"That was scarcely professional of her," I smiled.
"In a moment," said the girl, "she apologized, and was again herself."
"Did you continue to see her?" I asked.
"A few times," said the girl, "but it was never really the same after that. Eventually I stopped."
"You apparently touched a raw nerve in her," I said. "Or perhaps what you said threatened her in some way, perhaps as not being obviously compatible with some theoretical position." I looked at her. "There are many other psychiatrists and psychologists," I said, "both male and female."
The girl nodded.
"There is a variety of positions in those fields, in particular in psychology," I-said. "If you shop around you will doubtless find someone who will tell you what you wish to hear, whatever it is."
"It is the truth I wish to hear," she said, "whatever it is."
"Perhaps," I said, "the truth is the last thing you wish to hear."
"Oh?" she asked.
"Yes," I said. "Suppose that the truth were that you were, in your heart, a female slave."
"No!" she said. Then she lowered her voice, embarrassed. "No," she said. Then she said, "You are hateful, simply hateful!"
"That you might be in your heart a female slave is not even a possibility that you can admit," I said.
"Of course not," she said.
"It is politically inadmissible," I said.
"Yes," she said, "but beyond that it cannot be true. It must not be true! I cannot even dare to think that it might be true!"
"But you are very beautiful, and very feminine," I said.
"I do not even believe in femininity," she said.
"Have you told it to your hormones," I asked, "so abundant and luxuriously rich in your beautiful little body."
"I know I'm feminine," she said, suddenly. "I cannot help myself. I simply cannot help it. You must believe that. I know it is wrong and despicable, but I cannot help it. I am so ashamed. I want to be a true woman, but I am too weak, too feminine."
"It is not wrong to be yourself," I said.
"Too," she said, "I'm frightened. Last summer I did not even take a pleasure cruise in the Carribean."
"You feared the famed Bermuda Triangle?" I asked.
"Yes," she said. "I did not want to disappear. I did not want to be taken away, to be made a slave girl on another planet."
"Thousands of planes and ships, year in and year out, safely traverse the Bermuda Triangle," I said.
"I know," she said.
"You see, you are being silly," I said.
"Yes," she said. Then she asked me, "Have you ever heard of the planet Gor?"
"Certainly," I said, "it is a reasonably well-known fictional world." I laughed, suddenly. "The Bermuda Triangle and Gor," I said, "have, as far as I know, absolutely nothing to do with one another." I smiled at her. "If the slavers of Gor have decided to take you, my dear," I said, "they certainly will not sit about waiting for you to take a trip to the Carribean." I looked at her carefully. She was beautiful. I wondered, if there were Gorean slavers, if she might indeed not be the sort of woman they regard as suitable for their chains. Then again I tensed myself, scarcely daring to move. The thought of the lovely Miss Henderson as a helpless Gorean slave girl, at the mercy of a man, so aroused my passion that I could scarcely dare to breathe. I held myself perfectly still.
"You are right," she said. "Gor and the Bermuda Triangle have presumably nothing to do with one another."
"I think not," I said.
"You are comforting, Jason," she said, gratefully.
"Besides," I smiled, "if the slavers swoop down and carry you off, perhaps you will eventually, sometime, find a master who will be kind to you."
"Gorean men," she said, shuddering, "are strict with their slaves."
"So I have heard," I said.
"I am afraid," she said.
"It is silly," I said. "Do not be afraid."
"Do you believe Gor exists?" she asked.
"Of course not," I said. "It is an interesting fictional creation. No one believes it truly exists."
"I have done some research," she said. "There are too many things, too much that is unexplained. I think a pattern is forming. Could it not be that the Gorean books are, in effect, a way of preparing the Earth and its peoples for the revelation of the true existence of a Counter-Earth, should it sometime be expedient to make its presence known?"
"Of course not," I said. "Do not be absurd."
"There are too many details, too," she said, "small things that would not occur to a fictional writer to include, pointless things like the construction of a saddle and the method of minting coins. They are not things one would include who was concerned to construct spare, well-made pieces of fiction."
"They are more like the little things that might occur to one, not a writer, who had found them of interest, and wished to mention them."
"Yes," she said.
"Put it from your mind," I said. "Gor is fictional."
"I do not believe John Norman is the author of the Gor books," she said.
"Why not?" I asked.
"I have been frightened about this sort of thing," she said. "I have met him, and talked with him. It seems his way of speaking, and his prose style, may not be that of the books."
"He has never claimed," I said, "to be more than the editor of the books. They purport, as I understand it, to be generally the work of others, usually of an individual called Tarl Cabot."
"There was a Cabot," she said, "who disappeared."
"Norman receives the manuscripts, does he not, from someone called Harrison Smith. He is probably the true author."
"Harrison Smith is not his true name," she said. "It was changed by Norman to protect his friend. But I have spoken with this 'Harrison Smith.' He receives the manuscripts, but he apparently knows as little as anyone else about their origin."
"I think you are taking this sort of thing too seriously," I said. "Surely Norman himself believes the manuscripts to be fiction"
"Yes," she said. "I am convinced of that."
"If he, who is their author or editor, believes them to be fiction, you should feel perfectly free, it seems to me, to do likewise."
"May I tell you something which happened to me, Jason?" she asked.
Suddenly I felt uneasy. "Surely," I said. I smiled. "Did you see a Gorean slaver?" I asked.
"Perhaps," she said.
I looked at her.
"I knew you would think me mad," she said.
"Go ahead," I said.
"Perhaps foolishly," she said, "I made no secret of my inquiry into these matters. Dozens of people, in one way or another, must have learned of my interest."
"Go on," I said.
"That explains, accordingly, the phone call I received," she said. "It was a man's voice. He told me to visit a certain address if I were interested in Gorean- matters. I have the address here." She opened her purse and showed me an address. It was on 55th Street, on the East Side.
"Did you go to the address?" I asked.
"Yes," she said.
"That was foolish," I said. "What happened?"
"I knocked on the apartment door," she said.
"It was on the fifth floor," I said, noting the apartment number.
"Yes," she said. "I was told to enter. The apartment was well furnished. In it there was a large man, seated on a sofa, behind a coffee table. He was heavy, large handed, balding, virile. 'Come in,' he said. 'Do not be afraid.' He smiled at me. 'You are in absolutely no danger at the present moment, my dear,' he said."
"'At the present moment'?" I asked.
"Those were his words."
"Weren't you frightened?" I asked.