Mirus, her master, indicated that she might withdraw, and so she stood to one side. For some reason she was not to kneel.
The woman at the coffee table bantered lightly with the two men, her companion and Mirus. Tutina sat to one side, smiling. Ellen made certain she did not meet the eyes of Tutina. She stood to one side, keeping her head down. If she were to be summoned, a word would suffice.
But suppose the husband did make the wife, within their marriage, his slave, explicitly. Then, surely, their relationship would have changed, considerably. No longer might they not really see one another. No longer could they overlook one another, so to speak. No longer could they take one another for granted. The slave cannot take the master for granted because he owns her, and she must be diligent in his service, and be desperate to please him. And the master does not take the slave for granted for he now owns her; she has now become to him a source of delight and pleasure. And if she prove momentarily troublesome she may be disciplined as the slave she is. Let her beg naked to enter his bed and serve his pleasure. And if he does seem to take her for granted, it is only that she may zealously, piteously increase her efforts to be even more pleasing.
She supposed, serving, that such an arrangement would not merely freshen a stale marriage, not simply renew a flagging relationship, but that it would alter it utterly, transform it beyond recognition, catapult it into hitherto unsuspected, astonishing dimensions, replacing the wearying familiarities and tepid placidities of accustomed rounds and routines with a new, moving, exciting, dramatic, startling reality, replacing them with an altogether new life, one incontrovertibly meaningful, as the participants suddenly found themselves the inhabitants of a newer, deeper, more natural world, one of intense emotion and unbelievable feelings, one of perfectly clear identities and relationships, one of abject obedience and strict command, one of absolute submissiveness and uncompromising mastery.
She wondered what might be the reactions of her former feminist colleagues if society were to take seriously their effusive, tiresome, repetitive, propagandistic allegations pertaining to matrimony as slavery, and the general position of women in society as one of being held in bondage, and decide to make them true. What would they think if they were to suddenly find it necessary to be licensed to men, or simply owned outright, as women?
Mirus, her master, suggested that the group rise and go to table.
The table, long, with sparkling linen, polished silver, candles and flowers, was in the same room.
Mirus indicated that Ellen might ready herself to pour wine at the table.
‘Mirus’ is an extremely common male name on Gor. It is doubtless the name of thousands of individuals. Indeed, that consideration might have figured in its selection. It was the Gorean name, so to speak, of her master. His Earth name is not to be included in this narrative, no more than that name which had once been Ellen’s on Earth. The ‘us’ ending is the most common ending for a male name on Gor. The most common ending for a Gorean female name is ‘a’. There are, of course, numerous exceptions.
Ellen poured the wine, beginning with the woman, and then Tutina, and then the man she did not know, and then her master. The order had been prescribed. The woman, surely, did not know Tutina’s status. The woman had speculated that the bandage on Tutina’s left ankle must be the result of some earlier injury, and Tutina, smiling, did not disabuse her of this plausible surmise.
The new woman, whom Ellen did not know, had glanced at her at various times during the evening, curious, interested, but Ellen had kept her head down, serving silently, deferentially.
After a time Mirus indicated that Ellen might serve the soup, which, she began to do, ladling it from a large tureen on a serving cart, filling the bowls one by one, and placing them on the table, in the order prescribed.
Once, on her former world, in an officelike room, Ellen had relished being served by the hated Tutina, coffee and pastries, and had, in her manner, subtly and abundantly exploited the situation in such a way as to make abundantly clear to Tutina the servile nature of the task, and her own implicit superiority to her.
Now, of course, Ellen must suffer before Tutina, whom she must struggle to please with her serving.
And Tutina was not easily pleased.
Ellen was in misery, but she had no alternative but to serve with all the perfection of which she was capable. She was in the presence of her master. Too, later she knew, she might have to face the switch of Tutina. She feared that even a drop might be spilled upon the tablecloth. The subtleties between Ellen and Tutina doubtless escaped the attention of the guests, though, one supposes, from his amused expression, not that of their master.
Masters are often amused by such things, the small rivalries, altercations, frictions and tensenesses among their properties.
As the meal continued Ellen continued to serve the various courses, bringing them to the table.
At one point her master indicated the coffee table, and said, “You may clear, Ellen.”
“Yes, Sir,” she said, and went to clear the glasses, the plates and such, left earlier from the hors d’oeuvres and the sherry, from the coffee table. She referred to him as ‘Sir’, as she had been told.
She supposed that the room might have been arranged, as it was, in order that the new woman would be pleased, and feel more comfortable, more at home. It was certainly not Gorean in style, appointments, furnishings, and such. Gorean decor varies from latitude to latitude, from city to city, and home to home, but, in general, it tends to simplicity and openness, this presumably a heritage deriving from some remote tradition.
Ellen, quietly, deferentially, soon returned to the larger table, with its sparkling linen and elegant appointments, and, as appropriate, resumed her duties there, continuing to attend unobtrusively to the various courses. It was a lovely supper, surely, in its stateliness, gentility and sophistication, and might have been pleasantly, congenially served in almost any affluent, elegant home on her former world.
When spoken to she would quietly and respectfully respond with titles she had been told were to be used, ‘Sir’ and ‘Ma’am’. She used ‘Ma’am’ also to Tutina.
She had now come to the fourth meat course.
It might be mentioned that the diners’ clothing was elegantly congruent with their surroundings. The two men wore tuxedos. The two women wore evening gowns. It was apparently a celebration of some sort, perhaps one at the conclusion of some piece of business brought to a successful conclusion, or some piece of work that was now finished, and with which they might be well satisfied.