Gwen, in Green

It was obvious that either George or Dr. Braws or per­haps both had talked to the psychiatrist in advance. He was a kindly, bald, corpulent old man with a chubby, friendly face. She could not see herself telling this nice man that she had committed casual adultery. She said banal things about being tense without knowing the reason, about the shock of the incident with the cat. He let her talk without really saying anything for a long time. When she fell silent, he shocked her.

“Did you have the shotgun out to shoot the cat?” he asked.

“No,” she said automatically. “Yes, perhaps. Oh, I don’t know.”

“Have you ever killed anything, Gwen?” he asked.

“No. Oh, insects. Plants.”

He was silent, his head nodding. Finally, to break the silence, he asked, “Plants?”

“Isn’t that silly?”

“Not at all. There’s been some very interesting work done in the field. There are those who think plants have feelings, that they, for example, scream when they’re plucked or broken.” He was looking at her closely. “You’ve always been good with animals?”

“Always. They seem to like me.”

“Why, do you suppose?”

“Oh, I don’t know. I think they can feel the love.”

“And you’ve never been attacked by an animal be­fore?”

“No. Yes. Once there was an opossum.” She told him. Anything to keep away from the subject of that rutting on the balcony. She was not ready to face that herself, much less share the knowledge with another.

The interview seemed aimless and meaningless. She talked when she was primed with a question. She knew she was defeating the purpose and felt guilty for wasting money just to have a friendly chat with the doctor. She knew, too, that George must have mentioned the way she felt about sex, but the doctor made no attempts to open that can of worms. He merely smiled and nodded and talked about animals, and children and plants. He was quite good, for, before the end of the hour, she was at ease with him. Feeling that she had been manipulated, she was moodily silent on the way home.

By a supreme effort of will power, she was able to perform her connubial duty with George, faking her response all the way and feeling violently nauseous. During her next interview with the psychiatrist, she brought up the subject of her dreams.

“Interesting,” he said. “Why, do you suppose, are you having recurrent dreams of such a bloody nature?” She shook her head. “Have you ever seen anyone lose a limb, say in an automobile accident?”

“No.”

“Have you read accounts of torture and dismemberment?”

“Oh, not really. I avoid such things usually. I guess I must have read about the Inquisition when I was in school. I can remember a few things about it, and witchcraft, I mean the methods used against so-­called witchcraft. They were pretty bloody, but it has no real fascination for me. I mean, if I were touring a castle or something I wouldn’t ask to be shown the dungeon and the rack and things like that.”

The doctor took a surprising tack. “I understand that in some of the more primitive Arabian countries they still lop off a hand in punishment for petty theft.” He studied her closely and saw a slight frown. “And the American Indians were rather inventive. There was one particular case. A novel was written about it. A Kentucky frontier woman was kidnapped by Indians. She watched them kill all of her children except for one babe in arms. Later, she witnessed that child being killed by having its head dashed out against a rock. And she was forced to watch the torture of a young white man. He was hoisted up by thongs strung through his shoulder muscles, and roasted by fire all the while. When he tried to lift his feet out of the fire, he’d put weight on his mutilated shoulder muscles. Then they cut off his limbs, cauterizing the stumps, one at a time, being careful to keep him alive as long as possible.” He was looking at her through half-­closed eyes. He saw her tongue flick out to lick her lips, and saw her eyes narrow in thought.

“That doesn’t shock you?”

“You’re going to think I’m crazy,” she said evenly, “but when you’ve felt it happen to you, it loses its shock value.”

“In your dreams, you mean.”

“Yes, but it’s so very, very real.”

“Why, do you suppose?”

She smiled. “If I knew, would I be here?”

“In these dreams, are there particular people involved?”

She thought. “No. They are unseen. They are huge. They come at me and I’m unable to run.”

“They? Men? People?”

“Yes and no. Things. Huge teeth. Metal teeth sometimes.”