"And I suppose your parents approved these small pleasantries."
"We had to keep it under cover as we grew older. Awful bind actually. But they died in an accident not too long ago and left us quite a lot of money. That’s when we decided to buy The Island."
"Seems to me you have your heat’s desire. Why bother with some other poor girl?"
He shrugged. "Human perversity, I suppose. Always one more river to cross. Young Terry is absolute perfection. She and I have wondered how amusing it might be to have one that wasn’t."
"You mean kidnap?"
"Well, that is where good old David comes in. He is one of those resourceful blokes you go to when you want the impossible. Put enough money in his hand and he’ll produce it for you. We made only one stipulation. She had to be beautiful." He paused to give his next words weight. "You are beautiful."
The dark chasm had widened.
"Know what I think?" Mark asked good humoredly. "I think Dave persuaded you, and that everything probably went along OK until he hit on this quaint notion of setting you ashore to deliver yourself nicely stripped and handcuffed and ready for action. In the night you got scared and decided you had made an awful mistake and wanted out. Right?"
"Wrong!" Dorinda declared with all the emphasis at her command. "In a couple of days you are going to have an extra girl on your hands."
"Stretching coincidence a bit thin, don’t you think?"
"I have to agree to that," Dorinda conceded dejectedly. She looked across at him brightly. But don’t you see, a couple of days will prove me right."
"Suppose I have to concede that unlikely possibility too," he admitted unwillingly. "Seems sort of a silly game…"
"So, couldn’t be real nice and treat me as a sort of guest in the meantime? I like you both. You might like me. Please unlock these handcuffs and give me something to wear." She put all the feminine appeal at her command into her plea.
"No."
"Why not?"
"Get the old cerebrum working, love. You’re not that dim."
"Spell it out." Dorinda said resignedly. "Maybe then I’ll believe."
"Oh, you will, ducky. You will." He was exasperatingly cheerful. "You see, darling, the crux of your situation is that it does not really matter whether you are Dave’s girl or someone else’s. If your story is true it puts you in about the same boat that Dave’s girl will be when and if she arrives. As far as Terry and I are concerned you are a simply first class bit of good fortune."
"You mean I’m kidnapped. First Mike, than you?"
"Let’s call it displaced, shall we. Sounds less mercenary."
"Either way I am a prisoner?"
"Yes."
"What about the other girl when she comes? Will you free me then?"
"No. If one is good, two might bet better."
"What will you do about Mike when he roars up here looking for me?"
"If the apocryphal Michael shows up demanding female flesh, we may hand him the extra girl. Or give him some sort of fairy tale. We think you’ll do nicely for us."
How neat it was! Dorinda knew herself trapped by circumstances no one had contrived. Taking this engaging young man at his own face value she could understand the plausibility of his thinking. Now that the truth was out she relaxed into the depth of the chair and struggled absentmindedly with her handcuffs.
"What are you going to do to me? Chain me up to see how pretty I look?"
"Oh, that’s just part of it," Mark exclaimed with boyish enthusiasm. "You’re not a natural, are you’ I mean, not like Terry and me."
"Good heavens, no!"
"That’s all right then. "He sounded relieved. "Think what a marvellous time we’ll have training you."
Dorinda groped for the right approach. "What about conscience? Do you have any? What right have you to make me a prisoner? You can’t possibly expect me to play your silly games?"
"You will, y’know," Mark sauntered over to a cupboard. When he retraced his steps he was flexing the slender length of a wicked looking riding switch. Calmly he offered it for inspection. "You’ll do whatever this tells you to, darling," he chuckled. "Terry always does."
Dorinda cringed. She was naked and afraid. She knew nothing of pain. But looking at the thing he held she knew it foolish to suppose herself impervious to what it might do to her. She was bewildered. "But… that’s cruelty! You are spoiling something good. Out on the road, there where we met, I liked you. I was glad you’d found me – even though I was… like this. With most men I’d have wanted to run away. But I didn’t with you. Please…"
Mark resumed his seat, one leg draped over its arm. The riding crop resting across his knee where she could never be unaware of it. "It’s a bit of a poser, dear girl," he admitted. "You see, we really do want you to understand. We don’t want you tot think we’re a couple of absolute bastards: we like you too. I’m in a similar position to some johnny who can play the piano by ear, or a chap who can do a long division in his head. They were born with it. They can never explain it. They can never get rid of it even if they wanted to, and they don’t want to. See what I mean?"
"You feel that just because you’re obsessed with this… This ‘gift’ shall we call it, that any inconvenience or pain I may suffer is purely incidental and should be borne gladly…" She looked at him beseechingly. "That I am… That I’m well… Sort of privileged to be chosen?"
"You put it rather well, old girl!" Mark admitted wryly. "Not fair to expect you to digest out fantasy all at one sitting… hence the handcuffs. There’s one thing I want to avoid in speaking of the fantasy and that’s to be flippant. We British… you’re American, aren’t you! We British tend to use flippancy to get us over the hurdles. But it’s not appropriate in this. Honestly it isn’t."
It was hard to be angry with him. Dorinda listened quietly. Tension dissolved.
"The word transcendental comes to mind," Mark continued thoughtfully. "Terry and I are governed by this thing I am trying to make explicable. It is the most powerful force in our lives, except perhaps our love for each other. But even there I’m not sure… The nub and essence of understanding it is to face the fact that we are driven by a force, a compulsion that gives us an extra dimension in life beyond the norm. We still move within the framework that contains others. But we have been given an additional faculty of sexual expression. Even that does not say enough, because above and behind it always is a glimpse and awareness of an ineffable beauty, something subliminal."
His voice trailed into silence as though the effort of expression had wearied him. He sat, pensive and distant.
Dorinda knew he would not break the silence. Her heart went out to this man who would always be a boy. She might fight him. But nonetheless he had managed to evoke a picture in her mind. She knew herself within the grip of something she was ill equipped to cope with. She wished the whip was not so blatantly evident. Was it only by the medium of its bite that she would fully understand?
The sat mute for a long time. Each busy with their own thoughts. It was a beginning and an end. Dorinda no longer believed in anything other than what Mark had just told her. She would not escape. They would not let her go. No one would rescue her. The handcuffs became vividly real upon her wrists. No wonder they had refused to unlike them. What was she now? What was her status? A captive… A slave… some sort of plaything, a sexobject? What about sex?
"What are you thinking?" Mark asked irrelevantly
"Am I a slave?"
"Yes." He had a gift for monosyllables.
"What must I do?"
"You mean to avoid this?" He held up the black white.
"I suppose so," she admitted grudgingly. "I can understand that it is implicit in the question of obedience. That’s what slavery is, isn’t it? Total obedience? I’ve been looking at the damn thing ever since you produced it, knowing it won’t be the least bit heroic if you use it on me."
"I will use it on you." He said it not as a threat.