Guardians of the Home bondage story | sergeant, escape, gag

It all happened a long time ago; so long in fact that I doubt if my memory has retained the story with any veracity? When WWII started I was still at school and became an evacuee whisked away from the dangers of living in London and into the relative safety of Somerset. I could mention en passant the Spitfire that took a German bullet in the engine and came down in a field a short distance away from the village. The pilot climbed out and walked into the village in search of a telephone; we all leapt on to bicycles and went out to enjoy the spectacle with little appreciation of its true meaning.

The War was still wending its weary way when I left school and returned home to meet first the flying bombs and then the V2 rockets. I should have been called up for service but found myself in a reserved occupation and so was recruited into the Home Guard. The BBC series "Dad's Army" is funny and a perrenial favourite because, if over the top, it is based on reality and I'm sure that, if Hitler's spies had been any good, he would never have hesitated to invade.

Not that the Home Guard were insincere in their purpose, far be it, but they were amateur part-time soldiers with what can only be described as part-time equipment. This is the tale of an exercise designed to test our skills in the field and tactics in general.

Two neighbouring units took part and they were designated Red and Blue. We were the Blue lot and we had captured a female secret agent who had to be held until special forces arrived to collect her. Red were enemy forces whose task it was to raid our headquarters and rescue the Agent. This Agent was, in fact, a most-admirable niece of the Area Commander and so we were doubly handicapped in that there was considerable anxiety to see that she should not suffer harm while, in those days, one handled a female with the proverbial kid gloves.

We were to learn that there was yet another problem. The young lady herself was there at her own insistence. I believe the adjective is feisty? As a captured Agent she was determined to escape and she all but caught us with our pants down - so to speak.

Headquarters was but a large shed in a field. One half was a combination storeroom with a single bunk and the remainder was the "office". The task of defending such a chicken-coop can only be described as whimsical except perhaps that the same description can be applied to the attackers. The prisoner was locked into the storeroom, the major proportion of the Unit went out on patrol and the Sergeant and myself were left on guard.

The Sergeant underestimated our meek little prisoner, as did we all. After instructing me to check that she was OK, he went outside to unload some of the beer that had formed part of his dinner. When I opened the door I found her at the small window trying to wrest away the boards which had been nailed across it for security reasons. They were intended to discourage the entrance of would-be thieves but she had one of them already loosened and clearly intended the reverse action.

I yelped and sprang toward her but she, quick as a rabbit, dodged me and ran for the door. Outside it was black as night ... a silly expression when, in fact, it WAS night out there? Fortunately - for we never could have found her in the inkiness of the wartime blackout - the sergeant had finished his ballast-discharge in that inimitable nick one attributes to Time and she ran slap into his arms. Needless to say he was not a man to ignore his duty and he rose heroically to the situation, wrapped his arms tightly around her, lifted her feet from the floor and carried her back into custody.

But, as I have already recorded, she was a feisty young lady - no sooner had he put her feet back into contact with the good flooring of our shed, than she was off again. This time it fell to me to make the interception which she attempted to foil by using her elbow in a good-natured attempt to break my nose. I ask you ... what would any young full-blooded male do but hang on ?

"Now look'ee here," said my good sergeant in voice of stern authority: "Understand young lady that this is not a game. You are to be kept here ... and kept it is. I can't risk you getting hurt and so, if you please ma'am, give me your word not to try these hijinks anymore?"

She smiled sweetly: "Sergeant, dear sir, I thought I was supposed to be a captured spy? As such you surely can't expect me NOT to escape?"

"And I've got my orders, lady. You WILL be held here. So please, accept it."

Again that sweet smile and, in even sweeter voice: "Go to Hell!"

I thought that Serge would pop. But only for a brief moment. "Hold on to her boy." He opened a drawer in the officer's desk and pulled out a pair of handcuffs. He jerked her hands together and linked them with steel whence it became my desire to drop some ballast !

The window boarding was restored, with the aid of a couple of bent nails and the butt of a revolver, and the lady was returned to her cell. For a while the handcuffs jangled now and then and it was easy to imagine her trying to shed them but, eventually, all became quiet.

Then there came the loud protesting squawk of a rusty nail followed by a most unladylike exclamation of annoyance. She had the broom-handle wedged behind the window-bars which were about to give in.

"Ma'am," said the sergeant: "I gave you fair warning. Hold her boy." He unlocked the cuff from her right wrist and re-locked her hands behind her back. "Sorry about this but we'll bring you a cuppa-tea in a moment."

It proved to be not a moment too soon. As the door opened there she was wielding a broomstick like any good witch; she had worked the cuffs over her feet, her hands were back in front and she was well advanced on her escape plan just as before.

Sergeant had had enough. He unlocked the cupboard in the corner, pulled from it a large duffle bag and from that extracted a great hunk of rope. I couldn't believe my eyes. Even less could I believe the sight ten minutes later as Serge stood back to examine his handiwork.

The lady lay face down on a shiny black rubber rain cape trussed up like a Christmas turkey in what I now know to be a hogtie. He had used the entire length of that rope and she seemed to be covered in it running in all directions. No doubt he had experience in that sort of thing, if only because of the speed with which he performed the tie. Although she was able to move about and wriggle like mad, it was obvious even to my untutored and excited eyes that she had nary the slightest chance of escape.

"Now…" the sergeant's voice had risen a tone or two: "Perhaps you will believe me when I say you are to stay put?" To my intense, if little understood delight, she thrashed, wriggled and rotated there on the floor. Then, as at the throw of a switch, she ceased those exotic undulations and looked up at him with a glare I could not fathom. "All right. You've made your point. Now untie me. You can get into real trouble through this."

"You volunteered for this duty and you were forced on me with instructions to keep you under arrest. It may be just a war game but... it's still war. You were warned... so what are you going to complain about?"

"Damn you ... untie me. My Father will have something to say about it!"

"Occurs to me he might welcome the idea. You need taming!" I was thunderstruck by the Sergeant's daring but, at that moment, something clanged outside the hut. It was one of Sarge's tin can alarms. "Keep her quiet!" He seemed to hit the light switch and slide out through the door in one motion.

Naive? Yes I was. But not by any means slow and such a chance was not to be allowed to pass. I dropped to my knees and slapped a hand across her mouth. But the joyful feel of her was short lived as she sank her teeth into my thumb. The pain and my fear of Sarge's tongue combined to eliminate my chivalry and I pinched her nose - hard!

Now I have long held that it is not possible to fight, struggle or engage in strenuous pursuits while holding your breath and that was the moment I discovered that particular bit of philosophy. As she lay there, temporarily stilled with face turning slowly to puce in colour, I had the chance to push my hand inside my tunic and extract that nice clean man-sized handkerchief and it stuffed her mouth beautifully. She wore a scarf-cum-headsquare around her neck and I commandeered that to tie over the handkerchief. It did not truly silence her but it served the purpose well enough. It did not please her one little bit and, at that time, I was defintely not a gentleman!

The temperature inside that hut was rising - rapidly - and I was becoming conscious of discomfort between my legs when Sarge came back.

"See you're having a good time. Gotta get her out of here."

"Where to?"

"Doesn't matter. Whoever that was will be back here pronto with help and she mustn't be here."

He upended his duffel bag on to the floor and spread the opening. "Give a hand, lad."

"But Sarge. Isn't this getting a bit ... erm ...?"

"Not your worry lad. I never lost a prisoner yet and I don't aim to spoil that record over a chit of a girl." The girl in question let out a squawk and bounced off the floor; even to the inexperienced me ... she was getting mad as hell.

He pulled the bag over her bent knees; between us we lifted it by the top and she slid into the depths. While he was tying the top Sarge talked like a machine gun: "Take off that tunic... and y'cap. Leave them in the cupboard ... rifle too ... now ... ". He ran his hands down the sides of the bag: "Yeah. In the dark it COULD pass as a sack of cabbages." The bag protested again. "Get into this old jacket. If you're stopped just ground the bag and hold it tight between your legs like this. Out the door and straight ahead. You'll come to a low wall. Go right... some thirty-fourty yards there's a gap... let you out onto the road. GO HOME!"

"SARGE!! I CAN'T go home with a girl in a sack. Handcuffed, gagged an' her legs tied up. How in hell do I explain it to my mother?"

"Imagination boy. Initiative. But whatever you do DON'T let the opposition get her!" He hoisted the bag, dumped it across my shoulders, turned-off the light and pushed me out of the door. "Get going!"

I was, all said and done, still a teenager. Outside that hut, pitch dark, with a great piece of girlhood across my shoulders, wriggling now and again and especially when I stumbled... was I not entitled to feel lost? All at sea? Take her home... Great Scott! And then I remembered my Mother and Father were in Somerset visiting my younger sister and brother where they had been evacuated.

And a gentleman with horns, hitherto unknown to me, loomed behind me to whisper in my ear. And his appearance was accompanied by a searing flash of light and one hell of a bang! It was to be revealed that a German bomb-aimer had pressed his button, or depressed a little lever, and dropped a stick of bombs across the English countryside. They made a straight neat and tidy line of very untidy holes the last of which was exactly where our home-guard hut had been standing.

On all fours I groped around for that bag of cabbages and staggered on until I hit a wall. Close to wetting myself I blindly lifted her on top and started to climb up beside when the package wobbled briefly and fell completely over. Only then did my near panic state allow me to appreciate that the wall was barely four inches thick! It wasn't the field wall but the containing wall for one of those fire fighting static water-tanks which sprang up like daisies all over the place.

Well you may ask why they put one in the middle of a field? The only building around was our headquarters hut equipped with two stirrup pumps; useless with such a tank and, by the time any fire engine reached us, the wooden building and all within would be ash! It was too! But there I was astride the wall; a quick grab caught the bag by the tie-cord but the accompanying splash, plus the fact that half my left-leg was in cold water, plus the indignant antics of my charge showed that I had been only half successful. However, the girl was certainly still alive... something I should have checked before? I was young!

Barely had I covered a score of yards along the road when a pair of shielded headlights appeared ... indeed the fire service were awake although they were most probably on their way to something more important? In front of them their lights silhouetted a man on a bicycle ... the air-raid warden on route to deliver his stentorian "PUT OUT THAT LIGHT !!! "

I walked straight into something solid, which proved to be one of those metal bins in which sand is stored against the winter hazard of slippery roads. Without hesitation I heaved up the lid, tipped my load inside, closed the lid and sauntered on. "Hey. Did you light that fire?" Funny thing but A.R.Wardens never seemed to expect a silly answer.

When all was quiet once more I doubled back to retrieve our tame spy and soon after, with a great sigh of relief, I kicked aside my Mother's fireside rug and dumped my cargo on cold lino where it would be much easier to sweep up wet sand.

As I untied the sack it began to buck furiously and, with a little assistance, a tousled mess of hair emerged over a gagged and plainly furious face. "Hang on, " I said, with a touch of desperation: "Keep still so that I can untie you."

Yes, in retrospect, I should have started by removing the gag. I could well have followed up by getting her a drink. I could have done all sorts of things except give way to panic. As I pulled her out of the bag face down on to the floor so she began the most curious of gyrations. There wasn't anyone there to advise me, explain or to reassure me and I strove desperately to release her but that Sergeant knew a thing or two about knots. I rushed out to the kitchen to fetch a knife but, by the time I got back, she was resting there quietly looking up at me with two very-large eyes.

"Are you OK?" Of course she didn't answer and it was then that I thought to remove the gag.

"Thanks," she croaked. "For Pete's sake give me something to drink. That was a horrible job you did with the gag."

It was a good sharp knife that made short work of her ankle binding and I left her to straighten her legs while I fetched the drink. "I'll make a cuppa tea in a moment but let's get you sorted first."

"What the blazes happened out there? You dropped me."

"Not quite. We got blown up by a present from a Jerry bomber." And then it struck me; inside that hut had been my tunic, my rifle and the Sergeant with the handcuff keys in his pocket. I began to feel like... do I need to draw pictures?

I removed the rope from her body, which left her with her hands cuffed behind and a certain amount of dampness over her lower extremities. Thus began a wonderful weekend terminated by the appearance of a bandaged Sergeant armed, regretfully, with handcuff keys. It took me quite a time to remember that, when first we had cuffed her in the hut, she had slipped them by passing her hands over her feet?

He looked at her with pursed lips: "You've kept her cuffed the whole time?"

"Didn't give me the keys, Sarge. Didn't even say what I was to do with her except not to let the other lot get her."

"And you didn't come back to see if I was all right?"

"If you were all right... then I reckoned you didn't need me; if you were dead then I would be risking capture for no good. You did say don't let the Red lot get her WHATEVER?"

"Perhaps you believe me now Sergeant? I said if you put me in that bag I'd bring fire and brimstone down on your head. My spells always work even when I've got a horrible gag stuck in my mouth."

"So you're a witch? In that case you must know the standard test for witches?" He picked up the rope still lying on the floor. "Any woman with her big pelvis and sub-cutaneous fat will float in water. However, first tie her in a ball and she sinks and drowns where a witch still floats. Then you burn her."

"No good. John here has already tried it."

"So what happened?"

"HE got wet."

Today I use hinged cuffs and, over the years, she has yet to find a way to get out of them even when, feeling kind, I give her the key!