“Tut! Tut! Tut! Mamma spank. Is that any way to talk to the future mother of your children?”
“Mother of my fiddlesticks! If I needed anything to convince me that I want to have nothing to do with the scheme, you have given it to me. If I ever do have children, it won’t be by you!”
She had on shorts and a boyish corselet. In defiance of usual custom for her sex she wore, belted to her side, a hand weapon, small but deadly. She stood up at his words, resting her hands on her hips. “What’s wrong with me?” she said slowly.
“Hunh! What’s wrong with you! What isn’t wrong with you? I know your type. You’re one of these ‘independent’ women, anxious to claim all the privileges of men but none of the responsibilities. I can just see you, swaggering around town with that damned little spit gun at your side, demanding all the rights of an armed citizen, picking fights in the serene knowledge that no brave will call your bluff. Arrgh! You make me sick.”
She remained still, but her face was cold. “You are a shrewd judge of character, aren’t you? Now you listen to me for a while. I haven’t drawn this gun, except in practice, for years. I don’t go around insisting on privileges and I am just as punctiliously polite as the next brave.”
“Then why do you wear it?”
“Is there anything wrong with a woman preferring the dignity of an armed citizen? I don’t like to be coddled and I don’t like to be treated like a minor child. So I waive immunity and claim my right-I go armed. What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing-if that were really the case. Which it isn’t. You give the lie to your own words by the fashion in which you broke in on me. A man couldn’t get away with it.”
“So! So? Let me remind you, you ill-mannered oaf, that you signalled ‘welcome’ and let me in. You did not have to. Once inside, before I could say yes, no, or maybe, you started to snarl at me.”
“But — ”
“Never mind! You think you have a grievance. I said I hadn’t drawn this gun in years-that doesn’t mean I’m not ready to! I’m going to give you a chance, my fine bucko boy, to work out that grievance. Belt on your gun.”
“Don’t be silly.”
“Strap on your gun! Or, so help me, I’ll take it away from you and hang it in the Square.”
Instead of answering he moved toward her. She gripped her weapon, half drew it. “Stand back! Stand back, or I’ll burn you.”
He checked himself and looked at her face. “Great Egg!” he said delightedly. “I believe you would. I honestly believe you would.”
“Of course I would.”
“That,” he admitted, “puts a different face on things, doesn’t it?” He eased back a step, as if to parley. She relaxed a trifle, and removed her fist from the grip of the weapon.
He lunged forward, low, tackling her around the knees. They rolled on the floor, tussled briefly. When events slowed down a little, it could be seen that he had her right wrist grasped firmly, as firmly, indeed, as her right hand gripped her gun.
He banged her knuckles hard against the polished floor, grabbed the shank of the weapon with his other hand and broke it out of her grasp. Still grasping her wrist, he struggled to his knees and moved away from the spot, half dragging her behind him. He ignored the minor violences that were happening to his person in the process. When he was within reach he chucked her gun in the oubliette and turned his attention back to her.
Heedless of her struggles he picked her up and carried her to a large chair where he seated himself with her on his lap. He pinned her legs between his knees, forced her arms behind her back until he managed to get both her wrists in one of his fists. She bit him in the process.
With her thus effectively immobilized, he settled back, holding her away from him, and looked at her face. “Now we can talk,” he said cheerily. He measured her face with his eye, and slapped her once, not too hard but with plenty of sting in it. “That’s for biting. Don’t do it again.”