I was putting away groceries and was not thinking of the men at all. I had, to be sure, taken the hundred-dollar bill from the mail box earlier and put it in my dresser. This had become for me, however, almost routine. I was, at any rate, not thinking of the men. When the phone rang my first reaction was one of irritation. I picked up the phone. "Hello," I said.
"Hello?" Then I was suddenly afraid. I was not sure there was someone on the line. "Hello?" I said. Then, after a moment's silence, a male voice on the other end of the line spoke quietly and precisely. I did not recognize the voice. "You have been selected," it said. "Hello!" I said. "Hello Who is this?" Then the line was dead. He had hung up. The next two nights I waited by the phone at eight o'clock. It was silent. It rang, however, on Thursday, precisely at eight. I seized the receiver from its hook. I was told to report the next evening to the southwest corner of a given intersection in Manhattan at precisely eight P.M. There I would be picked up by a limousine.
I was almost sick with relief when I saw that the man I knew, he whom I had met at the perfume counter, he who had seemed in charge of the others, was in the limousine. The other two were with him, too, one with him in the back seat and one riding beside the driver. I did not recognize the driver.
"Congratulations, Miss Collins!" he said, warmly. "You have been fully approved. You qualify with flying colors, as I had thought you would, on all counts." "Wonderful!" I said.
The driver bad now left the vehicle and come about, to open the door. The man I knew stepped out, and, while the driver held the door, motioned that I might enter. I did so, and then he entered behind me. The driver shut the door, and returned about the vehicle to his place. I was sitting between the two men in the back of the limousine.
"I had hoped I might qualify," I said.
"I was confident you would," he said. "You have the appearance, and, independently, the beauty and the dispositions. You are perfectly suited to our purposes."
"Am I to gather that I have been found acceptable for what you spoke of as the more important position, or post, or something like that, then?" I asked. "Precisely," he said, warmly.
"Good," I said, snuggling back against the seat. I was quite pleased. These men, it seemed, were rich, or, at least, had access to considerable wealth. They would doubtless be willing to pay highly for the use of my beauty.
"I recall, you said," I said, "that I had already been selected for one thing, even at the photographer's studio."
"Yes," he said.
"But it was less important, I gather, than this other, more prestigious assignment, or position?"
"Yes," he said. "The other position, so to speak, could be filled by almost any beautiful woman."
"I see," I said.
"And if there should come a time in which your services are no longer required for this more important post, as I have put it, you might still, I am sure, meet the qualifications f or this other thing."
"That is reassuring," I said.
The man on my left smiled.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
"Were you given permission to speak?" asked the man I knew, he who had originally seen Me in the department store, he on my right.
I looked at him, startled.
"Kneel down here," he said, pointing to the floor of the car, "your left side to the back of the front seat." I did so, frightened. I was the only woman in the car. "Get on your hands and knees," he said. I did so. I could then, facing as I was, see him, by lifting and turning my head. He was unfolding a blanket. "You will not speak," be said, "until five minutes after you have left the limousine." He then, opening the blanket, cast it over me. I on all fours before them, covered by the blanket, hidden by it, was in consternation. The limousine drove on. No one outside the car could have told that I was in the car. I was silent.
As I knelt on all fours before them my mind was racing.
Why had they done this? Perhaps they did not wish anyone to know that I was in the car with them. Perhaps they did not wish for me to be recognized with them, or they with me.
Perhaps they were driving to some secret location, which they did not wish me to know. I was frightened. I did not know what their purposes were. After a time they let me lie down at their feet, with my legs drawn up, still covered with the blanket. I lay near their shoes. Once they even stopped for gas. "Do not move," I was told. I was perfectly quiet, at their feet. They drove about for at least four hours. It was all-I could do to keep from rubbing my thighs together and moaning.
Then the limousine pulled to one side and stopped. The blanket was lifted from me.
"You may get out now," said the man who seemed in charge, pleasantly. I rose to my feet and, crouching down, my muscles aching, stepped from the limousine. The driver bad remained in his place. The man who had been to my right when I was sitting, he who seemed to be in charge of the others, bad opened the door. I stood outside then, on the curb. There was traffic. The lights were bright. I was in the same place where I had originally been picked up, at the southwest corner of the intersection in Manhattan. It was a little after midnight.
I watched the limousine drive away, disappearing in the traffic. I did not really understand what they had done, or why they had done it. I stood back on the sidewalk then. I was extremely disturbed. I was almost trembling. Too, inexplicably, it seemed, I was terribly aroused, sexually.
Why had they done what they did?
For the first time in my life I had been put to the feet of men, and kept, uncompromisingly, in ignorance and silence.
They had dominated me. I almost trembled, filled with unfamiliar sensations and emotions. These feelings, these responses, were not simply genital. They seemed to suffuse, overwhelmingly, my whole body and mind.
I became aware of a man asking me for directions.
I turned away from him, suddenly, and hurried away. I had not yet been out of the limousine for five minutes. I could not yet speak.
I took my hand from the shower handle. A few drops of water descended from the shower head. It was warm and steamy in the bathroom, from the warm water which I had been running. It was about ten or eleven minutes after eight P.M. It was Tuesday. Yesterday, on Monday evening, at eight-P.M., I had received another call. I had been instructed to take a shower at precisely eight P.M. this evening. I had done so. I slid back the shower curtain. There was steam on the walls and mirrors. I looked for my robe. I had thought I had left it on the vanity. It was not there. I stepped from the shower stall, and picked up a towel and began to dry myself.
Suddenly I stopped, frightened. I had thought I had heard a noise oil the other side of the bathroom door, from beyond the tiny ball outside, perhaps from the tiny kitchen or the combination living and dining room.
"Is there anyone there?" I called, frightened. "Who is it?"
"It is I, Miss Collins," said a voice. "Do not be alarmed." I recognized the voice. It was he I took to be the leader of the men with whom I had been in contact, that of he who had first seen me at the perfume counter.
"I am not dressed," I called. I thrust shut the bolt on the bathroom door. I did not understand how he could have obtained entrance. I had had the door to the apartment not only locked but bolted.