Swordsmen of Gor (26 page)

She was now naught but a Gorean slave girl, on a world on which men knew what to do with such as she.

I did not, incidentally, despite Miss Wentworth’s command, or behest, give Cecily permission to reclothe herself. Without that permission she would remain naked.

Cecily was quite attractive.

And this is not surprising.

Is not a woman most attractive when she is naked, in a slave collar?

“Slut, then!” said Miss Wentworth.

“Every good slave,” I said, “should be a slut at her master’s feet.”

“Disgusting!” said Miss Wentworth.

“Not at all,” I said.

“Is that what men want, sluts?” said Miss Wentworth.

“Far more than that,” I said, “a slave. Every man wants a slave, a helpless, vulnerable, ardent, needful slave.”

“White,” she said, “does not!”

“I am Pertinax,” said Pertinax.

“What?” said Miss Wentworth.

“There is no ship,” he said.

“There will be a ship!” she cried. “I shall demand it!”

“I am Pertinax,” he said.

“You are mad!” she said. “That is over!”

“No,” he said, quietly. “It has just begun.”

“Pertinax,” she said, angrily, “is a man of Earth. He is civilized!”

“High civilizations,” I said, “have invariably held slaves.”

“He is a gentleman!” she said. “He would not want a slave.”

“Gentlemen,” I said, “have often held slaves.”

“Reassure him, Pertinax,” she snapped. “Tell him that no true man would want a slave!”

I thought it interesting, how words could be twisted about, and used as levers, as cudgels, as whips, and such.

“I am not sure of that,” he said. “Perhaps it is otherwise. Perhaps it is rather that any man who does not want a slave is not a true man.”

“Certainly men desire slaves,” I said to Miss Wentworth. “I think that is clear. Beyond that the dispute seems to me verbal. I suppose one could define the true tarn as one that does not fly, the true larl as one that does not hunt, and so on, but this does not seem helpful in understanding the world. Putting aside cultural and historical considerations, as somehow irrelevant, surprisingly so, or illegitimate, astonishingly so, one might ponder whether or not biology is relevant to the matter, for example the radical sexual dimorphism of the human species, genetic predispositions, the pervasive relationships in nature of dominance and submission, and so on.”

“I am a free woman!” said Miss Wentworth.

I was not clear as to the pertinence of her claim, which was uttered almost hysterically.

“There is also,” I said, “the test of life consequences. For example, what are the effects of one modality of life as opposed to another? Suppose one way of life reduces vitality, produces unhappiness, boredom, even misery, and anomie, a sense of meaninglessness, and another modality of life increases vitality, enhances life, produces happiness, charges one with energy, gives meaningfulness to one’s existence, and so on. Which is to be preferred?”

“I am a free woman!” she cried.

I was not disputing that. I wondered at her outburst.

She was still, of course, in her tunic.

Perhaps that was what motivated her outburst. Perhaps she wanted to utter something which might seem to belie her appearance, an appearance which doubtless made her uneasy, or somehow troubled her. Certainly Pertinax and I had no difficulty in accepting that she was a free woman. It did not seem, then, that she should be trying to convince us of that. Who then was she trying to convince? Pertinax naturally, from his background, I supposed, the antecedents of our situation, and so on, would think of her as a free woman. And I, too, thought of her as a free woman, particularly in view of her awkwardness, clumsiness, stiffness, and such, to say nothing of her manifest psychological and emotional problems. The contrast with Cecily was obvious. Cecily, now, not only accepted her sex, but rejoiced in it. At a man’s feet, owned, and mastered, she had found herself.

She had wanted to end her confusions and conflicts, and had discovered the sweetness and wholeness of a total surrender to the male, her master.

She kissed his feet and became herself.

“I am a free woman,” said Miss Wentworth, “a free woman, a free woman!”

“Of course,” I said.

“I wonder,” said Pertinax, thoughtfully.

Pertinax’s remark surprised me. I had not expected it.

“What?” cried Miss Wentworth.

“In the offices, amongst the desks,” said he, “did I not imagine you often not in your svelte business wear, and high heels, so chic and yet so provocative, so arrogantly, insolently, calculatedly, deliberately provocative, but rather barefoot on the carpeting, naked and collared?”

“You beast, White!” she screamed.

“You will address me as Pertinax,” he said.

“I do not understand,” she said.

“There is no ship,” he said. “Much has changed.”

“There will be a ship!” she cried. “Nothing has changed!”

“I have changed,” he said.

I had the thought, now, that Pertinax might leave a hut, to look after a trussed property, even were a sleen in the vicinity.

And certainly a property, helplessly trussed, lying outside in the darkness, might fervently hope that he might do so.

“I trust,” said Miss Wentworth to Pertinax, “you are not toying with contemplating the possible meaning of your bestial strength, that you are not tempted to acknowledge your desires.”

Pertinax regarded her, angrily.

How fortunate she was that he was not Gorean!

“Your strength and desires must be ignored,” said Miss Wentworth. “It is best if you can convince yourself that they do not exist. Struggle desperately to do that. If that is not possible, you must put them to the side. One must choose sorrow and righteous grief over opportunity and gratification.”

Yes, very fortunate.

“Why?” asked Pertinax.

“Because you are of Earth!” she said.

“Perhaps an Earth which has too long ignored certain truths,” he said, “an Earth in sorry need of recollection, of reformation.”

“You are a cultural artifact,” she said, “engineered to conform to imposed standards, as much as an envelope or motor.”

“No,” he said, “I am a man.”

“A cultural construct!” she said. “A manufactured product, designed to cohere with a complex set of systematically interrelated roles.”

“Surely,” I said, “a test of cultural value should have some relevance to the happiness and fulfillment of human beings.”

“No,” she said.

“To what then?” I asked.

“To the culture itself,” she said, “its prolongation.”

“I see,” I said.

A culture did seem to have its own dynamics, its own life, a life, a biography, to which the welfare or happiness of its components might be only indirectly related, if at all. A plant was organic, and the health of the plant assured the health of its components. A culture, on the other hand, though it might crumble and lapse into obsolescence, was commonly not organic, but mechanistic, and the functioning of the machine required not the happiness, health, or welfare of its parts, but only that they functioned appropriately, contributing to the pointless longevity of the machine itself.

“Is there no such thing as nature?” I asked. “Is there only misery, prisons, guns, and hatred?”

“Nature does not exist,” she said.

“You cannot be serious,” I said.

“It does not exist in any important sense,” she said.

“If not,” I said, “why must it be so fiercely contested, so strenuously fought against?”

“It is inimical to civilization,” she said.

“Only to unnatural civilizations,” I said.

“All civilizations are unnatural,” she said.

“Not necessarily,” I said. “There is no reason why a civilization cannot be an expression of nature, rather than her enemy, in its way an enhancement of nature, a celebration of nature.”

“There are no such civilizations!” she said.

“There have been several,” I said.

“None now!” she cried.

“I know of at least one,” I said.

“No!” she said. “No, no, no!”

“What are you afraid of?” I asked.

“I am not afraid!” she cried. She pulled down, desperately, at the hem of her tunic, with both hands. “Do not look at me so!” she cried to Pertinax.

“There is no ship,” said Pertinax.

I think Pertinax had begun to sense how a woman might be viewed, particularly one in such a tunic.

Women were not men.

They were quite different.

“Do not look at me so!” she said to Pertinax. “Are you some boor, or brute? Have you not been educated?”

“I was not educated,” said Pertinax. “I was trained, indoctrinated. Perhaps only now has my education begun.”

“Beast!” she cried.

“What of the test of life consequences?” I asked.

“I do not understand!” she wept.

“Does the mastery not fill a man with power,” I asked, “with zest, with vitality, with a sense of reality and identity, with a sense of fittingness, with a sense of being himself, with a sense at last of being a part of nature rather than a dislocated, lost, wandering fragment shorn from her?”

“Why have we not been brought before Lord Nishida!” she cried.

“The mastery fulfills a man,” I said. “What man is complete until he has at his feet a slave?”

“A slave! Oh, yes, a slave!” laughed Miss Wentworth, scornfully.

Then she turned to Cecily.

“Slave!” she said.

“Mistress?” said Cecily.

“You are a slave, are you not?” asked Miss Wentworth.

“Yes, Mistress,” said Cecily, frightened.

Surely Miss Wentworth could see that her fair throat was enclosed in the circlet of bondage.

“Worthless, degraded, meaningless, naked slave!” said Miss

Wentworth.

“Yes, Mistress,” whispered Cecily.

“You, slave,” cried Miss Wentworth scornfully to Cecily, “are you happy as a slave, do you want to be a slave, are you fulfilled as a slave?”

“It does not matter, Mistress,” said Cecily, “whether or not I am happy to be a slave, whether or not I want to be a slave, whether or not I am fulfilled as a slave. I am a slave.”

“Answer me, slut,” cried Miss Wentworth. “And speak the truth!”

“I must speak the truth, Mistress,” said Cecily. “I am a slave.”

“That is true,” I said to Miss Wentworth. “The slave must speak the truth. She is not a free woman.”

“Yes, Mistress,” said Cecily. “I am happy to be a slave. I want to be a slave. I am fulfilled to be a slave! It is what I have always been, and knew myself to be, and now the collar is on me! I am a slave, and should be a slave. It is what I am, what I want to be, and what I should be!”

“Disgusting, disgusting, disgusting!” screamed Miss Wentworth.

I did not understand her concern. If some women were slaves, and wished to be slaves, and loved being owned, and wanted to be at the feet of masters, why should she object? What was it to her?

“Have I come at an inopportune time?” inquired Tajima.

“No,” I said.

He had entered in his quiet, polite way, unobtrusively.

“Lord Nishida,” said Tajima, “regrets the delay, but he was awaiting an envoy, one from exalted personages.”

I supposed that would be some Gorean. Perhaps it would be Sullius Maximus, pretending, again, to be an agent of Priest-Kings. I had little doubt that the true agent had been disposed of, doubtless long ago, probably cast to the nine-gilled sharks of Thassa. They often follow in the wake of a ship, to retrieve garbage.

“There!” said Miss Wentworth. “At last! Now we will receive our pay, be conducted to the coast, board ship, and, soon, brought first to an appropriate base, find ourselves again on Earth.”

“Your slave is very pretty,” said Tajima, noting Cecily.

He viewed her as what she was, a lovely animal, perhaps even a prize animal.

“Thank you,” I said.

Masters are often pleased when their beasts are commended. Such commendation, you see, reflects credit on him. In such a way he is complimented on his taste in women, in slaves.

“You may finish my tea,” I told the slave, handing her the cup, with its residue, “and then you may clothe yourself.”

“Yes, Master,” she said. “Thank you, Master.”

She put her head down to drink. She held the cup with two hands, as a Gorean cup is commonly held.

“Do white women make pleasing slaves?” asked Tajima.

“Yes,” I said.

“That is well,” he said.

“I cannot see Lord Nishida like this,” said Miss Wentworth, indicating her brief tunic, little now but a rag, given our journey through the forest. “Bring me something suitable!”

“I have,” said Tajima, who held, over his left forearm, what appeared to be, arranged in several narrow folds, a sheet of rep cloth.

“Give it to me,” said Miss Wentworth, putting out her hand.

“Outside,” said Tajima, “there are three tubs, filled with hot water, in which you may soak, and enjoy yourselves. It will be very pleasant, and there are, at hand, smooth scrapers of sandalwood, scents, oils, and towels.”

“Outside?” said Miss Wentworth.

“She is not used to public bathing,” I said.

“Interesting,” said Tajima. “We shall have one of the tubs brought within the hut.”

“No,” said Miss Wentworth.

“No?” asked Tajima.

“I insist on being brought immediately to Lord Nishida,” said Miss Wentworth.

“You do not wish to bathe?” asked Tajima, surprised.

“No,” she said. “Bring us to Lord Nishida immediately.”

“We shall proceed immediately then,” said Tajima.

“No, no,” said Miss Wentworth, suddenly. “I must dress!”

“Perhaps we might have the honor of greeting Lord Nishida,” I said, “and Miss Wentworth might then follow, shortly.”

“A most suitable suggestion,” said Tajima. “The yellow-haired one may then, if she wishes, dress in privacy.”

“I certainly so wish,” she said.

He handed the rep-cloth sheet to Miss Wentworth, who seized it from him.

“I will send two men to conduct you to the audience,” said Tajima to Miss Wentworth.

“I will wait outside, and accompany her,” said Pertinax.

“As you wish,” said Tajima. “Also, as I recall, it is you who are to present Miss Wentworth to Lord Nishida.”