Elaine had no time to do more than blink, rub her eyes, and sit up in bed, before Audrey the Amazon, not even bothering to shut the door behind her, plucked her from bed, and tucked her under her massive arm as though she were a runaway puppy.

Then Elaine knew real fear, and cried aloud, her protests rousing Tom, who sat up very suddenly. Neither was he given any time to exclaim, for his wife, moving with incredible speed for one so huge, whipped round the end of the bed and threw Elaine heavily to the floor where she bumped on her bottom. Audrey then picked up her husband with even less effort than she had lifted Elaine, and tossed him casually into a shallow closet, smartly slamming the door, and blocking it with the end of the bed, which she hooked sideways with her foot.

Although Audrey's disposal of Tom occupied but a few seconds it presented Elaine with her sole chance to escape, and she took it.

Breathlessly she scrambled to her knees, and dived over the bed towards the door. She had stopped shouting, but her cries were now taken up by Tom from the closet, and by other people, presumably guests, or the proprietor and his wife, who had gathered in the passage, and were now adding their protests to the general uproar.

Elaine did not get very far in her scramble towards this group. Audrey the Amazon turned, seized her by the hair, pressed her face into the pillow, jumped on to the disordered bed, and pinned her down with one knee.

Then, releasing Elaine's hair so that she could turn her head just enough to breath, she tore down her pretty new pyjama trousers, baring her bottom to all and sundry, and commenced to administer a spanking that could be heard very clearly in the lobby downstairs.

Mrs. Tappertitt had huge, meaty hands, that were able to cover quite an area, and they were hands that were accustomed daily to tying reef knots in iron bars, and tearing encyclopædias in two. The wild cries of Elaine, squirming on the bed, were soon far louder than those of Tom, folded into the closet, and were certainly penetrating enough to drown the scattered protest of the group standing in the passage, and looking in upon the curious scene.

It was perhaps a full minute before Audrey the Amazon paused and, with a final flip of the wrist, again deposited Elaine on the floor, this time on her side nearest the door, with her pajamas around her ankles. "That," said Audrey, wheezing a little, "is what your mother ought to have done more often! Now get dressed, get your things together, and clear out of here, but don't take nothing he gave you, or I'll start on you again the minute I get me breath back!"

She then seemed to dismiss Elaine, and turned to the closet, kicking back the bed, and pulling open the door, so that poor Tom fell out face foremost, and landed abjectly at her feet.

"You get dressed too, Tom," she said, "and I'll give you your rations the minute we get home!"