Chapter 13
It was about as probable as if he'd walked in with the Queen of England on his arm. And just as shocking. I gawped in openmouthed becrogglement.
The entire room grew silent. People stared at each other. I felt curiously ashamed of my nakedness and of the naked girl curled up on my lap.
Janet said, "I know that girl. She's a sophomore named Carol West."
"And not the sort of girl to be coming here, either," I added.
Chuck stepped into the middle of the room, leading Carol by the hand. Carol looked like a shambling zombie. Her eyes were not only glassy, they might have been beads. Her face was set in a rigid, mechanical doll's smile. Her arms hung limply, as though they were strung to her body by wires.
She didn't look merely drunk. She looked completely helpless.
Drugged? Hypnotized? I wouldn't put anything past Chuck Gordon.
Chuck grinned broadly and said, "Ladeez and gentlemen, I have the honor to announce my flame for the evening, Miss Carol West, Chesley '65."
Roy Burchard said irritably, "You ought to know better than to bring strangers in here, Chuck."
"Have no fears. The little lady is sworn to secrecy. Besides, I assure you, she's in no condition to reveal our secret mysteries. None whatever! Furthermore, let me assure you," he went on in that same phony ringmaster's voice, "the little lady is a total novice to the sexual arts, and promises to give us all some rare entertainment this evening." Chuck's gaze came to rest on Helene Wallace. "Helene, would you be good enough to fetch two bourbon-and-waters, one for me and one for the little lady?"
Breasts jiggling, Helene went obediently into the kitchen to mix the drinks. Chuck eased Carol down in a vacant armchair. She sat there like a puppet temporarily placed at rest. Her eyes were open, but she wasn't seeing us. I was getting to feel very uneasy about this whole business.
"Excuse me," I said to Janet. "I want to find out what's going on."
"What do you mean?"
"I want to know how Chuck persuaded that girl to come here. She isn't the type."
Janet moved over, letting me get up, and I walked across the room to the corner where Carol was sitting, Chuck standing next to her chair. I remembered that only a few short weeks ago this girl had been in my room and I had made a simple little pass at her, only kissing her and squeezing her breasts a little, and she had practically had hysterics. Now here I was walking toward her absolutely in the nude, and she didn't even notice. She just sat there smiling. She was about as animated as a stuffed museum specimen.
Chuck was talking to Claire Reynolds. I took hold of his arm and pulled him around.
"Hello, Burnside," he said. "Surprised?"
"You damn well bet I'm surprised." I glanced at Carol. "Have you won your bet yet?"
"Not yet," Chuck said. "I figured I'd win it publicly, tonight. That way you can't claim that I'm lying. I'll win it right before your eyes.
I stared straight into his eyes. Snake's eyes, they were. My Adam's apple bobbed nervously a couple of times. I said, "What the hell did you do to her?"
He folded his arms. "We didn't agree on any limiting conditions. I didn't say she had to be sober when she was seduced."
"But she's too smart to get this drunk. Anyway, she had a date with Fred Lambert for today. Fred told me so himself."
A thin smile played on Chuck's thin lips. "Yes, that's right. Lambert had a date with her for this afternoon. He took her to the football game. But Lambert hadn't made any concrete arrangements for this evening, you see. And since I had gone to the game stag, I met Carol during halftime while Fred was getting refreshments, and I persuaded her to ditch Fred and go out for dinner with me after the game."
My blood pressure started to rise. The dirty louse, I thought. "So you went to the game alone, planning to spirit Carol away afterward?"
"That's right."
"Okay, then. So you spirited her away. But what did you do to her afterward?"
"Took her to dinner," Chuck said lightly. "We went to a fancy place in Washington Heights. The check, you might like to know, came to a neat twelve twenty-five plus tip. Which means I'll be down quite a bit on the night, even after I've charged off the five dollars I'D be collecting from you."
"Too bad," I snorted. "But how did you get her-this way?"
Chuck lifted an eyebrow in a genteel, mocking way. "We had some cocktails before dinner. Carol likes cocktails, you know. Then we had wine with the dinner-she didn't want any, but the waiter and I managed to talk her into it. And then, after dinner, I put some of this into her coffee while she was in the ladies' room."
He produced a small tubular vial, carefully stoppered, that contained a pale reddish powder.
Peering at it as though he were showing me a hydrogen bomb, I said, "What is it?"
"An aphrodisiac from the club collection. Guaranteed to turn a female into putty within fifteen minutes. She drank her coffee, I paid the check, and we drove down here. She kept getting sillier and sillier on the way. By now she probably can't tell her tail from her elbow."
" You drugged her?"
"I guess you could call it that."
"Of all the low, mean, filthy, despicable, underhanded, immoral, unethical-"
"Easy on the adjectives, Burnside. All's fair in love and war, ylcnow. Don't make a fuss or you may find yourself getting censured by the members here. You don't have any right to interfere with their amusement."
"And," I snapped hotly, "you don't have any right to take an innocent girl and drug her and-"
"Quiet," Chuck said in a low, menacing voice. "This isn't the place to get moralistic. If you don't like it, go upstairs and don't watch."
Helene appeared, wearing a scanty apron and nothing else. She looked cute as all hell. She was carrying a tray on which were perched two bour-bons-and-water.
"Sorry the drinks took so long, Chuck. There weren't any ice cubes except in the bottom of the freezer, and so I had to-"
"Thanks, sweetheart." Chuck reached out and affectionately pinched Helene's chubby breasts, first one nipple and then the other. I saw her eyes narrow and heard the sharp intake of breath that signaled the fact that Helene was turning on.
Chuck took the drinks from the tray, made a courtly little bow to Helene, and handed one to Carol. She took it acquiescently enough.
"Drink it, my dear," Chuck commanded. A regular goddam Svengali.
Helene rubbed herself up against me. Chuck had aroused her tremendously with his two little pinches, and she wanted to satisfy herself with anyone handy. "Jeff," she murmured. "Let's go upstairs for a while. I want you."
"Not now, Helene," I said, shaking my head. "I want to see what happens down here."
"But-"
"No."
She looked at me a long moment, not angrily but just disappointedly, and walked away. I glanced to my left and saw her talking urgently to Hal Sharp, and evidently Sharp agreed to give her what she wanted, because they went into an adjoining room. I pitied Helene. She was so high-strung that even a friendly pinch could send her spinning off into love-hunger.
Don Hammer came up and said to Chuck, "You know, this girl isn't eligible to become a member, Gordon. She's got to be sponsored by one of the junior girls-by Helene, as a matter-of-fact."
"I didn't bring her here to join. Just to give us some fun for the night."
"You know that's risky."
"Don't worry, Don. She won't remember a thing that happened to her. " He produced the little vial of reddish powder, and winked.
"Oh, so that's itl' Hammer said. "Okay, then. Fine."
He walked away. My dark expression got darker. Of course, Hammer would be delighted to have anything as foul as this take place.
Chuck bent low over Carol, who looked a lot more animated now that she had had her drink. She was still totally dazed-looking, though. Chuck was talking to her in a low, earnest voice.
Then he looked up, and called out, in his ringmaster's inflection, "Ladeez and gennelmun! I have the honor to announce that Miss Carol West will dance for us-the Dance of the Seven Veils. Following which, Miss West and I will demonstrate the Ceremonial Deflowering of Virgins as practiced on the little-known isle of Congatongal A little music, maestro."
Somebody put a record on the hi-fi-sinuous, twisty bump-and-grind music. Chuck drew Carol to her feet and dragged her out on the middle of the floor. Everybody paid keen attention. I noticed that Helene and Hal Sharp had returned from their quickie. Helene was wearing a smile of satisfaction.
Like a puppet master reaching the climax of his act, Chuck set Carol in motion. She moved jerkily, threatening to topple in a heap several times.
There wasn't a single thing I could do. I stood by the back of the room, watching with the same morbid fascination that I might nave had when watching a public execution. I couldn't cry out, couldn't say that this was all wrong, that this was an unspeakably filthy thing to do. Because I was very much in the minority here. Everybody else was waiting for the fun, waiting to see Carol peel to the buff and then to see Chuck rape her. The look on the faces of the seniors, particularly, was disgusting. Don Hammer and Les Haberman were practically bug-eyed with anticipation. They didn't even look human.
I felt sick. Yet I didn't have the guts to speak up against what was happening, because I knew that if I opened my mouth I might get expelled from the club. And I didn't want that. Whether I liked it or not, I was going to stay a member because I wasn't strong enough to break away from the club.
Carol was wearing a white woolen sweater, a plaid skirt, and warm woolen knee-socks. She went into her crude little dance, eyes fixed on a point a thousand miles in front of her. Guided by suggestions from Chuck, she put her hands on the hem of her sweater, peeled it upward, drew it over her head, tossed it into the corner. A cheer went up. She was wearing a pink bra.
She took a couple more turns around the floor wiggling her hips grotesquely, and started to open her skirt. There was a button on her right hip, and then a zipper. She had some trouble with the button, and nearly fell down. Chuck caught her and deftly flipped the button open. She managed the zipper by herself.
The skirt dropped, sagging over her hips, getting tangled for a second at knee level, then falling to the floor. She stepped out of it, and kicked it into the comer where her sweater had already gone. Another cheer rose, this one even louder.
I was in a cold sweat now, clenching and unclenching my fists, digging my teeth into my lower Hp.
Carol wore only the bra, panties, and the knee-length socks. The panties were so gauzy that when she pirouetted I could see the individual cheeks of her buttocks through them. I practically had to pinch myself to remember that this was the girl who had slapped me for making a pass at her that day.
"Take it off, take it off!" Burchard and Hammer chorused.
On instructions from Chuck, Carol peeled off the socks, one after the other. She tossed one to Burchard, the other to Hammer.
"Take it off!" they yelled. "Take it off!"
I glanced around the room. Everyone was staring fixedly at the drugged girl. I didn't have to guess what was going on in the minds of the fellows, but it was the facial expressions of the girls that amazed me. They weren't sympathetic at all. They were expectant, eager, malicious, anxious for Carol to be humiliated. The ugliest expression of all was on the face of Bea Mannheim, and I knew why. So recently devirginized herself, she was hoping fervently to see another good girl go the way of all flesh and be dishonored right in front of everybody.
Carol's hands were behind her back, now, working the catch of her bra. She was having trouble, but finally she got it open. The cups of the bra slipped from her breasts. She discarded the filmy bit of cloth. Another cheer went up.
Despite myself, I began to get excited. Carol had lovely breasts. They were white, and neither too big nor too small. And they were made with almost mathematical perfection, set close together, with full curving bottoms and a high, steep slope. They seemed to stand out from her chest as if supported by wires. Her nipples were small, and were stiff with sexual excitement. As she moved, her breasts swayed gently from side to side, and tiny ripples passed through the flesh.
Then her hands went to the waistband of her panties, and she started to roll them down past her hips, over her thighs, down her knees, then to her ankles and off. She was as naked as though she had just come from the womb.
There was a general murmur of pleasure, in which I joined, she was so beautiful. If she had any flaw, it was that she was carrying a pound too much flesh. But the only hint of that was the slight rounding of her belly. Her hips were smooth and outcurving, her thighs full without being thick, her buttocks slim, rounded, delicious-looking. She was like a kind of goddess, standing there still moving rhythmically, clad only in her golden hair. My heart ached at the sight of her.
And it ached even harder at the thought that all this beauty was going to be sacrificed now, sacrified to Chuck Gordon's libido and the collective sadism of all these onlookers.
Chuck began to strip.
He said, as he peeled off his clothing, "We will now demonstrate the Virgin-Deflowering Ceremony of the Isle of Congatonga. A virgin was obtained for this demonstration at almost unbelievable cost and effort, as our friend and fellow member Jeff Burnside can testify. Following the demonstration, other members of this organization are welcome to repeat the ritual, though of course the act can be performed only once."
I never felt so helpless in my life. I was quivering with mixed rage and fear. Chuck was naked now, and ready to go. Carol still stood dumbly, her mind a blank, not knowing what was about to happen to her.
But I knew.
It wasn't only that Chuck was going to rape her. Girls had lost their virginity before and still managed to retain their mental health. But this was different. Tomorrow sometime, Carol was going to come out of her fog and find out that she had been had, not just once, but twelve or thirteen times, maybe even more. There might be physical damage and there would certainly be psychological damage. I knew what happened sometimes to victims of mass rapes. Some of them committed suicide. Others entered convents. Others just imprisoned themselves in spinsterhood. But no matter what, Carol would never be the same again. Would never be able to marry, never be able to love, never have the children she no doubt wanted. After having kept herself pure for eighteen or nineteen years, she would regard herself with loathing now. For she would be defiled by more than a dozen men.
While I stood by watching and doing nothing.
A kind of clock started ticking in my head, counting off the seconds. Any moment now Chuck would get through clowning, and he would drag Carol down to the floor and throw himself on top of her, and then, to an approving chorus of yells from his assembly of satyrs and nymphomaniacs with which I had somehow become entangled, he would do away with her maidenhead, as the old phrase goes, and turn her into a ruined woman-also an old phrase, but in this case an accurate one. There are girls who can lose their virginity with no more regrets than if they had lost a pencil or a stick of chewing gum, and there are other girls who are saving themselves for their one special man, whenever he comes along, and when this treasure is taken from them they have nothing else left to stay alive for, and they pass out of life whether literally or just symbolically.
I knew that before the clock in my head had ticked off five minutes more, Chuck Gordon would have destroyed the essence of Carol West. And to my undying shame I have to put down here that if it had been left up to me I would not have done a thing to save her. I would have stood by and watched, and bitten my hp, and maybe ever afterward I would have regretted my fatal moment of inaction.
But it wasn't left up to me. While I stood there sweating and wincing and cursing myself, and while Chuck stood leering over the pale, naked, innocent body of Carol West, the action was taken from my hands.
The doorbell rang.
It wasn't the special signal of a member, nor could it have been, because all twenty-nine current active members were present. But Jack Beale, who was standing near the buzzer, didn't think of that. He was a little drunk, and ninetenths of his mind was occupied in watching Chuck and Carol, and it was simply a matter of reflex that led him to reach out and press the buzzer, opening the outside door to whoever might have been ringing.
Don Hammer saw him and said, "Beale, you idiot, you pressed the buzzer!"
Beale smiled foolishly, realizing he shouldn't have done it. But he had. And the front door was opening. We heard it slam. And then Fred Lambert came rushing in.