8 The Platform; The Annex to the Sales Barn
I sat on the long, heavy, wooden platform, raised about a foot above the dirt, one of several in this exposition area, in this annex of the sales barn, naked, my feet tucked back, near my left thigh, my ankles crossed, my left hand on my left ankle, my weight muchly on the palm of my right hand, on the platform. A chain was on my neck, an individual chain. It was about five feet long. It ran from a ring set in the platform to my collar.
We were not in Samnium, but in the Market of Semris. This is a much smaller town, south, and somewhat to the east, of Samnium. It is best known, interestingly enough, ironically enough, as an important livestock market. In particular, it is famed for its sales of tarsks. Too, of course, there are markets here for slaves.
"This is not Samnium!" had cried Ila, when the canvas and silk had been pulled aside, and the central bar unlocked from its socket.
"No," said the fellow handling us. "It is the Market of Semris." "Those are tarsk cages!" had cried Ila, when we had been unshackled. We had been lifted down from the wagon and placed on our feet in a high-walled courtyard. The shackles usually stay with the wagon, particularly when the wagon does not belong to the dealer to whom delivery is being made. The cages to which she referred were to the left, a few feet away, against the wall of the courtyard. There was, too, very strong, the smell of animals in this place. "Yes," said the fellow. "But tonight tarsks are not being sold, not four-legged tarsks, at any rate."
"I will not be sold here!" cried Ila.
He indicated the cages to our left. We stood there, barefoot, closely together, in the dirt. Too, was straw scattered about. It was muchly broken and trampled. In the dirt there were numerous tracks and prints, many of them of small hoofs, marking perhaps the place of passage of small groups of some sort of animal. Too, there were the tracks of wagon wheels there, and of sandals and boots, and of small, high-arched bare feet, doubtless those of girls. The cages were long, low and narrow, such as may be stacked and tied on long, flatbed wagons. They had stout frames of metal, were floored with sheet metal, and roofed, sided and gated with heavy meshes of a chain-link-type metal, the links passed through, and clinched in, apertures in the frame. As the mesh was formed its openings were about two-inches square.
"I will never get in such a thing!" cried Ila. "Never!"
Then the lash, from behind her, fell upon her, and she sank crying out, reaching behind her, sobbing, to her knees, and then, with the next blow, was flung by its force to her belly in the dirt before the man. Thrice there in the dirt was she struck, writhing and sobbing, begging forgiveness. Then, on her hands and knees, swiftly, at a gesture, she crawled, poked by sharp sticks, hastened by the cry "Quickly, she-tarsk!" to the first of the low, narrow cages and scrambled, weeping, within it. She was a large girl, and formidable to us, except perhaps to Gloria, but, compared to the men, she was only another female, no different from us. Compared to them, her size and strength, really only that of a woman, was, like ours, when all was said and done, simply negligible. Compared to them she was, like us, simply small and weak. Before them, and to them, she could never be any more than we, only another female, small, lovely and helpless, a mere female, totally at their mercy. We looked swiftly, wildly at one another and, in these swiftly exchanged glances, I think, honestly, there was pleasure as well as fear. We were pleased that the insolent Ila, often so pretentious and lofty with us, had been put immediately and sternly, to her instruction and anguish, in her place, that of a female slave, like us. We were glad the men had taken the action they had. We had been reassured by it. In it we had had a demonstration of their firmness and power, of the meaningfulness and reality of their mastery. It had served, too, to remind us all, graphically, of what we all were, women, and slaves, and that we were subject, as such, to them. The insolence of Ila, too, was an embarrassment to us, and, in its way, a reflection on us, and our sex. To be sure, we were also afraid. We did not wish her behavior to draw down the wrath of the men on us all. We were not eager to share the lash with her. We now saw Ila in the cage, her fingers hooked in the mesh, looking out. Her eyes were frightened. In them, too, there was grievous pain. She was a lashed slave. The rest of us then, quickly, at gestures, hurried to the cages, dropped to all fours, and entered them. Two cages sufficed us all.