Case of Lucy Bending (55 page)

"Rape?" he said in his harsh voice.

She nodded.

He went into the bathroom, soaked a towel in warm water. He came back, knelt close, began wiping gently: her mouth, thighs. The dried blood had to be rubbed.

"Let me," she said, taking the towel from him. She ran it over her face, breasts, arms, legs. Then she stuffed the towel into her crotch. '

"I'm dirty," she said.

"Want to go to the hospital?"

"No."

"Do you want a doctor? I can get one."

"No."

He was relieved at that, and ashamed for being relieved. He went into the kitchenette, found the Cutty Sark, poured half a tumbler. He brought it back to her. Sitting on the couch, he fed her the whiskey in little sips, wondering if that was the right thing to do if she was in shock.

"When did it happen?" he asked her.

"What time is it now?"

He told her.

"They left about a half-hour ago. They were here almost two hours."

⁴
'They? How many?''

"Two."

"White or black?" "White."

"How did they get in?"

"I let them in. They said they had a message from you."

"What?"

"They knocked, and I said who is it, and a man said I have a message for you from Luther. So I unlocked the door and the two of them pushed in."

"He said my name? He said Luther? Are you sure?"

"Yes. And when they left, they said to tell Luther they were here."

He drank off the whiskey in the tumbler. He went into the kitchenette and refilled it. He came back to her and proffered the glass, but she pushed it away.

"No more. I feel sick."

"Do you want me to call the cops?"

"No," she said, "don't do that."

Again, he was relieved. He didn't want the cops either.

"What did they look like?"

"Young. Big. Wearing white T-shirts. One had a blond mustache. One had a tattoo."

"Ever see them before?"

"No."

"What did they do to you?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

Suddenly it was important to him to know.

"Tell me," he insisted.

She told him. In a slaty voice, the words more breathed than spoken. They tore her clothes off. They punched her. Kicked her lame leg. Raped her. Both of them. Sodomized her. Other things . . .

"Do you know them?" she asked him.

"The two guys? No."

"How did they know your name?"

"Can you get up?" he said. "I'll help you. You'll feel better lying on the couch."

"No," she said. "I've got to go in the bathroom. I've got to take care of myself."

"Oh," he said. "Yeah. Sure. Here, I'll help you."

He lifted her to her feet, hands under her armpits. He supported her to the bathroom door, arm about her waist.

"You'll be okay?" he asked.

She nodded dumbly, went in, closed the door.

He went directly to the kitchenette sink, washed his hands thoroughly, dried them on paper towels. Then he tried to straighten the place: picked up her torn clothing, righted the overturned plants, even swept up the spilled dirt. Anything to keep from thinking.

May was in the bathroom a long time. He was getting concerned, but then he heard her moving about, heard the shower running, the toilet flush. He sat lumpily in the armchair, drank whiskey, waited.

She came out of the bathroom naked. He was surprised at that, and disturbed. He wished she had put on a nightgown or robe. Anything to cover herself.

"I took some aspirin," she said. "I hurt all over."

"Are you going to be, uh, all right? You know ..."

"I douched," she said. "And I'm on the Pill. So . . ."

She had pulled her long hair back tightly, bound it with a barrette. Her white face and body were scrubbed clean. Her skin shone. The darkening bruises stood out against the pallor like giant thumbprints.

"Can I get you something to eat?" he asked her. "Or drink?"

She shook her head. "I don't feel like it. I think I'll just get in bed and try to sleep. You don't have to stay."

"I'll hang around," he said. "For a while."

She stripped the coverlet from the couch, balled it up, threw it into a corner.

"They fucked me right on top," she said matter-of-factly. "So the sheets are clean."

He hoped she would cover herself up, but she didn't. Just lay atop the sheet, small pillow under her head, thin arms folded across her punished breasts: a waxen corpse waiting for a shroud.

"Will you turn off some of the lights, please?" she said. "It hurts my eyes."

He switched off everything but the bathroom light, and left the door ajar so the big room was dimly illuminated.

He sat down again. He drank more whiskey, not tasting it. He stared at her, lying so still, so drained. Her arms were down at her sides now. Eyes closed. She said nothing, and he could not stop himself from thinking.

She was such a scrawny thing. Not his type of woman at all. Bones jutted. Those pancake breasts. Thin arms, and then that gimpy leg. No meat on her. Not really pretty. He imagined even her hair had lost its gloss. He wondered how he could have been physically excited by this broken bird.

His sweet little girl. His maiden. His virgin. No more. She had let those two guys use her like any two-bit whore. "May I accommodate you?" She had accommodated them all right. Done whatever they wanted. Maybe even asked for more. It was possible.

It was all spoiled for Luther Empt. He didn't want to remember how he had felt about her, because then shame made his stomach flop. But that was all over now, all gone. Things could never be the way they had been.

He thought ponderously of how he might get away from her. He finally decided a hard, sharp break would be the best way to handle it. As far as he knew, she didn't know his last name, address, telephone number.

He'd just walk away from her. What the hell, she had been a hooker when he met her; she could take care of herself. Maybe he'd mail her a nice tip. That should make her happy.

He thought she might be dozing. He heard noises coming from her. Little sighs, little sobs. He rose cautiously, sidled toward the front door. He watched her, ready to return if she opened her eyes. But she didn't stir.

He eased the door open, slipped through, closed it gently behind him. He took a deep breath of cool night air.

He was beyond crying out at the cruelty and injustice of it all. What was it Turk Bending had said? "They hit me where it hurt."

Lucy came skipping into Levin's office, smile aglow. To his astonishment, he found himself recalling a quotation from
Cymbeline:
"Golden lads and girls all must, as chimneysweepers, come to dust."

She was wearing painters' white overalls, a turquoise T-shirt, scuffed sneakers on sockless feet. The long, sunny tresses were braided into two plaits, tied with bows of green yarn. About one wrist was her bangle of seashells.

There was an exuberance in her manner that daunted him.

"How are you today, Lucy?" he said with a show of gaiety. "I like your overalls! Very, ah, different."

"We're all wearing them now, Doctor Ted," she said, looking down at her costume. "It's like, you know, a fad. Listen, can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"You didn't make my mother cry, did you?"

"Why do you ask that?"

"Well, the last time she was here, she came home, and she looked just awful. She had been crying. My goodness, I can tell. So I wondered if you made her cry."

"No, Lucy, I didn't make her cry. But she told me something sad, and perhaps that made her cry."

She looked at him with narrowed eyes, her head cocked to one side. "Something sad, Doctor Ted? Something I did?"

He thought he might as well get to it. "No, it wasn't anything you did. It was something she did that she's sorry for now. She wishes it had never happened. Can you guess what it might be, Lucy?"

Eyes and mouth rounded to O's. She inched forward in the big armchair, sat on the edge so that her toes touched the floor. "Oh!" she cried excitedly. "That reminds me; I was going to tell you something. You remember how you liked those stories I told you? The ones I made up? Well, I made up a new story, and I said to myself, Doctor Ted would like to—"

"Lucy," he said, interrupting her, "can you guess what it was that made your mother sad? Something that she's sorry for now?"

She looked at him steadily. "No, I don't know why she cried. It's certainly beyond me."

"Do you remember that party you told me about? At your house. You wore a new dress and danced with your father for the first time."

"Did I tell you about that?"

"Yes, you did."

"Well, certainly I remember that party, although it was years and years ago. I was very young. It was a very nice party."

"I'm sure it was. You were allowed to stay up an hour past your regular bedtime. Isn't that correct?"

"Maybe. I don't really remember."

"But finally you went upstairs to your own bedroom. You undressed and got into your pajamas. Then what happened?"

"I fell asleep," she said promptly.

"That's not what you told me, Lucy," he said gently. "You said that you were so excited by the party that you lay awake for a long time."

"Did I tell you that? Well . . . maybe."

"And then?"

"Then? Then I fell asleep."

"Did anyone come upstairs? Did you hear voices? Did you get out of bed to investigate?"

She looked at him. "No," she said.

It would have been too easy, he admitted, to make a breakthrough on his first attempt. He decided to come at her from another direction.

"Lucy, when you woke up the next morning, the morning after the party, do you remember having a dream?"

"A nice dream?" she asked.

"It could have been a nice dream," he said cautiously, "or it could have been a bad dream. Do you remember having any dream at all that night?"

"No," she said in a small voice.

He sat back in his swivel chair. He wondered if other psychotherapists had the occasional urges he had: to grab a patient by the shoulders and shake savagely until the brain rattled and eyeballs rolled up into the skull.

He never did that, of course. And even if he did, he acknowledged it would probably be counterproductive. But still, he sometimes thought fondly of the days when priests and medicos scourged the demons from the bodies of recalcitrant patients.

"You don't remember?" he said softly. "Are you telling me the truth, Lucy?"

She slipped off the edge of the chair and stood, tugging at one of her braids. She looked at him with a glazed smile he could not fathom.

"Doctor Ted ..." she said.

He waited.

"I like you. I love you."

She circled the desk slowly, came around to him. He turned in his swivel chair to face her. She came close, put her soft hands on his knees.

"Do you love me?" she asked in a seductive voice.

"There are many kinds of love, Lucy," he began pedantically. "There is the love your parents—"

"I love you," she repeated, her small hands creeping up his thighs.

He had listened to the parents' description of her behavior and, intellectually, could understand their concern. But now, witnessing her aberration, being part of it, he could appreciate emotionally the intensity of their fears. His initial reaction was dread.

Transference was hardly a new experience for him. For any psychiatrist. But this passion was not for him, he knew. It was for what he represented. It could have been any of her father's friends, a teacher, a man who returned her smile on the street, the beach, anywhere.

He could have ended the incident immediately. He could have stood, stalked away. He could have buzzed for the receptionist. He could have banished Lucy immediately. But there was a chance . . .

He leaned forward, imprisoned her two little hands in his meaty paws. He held those hands lightly, drew her closer.

"Dear," he said in a throaty voice. "Darling." He released one hand briefly to touch her hair, following the scenario she had remembered and related.