Fighting Slave of Gor

7 I AM THROWN A WOMAN

I sat alone in my cell. I now sat on a heavy bench, some five feet in length, before a stout, rectangular table. These things had been put in the cell for me. I wore a light, repcloth slave tunic. On the floor, on straw, was a blanket which I had been given. Though the cell door was locked, I was not chained. On the table was a bowl of cheap wine, some wedges of yellow bread and a wooden bowl containing vegetables and chunks of meat.

Today I had been appraised.

I was still furious with the shame of it. I was not a woman! Then I smiled to myself. The thought had been almost Gorean. I reminded myself I was a man of Earth. How shameful, too, must be such an ordeal for a woman. How piteous it was that such fair beauties should be enslaved for the pleasures of masters.

I wished I owned one. Then, of course, I thrust the thought from my mind.

I chewed on a piece of meat and drank from the shallow, chipped bowl of clay which contained the wine.

My thoughts were mixed and troubled. Today I had been appraised. I was confident, now, that I would not be kept much longer in the pens. But I did not even know the location of the pens. I did not even know the city in which I was kept. Curiosity, I had been told, was not becoming in a slave. I smiled to myself. How faraway seemed Earth now with its pettiness and vanity. I was not even, for some reason, miserable that I had been brought to Gor. I did not understand, clearly, why this should be. Surely my condition was shameful, and I had much to fear. Surely, in many ways, it was a horrifying world to which I had been brought. I remembered the sleen. I had felt the whip. Yet I was not, truly, unhappy. Earth had been a country of pollutions and poisons. The very air men breathed there, the very food they ate, contained recognized, but, incredibly, not removed, toxic elements. It was impossible, really, to do anything about such things, I had gathered. What an incredible world Earth was. Could it not understand that the environmental criminal was far more dangerous than.the lonely madman or assassin, that his crime affected not isolated, tragic victims but communities, a planet, unborn generations. Was his profit so sacred, truly? Was it truly more precious than lives, and the future? The men of Earth congratulated themselves smugly on the power of their democracies, in which the people, purportedly, ruled. But if the people, truly, ruled, why and how could their planet's processes proceed in such obvious ways inimical to their welfare? How could their world be so miserable for the people if they were truly kings within it? But perhaps they were not kings within it. Perhaps they have only been told they are kings, and.that satisfies them. Who, I wondered, were the true kings? Or, perhaps there were no kings, truly, only the madness of the untended machine.

I rose from the bench and walked about the cell. I felt one of the damp walls. I was grateful for the blanket I now had. I went and felt the heavy bars, with the lateral crosspieces, which formed one side of the cell. I gripped them. I was well confined within. I went back to the table. I was a prisoner and a slave. I even wore a steel collar. Yet I was not overly discontent. I was eager to sae this world to which I, a man of Earth, had been brought as a mere slave. It was my hope that if I obeyed my masters or mistresses, and well pleased them; I might be permitted to live.

Why was I not more miserable than I was that I had been brought to Gor? I pondered this. Because of the diet and exercise, enforced on me in the pens, I was now healthier and stronger than I had ever been. Perhaps this had something to do with my feelings. Such homely simplicities as diet, rest and exercise can often work wonders for one's outlook. Too, I was looking forward to the adventures of a new world, even though it might be one in which I was only a slave. I laughed. Perhaps the matter was so simple as even the water and air of Gor, so fresh and pure, so stimulating, compared to that of Earth, even in the depths of the pens.

I rose from the bench again and gripped one of its legs in my fist. I lifted it from the floor by one of the legs, lifting it slowly, directly upward, until I held it at an arm's length. I could never have done this on Earth. This was not merely a function of the reduced gravity of the planet but of newly acquired strength. "A Mistress may wish to know that she is in your arms," the Lady Gina had told me. I laughed, and lowered the bench slowly to the stones.

I sat down again on the bench and fed myself another piece of meat.

I looked about the cell. The greatest reason I was not more discontent than I was, I think, was simply that I had come to a world such as Gor. I remembered Earth, with its pettiness, its greed and vanity, its smugness, its pretensions, its pollutions and poisons, its teeming, crowded, miserable populations, and its endemic fears, fears such as that of not having enough energy to spin the wheels of an exorbitant and largely unnecessary technology, and the fear, fully warranted, of the falling of the sword of a nuclear Damocles. Earth seemed a world of sicknesses and traps, a world which seemed contrived as an offense against nature, a world in which the very sir itself, by the works of men, was laden with deleterious gases. How little surprising, then, that I should not have found myself overly discontent with the felicitous discovery that I had now been introduced into a quite different milieu. I sensed that in Gor there was a youth and an openness which had long been missing from my old world. In Gor I sensed an ambition, a freshness and hope, a sparkle, that had perhaps not been felt on Earth since the Parthenon was new. Doubtless there is much on Gor to be deplored, but I cannot bring myself to deplore it. Doubtless Gor is impatient, cruel and heartless, but yet, I think, too, it is innocent. It is like the lion, impatient, cruel, heartless, and innocent. It is its nature. Gor was a strong-thewed world, a new world, a world in which men might again lift their heads to the sun and laugh, a world in which they might again, sensibly, begin long journeys. It was a world of which Homer might have sung, singing of the clashing of the metals of men and the sweetness of the wine-dark sea.

I thought of the gray, blackened landscapes of Earth. How sad it is when a world grows old, resigned and vile.

Doubtless there is much on Gor to be deplored, but I cannot bring myself to deplore it. I cannot bring myself, truly, to deplore the exuberance, the joy, the vigor and freedom that is Gor. Others may do that, if they wish. I cannot do so. I have been there.

Let men again put their hands to the oars; let the low, swift ships be launched once more.

I took another piece of meat from the wooden bowl. I looked down at the straw, and my blanket, heavy and dark, upon it. I did not really wish to retire so soon.

I then heard her weeping, being dragged down the corridor. I sprang up. I then saw, the guard, Prodicus, on the other side of the bars. He was a huge man. I had already had experience of his strength when he, with his fellow guard, Gron, the Oriental, had handled me with such ease. I knew he could break my arms and legs with ease, if he chose. "Stand back in the cell, Slave," he said. I stood back. At his left hip, cruelly bent over, his hand knotted tightly in her hair, he held a girl. She was naked and crying. Her small hands were fastened behind her back with slave bracelets. A key on a wire dangled downward from her collar. It was the key, I supposed, to the bracelets she wore. Also, tied about her neck, fastened there by its blades, dangling downwards, was a slave whip. Prodicus, with a jangle of keys on his ring, thrust a key into the lock on my cell door and freed the bolt. He then returned the key, on its ring, to the hook on his belt. He swung open the cell door. He entered the cell, dragging the girl. He threw her cruelly to her knees before me. "She is yours for the night," he said. "Do not kill her. Do not break her bones."

"I understand," I said.

He then, not turning his back on me, left the cell. In a moment meat he had locked it and, replacing the ring of keys on his belt, had disappeared down the corridor.

Lola, the slave whip tied about her neck, terrified, looked up at me.

"Please do not hurt me, Master," she said.

It startled me that she had called me `Master,' but then I recalled that she had been given to me for the night. For the night I owned her.

"Get up, Lola," I said.

She struggled to her feet, frightened. Half crouching over she backed away from me, until she was stopped by the bars, which confined her with me in the cell, one of many such cells deep beneath the House of Andronicus.

I approached her.

She stood straight then, her back against the bars, her head turned. to the side. I realized, suddenly, that she feared to look me in the face.

"I am sorry that I did you such injuries, Master," she said. I recalled her many cruelties to me in my training, the many lashings of the quirt, the blows of the slave whip she had arranged for me, the blows of her small hands and fists, her kicks, her belittlings of me. I recalled, most of all, how she had spilled the wine in the training session,. had accused me of it, and had prescribed twenty blows of the snake. The Lady Gina had reduced the penalty to only five. Twenty blows of the snake, I had little doubt, might cost some men their lives.

It irritated me that she was not looking directly at me. Angrily, before I had truly thought, I took the sides of her mouth between my thumb and fingers and pressing tightly inwards, which draws the inside of the cheeks painfully between- the teeth, turned her head to face me. I had seen a guard do this once to Tela, when she had not seemed to be paying him attention. This is not an action a woman fights. She complies instantly. I looked at Lola, so held, facing me. She was frightened. But suddenly I saw, too, in her eyes, that she wanted to be had as a slave. It was the first moment in which I had ever dominated a woman as a male brute, her master. I have never forgotten it.

Then, of course, I released her.

"Why did you spill the wine and accuse me of it?" I asked.

"It was a joke," she whispered.

"Do not lie to me," I said.

"I hated you," she said.

"Do you hate me now?" I asked.

"Oh, no, Master," she said, hastily. "I love you now. I want to please you. Please be kind to me."

I sniffed. I did not think that Lola, in her cruelties, or when she had played the cruel trick with the wine, and had prescribed the twenty blows of the snake, had anticipated that she would, one day, be braceleted in my cell, at my mercy as a naked slave girl.

"Why twenty blows of the snake?" I asked. "Did you wish to kill me?"

"You are strong," she said, her head inclined a bit downward, but looking up at me. "Twenty blows would not kill you. It would only have punished you, terribly."

"You would have had this done," I asked, "because you hated me?"

"Yes, Master," she said. Then she added, hastily, "But I do not hate you now. I love you now. Please be kind to me, Master."

"Let me relieve you of the weight of this slave whip," I said, reaching up to untie it from her neck.

She lifted up her head, her head pressed back against the bars. Her body, her back, too, her lovely shoulder blades, was pressed against them. "Are you going to use it on me?" she asked.

"I did not hear you say `Master,'" I said.

"Master," she said, quickly.

I untied the whip from her neck and, taking it, walked back to the table and bench. I put it on the bench. I sat down on the bench. I looked at the girl, standing with her back to the bars.

"Approach and kneel, Slave Girl," I said.

Quickly she came to the side of the table and knelt down before me.

"Am I to be whipped, Master?" she asked.

"Be silent," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I looked at the girl. I felt conflicting emotions. Lola was one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen. She was now kneeling before me, frightened and obedient, naked and braceleted, mine to do with as I pleased. Yes, she had caused me much pain, and had much abused me. Yet, interestingly, the miseries and humiliations which she had inflicted upon me were not uppermost in my mind. It was not that I was unaware that I now had an opportunity to work out a welldeserved revenge upon her beautiful slave hide; it is rather that that thought did not particularly occupy me. It was not, surely, what seemed to me of overwhelming interest and importance in the situation in which I found myself.

I looked at the beautiful, kneeling, braceleted woman. What seemed to me of overwhelming significance was simply this, that such a woman, one who must obey, and who was in my power, knelt at my feet.

"Master," said Lola.

"Yes," I said.

"I have not fed since this morning," she said. "May I feed?"

I took a piece of meat from the bowl on the table. I held it out to her. "Thank you, Master," she said. Then, turning her head delicately, she took it between her teeth. I then, for a time, fed Lola. She depended upon me, in the hours of my ownership of her, for her very food and drink. I could scarcely comprehend the feelings I had, feeding the beauty by hand. I had not realized such feelings could exist in a man. Then I placed the bowl on the floor and she, putting her head down, her hands braceleted behind her, biting and licking, addressed herself to its contents. I looked down at the kneeling, feeding slave. She was in my power. In these hours she was mine. I fought against the incredible surge of power and pleasure I felt, against the power and pleasure of blood and manhood. I fought against might and passion, and glory and joy, for I was a man of Earth. But in those moments, for a brief instant, before I could deplore and castigate my feelings, before I could muster misery and guilt, I had felt what it was to stand, if only briefly, in man's place in the order of nature. I had, for a brief instant, tasted dominance. But then I recalled that I was a man of Earth, and that the world of nature, and what I was and women were, must be rejected and repudiated. Thirsting, I must not drink. Starving, I must not feed. Never should one be true to oneself. Always should one be true to the images and lies of others, fearful ones, weaklings unable to be strong themselves, whose safety lay in the bleeding and tricking of more dangerous beasts. Is it not in the interest of slaves to prohibit kings from claiming their thrones?

Then I was overcome with misery and guilt that I had even dared to think such thoughts!

How wrong nature was! How wrong to be true to the deep themes of the animal kingdom! Did I truly need to be what I was? Why should I fulfill my needs? How wrong it was to have needs! And how far more wrong it would be to dare to fulfill them! Men, I knew, must be as flowers, not as lions, not as men.

But who will tell the lion to be a flower? Surely, only the flowers. And who will tell a man not to be a man? Surely, too, the flowers, who might otherwise fear the tread of the heavy paw, the passing of the foot of the striding warrior.

Then I laughed, for it suddenly seemed to me absurd that such incredible conflicts should rage within me. Surely I, a man of Earth, knew well how to live. I had been taught how to live, and if, in abiding by the denials and negativities of my world, I was made unhappy and miserable, what did that matter, truly, in the larger scheme of things? Who did I think I was? Did I think that I was important? Is a lion, or a man, truly, more important than an insect or a flower? If there were more flowers than lions, or men, must not it be right to be a flower, and not a lion or a man? It may not be easy for lions or men to pretend to be flowers, but let them do their best. Above all do not let the flowers know that there may be a man or a lion among them. They would then be disturbed They would flutter their petals fiercely.

Again I forced Gorean thoughts from my mind.

When I had laughed the girl, feeding, had stopped, and trembled. Then, after a time, she continued to feed.

"Here," I said. I crumbled the rest of the bread, which I had not eaten, which had been on the table, into her bowl, mixing it with the vegetables and meat which still remained. there. "Thank you, Master," she said. She put down her head again, feeding. I smiled. The braceleted, beautiful slave was ravenous.

I had laughed for it had suddenly seemed to me absurd that I should even, for a moment, have allowed myself to think disapproved thoughts. Was I not of Earth? Was I not a true man, capable of conquering myself? Why, I wondered, should I conquer myself? Why should I not allow myself to be victorious? Then, again, chagrined, embarrassed, I thrust such thoughts from my mind.

But who is stronger, truly, I asked myself, he who continues to wound and bleed himself to please others, or he who refuses any longer to do so?

I shook my head, to force such a thought out of my mind.

The girl lifted her head. The bowl was clean. I picked up the bowl and carried it to the side, where I placed it on a small shelf.

"Thank you for feeding me, Master," she said.

I took a bit of her hair and, gently, wiped her mouth. To my surprise she put her teeth gently on my hand, and then licked and kissed at my hand. She then drew her head back. "You are not going to beat me, are you, Master?" she asked.

"Be silent," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I looked at Lola. I forced myself to remember that she, in spite of her beauty and her collar, was a person. I looked at the small key, on its wire, dangling from her collar, between her breasts. It was; doubtless, the key to her confining bracelets. I must free her. Yet, as I looked down at her, I must admit that I enjoyed having her at my mercy. I knew, of course, despite the fact that she was a woman and I was a man, and that she was then to me as my own slave and I to her as her true master, that I must not permit myself this pleasure. It hinted too clearly at my dominance over her by nature, a dominance which I knew I must not permit myself to exercise, indeed, a dominance which I, of Earth, was not even supposed to permit myself to recognize. It was not congenial to the contemporary political myths of my planet. Men, not so long ago, I recalled, had not even been permitted to recognize that they were animals. Now, it seemed, although they might be granted a token permission to recognize their animality, they were refused permission to recognize the sort of animals they were. I wondered if there could be a politics which did not betray truth. Perhaps such a politics, something beyond theater and myths, might someday emerge upon the forge of history.

"There is a bucket of water at the side of the cell," I said. "Go there and drink. Then return and be again before me, as you are now."

"Yes, Master," she said. She went to the side of the room and knelt down. There was a wooden bucket there, with slatted sides, hooped with iron. It was full. She put her head down and drank. Meanwhile I put the wine, that in the shallow, chipped clay bowl, on the shelf to one side. The girl did not pay me the least attention in this. She did not expect to receive any of the wine. She was a slave. It was more than sufficient that she should kneel at the bucket and, braceleted, drink from it. Indeed, I had not forced her to crawl on her belly to a shallow pan. I wanted the table free.

I returned to the bench and sat down. In a moment the girl, again, was kneeling before me.

"Thank you, Master," she said. She had been fed and watered.

I rose to my feet and walked about her. I suppose I should not have done so, but she was so incredibly beautiful. It was s pleasure to see her displayed, fully, in her beauty and steel. She knelt very straight before me, a bit tensely, back on her heels, her knees wide. How marvelous it must be to own such a slave, I thought.- Then I reminded myself that she was a person. There was something about her, subtle, in her breathing and body tone, which I could not place at the time. Too, there was an exciting odor emanating from her, easily detectable in the Gorean air, even in the pens. A man of Earth I did not even fully register or comprehend these signs. I had never seen them manifested in an Earth woman, at least in such degree. As I now understand she was attempting to hold herself still and control herself, but her body was betraying her. The evidence was manifest, exposed before my senses, but I, as a naive fool of Earth, did not even fully understand what was presented before me. I had at my feet an aroused slave girl.

I put my hands on her upper arms, good-naturedly, not understanding her shuddering, and lifted her to her feet. "Master," she begged. I knew I must free her. She had caused me a great deal of bother. I then lifted her from her feet, by one arm and an ankle. I was startled. I had not realized I could handle her so easily, nor, I think, had she realized it. "Master," she begged, "please." I then, less gently than I should have, perhaps, threw her on her belly on the table. She tensed, and lay very still. I threw her hair forward. I twisted her collar about until I had the wire and the key attached to it. I unwound the wire and placed it, with its key, at the side of the girl's head. I readjusted the collar on her neck, so that the small, heavy lock was again at the back of her neck. I observed the small hairs on the back of her neck, her hair thrown forward, and the steel, with its lock, on her neck, snug. I thrust the tiny key into the locks on the slave bracelets and, with two small, heavy clicks, and an opening of metal, removed them from her. I put the key, with the wire, and the bracelets, on the bench.

"My hands are now free, that I may please you more," she whispered. She lay before me, on her stomach, her hair thrown forward. Her hands were beside her, their backs to the table. This exposed their palms to me. The palms of a girl's hands are extremely sensitive and erotic. I resisted the impulse to trace lightly in the palm of her left hand a small cursive "Kef," the staff and fronds, that letter used commonly in the branding of female slaves.

The girl lay still. She did not move. This irritated me. Had I not freed her of the bracelets? I realize now that she was waiting to be commanded to my pleasure.

She moaned.

I looked at her. She was very beautiful, and it was extremely difficult to remind myself that I must not treat her as the marvelous and exciting woman she was but rather as a person, a thing to which its maleness or femaleness was incidental and unimportant.

"Master?" she asked.

Then, suddenly, for an instant, I saw her as Lola, stripped and collared slave, who had caused me much misery, end who now lay before me, mine to do with as I wished. she suddenly tensed, sensing the difference in my attitude. My hands, angrily, gripped the edge of the table.

"Do not whip me, Master," she begged. "Let me try to please you. If I do not please you, then whip me."

"Do you bargain?" I asked.

"No, Master," she cried. "No, Master! Forgive me, Master! Please forgive me, Master!"

"Be silent," I told her.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I enjoyed having Lola at my mercy. Then I reminded myself that she was not to be treated according to the harsh modalities of nature, those of dominance and submission, and the enforcement of order. She was, of course, a person.

Did she truly think that I, a man of Earth, would treat her as a slave?

Surely she must know that she had nothing to fear from one such as I who would treat her with dignity and respect.

Then, suddenly, looking at her, I felt a flood of anger. It was she who had wished for me to receive twenty blows of the snake.

I flung the table up and to one side, throwing her to the floor. The table was half way across the cell.

Then she was at my feet, on the stones, kneeling in the straw, her head down, her hair before her face. I felt her lips, through her hair, kissing at my feet. Never had I dreamed that I would even meet so beautiful a woman, let alone have her in my power, attempting to placate me.

I looked down at the woman, her head down. "Lola begs to please Master," she wept. I felt, looking down at her, throughout my entire body, an incredible surge of force and power, of exhilaration. I threw back my head and laughed. She kept her head down. She trembled. Lola, I think, had heard such a laugh before. The feelings which swept me were almost incomprehensible and inutterably magnificent. I looked down at her. She was at my feet. I knew then, with a clarity and force far beyond those of argument and theory, that I stood in the order of nature. Laughing I crouched down, over her. I put my hands in her hair. I pulled her head up. Her eyes were closed. Her face, to my amazement, was rapturous. "Yes, Master," she said, "yes!" I prepared to hurl her to her back on the straw and stones, and treat her as what she was, a woman, and a slave. And then I remembered that I was a man of Earth. I released her hair. I seized her by the arms and threw her back from me. I clenched my fists. I cried out with frustration and misery. She was then on her hands and knees, on the stones. She looked at me, frightened. Then, again, quickly, she knelt. "Master?" she asked.

She was so beautiful!

I dug my fingernails into the palms of my hands. I gritted my teeth.

She crawled, unbidden, to me. She knelt then, close to me. She put out her hand to touch me. "Master," she said.

"Do not touch me," I said, suddenly.

She drew back her hand, quickly. "Yes, Master," she said.

I turned away from her.

"How have I failed to please you?" she begged.

"Be silent," I snapped.

"Yes, Master," she whispered.

I strode to the wall of the cell, away from the girl. I extended my arms and, head down, leaned against the wall. I fought myself, and my desires, and my needs.

"Master?" she asked.

"Be silent!" I cried.

"Yes, Master," she whispered.

I struck the heavy stone then with my fists, moaning. I must conquer myself. I must defeat myself. I must deny, thwart and suppress my impulses, my blood and manhood. I must be my own enemy. I must make myself my own victim.

"May I serve you wine, Master?" she asked.

I turned from the wall. I then had myself under control. I breathed deeply, almost gasping.

Unbidden, she went to the shelf where I had placed the shallow, chipped clay bowl of cheap, dark wine, fit for slaves. She then, holding the bowl, knelt again, gracefully, before me. Looking at me, she tossed her head, throwing her dark hair behind her. The slender steel collar was beautiful on her throat. She, holding the bowl with two hands, pressed it back against her belly, low, below the navel. I looked at the edge of the bowl, containing the wine, pressed back, into her flesh. Then she lifted the bowl before her and, gently, turning her head, placing her lips softly upon it, kissed it. She then, with two hands, head down, proffered to me the chipped, shallow bowl.

"Wine, Master?" she asked.

I took the bowl of wine from her. She trembled. She looked up at me.

I drank then, holding the shallow bowl with two hands. Then, after a bit, I lowered the bowl from my lips and looked down at the beautiful slave. I had not finished the wine.

"The wine, and Lola, are yours, Master," she said. I knew that she spoke the truth.

I lifted the wine again to my lips and again drank. Then I placed the bowl, containing its residue of wine, behind me on the table.

I had drunk as a master before the girl, the kneeling slave.

"You have tasted the wine of the House of Andronicus," she said. "Taste now the wine of Lola."

I then realized, clearly, suddenly, for the first time, that the slave before me was sexually aroused, and helpless. Hitherto I had been impervious to the obvious, manifested to displays of her need. Signs of which I had hitherto neglected to take active account now seemed clear to me, even the odor of her begging slave body. I realized now I had registered many of her piteous signals, but, somehow, had forced them away from explicit, conscious recognition. I had been, I suppose, stupid and insensitive. It is one thing to understand clearly what is the case with one's slave and then, as one pleases, to satisfy or not satisfy the girl, using her needs to bring her more deeply and powerfully under your control as an abject slave, and quite another not even to know what is going on in her pretty head and lovely body. My ignorance in these matters was, I think, a function of complex factors. First, I was a man of Earth. Thus I was not accustomed to truly looking upon women, truly seeing them and trying to understand them. Most men of Earth do not, truly, unfortunately, pay much attention to women. Men often do not even, truly. know their mates. If they dial. it seems that misunderstandings, divorces, and such, would be less frequent. An interesting contrast here is the Gorean master/slave relationship. Men tend to be extremely interested in things they own, and tend, usually, to be quite fond of them. Owned women do not form an exception to this general rule. The slave girl is commonly desired and prized by her master; she is one of his treasures. The Gorean master, interested in her and attentive to her, wants to know everything about her, in its complexity and intimacy. He wants to know her thoughts, her emotions and feelings, in their feminine, lyrical detail. Conversing with a lovely slave is one of the many pleasures of owning her. It is almost impossible for a girl to keep her thoughts or feelings from her master. He knows her too well. Most girls are extremely responsive to their masters, and love them deeply, with that incredible love which can be known only by an enslaved woman, that love which a woman can accord only to a man who is her total master. Yet I would be remiss did I not mention that even the most vital, animate slave, delightedly conversing with her master, knows that at a mere snap of his fingers she may have to tear aside her garments and serve him as a chain slut. She is owned. Too, many slave girls are kept by men who are harsh and cold to them, and who despise them as mere slaves. These girls, too, of course, must obey. They, too, of course, must perform perfectly for their masters.

"I am yours, Master," said Lola.

I looked down upon her. No, I had not, hitherto, realized the extend of her needs. I had looked at her, but I had not truly seen her. I had looked at her as might have a man of Earth, seeing her in terms of classifications and categories, and my conditioned expectations, discounting what did not seem congenial to these categories and expectations, refusing to see, or, at least, to understand, what was clearly, objectively, presented before my senses. I now saw her, however, not in terms of generalities and conditioned expectations but as what she was, startling though it might be to my Earthtrained mind, an incredibly aroused female at my feet.

I clenched my fists.

"Master," said Lola.

I had not even understood that a woman could have such feelings, in such depth and desperation. My education on Earth had not familiarized me with the complex and deep needs of women. That, I think, is the second reason I had not been hitherto alert to Lola's needs. I simply did not register what I saw. I did not know that that sort of thing, in such degree and intensity, could exist. I was furious. My education had apparently been kept deliberately incomplete in this respect. I had little doubt but what many specialists on Earth were familiar with such facts, facts they found it politically pertinent to suppress, or, should one say, politically pertinent to avoid bringing forward for general attention. There is much to investigate in science. Surely not all areas need be explored equally, especially if unguarded researches might, if published, bring ruin upon one's career. How much easier it is to be objective about the constituents of the atom than about ourselves.

I looked down upon the girl.

I had, of course, never seen such need manifested in a girl of Earth. But then, of course, I had never seen a girl of Earth, naked, in a steel collar, thrown to my feet in the straw of a Gorean dungeon either. I wondered if the girls of Gor were truly incredibly different from the girls of Earth. They seemed so sexually alive, so feminine and vital, whereas the girls of Earth, many of them, seemed so inhibited, so timid, so restricted, so tight, so embarrassed, so ashamed and frightened of their sex. It was as though they feared to let themselves go; as though it was terribly important for them to hold themselves in. Indeed, what was the pseudomasculinization of many of the women of Earth, in clothing and mental garb, but a hysterical attempt to dent their sexuality? What did the women of Earth fear? That a true acknowledgement of their deepest sexual needs would lead them to kneel at the feet of a master?

Lola looked up at me, tears in her eyes. Slavery, I suddenly suspected, releases femaleness in the woman. I did not suppose that Gorean free women could have brought themselves to this pitch of exposure, vulnerability and excitement, which was perhaps not unusual for a slave girl. The major difference then, I suspected, lay not so much between the Gorean woman and the Earth woman, but between the free woman and the slave. I recalled that Gorean slavers brought Earth women to Gor as slaves. Surely they would not have done so if such girls did not sell well, and, of course, they would not sell well unless they proved, on the whole, to be pleasing slaves, and fully. Many an Earth girl, I suspected, who might have thought herself frigid or sexually inert on her own world discovered to her horror that, collared, stripped, she was hot, helpless, exquisite meat in her master's furs. The girl of Earth would discover her sexuality on the planet Gor, or her master's whip would know the reason why.

"Did Master enjoy his wine?" asked Lola.

"I have not yet finished it," I said. The bowl was behind me, on the table.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I had drunk from the bowl which she had proffered to me. I had been standing. She, a naked slave, had been kneeling before me. I had drunk with her at my feet, as a master. Power had been in my body when I had drunk the wine. I recalled that I should have castigated myself for the feelings of strength which had been in me at that time, but I had failed to do so. I had felt powerful and magnificent. I realized now, of course, I should have been ashamed. I wondered if it were so wrong to feel magnificent and powerful. Was it truly unworthy of a man to feel magnificent and powerful? Why, I wondered. Why is it wrong for a man to feel like a man? Perhaps, I pondered, it is not wrong for a man to feel like a man. Perhaps it is not even wrong for a man to be a man. Who could think such, save perhaps some who were not themselves men?

"Would you like me to again serve you wine, Master," asked Lola.

"No," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said. She put her head down, deferentially. I realized then she was waiting for me to take her by the arms and throw her on her back on the straw, claiming her, subjecting her to the ruthless domination, sometimes tender, sometime harsh, always uncompromising, accorded by a master to one who is only a miserable slave.

Tears came to my eyes. I wanted her. Yet I knew I must not touch her. I was a man of Earth. I must remember that. And she was a helpless girl, a person.

She looked up. "Taste me," she said.

I then realized, to my chagrin, that another reason I might not have been alert to her needs was because of my fear. He who does not recognize a woman's needs certainly does not have to consider whether or not he should satisfy them. When a girl exposes herself as a slave it would seem there is then extended to the male an invitation to her mastery. She was at my feet, a slave. Did this not, then, challenge me, in effect, to put my collar on her. He who fears he cannot satisfy a woman, or fears he will be unable to do so, often pretends he does not understand her need. If necessary he may chide her, gently, or belittle or ridicule her, attempting to make her ashamed of her need, that it will therefore be overlooked that he has not satisfied it. If the female can be tricked, thusly, into the verbal repudiation of her needs, the male, in his weakness, relieved, need not consider fulfilling them. These deceptions, of course, are seldom successful; unhappiness, conflict and frustration, accordingly, for both males and females, for the needs cannot be physiologically repudiated, become endemic. One who fears to be a master, who doubts his capacity, his power, his strength, his will, his resoluteness, will be expected to turn a deaf ear to the pleas of even the most piteous of beautiful slaves. How can he be expected to fulfill another who fears, first, to fulfill himself? No man can be truly happy who does not own a slave. No woman can be truly happy who does not belong to a master. But if, in an unguarded moment, I had suddenly glimpsed my terror at the prospect of fulfilling myself, of accepting the responsibility, the joy and incredible power, energizing and exalting, of the mastership, of answering the obvious depth needs of the lovely, surrendered female before me, I swiftly thrust such a frightening comprehension out of my thoughts. I feared to look deeply into myself, and into women. Was I strong enough to accept honestly what I might find there? Is it not safer to cower in the caves of lies than stand upon the cliffs of truth, surveying the world? Yet when one stands is the sunlight, and feels the winds of reality, how dank and shameful seem the dark shelters of falsehood, and how foolish it seems then to have once feared daylight and fresh air. But swiftly I, a man of Earth, well tutored in my myths, scoffed that I might have feared to assume my manhood. I was well aware of the definitions of my manhood, and how well I must fulfill them, that I must be gentle, solicitous, feminine and sweet, and obedient to the whims of females, lest I be a brute. But into those definitions did not enter, as I now recognize, hints of a nature formed by a harsh evolution, remarks pertaining to genetic dispositions selected for in times when the meadows were bestrode by the prowling tread of the saber-toothed tiger and the hills rang with the trumpeting of mastodons; those definitions did not tell of the dark songs and cries of hunters; they did not speak of campfires or knives of blue flint; they did not speak of warriors, or of meat turned on green spits by captured, neck-thonged women; one reality seemed to have eluded the verbal formulas I had been taught; one item had been left out of the definitions; it is called man.

"I kneed before my master," said Lola. "I await my rape:"

I cried out with misery and frustration. Lola looked at me, startled, unable to comprehend the conflict which raged within me. I wanted to seize her and throw her to her back, and vent my wrath and joy upon her, uncompromisingly exercising the nocturnal rights which had been assigned to me over her, taking her hot slave flesh in my arms, making it writhe to my least touch, making her scream her submission to me as her master, but I knew that I was a man of Earth, and that she was a person.

Suddenly, angrily, stupidly, foolishly, I lashed out at her, cuffing her back with the back of my left hand. She fell backward. I was startled that I had struck her. Yet it had happened so swiftly I had hardly realized what I was doing. I had been furious not really with her, but with myself. Lola was innocent. She was only a naked, aroused, beautiful, collared slave at my feet. It was not her fault that she had been thrown to me nor was it her fault that her needs were those of what she was, a slave girl. Yet she was the obvious precipitant of my dilemma, my misery. It was thus that I had suddenly, irrationally, struck her. It was foolish, and meaningless, that I had done so. She was flung back in the straw, blood at her beautiful mouth. I expected her to look at me with horror and reproach. Instead, she put down her head and crawled swiftly to my feet. She then lay on her stomach in the straw before me, her upper body lifted on her elbows, her head down, over my feet. I felt her lips, sweet and full, kissing at my feet. There was a kind of wonder and pleasure in her voice. "Yes, Master," she said. "Thank you, Master. I am sorry if I was not pleasing to you." I then understood that she had taken the blow as a token of my mastery over her, an explicit expression of my sovereignty over her. I felt her lips kissing at my feet, happily, gratefully.

"It is enough," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said. She continued to lie at my feet, her head turned to the side, her right cheek on my feet. I felt her hair, too, on my feet.

A slave girl is subject to discipline. She may be struck with or without reason. Usually, of course, the master would have a reason, however trivial it might be. Sometimes, of course, he may strike her with no obvious reason whatsoever, even one which is trivial. This serves to remind hex that she is a slave and that no reason is needed to strike her.

I looked down at Lola.

She looked up at me, and then, turning her head and lifting herself on her elbows, she again kissed my feet. She then rolled from my feet a yard or so away in the straw. She lay on her back and regarded me, happily. "It will not be necessary to strike me again, Master," she said. "I will be docile, and obedient and loving." She looked up at me, smiling, her left knee raised, her hands beside her, palms up, in the straw. "Have me, Master," she said. "Subject me, uncompromisingly, to your pleasure."

"Do you beg it?" I asked. I did not know why I asked the question.

"Yes, Master," she said, smiling, "I beg it."

"Why were you put in with me tonight?" I asked.

"To be punished," she said. She smiled. "I await my punishment, Master," she said.

Then suddenly I was afraid, and guilty, and confused. I was weak, and I reddened, and stammered. I had struck the poor thing. And surely she did not expect me to be strong, and to take her in hand, as would have a Gorean master. I was of Earth. And did she not know she was a person?

"I am sorry I struck you," I stammered. "It was a stupid and cruel thing to do. I was really angry not so much at you, as at myself. I behaved as a brute. I am very sorry."

She looked at me, frightened. She did not understand me, or the forces which moved within me. How could she have understood me, she a Gorean girl, collared, whom strong men had long ago taught her womanhood? Did she not know that I, because of my fears, was trying to make her like a man? Could she not, like many of the women of Earth, because of her own fears, try, too, to be like a man? Each sex could then, because of its fears, try to protect itself from the other, denying the obvious complementarities of nature, the fitting together of diverse dispositions and modalities. The wholeness is not achieved, the puzzle is not solved, by trying to put togather pieces of the same configuration.

I looked at her. Quickly, trembling, confused, she knelt, making herself small. She put her head down to the straw.

"Do not be cruel to me," she begged. "If I have displeased you, simply whip me. I do not understand you, or what you are doing. I am only a poor female slave. Please do not tor. ture me in this insidious fashion. If I have so grievously displeased you, I beg to be simply put under the honesty of a leather discipline."

"I do not understand," I said.

She moaned. "Please do not subject me to these tortures, Master," she begged. "Lola is only a poor slave. Just tie her and whip her. Perhaps then she will learn to please. you better."

"I am not trying to be cruel to you," I said. "I am trying to be kind to you."

She moaned.

"Look up," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said. She looked up, frightened.

"I'm sorry I struck you," I said. "I am very sorry."

"But Lola is only a slave," she said. "Slaves are meant to be struck and abused."

"I am sorry," I said.

"Sorry?" she said.

"Yes," I said. "I am truly sorry."

She shuddered. "Tie me and whip me," she begged.

"Mere," I said, hurrying to the wine, which I had left on the table behind me. I took the wine and, as the girl trembled, crouched near her, holding the wine to her lips. Shuddering, she drank. "You see," I said, "you served me wine, now I serve you wine."

"Yes, Master," she said, trembling.

I understand now her trepidation better than I did at the time. My emotional conflicts and frustrations, my warring motivations, expressing themselves in inconsistencies in speech and behavior, had terrified her. She was a Gorean girl, and her experiences on Gor had not prepared her to understand a male who had been taught to suspect his own nature, and to torture and lacerate himself for impulses, desires and feelings as natural as the circulation of the blood and the movement of molecules through the membranes of cells. Shame she could understand, such things as the chagrin of a man who has failed in honor, but pathologically conditioned guilts, instilled neurotic anxieties, used as control devices to perpetuate sickened societies. were unfamiliar to her. I think, now, she may have feared that she was in the presence of a madman, one to whom her beauty, her vulnerability and helplessness seemed meaningless, one who seemed not to understand that she was a woman and a slave, one who seemed ignorant of her desires, impervious to her needs, one who did not seem to know what to do with her or how to handle her, one who, though ostensibly sane, and possibly dangerously strong, yet behaved unpredictably and irrationally, one who, though ostensibly a male, behaved in no fashion remotely resembling that of a man. It is little wonder she was frightened. Sorely, she must have surmised, if I were not mad, I was at least a fool. Who but a fool would not drink when he was thirsty, or eat when he was hungry? But I was not a madman or a fool. I was neither, or perhaps both. I was a man of Earth.

"Forgive me," I begged the girl.

She shuddered, spilling a bit of wine. She looked at me with terror. I did not strike her.

"Are you finished?" I asked.

She nodded her head, frightened.

"There is some left," I said. "Finish it"

I held the chipped bowl, and the girl, frightened, finished the wine. I put the shallow, chipped bowl on the table.

I returned to the girl, and crouched down beside her. She feared to meet my eyes.

"Please forgive me," I begged.

She shuddered.

"Forgive me," I said, irritably.

"I forgive you, Master," she said, quickly.

"I did not mean, truly, to order you to forgive me," I said. "I would appreciate it if you, of your own free will, would voluntarily forgive me."

"Yes, Master," she whispered. "I forgive you, of my own free will, voluntarily."

"Thank you," I said.

"Don't hurt me, please, Master," she begged. She refused to meet my eyes.

"Look at me," I said.

"Please do not torture me, Master," she said.

"Look at me," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

She lifted her head and looked into my eyes. I was startled. The girl was genuinely frightened.

I saw the slender steel collar on her neck. My eyes must have momentarily hardened, or glinted. She shuddered. Then I again controlled myself. "You need not call me `Master'," I said, kindly.

"Yes, Master," she said.

"Do not call me `Master'," I said.

"I am a slave, Master," she wept. Disrespect in a slave can be punishable by death.

"Do not call me `Master'," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said. "I mean 'Yes,'" she wept.

"Call me `Jason'," I said.

She looked away from me, down, trembling, terrified. " `Jason'," she whispered. "Please do not kill me, Master."

"I do not understand," I said.

"You have scorned my beauty," she wept. "You refused to rape me. You have forced me to show you disrespect. Now will you not, cruelly, punish me for being insufficiently beautiful, for not having yielded in your arms as an abject slave, and for having shown you disrespect? Will you not now throw me to your feet and kick and beat me mercilessly, venting your displeasure upon me?"

"Of course not," I said.

She shrank back. "The House of Andronicus would not like it if you killed me," she said. "I am their property."

"I have no intention of killing you," I said.

She shook with relief. Then she looked at me. "I am here," she said. "What are you going to do with me?"

"Nothing," I said.

"I find that hard to believe, Master," she said.

I shrugged.

"What game are you playing with me?" she said. "For what cruel treatment and punishment are you preparing me?"

"None," I said.

She shuddered. "I know you ire not of Gor," she said. "Are all men of your world like you?" she asked.

"Most, I suppose," I said.

"How their slaves must live in terror of them," she said.

"Most men of my world do not have slaves," I said. "Our women, almost uniformly, are kept free."

"Whether they wish it or not?" she asked.

"Of course," I said, "in such a matter their wishes are unimportant."

"That is called freedom?" she asked.

"Yes," I said. "I suppose so."

"But some men, strong men," she said, "must enslave their women."

I nodded. I had known of such cases. Such men, I supposed, made their own laws.

"But most men of your world," she said, "do not have slaves."

"Of course not," I said.

"Did you have slaves?" she asked.

"No," I said.

"Not even one slave?" she asked.

"No," I said.

"Are you typical of those of your world?" she asked.

"I think so," I said.

"If that is true," she said, regarding me narrowly, "how is that you know so well how to plunge a woman into terror?"

"If I have inadvertently frightened you," I said, "I am truly sorry. Such was not my intention."

"I am naked and collared, and at your mercy," she said. "Do you truly expect me to believe that you have nothing in store for me?"

"I will not abuse you," I said. "You are safe with me. Have no fear."

"You torture me so," she cried. "Why do you not just do what you are going to do and have done with it? Was I truly so cruel to you that you have seen fit to subject me to these agonies?"

I did not know how to reassure her.

"Is there some cruel caprice you intend to practice upon me," she asked, "some humiliating and degrading performance you will exact from me for your pleasure?"

"Do not be afraid," I said.

"Torturer," she wept. "Torturer!"

"Do not be afraid," I said.

She put her head in her hands, weeping. "How cruel and insidious are the men of your world," she wept. "How simple and bluff are the exactions of the men of Gor in comparison. Why could you not, simply, have made me serve you, and then raped and beaten me if you wished?"

"I have no intention of doing you harm," I said.

She, sobbing, crawled to the bench where I had left the whip. She took it from the bench in her teeth and, carrying it in her teeth, crawled to me. She lifted the whip in her teeth to me. I took it from between her small white teeth. "Whip me," she begged.

I threw the whip aside. "No," I said.

She, shuddering, lay at my feet. She did not know what would be done with her.

I did not speak to her but went to the dark blanket which lay to one side on the straw. I spread the blanket, which was heavy, and fashioned from the wool of the bounding hart, on the straw. I gestured to the blanket. "Lie on the blanket," I told her, kindly.

She crept to the blanket and lay upon it, on her back. Her body was very beautiful on the dark blanket. She touched her collar, lightly, with her finger tips. She was a slave. She looked at me. "Does it begin now?" she asked.

I stood over her, and looked down at her small, trembling body, open to whatever I might choose to inflict upon it.

I crouched beside her, and her eyes, terrified, met mine. "Please be kind to Lola, Master," she whispered. "She is only your poor slave."

Gently I took the half of the blanket on which she was not lying and drew it over her, covering her. "It is late now," I said. "You must be tired. Go to sleep."

She looked at me, frightened, disbelievingly. "Are you not going to own me?" she asked.

"Of course not," I said. "Rest now, pretty Lola." Then I realized that I, a man of Earth, should not have called her `pretty Lola. That she was pretty, decidedly so, and helplessly a slave, must be ignored; such things must not be recognized. They might interfere with the artificial constructions of neuteristic personhood, constructions in terms of which my. conditioning required me to view her. How foolish it now seems to me that I then refused to see a beauty as a beauty, and a slave as a slave.

"Are you not going to share the blanket?" she asked.

"No," I said.

"But I am branded, and wear a collar," she said.

"Rest," I said. "Go to sleep, Lola."

I went to the far wall of the cell, that opposite the bars. I sat back against the wall.

"Go to sleep," I said to the girl, gently.

She looked at me, the blanket pulled about her neck. "Am I not to be tied, or chained?" she asked.

"No," I said.

She lay there, quietly.

"You are safe," I told her. "Go to sleep"

"Yes, Master," she said. "Master," she said.

"Yes," I said.

"I am a slave." she said.

"Yes," I said.

"Are you not going to treat me as a slave?" she asked.

"Of course not," I said. "I am a man of Earth."

Did she truly think that I, a man of Earth, would treat her as a slave, merely because she was a slave?

She was silent.

"Go to sleep," I told her.

"Yes, Master," she said.

I leaned back against the wall, sitting in the straw. The girl lay very quietly. We did not speak for a long time. Then, after perhaps an Alm, I heard her moan, and saw her twist under the blanket.

"Master," I heard her beg. "Master."

I went to her side.

In the half light, she thrust the dark blanket down about her thighs. She half sat, half lay, on the lower portion of the blanket. She looked at me. She tried to put her small hands out, to clasp me piteously behind the neck. But I caught her wrists, and held her hands from me. "Master," she begged. "Please, Master" Her body, small and curved, was beautiful in the half light. Her breasts were marvelous. I toted the sweet turn of her body where the curve of her belly yielded to the flare of her hips.

"What is wrong with you?" I asked. Her small strength was no match for mine.

"Please have me, Master," she begged. "Please take me, and as a slave!"

I looked at her small body, and at the collar of steel on her throat.

"No," I said.

She stopped struggling, and I released her wrists. I rose to my feet and stood regarding her. She knelt now, trembling, on the blanket.

"I am a man of Earth," I told her.

"Yes, Master," she said, her head down.

I was angry, and frightened. My heart was pounding.

"You have nothing to fear from me," I said.

"Yes, Master," she said.

Surely she must know that she had nothing to fear from one such as I who would treat her with dignity and respect.

Why, then, was I terrified of her. she only a slave? I think it was because I feared she might release in me thins which I feared to understand, because I feared she might release in me something proud and savage, something which would be a stranger to apologies and pretenses, something long-forgotten and mighty, something which had been bred in caves and the hunt, something which might be called a man.

I looked upon the girl, the kneeling slave. For an instant I felt a surgency of power.

Then I recalled that I must not be a man, for manhood was prohibited and forbidden; it was something to be belittled and ridiculed. One must not be a man. One must rather be a person. Lions must be snared, and castrated and bled. There is no place for them among the flowers. Let lions be taught it is their function to draw the carts of sheep. Let them then be rewarded with bleats of approval.

But, for an instant, looking upon the girl, I had felt stirring within me something dark and mighty, uncompromising and powerful, something which told me that such beauties as now knelt before me were the full and rightful properties of men.

Then I thrust such thoughts from my mind.

"I do not understand you," I said, angrily.

She kept her head down.

"I have treated you with kindness and courtesy," I said. "Yet you persist in behaving like a slave."

"I am a slave, Master," she said.

"I do not know what you want," I said. "Should I tie you to the bars, that the urts may feed upon you?"

"Please do not do that, Master," she said.

"That is a joke," I said, horrified that she might have taken me seriously.

"I thought it might be," she said, softly.

"Speaking of jokes," I said, "what a splendid jest have we two tonight played upon our jailers."

"Master?" she asked.

"They put you in with me that I might punish you, and yet I have not done so. I have treated you with gentleness and courtesy, with kindness and respect."

"Yes, Master," she said, "it is a splendid joke."

"Apparently you are having difficulty sleeping," I said. "I, too, am restless. If you like, we may have a conversation."

She put her head down, silent.

"Would you like me to tell you of the women on my world," I asked, "who are fine and free?"

"Are they happy?" she asked.

"No," I said. "But neither are the men," I added hastily.

"Surely some men and women on your world must be happy," she said.

"Some, I suppose," I said. "I shall hope so." There did not seem much point to me to tell her in detail of the broadcast misery on my world, its pettiness and frustration. If one judges a civilization by the joy and satisfaction of its populations the major civilizations of Earth were surely failures. It is interesting to note the high regard in which certain civilizations are held which, from the human point of view, from the point of view of human happiness, would appear to be obvious catastrophes.

"You are safe with me," I told her. "I shall not demean you by treating you like a woman."

"Why is it demeaning to be treated as a woman?" she asked.

"I do not know," I said. "But it is supposed to be demeaning to treat women like women."

"Oh," she said.

"They are to be treated like men, the same," I said. "It is insulting not to treat them like men."

"Who has told you this?" she asked.

"Men," I said, "some men, and women who are much like men."

"I see," she said.

"Thus it must be true," I said.

"I see," she said.

"Yes," I said.

"I am a woman," she said.

"What you want does not matter," I told her.

"I see," she said.

I was silent.

"It would seem to me very insulting to treat a woman as though she were a man," she said.

"No," I said.

"Oh," she said. She looked at me. "But are not men and women obviously different?" she asked.

"Statistically, of course," I said, "there are vast and obvious differences between them, both psychological and physical, but some men can be found who are very feminine and some women can be found who are extremely masculine. Thus, the existence of such feminine men and such masculine women proves that men and women are really the same."

"I do not understand," she said.

"I do not really understand either," I admitted.

"If a man can be found who is like, a woman and a woman can be found who is like a man does this not suggest, rather, that men and women are really different?"

I was silent.

"If an urt could be found which was like a sleep," she said, "and a sleep could be found which was like an urt, would this show that urts and sleep were the same?"

"Of course not," I said. "That would be preposterous"

"What is the difference?" she asked.

"I do not know," I said. "There must be one."

"Oh," she said. "And," she said, "would not the feminine man and the masculine woman, by their comparative rarity, tend not to cancel out the obvious differences between men and women but rather, in their relative uniqueness, tend to point up the contrasts and differences even more vividly?"

I began to grow irritated. "The contrasts, over time," I said, "will grow less. Education now, on my world, is oriented toward the masculinization of women and the feminization of men. Women must become men and men must try to be like women. That is the key to happiness."

"But men and women are different," she said. She looked sick.

"They must behave as if they were the same," I said.

"But what of their true natures?" she asked.

I shrugged. "Their true natures are unimportant," I said. "Let the heads be shaped by boards. Let the feet be bound with tight cloths."

"But will there not come a time of screaming," she asked, "a time of rage, of lifting of the knife?"

I shrugged. "I do not know," I said. "Let us hope not." I did know that frustration tended to produce aggression and destructiveness. It did not seem unlikely that the frustrations of my world, particularly those of men, might precipitate the madness and irrationality of thermonuclear war. Aggression, displaced, would presumably be ventilated against an external enemy.- But the trigger would have been pulled. It would be unfortunate if the last recourse left to men to prove to themselves that they were men was the carnage of contemporary, technological conflict. Yet I knew men who hungered for this madness, that the walls of their prisons might be destroyed, even though they themselves might die screaming in the flames.

But perhaps they might reclaim their surrendered manhood before they themselves, and their world, became the helpless victims of its thwarted furies.

Manhood cannot be forever denied. The beast will walk at our side, or it will destroy us.

"Am I to understand," she asked, "that the men of your world do not take their women in hand, and throw them to their feet?"

"Of course not!" I said. "Our women are treated with total honor, and dignity and respect," I said. "They are treated as our equals."

"Poor men, poor women," she said.

"I do not understand," I said.

"You would make a love slave your equal?" she, asked.

"Of course," I said.

"You cheat her then of her opportunity to be overwhelmed, and to be forced to serve and love. You preclude her then from the fulfillment of her deepest nature."

I said nothing.

"If you will not be a man," she asked, "how can she be a woman?"

"Do you think that a woman is a slave?" I asked, scornfully.

"I have been in the arms of strong men," she said. "Yes."

I was stunned.

"You are wrong!" I cried. "You are wrong!" I was afraid, terribly, then, for if what she said was true then there might be within me a master. But if a woman should kneel before me and beg a collar would I not be terrified to enclose her lovely neck in its inflexible grasp? Would I not be afraid to own her, to assume the mighty responsibility of the mastery? Did I have the power, the strength, the courage, to be a master? Did I fear I would be unable to control and tame, and make mine, such a sinuous, beautiful animal? No, I surely would have, reddening and frightened, hurried her to her feet, trying to embarrass and shame her for having displayed her needs. I would have to encourage her to be a man. If she, too, were a man, then I could, with a clear conscience, leave the woman in her unsatisfied.

"And you are a fool," she said.

It irritated me that she had called me this, but I reminded myself that I was a man of Earth, and women might annoy or insult me as they pleased, with complete impunity. If they were not permitted to do this, how could they respect us?

"I am not surprised," she said, "that women are the equals of such men as you. It seems to me, Jason, that you are quite possibly the equal of a woman."

I did not speak.

"You are despicable," she said.

"It should please you," I said, "if you are the equals of men."

"Women dream not of equals," she said, "but of masters."

I sat back against the wall, angrily.

"It is degrading to wear a collar in this cell," she said. Then she lay down on the blanket, bitterly, and turned her back to me.

She did not bother covering her lovely body. Each insolent, luscious curve of her collared slave body was displayed to me, contemptuously, taunting me. It was the insult of a slave girl to an ineffectual slave she did not fear. My fists clenched. A wave of anger swept me. I considered leaping to her, hurling her upon her back, whipping her face back and forth with the palm and then back of my hand, and then, mercilessly, raping her, reminding her that she was only a slave, and a wench that had been given to me for the night. But I did not do this. I controlled myself.

I sat back against the wall, angry. I had tried to relate to her. I looked to the bench, where lay the slave whip. I considered putting it to her beauty, until she begged to serve. Lola would understand the kicks of my feet, the blows of the whip. Those are arguments which any woman can follow. Then I forced such thoughts from my mind. I had failed to relate well to her, in spite of being solicitous and charming, courteous and attentive, in spite of treating her with honor, and with dignity and respect. I treated her as my equal and I was, in return, subjected to ill treatment and scorn. I understood almost nothing of what had occurred. 1 had inked with her; I had treated her with homely comraderie; I had, almost invariably, treated her as a person.

"Are you going to whip me?" she asked.

"I certainly am not," I said.

"I did not think so." she said. Then, with a twist of her body, she rolled onto her back, and stared up at the ceiling. I saw the collar on her throat.

I sat against the wall, and troubled, thought.

Lola did not understand a gentleman, I decided. She was accustomed only to the brutes of Gor. I was too good for her.

"You do not seem grateful to me," I said, angrily.

"Why should I be grateful to you?" she asked.

"You were put in with me to be punished," I said. "I did not punish you."

"How clever were the masters," she said, bitterly. "I must have displeased them grievously."

"I do not understand," I said.

"I have been most cruelly punished," she said.

"I do not understand," I said. "I have not punished you."

Suddenly, surprising me, she rolled onto her stomach and, with her small fists, struck down at the blanket spread over the straw. She began to sob, hysterically. I could not understand her.

"What is wrong?" I asked her.

She leaped from the blanket and, piteously, choking and sobbing, fled to the bars. She pressed her lovely body against them and extended her arms and hands between them, to the silent, empty corridor. "Masters!" she cried. "Masters! Let me out! Let me out! Please, let me out!" Then she shook the heavy bars with her tiny, lovely hands. "Let me out!" she begged. "Please let me out, Masters!" Then, subsiding, sobbing, she slipped to her knees at the bars, holding them with her small hands: "Let me out, Masters!" she wept. "Please, my Masters, let me out!" But no one answered her cries. She knelt at the bars, her head down, sobbing. "Let me out," she whispered. "Please let me out, Masters:"

"I do not understand you," I said.

She sobbed, at the bars.

"I do not understand," I said. "I have not punished you."

"Do you not know what my punishment was?" she sobbed.

"No," I said.

"It was to have been put in with you," she said. She put down her head, sobbing.

Angrily I went back to where I had sat against the wall. Again I sat down, in the straw.

She remained at the bars, sobbing. Then, later, near them, she fell asleep.

I leaned against the wall, angry. I did not sleep.