It is interesting, I thought, how much such a small thing can mean to a girl. It was a mere slave tunic, a cheap, tiny thing, little more than a ta-teera or camisk, and yet it delighted her, boundlessly. It was the sort of garment which free women profess to despise, to find unspeakably shocking, unutterably scandalous, the sort of garment which they profess to regard with horror, the sort of garment which they seem almost ready to faint at the sight of, and yet to Phoebe, and to others like her, in bondage, it was precious, meaning more her doubtless than the richest garments in the wardrobes of the free women. To be sure, I suspect that free women are not always completely candid in what they tell us about their feelings toward such garments. The same free woman, captured, who is cast such a garment, and regarding it cries out with rage and frustration, and dismay, and hastens to don it only when she sees the hand of her captor tighten on his whip, is likely, in a matter of moments, to be wearing it quite well, and with talent, moving gracefully, excitingly and provocatively within it. Such garments, and their meaning, tend to excite women, inordinately. Too, they are often not such strangers to such garments as they might have you believe. Such garments, and such things, are often found among the belongings of women in captured cities. It is presumed that many women wear them privately, and pose in them, before mirrors, and such. Sometimes it is in the course of such activities that they first feel the slaver's noose upon them, they surprised, and taken, in the privacy of their own compartments. On Gor it is said that free women are slaves who have not been collared. In Phoebe's case, of course, the garment represented not only such things, confirmation of her bondage, her subjection to a master, and such, but more importantly, at the moment, the considerable difference between being clothed and unclothed. She, a slave, and not entitled to clothing, any more than other animals, was, by the generosity of her master, to be permitted a garment.
"Thank you, Master! Thank you, Master!" wept Phoebe, clutching the garment. Marcus had, of his own thinking in the matter, purchased the garment. It was, in my opinion, high time he had done so. Not only would Phoebe be incredibly fetching in a slave garment, garments permitting a female in many ways to call attention to, accentuate, display and enhance her beauty, but it would make her, and us, less conspicuous on the streets of Ar. Also, of course, she would then be no more susceptible than other similarly clad slaves to the pinches, and other attentions, of passers-by in the streets.
"May I put it on?" she asked, holding the garment out.
"Yes," said Marcus. He was beaming. I think he had forgotten that he hated the wench, and such.
"Why have you come to Ar?" I asked Marcus.
"Surely you know," he said.
"But that is madness," I said.
During the siege of Ar's Station its Home Stone had been smuggled out of the city and secretly transported to Ar for safekeeping. This was done in a wagon owned by a fellow named Septimus Entrates. We had learned, however, after the fall of Ar's Station, that the official rumor circulated in the south was to the effect that Ar's Station had opened its gates to the Cosian expeditionary force, this in consideration of substantial gifts of gold. Accordingly, those of Ar's Station were now accounted renegades in the south. This supposed treachery of Ar's Station was then used, naturally, to explain the failure of Ar's might in the north to raise the siege, it was supposed that Ar's dilemma in the north was then either to attack their former colony or deal with the retreating expeditionary force. On the supposition that the latter action took priority the might of Ar in the north entered the delta in pursuit of the Cosians, in which shifting, trackless morass column after column was lost or decimated. The devastation of Ar's might in the delta was perhaps the greatest military disaster in the planet's history. Of over fifty thousand men who had entered the delta it was doubted that there were more than four or five thousand survivors. Some of these, of course, had managed to find their way back to Ar. As far as these men knew, of course, at least on the whole, the circulating rumors were correct, namely, that Ar's Station had betrayed Ar, that it was still intact and that it was now a Cosian outpost. Such things they had been told in their winter camp, near Holmesk, south of the Vosk.
Phoebe slipped the garment over her head.
Marcus observed, intently.
Understandably enough, given these official accounts of doings in the north, Ar's Station and those of Ar's Station were much despised and hated in Ar. Happily Marcus' accent, like most of Ar's Station, was close enough to that of Ar herself that he seldom attracted much attention. Too, of course, these days in the vicinity of Ar, given the movements of Cos on the continent, and the consequent displacements and flights of people, there were medleys of accents in and about Ar. Not even my own accent, which was unusual on Gor, attracted much attention.
Phoebe drew down the tunic about her thighs, and turned before Marcus, happily. "Aii!" said Marcus.
"Does the slave please you?" inquired Phoebe, delighted. The question was clearly rhetorical.
"It is too brief," said Marcus.
"Nonsense," I said.
"It is altogether too brief," said Marcus.
"The better that my master may look upon my flanks," said Phoebe. They were well exposed, particularly with the notching on the sides.
"And so, too, many other men," he said, angrily.
"Of course, Master," she said, "for I am a slave!"
"She is extraordinarily beautiful," I said. "Let her be so displayed and exposed. Let other seethe with envy upon consideration of your property."
"She is just a slut of Cos!" said Marcus, angrily.
"Now only your slave," I reminded him.
"You are a pretty slave, slut of Cos," said Marcus to the girl, grudgingly. "A girl is pleased, if she is found pleasing by her master," said Phoebe. "Surely, by now," I said to Marcus, "you have thought the better of your mad project."
"No," said Marcus, absently, rather lost in the rapturous consideration of his lovely slave.
The Home Stone of Ar's Station, as I have suggested, was in Ar. It was primarily in connection with this face that Marcus had come to Ar.
"She is marvelously beautiful," said Marcus.
"Yes," I said.
"For a Cosian," he said.
"Of course," I said.
Given the anger in Ar at Ar's Station, and the fact that the Home Stone of Ar's Station had been sent to Ar, supposedly, according to the rumors, not for safekeeping, given the imminent danger in the city, but in a gesture of defiance and repudiation, attendant upon the supposed acceptance of a new Home Stone, one bestowed upon them by the Cosians, the stone was, during certain hours, publicly displayed. This was done in the vicinity of the Central Cylinder, on the Avenue of the Central Cylinder. The purpose of this display was to permit the people of Ar, and elsewhere, if they wished, to vent their displeasure upon the stone, insulting it, spitting upon it, and such.
"The stone," I said, "is well guarded."
We had ascertained that this morning. We had then gone to the Alley of the Slave Brothels f Ludmilla, on which street lies the insula of Achiates. I did not enter the insula itself, but made an inquiry or two in its vicinity. Those whom I had sought there were apparently no longer in residence. I did not make my inquiries of obvious loungers in its vicinity. I went back., with Marcus and Phoebe, later in the afternoon. The loungers were still in evidence. I had assumed then they had been posted. There was a street peddler nearby, too, sitting behind a blanket on which trinkets were spread. I did not know if he had been posted there or not. It did not much matter. Normally in such arrangements there are at least two individuals. In this way one can report to superiors while the other keeps his vigil. As far as I knew, no one knew that I was in the vicinity of Ar. I did know I could be recognized by certain individuals. The last time I had come to Ar, before this time, I had come with dispatches to Gnieus Lelius, the regent, from Dietrich of Tarnburg, from Torcadino. I had later carried a spurious message which had nearly cost me my life to Ar's Station, to be delivered to its commanding officer at the time, Aemilianus, of the same city. I had little doubt that I had inadvertently become identified as a danger to, and an enemy of, the party of treason in Ar. I did not know if the regent, Gnieus Lelius, were of this party or not. I rather suspected not. I was certain, however, from information I had obtained at Holmesk, at the winter camp of Ar, that the high general in the city, Seremides, of Tyros, was involved. Also, secret documents earlier obtained in Brundisium, and deciphered, gave at least one other name, that of a female, one called Talena, formerly the daughter, until disowned, of Marlenus of Ar. Her fortunes were said to be on the rise in the city.