Stories

by Susan Sontag

  As day followed night, which was followed by day, all spent in riotous pleasures, Miss Flatface sometimes wondered if she still deserved her name. But Mr. Obscenity proved a stern taskmaster. He would not allow her near a mirror. He refused to answer any questions about her appearance, her talents, or her destiny.

  Never once did she think of her mother, the widow of a railroad engineer and now living in St. Louis, not even to the extent of wishing to send her a postcard. Occasionally, very occasionally, she thought of Jim and the three children. Had he sold the Oldsmobile, she wondered; he wouldn’t need two cars. But there was no turning back.

  “You have some power,” she said to Mr. Obscenity one day. “But why are people afraid of you?” The spirits of Henry Adams and Stephen Crane whispered hoarsely in her ears, beckoning and forbidding. Surely it wasn’t forbidden to ask questions? Not in a free country.

  “I mean, how did you get Jim to let me go so easy?”

  Mr. Obscenity, plunged deep in Miss Flatface, did not reply. He merely placed a pillow over her animated visage.

  She flung off the pillow. “And Honest Abe?” she said, looking up into his calm faraway eyes. “Why was he afraid of you?” Still no answer. “He’s bigger—I mean taller—than you.”

  Mr. Obscenity continued to leaf, as it were, through her body. A gale, premonitory of something, had just come up. Somewhere a shutter was banging against a wall.

  Miss Flatface’s attention began to wander. She watched a fly sipping at a puddle of cold coffee on the night table. Next, the label on Mr. Obscenity’s new tan jodhpurs, bunched on the floor, caught her eye. Then she wondered if Mr. Obscenity had any trouble getting listed in the telephone book.

  “Pay attention,” he barked, withdrawing from Miss Flatface, turning on his side and lightly dusting her torso with sugar.

  “I am.”

  “Don’t contradict me. You aren’t.”

  “Well, what if I do think of other things? Who says I have to think about it all the time? Doesn’t thinking spoil it anyway?”

  “Look,” he said, “this isn’t a eurhythmic exercise.”

  “Well, I don’t know what that means,” she said self-righteously, “but I know it isn’t supposed to be hard labor either.”

  “Don’t play innocent with me! I don’t have all these people parked here for nothing.”

  Above the buzzing of flies about her breasts, Miss Flatface tuned in on a chorus of raspy breathing. In the hallway just beyond the open door, four Air Force lieutenants appeared to be playing bridge.

  “I didn’t see them,” she protested.

  Mr. Obscenity grunted.

  “Honest I didn’t.”

  “I bet you were a fussy eater when you were a kid,” muttered Mr. Obscenity.

  “No, really—”

  Mr. Obscenity replaced the pillow. Miss Flatface resigned herself to pleasure. She would ask her questions another time.

  “How do you like this life?” Mr. Obscenity deigned to inquire one afternoon in a muffled voice while nuzzling between Miss Flatface’s legs.

  “Gosh,” she exclaimed, “I never imagined life could be like this!”

  “Want to continue to live like this?” he asked.

  “Sure!” Since childhood, Miss Flatface had always said “Sure!” when she wasn’t. “Who’d want to live different? I can hardly imagine it,” she went on, with a tremor of anxiety at this untimely chain of consecutive words.

  “Ah my dear,” sighed Mr. Obscenity, sitting upright amid the damp, rumpled sheets and patting Miss Flatface on the thigh. “I’m afraid you’ve had it. One must never think that no other life than this is possible. All other lives are imaginable, possible, even probable.”

  “What have I done?” she cried, dismayed to see that he had inserted his monocle in the socket of his left eye. Mr. Obscenity never removed his monocle except when engaged in the most profound carnal inquiry.

  “Unless you wish to risk your life in one of the most picturesque exploits known to man—an orgy with no holds barred—I’m going to send you on your way. With references, of course. And some cash to see you through your first week.”

  An orgy with no holds barred? Drugs? Instruments of torture? Perversions? Artificial phalluses three feet long? She bowed her head in thought. The spirits of William James and Fatty Arbuckle whispered hoarsely in her ears, beckoning and forbidding. Mr. Obscenity drummed an indecipherable tune on her belly with his fingertips, waiting for her to come to a decision.

  She was a brave girl, but not that brave. One sought an education in order to use it. She had not left Jim to die but to live. For Miss Flatface there was a limit, even to voluptuousness. Innocent as she might be, despite all she’d experienced, she had some sense of her own worth.

  “Want to flip a coin?” said Mr. Obscenity, languidly sketching with a soft orange lipstick the outline of her pudenda in the vicinity of Miss Flatface’s navel.

  “Don’t bother. I’ll go,” she said.

  Someone put a dime in the jukebox. “Anyone Who Had a Heart,” thought Miss Flatface, “Would Love Me.” Mr. Obscenity whisked a mirror from his pocket and began preening himself. First he inspected the insides of his nostrils, then punched his midriff for signs of flabbiness. Miss Flatface had never felt so let down in all her life. Suddenly she felt terribly, terribly alone.

  Yet Miss Flatface knew she was not alone in this place. There were other young American women here, in the charge of other educators like Mr. Obscenity. Just possibly they might be all in the charge of Mr. Obscenity himself. Miss Flatface preferred not to think about that.

  All houses by the ocean are damp, and it was getting on to winter now. Workmen came trooping through her room; buckets of paint, stiff abandoned brushes, rollers, cans of turpentine, and huge rough paint-encrusted ladders lay about, adding to the confusion. The premises were being renovated. Miss Flatface gave way to a profound gloom.

  Days went by without a glimpse of Mr. Obscenity. Miss Flatface tried to recall everything she owed him. At first she supposed that her tantrum was desire. It wasn’t that. Not being of a grateful disposition, what Miss Flatface craved was revenge. She even had a plan. She would persuade some of the other boarders to leave with her. Then Mr. Obscenity would regret the whim that had prompted him to decree her expulsion.

  Whom would she take? Only women, she decided. Dragging men along would make it too complicated. Miss Flatface had never thought of herself as a feminist before—certainly not when she had been Jim’s wife and the mother of three. But now she felt the tug of sex loyalty. The spirits of Edith Wharton and Ethel Rosenberg whispered hoarsely in her ears, beckoning and forbidding.

  Or was it that?

  That very night, looking a bit slovenly in her blue flowered wrap-around housecoat, she crept about the drafty corridors, listening and, whenever she could, watching at keyholes. Scenes of aching delight assaulted her senses. Was this the Eden she was losing? Then no one else should have it either.

  In the hall she accosted a dark-haired hoyden wearing nothing but a beige trench coat.

  “You look like you can be trusted,” said Miss Flatface cheerfully. “And I’m clearing out of here—I mean, I’ve had enough. How about coming with me? Wouldn’t you like to bathe in the ocean, or ride The Hurricane? You know, do whatever you want and not have to be taking down your bloomers all the time?”

  Quick as a flash, the girl reached under her coat and pulled out a dark metal object. A gun? Miss Flatface drew back in terror. No, a camera. The girl laid the cold instrument to her eye and rapidly snapped nine close-ups of her astonished companion.

  “These can be developed by morning,” said the girl. “I’ll send you copies, if you want ’em.”

  “But what for?” cried Miss Flatface, realizing that her conspiracy was not even getting off the ground.

  “They’re for my album.” Noting Miss Flatface’s uncomprehending stare, she added, “My collection.”

  “Your collection?”

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sp; “For Soc. 1046y, Marriage & the Family,” replied the girl. “A research project for my junior year. Four credits.”

  Although mystified, Miss Flatface now grasped enough to confirm her suspicion that this place was not the haven of spontaneous misrule it might appear. How else explain this girl, a crisp secretarial type, who probably took dictation at some phenomenal speed? Miss Flatface felt like a frump.

  The girl bared her large white teeth in a smile, then glided down the corridor.

  “Wait,” called Miss Flatface. “I would like a picture. I mean, so I can see what I look like in it.”

  “Why not,” said the girl. “Tomorrow morning. And I won’t use your name. Everyone is anonymous, you know. It makes the project more scientific.”

  Scientific! There’s an idea! Why hadn’t she thought of that before? Every large institution requires great machines, and this one couldn’t be different. All she had to do was to get control of the machinery. That’s what a revolution is. Not simply using force, but seizing the tools of power. Miss Flatface hastened to the boiler room. The floor had recently been under water, piles of moldy soaked books were precariously balanced on top of orange crates, and the stench of urine was distracting. But the only machinery she found was a row of television screens, each carrying a different image, topped by a single screen which repeated one or another image from the row. Below the screens was a large prickly table studded with switches and buttons and dials and levers; and before that table, operating the panel and sporting a set of earphones, sat a bulky figure wearing a white plastic hood.

  “Mr. Obscenity,” she whispered, fearing the worst and preferring immediate censure to suspense.

  Instead of turning, the figure convulsively manipulated some dials. The image on the master screen changed from a roller derby to a woman, legs agape, in the last stages of childbirth. Demoted, the roller derby continued as one of the images on the row beneath.

  “Please tell me who you are. I know I shouldn’t be here.”

  Competing with all these images, Miss Flatface feared she would never get an answer. The figure in the white hood threw a switch. A bald, toothy state governor addressing a Shriners’ convention was promoted from the row to the master screen, and the anguished mother-to-be seemed much calmer alongside the roller derby. The political speech lasted a few moments. It was erased by the image Miss Flatface had had her eye on from the beginning—a delightful erotic scene between two women and a Nisei youth with an enormous erection.

  Making an effort, Miss Flatface wrenched her glance from the master screen.

  “Mr. Obscenity, I love you.” This was a feckless lie.

  A commercial for a new roll-on deodorant blanked out the erotic scene. The impassive figure turned, its attention for the moment released. Miss Flatface, tremblingly, undid her blue flowered housecoat, yearning to seduce. So far so good: now she had the attention of the eyes (which were all of the hooded face she could see) quite to herself. A hand reached toward her clammy thighs, a hand that seemed more slender than Mr. Obscenity’s.

  “Yes, yes,” she cried, leaning toward the hand.

  But at that very moment the commercial ended, and the Nisei youth and the two women resumed their sport. The hooded technician’s delicate hand hovered in midair, suspended between Miss Flatface and the instrument panel. Seconds that seemed like hours passed. Then the machine won: the hand lunged toward a dial. Humiliated, Miss Flatface wrapped the housecoat around her shivering loins and found her way back to her room.

  Next morning Miss Flatface, her eyes reddened by her first good cry since she left Jim, was scooped from sleep by a loud knocking.

  “Laura,” said the man at the door, who wore a gray chesterfield coat and a gray porkpie hat. “Laura?” he said again.

  No one had ever called Miss Flatface by her first name in this place before.

  “Miss Laura Flatface?”

  Miss Flatface was daunted but intrigued.

  “Let me innerduce myself.” The man handed Miss Flatface an embossed card. Inspector Jug, Detective, it read. By appointment only.

  “Now let’s get this straight, Laura,” said the man, all ceremony seemingly concluded. He had sat down but hadn’t removed his hat.

  “Who said you could call me by my first name?” wailed Miss Flatface, indignant.

  “Now lookee here, Laura,” said the man soothingly. “I don’t mean to frighten yer”—he said yer instead of you—“but I’ve gotten wind of what yer up to and it won’t wash. No ma’am, it just won’t wash. Them girls stay here, and the TV sets too, and you gotta go. That’s what the boss called me in to tell yer.”

  Provoked by her rejection the night before, Miss Flatface decided to see if Inspector Jug was proof against her charms.

  “Music, Inspector? And perhaps a little wine?”

  “Don’t mind if I do, ma’am.”

  “You can call me Laura.”

  Ignoring the spirits of Eddie Duchin and John Philip Sousa which whispered hoarsely in her ears, beckoning and forbidding, she put on a pop ballad rapidly climbing to the top of the Top 40. The voices of an androgyne quaternity and the quakings of their electric guitars resounded in a heavenly echo chamber. Miss Flatface, ever attuned to the new, was entranced. But Inspector Jug was clearly of the older generation. “Turn off that record,” he howled, pulling at his tie. “How can you stand all that bawlin’?”

  “I like it,” said Miss Flatface sweetly, lowering herself into his lap.

  “Hey, whatcha—”

  Just then, another knock on the door.

  “God damn!” muttered Miss Flatface.

  It was the dark-haired girl, good as her word, who silently proffered a small manila envelope.

  Miss Flatface tore it open and gazed with delight upon her own features. Thank God, things had not gone too far: they were not indecently protruding. Perhaps they didn’t protrude even in an average way. But that a definite change had taken place—a distinctly forward, assertive movement of her face—there could not be the slightest doubt. In her glee, she threw her arms around the dark-haired girl and kissed her.

  “Who’s there?” called out the Inspector, who, although he’d been backing off from Miss Flatface’s attentions, was now beginning to feel ignored. It seemed that this day he would not have his mind solely on his professional duties. “Why doncha invite yer friend in?” he said, feigning casualness. Perhaps, he thought quickly, Mr. Obscenity could use a report on this one, too.

  “Okay,” said the girl. “For my collection,” she explained to Miss Flatface, who didn’t know whether she wished to share Inspector Jug with anyone else.

  “Well, well, well,” said the Inspector. “What a pretty pair of ladies we have here. One a little older”—he pointed to Miss Flatface, who was gratified to be mentioned first. “One a little younger,” he said, pointing to the student of Marriage & the Family. “One blond”—Miss Flatface again. “And one brunette”—the girl. “One with dimpled knees”—it was Miss Flatface’s knees that were being fondled; “one with knees like a tennis player”—the Inspector stroked the back of the girl’s leg. “One with a mole on her—”

  “Inspector Jug!”

  Alas, here Inspector Jug’s anatomical inventory was rudely interrupted. At the fireplace stood Mr. Obscenity, black-robed and arms extended like a great winged bat. His monocle glinted with the reflected rays of the sun, making one eye obsidian and relentless. His teeth seemed longer, and his face was a thing of terrible wrath. There was not a trace of mockery or compassion on it. Inspector Jug blanched, but held his ground; he did not move his hands, which rested on the buttocks of both women.

  “You can’t talk to me like that, Mr. Obscenity.”

  The girl broke away from Inspector Jug’s grasp and pulled down her skirt.

  “You were my most trusted assistant, Jug,” said Mr. Obscenity sternly. “And you have betrayed that trust. You know my motto: every man to his business. I know my business. And you should have known yours.�
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  Inspector Jug had, visibly, begun to quail. Miss Flatface, feeling the hand that had grasped her buttocks so avidly now loosening its grip, becoming more tentative in its lust, moved away. She had a faintly unpleasant sensation of coolness in the place where Inspector Jug had held her.

  Mr. Obscenity advanced, hands like claws.

  “But Mr. Obscenity—sir—”

  At these halting deferential words Miss Flatface knew the game was up. Inspector Jug couldn’t brave Mr. Obscenity any more than the others could. The king of the jungle, she concluded, will ever be king.

  “You!” called Mr. Obscenity to Miss Flatface, imperiously. “Stay where you are. I want a word with you, as soon as I’ve lopped a piece off this sniveling rogue.”

  “Don’t go, Laura,” pleaded Inspector Jug. “Tell him how businesslike I was when I first came in the door. I wasn’t doin’ nothin’ wrong. You can tell him that, Laura. Tell him! Please!”

  Mr. Obscenity sank his fangs, through winter coat and all, into Inspector Jug’s shoulder.

  “Is there a way out of here?” Miss Flatface asked, addressing herself to the dark-haired girl cowering by the door. The girl pointed, mutely. Miss Flatface heard the sound of prancing hoofs. “Consider this an escape,” she announced to the two men.

  “I’ll get you,” shouted Mr. Obscenity. “No one escapes from here. You must be expelled.” Saliva streamed from the corners of his mouth.

  “Me too, Laura!” shouted Inspector Jug, pressing a handkerchief to his bleeding shoulder. “I’ll get yer for gettin’ me in dutch with my boss. Hellion! Bitch!”

  “I’m staying,” said the dark-haired girl, dropping her skirt to her ankles and lifting her sweater over her head. The two men ignored her—their first act in unison. All their hot desire, tardy as the hottest desire ever is when it is not premature, was flung at the proud departing figure of Miss Flatface.