by John Norman
"It is impossible to talk with you," she said. "You are too unenlightened."
"Perhaps," I said. "But one thing, amidst all these complexities, stands out clearly."
"What is that?" she asked.
"That you," I said, "undeniably and nonrepudiably, are an extremely lovely and exciting young woman."
"You are terrible," she said, head down, smiling.
"It is easy to see why the slavers of Gor would be interested in you," I said.
"What a beast you are," she laughed.
I was pleased to see that I had relieved her mind on this issue.
"And your outfit tonight," I said, "like yourself, whether you like it or not, is deliciously feminine."
She looked down at herself. She, without really thinking, smoothed the sheath on her hips. It was a very natural gesture. I supposed slaves might be taught such a gesture. But with Miss Henderson it was totally natural. I found her very exciting. I wondered if there were such things as natural slaves. If there were, I was confident the lovely Miss Henderson would qualify.
"What a hateful and unteachable brute you are," she smiled.
"I have never seen you wear anything really feminine before," I said. "What brought about this sudden change of heart, that perhaps it might be all right for a woman to be just a little bit feminine?"
She put down her head.
"Surely this represents a change," I said.
"Yes, perhaps;" she said. "I do not know."
"You bought this outfit recently, didn't you?" I asked.
"Yes," she said.
"When?" I asked.
"This morning," she said. She looked up, angrily, defensively. "I thought it wouldn't hurt to have something that was just a little bit pretty."
"You are more than just a little bit pretty," I told her.
"Thank you," she said.
"And you are wearing a bit of make-up and eye shadow," I said.
"Yes," she said.
"And perfume," I said.
"Yes," she said. "I truly hope," she said, "that none of those in my department see me as I am now."
"They would deride your attractiveness," I said, "and attempt, in envy, to avenge themselves on you in the department?"
"Yes," she said. "I think so."
"This change in you is sudden," I said. "It has to do with your experiences with the heavy man, who, so to speak, interviewed you, doesn't it, he whom you saw in the apartment?"
She nodded. "Yes," she said. "It is strange. I never felt so feminine as when he ordered me, so complacently, to kneel and serve him."
"It released your femininity?" I asked.
"Yes," she said. "It is so strange. I cannot explain it."
"You had been put under male domination," I said. "For the first time in your life you probably found yourself in a fully natural biological relationship."
"I repudiate your analysis," she said.
"Too, you were sexually aroused," I said.
"How could you know that?" she asked. "I said nothing of that."
"You did not have to," I said. "It was evident in your expressions, your tone of voice, the way you recounted the experience."
"You are hateful," she said, irritably.
"May I help you with your cape?" I asked.
"I can manage it myself," she said.
"Doubtless," I said.
She glanced back at the girl at the hat-check counter. The girl then looked away.
"Yes," she said, clearly, a little more loudly than was necessary, "you may help me with my wrap."
She then stood there quietly, and I, standing behind her, lifted the cape about her shoulders. For an instant, the barest instant, after the cape had settled about her, I rested my hands on her upper arms. In that brief second she knew herself held. Then I had released her. Her body was tense, rigid, defensive. "Do not think to put me in your power," she whispered, angrily. "I will never be in the power of any man." Then she said, clearly, pleasantly, a bit loudly, for the benefit of the girl at the counter, "Thank you."
Then, suddenly, she half moaned. Then she said, delightedly, "Hello, how are you? How nice to see you here!" Introductions were exchanged. I looked at the two horse-like women, in one another's company, a large one and a small one, who had entered. They regarded me, angrily. They beamed on Beverly. "How pretty you are tonight, Beverly," said the larger woman. "It is all right to wear a dress sometimes," said Beverly. "It is a freedom."
"Of course it is," said the larger woman, "don't you worry about it. You look lovely, just lovely." The smaller of the two women said almost nothing. Then they had entered the main dining room, and were being greeted by the head waiter.
"I should never have come here," said Beverly.
"You know them from school?" I asked.
"Yes," said Beverly, "they are in two of my seminars."
"You look ill, miserable," I said. "Do you care, truly, what they think?"
"They are politically powerful in my department," she said, "especially the big one. Even some of my male professors are afraid of them."
"So much for them," I said.
"Many without tenure fear their student evaluations," she said, "and, more importantly, their influence on the evaluations of others. Most of our young male teachers, and female teachers, too, do what is expected of them, and try to please them. They do not wish to lose their positions."
"I'm familiar with that sort of thing," I said. "It is called academic freedom."
She tied the strings of her cape. We then left the restaurant.
"I will hail a taxi," I said.
"I am not really a true woman," she said, outside the restaurant, miserably. "I am too feminine." She looked up at me. "I have tried to fight my femininity," she said. "I have tried to overcome it."
"You could redouble your efforts," I said. "You could try harder."
"I am finished in my department," she said. "They will undermine and destroy me."
"You could transfer to another school," I said, "and start over."
"Perhaps," she said, "but I fear that it is hopeless. It might just begin again. Or the word might be conveyed to the new department that I was not, truly, of the right kind."
"Of the right kind?" I asked.
"Of their kind," she said.
"That of the two women you met in the restaurant?" I asked.
"Yes," she said. "They are so strong and man-like, like men used to be, before."
"Femininity is wrong in a woman, and masculinity in a man?" I asked.
"Of course," she said, "it interferes with personhood."
"But it is all right for women to be masculine and men to be feminine?"
"Yes," she said, "that is all right. Indeed, men must be taught to be gentle, tender and feminine."
"Can you not see," I asked, "that women who wish that of a man are not truly interested in what men happen to be, but want, perhaps, actually not a man but a woman of an unusual sort?"
She looked at me, with horror.
"The thought has an alarming plausibility, doesn't it?" I asked.
"I have never known anyone like you," she said. "You confuse me."
"Frankly," I said, "you are not of their kind, that of the two women in the restaurant you met. You are extremely different. Indeed, most women are extremely different from them. They are not even, truly, women. They are something else, not really women or men. It is little wonder they are so hostile, so filled with hatred, so vicious and bellicose. After centuries of disparagement why should they not now, with a vengeance, set themselves up as models for their sex? Why should they not now, so long denied the world, attempt now through rhetoric and politics to bend it to their designs? Can you blame them? Can you not understand their hatred for women such as you, who seem a veritable biological insult and reproach to their pretensions and projects? You are their enemy, with your beauty and needs, far more than the men they attempt through political power to intimidate and manipulate." I looked at her, angrily. "Your
desirability and beauty," I said, "is a greater threat to them than you can even begin to understand. Their success demands the castigation and suppression of your sort of woman."
"I must not listen to you," she said. "I must be a true woman!"
"I have little doubt that you are more intelligent, and have a greater grasp of reality, than they," I said, "but you will not, in all likelihood, compete successfully with them. You lack their aggressiveness and belligerence, which are probably indexed to an unusual amount, for a woman, of male hormones in their bodies. They will, through their cruelty and assertiveness, crush you in discussion, and, when it is to their purpose, demean and humiliate you."
"I do not even enter into discussion with them," she said. "I am afraid."
"You do not wish to be verbally whipped," I said.
"I do not know what to think," she said.
"Try to understand and interpret your feelings," I said. "Consider the possibility of being true to yourself."
"Perhaps they are really women, only latently so," said the girl.
"Perhaps," I said. I shrugged.
"What is a woman, truly?" she asked, angrily. "A slave?"
I was startled that she had asked this. I looked down at her. She was emotionally overwrought. There were tears in her eyes. I knew that I was supposed to reassure her and deny vehemently what had been suggested in her fantastic question. But I did not reassure her nor deny, as I was expected to, what she had suggested. Indeed, it suddenly struck me as not only strange that she had addressed this question, presumably a rhetorical question to me, but, too, that this was precisely the sort of thing which, for no reason I clearly understood, women of her political persuasion spent a great deal of time, excessively in my mind, denying. I wondered why they should be so concerned, so frequently and intensely, in denying that they were slaves. Why should they feel it necessary to deny this apparently fantastic allegation so often and so desperately?
"Do you think we are slaves?" she demanded.
I looked down at her. She was small and exquisitely beautiful. She wore a bit of lipstick and eye shadow. I could smell her perfume. The whiteness of her breasts, as I could see them, and of her throat, was striking. How marvelously the white sheath concealed and yet suggested her beauty. I wanted to tear it from her.
"Well?" she demanded.
"Perhaps," I said.
She spun away from me, in fury and rage.
I did not speak to her then, but watched her, as she stood, angrily, outside the restaurant.
I considered her. Thoughts slipped through my mind. I wondered what she might look like, her clothing removed, standing on the tiles of a palace.
How strange it then seemed to me that society should ever have developed in such a way that such delicious and desirable creatures should have ever been permitted their freedom. Surely they belonged in steel collars at a man's feet.
She was aware of my eyes on her, but she did not look at me directly. She tossed her head. It was a lovely gesture I thought, of a girl who knew herself inspected, a slave's gesture.
"Are you going to apologize?" she asked.
"For what?" I asked.
"For saying that I might be a slave," she said.
"Oh," I said. "No," I said.
"I hate you," she said.
"All right," I said. I continued to regard her, her clothing removed in my mind. I tried, in my mind, various sorts of collars and chains on her.
"You are a rude and hateful person," she said.
"I'm sorry," I said. I then considered how she might look in a market.
At last she turned to face me, angrily. "What are you thinking about?" she asked.
"I was considering how you might look on a slave block," I said, "being exhibited by an auctioneer who knew his business."
"How dare you say such a thing!" she cried.
"You asked me what I was thinking," I said.
"You needn't have told me," she said.
"You would prefer dishonesty?" I asked.
"You are the most hateful person I have ever met," she said.
"I'm sorry," I said.
She walked angrily to confront me, but then she looked away.
"I do not see any cabs," she said.
"No," I said.
She turned to face me.
"Was I pretty?" she asked.
"When?" I asked.
"In your imagination," she said, archly.
"Sensational," I said.
She smiled. "How was I dressed?" she asked.
"You were exhibited naked," I told her, "as women are sold."
"Oh," she said.
"If it is any comfort," I said, "your wrists were joined by a long length of chain. The auctioneer showed you off with a whip."
"With a whip?" she asked, shuddering.
"Yes," I said.
"Then I would have had to obey him, wouldn't I?" she asked.
"You did obey him," I said.
"Perfectly?" she asked.
"Perfectly," I said.
"If I had not, he would have used the whip, wouldn't he?"
"Of course," I said.
"Then it was wise of me to obey."
"I would suppose so," I said.
"I was pretty?" she asked.
"Marvelously exciting and beautiful," I said.
She blushed, and smiled. How feminine she was.
"Jason," she said.
"Yes," I said.
"Would you have bought me?"
"What else was for sale?" I asked, smiling.
She struck me with sudden fury and my face stung. "Hateful monster!" she said.
She turned angrily away from me.
"I am not a slave!" she said. "I am not a slave!"
At this point I noticed that a car's headlights went on. It had been parked down the street about a block away. It had been there for some time.
"Hey!" I called, raising my arm, suddenly seeing that, as it approached, it was a cab.
The cab pulled to the curb.
"I will take you home," I said.
"It is not necessary," she said. She was angry, distressed, upset.
The driver came about and opened the back door on the right.
"I have been very rude," I said. "I'm really sorry. I did not mean to upset you."
She did not even look at the driver. "I'm not one of those females you have to patronize," she said. "I am a true woman."
She climbed angrily, distressed, into the cab. The glimpse of her ankle was exciting. I forced from my mind the thought that its lovely slimness would look well inclosed in a loop and ring.
"Please give me an opportunity to apologize," I begged. I was, myself, suddenly upset. I realized that she might be angry, and might not see me again. I could not bear the thought of losing her in this fashion. I had admired and desired her from afar for months. Then tonight we had met, and talked. I found her irresistibly attractive. "Please let me apologize," I begged. "I was thoughtless and rude."
"Don't bother," she said.
"Please, please," I said.
"It is not necessary," she said, icily.
I was miserable. She was an intelligent woman. How offended she must have been by my foolish audacity. How scandalized she must have been by the pretensions of my boorish and foolish masculinity. Did I not care for her feelings? Did I not respect her mind? How tiresome and obnoxious she must have found my inopportune and unorthodox views.
Surely there was still time to change them, to please her. I hoped that I had not ruined everything that might have been between us. Was I not strong enough to be solicitous, sweet, gentle, tender and feminine? I hoped she would still like me, that she could still permit me a chance to try to please her.
I realized then, with a force I had not felt before, probably because I had not found a woman so exciting as she before, that, in this society, men must strive to please women, that they must, if they wish to relate to them, be and do exactly what the women wish and require, else the wome
n will simply remain aloof. The women, now, were of a whole new breed, somehow magically different from all women of the past, free and independent. It was they who would set their terms, and it was the men who would, if they wished to know them, comply with their wishes. But was this not all right? Surely women have a right to demand that men comply precisely with their wishes. If the men do not do so, the women simply need have nothing to do with them. In my society it was women who called the tune, and the men who would have to dance. If the women, for some reason, wished us to be just like women then we would have to do our best to be just like women. They could decide matters, by the device of granting or withholding their favors.
"Please," I begged.
"You are despicable," she said.
"Please forgive me," I begged.
The driver went to close the door. "Wait," I said to him. I held the door open. For some reason, it seemed, he wished for me to remain outside the cab. He did not ask me if I were getting in, or accompanying the lady. It seemed he wished to be on his way, leaving me behind. I did not understand this, but I did not stop to consider it.
"Please, Miss Henderson," I said. "I know I must have truly offended you. For this I am extremely sorry." I was thinking quickly. "But it is late now, and it may be hard to find another cab. If you will not let me take you home, let me, at least, share the cab, so I can get back to my apartment without a great deal of inconvenience."
The driver reacted irritably. I did not understand this. It seemed to me in his best interest to have an extra fare.
"All right," she said, looking straight ahead, "get in."
I entered the cab. The driver shut the door, it seemed to me a bit angrily.
Miss Henderson and I sat side by side in the cab, not speaking.
The driver went around the cab. In a moment he had slipped behind the wheel.
We then gave him the addresses. Miss Henderson lived closer to the restaurant than I. Although the driver was not facing us I could tell that he reacted angrily when I gave him my address, which was farther from the restaurant. His irritation made no sense to me. What difference could it make which fare was let off first? He seemed a surly fellow, Too, he was a large man.
"I am sorry, Miss Henderson," I said.
"That's all right," she said, not looking at me.
In the top of the seat in front of us, that against which the driver's back rested, there was a long, lateral slot. In the top of the cab, interestingly, there was a similar slot. The slot was about an inch in width.