“You know why I’ve sent for you, Mr. Parkinson?”
“I—I think so.”
“It concerns Eve.”
“Yes. I—I guessed that.”
“She says you raped her.”
Parkinson looked at her in disbelief. “Raped her? My God! If anyone was raped, it was me.” In his excitement he lapsed into the ungrammatical.
Mrs. Chandler said contemptuously, “Do you know what you’re saying? That child is—”
“She’s not a child.” His voice was venomous. “She’s a devil.” He wiped the perspiration from his brow. “All semester she sat in the front row of my class, with her dress hiked up. After class she would come up and ask a lot of meaningless questions while she rubbed herself against me. I didn’t take her seriously. Then one afternoon about six weeks ago she came over to my house when my wife and children were away and—” His voice broke. “Oh, Jesus! I couldn’t help it.” He burst into tears.
They brought Eve into the office. Her manner was composed. She looked into Mr. Parkinson’s eyes, and it was he who turned away first. In the office were Mrs. Chandler, the assistant principal and the chief of police of the small town where the school was located.
The chief of police said gently, “Do you want to tell us what happened, Eve?”
“Yes, sir.” Eve’s voice was calm. “Mr. Parkinson said he wanted to discuss my English work with me. He asked me to come to his house on a Sunday afternoon. He was alone in the house. He said he wanted to show me something in the bedroom, so I followed him upstairs. He forced me onto the bed, and he—”
“It’s a lie!” Parkinson yelled. “That’s not the way it happened. That’s not the way it happened…”
Kate was sent for, and the situation was explained to her. It was decided that it was in everyone’s interest to keep the incident quiet. Mr. Parkinson was dismissed from the school and given forty-eight hours to leave the state. An abortion was discreetly arranged for Eve.
Kate quietly bought up the school mortgage, carried by a local bank, and foreclosed.
When Eve heard the news, she sighed, “I’m so sorry, Gran. I really liked that school.”
A few weeks later when Eve had recovered from her operation, she and Alexandra were registered at L’Institut Fernwood, a Swiss finishing school near Lausanne.
25
There was a fire burning in Eve that was so fierce she could not put it out. It was not sex alone: That was only a small part of it. It was a rage to live, a need to do everything, be everything. Life was a lover, and Eve was desperate to possess it with all she had in her. She was jealous of everyone. She went to the ballet and hated the ballerina because she herself was not up there dancing and winning the cheers of the audience. She wanted to be a scientist, a singer, a surgeon, a pilot, an actress. She wanted to do everything, and do it better than anyone else had ever done it. She wanted it all, and she could not wait.
Across the valley from L’Institut Fernwood was a boys’ military school. By the time Eve was seventeen, nearly every student and almost half the instructors were involved with her. She flirted outrageously and had affairs indiscriminately, but this time she took proper precautions, for she had no intention of ever getting pregnant again. She enjoyed sex, but it was not the act itself Eve loved, it was the power it gave her. She was the one in control. She gloated over the pleading looks of the boys and men who wanted to take her to bed and make love to her. She enjoyed teasing them and watching their hunger grow. She enjoyedthe lying promises they made in order to possess her. But most of all, Eve enjoyed the power she had over their bodies. She could bring them to an erection with a kiss, and wither them with a word. She did not need them, they needed her. She controlled them totally, and it was a tremendous feeling. Within minutes she could measure a man’s strengths and weaknesses. She decided men were fools, all of them.