"Good," I said. "Eat it."
She thrust the bit of food into her mouth, feeding on it like a voracious little animal. She fed with the eagerness of a half-starved slave girl.
I looked down at the warder. "Put your legs together," I said, "and your arms at your sides, palms up."
She obeyed.
I then crouched down, beside her.
She moved, uneasily, but kept position.
"These rags, I said, "are doubtless contrived in such a way that they may easily be removed."
She squirmed in anger.
I did not touch them, however. I pulled back the warder's scarflike turban which, I had assumed, was worn to cover and hide a closely cropped head.
"OH!" she said. To my surprise, however, her hair, loosened from under the turban, would have, had she been standing, fallen well beneath her shoulders. "Oh," said Lady Claudia, interested, come now to my side, a piece of crust in her hand.
"Yes," I said. "Her hair has not been cropped."
The warder squirmed a little, angrily.
"As I recall," I said to Lady Claudia, "you had not had yours cut either." "No," said Lady Claudia, smiling. "I did not want it cut. I was too vain. I was too proud of it. I thought it too pretty to want to look like one of those girls who carries water in a quarry, or works in a mill or laundry, in the heat. Let other women sacrifice their hair, not me. But when I was caught on the wall it was cut quickly enough."
"Then as a punishment," I said.
"Doubtless," she said, "but, too, they had need of catapult cordage." "What is your name, prisoner?" I asked our warder.
"Prisoner?" she said.
"Yes," I said.
"Publia," she said.
"Are you free?" I asked.
"Of course!" she said.
"You will forgive me," I said, "but the most common brand sites are covered by your rags."
"Do you think," I asked Lady Claudia, "that Lady Public's motivations in the matter of keeping her hair were similar to yours?"
"I suppose so," said Lady Claudia, finishing the bit of bread.
"And you are probably correct," I said, "but there was one other, too, perhaps, which had not occurred to you?"
The prisoner moves a little, angrily.
"What was that?" asked Lady Claudia.
But I addressed a question to our prone captive. "What is your caste?" I asked. "The Merchants," she said. "That, on the whole, is a quite well-to-do caste," I said. "It is mine, too," said Lady Claudia.
I jerked the pouch from the prisoner's belt, breaking the strings. It was a weighty pouch. I tossed it to Lady Claudia, who examined its contents." "There is much gold here," she said.
"Put it in my pouch," I said.
Lady Claudia did so.
"How is it, Lady Publia," I asked, "that you, a member of the Merchants, and one who until a moment ago had a heavy purse, are barefoot, and clad in rags?" She did not respond.
"And such artful rags?" I asked.
She did not answer.
I fingered them. "I doubt that you sewed these yourself," I said. "They were probably done by a Cloth Worker. Consider the stitching, the tightness of the stitches, its regularity and fineness. It seems very professional. Doubtless though it was done according to your directions. The outfit is calculated to give the appearance of rags but, upon close examination, we discover it is more in the nature of a costume." I smiled inwardly. Slave girls, too, I knew, occasionally practiced such wiles with their brief, scandalous ta-teeras, supposed mere rags, befitting their degraded status. Yet I knew they often labored on such rags in such a way as to show an inch her, and conceal an inch there, in such a way that a masterpiece of sensitivity, vulnerability and provocation was achieved. By such means and many others do the luscious, loving, collared little brutes save themselves many a beating and drive their masters half mad with passion and desire.
"I congratulate you," I said. "The entire ensemble, the points and such, and the varying lengths thusly achieved, and the consequent, now-and-then baring of your calves, and such, is extremely well done. The entire ensemble reveals marvelous imagination and exquisite taste."
The prisoner made a small, pleased noise.
"The question remains, of course, as to why you might do such a thing." She lay quietly, not moving.
"The question may be easily decided, of course," I said, "by seeing whether or not these garments, unlike the garments of free women, can be easily, swiftly and provocatively removed, and, say, whether or not, in the typical fashion of free women, even of the lower castes, you are wearing underrobes." Her small fists clenched in fury.
"Accordingly," I said, "rise up on your knees, and turn and face me." She did so, in fury.
Then her fury turned to fear, timidity and docility as I held her veil. I drew it toward me, gently. Instantly she fell forward on all fours, to relieve the pressure on the veil, to keep it on her. Her eyes were now wild over it, held out from her.
"No," she said, "please do not take my veil."
"I shall not do so," I said.
She gasped in relief.
"Lady Claudia will do so," I said.
Tears brimmed in her eyes.
"Surely you have looked upon her, unveiled," I said.
The prisoner sobbed.
"Stay on all fours," I cautioned her. In this way she would be unable to interfere. Too, she could not put her hands before her face.
The prisoner sobbed, and trembled.
"Remove the veil, carefully," I cautioned Lady Claudia. I had my reasons for not wanting it damaged.
"Please, no!" begged the prisoner.
The veil was fastened with a string and Lady Claudia, with two hands, lifted it gently from the head of our prisoner.
"She is beautiful!" said Lady Claudia.
"Please do not look at my lips!" sobbed the prisoner. But my hand was in her hair, holding her head up.
"She has excellent lips," I said. "Properly trained, she could probably kiss well."
"How beautiful she is!" breathed Lady Claudia.
"No more beautiful than you," I said.
"Truly?" asked Lady Claudia.
"Yes," I said.
Lady Claudia caught her breath for an instant, suspecting then, perhaps, how attractive she herself might be.
"You may kneel back," I told the prisoner, releasing her hair. She lost no time in scrambling back to her kneeling position, and put her two hands before her face.
"Put your hands down," I said.
"I do not have my veil!" she said.
Her lips, her mouth, her features, in all their expressiveness, with all their delicacy, sensuousness and beauty, it was true, should she lower her hands, would be bared. They would be exposed. One could look upon them, even idly. She had been face-stripped. Her face was now naked, as much so as that of a slave. "Now," I said.
She lowered her hands, sobbing.
I had denied her the delicacy, the modesty, the shield and defense of the veil, just as it is denied to slaves.
"Did you not expect to tear off your veil before Cosians?" I asked. She looked at me, angrily.
"I see you did," I said.
"One grows used to being without the veil," said Lady Claudia.
"Slave!" cried Lady Publia.
"I am as free as you!" retorted Lady Claudia.
"In the south," I said, "the women of the Wagon Peoples, even the free women, do not wear veils."
"Slave!" cried Lady Publia again to Lady Claudia.
"My face is no more naked than yours!" retorted lady Claudia.
"Naked face!" cried Lady Publia.
"Naked face!" responded Lady Claudia.
"On the other hand," I said, "the free women of the Wagon Peoples do wear clothes."
Lady Publia looked at me, suddenly, sharply.
"Those are pretty rags," I said.
She said nothing.
"Remove them," I told her.
Angrily Lady Publia removed the belt from her waist. It was a sturdy belt, flat, white, woven of ropelike material, quite capable of supporting the purse she had carried. It was, however, a hook-fastened belt. And she had unhooked it in an instant and, thus, freed, it fell back, behind her. She then, angrily, put her hands to the sides of her garment, up about the neck. It was a wraparound garment. She undid one hook there and, in fury, with her two hands, swiftly, easily, insolently, gracefully, slipped the garment away.