AN HONEST WOMAN
49
be a very strong argument with Daddy, who was violently anti–
Catholic, like all good Boston Republicans. The other difficulty would
be to explain how she had got interested in the movement; would
it be stretching probability too far to say that she had gone with
Kay to visit birth-control headquarters?
"Miss Renfrew," called the nurse softly, and Dottie, trembling,
got up. With a farewell look at Kay, like one about to be executed,
she advanced into the doctor's consulting room; all at once, she was
frightened stiff. At the desk sat a white-coated, olive-skinned woman
with a big bun of black hair. The doctor was very handsome, about
forty years old, with large black brilliant eyes, which rested on
Dottie briefly, like electric rays, while one broad hand, with exquisite
tapering fingers, motioned Dottie to a chair. She began to take the
medical history, in a detached, businesslike way, but all the while
Dottie was aware of a mesmeric, warm charm that emanated from
her person and seemed to tell Dottie not to be afraid. It occurred to
Dottie, almost with surprise, that they were both women. The doc–
tor's femininity seemed a part of her professional aspect, like her
white coat; the broad gold wedding ring on her hand shone like a
talisman, a Hippocratic band.
"Have you ever had intercourse, Dorothy?" The question seemed
to flow so naturally from the sequence of operations and previous
diseases that Dottie's answer was given before she had time to flush.
"Good!" exclaimed the doctor, and when Dottie glanced up, wonder–
ingly, the doctor's smile was encouraging. "That makes it easier for
us to fit you," she said, like one commending a child. Her skill as–
tonished Dottie, who sat as if anesthetized by the doctor's personality,
while the doctor's questions, like a delicately maneuvering forceps,
extracted information, as it were, from Dottie's body while leaving
her mind's tissues unbruised. The questions betrayed no more interest
in the man or the circumstances of Dottie's defloration than if Dick
had been a surgical instrument: had Dottie been completely pene–
trated, had there been much bleeding, much pain? What method
of contraception had been used, had the act been repeated? "With–
drawal," murmured the doctor, writing it down on a separate pad.
"We like to know," she explained, with a quick, personal smile,
"what methods our patients have used before coming to us. When
was this intercourse had?" "Three nights ago," said Dottie, coloring,
