“Okay, you’re telling it like it was.”
“So that made me very unhappy, because while I valued him as a friend, and had thought the world of Miss Dale, I didn’t like him that way, for a reason I’d rather not tell.”
“Nobody’s making you do it.”
“Next off, comes the invitation. From a girl I knew at school, and after Miss Dale got killed, the best friend I had, I thought. She called, and asked me to spend the night. So she came and picked me up, after Mother said okay, and drove me to her house. This was two months ago. But her mother wasn’t there, and I thought it was kind of funny. And then when the boys came, loaded with six-packs of beer, I knew what was up and ducked — or tried to. Because not to mention my morals, which so far had been okay, there was this thing about Burl, which made him repulsive to me.
“So I made a break for the door, but he grabbed me and threw me down. He threw me on the bed, a studio bed that was there in the living room, that my girl friend had fixed up, by pulling the sofa out so it was a bed. Then she and her boyfriend laughed, they laughed real hard at me, and said look at her, look at Little Red Riding Hood, who’s going to be et by the wolf, and learn the facts of life. So then they commence guzzling beer.”
“Did you guzzle beer?” I asked.
“I don’t like it, I can’t drink it, no.”
“Okay, just asking, that’s all.”
“Then this girl and her boyfriend did it.”
“They—? Did what?”
“Well what do you think?”
“You mean, they just went upstairs and—?”
“No! On the studio bed they did it!”
“Right in front of you?”
“Yes, sir. Right beside me and Burl.”
“...Well! What then?”
“Before I tell about that, I want to explain how it was, when they did it where I could hear. Not where I could see — I couldn’t look, I closed my eyes, I had to. But I could hear, and the sounds she made frightened me. I mean they scared me to death! She moaned and wailed and gasped, as though he was torturing her, and I cried and begged him to stop. He didn’t and then when they were done, and lying together close, I realized at last that it wasn’t pain at all, but joy that was turning her on. And that, for some reason, scared me most of all. But before I could get myself calm, Burl was pawing me. Because he’d been turned on too, exactly the same way she was. And he pawed and pulled at my zipper, trying to get off my dress. And the girl, the one I thought was my friend, said: ‘Now, let’s give her the works, so she gets it once and for all.’ Then they held me, she and her boyfriend, while Burl took off my clothes. And then they opened me up, she holding one of my legs, him the other, and Burl did it to me. It hurt and I bled and I cried, but he didn’t stop. Then it was over, and we all lay back, and she said: ‘You never regret it, baby — once in a lifetime, but when that cherry is gone, life’s just a bowl of nice ones.’ You understand, Mr. Kirby, I didn’t let Burl do that. I fought him, I fought the other two, and screamed, or tried to. But her hand was over my mouth, though I bit her. But her only reaction was to laugh at me — as though I was funny.”
“So!” I said. “Makes quite a tale, I must say.”
“But, Mr. Kirby, there’s more.”
“Then, let’s get it told, by all means.”
“When I didn’t join in with the laughing, the other boy got scared and blew. He just up and walked out, and she said: ‘Oh for God’s sake, let him — he’s chicken anyway.’ Then she commenced wiping me off where I bled, with the towel that she brought. So then Burl decided I’d had enough for one night, and she complimented him on how considerate he was, ‘though of course it’s tough on you.’ And when he asked what she meant by that, she told him, ‘If it was me, I’d be looking around for help.’ So then he jumped her, and again I heard those terrible sounds that she made, and once more I thought I would die.”
“...You mean Burl had you both?”
“Yes, sir — and she had them both.”
“All right. And—?”
“They did it one more time, and then at last it was daylight and she took me home. And on the way, she said I shouldn’t tell Mother, ‘as it’s all for your own good, and had to come sooner or later.’ I didn’t tell, but not for that reason. She’s always suspicious of me so I was afraid to. So I said nothing about it. And Burl visited two or three times, wanting to take me out, but I wouldn’t go. Then, though, I missed my period, and had a horrible idea why. So I waited and hoped and prayed, but then when no period came I had to go to the doctor and let him give me the test. So when it came back positive he said he had to call Mother. And then holy hell broke loose!
“That was last week, and in all this time I haven’t had one kind word or one peaceful moment. She’s bad enough, the way she carried on, but he’s worse, the goofy ideas he has. They’re willing to have the abortion done, but to have an abortion in Maryland, on the basis that I was raped, I have to charge the guy, bring him into court. Because they won’t do an abortion just on the girl’s say-so to the doctor that unfortunately she was raped, or else they all would say that. But Mr. Kirby, I’d rather die — you know the stink it would kick up, but they don’t as I haven’t even told them yet how those other two helped Burl. They insist I have to charge him, and they’ve given him until sundown to say what he’s going to do — you’d think this was a Western.
“And another thing: It’s in my father’s family to shoot in a case like this. His grandfather killed a guy once, for playing around with his grandmother. It blackened her name, but my father thinks it was wonderful. So now he feels he must carry on, except instead of shooting Burl he means to put him in jail.”
“Or make him marry you?”
“Oh no. Father knows I wouldn’t.”
“Then, at sundown, what’s he supposed to do?”
“That keeps digging at me. I can’t get it out of my head, he’s supposed to come up with dough. That’s what my father’s pushing him for.”
“He doesn’t have any money.”
She studied me, then asked, “Are you sure?”
“...His mother has money, of course — she’s not rich, but she’s comfortably well-off. However, I can’t quite see her kicking in for this.”
“And you have dough, Mr. Kirby?”
“Not as much as you might think — I have a business, I make a living. But Burl is twenty-one, and I’m not liable for what he does. So—“
“Mr. Kirby, will you kindly wake up? Come out of that dream you seem to be in? Maybe you’re not liable, but you can’t turn your back on Burl, and neither can your mother. He’s your brother, he’s her son, as this whole community knows, and you’ll have to stand by him, you and your mother both, whether you want to or not. And then what? You have a business, you say, but will you have one next week, when this stink really gets going? Who wants to do business with a guy who’s brother is sitting in jail, for raping a girl in her teens, with the help of two kind friends who are sitting in jail too? I tell you, my father means business, on my behalf, he says, but no matter whose behalf, you are under the boom!”
“I’ve got it, I see it!”
Not that I liked it much, but at least she’d made it clear, where I was at and why, so I could try and figure out what I might do about it. But little by little, as a few minutes went by, I felt things clearing for me — I wouldn’t get out of it cheap, but to get out at all was the main thing. She must have sensed I had thought of something, as she leaned forward and waited. “First,” I said, “You haven’t mentioned yet what you think should be done.”