by John Norman
“But you do not think she is a slave?” asked Brenner.
“No,” said Rodriguez. “Are you disappointed?”
“Of course not!” said Brenner.
“The second reason, or second main reason,” said Rodriguez, “that I doubt that she is a slave is because this is Company Station, and it is highly unlikely that they would have slaves here. The company, you see, like many of the companies, at least in public matters, must maintain its image, on the home world and similar worlds.”
“I see,” said Brenner.
“It would scarcely do for the company to be discovered to be keeping slaves here,” said Rodriguez. “Think of the political embarrassment, and the leverage this might provide competitive companies.”
“I understand,” said Brenner.
“The company, however, doubtless keeps slaves one place or another,” he said, “in one out-of-the-way place or another, perhaps on vacation worlds, or resort worlds, such places, for their executives, or something along those lines. Too, of course, the company does have holdings on several worlds, even strong worlds, where there are slaves, and who is to say on such worlds to whom those slaves, in one holding or another, belong. Too, it is rumored that the company, and other companies as well, here and there, do dabble in the slave trade, that they capture or buy such merchandise, that they transport it, train it and sell it, such things.”
Brenner was silent.
“The Serian girls, the little blue beauties, are mostly bred now, of course,” he said.
“Like cattle?” asked Brenner.
“If you like,” said Rodriguez. “But they are, of course, also educated and trained.”
Brenner was silent.
“Some companies are doing this, here and there,” said Rodriguez, “with women of our species.”
Brenner looked at him, aghast.
“Yes,” said Rodriguez.
“But what of the woman we just saw?” asked Brenner. “What is she?”
“I would guess,” said Rodriguez. “That she is either a convict, or a delinquent assignee, or, more likely, a contract slut.”
“What?” asked Brenner.
“A woman who is contracted,” said Rodriguez. “This can come about in a number of ways. For example, she may have been subjected to contract in virtue of incurred debts, or she may have contracted herself for a certain fee, for a certain time, or this may have been done to her by a reformatory board, or a correctional board, many things. Her contract can be bought and sold and she, with the contract, passes from one hand to another.”
“And what are her duties for the contract holder,” asked Brenner.
“Whatever he wishes,” he said. “He holds the contract.”
“When does the contract expire?” asked Brenner.
“Normally when it is paid off,” said Rodriguez, “but, as she is considered a free woman, and is usually charged for her board and such, things are usually arranged in such a way that she cannot pay it off.”
“Then she is in effect a slave?” said Brenner.
“Her contract might be purchased by someone, who pays it off for her,” said Rodriguez.
“Is that likely?” asked Brenner.
“Not at all,” said Rodriguez.
“What is the usual outcome?” asked Brenner.
“The usual outcome?” he asked.
“Yes,” said Brenner.
“Usually, on one world or another, sooner or later, they find themselves reduced to bondage.”
“They become full slaves?”
“Exactly,” said Rodriguez.
“I see,” said Brenner.
“The hostel is ahead,” said Rodriguez, who had by now caught his breath.
“I thought you were looking for a bar,” said Brenner.
“I don’t see one, do you?” said Rodriguez.
“No,” said Brenner, making certain that he did not look too carefully.
“Let’s check in, and change our clothes,” said Rodriguez. “I want a shower. I want to be warm and dry. Then we can go out again.”
You can go out again, thought Brenner. I will stay in the hostel. He did not find Company Station an inviting locus for ambulatory peregrinations.
“The bars are probably off the main street,” said Rodriguez. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” said Brenner. To be sure, he still seemed short of breath. Too, his heart was pounding, and he was in a state of agitation, perhaps from his encounter with the young woman and his conversation with Rodriguez, or perhaps from the normal adjustments involved in adapting from the weightlessness, or comparative weightlessness, of the ship to the gravity of a world. In such a transition one recovers a sense of the cubic content, the weight, the reality, of one’s body, which, of course, after a period of adjustment, is forgotten.
Brenner then, bag in hand, trying to keep his footing in the mud, squinting his eyes against the precipitation, now again a drizzle, followed Rodriguez toward the double doors of the hostel, some two hundred yards, or so, down the street. He looked up once at the overhead tracks, which were now unburdened by cargos. The ship, he assumed, would have left by now. They had come to Company Station, on Abydos. There would not be another ship for months. Through the glassed paneling of the hostel’s doors shone a welcome illumination. Too, as they approached the building, the sign was lit. Doubtless this was a coincidence, and constituted no more than a belated concession to the misery and darkness of the day, but it cheered Brenner.
Chapter 4
“Do not be disturbed,” said Rodriguez. “It is merely that you have not seen women of your species in this way before.”
Brenner did not dare to look down at her, to where she knelt beside him, as he stood at the bar. Her hands were on his left leg. Her head was down, her cheek pressed against his thigh.
“Get away,” he hissed to her.
The bartender, a zard from Damascus, a life form thought by many to be related to that of the captain of the freighter, though smaller and more upright in carriage, looked up from where, a few feet away, behind the bar, he was polishing glasses. The relationship of the zard to the species of the captain, incidentally, despite popular conjectures on the subject, is regarded as improbable by most zoologists, given the diversity of worlds and the timing of certain technological developments on these worlds, in particular, their attainments of interstellar flight capabilities. These zoologists tend to attribute the resemblance to the parameters of convergent evolution which, to be sure, has apparently produced numerous resembling species throughout the galaxy. The subject, however, remains open, even in learned circles, because of the unusual similarities of microscopic genetic structures between the two species. Too, it is obvious that a third species, which had, in the remote past, and perhaps even one now extinct and lapsed from notice in galactic records, which did possess interstellar capabilities, might have been involved, for example, in settling certain specimens of a primitive species on a different world, on which world, over periods of time, these specimens, wending their own ways, would develop into a new variety of the old species, or, if one likes, into a new species. Certain crossings between zards and others, for example, of the captain’s species, had proven fertile. The problems, of course, had to do with probabilities in such matters. In spite of the fact that life forms on diverse worlds often bore remarkable similarities to one another, presumably because of resembling adaptations to frequently similar ecological niches, the chances of crossfertility between diverse species tended to be calculated in the millions to one. It is possible, of course, that that million, or millions, to one chance might obtain. Too, of course, a sufficiently advanced life form, might be able, through chemical and physical alterations in genetic materials, deletions, additions, and such, to produce hybrid forms. Much progress had been made, for example, in developing new agricultural products along these lines. Needless to say, animal husbandry had also profited. In general, in speaking of adaptations, and adaptational advantages, intelligence, or rationality,
tended to be extremely common in the galaxy. It is difficult not to acknowledge the obvious value of this adaptational device. It is interesting to note, incidentally, that normally only one such form, one such rational form, tended to be found on undisturbed worlds, that form which, it seems, in one way or another, overcame its rivals. Rationality, you see, is not always conjoined with kindliness and tolerance; it may be as often conjoined with fanaticism and ruthlessness; rational species which did not, at least in some point in their development, practice the principles of priority and tyranny, tended on the whole to disappear or, at least, to have their numbers controlled by the dominant species. Only in current times, with a plurality of worlds, and available room for expansion, at this point in history, and the balances of power between certain species, and the advantages to be obtained from commercial and technological exchanges, it seems, did clearly diverse rational species set about the business of tolerating one another’s existence. The zards, incidentally, were the dominant life form on Damascus, though other life forms, in diverse menial and servile capacities, were permitted amongst them. Their reputation in this portion of the galaxy was to the effect that they were shrewd businessmen, or creatures, that one must be wary of bargaining with them, and that their word was not to be overly trusted. They tended, on the whole, to be an aggressive, commercially active species. Whereas one could commonly count on them being civil and polite in the pursuit of business, and sometimes even ingratiating and obsequious with prospective clients or customers, they had a general reputation, it must be admitted, outside of interspecific transactions to their advantage, of being severe to inferior life forms.
“Easy,” said Rodriguez to Brenner.
Brenner turned a bit away from the girl, to his right. He did not wish her to see the effect on his body of her proximity.
“If you do not want her there,” said Rodriguez, “cuff her away. She will crawl back, but probably keeping out of your reach.”
“This is a human female,” whispered Brenner to Rodriguez.
“Do not demean her,” said Rodriguez.
“How could she be more demeaned than she is?” asked Brenner.
“Drink your drink,” said Rodriguez.
Brenner, unsteadily, almost tipping the glass, reached for the drink.
He glanced at the bartender, who then looked away, continuing to dry the glasses.
The young woman did not release his leg, and she kept her cheek pressed against his thigh. She seemed frightened.
Brenner also glanced to his right, and back, well beyond Rodriguez at the bar, to a counterlike desk near the rear of the room, behind which sat the proprietor of the establishment, like the bartender, a zard. This desk, near the rear of the room, not far from a beaded curtain to its right, as Brenner looked at it, was set well back from the main floor with the small tables, and, at one side, booths. Near some of these booths, and tables, rings were set in the floor. Rodriguez and Brenner, perhaps because of the hour and weather, were at this time the only customers in the establishment. The proprietor looked at Brenner, and then returned his attention to the papers before him. On the top of the desk, at hand, so to speak, lay a stout, two-foot-long leather quirt. The young woman who knelt beside him was the second woman who had been summoned forth, through the curtain, the first a blonde, to hasten to the bar, by two blows of that quirt on the top of the desk, loud, sharp, and resounding blows, almost like the reports of primitive firearms.
Then Brenner had his hand on the glass, and, slowly, deliberately, in misery, as steadily as he could, took a tiny sip. It was a cheap cooler, flavored with imported citarine extract. The bartender, if Brenner had not been mistaken, had served it with a certain contempt. Rodriguez was nursing a glass of Heimat, for which he had a taste.
“I cannot have this person in this position,” said Brenner.
“She is a female,” said Rodriguez. “If you would look at her, you might notice that.”
“I cannot have this young woman in this position,” said Brenner.
“Call her a “girl,”” said Rodriguez.
Brenner looked at him, angrily.
“She is a girl,” said Rodriguez.
“Rodriguez,” protested Brenner, half under his breath.
“She is pretty enough, and menial enough, to be a girl,” said Rodriguez. “And considering her status, there is no doubt about it. She is a girl.”
Brenner looked away, angrily. Too, he was worried. He recalled the first woman, the blonde. She had hurried forth from behind the curtain, in response to the signal, but then, for the merest instant, had stopped. She had regarded them. She had seemed startled, and then flushed, as though with sudden hope. Her hand had gone, seemingly inadvertently, to the narrow, silken sash of her garment, tight about her waist, but then she had jerked it away, frightened. She had looked to the proprietor, and the bartender. Neither, it seemed, was paying her attention. Of course, she had responded to the signal. Neither, too, then, would have observed her tiny, arrested, furtive movement, that of her hand near her sash. She then gathered herself together, and smoothed down the sides of her brief garment. On her left ankle was a small chain. Attached to it was a tiny disk. She had then approached them in a manner which might have made Brenner cry out in protest and desire, on all fours, had he had not detected something of falsity in it. Before Brenner and Rodriguez, Brenner surmised, she was, in effect, acting. This was to be a secret between the three of them, to be kept from the zards. Surely Rodriguez, too, with his perceptiveness, had noticed these things. “Sirs?” she had then asked, kneeling before Rodriguez, whom she naturally took to be first amongst them. He looked at her, and she looked puzzled, and then she smiled, knowingly, and spread her knees more widely. This, too, Brenner gathered was to be a part of the secret. He had to look away from her, as it disturbed him to see her as she was garmented, and in her current attitude. Such things made his blood scream with need. In a moment or two, he could look back, as the woman had withdrawn, Rodriguez having ordered, the food to be brought to one of the tables. Brenner was hungry, as they had not eaten since this morning on the ship. A few moments later the quirt had struck down twice again on the desk, suddenly, loudly, sharply, the sounds startling Brenner, and the second woman, a brunette, had come forth, and quickly. There had been no doubt whatsoever as to her prompt response to the signal. Then she, too, as had the other woman, had stopped. Then, angrily, she had dropped to her knees and, in a moment, as Brenner supposed she was expected to do, head down, approached them on all fours. Although she was angry, resentful, frustrated, she was not like the other woman. This one, before them, was truly on all fours.
Then she was before Brenner, and put her head down, and kissed his boots, first the left and then the right, and then knelt near him, holding to his leg, and putting her cheek close to, and then against, his leg. He had tried to draw back, but she had kept close to him. She seemed angry, but frightened, too. It was then that he ordered her away from him. She had not, of course, as we recall, surrendered her position. Brenner, putting down his drink, was in consternation. He had never seen women like this before, of course, or known they could be like this, except perhaps in his dreams. But it had not occurred to him that the substance of such dreams might be founded on realities, to be sure, realities which he had not himself experienced. These things, then, as actualities, not as dreams, were revelations to him. He had not really understood that females could be such, or that there might be places where they were such. To be sure, he had heard of such things, as, for example, having a woman at one’s feet, but, as is well understood, to hear of having one there is one thing, and to have one there, in actuality, is quite another. Brenner wanted to scream, to cry out with exultant joy, but instead he had ordered her to withdraw, with which command, as we noted, she did not comply, but only clung to his leg the more closely.
The proprietor, back at the desk, stood up, sliding his chair, or seating device, a rather heavy, stable object, cut in such a way as to accommodate
his tail, backward on the wooden floor. He then came about the side of the desk. Although the girl had not turned to see, she had undoubtedly heard the movement of the chair, or seating device. Brenner felt her cheek press more closely against his thigh. Her small hands held him more closely, too. He noted that the zard, in leaving the desk, had picked up the quirt. But he had done so, as far as Brenner could tell, as much as a matter of habit as anything else. The zard, in its soiled, pocketed apron, was now moving toward them, with its characteristic, stalking gait. It was of average height for a zard, which was some seven Commonworld feet in height, a foot or so taller than either Rodriguez or Brenner. Brenner could mark its approach, its measured steps, the heel pads of its rear legs making contact with the floor first, and then its claws. Brenner felt the girl now press even more closely against him, and hold even more closely to his leg. She seemed to be very afraid. Then the steps passed them, as the zard, apparently not even noticing them, or being concerned with them, went to the door of the establishment, and, stretching his neck a little, peered out into the night. Outside the paneling of the door one could see the rain in the light of the establishment’s sign. Then, in a moment or so, the zard turned about, and stalked back to his desk. The night was not a good one for business in Company Station.
The girl drew back a little, but kept her cheek in contact with his thigh, her head down. Too, she held to his leg, as before. Brenner could not forget the feel of her body, the softness of it as it had been pressed so closely against him in the girl’s terror, her apparent fear of the proprietor, that unspeakable, luscious softness which was doubtless intended to be betrayed by the bit of yellow silk she wore. How that softness had alarmed him, and disturbed him!
Brenner took another drink, angrily.
He was furious that he had agreed to come with Rodriguez. He had originally resolved to remain in the hostel. He realized now he should have done so. Too, he could have gotten something to eat there. But he had decided not to remain there. He had been afraid to stay there, not that there was any real danger. And he had certainly been pleased to follow Rodriguez to the hostel. The day had been, as it remained, chilly, and what with the rain, and enough wind to drive the chill through one’s jacket, he had been miserable. When Rodriguez and he, soaked and cold, with their bags, had entered the hostel, he had seen, behind, and above, the desk, squatting in a large ring, suspended on a chain hung from the ceiling, a small, large-eyed, furred creature. He had originally taken this to be a pet of some sort but it had swung down from the ring to the desk, and, in a bit, had welcomed and registered them. Shortly thereafter, too, it had with one small, prehensile, black-toed foot, punched a bell, in response to which a large, shambling, slothlike creature hove into view, who seized up their bags and began to ascend the stairs. Ascending rings hung to one side, for the use of those who might prefer them to the stairs. The stairs were broad, and coarsely carpeted, to accommodate various sorts of grasping or locomotory appendages. The desk clerk, if Rodriguez was right in his identification, as it seemed probable he would be, was a Chian lemet, whereas the porter, if we may call him that, was a hirsute, three-toed veripus, an unpleasant creature of unusual strength, thought to have been originally native to Pergamum. Before one forms any possible contempt for either of these species, however, it is well to keep in mind that both life forms had independently, long ago, achieved interstellar capability, a feat which the species of Rodriguez and Brenner, presumably because of various historical reasons, had never managed. In the hallway, leading to their room, Rodriguez and Brenner passed a female of their species, who was standing near a cart. On a projection at one end of the cart, and within two containing rails, one lower and one higher, were some cleaning implements, brooms of various sorts, dustpans, one long-handled and one short-handled, and, standing in a pail of liquid, a mop. The top two shelves of the cart were laden with various objects, implements and supplies. Amongst these were brushes of various sorts, and cans and bottles, filled with various substances serviceable for cleaning and polishing. There were also such things as toiletries, bars of soap, and such. There were also, folded neatly, assortments of clean linen, sheets and such. Two blankets were also in evidence. The lower portion of the cart back from the projection, contained a hamper, in which crumpled sheets could be seen, and another container in which might be seen such things as discarded paper and the remnants of packagings of various sorts. At one side of the hall, not on the cart, was a vacuum cleaner. The woman lowered her head as they passed. She was wearing that form of garment which Rodriguez had reminded him was called a “dress.” It was rather stiff, and was presumably starched. It was of two colors, basically tan, but trimmed with white at the collar and at the borders of the short sleeves. Brenner had seldom seen a woman’s arms, as home-world proprieties had required that those small, lovely, rounded limbs should be concealed. Naturally that her arms were bared disturbed him. The dress, too, far worse, came slightly above her knees. This, too, disturbed Brenner, and even more than the baring of her arms, for the home-world proprieties were even sterner with respect to the baring of a woman’s legs, perhaps because this was thought to lead even more swiftly to lewd thoughts of mysterious, sacrosanct secrecies. Such things, the baring of arms and, even more, the baring of legs, were thought to demean her personness, which was apparently regarded by many as being incompatible with having a body, or, at least, an interesting, attractive one. The porter, for we shall speak of him as that, as he passed her, paid her no attention. Brenner noticed that the woman was barefoot, as had been the woman with whom he had so inadvertently and unfortunately collided earlier in the day, she who had been so angry. But about the ankle of this woman, the left ankle, was a small, sturdy chain, doubtless a decoration of some sort. She had apparently fastened this on herself with some sort of short, thick, cylindrical lock. Completing the decoration, about an inch in diameter, was a small, flat, circular metal disk, itself fastened into one of the links. This unpretentious little getup at the ankle seemed to Brenner an unusual sort of ornament, particularly in its plainness and sturdiness, but he did admit it was attractive.