JOYCE CAROL OATES
567
would say in her reasonable soft-toned voice except for the fact that
she can't breathe and her attacker is warning her to keep her mouth
shut or he'll rip off her head. Yes the accent is American, low and
throaty, South Carolina, perhaps, Georgia-yes she catches a
glimpse of dark skin, long fingers, and blunt square trimmed finger–
nails, the palm of the hand lighter, almost pale.
Afterward Cecilia will recall the footsteps hurrying close behind
her and her body's shrewd instinct to steel itself against attack, while
a more mature- detached- rational- "intelligent"- part of her dis–
missed the reaction as unnecessary. She is not the sort of woman to
succumb to fear, or even to take herself, as a woman, very seri–
ously-not Cecilia Heath.
Nor is she the sort of woman-she has always supposed-who
need fear sexual attack: her vision of herself is hazy and unreliable,
but she has always assumed that men find her no more attractive
than she finds herself.
Now she has been dragged somewhere, her smart linen jacket
has been ripped partway off, her skirt lifted- she is being slapped,
shaken, cursed, warned- her assailant appears to be both frightened
of her and very angry, wildly angry. She doesn't see his face. She
doesn't want to see his face. Her body goes limp with terror, she will
discover that her clothes are soaked in perspiration, though still,
still,
that amazed stubborn voice of hers, that relentlessly civil voice, is
trying to plead, to reason-
Please,
you don't really want to do this,
there must be some mistake-
The man holds her from behind, panting and grunting;
awkwardly, and angrily, he jams himself against her buttocks, once,
twice, three times; then releases her as if in disgust, thrusts her
away, gives her a hard blow to the side of her head; and it's over.
Cecilia is sprawled gracelessly on the ground, her nose dripping
blood, her breath coming in shudders.
Her assailant is gone as abruptly, and very nearly as invisibly,
as he appeared. She hears his footsteps, or feels their vibration, but
she can't move to look around. "Oh but
why .
..
?"Cecilia whispers.
"Why at this time in my...."
Fortunately, she thinks, she hasn't been badly injured; perhaps
she hasn't been injured at all . Fortunately she is not far from the
Hotel Zur Birke, three blocks away in fact; and Philip will probably
not be waiting for her; and no one has witnessed her humiliation;
and no one need know. (Though, surely, humiliation is too extreme
a word, too melodramatic?- Cecilia Heath does not consider herself
