Once he had stripped, Mark’s excitement accelerated. She was waiting. He pictured her. He then hurried into the bathroom, closed the door, slid the latch, and strode to the bathtub. He could hardly contain himself. He groped for the shower curtain, found the end, and ripped it aside.
Emily stood nude, her back to him, streams of water chasing the soap down her limbs. At the noise, she wheeled around, almost losing her foothold. What she saw, through the steam, petrified her: Mark, his lascivious grin, his huge, hairy chest, the horrible, blatant torso.
‘Sa-ay, now honey,’ he was saying, ‘I knew you were beautiful, but-’
She reached to cover her breasts first, and then darted one hand below. She had lost the power of speech. Her eyes widened with disbelief, as he climbed into the bathtub.
Her voice surfaced in a shrill cry. ‘Are you crazy? Get out!’
‘And miss the fun?’
He stepped beneath the shower, reaching for her. With a tremor, she tore away from him, and leaped out of the tub. Landing on the bathroom floor, her wet feet gave way, and she fell on the bathmat. Rolling off it, her slippery body on the tile, she clutched for the mat to cover herself.
As she tried to pull the inadequate mat around her waist, she felt Mark’s hand on her shoulder, pinning her to the floor.
‘Let go of me!’ she cried. ‘What’s got into you?’
‘Cut it out-stop the act.’
His hands were on her breasts. Horrified, she released the mat and tried to grab his wrists and remove his hands. With ease, he pulled one hand free of her wet fingers, and tore the mat aside and threw it against the wall.
‘There now-now-’
Panting, she pressed her thighs together, as he loomed above her.
‘Honey,’ he was saying, ‘be a good girl, honey. We can’t get anywhere with your legs like that. Come on, now, relax, enjoy yourself-’
‘No, damn you, I don’t want that!’
One hand was on her thighs, as the other fended off her fists. ‘Sure you want it, sure you do-you wanted it all this trip-you kept telling me without words.’
She held his defensive arm, and began to plead. ‘No, Mark, no-I can’t-’
‘Listen to you, the way you’re breathing-’
‘I’m scared!’
‘Stop that stuff. You’ll love it, I guarantee you, you’ll want more. We’ve got hours-’
Suddenly, he freed one arm, slipped it around her back, so that it came around to cup a breast. She snatched at the invading hand, trying to sit up, trying to push herself upright, and as she did so her legs and thighs came apart. In an instant, he rolled between them, above her.
She was exhausted, her heart against her ribs, and the decision was now, relent or fight. She was conscious of the suspended second. To lie back and let the muscular naked body above enter and consume her or to beat off and repel the ugly menace of its offering?
With all her strength, she smashed both fists against his chest. For a moment, he tottered above her, then reeled backwards on his haunches in genuine surprise and bewilderment.
She sat up. ‘Get out, or I’ll scream!’ she shouted.
He sat blinking at her a moment, awkward and foolish. ‘You mean it.’ It was a flat statement. He climbed to his feet. ‘You don’t have to scream. And stop shaking like a frightened rabbit. Rape isn’t my line. But you sure had me fooled. I’ve never been wrong before-’
‘You’re wrong now!’ She had recovered the bathmat, and, still sitting, shielded her lower parts. ‘Please go!’
With some remnant of dignity, he turned, unlatched the door, and went into the bedroom.
Trembling, Emily stood up, edged to the door, and held the knob. She could hear him dressing. She started to close the door, when he spoke.
‘I still say I wasn’t wrong. I just wonder what happened between the time you said yes to yourself and no to me. Something happened.’
‘Nothing happened,’ she said through the door. ‘I was a little drunk, and you-you misinterpreted it.’
‘Maybe. Honey, tell me one thing. Between us.’
She waited.
‘Are you a virgin?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, that explains a little.’ He paused. ‘I’m leaving now. I’m sorry for both of us. No hard feelings. See you at smorgåsbord.’
She heard the door slam, held back, then peered out, and saw that the cabin was empty.
Emotionally spent, she turned off the shower and then dried herself. After tidying the bathroom, she went into the cabin and mechanically dressed in the garments that she had recently discarded. Closing the zip of her skirt, she felt dizzy. She lowered herself to the bed, and finally fell back on the pillow, hands covering her eyes from the overhead light.
Twenty minutes later, passing to his room, Max Stratman thought that he heard her sobbing. He placed his ear to her door, confirmed his suspicion, and hastily opened it and went inside.
‘Emily, um Himmels willen, what is the matter?’
‘Nothing, Uncle Max, nothing-I swear.’
‘Why are you crying like this?’
She tried to contain her sobs, and finally reduced them to a soft whimper. ‘I’m not crying-see?’
He pulled the chair up beside her bed, and perched forward on it, like a kindly country doctor. ‘Something has happened. We have no secrets.’
She rolled on her right side, studying the hedge of hair on his oversized bald head, the worried eyes behind the steel-rimmed bifocals, the concern in his wise old red face. Here was one of the great minds of the world, a genius cherished and honoured, and she, a neurotic nobody, was troubling him with her petty problems.
‘It’s nothing,’ she repeated without conviction.
‘Please tell me. I will not go until you tell me.’
She tried to visualize her father, and could not, and suddenly there was only Uncle Max, and she wanted to tell him. Haltingly, avoiding his eyes, she related the events of the past hour or more, from the time Mark had escorted her to the door to the time he had left her nude on the bathroom floor to dress and leave.
‘That is all?’ asked Stratman, when she had finished. ‘You are not leaving out anything?’
‘He didn’t touch me, I swear-’
‘No-no assault?’
‘Uncle Max, I’d know.’
Stratman rose, agitated. ‘It is terrible, anyway. No one is safe. I will go to the Captain at once-’
‘Oh, no!’ She sat up and swung her legs off the bed. ‘I don’t want him in trouble-’
‘You care for him that much? Is that it?’
‘I don’t care for him at all,’ she said vehemently. ‘He means nothing to me. But I’m just not sure he’s all to blame.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘Only-I had too much to drink-I invited him-he misunderstood. It is something that happens every day.’ She softened her tone. ‘Let’s not make a fuss, Uncle Max. I don’t want to go through that. It would embarrass me. It would be easier to forget it. We’re almost there. We’ll leave the boat soon and not think of it.’
‘You are sure it is that simple?’
‘Oh, yes. I was upset, naturally. But I’m all right, you can see. I don’t want an incident, that’s all.’
He looked at her. ‘Maybe I can get the ship’s doctor. To give you a shot, calm your nerves-’
‘Not, not even that. Just let me rest, and an hour before we get in, come and get me. I’ll be ready.’ She tried to change the subject. ‘Do you think there will be a reception when you get to Göteborg?’
‘I doubt it. Everything is in Stockholm.’
She feigned enthusiasm. ‘I can’t wait. It’s really been a marvellous trip.’
She dropped back on the pillow. He waited until she was comfortable. ‘I’ll be next door if you need me.’
‘What about dinner?’
‘I’m not hungry. I’ll have the steward bring a sandwich. I’ll come back soon. You rest.’