I found her very exciting. I wondered if there were such things as natural slaves. If there were, I was confident the lovely Miss Henderson would qualify.
'What a hateful and unteachable brute you are,' she smiled.
'I have never seen you wear anything really feminine before,' I said. 'What brought about this sudden change of heart, that perhaps it might be all right for a woman to be just a little bit feminine?'
She put down her head.
'Surely this represents a change,' I said.
'Yes, perhaps;' she said. 'I do not know.'
'You bought this outfit recently, didn't you?' I asked.
'Yes,' she said.
'When?' I asked.
'This morning,' she said. She looked up, angrily, defensively. 'I thought it wouldn't hurt to have something that was just a little bit pretty.'
'You are more than just a little bit pretty,' I told her.
'Thank you,' she said.
'And you are wearing a bit of make-up and eye shadow,' I said.
'Yes,' she said.
'And perfume,' I said.
'Yes,' she said. 'I truly hope,' she said, 'that none of those in my department see me as I am now.'
'They would deride your attractiveness,' I said, 'and attempt, in envy, to avenge themselves on you in the department?'
'Yes,' she said. 'I think so.'
'This change in you is sudden,' I said. 'It has to do with your experiences with the heavy man, who, so to speak, interviewed you, doesn't it, he whom you saw in the apartment?'
She nodded. 'Yes,' she said. 'It is strange. I never felt so feminine as when he ordered me, so complacently, to kneel and serve him.'
'It released your femininity?' I asked.
'Yes,' she said. 'It is so strange. I cannot explain it.'
'You had been put under male domination,' I said. 'For the first time in your life you probably found yourself in a fully natural biological relationship.'
'I repudiate your analysis,' she said.
'Too, you were sexually aroused,' I said.
'How. could you know that?' she asked. 'I said nothing of that.'
'You did not have to,' I said. 'It was evident in your expressions, your tone of voice, the way you recounted the experience.'
'You are hateful,' she said, irritably.
'May I help you with your cape?' I asked.
'I can manage it myself,' she said.
'Doubtless,' I said.
She glanced back at the girl at the hat-check counter. The girl then looked away.
'Yes,' she said, clearly, a little more loudly than was necessary, 'you may help me with my wrap'
She then stood there quietly, and I, standing behind her, lifted the cape about her shoulders. For an instant, the barest instant, after the cape had settled about her, I rested my hands on her upper arms. In that brief second she knew herself held. Then I had released her. Her body was tense, rigid, defensive. 'Do not think to put me in your power,' she whispered, angrily. 'I will never be in the power of any man.' Then she said, clearly, pleasantly, a bit loudly, for the benefit of the girl at the counter, 'Thank you.'
Then, suddenly, she half moaned. Then she said, delightedly, 'Hello, how are you? How nice to see you here!' Introductions were exchanged. I looked at the two horselike women, in one another's company, a large one and a small one, who had entered. They regarded me, angrily. They beamed on Beverly. 'How pretty you are tonight, Beverly,' said the larger woman. 'It is all right to wear a dress sometimes,' said Beverly. 'It is a freedom.' 'Of course it is,' said the larger woman, 'don't you worry about it. You look lovely, just lovely.' The smaller of the two women said almost nothing. Then they had entered the main dining room, and were being greeted by the head waiter.
'I should never have come here,' said Beverly.
'You know them from school?' I asked.
'Yes,' said Beverly, 'they are in two of my seminars.'
'You look ill, miserable,' I said. 'Do you care, truly, what they think?'
'They are politically powerful in my department,' she said, 'especially the big one. Even some of my male professors are afraid of them.'
'So much for them,' I said.
'Many without tenure fear their student evaluations,' she said, 'and, more importantly, their influence on the evaluations of others. Most of our young male teachers, and female teachers, too, do what is expected of them, and try to please them. They do not wish to lose their positions.'
'I'm familiar with that sort of thing,' I said. 'It is called academic freedom.'
She tied the strings of her cape. We then left the restaurant.
'I will hail a taxi,' I said.
'I am not really a true woman,' she said, outside the restaurant, miserably. 'I am too feminine.' She looked up at me. 'I have tried to fight my femininity,' she said. 'I have tried to overcome it.'
'You could redouble your efforts,' I said. 'You could try harder.'
'I am finished in my department,' she said. 'They will undermine and destroy me.'
'You could transfer to another school,' I said, 'and start over.'
'Perhaps,' she said, 'but I fear that it is hopeless. It might just begin again. Or the word might be conveyed to the new department that I was not, truly, of the right kind.'
'Of the right kind?' I asked.
'Of their kind,' she said.
'That of the two women you met in the restaurant?' I asked.
'Yes,' she said. 'They are so strong and manlike, like men used to be, before.'
'Femininity is wrong in a woman, and masculinity in a man?' I asked.
'Of course,' she said, 'it interferes with personhood.'
'But it is all right for women to be masculine and men to be feminine?'
'Yes,' she said, 'that is all right. Indeed, men must be taught to be gentle, tender and feminine.'
'Can you not see,' I asked, 'that women who wish that of a man are not truly interested in what men happen to be, but want, perhaps, actually not a man but a woman of an unusual sort?'
She looked at me, with horror.
'The thought has an alarming plausibility, doesn't it?' I asked.
'I have never known anyone like you,' she said. 'You confuse me.'
'Frankly,' I said, 'you are not of their kind, that of the two women in the restaurant you met. You are extremely different. Indeed, most women are extremely different from them. They are not even, truly, women. They are something else, not really women or men. It is little wonder they are so hostile, so filled with hatred, so vicious and bellicose. After centuries of disparagement why should they not now, with a vengeance, set themselves up as models for their sex? Why should they not now, so long denied the world, attempt now through rhetoric and politics to bend it to their designs? Can you blame them? Can you not understand their hatred for women such as you, who seem a veritable biological insult and reproach to their pretensions and projects? You are their enemy, with your beauty and needs, far more than the men they attempt through political power to intimidate and manipulate.' I looked at her, angrily. 'Your desirability and beauty,' I said, 'is a greater threat to them than you can even begin to understand. Their success demands the castigation and suppression of your sort of woman.'
'I must not listen to you,' she said. 'I must be a true woman!'
'I have little doubt that you are more intelligent, and have a greater grasp of reality, than they,' I said, 'but
