I dress myself calmly and stand above him. The wound is like a red flower pinned to his chest. His eyes are open and unseeing. His arrogance is finally gone. I let the image sink into my mind, set against another of a woman’s pale legs, awkwardly posed, motionless in a field of tall grass, on the first warm day of spring. Quickly it fades away, replaced by darkness, the lapping of river water against a pier. I shudder.
Steeled to my task, I yank the knife from his chest; then the razor-sharp blade severs that part of him that most defined him in life, leaving blood oozing between his legs.
Only then do I fasten my coat, pull the wool cap over my head, and stop to draw my sign upon one bare wall before leaving down the empty halls and into the cool, deserted street.
I am the huntress. Already I am looking for my next trophy.
Praise her, praise Diana.
Chapter Two
On the sidewalk across from the Bloomingdale’s on Lexington Avenue, Judith Frazier sat in a folding chair behind the card table she had set up that Friday morning. She had done this three times a week since her grad school classes had finished for the summer in May. As always, she was wearing old faded jeans, ripped at the knees and tattered at the bottoms of the legs; a wide leather belt, a flannel shirt and over-the-ankle work boots. Her somewhat frizzy, dark hair was held back with a rubber band. Her face was not unattractive, although it showed every one of her 37 years. Whatever. At this stage of her life, no make-up touched her skin, and it never would again.
“Wake up, ladies!” she yelled in a voice that a friend had once compared to the sound gravel makes when caught between concrete and the treads of a bulldozer. She liked the description. But after an hour and half, she was getting hoarse. “Fight back!”
On the card table was a stack of literature and a small plastic container for contributions. Taped to the front of the table was a large piece of poster board to which Judith had pasted a montage of pictures gleaned from various books, magazines and newspapers. On the viewer’s right were works of so-called “art” in which a woman posed naked or semi-naked: the Venus de Milo, Manet’s Dejeuner sur l’Herbe, Rembrandt’s Bathsheba, Rubens’ Rape of the Sabine Women, and scores more by Renoir, Matisse, and Picasso—all of the highest pedigree. As the eye traveled from right to left, these well-known images were mixed with advertisements for perfumes and shoes and makeup and lingerie in which the models wore next to nothing and in most instances were far more suggestive than the naked women in those works of “art.” Next was a selection of little girls from kindergarten on, dressed up like tarts with short skirts, tight tops, lipstick, eyeliner and blush. Toward the center of the poster board were pictures from men’s magazines, beginning with photographs from early Playboy of women lounging invitingly but demurely on a bed or in a chair with shirts unbuttoned, gowns unzipped, skirts raised over abundant pink flesh, breasts exposed but not a trace of pubic hair. Moving the gaze further left, pictures appeared from more recent publications where nothing was left to be imagined: legs open wide, buttocks spread; all orifices gaping, dripping, some filled with objects of various degrees of creativity. Next were the hard-core shots of women bound with ropes, chains, wire, or pieces of their clothing; women blindfolded or gagged; women tied to beds, to chairs, to trees. Finally, there were the headlines, some yellowed with age, others much more recent, from newspapers all over the country and around the world, attesting to rape, torture, clitoral removal, untreated fistulas, ruined youth, wasted beauty, murder.
“Fight back, Ladies!” Judith screamed, and took a sip from a bottle of water.
She spotted a woman in her late twenties walking past the table. It wasn’t the first time Judith had seen her in the past several weeks; no doubt, she worked in a nearby office. Today, she was wearing a crisp white blouse and a red silk skirt that was so skintight Judith could see the outline of her legs and pubic area through it as she approached, and every contour of her rear end as she walked by on six-inch heels. Despite her appearance of grossly exaggerated sexuality, Judith was sure a glimmer of understanding existed deep inside her to be nurtured and awakened, and that she could be saved from the ranks of the robotons who sashayed by every hour, caught in the abyss of male domination.
“You’re a victim, lady! Wake up!” Judith yelled at her.
The woman turned her head slightly and sneered at Judith over her shoulder.
“Fuck you, you crazy bitch.”
“You think I’m crazy!” Judith retorted, her voice rising in pitch and making her throat feel as though it were being rubbed with sandpaper. “You’re the one wearing six-inch heels, honey!”
The woman raised her middle finger over her shoulder.
“And thong underwear! For Christ’s sake, I can see the dimples on your ass and so can every Mr. Pig on this street.”
Judith heard laughter and turned her head swiftly in its direction. Smiles disappeared on the lips of two women and a man.
None of them had the right to laugh at a lost sister. There was nothing funny about this.
“Wake up, Ladies! You’re all oppressed! You’re all just little wind-up dolls for the Mr. Pigs in your pathetic lives. Wake up!”
She took another sip of water and swallowed hard. She would have to quit soon, or she wouldn’t be able to teach her section of Women’s Studies 1001 later that afternoon. She was working on her Master’s thesis under the tutelage of Professor Sheila Majors at Columbia and had defrayed the exorbitant costs of that education by teaching two sections. Before starting that summer, Sheila had made her promise not to get on a soapbox in her classes, and so far Judith had been able to stop herself from saying all that she felt. But in her heart she was sure that her message should be heard, and would be some day. A few of her students had approached her after class for coffee or a beer, to talk. They knew what she represented and also wanted action, not just words.
Suddenly, Judith noticed the woman in a shapeless dress now standing beside her. She was an older woman by the name of Rose who had stopped to “chat” before. It was difficult to tell her age. Over the course of their meetings, Judith noticed that she wore a wig and applied an inordinate amount of eyeliner and lipstick and a thick layer of foundation. White gloves covered her hands. Was she trying to look young?
Rose liked to argue that art had value even with its sexist elements, which enraged Judith. But in deference to Rose’s age, Judith had managed to contain her anger so far. The old woman could be forgiven for being hopelessly out of touch.
“Good morning, Judith,” Rose said. “I brought you something I thought you would find interesting.”
It annoyed Judith when people assumed they knew what she would find interesting. But then she saw Rose place on the table a copy of The Portal, opened to the new section called Femme, where the first chapter of Diana had been printed.
“I have no interest in what Maggie Edwards writes,” Judith said, turning away from Rose and toward the passersby. “Getting There was pornography and demeaning to women. And the same goes for Staying There, I’m very sure. Wake up, Ladies!”
“But this is not the book that the newspaper has been promising for the past two months,” Rose continued with an unusual sense of urgency to her sweet, grandmotherly voice. “Marissa isn’t even in it. And the rumor is that someone at the magazine snuck it in without Harry Lesdock even knowing. It’s very exciting. You must read it.”
“The day I patronize a publication of Harry Lesdock’s is the day the Mr. Pigs of this world start to fly down Lexington Avenue by flapping their arms. I’ll be a salesperson behind the counter of Victoria’s Secret on that day also, Rose. Wake up, Females! You’re oppressed and you haven’t a clue!!”
“I’ll just leave the paper for you,” Rose said gently. She was always giving Judith things to read, like some grade school librarian. “Maybe you’ll look at it later.”
Rose reached into her handbag and pulled out a five-dollar bill folded up to the size of a quarter. She dropped it into the co
ntribution box, which was even emptier than usual that day.
“Thank you, Rose,” Judith said gently. She had a soft spot for the old girl.
“It looks like someone left you a note,” Rose said, pointing.
In the box, Judith saw an index card bent in half. It was the third time this had happened, and she felt her heart begin to beat faster.
“I’ll read it later. Thanks.”
Rose hesitated, head cocked to the side in apparent disappointment, as though it were only right that Judith share the note’s contents with her. Then she started walking away and Judith followed her progress down the street.
The first note had said simply, “Courage! Your time will come.” The second was longer—“Watch for the first Gospel to arrive in The Portal.” Both had been signed with a large letter “D.”
When Rose was out of sight, Judith picked up the new note and opened it. Her hands shook with a joy she seldom felt as she imagined what Sheila would say—what she would think—when she heard.
“The day has come,” the note said. “A new beginning beckons. Blood will be spilled. Praise her, praise Diana.”
“Wake up, Ladies!” Judith screamed now, louder and more raucous than ever. “Wake up!”
She placed the note in her pants pocket, wrapped around the few dollars and loose change that comprised the last two hours’ contributions. Then she folded the copy of The Portal that Rose had left and put it into a folder inside her shoulder bag. She would not have told Rose or anyone else this, but she had already read that exact piece three times and looked forward to a fourth later, in the privacy of her room, in that pre-sleep twilight when all fantasies are free to leap into being.
Effortlessly, Judith could summon up the face that she would substitute for the doomed young man in Maggie’s story. It was a familiar face that she had known for years—a face that smiled down into hers even as he did the unthinkable.
Praise her, praise Diana.
Chapter Three
Jane Larson had promised to meet Maggie at 11:00, but it was past 11:30 by the time she got to the coffee shop on 55th street where her new client waited. That morning’s hearing in Family Court had not gone as planned. At the last possible minute, the husband a/k/a ‘Jerk’ had refused to consent to a protective order which would have barred him from coming anywhere near his girlfriend, the mother of his young child, for 90 days.
“Why should I agree?” he had said, looking soulfully across the room at Jane’s client, Mariana Morales, a slight, pretty woman with short black hair and light brown skin who seemed to shrink visibly as his voice rose. “I didn’t do nothin’.”
“I guess she gave herself that black eye then, Mr. Torres?” Jane retorted with no attempt to disguise her disgust, stepping forward slightly to keep herself physically in line between him and her client. She wasn’t afraid that he would actually attack Mariana, since the court clerk would have knocked him to the floor in a heartbeat. But it seemed that his words, together with his gaze, served as a kind of assault. Her client’s will to proceed was slowly withering. “And did she put those thumb marks on her throat, too? I know the bruises have faded but we took photos, and the photos don’t lie, Your Honor.”
“She lies, Your Honor,” the man said, pointing one blunt finger at Jane. “Ask my Mariana. She don’t want to go ahead with this.”
“Your Honor, he’s scaring her now. It’s obvious.”
“I beg you, Your Honor!” the man had said. “Ask Mariana. I am a police officer of ten years’ standing. I don’t hit women.”
And on and on.
Finally, Jane had convinced the judge to put the matter over for a week and continue the temporary protective order so she could line up her witnesses. She had spent more precious minutes persuading Mariana that she needed to follow through with the case or the abuse would never end. Afterward, Jane had run over to the N train on Broadway and then hurried again from the 55th Street N train stop to the coffee shop where Maggie was sitting at a corner table. At noon they were supposed to be at the offices of The Portal, the New York tabloid that had agreed to serialize Maggie’s book.
This was not the way Jane had hoped that their first in-person client/lawyer meeting would start. She was anxious to impress Maggie. She had met her once briefly when her mother, Martha, had represented her and also knew her tangentially from her recent activities with WPW—Women Protecting Women—the group Martha had formed, but Jane had never personally represented her as a client. She saw this case as an opportunity to branch out into a different area of the law. Since taking over her mother’s practice a year ago, she’d been bogged down in the matrimonial cases that had been Martha’s bread and butter and was beginning to find them suffocating.
Now, with Maggie across from her at a cramped table, Jane tried to project competence and calm, aware of the minutes passing and the noon hour approaching. That morning she had deliberately pulled on her most businesslike gray Brooks Brothers suit, along with a conservative eggshell-colored blouse. Maggie also was well turned out for the event in a dark maroon dress that dipped across her chest and favored her long legs. Her hair was held back in a large barrette decorated with colored rhinestones that matched her eyes. She attracted the gaze of every man who came into the coffee shop.
Jane looked again at the letter that Maggie had received by messenger 24 hours before, imperiously summoning her to the offices of The Portal for a meeting. Her editor, Anthony Paola, would be there; along with the publisher, Harry Lesdock; and Daniel Meyers, the in-house lawyer who had actually written the letter. They were all waiting to hear Maggie explain why she had breached her contract and what she was going to do to remedy the default. They’d flat-out refused Jane’s request that The Portal postpone the meeting, even for an hour.
“Self-important assholes,” Jane muttered.
With a frown, she glanced at the legal pad on which she had been taking notes, then tossed the letter and pad onto the table in front of her.
“Okay, let me see if I have this straight,” Jane said. “Although, frankly, it isn’t that complicated.” She leaned forward with her elbows on the table, pushing her short blond hair back behind her ears. Complementing her Brooks Brothers suit, a pair of large diamonds sparkled in the lobes of her ears and Cole Hahn loafers graced her feet. She’d kept all the trappings of a Wall Street lawyer at a mega firm, although she had left that job description behind to take over her mother’s practice when Martha died. “You entered into a contract with these bastards to serialize a book they wanted to publish in their new weekly magazine, Femme.” She glanced at her notes again, and then back toward Maggie. For a brief moment, when she seemed to wince slightly in sympathy, Jane’s facial resemblance to her late mother Martha was apparent. “The book was supposed to be a follow-up to your earlier book, Getting There. Which is why the new book’s title was Staying There.”
“Correct.”
“Which is a terrible title, I think.”
“I know. But Anthony and Harry wanted the connection to be clear. Getting There was a pretty big success.”
“And Hiroshima was a pretty big explosion.”
Jane glanced at her legal pad again.
“I googled you last night and got ‘findingmaggie.com.’ Is that your web site?”
“No, not mine. Some gay guy set it up a few years ago. Gay men seem to love Getting There. I’ve met him. He’s okay. I post there sometimes.”
“It said you haven’t written anything since Getting There. Is that right?”
“That’s right,” Maggie replied. She shifted in her chair. “Is that important?”
It was a question and a statement. She clearly did not want to defend or explain her life right now.
“Well, it explains why The Portal made that deal with you for such a hefty advance, I suppose. They knew your fans had been waiting for something from you for years. It was a no-brainer for Harry Lesdock. I mean, even the women in my classes at Columbia Law School read Getting There,
although they may have hid their copies. They all wanted to be Marissa—to have guilt-free sex the way a man does, without a second thought.”
“I’m glad you liked it,” Maggie replied, seeming to count as she breathed in an apparent effort to stay calm.
Jane remembered first seeing Maggie on the back cover of Getting There, addressing the camera boldly in a white shirt knotted at the waist and khaki shorts. How could a woman as sexy and talented as Maggie ever be rattled?
“The point is,” Jane continued, “They weren’t looking for just any book from you. They wanted the sequel, the long-awaited sequel. Lots of people commented about it on that web site.”
“And I tried to tell them it might not happen,” Maggie said.
“I saw that too.”
Maggie took another deep breath and held it, then let the air out in a series of short quiet bursts. Her hands rested on the corners of the table and her leg jiggled beneath. She seemed like she had something she wanted to tell Jane but wasn’t yet sure if she could be trusted.
“I could not write Staying There, Jane. I tried in good faith, but I couldn’t. I sat at my computer day after day, staring at a blank screen. I got extensions from Anthony. He’s not a bad guy. He had a pretty good reputation with writers when he was at Bellejour Magazine.”
“Harry Lesdock can ruin anyone.”
“I suppose. In any event, it was no use. I couldn’t do it.”
“Kind of a hard act to follow, huh? Getting There, I mean.”
Maggie stiffened. Once more there was the strong sense that she was holding back something.
“Yes and no. I think a sequel could be done. But Harry Lesdock wanted Marissa as a grown-up with an older woman’s sags and bags—preoccupied with the effects of age on her ability to attract a man, to achieve a new success equal to the young Marissa’s. But I ... I just couldn’t write about Marissa again.”
Praise Her, Praise Diana Page 2