"Do you think I am such a man?" I asked.

"No," she said, "else I would have petitioned redemption from you." "Men such as those of whom you speak," I said, "those who are so solicitous, so kindly, those who are so eager to render you succor, who will strive so desperately to help you, and please you, do they stir you deeply in your belly?"

"I am a free woman," she said. "We do not consider such things." "But you must fear the iron," I said.

"It will never happen," she said.

"But you must fear it," I said.

"Perhaps," she said.

"Things, then," I said, "would be quite different."

"Yes," she said. "They would then be quite different."

This was quite true. The slave girl is in a totally different category from the free woman. it is the difference between being a person and being a property, between being a respected, legally autonomous entity, entitled to dignity and pride, and being a domestic animal. The same fellow who will go to absurd lengths to please a free woman, and even make a fool of himself over her, will, even with the same woman, if she has been enslaved, simply gesture her with his whip, and without a second thought, to the furs.

"When were you, and your fraud sisters, taken into custody?" I asked. "Payment was demanded this morning," she said. "When our evasions failed to satisfy the attendants ropes were put on our necks, over our robes and veils, and we were brought to the keeper's desk. We gave him what little money we had, of course, but it was not enough to satisfy our bills. We then spent the morning in a wheeled cage, sitting on hard benches, while men checked out. None would redeem us. Then, at noon, as soon as the tenth hour had struck, the cage was wheeled back, into a storage area. It was plain and cold. There, one by one, taken from the cage, while men waited outside the area, we were stripped and searched by two powerful free women. When they finished with one of us they did not then permit her to return to the cage but rather forced her to stand apart, facing a wall. In this way, one who had already been searched was prevented, and quite simply, from receiving anything from one not yet searched. Our garments were examined carefully, and even our bodies. This yielded them some few extra coins. The women, I assure you, were thorough. Doubtless they had done this sort of thing before.

"When we were returned to the cage we were both coinless and naked. All that was left was ourselves. The cage was then wheeled back, by the keeper's desk. As you might well imagine our importunities to the guests now became more earnest. Yet none were gentlemen. We even found ourselves looked upon, in the cage, as though we might be slaves! At the fifteenth Ahn we were removed from the cage and knelt down, to the side, to the left of the keeper's desk. Our ankles were then crossed and tied. This was done with a single length of rope. It served also, thusly, with a minimum of knots to which we might have access, to fasten us together.

"Your hands were left free, of course," I said, "so that you might extend them piteously to passers-by, guests, and such."

"Of course," she said, angrily.

"Continue," I said.

"At the seventeenth Ahn," she said, "the keeper, it seems, grew of our pleas and protestations. Also, I think he was not too pleased with women such as we, who had attempted to do fraud and dupery within his inn."

"That is understandable," I said.

"No," she said. "We are not slaves! We are free women! We may do anything." "I see," I said.

"The keeper," she said, "is not a gentleman."

"I am prepared to believe that," I said.

"It is true!" she said. "Look at me, naked and chained!"

"I have been," I assured her.

She shook the chains on her wrists, angrily.

"But he did, it seems, give you an opportunity to practice your fraud and dupery," I said. "Your primary problem would seem to be simply that you were unsuccessful."

"Perhaps," she said, irritably.

From what I had seen of the keeper, I supposed that his main interest in these matters would be to obtain his fees, if not in one way, then in another. "Continue," I said.

"There is little more to tell," she said, angrily. "At the seventeenth Ahn, perhaps wearying of our presence there he had us cleared away from the vicinity of his desk. Five of us were taken outside somewhere, and from what you say, I take it, chained in the court. I myself was shackled, and put here, in the paga room, to serve at tables."

"Why were you not taken outside?" I asked.

"I do not know," she said.

"There are only five exposition places at the wall," I said.

She shrugged.

"Still that would not explain why it should be you who are here, and not another."

"I suppose it had to be someone," she said.

"Two women might have been chained to one ring," I said. "Or you might have been chained on your knees, nearby, to a sleen ring."

"Men are lustful beasts," she said. "They seem to enjoy looking upon women. Doubtless I am here because I am the most beautiful."

"But you are not," I said.

"Oh?" she said, angrily.

"No," I said. "She who was at the first ring and she who was at the fourth ring were both more beautiful than you."

"Who were they?" she asked, angrily.

"She at the first ring was the Lady Amina," I said. "I do not know who was at the fourth ring."

"Was she small, and dark-haired?"

"Yes," I said.

"That is Ramice," she said. "She is a small, curvy slut."

I recalled the girl at the fourth ring. She was sweetly thighed with a marvelous love cradle, made for a man's loving.

"I am more beautiful than both," she said.

"You seem vain, for a free woman," I said.

"Not really," she said. "I have no interest in such matters."

"To be sure, all of the women out there," I said, "including the Lady Amina and the Lady Ramice, are not yet truly beautiful. They are still too rigid, too tense, too tight, too inhibited to be truly beautiful."

"You see!" she said, triumphantly.

"But none of them so much as you," I said.

"Sleen!" she said. "It is interesting to speculate what you women might be like, if you became beautiful," I said.

"Sleen, sleen!" she said.

"How did the keeper seem when he ordered you shackled and put in the paga room?" I asked.

"Amused," she said, angrily.

"Perhaps you had spoken up to him," I speculated, "though you were only a debtor slut."

"Such is my right!" she said. "I am a free woman!"

"You dared to protest the treatment you received?" I asked.

"Of course!" she cried. "How is it that I, a free woman, should be stripped, and searched, and put in a cage, and such!"

"Perhaps you made demands, threatened him, insulted him, that sort of thing?" I asked.

"Perhaps," she said.

"I can see then," I said, "why it might have amused him to put you here, to serve as a waitress."

"Perhaps," she said, angrily.

"How much do you own him?" I asked.

"A silver tarsk, five," she said.

"That might be another reason," I said. "That is more than is owned by any of the other women." The amount stated was a silver tarsk, five copper tarsks. "Perhaps, she said, thoughtfully. "He may want to keep me where he or his men can keep an eye on me."

Did she really think they feared her escape, she, within the palisade, shackled and naked?

"They might, too," I said, "consider that your display here, if you will pardon the expression, might enhance your chances of obtaining a redemption." "Yes," she said, "that, too."

In the morning, of course, the girls outside, at the wall, might have a better chance. They would, by that time, I speculated, be bedraggled and piteous, indeed. Still I did not think any of them, the Lady Temione here, or the others outside, in these times, were likely, really, to get some fellow to redeem them. "Would you care to order, Sir?" she asked, irritatedly.