Chapter 6: Judge And Jury

‘I’m Lewis,’ he replied. ‘I’m the one who will have to tell your wife and son that yesterday you sexually abused a boy of similar age to your own son.’ ‘She won’t believe you.’ he said as he reached for his clothes.

Lewis had transferred yesterday’s recording of Michael onto a DVD. He handed it over to Roy and said, ‘Play that please.’ As Charles finished dressing, the TV burst into life. Charles glanced at it, then froze horrified as he saw himself naked and assaulting Michael. He stood watching with his mouth open.

‘I think she will,’ Lewis said, ‘When she sees not only this video but the one of you raping Roy just now. Both are now stored on the internet.’

Charles sank down into the armchair and put his head in his hands. ‘What have I done?’ he said more to himself than them, ‘What have I done.’ Roy was still standing naked. He looked amazed at the change in him. ‘Get dressed Roy.’ Lewis prompted.

He remained silent whilst he did, texting Michael whilst he waited and asking him to come over. Whilst Roy got dressed, Lewis went and opened the front door. Returning he told Roy to sit down. Lewis went over to the settee and sat beside him. Shortly afterwards they heard someone coming in. Michael walked into the room and stopped dead in his tracks, surprised to see Charles sitting there.

‘It’s ok,’ Lewis said, ‘He’ll never touch you again. Come and sit down. Charles!’ he said firmly. When Charles looked up at him, Lewis said, ‘Pay attention please. The first thing I want to know from you is how many other people you have attacked in this way.’

‘None,’ Charles said, ‘I’ve never done anything like this before.’ ‘You will understand that I can’t take your word for that,’ Lewis said. ‘Open your phone and pass it over to me please.’

Lewis looked through the gallery. He soon found the picture of Roy and Michael. He deleted it. Next, he went into the recycle bin and emptied it.

Returning to the gallery he looked through all the pictures. There were no others like that one.

‘You have some nice family pictures in here,’ Lewis said. ‘You are very lucky to have a nice family, why did you choose to destroy them?’ ‘I didn’t,’ Charles said. ‘When I came in here and saw Roy and Michael naked it just aroused me so much, I lost control.’

‘You took a photo and threatened them with it,’ Lewis said. ‘What did you do with it?’ ‘It’s still on my phone,’ he said. ‘I never would have shown it to anyone, I just used it to get my own way.’

‘Michael and I are at school with your son,’ Lewis told him. ‘He’s a nice lad, what do you think it will do to him when it becomes public knowledge that his father sexually assaulted someone of a similar age as him.’ ‘It will destroy him,’ he said, ‘I don’t know why I couldn’t see that possibility before I let myself get carried away.’

‘Before this happened, Roy knew you and liked you.’ Lewis told him. ‘If you had wanted to join in with him and Michael, they may well have let you, had you just asked.’

‘But you chose to use force and threaten them. You have caused them a lot of distress. In Roy’s case a lot of physical pain too. There are several options to deal with you.’

‘The first is to have you arrested and put you in front of the court. You would undoubtably go to prison. Your life would be ruined as well as that of your wife and your son. You deserve it. They don’t.’ Charles looked even more dejected.

‘The second is for me to visit your wife on her own. Tell her what you have done, show her the film and leave her to deal with it. She would probably throw you out. She may not tell your son or anyone else why she had done it, but even so, it would ruin both of their lives.’

‘The third one is to come up with a punishment ourselves which would discourage you from doing it again, but keep it private, so that it only affects you.’ Charles sensed a modicum of hope and looked at Lewis intently.

‘I know I don’t deserve it,’ he said, ‘But if you decide on the last one you will have my full cooperation.’ ‘I will make a suggestion,’ Lewis said, ‘But the final decision will be up to Roy and Michael. Only if there’s a tie will I cast a vote.’

‘I want you to sit there in silence whilst I put the options to Roy and Michael.’ Lewis told him.

‘If you opt for the police,’ Lewis said to Roy and Michael, ‘The evidence of my recordings will be sufficient to convict him. Neither of you will need to appear in court. If he tries to make finding you two naked as an excuse, you can simply deny it. He no longer has any evidence as I have just deleted the picture he took. Any attempt to blame you two will be seen by the court as an attempt made up to save his own skin. That would likely increase his sentence. He will lose his freedom, his wife, and his son. Also, his job and possibly his house.’

‘If I tell his wife, he keeps his freedom so he is able to carry on working, but he will likely lose his home, his wife, and his son. In both of those cases the punishment is being shared by the three of them instead of just him.’

‘The third one I am only going to tell you a few bits of the punishment I have in mind, because I don’t want to influence your decision. If you voted for it, only the four of us in this room would know about what had happened. This one would require Charles to pay a brief visit here on a number of occasions and make a verbal apology to each of you, each time. He will also pay a fine.’

‘If you do vote for that one, then it will only be acceptable to me if Charles agrees to honour it. If he doesn’t, I will select one of the other options myself. At the end of the punishment period, the recording of events I have will be deleted for ever. Thus, only Charles will be punished.’

‘Before you vote, I’ll tell you three things in his favour. One is that it seems this was his first offence which in court usually earns some leniency. Secondly, prior to this offence, Roy says he was a kind and good landlord. Three, when he threatened to go up Michael’s bum, when Michael pointed out that the size of his cock would do terrible damage requiring hospital treatment because of his small stature, he at least postponed the idea.’

‘Do either of you have any questions before you vote?’ Lewis asked. ‘Would Roy and I both be here together when he called?’ Michael asked. ‘Yes,’ Lewis said, ‘We would fix a set day, so you’d all know when.’

‘Would you be here too?’ Roy asked. ‘Only for the first one. After that, not unless you invited me for any particular reason.’ Lewis said.

‘How long would he stay?’ Michael asked. ‘That would be up to you two,’ Lewis said. ‘He would come in, do his penance, make his apology to each of you and go. If you decided to offer him a coffee that would be up to you.’

Seeing they had no more questions, Lewis scribbled...

Arrest.

Wife.

Punishment.

on two pieces of paper and handed Roy and Michael one each and a pen.

They both studied the list, thought briefly then put a tick. Handing them back to Lewis, everyone sat looking at him. Charles had almost stopped breathing.

‘The first vote is for,’ Lewis said pausing briefly to read it, ‘Punishment.’ He put the paper down and picked up the second one. He read it, looked at Charles and said, ‘The second vote is for,’ he paused then said, ‘Punishment.’ Roy and Michael smiled at each other. Charles let out an audible long sigh of relief. He looked at Roy and Michael and said a very sincere sounding, ‘Thank you.’

‘This is your punishment.’ Lewis said picking up the list he had made.

‘You will surrender your front door key to Roy. In future you will only enter the property by prior arrangement, so that Roy can arrange to have someone with him, should he wish to. Starting next week, every Thursday night at five o’clock you will come here and knock to be let in.’