Quickly she knelt, assuming the position of submission before men.
But this time she felt a surge of joy she tried to conceal. She might be a woman, and a prisoner, but she, too, was a human being, and could be clever and cunning. She was a woman. She had been taught her femaleness. But she was not a simpleton, not a fool!
She was clever, cunning. She would fool them all and escape!
The door opened.
Brenda Hamilton was startled. Herjellsen stood in the doorway. It was the first time since her captivity that she had seen him. She gasped.
She looked at him.
He regarded her. She knew it was the first time he had seen her dressed as a woman, and as a woman prisoner of men.
“Please get up,” said Herjellsen. He blinked through the thick lenses of his glasses, glanced about the room.
Gratefully Brenda Hamilton rose to her feet.
Herjellsen returned his attention to her.
“You are an extremely attractive young woman, Doctor Hamilton,” said Herjellsen.
“Thank you,” said Brenda Hamilton.
“You have been crying,” he said. “Please, if you would, ` wash away your tears.”
Gratefully, Brenda Hamilton went to the water bucket, and with water, and a towel, washed her face.
“I do not like to see a woman’s tears,” said Herjellsen.
Brenda Hamilton said nothing.
Herjellsen looked at her.
“Please brush your hair now,” said Herjellsen.
Obediently, Brenda Hamilton, while Herjellsen, and the two blacks watched, brushed her hair.
Then she turned to face them. “Ah,” said Herjellsen, “that is better.”
They regarded one another.
“Now,” said Herjellsen, “where is the missing implement?” “What implement?” asked Brenda Hamilton.
“The missing fork,” said Herjellsen.
“There was no fork,” said Brenda Hamilton. “One was not brought with the tray.” She looked at the large black, who had abused her. “I told him that,” she said. “But he did not believe me.” Her voice trembled. “Look,” she said, indicating a bruise on her arm, where she had been hurled into the wall. “He was cruel to me!”
But Herjellsen did not admonish the black.
“He hurt me!” said Brenda Hamilton.
“At the least sign of insubordination,” said Herjellsen, “you must expect to be physically disciplined.”
“I see,” she said.
“Now,” said Herjellsen, “where is the fork?”
“One was not brought,” said Brenda Hamilton.
Herjellsen regarded her.
“Look!” she said, angrily. “Search the cell. I do not care!” “That will not be necessary,” said Herjellsen.
Brenda Hamilton looked at him.
“You will lead me to it,” he said.
The golden light of the late Rhodesian afternoon filtered into the room, between the bars, through the netting.
“Approach me, my dear,” said Herjellsen.
Hesitantly, Brenda Hamilton, barefoot, in the thin, white dress, sleeveless, approached him.
He then stood slightly behind her, to her left, and placed his band on her arm, above her elbow.
“There is nothing mysterious,” he told her, “in what I am now going to do.”
Brenda Hamilton was terrified.
“It is a simple magician’s trick,” said Herjellsen. “It is called muscle reading. The principle is extremely simple. You will find that you are unable to control the subtle, almost unconscious movements of your arm muscles.”
“No!” she cried. She felt his hand on her arm. His grip was not tight, but it was firm, and strong. She knew herself held.
“You must not, of course,” said Herjellsen, “think of the location of the missing implement.”
Immediately the location of the hidden fork flew into
Brenda Hamilton’s mind the inevitable response to the psychological suggestion of Herjellsen’s remark.
She felt herself helplessly, uncontrollably, pull away from its location.
“It seems,” said Herjellsen, “that it is on this side of the room,” indicating the direction she had pulled away from.
Brenda Hamilton moaned. She tried to clear her mind.
“We must, find it, mustn’t we, my dear?” asked Herjellsen.
Again its hiding place darted into her mind.
Herjellsen guided her in the direction she had pulled away from.
She tried to relax her body, her arm, to think nothing. “Please,” she said.
Herjellsen stopped. “Excellent,” he said. “We must not be tense.”
Immediately Brenda Hamilton’s body, helpless under the suggestion, tensed.
“Ah,” said Herjellsen. He led her to the corner of the room.
She trembled. She stood in the corner, where the two walls joined. There was only the bleakness of the white plaster. “There was no fork,” she said. “You see?” She looked at Herjellsen, her lip trembling. “There is nothing here,” she said.
“Get the fork,” said Herjellsen to the black, the large fellow. He came to where they stood.
Herjellsen released her. Brenda Hamilton ran to the center of the room.
The black reached up to where Herjellsen indicated, where the walls stopped, and the sloping, peaked, tin corrugated ceiling began, with its metal and beams.
He took down the fork, from where Brenda had thrust it, at the top of the wall, under the tin.
He put it in his shirt pocket.
“Lie down across the cot,” said Herjellsen to Brenda Hamilton, “head down, hands on the floor.”
She did so.
“At the least sign of insubordination,” he said, “you must expect to be physically disciplined.”
Herjellsen turned away. “Two strokes,” he said to the guards.
He left the room.
Brenda Hamilton fighting tears, felt the dress thrust up over the small of her back, heard the rustle of the heavy belt pulled through its loops. It was doubled. She was struck twice, sharply.
Then they left her.
Brenda Hamilton crawled on the cot and stretched out on it, red-eyed, humiliated.
The room was now half dark as the dusty afternoon faded into the dusk. She heard insect noises outside.
She did not turn on the electric light bulb.
It was an unusually docile Brenda Hamilton who was served her meal that evening.
When the black had left the room she lifted her head and sped to the tray.
Her heart leaped. There was again both a fork and spoon with the mug and tray.
William, if the usual routine obtained, would pick up the tray.
She washed her body and her face, and even the garment and put it quickly back on. In the hot Rhodesian night it would dry in minutes on her body. She combed her hair, and brushed it until it was glossy. Then, a few minutes before ten P.M. she bolted down her meal. She thrust the fork into her mattress.
At ten promptly, as was usual, William entered the room. He didn’t look at her.
“You heard what happened?” she asked.
“I heard you were foolish,” said William.
“Look at me, William,” she said.
He did so. She smiled.
He seemed angry with her. She flushed slightly. Doubtless Gunther had made his report.
But she smiled her prettiest and lifted the spoon left on the tray.
“I tried to hide a fork today,” she said. “And now look,” she pouted, “I have only this spoon to eat with. I feel silly, eating meat with a spoon. They treat me like I was a child.”
“Oh?” asked William. He looked at her, closely.
“See if you can’t get them, tomorrow, not tonight, to let me have a fork again.”
“You don’t need it,” said William.
“Don’t be cruel to me, William,” she said.
“Herjellsen must have given them their orders,” he said.
“See if you can get him to change them tomorrow, when he is in a better mood,” she wheedled. She smiled at him.