I put on my doubtful, slightly shamed, sly, well-you-know, all-purpose look. I have never known what it means, but they seem to. He laughed out loud. Another drink.
“Look here,” he said, “I expect you have more intelligence than most of those bitches or you wouldn’t be in this job. Right? Now it’s obvious to anyone that we need each other. Even in separate camps we still have to trade, you still have to have the babies, things haven’t changed that much. Now what I have in mind is an experimental project, a pilot project, you might say, in trying to get the two sides back together. Not all at once—”
“I—” I said. (They don’t hear you.)
“Not all at once,” (he continued, deaf as a post) “but a little bit at a time. We have to make haste deliberately. Right?”
I was silent. He leaned back. “I knew you’d see it,” he said. Then he made a personal remark: “You saw my wife?” I nodded.
“Natalie’s grand,” he said, taking some more chips. “She’s a grand girl. She made these. Deep-fried, I think.” (A weak woman handling a pot of boiling oil.) “Have some.”
To pacify him I took some and held them in my hand. Greasy stuff.
“Now,” he said, “you like the idea, right?”
“What?”
“The aversive therapy, for Chrissakes, the pilot group. Social relations, getting back together. I’m not like some of the mossbacks around here, you know, I don’t go for this inferior-superior business; I believe in equality. If we get back together, it has to be on that basis. Equals.”
“But—” I said, meaning no offense.
“It has to be on the basis of equality! I believe that. And don’t think the man in the street can’t be sold on it, propaganda to the contrary. We’re brought up on this nonsense of woman’s place and woman’s nature when we don’t even have women around to study. What do we know! I’m not any less masculine because I’ve done woman’s work; does it take less intelligence to handle an operation like the nurseries and training camps than it does to figure the logistics of War Games? Hell, no! Not if you do it rationally and efficiently; business is business.”
Let it go. Perhaps it’ll play itself out; they do sometimes. I sat attentively still while he gave me the most moving plea for my own efficiency, my rationality, my status as a human being. He ended by saying anxiously, “Do you think it’ll work?”
“Well—” I began.
“Of course, of course,” (interrupted this damned fool once again) “you’re not a diplomat, but we have to work through the men we have, don’t we? Individual man can accomplish ends where Mass-man fails. Eh?”
I nodded, picturing myself as Individual Man. The “woman’s work” explains it, of course; it makes him dangerously irritable. He had gotten now into the poignant part, the mystifying and moving account of our Sufferings. This is where the tears come in. It helps to be able to classify what they’re going to do, but Lord! it’s depressing, all the same. Always the same. I sit on, perfectly invisible, a chalk sketch of a woman. An idea. A walking ear.
“What we want” (he said, getting into stride) “is a world in which everybody can be himself. Him. Self. Not this insane forcing of temperaments. Freedom. Freedom for all. I admire you. Yes, let me say that I do indeed, and most frankly, admire you. You’ve broken through all that. Of course most women will not be able to do that—in fact, most women—given the choice—will hardly choose to give up domesticity altogether or even” (here he smiled) “even choose to spend much of their lives in the market-place or the factory. Most women will continue to choose the conservative caretaking of childhood, the formation of beautiful human relationships, and the care and service of others. Servants. Of. The. Race. Why should we sneer at that? And if we find there are certain traits connected with sex, like homemaking, like reasoning power, like certain temperamental factors, well of course there will be, but why derogate one sex or the other on that account? People” (braced for the peroration) “people are as they are. If—”
I rose to my feet. “Excuse me,” I said, “but business—”
“Damn your business!” he said in heat, this confused and irritable man. “Your business isn’t worth two cents compared with what I’m talking about!”
“Of course not, of course not,” I said soothingly.
“I should hope so!”
Numb, numb. With boredom. Invisible. Chained.
“That’s the trouble with you women, you can’t see anything in the abstract!”
He wants me to cringe. I really think so. Not the content of what I say but the endless, endless feeding of his vanity, the shaky structure of self. Even the intelligent ones.
“Don’t you appreciate what I’m trying to do for you?”
Kiss-me-I’m-a-goodguy.
“Don’t you have any idea how important this is?”
Sliding down the slippery gulf into invisibility.
“This could make history!”
Even me, with all my training!
“Of course, we have a tradition to uphold.”
It’ll be slow.
“—we’ll have to go slowly. One thing at a time.”
If it’s practical.
“We’ll have to find out what’s practicable. This may be—uh—visionary. It may be in advance of its time.”
Can’t legislate morality.
“We can’t force people against their inclinations and we have generations of conditioning to overcome. Perhaps in a decade—”
Perhaps never.
“—perhaps never. But men of good will—”
Did he hear that?
“—and women, too, of course, you understand that the word ‘men’ includes the word ‘women’; it’s only usage—”
Everyone must have his own abortion.
“—and not really important. You might even say” (he giggles) “‘everyone and his husband’ or ‘everyone will be entitled to his own abortion’ ” (he roars) “but I want you to go back to your people and tell them—”
It’s unofficial.
“—that we’re prepared to negotiate. But it can’t be official. You must understand that I face considerable opposition. And most women—not, you, of course; you’re different—well, most women aren’t used to thinking a thing through like this. They can’t do it systematically. Say, you don’t mind my saying that about ‘most women,’ do you?”
I smile, drained of personality.
“That’s right,” (he said) “don’t take it personally. Don’t get feminine on me,” and he winked broadly to show he bore me no ill-will. This is the time for me to steal away, leaving behind half my life’s blood and promises, promises, promises; but you know what? I just can’t do it. It’s happened too often. I have no reserves left. I sat down, smiling brilliantly in sheer anticipation, and the dear man hitched his chair nearer. He looks uneasy and avid. “We’re friends?” he says.
“Sure,” I say, hardly able to speak.
“Good!” he said. “Tell me, do you like my place?”
“Oh yes,” I say.
“Ever see anything like it before?”
“Oh no!” (I live in a chicken-barn and eat shit.)
He laughed delightedly. “The paintings are pretty good. We’re having a kind of Renaissance lately. How’s art among the ladies, huh?”
“So-so,” I said, making a face. The room is beginning to sway with the adrenalin I can pump into my bloodstream when I choose; this is called voluntary hysterical strength and it is very, very useful, yes indeed. First the friendly chat, then the uncontrollably curious grab, and then the hatred comes out. Be prepared.
“I suppose,” he said, “you must’ve been different from the start—from a little girl, eh?—doing a job like this. You’ve got to admit we have one thing up on you—we don’t try to force everybody into the same role. Oh no. We don’t keep a man out of the kitchen if that’s what he really wants.”