The stout fellow looked about, and caught the eye of one of the slaver's men who, seeing him, made his way through the crowds to his side.
"These are new slaves?" asked the tarn keeper.
"Fresh to the collar," said the slaver's man.
"I need a wench," said the man, "one who will cost me little, one to keep in the cots by day, to shovel the excrement of tarns, one to keep in my hut by night, as a pot-and-mat girl."
"These four wenches," said the slaver's man, expansively, indicating the small coffle, "are comely candidates for such a post." He stepped upon the platform, and crouched upon its surface. "Consider this one," he said, indicating the blond, who was first upon the chain.
He reached to her tunic.
"Don't touch me," she cried, drawing back.
"A barbarian," said the tam keeper.
"Yes," said the slaver's man.
"And the others?" asked the tarn keeper.
"They are all barbarian, Master," said the slaver's man.
The dark-haired girl, seeing the tam keeper's eyes upon her, shrank back.
The tarn keeper turned and walked away. The girls looked at one another, frightened, and knelt back. They seemed relieved. This relief, however, was surely premature. Another slaver's man joined his colleague at the platform. "We will never sell these," said the first. "They are raw girls, untrained, inept, clumsy, meaningless sluts. They do not even speak Gorean."
"Tenalion has no intention of putting them on the main block in the pavilion," said the second. He had a five-bladed slave whip at his belt.
"It would be a waste of block time," said the first. "Who would want girls this worthless and ignorant?" he asked. "We shall surely have to transport them back to Ar."
"Who of Ar would want them?" asked the second man grinning.
"We will have to take them back to Ar," said the first man.
"We could sell them for sleen feed here," said the second.
"That is true," granted the first.
"Attend to the forty through forty-five platforms," said the second man, who seemed to have greater authority than the first. "I shall stay in this vicinity for the time."
The other man nodded, and turned away.
The second slaver's man regarded the four girls, who did not meet his eyes. He wore blue and yellow, a tunic. He wore studded leather wristlets. At his belt hung the whip. The girls now seemed apprehensive. I did not blame them. One in whose charge they were now stood near them. I saw them look at his whip, but there was no real comprehension of it in their eyes. They did not yet understand the whip, or what it might do to them. I gathered they had never been whipped.
"The bids have begun in the pavilion," I heard.
"Move forward," said the slaver's man to the girls, in Gorean. They did not understand his words, but his gesture was clear. Frightened, they, on their knees, crept forward to the edge of the platform. They were now quite near the crowd. Before they had been back about a yard or so on the platform. When a girl is back somewhat it is easier to see her. On the other hand, the proximity of female flesh to the buyer can in itself, of course, be a powerful inducement to her purchase. What man, truly close to a beautiful female, can fail to feel her in his blood, and want to own her?
The slaver, I conjectured, knew his business.
The girls looked at one another, terrified. They were now close to the men.
"Please, don't!" begged the blond girl. A man in the crowd, passing her, had put his hand on her thigh.
The slaver's man looked at her, angrily. She looked at him, tears in her eyes. Did he not know what the beast, in passing, had done? He looked away.
What did it matter that someone had touched, even intimately caressed, a woman who was only a slave?
She tried to creep back, but the slaver's man, seeing this, irritably removed his whip from his belt and, with its coils, indicated the place on the platform where her knees must be. They were placed in such a way as to be a quarter of an inch over the edge of the platform. The other girls, too, made certain their knees were perfectly aligned. The robes of passing men then brushed their knees.
"I would look at this one," said a leather worker, who stopped before the blond, first on the chain.
She shrank back.
"She is a beauty, isn't she?" smiled the slaver. "Open her tunic. See what she has to offer you," he invited.
The leather worker reached toward the girl, but she scrambled back. "Don't touch me!" she cried. The dark-haired girl cried out with pain, dragged by her collar back, too. She fell twisted, on her side, in the chain.
"I'll scream," warned the blond girl.
The leather worker was quite puzzled. "I do not think I am interested," he said. "Too, this one is a barbarian. She is not broken to the collar."
"Break her to your collar," said the slaver's man.
"I do not want to take the time to break a girl in," he said.
"Wait, kind sir," said the slaver. "Wait! See what delights would await you."
The man hesitated.
"Prodicus!" called the slaver's man.
In a moment the first slaver's man, who had gone to supervise the forty through forty-five platforms, those in the two hundreds, joined his colleague.
The second slaver's man, who carried the whip, which he now uncoiled, unnoticed, I am sure, by the girls, indicated the blond with his head.
The fellow called to the platform scrambled onto it and swiftly knelt the blond before the slaver's man with the whip and the leather worker. The fellow on the platform then jerked loose the knot at the blond's right hip, which held the wrap-around tunic closed. "No!" she screamed. He jerked it back, away from her, exposing her. She was very beautiful. It lay behind her, over her chained wrists. He kicked her knees apart. Then he crouched behind her, holding her by the upper arms. She struggled, twisting, on her knees. She began to scream miserably, her head back. She pressed her knees closely together. The slaver's man with the whip angrily leaped to the platform. He kicked her knees open again. She was sobbing and screaming. Men about laughed. "See, Master?" asked the slaver's man with the whip, but the leather worker had gone. The slaver's man glared down, in fury, at the chained blond. Another man in the crowd reached to take the ankle of the dark-haired girl in his hand and she, with a rattle of chain, jerked it away. She looked at him, terrified. "They are all barbarians," said a man, "all of them." Puzzled by the reactions of the blond and the dark-haired girl other men in the crowd reached out to touch the last two girls on the chain. One held with his two hands the thighs of the third girl, who had worn the plaid flannel shirt. She screamed in the collar. Another man took the fourth girl, who had worn the beige flannel shirt, under the arms, and pulled her to him. She fought to pull her lips back, that they might not touch his. She struggled in his arms. She screamed. He thrust her back on her side on the platform, and left her. The man who had held the thighs of the third girl, too, released her. There was much laughter in the crowd. She scrambled back in her chains, sobbing. The slaver's man was furious. He looked from one girl to the other, to the stripped, chained blond, to the cowering dark-haired girl, her neck cut by the collar, from its movement, to the third girl, sobbing and looking up at him, to the fourth girl, lying on her side, her legs drawn up, crying. He gestured to his colleague. This man went to the second girl and jerked back her tunic, and to the third and jerked back her tunic, and to the fourth and jerked back her tunic. Then they lay in their chains, exposed at his feet. Then he put them under the whip.
In moments they writhed at his feet, slave girls, screaming for mercy.
Tenalion of Ar, the slaver, their master, stood at the edge of the platform. He was not pleased.