'I mean, you ain't convinced me that you wouldn't make plenty of trouble for me an' little brother. So I guess I'll just have to convince myself, won't I? Have to make sure that you don't never come near me or Critch again.'
'Do it then, damn you! But for God's sake get up so I can breathe!'
Arlie removed himself from her, still keeping well down among the weeds. Ethel Anderson sat up, drinking in great chest-swelling gulps of air. Arlie asked her where she had left her horse; learned that it was behind some trees about a quarter-mile to the north. He told her to head in that direction, unbinding her wrists so that she could crawl ahead of him.
They proceeded thus for a few hundred yards, until they had come up on the blind side of the house and were almost out in the open. Then, Miss Anderson suddenly flipped over on her back, simultaneously throwing a handful of dirt in his face and kicking out mightily with both feet. She came to her feet running, racing as fast as her well- curved legs could carry her. She burst out of the weeds and into the open. Heart pounding wildly, she sped toward the trees behind which her horse was tethered. She rounded them, and –
And had to fling herself backwards to keep from being impaled on the blade of Arlie's outthrust knife. He gestured with it, ordered her to stretch herself out on the ground. She obeyed, eyes fixed fearfully on his face. Mumbling incoherent apologies for what she had done. Arlie said genially that she was not to feel bad about it at all. His plans for her had been unchanged by her attempted escape.
'Now, we'll just get you out of them clothes…' He tore them off her with a couple of hard tugs of his hand. 'An' then I'll just cut myself a nice piece of ass.'
Her fear abating, Big Sis said irritably that he could have done that without destroying her clothes. She'd make a hell of a sight traveling across the countryside naked. Arlie said her nakedness would be no bother to her, her mind being occupied by other things.
'Like this,' he said, squatting astride her, and firmly gripping a bare buttock. 'Like goin' around with only one cheek to your ass.'
The cold edge of his knife pressed against the bulging flesh. She gasped, then screamed, as the blade sank in, was almost buried in the pulsing softness.
'What are you -? _No! Stop! S-STOP!'_
Arlie lightened the pressure on the knife, asked what the hell she was fussin' about. 'Just cuttin' myself a piece of ass like I said I was goin' to.'
'You're c-crazy -! _No! N-n-n-noo!'_
Arlie shifted his weight a little, forcing her face down into the dirt so that her screams became a frantic muffled mumble. She squirmed and pitched, and Arlie only brought his weight down the harder, murmuring assurances that she was making a lot of fuss over nothin'.
'What's one piece o' ass to a gal that's got as much as you have? If you're afraid it'll make you lopsided, I can even things up by whopping off the other cheek. Now, you jus' lay real still an' – '
Big Sis reared up violently. Managed one short, strangled scream. Then she flopped down on the ground again in a dead faint; lay motionless and silent.
When she regained consciousness she was lying on her back, her hands again bound behind her. A gag made from shreds of her clothes was in her mouth, and Arlie was seated on her chest, his back to her. He gave her an over-the-shoulder grin; a reassuring wink and nod. Then, taking a tight hold on the loose flesh of her crotch, he brought his knife down hard and slowly inscribed a circle around her uterus.
He had decided to leave her ass intact, he explained, as a relatively harmless part of her body. Instead he was going to remove the real mischief maker. And with her cooperation and his skill, the operation would be quite painless.
'Wish I had me a nickel for every puss I cut off,' he went on, carefully reinscribing the circle with his knife. 'An' ol' Indian trick, y'know, an' us Kings are prob'ly more Indian than white. Funny thing is the woman don't hardly feel it – you don't feel nothin', do you? – till a long time afterward. That's maybe because it's mostly muscle, you know, an' stretchy; got more give to it than a mile o' cat gut. Why I seen a fella stretch a gal's puss clean over her head, an' then let it snap shut around her neck. Man, oh, man, what a sight to see!' His body shook with laughter. 'That gal was flingin' herself around like a chicken with its head off; strangled to death by her own tokus. Now – _lay still!_ You keep up that kickin' and squirmin', you'll _really_ get hurt…'
Big Sis could not lie still; no more could she be silent. Her entire body was racked with involuntary trembling, and an incessant moan came from her muffled mouth.
'Now, less just see,' murmured Arlie. 'Uh-huh, I reckon that'll just about do it. Just one quick pull on the hair patch, an' the thing oughta lift right off as slick as pig shit.'
He knotted his fingers in the pubic hair, gave it a long steady pull. He paused; gave a harder pull. Then turned his head to give her an abashed look.
'You mind waitin' a day or two f'r it to drop off? Seems t'be stuck pretty bad right now. Reckon it musta got sort of scabbed on, what with all the bleedin'.'
He held out his hand, by way of demonstration. A hand that was scarlet, dripping with blood. Then, as her eyes grew wider and wider, he reached around and wiped the hand on her crotch.
'Reckon I oughta put it back where I got it, huh? Well, now that we got that over with…'
He stood up, held a hand out to her. She took it silently, staring at him with unseeing eyes, and he drew her to her feet. As he guided her to her horse, helped her to get astride the saddle, he looked searchingly into the frozen face – into the eyes that looked only inward – and was almost shocked by what he saw. Almost moved to pity her.
Almost. He was virtually immune to shock and feelings of pity.
'Now, you're gonna be all right,' he said gruffly. 'You've had the fear of God put into you, an' you figure you're half-killed. But – '
'I know…' She smiled at him suddenly; the open, innocent smile of a child. And her voice was thin, high- pitched: a child's voice. 'It's like Papa says.'
'Uh, how's that?' Arlie said.
'I live with Papa,' she piped. 'Papa an' my little sister, Anne. Papa said it would only hurt us at first, and then it would feel good. An' I guess he ought to know, 'cause he's my Papa an' Papas know everything!' She tossed her head in childish bravado; then her voice clouded, and an incipient whimper came into her voice. 'But it still hurts. It hurts awful, awful bad. An' – an' – ' Dry-eyed, she began to sob. 'I want my Mama. _I want my Mama…!'_
A bilish lump had risen in Arlie's throat. He gulped it down sickishly. 'Jesus Christ!' he breathed. 'Jeez-ass Keerist!'
'I got to go now,' said Ethel Anderson. 'You better go, too, or
She nodded to him winsomely. Nudging the horse's flanks with her heels, she galloped away. And in the dying sunset Arlie stared after her, the naked woman grown smaller and smaller in the distance. And at last disappearing, as all things must, at horizon's end.
Arlie turned, and trudged away in the direction of his own horse. His big hands clenched and unclenched slowly, and his mind was in turmoil. Emotionally, he was tugged this way and that; self-damned and self-praised; his inner self simultaneously shaken and reassured.
Could a thing be both wrong and right? Could justice be injustice? Condemnation wrestled with rationalization, and the latter at last won out.
He shrugged as he came up to his horse, his face and conscience clearing.
'Shit and four are ten,' he mumbled. 'Shot a goose and killed a hen.'
…It was quite late at night when Ethel Anderson reached the Gutzman farm, and Gutzman was already in bed. Hearing her ride in, he got up and lit the kerosene lamp; trying to maintain his anger with her as she drew oats from the feed shed, then, after a suitable interval led the horse to the watering trough. There was the sound of the barn door opening, the sound of its closing again. And then, finally, the rasping of weary footsteps, crossing the rutted soil of the barnyard and approaching the house.
Gutzman forced back the beam of approval which threatened to disperse his stern scowl.
So his Greta vas a goot woman. So always she took care of the animals first, herself second. Still, vas such an excuse to behave like whoore voman? To stay out half the night, and give him insults instead of explanations.
