“I won’t scream,” she said.
“It will be better,” he said, and cut the tape on her hands. She was tempted to reach up for the blindfold at once, pull the blindfold loose — but she remembered the scalpel again.
“Is that better?” he said.
“Yes, thank you.”
“Come,” he said, and pulled her to the wall, and propped her against it. She sat with her hands in her lap while he spoon-fed her. The soup was delicious. She did not know what kind of soup it was, but she tasted what she thought were meatballs in it, and noodles, and celery. She kept her hands folded in her lap, opening her mouth to accept the spoon each time it touched her lips. He made small sounds of satisfaction as she ate the soup, and when at last he said, “All gone, Augusta,” it was rather like a father talking to a small child.
“Thank you,” she said. “That was very good.”
“Am I taking good care of you, Augusta?”
“Yes, you are. The soup was very good,” she said.
“Thank you. I’m trying to take very good care of you.”
“You are. But…”
“But you would like to be free.”
She hesitated. Then, very softly, she said, “Yes.”
“Then I will free you,” he said.
“What?”
“Did you not hear me?”
“Yes, but…”
“I will free you, Augusta.”
“You’re joking,” she said. “You’re trying to torment me.”
“No, no, I will indeed free you.”
“Please, will you?” she said.
“Yes.”
“Thank you,” she said. “Oh God, thank you. And when you let me go, I promise I won’t—”
“Let you go?” he said.
“Yes, you—”
“No, I didn’t say I would let you go.”
“You said—”
“I said I would free you. I meant I would untie your feet.”
“I thought—”
“You’re interrupting again, Augusta.”
“I’m sorry, I—”
“Why did you marry him, Augusta?”
“I… please, I… please, let me go. I promise I won’t tell anyone what you—”
“I’m going to untie your feet,” he said. “The door has a dead bolt on it. From either side, it can be opened only with a key. Do not run for the door when I untie you.”
“No. No, I won’t,” she said.
She heard the tape tearing, and suddenly her ankles were free.
“I’m going to take off the blindfold now,” he said. “There are no windows in the room, there is only the door, that is all. It would be foolish for you to try to escape before the ceremony, Augusta, but—”
“What ceremony?” she asked at once.
“You constantly interrupt,” he said.
“I’m sorry. But what—”
“I don’t think you will try to escape,” he said.
“That’s right, I won’t try to escape. But what cere—”
“Still, I must be gone part of the day, you know. I’m a working man, you know. And though the door will be locked, I could not risk your somehow opening it, and getting out of the room, and running down to the street.”
“I wouldn’t do that. Really,” she said, “I—”
“Still, I must protect myself against that possibility,” he said, and laughed.
She smelled a familiar aroma, and started to back away from the sound of his voice, and collided with the wall, and was trying to rip the tape from her eyes when he pulled her hands away and clapped the chloroform-soaked rag over her nose and her mouth again. She screamed. She screamed at the top of her lungs.
But no one came to help her.
There were no windows in the room, just as he had promised.
The only source of illumination was a light bulb screwed into a ceiling fixture and operated from a switch just inside the door. The light was on now. The lock on the door was a key-operated dead bolt; it could not be unlocked from either side without a key. She walked to the door and examined the lock, and realized it had been installed only recently; there were jagged splinters of unpainted wood around the lock in the otherwise white-painted door. Against the wall opposite the door, a plastic bowl of water rested on the floor, and alongside that a bowl with what appeared to be some sort of hash in it. She went to the bowl, picked it up, sniffed at the contents, and then put the bowl down on the floor again. It was cold in the room, there was no visible source of heat. She shivered with a sudden chill and crossed her arms over her breasts, hugging herself. In the apartment outside, she heard footsteps approaching the door. She backed away from it.
“Augusta?” he called.
She did not answer. She debated lying on the floor again, pretending to be still unconscious so that she could make a run for the door when he unlocked it. But would he enter the room without the scalpel in his hand? She doubted it. She knew the sharpness of that blade, and she feared it. But she feared he might use it, anyway, whether she attempted escape or not. She waited. She was beginning to tremble already, and she knew it was not from the cold.
“May I come in, Augusta? I know you’re conscious, I heard you moving about.”
His idiotic politeness infuriated her. She was his prisoner, he could do with her whatever he wished, and yet he asked permission to enter the room.
“You know you can come in, why do you bother asking?” she said.
“Ah,” he said, and she heard a key being inserted into the lock. The door opened. He stepped into the room and closed and locked the door behind him. “How are you?” he asked pleasantly. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, I’m fine,” she said. She was studying his face more closely than she had in the hotel room. She was memorizing the straight blond hair, and the slight scar in the blond eyebrow over his left eye, and the white flecks in the blue eyes, and the bump on the bridge of his nose, where perhaps the nose had once been broken, and the small mole at the right-hand corner of his mouth. He was wearing dark blue trousers and a pale blue turtleneck shirt. There was a gold ring on his right hand, with a violet-colored stone that might have been amethyst; it appeared to be either a college or a high school graduation ring. He wore a wristwatch on his left wrist. His feet were encased in while socks and sneakers.
“I have a surprise for you,” he said, and smiled. He turned abruptly then, and left the room without explanation, locking the door behind him. She moved into a corner of the room the moment he was gone, as though her position was more protected there in the right angle of two joining walls. In a little while she heard the key turning in the lock again. She watched the knob apprehensively. It turned, the door opened. He came into the room carrying a half-dozen or more garments on wire hangers. Holding these in his left hand, he extricated the key from the outside of the lock, and then closed the door and locked it from the inside. The clothing looked familiar. He saw her studying the garments, and smiled.
“Do you recognize them?” he asked.
“I’m… not sure.”
“These were some of my favorites,” he said. “I want you to put them on for me.”
“What are they?” she asked.
“You’ll remember.”
“I’ve worn them before, haven’t I?” she said.
“Yes. Yes, you have.”
“I’ve modeled them.”
“Yes, that’s it exactly.”
She recognized most of the clothing now — the chambray-blue safari jacket and matching shorts she had modeled for Mademoiselle, the ruffle-edged cotton T-shirt and matching wraparound skirt she had posed in for Vogue, yes, and wasn’t that the high-yoked chemise she had worn for Harper’s Bazaar? And there, the robe that—
“Would you hold these, please?” he asked. “The floor is clean, I scrubbed it before you came, but I would rather not put them down.” He shrugged apologetically and extended the clothes to her. “It will only be for a moment,” he said.