"Tighten up a little, Eddie. You, too, Bob."
"Stop it! Oh, God, STOP IT!" The unbearable agony relaxed a little. She watched in horrified fascination a second glowing coal approach her bare right side. "Even if I do talk you'll kill me anyway. You couldn't let me go now."
"Kill you, my pet? Not if you behave yourself. We've got a lot of planets the Patrol never heard of, and you could keep a man interested for quite a while, if you really tried. And if you beg hard enough maybe I'll let you try. However, I'd get just as much fun out of killing you as out of the other, so it's up to you. Not sudden death, of course. Little things, at first, like we've been doing. A few more touches of warmth here and there—so....
"Scream as much as you please. I enjoy it, and this room is sound-proof. Once more, boys, about half an inch higher this time ... up ... steady ... down. We'll have half an hour or so of this stuff"—Herkimer knew that to the quivering, sensitive, highly imaginative girl his words would be practically as punishing as the atrocious actualities themselves—"then I'll do things to your finger-nails and toe-nails, beginning with burning slivers of double-base flare powder and working up. Then your eyes—or no, I'll save them until last, so you can watch a couple of Venerian slasher-worms work on you, one on each leg, and a Martian digger on your bare belly."
Gripping her hair firmly in his left hand, he forced her head back and down; down almost to her hard-held hands. His right hand, concealing something which he had not mentioned and which was probably starkly unmentionable, approached her taut-stretched throat.
"Talk or not, just as you please." The voice was utterly callous, as chill as the death she now knew he was so willing to deal. "But listen. If you elect to talk, tell the truth. You won't lie twice. I'll count to ten. One."
Jill uttered a gurgling, strangling noise and he lifted her head a trifle.
"Can you talk now?"
"Yes."
"Two."