Chapter 14

It had been a week, now, since Lena Troy had left town and Bart Laramie missed her more than ever. He had spent a bad night after that scene with Harry Fields, in which Lena's promotion manager had told him that weird story about Lena and that he, Harry, had twice been intimate with Lena in her office, after hours. At first he had tried to tell himself that the whole thing was ridiculous, a figment of the other man's vile imagination. Yet the more he mulled it, the more obvious it became that Harry must have been telling the truth. Nobody could concoct such a fey story about a woman. In the first place, a man like Harry wouldn't have the imagination. Even now, it was still a little hard for Bart to believe.

In the past week, Bart Laramie had told himself that he would have to forget Lena Troy. He knew that he could never forgive her. No matter how much he tried, if he ever saw her again, Harry's story would stay in his mind. He did everything he could, to follow through on that, to try to forget. He got drunk every night. He consorted with expensive call girls, sometimes even with several of them at one time. None of this did any good. None of it worked. He remained hooked on Lena Troy. He knew then that he was, for the first time in his life, really and truly in love. And that unless he got Lena back, nothing else in his life would ever mean anything to him.

Now, this morning, while he was showering, Bart made a decision. He told himself that Lena must be emotionally ill. He told himself that if she were physically sick, he wouldn't desert her, would he? He would try to help her. Well, the sensible thing to do was to approach this the same way. He would find her, somehow and get her to have psychiatric help. He knew that they performed wonders in that field, these days.

The big problem, though, of course, would be to find Lena. Her lawyers had already told Bart that they didn't know where she was. But he sensed they had been lying. They would almost have to know. He set about trying to figure some way to get that information out of them...

In Dr. Kleaver's office, Lena Troy broke down, after d e related to him the incident with the two lesbians in her motel room. Sobbing as though her heart would break, with her face in her hands, she cried: "What am I going to do? I've got to do something fast. I can't go through any more such experiences.'

Dr. Weaver let her cry, for awhile, and then got her a box of tissues. When her sobbing had subsided, he said: "You're perfectly right, Miss Troy. I hadn't realized that situation had become quite this extreme. We'll see if we can't take some kind of drastic measures. I would have preferred not to but apparently there's no other choice, now. But first of all, I want you to get something straight in your own mind."

"Wh what is that?' she asked, still sniffling, dabbing tears from her eyes.

"About this latest experience." Dr. Kleaver looked at her sternly and smoothed down his clipped mustache with the edge of his fingernail. "I want you to get any idea out of your head that you might have lesbian tendencies even latent. You haven't. This experience was brought upon you. It wasn't anything voluntary. You were under terrible emotional stimuli. The same thing could have happened to any woman in a similar situation, in u similar condition. It happens in "women's prisons, all too frequently and in women's Army corps. It even rather frequently happens to very young girls who are seduced by older more experienced women. It even happens to men. at some time in their life. You see, the sexual demands of the human body are almost as strong as; let's say hunger or self preservation. Under these latter stresses, a desperate person will even steal. But that doesn't mean he's basically a thief. It's only a circumstantial deviation. The same thing applies to you and this latest experience. Neither are you a nymphomaniac, in the ordinary sense of the word. Now, I want you to be completely assured of this and I'll tell you what we are going to do."

Lena thought about the things he had said and they made sense: she hoped they were true. "All right," she said, now. "I'll accept that."

"All right, then. Now, here's the situation. I don't ordinarily like to do this, because a problem like yours is nearly always tied in with .a lot of secondary behavior problems, such as your obsession about becoming wealthy, to the point where you've denied yourself ordinary female social activities. This is not too wholesome, either, but it's part of your general problem. There are other facets to it, also, I'm sure. But I think we'd better root out the cause, even though it will require extreme measures to do so."

"Like what?" Lena asked, nervously.

"Have you ever been hypnotized, Lena?"

She shook her head. "Uh-uh."

"It makes no difference. I'm almost sure you'll be a good subject. Ami please be assured, medical hypnosis is nothing like the parlor trick stuff you see on TV and in nightclubs or the movies. It has become as scientific as other aspects of medical treatment. It will not harm you in any way, will not be an unpleasant experience."

"But what will it do for me?"

Dr. Kleaver drummed his fingers on the desk, swung around on his swivel chair. "I've become almost certain and it's especially indicated in your tests that you must have suffered some kind of traumatic experience when you were thirteen years old."

Lena shook her head. "I don't remember anything about it."

"That's just the point. The experience was so unpleasant, so shocking, that you can't face it. Consequently, it has become buried deep in your subconscious. We must bring it out, let you face it, see it as it really was and that, in all actuality, it has no bearing on your present life. ... You say you remember nothing about your thirteenth year. Nothing at all?"

It came to Lena, then. She wondered why it hadn't, the other day. "Why, yes," she said. "I remember that was the year my father died." With that, she again burst out sobbing.

When she fought for control once more, Dr.' Kleaver said: "I've made arrangements with a colleague of mine, who specializes in hypnosis. He's one of the best in the country. If you're ready, we'll go to his office, now. It's right here in the building. I'll be right there with you, too, taking notes. Are you willing?"

Lena didn't have much time to think about it. But she was so desperate for help, she had to agree. She finally said, yes, a little dubiously. Dr. Kleaver then got a folder from his desk drawer, stuck a pen in his pocket and escorted her to the door. They rode on the elevator, to the top floor of the building, entered a door on which was lettered:

F. M. RICHMAN, M.D. , Office Hours 10 A.M. 12 M. I 4 P.M.

Lena was trembling, now, as she was led into the office. Dr. Kleaver said good morning to the receptionist, went right past her and into the inner office. It was furnished in simple good taste, similar to Dr. Kleaver's office, with the exception of a long leather couch at one side of the office. Dr. Richman was a tall, slender man with bushy white hair and a kind of sad, lined face. Lena liked him' and his gentle smile and soft way of speaking and took confidence in him, right away.

First he explained to her what was going to happen. He said: "We don't swing a bright object in front of your-eyes. Miss Troy, or any of that dramatic nonsense. It's a simple verbal procedure by which I gain the rapport and the confidence of the subject. The first stages are merely a matter of achieving your complete relaxation. As we proceed to the deeper stages, I will attempt to regress you to earlier ages, gradually, until we get you back to your thirteenth year. At that point, we hope that you will relive for the moment and tell us about, various experiences you had during that period."

He gave her some more simple instructions and led her to the leather couch, where he instructed her to lie down and assume as comfortable a position as possible. She obeyed and was then subjected to the first stage of hypnosis, which she found to be just as Dr. Richman had stated and quite pleasant. But soon she advanced into a deeper stage and lost awareness of all things except the sound of Dr. Richman's voice and her own thoughts. She felt body less, a person apart from herself. Soon, she found herself reliving and telling about a weekend at an amusement park, when she was 20 years old, with a group of college girls. It was actually as though she was right back there, at that age, living through again and enjoying every moment of the experience, which came to her in clearest, minutest detail.

She regressed then, back to age 18 then to 15. And then she was back in her thirteenth year...

She and her mother and father had been visiting, spending their vacation, at a farm they owned, in Connecticut. Her parents were quite wealthy, at the time. Lena had always been a big girl for her age. At twelve, she started to develop. At thirteen, she was in the full bloom of young womanhood, already, at least, physically. In spite of this or possibly even because of it she was rather a shy girl, who found boys attractive but a little frightening. She had had several experiences by this summer, when alone with boys, when they had tried to feel her ripe breasts, dip their hands down inside her blouse and even run their hands up under her dress.

Her mother had previously warned her that this might happen and told her that she mustn't let it and advised her how to handle such a situation. Lena followed through and found that it was remarkably simple to dissuade these ardent young swains. Yet at the same time, she found herself tempted not to, some time, just to see what it was all about. She found that when they made such overtures, they had a strangely exciting effect upon her. Later, when she'd think about it, the tender tips of her breasts would rise and acquire a gentle, pleasant ache .and her thighs would tingle and strange sensations would invade her young loins.

The early weeks at the farm, were quite pleasant. There was a handyman named Wade Hamlin, who was very kind to her, often let her accompany him on his farm chores. He was not a formally educated man but was well read and an interesting talker. He was about forty but somehow, Lena never thought of him as being old. He was slender, well built and there was only a light sprinkling of gray at the temples of his crisp black hair. In a few weeks she been quite fond of him, in fact, actually had what amounted to a school girl crush on him.

Wade had worked on the farm for years, in fact, almost ran the place. Lena's mother and father quite trusted him.

The first intimation of what was going to happen, later, occurred one warm afternoon, down by the pigpen. Lena was a little disturbed about it at the time, but later dismissed the incident, forgot about it. She was wearing a middy blouse, that day because it was so hot, hadn't bothered to put on a brassiere. At first she wasn't at all self conscious of her unusually large, ripe young breasts swinging and jouncing unfettered beneath the cloth of the blouse; nor of the way her big nipples were limned by the cloth. But then she noticed that Wade was stealing covert glances at them, every chance he could and there was an expression in his eyes she'd never seen before. It didn't exactly frighten her but it disturbed her. And then, soon, she noticed that Wade was taking every opportunity to get her to bend over in front of him. Since she had broken off the top button on the blouse, when she bent forward, it billowed out, considerably.

One time she caught Wade looking down into the front of her blouse and when she glanced down, herself, to her alarm and confusion, she saw that both great, billowing white mounds, including the strawberry-like nipple decorating the center of each, were clearly visible to him. She straightened quickly, blushing severely.

She was careful, then, not to bend over in front of Wade and she swore to herself that she would never go without a bra again.

They were out of sight of the house, now and a few moments later, Wade said, with mock alarm, which she didn't recognize right away: "Hey, Lena, a flying ant just crawled down inside your blouse!"

She was deathly afraid of flying ants, having been bitten by one, that summer, once before when she was with Wade.

In instant terror, she yanked the top of her blouse open and looked down in it. "Where? Where?" she cried. "I don't see it. Are you sure?"

"Yes. I saw it," he said, quickly. "Better let me get him out of there, before he bites you."

By now she was so terrified, she couldn't think of anything else. Innocently, in her terrible fright, she held the blouse top open, now, while Wade looked down inside it and then, suddenly said: "I see it! I see it! Let me get it out for you."

She didn't even think anything about it at the moment. The next instant she was aware of Wade's big, rough hand down inside her blouse, rubbing against her breasts, delving deep into the steep-sided valley between them. She heard him say, excitedly: "Just a minute, now. I've' almost got him. Ah, there he is! Now you needn't fear any more, honey. I just squished him between my fingers. I surely wouldn't want him to hurt these pretty things, for anything!"

Then, Lena became aware of Wade's hand cupping and lifting and eagerly feeling the large, firm swell of her virginal breast, holding it like a dove, while his thumb delicately rubbed the prominent nipple which immediately stiffened to twice its normal size. For a moment, Lena was so surprised, she didn't know what to say, what to do. At the same time, exotic sensations that she'd never experienced before, suffused her whole body. She wanted him to continue holding her breast, fondling it yet she knew she couldn't let him.

"No, Wade, don't!" she cried, then. "Please don't." And she grabbed his wrist, violently forced his hand to withdraw from inside her blouse.

Then tears of anger and hurt welled into her eyes. Quickly, Wade said: "Oh, I'm sorry, honey. I I didn't mean to do that. I won't ever do it again, I swear. I just got carried away, I guess, because your breasts are so beautiful, so soft and warm and full they're the most beautiful I've ever seen, even nicer than any movie star's."

In spite of herself, Lena felt a little thrilled by the compliment. So that when Wade said: "Don't cry, honey, please! It's all right, now. I won't do anything more," and he took her into his arms, held her face against his chest and dried her tears, she let him. ... Until she became aware of a pressure from his body that was completely unfamiliar. Then she pulled away and glanced down and was shocked and quite frightened, so that she ran from him and hid behind the smokehouse.

He followed her and stood some distance away and pleaded so eloquently for forgiveness and promised so heatedly that he would never touch her again, that she believed him.

The next few days there were no more incidents and Lena almost forgot about it. She couldn't quite forget, though. Sometimes, at night, in bed, she would remember the feel of his hand caressing her breast and the feel of him against her and she would wonder at the fact that a grown man and such an attractive one, was interested in her in that way. Maybe it meant that she wasn't a girl anymore, had become a woman. This thrilled her, in spite of some of the unpleasant aspects of the incident. And reliving it in her mind, she would find herself becoming strangely excited and she would catch herself wondering what would have happened if she hadn't stopped him and supposing then he'd put his big, rough hand up under her skirt and she hadn't stopped him and sensation coursed along her firm young thighs just as though his hand was there. And then supposing he kept on and pretty soon his hand touched here there oh, golly, what what would she do then, what would that have been like? And she experienced a sensation as though it was actually happening and found her own hand moving to experiment and then wild and terrible things happened to her quickly. ... Later, she would lie, looking into the dark of her room and tell herself how awful she had been, that it was bad, she must never do that again. ... But, of course, a few days later, she did, and the experiment soon became separated from anything that had to do with Wade Hamlin and became an experience solely of its own volition and pleasure.

A week went by and consciously, at least, she had all but forgotten about Wade's stunt about the flying ant. They were now back on their strictly buddy-type relationship and Lena was again enjoying his company and the farm chores into which he initiated her.

Then, one day, he asked her how she'd like to explore the old farmhouse nearby, that was supposed to be haunted. It was an abandoned farm building, on neighboring acreage and Lena, was of course, thrilled by the prospect. They reached it in about a fifteen minute walk, on a short cut through some woods. Together they explored the old, abandoned building and Lena was a little disappointed although she didn't really know what she had expected.

From time to time, she noticed Wade looking at his wrist watch and wondered why he was worrying about the time. It was his day off from farm chores. Finally, rather abruptly, he said: "Well, so much for this haunted house. Now, let's go take a look at the barn. Maybe we'll find a skeleton or something in there."