“On me?”
“On you.” ’
She had gone on with the dishes and pans, and since neither wanted to eat, because there was still too much unsaid, she had asked for a drink. While she carried Deirdre off to bed, he had gone to the bar and prepared double Scotches with water.
Now they were two, locked in by the night. She stood with drink in one hand and cigarette in the other, before the wide picture window that faced out on the patio and the enclosed garden, and she said nothing. Patiently, he remained on the sofa, respectful of her isolated silence, and he drank and watched her. Remembering the first time he had seen the lovely child face, the short dark bob, the Oriental eyes, the tiny nose, the cherry-red lips, in the wallet, in the doorway returning the wallet, he felt again the same surge of passion and desire. Her lithe body, high-breasted and narrowing to long, curved hips and thighs, drew close to each projection and concavity the golden silk dress.
He rose and came behind her, encircling the soft breasts with his arms. He kissed her raven hair, and the warm ear shell, and her cheek. “Kathleen,” he whispered, “marry me.”
She revolved slowly, ever so slowly, her breasts pressing inward and releasing fully inside his arms, until she faced him. Her red lips were unsmiling.
“Paul, I love you.”
“Then-“
“But I can’t marry you, because I’m afraid.”
“But you love me.”
“That’s it, darling, don’t you see? I always knew I’d many again, for Deirdre at least, for loneliness, for social conformity, but I also knew it would never be someone I loved. With a man who didn’t matter, a friend-well, it would be a bargain understood in advance. I would be wife and wifely, and even a bed companion. But if it had to be more, I knew I could not do it. I knew I could never marry for love, because too much more would be expected of me. I would expect too much more of myself. And, Paul, try to understand this-I’m inadequate, incapable; I can’t give real love.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I know.” She closed her eyes, lips compressed, and shook her head. “Or maybe I don’t know. But I can’t chance it. If 1 failed again, it would be the worst kind of hell. And I haven’t the strength to face that. You see, it’s because I love you so-“
“Exactly what are you trying to tell me, Kathleen?”
“What I intended to tell you yesterday morning, when I came to your office.”
“What, Kathleen?”
“The truth.”
She disengaged herself from him. He waited, very still. She took his hand and, wordlessly, led him back to the sofa. He sat down. She sat beside him.
“Paul, when you interviewed me for Dr. Chapman that Thursday afternoon-“
“Yes.”
“I lied. I lied and lied.”
“Yes,” he said again. “I know.”
She stared at him incredulously. “You knew I lied?”
He nodded. “It’s part of our training.”
“And still you … you wanted to love me?”
“Of course. One thing has nothing to do with the other.”
“But it has, Paul.” She hesitated. “I only lied about the married part.”
“That’s right.”
“Arid still-“
“I love you, Kathleen.”
“But you won’t, Paul! That’s the whole point of it. That’s what I went to tell you yesterday. I wanted to have it done and over with and forget it. I wanted you to know about my marriage, and I tried to tell you, and I’m going to now.”
“I don’t want to know, Kathleen.”
“You have to know! Paul, I came to ask you a favor yesterday. I’m going to ask it-“
He waited apprehensively.
“Interview me again.”
“What?”
“You know the questions by heart. Ask them again. The ones about marriage-marital intercourse-the ones I lied about. Ask them again, and let me tell the truth this time.”
“But it’s-look, Kathleen, that kind of ordeal isn’t necessary.”
“You’ve got to do it. There’s nothing more to say unless you do it.” She rose and removed herself to the farthest end of the sofa and looked at him. “Go ahead.”
“I can’t see what’ll be gained-“
‘You’ll see. Go ahead. No screen. The truth this time. I’m scared sick-“
‘No-“
‘Please, Paul!”
He found his pipe and filled it. Her eyes did not leave him. The pipe was lighted, and he saw her eyes.
“All right,” he said. “You were married three years?”
“Yes.”
“What was the frequency of coitus with your … your husband?”
“The first six months, twice a week, then once a week. The last two years, once a month.”
“Once a month?”
“Yes, Paul.”
“Sex play before coitus?”
“Almost none. Sometimes a minute-sometimes.”
It was curious, he thought, how soon the inadequacy of the Chapman method had demonstrated itself. Here was a statistic, a numeral. A minute, she had said, sometimes. But the fact had no life, and therefore less truth. Hell, he thought, I’m not bound to
Chapman any longer. The question is not what he must know, but rather what I must know to help her.
He resumed his examination, abandoning the formula of the questionnaire in order to seek not numbers but an understanding of her. He solicited Boynton’s attitudes toward petting, and then her own, and, although high-strung, she replied to each inquiry without evasion.
“Did you ever take the initiative?” he was asking.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because-I don’t know why not.”
“Let’s go on.”
Mercilessly, but with increasing aversion, he probed her libidinal history. Her answers continued, dulled by pain, and when, again, he tried to halt, she demanded that he continue.
“All right,” he said. “Did you attain physical satisfaction always, almost always, sometimes, rarely, or never?”
“Never.”
“Were you most often clothed, partially clothed, or in the nude?”
“Partially clothed.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t like him to see me naked. I didn’t like to see him either.”
“Was it always that way?”
“I don’t know. I don’t remember.”
“What time of day did you usually-“
“After midnight, when he was drunk enough.”
“Was the act ever physically painful to you?”
“Sometimes, yes. He could be rough.”
“But generally he didn’t hurt you?”
“No, generally he didn’t.”
Paul watched her a moment. “What characteristics in men do you find most sexually repellent?”
“Men or Boynton?”
“Men.”
“Do you mean physical?”
“Anything.”
“I don’t like fat men,” she said, “or the super-Nordic type.” She thought about it. “No, that’s not what matters, really. I don’t like brutality, vulgarity-“
“What do you like, Kathleen-what do you find sexually attractive in a male?”
“Intelligence, empathy, a kind of gentleness.”
“An effeminate man?”
“God, no-I mean, mature authority in a man, strength-a solid, grown man, not a thoughtless acrobat. I want all the things in a man my husband never had.”
“Did he have anything at all for you, Kathleen?”
“What do you mean?”
“Did he-well, let me get back to the Chapman questions. You never had an orgasm with him. But otherwise-” He paused, then continued. “To what degree did you enjoy the sex act with your husband-very much, somewhat, not very much, not at all?”
“I hated it. I hated every damn minute.”
Her hand trembled as she pushed
the cigarette into the tray, and then fumbled for another.
“Go on,” she said, “go on.”
“No, Kathleen,” he said. “This is foolishness. You’re the one who must go on. I don’t need statistics. Just tell me what really happened, how you felt-that’s all that counts-how you felt.”
She stared at the tea table, drawing steadily on the cigarette. “He came from Korea, this hero-handsomest man on earth-everyone wanted him, and he wanted me. I was flattered silly.” She remembered a moment, and then began again. “We eloped. It was in all the newspapers. I’d never been with another man before him. He’d had a hundred women, but never a love affair, I’m sure. He’d had prostitutes, call girls, camp followers, and, well, just easy girls who were worshipful and wanted it on the record.” She faltered. “I’m trying to explain hirn. I don’t know. From the first night, he did what he wanted for himself, and that was all. I didn’t know what to do, or what was expected of me. And I never had a chance to react. I never reacted. To what? There was no love -only intercourse. He wasn’t inadequate or anything like that. I was the one who was inadequate. I came to despise the time and avoid it. He called me cold, frigid.” She looked up. “Do you know French?”
“Slightly.”
“He had a stock of expressions picked up in bordellos. Femme de glace, he called me once-woman of ice.” She bit her lip. “He kept calling me frigid. He never stopped.”
“Why did he call you that?”
“Because I was frigid, I guess,” she said helplessly. “I guess I was. How could I know? At first, I thought it was his fault. But I wasn’t sure. And he was always sure. And so, finally, I decided that it was my fault. That was after he had died-no, even before, yes, even before, I was beginning to believe it was me. I never felt anything, Paul, and I couldn’t give anything. I don’t mean orgasm. Forget orgasm. I mean, passion, excitement, tenderness, desire-oh, love, just plain love. Eventually, he stopped coming home nights at a stretch. When he was home, I was stiff, I avoided him, I pretended I was tired or ill. Once a month maybe, he’d take me, or I’d let him, when he was drunk, and I was drugged with sleeping pills.”
“Did you try to do anything about it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Seek help?”
“Yes, one month I went to an analyst I’d heard the women discuss. I saw him a dozen times, I think. We just talked. He was always speaking of beautiful women who were inhibited by narcissism-women so much in love with themselves that they had no love left for anyone else-but that wasn’t me, because I never felt beautiful, not even when I was younger. Also, he quoted Stekel at me-unconscious punishment of a man who disappointed-well, maybe unconscious, but I tried consciously in the beginning to give something to Boynton. Then the analyst thought possibly it went back to the time when I was six. The neighbor girl and I always played with our dolls, and one day my mother caught us touching each other-you know-and I was punished. I guess I was always nervous about sexual behavior after that. I remembered, when I was twelve, I think, being ashamed of my breasts, walking hunched-anyway, there was no help from the analyst; he was too formal and unsympathetic, like Boynton in a way, and so I didn’t go back-just lived on and on in the ice palace.”
“And you still think you’re frigid?”
“The night I first met you-just before-a friend of Boynton’s who had been courting me came over and, well, I’d had the interview in my head and was upset about lying and wanted desperately to be normal, so I decided to give him what he wanted, hoping it might be different. I wanted him to take me. I led “him on. But at the last moment I just froze. It was involuntary. I couldn’t help it. I stopped him. He was furious.” She paused. “And you. When I thought you were trying to pet-you saw-I froze again. I
couldn’t control myself. I was afraid. I’m still afraid. You say marriage, and I say, how?”
Paul rubbed the briar of his pipe across the back of his hand. “Kathleen, have you ever had another man?”
“No.”
“How do you know it’s all you then? How can you be sure you’re-well, as you put it, frigid?”
“Because I’m afraid of the act, I don’t enjoy it, I’m not stimulated, it leaves me cold.”
“Have you wanted to sleep with me?”
“Yes,” she said immediately.
“That’s a rather warm emotion. That’s not cold.”
“Oh, yes, when we’re apart, and it doesn’t count. But if I knew it were to happen-“
“You can’t be certain how you’d finally feel. Actually, except in the case of a pelvic disorder, there’s no such thing as frigidity.”
“Please, Paul. I’ve read those ridiculous books.”
“Nevertheless, it’s true. Perhaps thirty-five to forty per cent of all women get little pleasure from intercourse-anesthesia of the vagina, the analysts call it, and it’s not uncommon-and the reasons vary from guilt to fear of pregnancy to some distant psychic trauma. But in every instance, it is not an inherent coldness the woman suffers, something that can’t be overcome, but rather an emotional block that can be worked loose to free the natural warmth down deep inside.”
“You think it’s an emotional block?”
“With you? Possibly. But possibly not. It may have much less to do with you than you think. It could have been your husband, you know. Too often, it is the man’s lack of technique, his poor judgment, his insensitivity, his neuroses, that make the woman unresponsive.” Paul lay down his pipe and looked at her anxious face. “You told me yourself,” he went on, “that you were shy and timid from the start. Had your husband understood this, then or later, and catered to it, you might have gradually begun to respond. But he couldn’t help you because he was ignorant, too. He mistook experience for knowledge, but experience, like common sense, can be a pack of stupid misinformation. And so, to bed. You found him sexually distasteful at once. Emotionally you closed up shop and threw away the key. But, believe me, because ardor and desire are asleep inside you does not mean that they don’t exist.
They’re there, alive, waiting to be freed. But no man, no matter how cherished, can do it without your help. Such prodigies do not exist. I think if you understand how much I love you, how much I love you and want you and need you-there’s no question in my mind that you’ll find the capacity to love me back.”
“But if I don’t-can’t?”
“You will, Kathleen.” He smiled. “End of interview.” He held out his arms. “Come here.”
She went into his arms.
“Now,” he said, “will you marry me?”
Her head was in the safe corner of his shoulder. She turned it upward. “I’ll let you answer for me-after you’ve slept with me.”
“You want me to make love to you first?”
“I want us to make love together.”
“Why, Kathleen? So I can audition you-have a preview?”
She closed her eyes, and he kissed her hard, almost angrily, and then, his heart wildly pounding, with persistent tenderness. Her breasts strained against his chest, and her body arched high in his arms, and her free hand caressed his face.
Briefly, he held her off, and found speech difficult. While he could, he wanted to have her understand. “Kathleen, I love you. But I’ve learned something, too-sex is only one part of love.”
“I want that part now.”
“Why?”
“Because I want you now. I want your sex-and your love-and you.”
“All right,” he said softly “Now, darling, right now.”
Naked and together on her bed, they were joined.
It was still not love, she decided, and never would be. She had not enjoyed a moment of it, and because of this, she knew that he could feel no differently. She had meant to pretend, to at least do that, but this was too important for a lie, and now her heart was heavier than the weight of him above her.
Femme de glace, she had warned him. And now he knew for himself.
Long minutes before-how ma
ny? five? ten?-he had crowned the countless kisses and caresses by entering her. She had wanted him and welcomed him with her mind, but her open thighs had been as rigid and lifeless as planks of wood. Yet, somehow, the desired and dreaded penetration had been effected, mechanically and with hurt, and ever since, she had lain stiffened by fear, knowing that each thrust and withdrawal pushed them further apart.
The guarded awareness of her hateful brain, the unyielding flatness of her shameful nudity, kept captive all response and repelled all rapture.
I told you, I told you, she wanted to scream in mortification. I’m infirm below the neck, infirm and petrified, I’m no good. Why didn’t you believe me? Why must it end this way?
Her eyes were closed to shut out all embarrassment, but from behind the lids, she imagined the stranger whom she loved and yet could not love because he was a man. She was conscious of each movement of his lean, muscular frame, of his lips and hands and loins, of the piercing of her flesh. Why, oh, why did she belong to that branch of living things that mated in this ridiculous, complex way? How did flora procreate, and fish, and birds? Weren’t there some living things that were fertilized by pollen and others that reproduced by splitting themselves into halves? Somewhere she had read-heard-of more sensible means-the tapeworm that possessed both male and female organs and mated with itself; and the oyster, yes, silly oyster, changing from female to male and back again. But this-this exacting complexity-forcing one dignified being to accept a foreign body inside its own? The foolishness of it!
She opened her eyes and stared up at the face she loved, and saw its love for her, and was sorry for what she was and was not. “I’m sorry, Paul,” she whispered. She wanted to say more, but his lips stopped her, and the lingering kiss and touch of his marvelous fingers on her breasts sent a wave of warmth slowly through her. And for miraculous seconds, because he was so precious, her white body became pliant and malleable. For the first time this night, although she hardly realized it, that part of him so deep inside her seemed less intrusive and more pleasurable.
Embracing him, she closed her eyes again and turned her face sideways on the pillow. She ceased to deliberate, allowing her flesh to relish this new contentment. Almost without knowing it, as an act quite apart from her intent, she had relaxed her thighs. A physical transformation, quite uncontrollable, seemed to possess her -the brown nipples of her breasts had swollen to points, and her womb had started to throb, and in her entire body a fierce genii took shape, a form unknown, a lust unknown, now known. Mindless she was, briefly-and then, suddenly angry at her helplessness
(1961) The Chapman Report Page 45