all the way down her side to her hip. "For now, spread those lovely legs, me proud beauty!"
She took a closer look at him and saw a terrible thing: he knew. He knew she wasn't kidding about not wanting to go on with it.
He knew, but he had chosen not to know he knew. Could a person do that?
You bet, the no-bullshit voice said. If you're a hotshot shyster inthe biggest corporate law-firm north of Boston and south of Montreal, Iguess you can know whatever you want to know and not know whateveryou don't want to. I think you're in big trouble here, honey. The kind oftrouble that ends marriages. Better grit your teeth and squint your eyes,because I think one bitch of a vaccination shot is on the way.
That grin. That ugly, mean-spirited grin.
Pretending ignorance. And doing it so hard that later on he would be able to pass a lie-detector test on the subject. I thought it was part of the game, he would say, all hurt and wide-eyed. I really did. And if she persisted, driving at him with her anger, he would eventually fall back to the oldest defense of them all... and then slip into it, like a lizard into a crack in a rock: You likedit. You know you did. Why don't you admit it?
Pretending into ignorance. Knowing but planning to go ahead anyway. He'd handcuffed her to the bedposts, had done it with her own cooperation, and now, oh shit, let's not gild the lily, now he meant to rape her, actually rape her while the door banged and the dog barked and the chainsaw snarled and the loon yodeled out there on the lake. He really meant to do it. Yessir, boys, hyuck, hyuck, hyuck, you ain't really had pussy until you've had pussy that's jumping around underneath you like a hen on a hot griddle. And if she did go to Maddy's when his exercise in humiliation was over, he would continue to insist that rape had been the furthest thing from his mind.
He placed his pink hands against her thighs and began spreading her legs. She did not resist much; for a moment, at least, she was too horrified and amazed by what was going on here to resist much.
And that's exactly the right attitude, the more familiar voice inside her spoke up. Just lie there quietly and let him shoot his squirt. Afterall, what's the big deal? He's done it at least a thousand times beforeand you never once turned green. In case you forgot, it's been quite a fewyears since you were a blushing virgin.
And what would happen if she didn't listen and obey the counsel of that voice? What was the alternative?
As if in answer, a horrid picture rose in her mind. It was herself she saw, testifying in divorce court. She didn't know if there still were such things as divorce courts in Maine, but that in no way dimmed the vividness of the vision. She saw herself dressed in her conservative pink Donna Karan suit, with her peach silk blouse beneath it. Her knees and ankles were primly together. Her small clutch bag, the white one, was in her lap. She saw herself telling a judge who looked like the late Harry Reasoner that yes, it was true she had accompanied Gerald to the summer house of her own free will, yes, she had allowed him to tether her to the bedposts with two sets of Kreig handcuffs, also of her own free will, and yes, as a matter of fact they had played such games before, although never at the place on the lake.
Yes, judge. Yes.
Yes, yes, yes.
As Gerald continued to spread her legs, Jessie heard herself telling the judge who looked like Harry Reasoner about how they had started with silk scarves, and how she had allowed the game to go on, progressing from scarves to ropes to handcuffs, even though she had quickly tired of the whole thing. Had become disgusted by it. So disgusted, in fact, that she had allowed Gerald to drive her the sixty-three miles from Portland to Kashwakamak Lake on a weekday in October; so revolted she had once again allowed him to chain her up like a dog; so bored with the whole thing that she had been wearing nothing but a pair of nylon panties so wispy you could have read The New York Times classified section through them. The judge would believe it all and