It was dark and cold. David’s head rolled as he emerged from the blackness. For a minute he thought it had been a dream. Then, with a start, he realized that he was not home in his bed. He had been attacked! With every ounce of effort, he forced his eyes open and tried to focus. Odd. What were his shirt and tie doing there? He was not lying down, but rather his head was hanging as he sat in a chair. Ah, he thought, now it made sense.  
    Incrementally, he began to hear through muffled ears. Someone was crying, no … sobbing. Groggily, David raised his head, and it swayed in response. Alex was a few feet away, tied with a rope across his chest and his arms behind his back in a small wooden chair. Puzzled, he looked down at his own chest again. Strange, he had not seen the rope there before. Then he realized pain in his arms and wrists, a burning sensation that increased dramatically as he became more aware. He, too, was strapped from behind, but with what, barbed wire? Irritated, he wondered why his antagonists had stretched his arms so tightly. Didn’t they realize the job could have been done without causing so much pain? And what was this rope drawn down across his legs for? Were they going on a Ferris wheel? Really!
    Nearly fully awake, he looked at Alex who was sniffling. David felt a surge of anger. Crying at a time like this was not going to help matters. Irritated, he looked away.
    “I’m sorry,” Alex said with a quiver.  
    David swung his head back around, and it flopped in response from the lingering drugs.
    “I’m sorry I didn’t listen when you said you were scared.” Alex started to cry harder, despite his obvious effort to control his voice.
    Although he was embarrassed for Alex, David was suddenly more embarrassed for himself as he recollected the way he had acted. Hearing Alex verbalize it was even worse. Wanting to change the subject he spoke. “Do you know what’s going on, Alex? Who were those men, and what do they want?”
    “I don’t know,” Alex trembled. “I only woke up just a few minutes before you. I don’t know anything.” Alex sniffled as a few more tears dribbled.
    If he hadn’t acted so peculiar himself, David might have word-lashed Alex right out of his hysteria, but seeing as he had just met those unwelcome emotions, he decided to let it go. Instead, he looked around the room hoping for a clue. Just then, Alex burst out.
    “What’s going on here, David? Obviously you know something. You’re the one that said we shouldn’t go down to the car!”
    “Shhh!” David shot back. “They’ll hear you.”
    “Who? Who’s going to hear? David, you had better let me in on this or so help me-“
    David cut him off in a loud whisper, “I have no idea, Alex! But I’ll tell you one thing, it’s pretty dumb to sit here crying about it.”
    “Oh sure, now you’re the tough guy. You little wimp. I saw you! You were shivering like a chicken liver.”
    “Fine, Alex, I was scared  as a chicken liver,” David emphasized. “Are you happy now?”
    Sheer raw emotion had taken over. “Act like it was nothing. I’ve never seen anyone so terrified in my entire life.”
    David glared at his words. “Will you just stop so I can think?” He tried to keep his voice down, but like Alex, he, too, was tense. The combination of the situation and the lingering drugs blurred his mind in a most unsettling manner.  
    “You’re just a big phony,” Alex snarled. “I heard you whimpering at the conservatory, and I’ll never let you forget it. You treat everybody as if they were nothing. But you’re no better.”
    Alex continued to rant, but David didn’t care. They were in trouble, and somebody had to take the lead. He noted how dark it was outside and wondered how much time had passed. He thought of Clifford’s reaction when he had buried the Spanish coins and wondered if his parents had been informed yet. Poor Mother. She had been through enough to last a lifetime.
    Alex’s ranting continued. “… You think you’re so special, so much better than the rest of us. Well, let me tell you something, mister, you’re just the same as everybody else. The only differences is that you’ve never had to deal with anyone so spectacularly and magnificently irritating. That’s why you can’t understand how other people feel. And what’s more, you’ve got no social skills! None whatsoever. You think you’re so superior, but you’re not! Oh, except that, of course, you’re really good at playing the puppet and, well, I hate to be the one to break it to you because it’s going to come as a total shock, but you’re totally stuck-up and irritating and downright rude with your I’m better than you attitude …”
    “Oh, brother,” David spat. Alex had to take this opportune time to fall to pieces. Great. Just great. It looked like David was going to have to figure things out on his own. He turned his attention back to the inside of the room. The floor was tile, and there were several desks shoved against the far wall. As his senses awakened, he became painfully aware of a miserable rotting stench, like molding socks. Err … At least it smelled the way he imagined dirty socks would smell. Having never smelled such a thing, he was left to his imagination.  
    Frustrated, he pulled at his arms. This hurt! How was he supposed to concentrate when his arms were slowly being pulled from their sockets?
    “Can you see anyone out that door?” David whispered, interrupting Alex who was still in the process of venting every real and imagined oppression that he had ever endured in his life.
    Surprised, Alex stopped. “Uh … ” he sputtered, startled back to reality.  
    “Well?” David pressed.
    Alex stretched his neck as far as he could. “No,” he whispered still craning. He had been so busy ranting that he had totally lost track of the current situation.  
    “They must not be here, or they would have come when they heard us talking,” David reasoned aloud as he tried to scoot his chair toward Alex’s. His unknown adversary had tied each foot very tightly to a different leg of the chair. Only his toes reached the floor, making each inch gained with a wince of pain. His unaccustomed body immediately set his brain to work on the abuses he would inflict on his abductors once they were brought to justice. Chinese water torture for one. He heard it was quite effective.
    “Why do you think they took us? I mean, brought us here like this?” Alex asked. “We haven’t done anything. Have … have you … done anything?”
    Sometimes David wondered at Alex. How could he be the oldest? He was so stupidly naїve. “They probably kidnapped us for ransom.”
    “Kidnapped? They kidnapped us?”
    David stopped his efforts momentarily to give Alex an even bigger look of dismay. “What would you call it?”
    “Well … I don’t know. I guess … I … didn’t think,” he admitted.
    “I’ll say.” Then in irritation he shot out, “Do I have to do all the work here? Maybe you could work toward me too.”
    Understanding smacked across Alex’s face, and he immediately sprang into action, if you could call scooting inch-by-inch “springing.”
    After a few minutes of agonizingly slow progress, they were in position, back to back. “Okay,” David whispered, “hold still while I try to untie you.”
    “Are you sure this is such a good idea?” Alex began to doubt the intelligence of the plan. “What if they come back? I don’t think they’ll be too happy to catch us like this.”
    “Be quiet and concentrate,” David ordered.
    “I’m holding still, how much concentration does it take?”
    “Then pipe down so that I can concentrate!”
    “You know, David, Mother would never believe what a pain you really are. Have you ever noticed that you never listen to anybody but yourself? Oh no. You’ve always got to be in charge. You are two years my junior, and it gets annoying! Even now, when we are both tied up, who gives the orders? David, always David. I’ve about had it.”
    “Could you pleeeease?”
    “You see? Still giving orders!”
    “For Pete’s sake. I think you’re trying to be difficult.”
    “Don’t turn this around on me!”
    “How much effort does it take? You press your lips together and voilà, closed mouth, hence silence.”
    David continued to work on the ropes as they argued. Despite the quarrel, he did make some considerable progress. Unfortunately, and unbeknownst to them, an exterior door had opened and shut during the course of their argument, giving an advantage to the unforgiving stranger that was now upon them.
    “What’s this?”
    Alex and David both looked up to see a tall, unkempt man with sandy hair standing in the doorway wearing tattered brown pants and suspenders that rolled over a once-muslin shirt. David recognized him immediately as the man who had pulled him inside the car.
    “Why you lit’le weasels,” the man whom they would come to know as Willy spoke with a broken English accent. “Eh, Beez, we got ourselves some ‘neakers here, we do.”
    A shorter, heavier man with dark hair came into the room. The very man who stood watching that day when David insulted the beggar woman and her child.  
    Beez wore suit pants and a white shirt with several buttons undone at the top and sleeves rolled to the elbows. A cigarette hung from his mouth as he leaned one hand on the doorframe. Rolling the cigarette with his lips, he summed up the situation. His voice was soft and gritty. “So here you are, back to back. That’s not the way we left ya,” he said as he paced circles around the boys. “What’s a matter? Ya sick o’ lookin’ at each other?” He spoke with a thick Brooklyn accent.
    David looked directly into the man’s dark eyes and protruded his chin in challenge. Alex preferred to look at the floor, hoping beyond hope that his lack of eye contact would dismiss him from the conversation.
    “Huuhhh?!!” the man shouted.
    By raising his voice, David surmised that they were in the country, away from eager ears.
    Beez’s volatile temperament was on the verge of exploding. “Just what do you think you was doing?”
    “That’s just what I was about to ask you.” David spoke with authority. “I demand you release us. Now!”
    Beez inhaled deeply then flicked the smoldering cigarette across the floor, the butt still glowing as it came to a spinning stop. He crouched and breathed the soot into David’s face causing his eyes to water as he coughed.  
    Beez remained inches from his face, studying, until without warning, he threw David’s chair across the room in a single heaving motion. The chair landed at an angle on two legs as it screeched and teetered to the floor with a crash on its side. Unable to compensate, David’s head clunked down with a sickening thud on the tile.
    “That’s where I left ya,” Beez proclaimed and pulled a fresh cigarette from his pocket. “Rich brat,” he muttered as he turned for the door. He snapped his fingers at Willy. “Take care o’ the other one,” he said as he left.
    Willy’s eyes had glazed over as if watching a scene at the theater. Instantly, he snapped and tightened Alex’s ropes as Alex let out a soft grunt of pain. Then Willy unleashed a painful smack across Alex’s face with the back of his hand. Alex’s head jerked to one side from the impact. Satisfied, he went to David and cinched his ropes tighter before turning to leave. With obvious satisfaction, he left David lying motionless on the cold tile floor.
    Alex stared at the closed door then back at David, then at the door again. Finally, he whispered. “Are you all right?” His voice was breathy and hoarse with fear. The only light came from beneath the door. “David?” Alex pressed. He couldn’t call any louder for fear that the men would return and with that thought he started to hyperventilate. “David,” he continued to whisper as he breathed in heaps.
    David’s head was spinning, leaving him unable to answer. Halfway between two worlds, the conscious and unconscious, and still swimming in a sea of lingering drugs, he couldn’t manage a word. He felt the warmth of acid threatening in his mouth as it spilled in his throat. The smoldering cigarette that lay near his face only made matters worse.
    “David …” Alex continued to huff in hyperventilation. “David … are you okay?”
    “I’m fine,” David finally managed to muster. No matter how bad the pain, he couldn’t stand the idea that Alex might learn of it. He was tied to a tipped chair with ropes tearing at his flesh, his head reeling from the combined assault of trauma and drugs and the fear of imminent vomit. This was bad, and Alex wanted to know if he was okay? No. He was notokay, but he wasn’t going to say it.  
    He closed his eyes and imagined the Virginia coastline with a cool ocean breeze. Mind over matter, mind over matter, that’s all it takes. Mind over matter. A few minutes later, his mind lost the matter as he puked it from his guts in heave after heave. Thankfully, there wasn’t much to expel. They hadn’t eaten since breakfast so the putrid regurgitation was mostly water and acid with an occasional lump here and there.
    Alex looked on in horror through the darkness. “I don’t think you’re okay,” he commented dryly, turning his head so that he wouldn’t join in vomiting as David heaved again and again. “Nope  nope,” he said shaking his head against the malodorous smell. “Definitely not okay.”
    When it was over, David tried to rest his head, only to realize that doing so would settle him right in the middle of the puddle of vomit. “Fresh mountain snow, big puffy clouds, cool autumn breezes,” he mumbled to himself. It was a difficult process. The acidic soup lay only inches from his face. To his grave misfortune, the idea that he would be sleeping in it combined with the smell made him heave again … And again … One more time.
    The muscles in his abdomen ached from the pressure as the violent process wreaked havoc. What he wouldn’t give for the use of his hands. It would be worth every single last Spanish coin. At this point, for a damp, soothing washcloth, he would even throw in his loyal feline. This drip-dry business was no fun at all. Where was Clifford when he needed him? And Mother … she would wipe his sweaty forehead with a cloth and talk in soft, soothing tones. He thought of how she would rub his arms down as he lay on the bed and pictured her silken hair shining in the glow of a dim lamp. Reluctantly, he released the tension in his neck and let the upper half of his head rest in the pool. With a grimace, he closed his eyes against the odor. The room was still turning. Wishing it to be still, he opened his eyes. No such luck. Halfway around, then back again. Too tired. Too tired … He rested back as the smell drifted. Sleep … was all … he … wanted.
    Alex couldn’t understand why David had thrown up. And sleep? It was unbelievable and totally unfair. What a brother! Bossy, pretentious, proud, and able to sleep in any position.  
    “There I go again,” he chastised. “I’ve got to stop.” His penny-ante side was taking over again, but it was hard to believe that some part of this wasn’t David’s fault. Nobody liked him. He must have done something to someone. He must be to blame. He must.
    But then, he was Alex’s best friend.

Friday before Thanksgiving, 1931 …
    Dawn approached and with it, the revelation of the grungy state of their new residence. The building was noticeably run-down with piles of junk heaped everywhere. There was a puddle of water near where David lay, remnants of the last rain, and what looked to be a bunch of desks the night before was really three desks piled amidst rubble and demolition waste shoved along the opposite wall.  
    Between the boarded windows, thick grime, and soot, Alex could see a field of sorts, one which looked long-since abandoned, with an old tractor rusting under a nearby dead tree.
    Just then, David moaned. Since he had been doing that all night, Alex wasn’t sure if it meant anything. He moaned again, and then spoke.  
    “Is it morning?”
    “Yes. How are you feeling?” Alex tried to sound concerned. Through the course of the night, his sympathy for David had grown, partly out of guilt and partly out of duty.
    David raised his head a few inches. The vomit had dried in crusty clumps that stuck to his hair like bad gel from the dime-store sales rack. The area of his head that had been resting in the pool was still damp and dripped slightly.  
    “Awful.”
    “Yeah, well, you don’t look so good either.” Alex’s own wrists were throbbing. He couldn’t imagine how David’s must feel.
    David set his head back down. “Do you have any idea what time it is?”
    “I think it’s about eight o’clock.”
    “I wonder what everyone is doing at home.”
    “Probably eating breakfast. Boy, what you won’t do to get out of oatmeal,” he teased, hoping to lighten the moment.
    David tried to force a laugh. Even that hurt.
    A few minutes later the door creaked open and Willy stepped in. He smelled the vomit right away. “Aghh! What the? Uuugh … uuuyee oiy,” he pinched at his nose as he fled the room.
    It wasn’t long before the shouting started as the men argued over the situation. The need for the remote location was becoming more apparent all the time.
    Alex stared at the door in disbelief. He had never heard two grown men behave in such a manner. After several shouts and multiple threats Willy returned with his nostrils flaring. Beez was obviously the one in charge. Either that or he was the bigger bully.
    “I ain’t cleanin’ it up, I’ll tell you at right now,” Willy complained. “No sir. I ain’t doin’ it. No matter how much money.”
    He tipped David’s chair up right, and David shuddered from the pain, especially when the legs of the chair clunked down, distributing a shock to every nerve in his body. Willy continued to rant as he untied David’s ropes, none too gentle. One would assume that being released after such a long ordeal would be a welcome experience. It wasn’t. The pain was unbelievable. The bristly cords yanked and pulled, sending twine micro slivers into David’s open wounds with each merciless jerk.  
    “You sir, you’re the one ‘at gets the job. Stupid bloke.”  
    With each tug David braced. He had to keep up the front. These men were nothing to him. Nothing! And he wanted to be sure that they knew, that he knew, that he was better than them. Even if it killed him.     
    Once untied, Willy shoved David from the chair to the floor. He fell, nearly landing on his face with his knee in the puddle of muck. As he tried to get up, the realization of what his body had been through became more evident.   
    “Hurry up, you little brat ‘for I rub your whole face in it!”
    His aching ankles couldn’t manage his weight as he tried to get up, sending him to the floor. For the first time he saw his hands and wrists. The injuries were infuriating, which gratefully did the trick. New strength poured into every facet of his body, and he rose to his feet, settling into a stance of perfect posture. The skin around his wrists was raw, thick, and swollen with deep purple bruises. Blood stained his shirt cuffs. His suit coat was rumpled with splats of vomit here and there, and blood had run thick into the creases of his hands where it dried in crusts. All of this added steam to his anger, and he stood with more pride and determination than he had in his entire life. Even though David was a child with his hair askew, Willy stepped back, completely intimidated. Unfortunately, the effect didn’t last long. In an instant, Willy regained his senses and pulled at David’s ear.
    “Come on, you.”  
    Willy kept a hold of David’s ear and dragged him down the dilapidated hallway to a double door where he shoved it open and tossed David down the exterior steps. David lost his footing and fell most of the way to the ground. Despite the tumble, he was elated to be free. The fresh air instantly dispersed the haunting nausea.
    “There. You see that bucket?” Willy ordered. “You get that buck