The wire enclosed her, its gate locked importantly by a very official and distant corporal Kahdin. There was much tugging and small sounds of snaps and buckles. Without warning the tarp was swept away. She stood naked for the multitude.
There was the same surging cry that greets the players entering the field. Elation, awe, good spirits. Faces were everywhere. It was a roman holiday. General Hakim’s munidicence made it free for all. The first sticks and stones beat upon the wire with frightening volume.
The corporal seated himself with the driver. A small escort of uniformed troops, well armed, surrounded the vehicle and its unpopular cargo. The captured girl was thankful to see the general was protecting his investment. Such a crowd, left to its own devices, could easily kill her.
It was all frightening, beastly, and quite difficult. In spite of being within the limits of a town the road was far from smooth. All Dorinda’s energies were devoted to keeping her feet. With hands linked at her back it was not easy. The jolting of the truck forced upon her a constant change of stance so that the citizenry did indeed have a constantly changing view of their enemy. She thought, fleetingly, of the real saboteur crouched somewhere in a cell awaiting her captor’s pleasure. Assuredly this was not a land in which to espouse the rights of women.
Nostalgically a vision of Kyrexos and of her home in the USA flitted across her mind. In desolation she realised that she would probably never see them again. From what was happening to her now, the life expectancy of one of Rabin’s Rentals could surely not be long. She wept. The crowd roared its approval of her tears.
It was not a big place. But the circle and the various side streets on which the prisoner was to be exhibited accounted for perhaps four miles of shameful stumbling and balancing for the female object of everyone’s vilification. Most of the crowd followed to enjoy her exposure to the full, but heads stuck out of windows and doors. It was a gala day. The litter on the floor became an additional hazard for the caged girl striving to stand. Very little of what was thrown reached her with any velocity. But there were a lot of broken pieces that fell within the wire. Dorinda hoped that tears and haughtiness together were appropriate to the occasion.
The grand tour concluded, the truck was positioned in the center of the main square and came to a standstill. Corporal Kahdin unlocked the door to her cage and joined her within. He was smiling cheerfully. Undoubtedly the general would be pleased with his conduct of the day’s affairs. He carried something that caused his captive to wince.
"Are now on long display," he announced. "Poor girl are not allowed sitting down. She must stand."
"I’ll stand," his prisoner promised miserably. "You don’t have to chain me."
"Not needful." The corporal agreed. "But giving much more pleasure for all to see. Could not do in motion for fear of maybe fall. But now quite safe."
Grinning widely, so that Dorinda guessed he, too, was enjoying what must be done, he buckled the dog collar around her neck and snapped the light chain tether above her head to one of the hoops and the wire. No locks were needed. Handcuffed she was powerless to touch the new infliction. It gave her about a foot of latitude in which to turn. That was all. "Soldiers stay on guard. No harm come," he assured her earnestly as he left and locked her cage again.
Had Rabin and his daughter realised what they had consigned her to do? Probably. She was a woman. It did not matter. That had been the theme of the dinner conversation. Shame and indignity would be her lot from this time forward.
She let her eyes rove. The seething crowd had become amorphous, without identity. She felt their hate and their lust as she had not felt their sticks and stones. Those who got closest to the cage were men who had the strength, they were the ones she knew would conceal the rigid sex beneath their haik, longing to spend it within her loins. They were the ones for whom she wore the chains. Each could see her as his own. Each would violate her in his mind. She supposed it was not really much different from the plight of a girl in the stocks at Tyburn Hill, or held in a pillory in the old Massachusetts colony. No different from all the girls everywhere who had been displayed for crimes, real or imagined. Always the crowd had roared its approval of her body and her shame. There would be but few who saw virtue triumphant. For most she would be a visual instrument of latent lust.
She suffered. The crowd shared that suffering with delight. As the dismal time slowly spent itself she discovered that, in a small measure, she could control them. Her tears were met with vociferous approval. To tug against the tether on her neck would send a wordless susurration of sound through the ranks. If she struggled against the handcuffs a low rumble of approval signalled her ignominy. She found that she could mute the vocal discords by standing very straight and thrusting out her breasts in arrogant disdain. For a few moments they would be content to look at what they seldom saw. There would be among them adolescent males who had never seen a woman’s breasts. The knowledge of their tumescence gave her a momentary glow of satisfaction. She was deeply thankful for the cage and for the guards.
The military concluded the exercise with aplomb and dispatch. The driver and the corporal resumed their seats as the afternoon waned. The soldiers took up their escort. The small cortege made its way to a barracks, though a huge door that closed behind them, and stopped beside a smaller, but still impressive door. To the chained girl it was peace after storms. Her enemies were behind a very high wall. "Welcome to Fort Rahbeal," the corporal glowed.
Dorinda gave him a wan smile. "What now, a cell?"
He seemed genuinely shocked. "Oh no. No cell ‘till much later in night. This evening you are guest of general Hakim. Much arrack and champagne." He viewed her with reverence. Such honour was not for all.
She strove to share his enthusiasm as he removed her shaming leash from her neck. At the moment the general was an enigma. She supposed, wearily, that the least she could expect of him was to be used. Her status would be about that of a dancing girl. But she took heart when he lifted her from the truck and handed her over to a girl who now stood waiting. A girl both respectful and awed. As his last gesture for the day, corporal Kahdin unlocked the handcuffs from her back and locked them again at her front. Ceremoniously he handed the key to the prisoner’s new escort who accepted it with glowing panache. For her this was an occasion. She looked at her prisoner and smiled shyly. The corporal saluted and was gone.
Nothing made sense. But why should it? Sheherazade had taken it for granted. So must she. Her feminine escort led her out of the centuries into the exquisitely modern. General Hakim evidently believed in comfort. When the moment came for the bath, the girl shyly touched the handcuffs and held up the key. "No fight?" she asked simply.
For the first time that afternoon Dorinda laughed. She shook her head, smiling into earnest eyes. "No fight." It was an easy promise to make.
The serving girl grappled with the key. It was plain to see she was intrigued by the handcuffs. When she had them off she fitted one upon her own wrist and forced it tight to test its feel. Giggling she held the dangling steel up for inspection as though it was a new idea in bracelets. Thoughtlessly she placed the fetter and its key upon the dresser seeming to find no inconsistency in its easy use or removal. No doubt she had her own knowledge of the impossibility of escape.
Dorinda had not hoped for such a boon as the huge tub. She sorely needed it after the dusty drive and the attentions the citizens had seen fit to bestow. Now she was bathed and attended as a princess. As the gentle hands lathed the soap they also traced the marks beneath it. "Much whip," she queried in wonder.