. "You know the location, don't you? And you're going to tell me, aren't you?" The boy tries to stare back. Steve slaps his pretty face, "Tell me where you hid them... Now."

"Never." the dangling boy spits.

"Soviet scientists have proven American boys are sissies, too much democracy, so don't feel bad, OK to tell. We have plenty time to find out... And what have we here?" Steve lightly slaps the boy across his obvious hardon. "Maybe you like I warm up your wiener? Make it swell up bid, very big, look like grown up?" Steve slaps Lances's cock vigorously several times as the boy squeals and struggles.

"That's not fair, you're not supposed to hurt people there." Bert objects.

"Ah, but it is good place to make hurt, much pain. But maybe it is better to see how we are doing." He works the glowing pink rod out of the fly in his briefs. "Very pretty, but just start." He gives Lance's stiffy several more smarting slaps, the boy flinching but remaining grimly silent. "Soon we make purple, nice purple colour, you like?... Or you like tell where envelopes is hid?" When Lance doesn't reply he starts slapping the bouncing prick harder until the boy howls. Lance is too scared to curse and begins to sob. "Here," Steve takes out his handkerchief, "Let me to clean up your face and noseblowing." Lance shakes his head violently. Steve examines the boy's bruised cock, seems pleased and informs Lance, "Regulations do not permit extreme measures... yet." Attention shifts to Jacky as Marko grabs him by his untidy blond locks and yanks his head back painfully. Then with his other hand he reaches inside Jacky's briefs and grabs his acorn sized balls. Jacky tries to control himself as Marko simultaneously wrenches his head back and squeezes his testicles. Marko peers into the boy's agonized face just a kiss away. And that's what he feels tempted to do, he admits to himself, but it's not in the plan. He jerks and squeezes harder keeping it up for over a minute. He's impressed, it's incredible what the boy can take. Jacky struggles in vain, sweat pours out of him, his face contorts and he shrieks. Marko smiles, his lips inches from the boy's, "How about it, Jacky?"

"FUCK YOU!"

Marko's admiration, and lust for Jacky spiral higher. He is developing an unholy love for the spunky boy. But the lad's soon exhausted and he doesn't want to push him too hard too soon.

"Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you." The blond boy curses when he relents. "That's telling him." Bert sticks out his tongue. A look of determination comes over Jacky, "I swear to God on my honor as an American I won't tell you nothing. You fuckin' Commie." Marko sighs.

"And how about you, Bertie boy?" Steve approaches the little red head. The boy glares back at him. Steve, grabbing him from behind, pinches the child's tiny nipples with his thumbnails dug in and twists. "You like big titties, like girl?" Bert writhes and screams and then when it seems he might break Steve eases off and becomes gentle and sympathetic. "Please tell the location because it hurts me to torture you." he begs and kisses the helpless boy. Then he slowly begins torturing Bert's nipples until he again approaches the limit of his endurance. "You like tell me where you hid the envelopes?" The others shout encouragement to Bert and he too recites their pledge with tears of anguish running down his face. As he sings the words in his squeaky voice Steve works on the boy's swollen nipples until blood blossoms in the sweat on his narrow chest but stops when he feels the boy may become hysterical. He cleans the boy up with a wet cloth and puts ointment on his bruised nipples. "Now, just warm up, next time big time torture."

Marko picks up a light hickory switch from a bundle he's cut and confronts Robby. "Are you going to tell us your little secret?" Fear pervades his sweet boyish face, he looks at the others and shakes his head. Marko gives him several stinging lashes across his lovely pale thighs that leave bright red weals. He experiments a few more times impressed by how delicate the boy's flesh is. "Wouldn't you like to help make the USA the SSA, the Soviet States of America? and a good friend of the USSR?" When Robby doesn't reply he resumes lashing his thighs. The other boys, more subdued now try to cheer him on and Marko continues the whipping but with breaks and taunts that draw it out. And then Marko gives him a couple of hard wicked blows across his soft white belly and demands he tell the secret. "I don't know, I don't know." the boy sobs. Marko gives the pale boy two more heavy lashes. The boy still insists he doesn't know. The other boys watch closely and beg him not to tell. This time Marko asks if Jacky knows. Robby doesn't answer but he's weakening and when Marko lashes his soft chest a few times he admits that Jacky knows. And what about Lance? It takes only a couple more nasty swats before, "He knows too." And Bert, his friend? "Bert don't where they are." Is he sure? Robby tries his best not to, but it only takes about three more swats for him to change his mind. The other boys glare at him contemptuously. And you? Robby, crying nods his head.

"Now we are getting somewhere, you know that we know that you know. Isn't that right boys? And comrade Ivan, you know what means." Ivan smiles sinisterly. Marko gently rubs the boy's shoulders and whispers in his hear, "You're a very brave boy Robby to say you know." He unties one of the boy's wrists, reaches in his mackinaw pocket, pulls out a Hershy bar and hands it to Robby. "Now show me where the envelopes are." All eyes are on Robby.

"Your country for a candy bar?" Jacky mocks the quivering boy.

Marko pulls out another candy bar. Robby hesitates as the boys taunt and encourage him. Then he throws the candy bar at Marko. "You are such a silly stubborn American boy. Maybe I should exercise your nuts again?" He takes out his pearl handled jackknife and cuts his briefs off. He very lightly runs the blade over Robby's trembling body. "I tell you comrade Ivan, they've been brainwashed with democracy.... What a nice boner you have, and what are these? Your little beans, they're just starting to grow big, and they haven't had a good squeezing for a while now, have they?" And Marko remembers what the game is supposedly about. "Robby, you're going to show me where the envelopes are, aren't you? Answer me, YES or NO." He holds the boy's balls firmly, each between a set of fingers, and gently squeezes. The boy shakes his head and the pressure increases, slowly and with pulses. "Are you going to show me?" The others watch intently. But before very long the boy screams, "STOP. Please. I'll show you." "That took courage Robby. I congratulate you in the name of the Communist Party and the oppressed workers of America."

The other boys scream at him and curse. Lance glares at him angrily, "I know we shouldn'a let him come." Jacky calls him a traitor to America and says he would personally put a bullet between his eyes. Robby turns his head away in shame and sobs that he's sorry. Marko unties the pathetic child, embraces him tenderly, "Don't listen to them my little hero." He ties a thong around his tender testicles before leading him stumbling out the door.

They set off, the barefoot boy stepping carefully over the sharp stones and gravel, down the grade through the slanting sun rays of late afternoon to the place where the memorized stone is and look in the hole of the oak. There's nothing there. "You lied, you capitalist piglet. You will be punished for this." He jerks the cord tied around his genitals.

"Don't, please. They really were there, I know they were. Please believe me."

"There will be no place for liars in a Communist America. You do not deserve to live one minute more... I think I will whip you until you pass out from the pain before I kill you. How would you like that?" Marko threatens him with a switch and lightly smacks his ass. He repeats his threat. "Please, please," Robby hugs him around the knees. Marko makes him stand and gently fondles the boy, arousing his cock. "Maybe I'll let you live a bit longer so you have more time to suffer." Robby soon finds he's welcome to reciprocate and Marko takes the boy down into the overgrown ditch by the grade where a small stream flows and washes off the boy and himself. He lays the boy down on a mossy patch of grass and gently takes the hairless boy's cock into his mouth. It tenses superhard immediately and spurts in seconds and again in under a minute. Robby knows what to do, and sucks on Marko's generous rod until he's told to lie on his side. Marko lies beside him, enters him without difficulty, the boy's obviously been fucked before, and enjoys the willing, anxious to please lad. He is a great fuck. Marko tells him that he must still must be punished for lying, "Unless you want to show me where they really are now." Robby pleads that he really doesn't know. "After your punishment I will start interrogating you again. The regulations say you must be given a twenty minute rest in between."

"Don't hurt my nuts, please." Marko promises he won't and he will keep his promise. He's much more interested in testing Jacky's balls, or even Bert's diminutive peas, and seeing how much they can take.

When they return the boys, wrists and ankles bound, are sitting around despondently, their beers to toast "the glorious Communist victory" untouched. Marko twisting Robby's ear announces, "This degenerate dupe of capitalism has lied to an official of the Communist Party of America." Comrade Ivan looks shocked as the boys perk up. "He must receive the full severity of soviet justice, twenty strokes with a school strap."

"Please, please, I don't know!"

"You thought you were being clever telling us lies. Well when I'm finished with you, nobody else will dare lie to me. Understand?" Robby is smart enough not to protest that he wasn't lying. "After your twenty lashes, and the bleeding has stopped, We will resume interrogation." Jacky and Lance look relieved, almost happy, Robby hasn't betrayed America after all.

"Comrade Marko, the Party regulations say ten strokes is the maximum penalty for boys lying." "You are right Comrade, I'd forgotten, but there is Subsection 7 in the Interrogation Manual saying that if the boy cries the stroke doesn't count and must be repeated." "Ya, ya, comrade Marko, easy to forget because Russian boys not cry."

The men tie Robby face down over the end of a long plank table with a couple of jackets to pad the edge. His pal Bert has his wrists untied presumably so he can help hold him. He hugs Robby around the shoulders and mumbles in his ear. Marko holds up the old school strap, "Comrade Ivan, I want you to watch closely and tell me when the cowardly American boy cries while I carry out Soviet justice." All eyes are focused on Robby as Marko slams the strap into the lovely pale, almost translucent flesh of his pert bum. Robby surprises himself by not screaming, he's so scared, he's gasping. The second blow slams into his ass. He's still too scared and his eyes are full of terror.

"You can do it! Robby." Bert shouts as one lands slightly lower. "We're sorry for what we said, we thought you'd sold out America." Lance explains. The next stroke is lower still but the boy is no longer aware of such details as he ejects into the feared abyss of pain, losing control. Bert hugs him tightly as blows continue to land on the struggling shrieking boy. Jacky starts singing, "GOD BLESS AMERICA!" and the other boys join in as Steve lashes at them with a switch. Marko is delighted by the patriotic fervour of the boys and the expressions of acute suffering on Robby's face. Enjoying the poignancy of Bert cuddling his agonized friend he lets up on the force of the blows. Robby cries loudly but between sobs he complains, "You murdered me you bastard." He has a brilliant though not bleeding bum and he's going to be sore for a while. Marko announces that according to regulations there must be twenty minute rest period after punishment and unties the boy. "And besides, I need time to prepare for your next torture." The pain eclipses the last of Robby's personal hurting and he curls himself up on the floor and quietly sobs. Bert tries to comfort him but is waved away. Steve comes and kneels beside him, whispers loudly, "Regulations also say refreshments after punishment." and offers him a beer.

The men relax, the boys are hobbled except for Jacky who is suspended again. The boys decide to drink their beers and Lance holds the bottle for Jacky to drink. Steve who's become fascinated with Bert watching him cuddling his pal decides to begin his torment. He checks his watch, "Time to start interrogations." He looks at each boy, appears to ponder and says, "Better maybe we beat little brother first, good for practice." He brings an old low back armchair and ties Bert over it. The delicate red head's body has relatively few marks except for his mangled nipples. Steve pulls down the child's white briefs exposing his tiny buttocks. "What a pretty bum. It is shame to beat it without cornholing it first." Steve pats it affectionately.

"Lay off, you fucking queer." Bert screams. Lance, furious, spits and curses, "Fuckin' asshole, you got no right to touch my brother."

"Only joke, good Communist not screw little boy, not like capitalist pig. But maybe you like cornhole your little brother?"

"Fuck you, I ain't no fuckin' queer." Lance blurts.

Marko hoists Lance over, lowers his briefs and positions him so that his aroused cock is a few inches in front of the eyes of his kid brother. Steve borrows a belt from one of the boy's trousers and pats the boy's slender rod and ruffles his tiny clump of pubic hair. He bends down to look at it closely. "You have pretty one." Then he smacks it lightly with the belt and it bounces right in front of his brother's eyes. "Now, you like fuck little Bertram, be so sweet, brother fucking brother, like real brotherly love." The answer seems to be 'no', and with Marko holding the desperately struggling boy Steve starts strapping Lance's prick top and bottom and side to side, not too heavily but enough to make the slender dark haired boy writhe. His cock turns a bright pink and dark blotches begin to appear. "Is more pretty now, don't you think?" Steve pulls back the foreskin. "So make hurt better, OK?" Jacky screams "Fuck you. Fuck you Commie queers!" Steve turns to Jacky, "You like d'same?"

Bert can't stand seeing his brother tortured any more and pleads, "Stop, don't hurt him any more. Please, please, he can screw me." But Lance can't screw his brother, it's not because he's never cornholed anyone before, he just can't and his cock goes soft. Steve is disappointed, he would have enjoyed seeing Lance fuck his brother, it could have been such a charming sight. Then he remembers he's comrade Ivan and supposedly interrogating Bert. Deciding that the school strap may be a bit heavy for the small boy he picks up the boy's belt. The lighter instrument will prolong his fun and allow other things. The child is still tied over the bar chair with his ass exposed. Steve fondles Bert's skinny goosepimpled thighs and narrow bum. "Now little boy, you want to talk, you want to tell us where the envelopes is hidden?" The red head defiantly glares at him. Lance kneels beside his brother, puts an arm around his shoulders and whispers encouragement. Steve starts strapping the small boy's dainty bottom and thighs lightly, but dozens of times until they pinken evenly, then he slows down but increases the force. Lance, hatred in his eyes, holds his brother tightly. But Lance's soothing embrace and words cannot prevent Bert's grit from eroding as the pain becomes more intense. Marko is thrilled by the tender brotherly scene which helps refuel his lust. Steve stops after every three or four strokes and asks Bert if he's ready to talk, "for Stalin's sake". Bert begins reciting the pledge and the other boys join in. Jacky has quite a good voice. When a particularly nasty blow makes Bert shriek Lance screams angrily at Steve, "FUCKER!" Steve tells Lance, "You not like me giving your brother official regulation interrogation, then you make him talk." In addition to his fear and concern Lance seems aroused by his brother's torment. Bert's bottomside is getting as bright as his hair, his face is scrunched up in pain and he keens loudly. He's taking a heavy beating for his size, as heavy as they give in reformatories. The boy's flesh is becoming raw and Steve's afraid of really injuring the kid and he's concerned that the boy will break down and blab. Lance is desperate, he stands up and screams, "Stop. Please comrade Ivan, stop. PLEASE!"

"What do you suggest?" Steve inquires as he leers at the boy. Lance has no answer and glares back. "Do you want to talk, tell us where you hid the papers?... Or you like talk private?" Lance raises his fists but the man easily knocks over the hobbled boy and kicks him a few times. Steve can wait no longer, he picks up Lance and carries him upstairs to the old saloon keeper's quarters. The men had prepared a couple of places with old mattresses and blankets for such times. Steve cuddles and fondles the boy, "You not like see brother Bert suffer? You wait, regulations say tomorrow we can use knives," he stretches out Lance's balls, "and gouge out one eye." Lance begins to cry and Steve tries to soothe him. "Maybe instead you like..?" he begins fondling the boy again and pulls down his briefs. Carefully holding one of Lance's wrists so that he can twist it painfully he sucks on the boy's erection. "Maybe I not cut your brother or take eye." The man pulls down his pants and stands over the boy. Lance understands and forces himself to suck the man. For Steve, aroused to an unprecedented pitch, the blow job is only an hors d'ouevre and he fucks the reluctant boy twice. However, as a "reward" he blows the boy after.

Jacky is let down and ankle bound and the men bring out snacks and drinks. The boys nibble sullenly while Marko and Steve tell them how much better things would be in a Communist America. After cigarettes and taking the boys out one at a time to pee Marko announces that according to the Party regulations interrogations must be resumed. Marko's anxious to work on Jacky, he knows the boy can take a lot more punishment, and he's counting on him to put on a good show to encourage the others. After he's suspended again Marko picks up a thin hickory switch and confronts him, "It pains me to hurt you, Jacky. I wish there was enough time to brainwash you, I like brainwashing much better, no blood, but I'm afraid I'll have to torture you as best I can." He pauses for effect before continuing, "You don't have to be a dupe of capitalist propaganda Jacky, the working class is not free in America. You can help liberate them! Now, for the sake of a Communist America tell me where you've hidden those envelopes." Jacky spits at him and taking his time Marko starts whipping his sturdy thighs and legs with their fine golden fuzz. He breaks a switch and then another when he adds more thin welts to the boy's chest. He's pleased at the defiant way Jacky is taking his thrashing but is careful to pace his torment and lectures the boy. "Think of the suffering in America, think how you can serve the oppressed working class by helping us find those envelopes." he pleads as he slashes him across his pubes. Jacky twists and grimaces, "No fuckin' way am I gonna tell you anything, you pinko queer." The other boys cheer him on. "Just think, no more democracy! Wouldn't that be nice? ... And no more whipping."

Marko becomes extremely aroused again and when Jacky is brightly striped he drags him upstairs, sits him in a corner and ties him loosely but securely with his arms over his head. "Don't you think you should be reasonable?" He holds the boy's balls and lightly massages them. "I can make you suffer anytime I want, as much as I want, but I'd much sooner give you pleasure." He gives a little squeeze and then hoping to get the boy aroused, he starts to play with the blond boy's floppy dick. He tries sucking it vigorously but nothing happens. Jacky just looks at him blankly. Marko's getting frustrated, he's already seen the boy hard a couple of times, once when he was hurting him, but now nothing he tries seems to work. Marko doesn't want to forcibly rape the boy he has become so infatuated with. He wants him to cooperate even if it takes some painful persuasion. He would love to get him horny and make him come, but he doesn't want to simply break his will like his dad. Marko lightly strokes his body until Jacky starts writhing, "It tickles!" the boy screams. Marko then decides to deliberately tickle the weary boy, but he has to stop when the boy becomes hysterical. Another round lost. And he has hurt the kid, his front is a mass of angry welts, his shoulder joints are strained and his balls are swollen and very tender indeed. It's been a lot of fun, and Marko's still looking forward to strapping the boy's ass, which was the original reason why he's gone to so much trouble. Marko is disappointed but decides to wait and fuck him later, he's in no hurry and there's other boys to play with. He drags him back downstairs.

Steve is busy switching Lance who's tied face out to a post. He is being playful, often softening the blows. "Not so bad, eh?" and then he gives him a couple of nasty lashes. "Is that better?" The boy is in agony but still determined. Bert, snuffling but still stubborn is finally untied, his little bottom is well bruised, purpling in places. Marko allows him to put his pants on and lie down and he ties his hands apart from each other. Marko watches Lance's torment for a minute, encouraging comrade Ivan to lash harder in the name of Communist America. Then he turns his attention to Robby.

He's getting to like the young boy and plans to fuck him again but decides on some more torture first. Taking the lighter boy's belt he orders Robby to lie across his lap. "How did you like your friend Bert's spanking? Lots of nice pretty colours eh?" He massages Robby's already inflamed buttocks. "You have more meat on your bum, better for the belt. I make yours look even nicer." With much talk he lazily straps the boy turning him on his side to get at his belly and the fronts of his thighs. Robby loudly complains and sobs. Marko neglects to press the questioning.

Then just in time Steve sees Jacky trying to sneak out the door and catches him still hobbled a few yards away. "Comrade Marko not like runsaway. Now you get special treatment." He drags him struggling along the ground, up the steps and back into the old saloon. The men decide to suspend Jacky by his wrist cords from two big nails on a beam and his ankle cords are tied stretch taut to bent over nails in the floor so that he's stretched painfully and his entire body is exposed. Marko cuts off his briefs and decides to leave him suspended for a while before punishing him. He puts an arm around Jacky's waist and wipes the sweat from his face, "Anything you like?" He holds a Coke to his surly lips. The boy has a few sips and even accepts a drag off his cigarette. Jacky complains about the cords which are cutting into his wrists. "I am so sorry about that, I will resume your interrogation as soon as I finish my cigarette, unless you want to talk." He offers the boy another drag and he inhales deeply. "You know you have such a beautiful ass, so soft and round, it would be a shame to see it covered with bruises and cuts, and these," he cups the boy's genitals in his hand, "How much better for them to give you pleasure than the pain I will inflict if you don't tell me your little secret. The regulations do not cover genitals, do they Comrade?" Steve agrees. "They won't be very pretty when they're crushed, swollen and slippery with blood, will they?" For emphasis Marko crushes his cigarette with his heel. There's fear in Jacky's big blue eyes, "You can't scare me, you commie weirdo bastard."

"I don't want to scare you, or hurt you, I just want some information. Why I wouldn't even punish you for trying to escape if you tell me the truth." Marko gently strokes Jacky's handsome suspended body, glistening with sweat in the warm glow of the Coleman lamp. He looks very vulnerable as the man caresses his face, cock and bum, and probes, assessing his fleshier and more tender parts. "Now, let's see, attempted escape? How many strokes for attempted escape comrade Ivan?" "Twenty five." "And if I just use a light belt?" "Like that boy's belt? I'd say up to a hundred, no problem." "Thank you, comrade."

"A hundred? That's not fair." Bert protests.

"Sometimes, as comrade Commissar says, you just have to use your judgement." Marko explains. The light belt is merely an appetizer, for some showy, short term effects, though ideal for more tender places such as the ribs, the insides of the thighs and the soft folds where the thighs meet the belly as Marko vividly demonstrates. He looks Jacky in the eye as he lashes his front and sees the boy's big blue eyes full of hate staring right back at him. The boy is magnificent. Marko takes his time to select his blows. He does not neglect his genitals, they're tougher than people think, and bring little shrieks from the boy, and he likes the way they bounce. The boy demonstrates his considerable grit throughout the ordeal, not without the odd gasp and moan. When he feels the boy is prettily decorated with bright weals, probably well under a hundred strokes, he stops to light another Lucky and admires the patterns and textures of his handiwork. Marko picks up the much heavier school strap and announces, "Now we can get back to your official interrogation, my little capitalist fellow traveller." Robby, who seems to have recovered somewhat, complains, "I thought there was supposed to be a twenty minute break after punishments." Marko seems to ponder, "Ah, you are so right Robby. Thank you, I forgot about the regulations, and there's refreshments too." Marko cuts Jacky down with a flourish, as if he expects applause, and hobbles him tightly as a precaution, the boy will have to hop or crawl.

After the boys are secured and given pop and doughnuts the men go out on the veranda. "Things are going well comrade Ivan, wouldn't you say?" Steve smiles broadly, "Marko, you're a genius. I never thought I'd enjoy being a Communist." They peer through the cracks at the despondent boys. Inside things are quiet, all are suffering from the effects of their tortures. Robby quietly weeps, Bert wants to be left alone and Lance doesn't think he can take much more. Jacky tries to get them to chant the pledge but only Lance actually joins in and it soon peters out. "I don't think we should work them much more tonight Marko, not the little ones anyway." His brother agrees, "We must save something for tomorrow, but I'm not finished with Jacky. I think he expects something more." When the men go back in the boys are sitting in silence. Marko cheerfully inquires, "Anyone ready to talk?" The boys ignore him and he goes up to Jacky, "How about you, Jacky boy? Your twenty minutes are up, it's time for us to get back to work." He examines and prods the boy, "You don't look much the worse for wear. A few tender spots maybe?" Jacky sullenly turns away. "Now, as the son of an exploited American worker, for the good of your class, I want you to tell me where the envelopes are hidden... You have nothing to lose but your chains, as Lenin used to say." The boy remains silent, Marko wants to get him worked up, angry and defiant before he gives his barely marked ass the heavy strapping he's planned. "You are a traitor to the working class!" SMACK He slaps his face lightly. "Cowardly Capitalist piglet!" He teases and baits the boy until his resolve builds up. "Now I want you to bend over that table. Now I'm gonna beat your ass until you beg me to stop and you will tell me where the envelopes are. You understand?" The boy obeys as Steve stands ready.

The sullen, silent lad leans over putting his head on his folded arms. Marko's pleased, he figured he might have to tie him up. The strapping proceeds slowly, Marko wants to savour Jacky's ordeal and not push him too fast. WHACK No reaction beyond a wince. A ten second wait. WHACK Another ten seconds. WHACK WHACK He studies the boy's reactions. He knows he's hurting him, it's a hefty bruising strap and he's putting most of his strength behind it. The impressive ridged and darkening welts on Jacky's bum remind him of those he saw at the reformatory. Marko knows eight strokes is about the maximum he dares give him. "You are being very stubborn, you know." WHACK... WHACK The determined boy is sweaty and tired but his resolve shows no signs of weakening. Marko's admiration, and adoration for Jacky soars as the boy stoutly resists. After eight heavy blows which leave ugly bruises he begins to wonder if Jacky would hold out no matter what he does. "It seems, comrade Ivan, that we must try other methods."

First he and Steve break for a smoke. Steve offers drags to the boys, all except Jacky accept. Robby inhales deeply and asks, "What about the regulations about lighted cigarettes nearer than ten feet?" Steve pretends surprise and takes the cigarette back, "Ah yes, stunts growth, but maybe you not live to grow anyway." Then Marko interjects, "Comrade Ivan, you forget regulation 23B which states that denying prisoners cigarettes is a cruel and unusual punishment." The boys all smoke.

Then with Steve's help Marko grabs Jacky and ties the struggling boy face up on the bar with his arms and legs stretched. His whole front is exposed and he can barely move. The other boys are encouraged to watch but show little enthusiasm. Marko takes out his pearl handled pocket knife and strokes the boy's body with the edge of the blade like he was shaving it. The nipples, navel and around his genitals get the most attention. "Do you have anything you want to say before we start?" Silence. Then he stretches out the boy's compact ball sac and more than lightly runs the blade across it. Jacky gasps and tries to jerk away but only hurts his wrists. "You may not need these anyway." Marko looks thoughtful. "I forgot. It is best if balls are squeezed and punched hard first so that it doesn't hurt as much when they are cut off." Steve offers to demonstrate on Lance whom he's got tied into a big chair with his legs apart. He kneads and spanks Lance's nuts bringing him to his breaking point again and again. "And you must remember the regulations say you must cut off right ball before the left." "So right, comrade Ivan, easy to forget. And regulations say that the time in between is the best time for interrogation." Marko looks down at Jacky flat on his back, "Isn't that true my little capitalist piglet?" The boy denying his fear bravely states, "I'll give both my balls to save America." Marko smiles and grabs the boy's floppy cock, "What about this? Some say it's best to cut off cock first." Jacky replies, "I'd give my cock too if I had to." Lance and Bert say they'll give their balls too. Marko stretches out the rubbery appendage and quickly with his knife makes a tiny nick from which a few drops of blood emerge. Jacky momentarily grimaces and grits his teeth as Robby and Bert stare in fascination and fear, and adulation of Jacky. Lance is wriggling in agony on the floor holding his balls which almost had him talking. Another delightful display of fortitude for the men. Steve examines the nick squeezing out a few more drops. "Think of all the blood if we cut it off!" "You are so right, comrade Ivan, too much blood. We therefore begin with the rightside ball." Marko has the blade ready to pop the nut when he glances at his watch. "Ah, almost time we must eat according to the regulations. Rightside ball must wait." It is getting late, the sun has set long ago and the men and boys are hungry. "Tomorrow the knife!" Marko promises, "We will start with fingers and save tongues for last." Steve sets out the food, reheated fried chicken and fries with soft drinks for the boys and beer for the men. Marko addresses the boys, "We have been very lenient so far, we don't want to force you, and as good Communists we don't really want to hurt you, especially as you are all children of the working class. But we must have those envelopes and tomorrow we will resort to extreme methods, section 14T of the regulations, to force you to tell. Do you understand?"

"I understand you're a pinko pervert, and no commie queer is going to make me talk." Jacky tries to sound confident. "Yeah, you're just sicko weirdos, and when they get you you're gonna fry in the electric chair like them Rosenberg spies." "Yeah, and I'd like pull the switch." Bert adds.

"And what do you have to say Robby?" Marko asks. The boy seems unsure but inspired by the others' bravado he sticks out his tongue.

The boys eat in sullen silence while the men try to cheer them up. "Potatoes is good, very good for you." Steve begins in his phoney accent. "In Russia we always eat potatoes, that is why we stronger people. I want you to be strong and healthy like Russian boy." Later Steve brings out canned peaches and cookies for dessert. There is more than enough to eat and drink and the boys despite their discomfort eventually have some appetite. The men relax smoking and drinking beer and allow the boys to share cigarettes among themselves. Steve addresses the boys again, "Also good, no television here. We must made own fun."

In the middle of the saloon floor, right under the Coleman lantern, the two younger boys are tied together, wrists to the other's ankles. Robby's lips are inches from Bert's tiny cock and vice versa. "You make nice kiss." Steve suggests, his fingers reaching around Robby's already tender balls. "You kiss cock.... good, now suck.... no suck hard, make feel nice for your friend." Robby gets the idea. "Now Bertram, you suck Robby the same way or...." He soon has them sixty-nining and is pleased with their apparent enthusiasm. "You like suck better than interrogation?" Steve inquires. Marko promises them candy bars and tells them not to stop, "or else..." Jacky and Lance watch with curious disgust before they deliberately turn their heads away and pretend to ignore the entertainment. The men applaud the youngsters' performance.

For a finale Marko rather sarcastically asks the battered boys to sing their pledge. They will be allowed to stand with only their ankles hobbled. Bert and Robby want to, "to show them", but Lance thinks he's just making fun of them, and Jacky agrees. They tell the men to fuck off. But then they'll only be hobbled and Jacky sees an opportunity and makes a desperate plan. He says they should sing it anyway to show they're proud to be Americans. By winks and signs he makes the other boys aware something is up and Lance learns he's to hold off Ivan. Jacky launches into an amazing paean of America for a boy his age and what it lacks in facts it makes up in fervour. Then standing very proudly in his bruised nudity he bursts into, "On my honnnour as an Americaaan. CHARGE! Grab his arms." Robby and Bert manage to hold on to Marko's arms briefly while Jacky gets his hand on Marko's pocketknife. He's got it open when Lance shouts, "He's gotta gun!" and there is Steve grinning with his revolver in his hand. "You boys forget something?" The boys back down. Marko tells them they were silly and does not mention punishment. His lust is temporarily tempered by admiration for the spunky boys.

That night the boys are separated, Jacky and Lance in rooms upstairs and the two younger boys in opposite corners of the old saloon. All are able to lie down but their hands are securely tied back wide apart. The men sit out on the veranda and finish off the beer. Marko lights up a Lucky Strike, "Ain't patriotism a wonderful thing brother?" "Yeah, they're doin' it for real, and as an American I'm proud of them. You're such a genius. It would be a shame to spoil it for them." Marko nods wisely, "Downright cruel I'd say."

Marko beds down with Jacky who can't do much with his arms tied apart. Marko tries flattery and tells him what a brave young man he is. "You would make a good Communist." And he acts very sweet and fondles the boy getting a thrill from gently running his fingers across the raised welts. He cuddles and kisses his neck, "I would like to be your friend." "Then let us go." Marko futilely sucks at the boy's cock trying to make it hard. He's eager to screw Jacky, but without having to forcibly rape him. He's awed by his grit. He believes he is in love. Jacky's cock refuses to respond and he manages to fend off or ignore Marko's advances. After a while Marko, frustrated, decides to try his luck with little Bert. The youngster's still consciously suffering from his abuse and is in bad mood. He becomes hysterical when Marko tries to screw him. It would be awkward and he discovers that comrade Ivan had just sucked him dry again. He goes over to Robby who's just been fucked by Steve and the boy is almost totally passive this time. Marko doesn't think it's a good fuck. Jacky is still in a fighting mood and Marko soon falls asleep. At dawn, with light coming through cracks Marko takes the sleeping boy's morning hardon in his mouth and sucks with long slow strokes. He is generously rewarded. Jacky wakes up and rolls over on his belly. "I'll murder you some day."

Steve who's slept with Lance gets up with the sun and makes coffee on the small Coleman stove. Lance's blotchy blue bruised bottom gets fucked again, this time impaled on Steve's lap as the man drinks his coffee and shares a cigarette with him. Later Steve makes more coffee and serves it out. Robby and Bert have Cokes.

After breakfast Marko tells the boys that he has good news, "Today is the birthday of our glorious leader Stalin." The boys are not impressed. "How about we all wish Stalin a happy birthday? Because you are good working class boys you could call him 'Comrade Stalin', or 'Uncle Joe'. OK?…'Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday dear Uncle Joe, Happy birthday to you.'" After some prodding the boys led by Bert join in using a word that sounds more like 'deathday'. Marko announces that there will be no interrogations before noon. "Instead we will have political indoctrination." For a start the boys are made to do morning exercises, callisthenics, stretching, twisting, knee bends. The hobbles make it awkward and Robby and Bert are both sorely stiff and need to be encouraged with switches. All are tired, puffing and sweating, and need encouragement before they're allowed to relax. "Feeling better?" Marko enquires, and after a moment, "Ah yes, political indoctrination, I almost forgot." Marko addresses the boys standing in sullen silence, "OK boys, for a start let's hear three cheers for a Communist America! Hip hip..." There's no response and Marko suggests, "Down with Yankee Imperialism!" Nothing. Marko appearing exasperated taunts them and calls tells them they lack the guts to help the oppressed workers of America. Then he relaxes and smiles, the boys have lost some of their fighting spirit so he prods, "Look boys, the least we can do is give a cheer for Stalin, after all you're having a holiday from interrogations because it's his birthday. You owe him a favour. Now when I give the word I want you to shout, 'Long live Stalin!' and you don't have to raise your fists... Now, 'LONG LIVE...'."

"I like Ike!" Bert whispers loudly. Then the others join in one by one chanting, "WE LIKE IKE. WE LIKE IKE." Marko acts very angry, "That imperialist, warmongering swine. We will try him as a war criminal. He will plead for mercy." And he tells them they won't be allowed any more cigarettes as punishment. Robby tries to object, "But the regulations say that's a cruel and unusual punishment."

Steve takes over and announces, "Under Party regulations you must have right to have bath. Clean boys are happy boys. As my mother used to say, 'Cleanliness is next to Communism'." They are led barefoot, hobbled and naked a hundred yards down the old Connors road to where a warm spring emerges from the base of a cliff into a shallow pool. Except for their bruised asses and various cuts, the marks on their bodies have begun to fade leaving intricate designs on their flesh. Steve gives them soap and tells them to wash. "Now while you wash we have political indoctrination in honour of our glorious leader Stalin. I want you boys to repeat after me, 'Our Father Stalin, who lives in the Kremlin, hallowed be Karl Marx...'." Jacky loudly refuses, and the others back him up. The men lash them a few times with stinging switches, bringing a little more colour to the boys' legs and bellies, but then lose interest. The men settle down on a ledge by the pool, smoke and watch. They tell the boys to have a good time.

After a while the men undress and join the boys in the pool. "We have fun." Marko announces, "Party regulations say boys must have fun, even prisoners." He grabs Bert and holding his wrists he swings him playfully around in the shallow pool. "Wheeeee!" Steve playfully splashes Robby

trying to get him into a splash fight. The men playfully chase, dunk and toss the small boys around fondling them briefly at times.

Jacky and Lance stare incredulously at the men, and without being noticed, try without luck to untie the thongs hobbling them but the water has caused the leather to swell. "I can't figure it out," Lance puzzles, "they torture you and cornhole you and then pretend to be friendly. It's like they're loco too." "Yeah, and I wonder why they ain't done worse to us. I thought they'd a beaten us a lot worse, like you see in gangster movies." "I thought we were gonna get killed. Maybe it's those regulations they keep talking about, maybe they can only do certain things." Jacky's eyes light up, "And if they can, maybe we got a chance, what d'yuh think?" "We can try... But they're queers too. Is that regulations?" "I dunno, but it's better than getting brainwashed."

After well over an hour Marko stands up and announces, "Now boys, I want you to get ready to leave, we want to finish our interrogations and recover the envelopes well before it gets dark." The hobbled boys pick their way through the small saplings growing out of the old gravel road. The men joke and offer mild encouragement with their switches. At a wider, open section not far along Jacky turns around and says, "I ain't goin' no further." and challenges Marko to make him. "I'd sooner die out here than in that rotten old roadhouse." He looks at the other boys holding his head high and shouts, "STAND BY AMERICA!" and sings, "O say can you see/by the dawn's early light/ what so..." First Bert, then Lance and lastly Robby join in.

Marko is delighted by the sight of four naked boys bravely singing the national anthem but pretends to fume and curse. It's time for the boys to recharge their patriotism and build up their capacity for more fun and games. It is only when they rather raggedly finish, as if a spell were broken, do the men act, lashing out viciously at legs and shoulders, and bruised bottoms get second coated. Marko, holding Robby by his wrist cords, gets in six searing swats on Robby's already well bruised bum which he has to take bravely. "Robby, I'm very disappointed in you, I had hoped you would not be deluded by that capitalist fellow traveller Jacky." After a few more swats he ties the boy's arms around a tree. Steve meanwhile restrains Bert.

"And now for you, Jacky, you traitor to the working class." Marko slaps the boy around knocking him to the ground and making him get up a few times. The boy tries to fight back despite his hobbles. After a while the man grabs first one, then the other wrist cord, and toppling the boy to the ground gets his hands behind his back and pulls the cords around to the front and ties them tightly across his belly trussing him. Marko leans his weight on the helpless boy and puts his face right over the boy's and unable to resist the urge he kisses the squirming boy. Jacky screams, "You fucking commie pervert, I'm going to kill you." A little fondling and slobbering on his lips lead to a futile frenzy that exhausts the lad. Steve meanwhile has trussed Lance in a similar fashion and baits him with taunts, slaps and switchings. Both boys counter with insults, obscenities and patriotic platitudes. "You are nothing but democratic vermin, you cowardly lackeys of capitalist oppressors enslaving mankind. I shit on your flag." Marko's amazed by his own eloquence and slaps Jacky for effect. "GOD BLESS AMERICA. And fuck you, you fuckin' slimy commie weirdo. When the FBI gets you, you fuckin'..." SMACK Marko almost breaks the switch across the boy's chest.

The boy baiting goes on and on, the men egging on the boys, enjoying the abuse they dish out, and building up the boys to take more. The two smaller boys act as cheerleaders encouraging Jacky and Lance, and occasionally get brief, but nasty lashings for their efforts. There are lulls, the men take smoke breaks, and the boys exchange and recharge their bravado. "We don't want to hurt you, we just want the envelopes." Marko wants some fun with Bert and brings him over to where he has tied Jacky with his hands behind a tree. He tells Bert to punch Jacky's balls as hard as he can. "I won't." Bert protests. "And why won't you, you miserable little dupe of capitalist propaganda?" "What about the regulations?" Bert demands. Marko grabs the small boy and squeezes his balls making him shriek. "Now, get to it." Bert gingerly starts massaging Jacky's nuts as Marko looks on giving him painful encouragement. Jacky grimaces. "Good boy, good boy. You do good job OK" Now, you make him talk and we finds the plans, I will personally recommend you, maybe you will get the Order of Lenin. Wouldn't that be nice?" Bert looks away shame faced. "Just think, you'd be a Communist hero!" "I ain't no fuckin' Communist hero an never will be, I stand by America." "I'm sorry to hear that." SMACK He hits the boy in his already sore balls. Over the course of an hour the boys take lot of abuse, all get pretty messed up with at least a couple of oozing wounds. However with the wounds still fresh and unscabbed and thrill of the thrashings still warm in their loins the men figure it's a good time for some more fucking.

Back at the roadhouse Marko addresses Jacky and Lance, "Well boys, I'm not sure the other boys know where the envelopes are hidden, but I'm sure you two do. It will be interesting to see who tells me first. In fact comrade Ivan and I have a bet. I have fifty dollars that says I can make you, Jacky, squeal before Ivan can make your friend squeal. It's like we're a team, us against comrade Ivan and Lance. You like the idea?" Marko waits for a reaction and when neither boy says anything he announces that each boy will have the chance to tell in private. First Steve takes Lance upstairs where after a perfunctory questioning he fucks him, and blows him and fucks him again. Then Marko tries the same with Jacky but with no success. Steve makes another attempt to screw Bert while Marko enjoys Lance for the first time. Bert howls loudly as his nuts are smacked but refuses to cooperate becoming hysterical. Steve has had his fun.

When all are assembled back in the saloon the battered boys all have their ankles bound tightly together and their hands unbound. Steve feeds them stale butter rolls and the canned beef stew he has heated up and Marko offers them cigarettes and the remaining candy bars. Then Steve links together the boys' feet with a short loop.

"What are you gonna do with us?" Jacky asks.

"Far worse things than we already have if you boys don't produce those envelopes. And, we must have them by six o'clock when we go to meet Comrade Commissar." "I keep telling you, you're too soft on them Comrade Marko. We should break bone, arm bone very easy. Now second day, regulations say we can break one bone each day." "And cut off things. You are right, I'll start pulling out fingernails and teeth and if that doesn't work, we gouge out eyes and twist off nuts."

"You'd really do that?" Jacky's aghast.

"Why not?" Marko replies. "Maybe I'll have your wiener cooked in a hot dog." Steve adds, "And you Lance, "I have your nuts pickled, go good in hot dog." Marko pretending to be generous tells them, "But we give you boys one more chance to think about it, while you still can think. Very fair, OK? We leave you alone for a while. Maybe you can still get Young Hero medals if you talk."

The men tie the boys' hands together, and then all the hands to all the feet creating a cluster of boyflesh in bondage, a temporary organism that can only move with great discomfort.

"We'll be back boys, so think about it." "Good bye boys, see you all in a while." The men wave at the contorted, squirming mass. Marko casually flicks his pearl handled penknife, embedding the blade in a stump near the bottom of the veranda steps, where the boys will surely see it. He imagines the fun they'll have rolling, all tied together down the steps to get it.

Marko and Steve are well out of the state before sunset. Without boots they don't expect the boys to make it to Connors before noon the next day, and then it'll take a while to put anything together. "Bad time to be a Communist, I bet." Steve jokes. "Or Marko Plasvik, but it's 1954, and with the statute of limitations, I can soon go back to my real name." "You're right Jack. And it was a great time, a glorious two days of whipping and fucking spunky boys' butts. Thanks brother, I never had so much fun in my life. But you know, I never did get to fuck little Bert."

"And I never fucked Jacky but he sure tasted good. I had fun trying and what a perfect boy to whip. I'll never forget that." "It was so obvious that you liked him, a fine KGB agent you made..." Marko admits he will miss Jacky. "I really like the brothers, but then Robby seemed to like it... Oh, and by the way don't forget to get rid of the envelopes." Marko nods, "And something else you know, it'll be something the boys will never forget."

*     *     *

Police Chief Jarvis can find no reason to doubt the truthfulness of the boys and he issues state wide warrants for the two men charging them with kidnapping and assault. He believes the boys because with the possible exception of Robby they all come from good families well respected in town, and none of the boys has a record of any sort that the schools or police know of. He's convinced the story couldn't be something the boys made up. Their statements are too consistent with each other and too complex and coherent to be a fabrication. All his police training and intuition tells him they are reliable witnesses. Secondly the boys had been tortured and savagely beaten, there can be no question of that, and their injuries are consistent with their stories. Thirdly, Marko has disappeared without a trace after picking up his valuables from Mrs. Cody's roominghouse. And fourthly, there's the evidence found on the site, the remains of provisions including two dozen empty beer bottles, the Coleman lantern and stove, the remains of their burnt boots, switches, and extra thongs like the ones they still had on their wrists when found. They also found where a car had been parked near the fence cutting off the old Connor's road and witnesses confirm that someone answering comrade Ivan's description and driving what sounds like Marko's car had purchased a huge quantity of chicken dinners, beer and canned stew among other things on the highway near Connors.

But right from the start the FBI and the Pentagon seem disinterested. An agent spends no more than twenty minutes interviewing each boy. Chief Jarvis is informed that there has been no security leak and there was no such project as a lithium bomb. The FBI did find out and tell him that the real Marko Plasvik died in 1948 in a highway collision in Indiana. The mayor's convinced the FBI knows a hell of a lot more than it admits. The townspeople are used to government secrecy and extraordinary security measures. Now that Senator McCarthy has proven that Communists have infiltrated the highest levels of government the utmost vigilance and discipline is essential. Chief Jarvis wonders if perhaps the FBI is investigating the matter secretly, perhaps not even trusting him or the mayor.

But Chief Jarvis is troubled by the case. At first he thought that there might have been something the boys didn't tell him. However, he has no idea of what it might be and certainly the boys have been very cooperative. He even asked the boys if the men did anything else to them but they all denied it. The idea of sex perverts was a long shot anyway but you've got to consider all angles in cases like these. It isn't often he gets a real thinking case. And then he boldly speculates that while the boys may be truthful their story may not. The description of the envelopes and their contents make them seem like crude forgeries that anyone could put together. He assumed the Commies would do a slick job. And their injuries while consistent with their stories are not consistent with a serious torturer trying to extract information. More than anything else, why were the boys not interrogated separately? Why were they permitted to give each other moral support? It's almost as if they didn't want them to tell. But that seems absurd, unless, improbably, there is no secret. But if that's the case why are the Communists involved? Maybe they were after something else, beating the boys was perhaps an attempt to divert the attention of the authorities. But from what? Chief Jarvis can only speculate on the unknown but suddenly he has more respect for the FBI who must have thought the same thing. With his own patriotism it is beyond his credulity that someone might pretend to be a Communist if they are not. The commies are clever he has to admit as he recalls drinking beer at Bud's Tavern with the phoney Marko and suspecting nothing.

The boys are convinced they are heroes of the hour, this is what everyone tells them and their popularity skyrockets. Tales of their fortitude in face of torture circulate through the town by word of mouth. They all get pestered by girls and people who want to meet them. According to the FBI the envelopes were never found but few believe them. Chief of Police Jarvis swears as to the truthfulness of the boys' accounts. The mayor and the Chamber of Commerce invite the boys and their families to be the guests of honour at their Thursday luncheon meeting. Bradley Pruitt proudly extols his all American son. The Daily Chronicle runs a story saying that some boys were abducted by a couple of lunatics with foreign accents, probably escapees from a mental asylum, who beat them savagely before they were able to make their break for freedom. But the locals know better, they can read between the lines and smile smugly. The boys' friends think they're real big time heroes and want to see their scars. Both Jacky and Lance finally get to screw girls, several as a matter of fact, within the first week. After talking about it Robby and Bert try out some of the sex things they learnt and find some they really like doing. And Robby, who figured for sure he'd squeal under torture, and actually did, is the only one who sometimes thinks that maybe Marko and Ivan were just having fun. But he can't tell anyone. The townspeople understand the need to play down the Communist connection because it might interfere with the work of the FBI, but rumours continue to circulate about the supposedly missing envelopes and a lithium bomb project.