Chapter 8
For the first time in his life Bart Coldridge felt like some kind of stale leftover. He was neglected and ignored, and he didn't like it at all. It was difficult to go from tall man on the campus to low man on the totem pole, and he had managed to make that transition with one decision. That decision had alienated him from his father with a resultant loss of his allowance. It had made his fiancee break their engagement, and it had cost him his circle of friends. It was now costing him his self-respect.
He had listened too long and too hard to the non-student agitators who invaded the campus to air their real and imagined grievances. His number had come up for the draft, and the change of subjecting himself to military life did not appeal to him. A spoiled only child who had been permitted to sway his father too often in matters of discipline and privilege, Bart could not admit to himself that he had erred.
It had not yet dawned on him that there was any supreme judgment except his own. From one bad decision he had deteriorated into being unlucky enough to err in other judgments, and his present situation was the result of again picking the wrong side. Jefferson Burns had appealed to him as a man of action and Jefferson Burns had turned out to be a weak, blustering idiot. Bart had hated Troy Woodford on sight as being competition, and he had leaped at the opportunity to bring him down. Now he saw Troy's success with the girls on the tour, and he hated him even more. The hate affected his thinking. Somehow, the answer to all his problems seemed to rest on assuring himself that he was a man.
He lacked the knowledge and experience to show his manhood under these primitive conditions, and the proof of manhood filtered down to the essence of sex. Man's prime function then became a need to take a woman-any woman-and Bart's need at the moment had no conscience. In fact, brutality was supposed to be a masculine trait, and Bart needed action to vent his spleen.
He watched Owney Lee go off into the bushes to relieve herself before making ready for bed and his imagination pictured her. As he visualized her bare anatomy, an instant erection lent his irritation the force of sex hunger. Almost without consciousness, he rose and followed the girl into the starless night.
His inept feet encountered many unseen obstacles, and he tore through the brush with rising frustration and anger. Owney heard him long before he loomed over her, but there was no reason for her to be alarmed. With some surprise, she found out that she was the object of his clumsy search. He had her pinned to the ground before she was aware of his purpose.
"Hey, man, why the rush? You got a hot point that needs soothin', Owney'll do it for you, but let's not lick the frostin' off the cake before it's baked, huh?"
"Shut up, damn you! Just lay down and shut up."
"Just like that? Go to hell, man! None of my relatives is named Uncle Tom, an' I don't take orders without gettin' paid."
She made a move to rise, and her chin was seared by a back-handed slash that made bright lights dance before her eyes. Given any part of a chance, she could have made him crawl, but his hard fist slammed against her temple, and she was dazed. His thumbs dug at the hollow of her throat, and a black cloud of unconsciousness enveloped her quickly.
Bart's angry vision cleared, and for a moment he thought he had killed the girl. He searched anxiously for her pulse, but his own heart was beating so hard that he couldn't make any determination. He leaned over and was reassured when he felt her feather breath warm his cheek. He felt for her heart, and his hand closed on a full breast to remind him that he had come here for sex.
He had caught her urinating, and her underclothing had been pulled down to her knees. His searching hand found a small hill of wiry hair, and he sucked in his breath at the discovery. The effort to spread her legs was hindered by the panties, and he used both hands to tear the things away. The material was too strong, and he was reduced to groping his way along her thighs to pull them off. His patience was almost exhausted when he tugged a foot free of the garment, and he was sobbing in his urgent haste when he fell full-length upon her unresisting body.
It took him only a few seconds to bare himself and make the insertion, but even here, he was deterred by her coma. Her organ was flaccid and unready, and the constriction tore at the tender skin of his member to make him wince in pain. He had no thought for the damage he was doing to the girl as he tore at her groin with the fingers of both hands. The feat was finally accomplished, and he rested his full weight on her as he tried to feel something in the penetration.
There was no sensation of sexual heat, no sense of accomplishment. His erection waned, and he was left with a limp member inside an unconscious girl. He beat at her shoulders to try to rouse her into movement. Perhaps his passion would return if he had her cooperation.
Perhaps, if she knew how desperately he needed this, she would help him show that he was a man. Perhaps he should wait until she woke up and try again. It never occurred to him to give up. The possibility that he had offered proof that he was not a man didn't once come to plague him. He ran out of things to do and he rested on her prone form.
Owney blinked her eyes and was aware of a great weight upon her body. She moved tentatively, and memory returned to her. Something hit her cheek, and she stuck out her tongue to examine it. It was salty, and as another droplet touched her, she knew that the young man above her was crying. She sensed his puny penetration and tried to figure out what was going on. He moved his hands to her breasts, and she wondered how the earlier brutality could be so quickly replaced by pleading tenderness.
There was nothing sexy or passionate in his caressing of her breasts, and she had the idea that he was merely feeling her as a child feels its mother in search of warmth and reassurance. He was lonely beyond belief, and she was suddenly frightened by the knowledge that he was not sane. She endured his awkward caresses, and she couldn't tell if this was because she was frozen stiff or sensibly compliant.
Bart noted her return to consciousness and, probably because he was intimate with her, began talking to her. His inanities started with childhood frustrations and led gradually up to the thing that really bothered him. Within fifteen minutes, she knew more about him than he did about himself and he destroyed any feelings of pity that he might have roused in her.
He talked himself out of breath, and the pain in his penis began to exert itself until he again had an erection. He experimented with movement and found that he was now enjoying the pain that he was inflicting upon himself. He wanted to be hurt, and he didn't know that this was his subconscious mind punishing him for what he had done.
He wanted Owney to hurt also, because she was a part of his undoing, and he moved faster each time she flinched. He was pumping away with an insanity that was impossible for his body to maintain, and he began to falter for lack of breath and strength. He fell to one side, crying aloud because he was unable to continue. He broke the connection and sat up with an effort.
Owney thought she saw a chance to escape, and she pulled sore legs beneath her to crouch and spring to her feet. He tumbled her back to the ground before she could take a single step, and he brought her head to his lap. He twisted up two handfuls of her hair and then let his thumbs dig into her cheeks until she was forced to open her mouth. His intention became clear to her, and she gagged.
He brought her head closer. "Bite me or I'll tear your head off by the roots. Get me off, goddamn you!"
Owney had no choice. A half minute passed, and he tossed her away as he found out that this was more futuility. He came to his feet and crashed off into the brush away from the camp.
Owney crawled the first few steps, and then panic made her get to her feet and run stumblingly to the fireside. She reeled and lost her crazy balance as she reached Angela Holmes's blanket. She fell there in a faint.
Her unexpected collapse brought Troy over for an investigation, and Angela made a cursory inspection. Her eyes were wide and without comprehension as she raised her face.
"Why ... she's been raped, Troy! Who in the world...?"
Her voice trailed off as he bent to look for himself. He saw the bloody evidence, and then Angela pushed him aside to set about making repairs. Troy was alerted to a new facet in Angela. She obviously knew what she was doing, and he helped her staunch the flow of blood. They worked well together as a team and were finishing when Owney came to.
"The bastard! The dirty white bastard! I'll kill him!"
"Stop it, Owney, and tell me what happened."
She looked around blindly until her eyes fastened on Troy. She reached for his hand and clung to it. "It was that damned hippie. He's a draft dodger under federal indictment. He's running from the police, and he ought to be locked up for life. Kill him for me, Troy."
She poured out what she knew of the tale and then buried her head in Angela's lap to cry. Angela soothed her until the worn-out girl fell into a merciful sleep. The ordeal had sapped all her energy, and her body needed time to mend. Troy woke Jay and told him what had happened. They talked for a few minutes and decided against going out to search for Coldridge. It would be much easier to protect the camp from a maniac than to split up into vulnerable groups.
Troy woke everyone up separately and gave them warning. He knew that he had spoiled sleep for the timid, but he felt that such a warning was necessary. The last one he warned was Claire Glassman, and she laughed at the news of the rape.
"What's so damned funny? This is serious."
"What's so serious about a rape? I imagine that I could make a pretty good case of rape against Jay Berry for what he did to me this afternoon. I was taken against my will, and that's rape, isn't it?"
Troy was surprised, and he listened to her scanty details. But rape without violence and with adults was no rape at all in Troy's book. He was ready to turn in when she reached out a hand to keep him from going.
"I overheard a conversation between Willa and Andra about you, Troy, and what you did with them last night. They seem to think that you're one helluva lot of man, and I wonder if I could ask you for a favor?"
He had the decency to blush over what the schoolteachers might have said about him, and he nodded.
"Well, I was wondering ... hell, why don't I come right out with it? I want to know what it's like to be with a real man once. I've got to know whether there's something wrong with me. Maybe when we get out of this?"
She had put aside her blouse and skirt for sleep, and when she had laid the hand on his leg to keep him with her, the blanket had slipped from her shoulder. The brassiere-covered mound of her breast was outlined by the dim light of the campfire, and he could tell by its quivering that she was agitated. He saw no reason why such an experiment should be delaid. He told her to follow him in a few moments, and he moved his blanket to a remote spot outside the circle of firelight.
She joined him there and shivered in the night chill as he rearranged the blankets. He could see the silhouette of her figure as she assumed a semi-modest crouch. She stretched out beside him and he noticed that he still had to remove her undergarments. For someone eager to try sex, she was doing it the hard way. It was very odd how some women insisted on being aloof for the preparations. They seemed to want it to come as a surprise, and most of them let the man think that he was totally responsible and terribly lewd for bringing it all about.
She let him do it all and offered him no help in raising herself while he struggled with brassiere and panties. She pretended indifference, and yet he knew that her arousal was high. She would not even spread out her thighs to make herself available, and he had to use pressure to get her into position. A part of his mind mused that this might be construed as rape, in that she gave him no assent for what he was doing to her.
He found a breast with his mouth, and the only indication that she was aware of his teasing was a sharp intake of breath. He covered her groin, and she studdered, but she was unwilling to admit to him that sex was the reason for the trembling. She evidently wanted him to think that it was the chilly air.
He was bemoaninig the fact that, outside of the session with Lorena Diaz, the lavish sex that was coming his way was not the type he would have wished for. He didn't like this groping in the dark for a girl who might be any female with a yen for sex. He wanted to see each girl's loveliness and distinctive differences.
He jerked off his pants and shorts and was about to lean over her prone body, when he heard a disappointed gasp behind him. There was the sound of retreating footsteps running blindly through the undercover of brush, and he thought he heard a girl sobbing as she ran away. He couldn't swear to it, but he thought he recognized Angela's voice. In any case the interruption delayed his taking of Claire.