"Where, Master?" she asked. "Oh!" she cried, as the needle was entered into her body, in her back, just behind and above the left hip.
I tried to struggle to my feet. But a booted foot, that of one of the men behind me, pressed me down.
The girl began to sob. The heavy man, after a few moments, drew the needle from her flesh. The syringe was then empty. He again swabbed the area into which the needle had penetrated.
"Where, Master?" begged the girl, shuddering from the coolness of the alcohol. "Where?"
"Why, to the planet Gor," he said.
"Gor does not exist!" she cried.
"Let us not enter into fruitless controversy," he said.
"It does not exist!" she cried.
"You will better be able to adjudge the truth of that matter later," he said, "when you awaken chained in a Gorean dungeon."
He rose to his feet. He handed the cotton and the used disposable syringe to one of the men, who discarded them.
"I can't be a slave. I can't be a slave!" she wept.
"You are a slave," he said, looking down on her.
"No!" she said.
"Indeed," he said, "you are one of the most luscious and exquisite natural slaves I have ever seen."
"No," she said. "No!"
"Do not rise from your stomach," he cautioned her.
"Yes, Master," she wept. She trembled, and moaned. "You have drugged me," she said.
"It is kindness that we have done so," he said. "The trip, otherwise, would be very difficult for you."
She began to sob, uncontrollably.
"Relax, relax, little slave," he said to her, soothingly.
"Yes, Master," she said. Then she was unconscious.
I watched in horror as Miss Henderson's clothing was cut from her, completely. A crate was then brought forward. It opened from the side. Inside it were various straps. One of the men busied himself with gagging the girl. The gag was of leather, black, and effective. It buckled behind her neck with two buckles. I gathered they were taking no chances on the possibility of the effects of the drug prematurely wearing off. The heavy man then brought forth a long, narrow, rectangular leather case. In it, aligned, each held in its place by the construction of the interior of the case, each in its cushioned slot, was the remainder, some six or so, of what must once have been a series of something like twenty steel anklets.
Miss Henderson, now gagged, lay unconscious on her back on the cement.
The heavy man put the case down on the steel table, made a note of something in a small notebook, and then threw one of the steel devices to the fellow who stood by Miss Henderson, he who had gagged her unconscious body.
I saw then that the device was indeed a steel anklet. The man snapped it snugly about Miss Henderson's ankle, her left ankle. The snap was heavy, sharp, businesslike. Her ankle was then locked in the device. To my horror I realized she could not remove it. She would have to wear it until men chose to take it from her.
"H-4642?" asked the heavy man.
The other man lifted Miss Henderson's ankle, inspecting the steel locked there. "Yes," he said.
The heavy man closed his notebook.
He nodded to the man at the side of Miss Henderson, and to another man, as well.
Not speaking these two men then, as I watched, from my helpless, prone position, placed Miss Henderson in the crate. They placed her sitting in the crate, its open side to her left. Her head was first drawn back and fixed in place. There was a ring on the back of the gag straps and a ring within the crate. These two rings snapped together, holding her head back. A heavy black belt then, attached in the container, was looped about her waist. She was thrust back in the container further. Then the belt was tightened about her and buckled shut. Each of her wrists was then strapped back, her left wrist on her left side, her right wrist on her right side, the back of each wrist against the side of the container against which her back rested. Because of the smallness of the container her knees must be thrust up. Both ankles, then, one on the left, one on the right, were strapped in place.
The heavy man looked at the girl.
The heavy belt, buckled tightly about her belly, held her body back against one wall of the container. Her head, too, by the two rings, was held in place. Her wrists were strapped back, her ankles were strapped down. She was gagged.
The heavy man smiled. There was little doubt but what the fair prize was well secured.
I suppose I should not have looked upon her, but I could not help myself. Clothed, she had been beautiful; naked, she was fantastic. I could scarcely imagine the joy and power a man would feel, having such a woman at his feet.
"Close the crate," said the heavy man.
I saw the hinged side of the crate swung shut, inclosing Miss Henderson within it, a steel anklet, numbered, apparently an identificatory device, locked on her left ankle.
When the side of the crate had swung shut, it had snapped shut. Two fastenings had been engaged. Two men, now, twisted some ten screw bolts shut. There would be no way the container could be opened from the inside. There were two small, round holes, each about a half of an inch in width, in the upper half of the side of the crate which had served as its door. It was through these that the girl would breathe.
I looked at the crate. It occurred to me that its contents, Miss Henderson, if she were truly a slave, would one day, doubtless, be put up for sale. The thought of Miss Henderson on a slave block, actually, not just in my imagination, was almost overwhelming.
"Put the crate in the van," said the heavy man.
Two men picked up the crate and carried it from the room. Another man preceded them, presumably to facilitate their passage and, perhaps, open the van.
I felt, along the floor, a flood of fresh air. Somewhere a door had been opened. I tensed. I felt, then, a boot in the small of my back, pressing me down. "Don't try anything," said a voice, that of he who had been the driver of the cab. The fresh-air draft then ceased. I heard a door shut in another room.
The heavy man then turned and looked at me.
"You treated her like merchandise;" I said, angrily, to the heavy man.
"She is merchandise, a slave," he said.
"What are you going to do with her?" I asked.
"She is to be shipped to another world, one called Gor," he said, "where she will be branded as what she is, a slave, and then sold on the open market for whatever she will bring."
"How can you do this?" I demanded.
"It is my business," he said. "I am a slaver."
"But have you no pity for your pathetic captures?" I asked.
"They deserve no pity," he said. "They are only slaves."
"But what of their happiness?" I asked.
"It is unimportant," he said. "But, if it is of interest to you, no woman is truly happy until she is owned and mastered."
I was silent.
"Free a woman," he said, "and she will try to destroy you. Enslave her, and she will crawl to you on her belly, and beg to lick your sandals."
"Madness!" I cried. "False! False!"
The heavy man smiled at the man behind me. "He seems a typical man of Earth, does he not?" he asked.
"He does, indeed," said the man behind me. I then felt again the draft of fresh air, which then, in a moment, ceased. The other three men then re-entered the room. "The crate is in the van, with the others," said one of them.
I was startled. There must, then, be other girls, too, who were to share the sordid, horrifying fate of Miss Henderson.
I then found myself the center of the attention of the five men. I became suddenly very frightened. I began to sweat. I realized that neither Miss Henderson nor myself had been blindfolded. The men, thus, had not apparently been concerned that we would, at a future time, be able to identify either themselves or the interior of the large structure in which we had found ourselves.