She pulled at the handcuff, defeated.
9
“More wine, Doctor Hamilton?” inquired Herjellsen. “Yes,” said Brenda Hamilton. Herjellsen nodded, and one of the blacks, in a white jacket, stepped discreetly forward and filled her glass. “Thank you,” said Brenda Hamilton. The black did not reply. “May I smoke?” asked William, drawing out a cigarette. “Certainly,” said Hamilton.
He lit the cigarette. “Would you like one?” he asked.
“No,” said Hamilton.
They sat at table in Herjellsen’s quarters, where, in earlier weeks, they had commonly dined together, a continental supper, served at nine P.M., after the heat of the day.
Herjellsen, and William and Gunther, wore evening clothing, black tie.
Brenda Hamilton wore an evening gown, a slim, white sheath, off the shoulder. She had never worn such a gown before. It fitted perfectly. Except for a string of pearls, and two pearl earrings, it was all she wore. Gunther, standing behind her, had put the pearls about her neck.
Her ankles, her wrists, were free of fetters.
Hamilton looked down at the white linen tablecloth, the napkin, the silverware.
There was candlelight.
The evening was comfortable.
The conversation, mostly unimportant talk, had not been unpleasant.
Hamilton sipped the wine.
“A toast,” said Herjellsen, lifting his glass toward Hamilton. “I had forgotten until now,” he said, “how beautiful a European woman could be.” He used “European” in the African sense.
Gunther, with William, and Herjellsen, lifted their glasses to her.
“Thank you,” said Hamilton.
She blushed, and lowered her head, pleased in spite of herself, in the depth of her new-found womanness, which they had released in her, at being the object of their admiration. William, she had seen, had not taken his eyes from her all evening. Even in Gunther’s eyes she had detected a grudging admiration. This had stirred her, helplessly, deeply. He was the most exciting man she had ever seen. She knew she was his for the asking, even though she knew he despised her, and had, as her jailer, treated her with contempt, with harshness, and even cruelty. She sat among them as a slim, erect, elegant young woman, educated, beautiful, and civilized, in a white sheath gown and pearls, but she knew that if Gunther wanted her, she would yield to him on his own terms, whatever they might be. If he so much as snapped his fingers, she would prepare herself, eagerly, for him. She wanted to serve him, intimately, desperately, at length, even if he, in his cruelty, forced her to take payment for doing so, a cigarette, or a shilling. She sat across the table from him, looking at him, over the candlelight. “Do you know, Gunther,” she asked him, silently, to herself, “that I, sitting here, elegant in my white silk and pearls, am your whore?” She regarded him. He smiled. She put down her head. She knew that he knew.
She sipped her wine, finishing it.
“More wine?” asked Herjellsen, attentively.
“No, thank you,” said Hamilton.
“Coffee,” said Herjellsen to one of the blacks, standing nearby, in his white jacket. The fellow left the dining area.
“I had thought,” said Hamilton, to Herjellsen, “that I was not to be permitted cosmetics, perfume.”
Tastefully, and fully, beautifully, she had adorned herself this evening. She had, of course, been instructed to do so.
“Tonight,” said Herjellsen, “is a night on which we are celebrating. We have worked hard. We have been successful. You would not begrudge us our wine, surely, our supper, the stimulation of your lovely presence.”
“Of course not,” she said. She smiled.
“We have treated you rather harshly,” said Herjellsen, apologetically. “But we have done so in the hope that we may have, thereby, increased your chances of survival.”
“I find it difficult to follow your reasoning,” said Hamilton.
The coffee was brought, black, hot, bitter, in small cups. On the tray there was a small container of assorted sugars, with tiny spoons.
“I have made a positive identification,” said Herjellsen, “of the rodent, which you observed being brought into the translation cubicle. The family is obviously Muridae. It is a species similar to, but not precisely identical to, the widely spread, cunning, vicious, highly successful Rattus norvegicus, the common brown rat, or Norway rat. It is doubtless an ancestral form, the only actual difference being that the teeth are more substantially rooted.”
“Does this identification have significance?” asked Hamilton.
“Of course,” said Herjellsen. “It is a commensal.”
“I-I do not know the word,” said Hamilton.
“A companion at meals,” laughed William.
“A commensal,” said Gunther, “is an animal or plant that lives in, on or with another, sharing its food, but is neither a parasite to the other, nor, normally, is injured by the presence of the other.”
“It thrived in the Pleistocene,” said William, “and thrives today, one of the most successful forms of life the world has ever seen.”
“It supplants allied species,” said Gunther. “It is a swift, curious, aggressive, savage animal, with the beginnings of a tradition, older animals instructing the younger, particularly in avoidance behaviors, as in preventing their consumption of dangerous or poisoned food.”
“A very successful co-inhabitant of our Earth, my dear,” said Herjellsen, “but, more importantly for our purposes, a commensal.”
“It entered Western Europe from Asia in prehistory,” said Gunther, “as an accompanier of migrations.”
“The current brown rat,” said Hamilton, “is a commensal of man.”
“Precisely,” said Herjellsen. “And so, too, was it in the beginning.”
Hamilton could not speak.
“You see now the significance of the catch?” he asked.
She shook her head, not wanting to speak.
“It gives us the coordinates of a human group, a living human group,” smiled Herjellsen.
“This is much more accurate than a stone tool,” said William. “Such a tool, particularly if adequately protected from weathering, and patination, might have been abandoned or dropped hundreds of years ago, or years earlier.”
“Where the brown rat is found,” said Herjellsen, “there, too, will we find man. They are companions in history.”
“You said,” said Hamilton, “that you treated me harshly, that my chances of survival might be improved.”
“Yes,” said Herjellsen. “It is our anticipation that these men do not live in an environment so hostile and cruel that they need fear, in practice, only the scarcity of game, or so remote and impenetrable that no others would care to live there. Eskimos, for example, are a kindly people, trusting, helpful, affectionate, and, in a very different environment, so, too, are the Pygmies of the Congo.”
“Such peoples, you note,” said Gunther, “have been driven from choicer lands by more aggressive competitors.”
“What are you trying to tell me?” asked Hamilton.
“Xenophobia,” said Herjellsen, “or the hatred of the stranger, is an almost universal human phenomenon, at one time, judging by its pervasiveness, of important evolutionary import. Groups who did not distrust strangers were either destroyed, or driven into the remoter and harsher portions of the Earth. Too often, in the history of the world has the stranger meant ambush, treachery, disaster.”
“Interestingly,” said William, “this suspicion tends to be somewhat reduced during the prime mating years, particularly those of adolescence and the early twenties.”
“That, too, doubtless,” said Herjellsen, “has played its role in mixing and distributing genes among diverse populations.”