CHAPTER XVI
The Promenade of the Young Males was again a spectacle for which I was totally unprepared.
The spot itself was of a sylvan beauty that recalled the Elysian fields with its shaded groves and soft greensward. Under the trees were hundreds of marble seats grouped according to the castes where the women as spectators had taken their posts of observation. I sought feverishly for my lovely Dianne but in vain. Following Acquilla, I took my place among the Minervenes and eagerly looked out at last upon my fellow men.
For a moment, I could not believe my eyes. Groups of young men in twos and threes were sauntering through the sylvan avenues, with a rhythmical Andalusian swaying of their hips, glancing with timid provocation over their long plumed fans, at the Amazons who gazed down upon them with an estimating curiosity. I heard around me a buzz of comments, which I must confess, reminded me strangely of certain memories of club windows fronting on Fifth Avenue.
“A fine neck and shoulders.”
“The one, the third to the left, is a darling.”
“What a charming figure!”
“You can have him! Too athletic, but the boy over there is like a Greek god.”
A Greek god! The expression in a flash made comprehensible to me the metamorphosis. I remembered that every young girl, somewhere in her life, had a Greek god as her ideal and now when the secrets of eugenics were in their hands, what more natural, than that they should breed to that ideal?
Just as among the Amazons, I had noted three variations, the blond Greek, the dark Latin and the heavy intellectual Prussian, so I found the males were bred for two distinct varieties. There was a graceful Olympian type resembling the decadent period of Greek sculpture; lithe and delicately turned, rounded and dimpled, the hair curled above the forehead and piled high as in the famous Apollo Belvedere. In strong contrast the second type had brown dusky skins and glossy black hair brushed straight back. Slender and languorous in their movements, they had the slanted seductive eyes which recalled to me a certain predominant type of moving picture hero popular in my day. These last carried small lutes of an agreeable tinkling sound with which they accompanied their soft crooning voices. Their flowing tunics, Attic in feeling, but with a touch of the licentiousness of the later Directoire, were in multi-colored gossamer materials of an astonishing richness that revealed the flowing lines of the graceful young bodies beneath.
Several of the blonds, in fact exceeded the bounds of good taste in the arrogant display of their soft shoulders and backs, with a curious fluttering divided skirt which too boldly revealed the length of their shapely legs. I noted with a growing repulsion, that not only were these young debutants manifestly painted and powdered, but that generally they had adopted ridiculously high heels to increase their stature which I estimated at no more than five feet six.
“I am waiting for your comments, Bogardus,” said Acquilla gently. “Your face is flushed and you are positively scowling. What angers you now?”
My face must have betrayed my extreme dejection! In truth, my courage all but failed me then and there. What possible hope was there that I alone against all the forces of a determined and relentless matriarchy, could regenerate such a degenerate and decadent sex? But I did not wish Acquilla to suspect my true thoughts.
“As if you did not know very well,” I answered. “What other feeling except scorn and repulsion could I have, in seeing my fellow men reduced to this artificial slavery and parading like prospective concubines in the humiliation of a slave mart!”
“What do you specially object to?”
“I object to everything, their unmanly mincings and veiled provocations. Good God! To think that my sex has descended to the arts of decadent courtesans, to paint and perfume, to insidious advertising of their physical charms, to giggling and smirking. If you did not affirm it, I should refuse to believe these theatrical voluptuous figures were men.”
“Yet, if they were women, nothing would astonish you?”
I caught myself, frowned, blurted out:
“Well, no. Of course not.”
“You see, Bogardus, you make the mistake that men made for centuries, in believing that woman’s nature was different from man’s. All that you have observed in this curious display is only acquired characteristics and the acquired characteristics of the sex whose primary function is to attract the stronger. Once it was woman, now it is man.”
“I am forced to believe it,” I said gloomily.
“And to be fair, if it were possible to revive the process, wouldn’t I be just as indignant, if you were taking me to one of your assembly balls?”
“I should like to drive them out with whips and scorpions,” I said, evading an answer.
“On the contrary, they are really quite charming--for a week or so. Nor is it fair to believe that what annoys you now is the result of our suppression. The young fops of decadent Greece and Rome, I imagine, would have excited your puritanical scorn just as much. It may be painful to you, Bogardus--but it is better to face the truth. Is it from such that you would attempt a movement for social equality?”
Carried away with my resentment, I did an impulsive and rash thing.
“Which would you prefer, Acquilla?” I said looking her boldly in the eyes. “One of these decadent Roman demigods you have created or a man like myself?”
“For a week or for a year?” said Acquilla, smiling.
“As a woman, any time!” I said insistently and the desire to avenge myself on the humiliation of my sex was so strong, that I threw into my voice, my look and the touch of my hand, all the animal magnetism that my male instinct could summon.
Acquilla’s glance unlike Dianne’s, never fell. On the contrary, a quick feline light gleamed in her eyes as she looked at me.
“You, of course,” she said tensely, to my dismay. “Being what I am, you on your own terms, you all my life! And just as frankly, dear man, if it were a question of a hundred men like you to be let loose among our society, I should cast my vote at once for extermination.”
A shudder passed over me. To be loved by Acquilla, was like being loved by a coldly reasoning tigress. I regretted instantly the dangerous provocation I had given and uneasily changed the subject.
“Now that I am reconciled to realities,” I said, with a touch of sarcasm, “I am anxious to understand more fully your customs. What is the object of this parade?”
“What was the object of the introduction of your daughters to society?” replied Acquilla. “Daughters to marry--men to mate! The principle is the same, only I think we are franker, because we have done away with inhibitions. Those you see with the white plumed fans are the debutants of the first year. They do not mate immediately with the maidens of their age, but are apprenticed to the Histriones for their sentimental education. Those with the scarlet fans are of the second year.”
“Yes, they have a look of men of the world,” I said with a sarcasm that was of course, lost on Acquilla.
At this moment, there was a perceptible stir of curiosity among the languidly circulating males, a sudden chime of bells in the air and the irruption of hundreds of young maidens, which I can only describe as the scrambling rush of the stags at a ball. These young Dianas, dressed in short tunics that stopped short of the knee, advanced eagerly and posting themselves at points of vantage, stared appraisingly at the fluttering males, with a boldness that Don Juan himself might have envied.
The debutants of the first year, I observed, pretended an indifference which their furtive glances belied, as they endeavored by careless and seemingly haphazard meetings to attract their attention. But the superior Dianas (I had almost written “the young bucks,” so completely did their impertinent inspection suggest the manners of the highborn oglers of other days) indifferent to these timorous advances, had eyes only for their more experienced brothers. The white fans, as though conscious of their inferiority, gradually drifted away to the grove of the Histriones.
I beheld then, the curious sight of hundreds of couples moving languidly with the woman’s arms around the man, her head bent in solicitous courtship.
“Are these women virgins?” I asked.
“Oh, absolutely,” said Acquilla. “We permit no intercourse until a woman has borne her female child. These first unions are serious and endure for six months, during which time the male resides in the seclusion of the woman’s home.”
“In a solitary seraglio?”
“Naturally. What you see is only the first of the promenades. They continue every week for several months during the period of courtship, before the final engagements are concluded.”
“Then the men have a freedom of choice?”
“Theoretically, yes, but they seldom exercise that right.”
“But supposing several women desire the same man?”
“That often happens, but the priority is determined by the eugenics board according to their qualifications.”
“But doesn’t this arouse fierce jealousies?”
“Why, one man is like another. Besides, it’s a question of waiting.”
“One question,” I persisted, “I comprehend that in this age of reason, you have done away with sentiment. But have you so completely dominated the emotions that these mating comradeships do not sometimes develop into what we called the passion of love? And what then?”
“In the young, it is quite true that violent attractions take place,” said Acquilla. “But as we know that such infatuations are immoral, we limit the duration of the attachment to six months.”
“Immoral?” I said, looking at her fixedly. “How am I to understand that?”
“What do you mean?” said Acquilla perceiving, I think, her slip.
I saw my opportunity and seized it.
“Six months!” I exclaimed indignantly. “A plaything for six months! So that is all you have had in mind. Now I know your real intentions.”
“A particular case has nothing to do with a general law,” said Acquilla with her genius for easy evasion. “Besides, such a case as yours has yet to be determined. Trust me, my dear one. I shall know how to protect us.”
My glance dropped before the ardor of her look.
“But how can passion under your society ever be immoral?” I asked.
“Morality is order, and immorality disorder. Anything that takes away from a woman the control over her faculties is of the quality of disorder and therefore immoral. The moment the relationship exceeds the bounds of her self-control, a woman passes into a state of emotional servitude and ceases to think honestly. Of course, in your day, you used marriage as a moral umbrella, forgetting that in the majority of cases, marriage either became a physical slavery or worse, and where hatred had risen, contrary to the natural selective principles of nature and therefore doubly immoral.”
“All this is marvelously if incredibly reasoned, Acquilla,” I said, “but since you admit that the passions do flame out, how do you treat them?”
“With the exception of the Histriones, where for the purposes of art we encourage a certain emotional latitude to produce that contact with suffering which the artist we know must experience; the cases you refer to, are rare. The remedy is of course, simple. All emotions have a physical or glandular origin so that a short period of treatment in the hospital corrects the malady.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to recommend to her an immediate treatment, but I conquered my sense of humor. Our relations had now reached so critical a point that I realized they would bear no further provocation. So I said smiling: “But if the woman doesn’t want to be cured?”
“You forget,” said Acquilla, with a gesture to the assembly, “that men such as you see there, can have only a physical appeal. In the rare case where an accidental intelligence may complicate the emotional problem, and this has only happened to the Histriones, there is a choice. We cannot, in the name of morality, permit the continuance of a relationship which has degenerated into a disorganization of the senses, but we do permit the unfortunate couple the right to be translated together through the Frigidrome into another existence.”
“Wait.” I stopped and took her hand genuinely moved. “Do I understand, my dear Acquilla, that you are prepared to take this voyage into time with me?”
“If there is no other way out--yes,” she said tremulously.
“But if I could show you another way?” I said, pressing her arm in my eagerness.
In that heroic moment, I was ready to sacrifice Dianne for Acquilla.
“What way, dear?” she asked startled.
“Help me to restore men to their former dignity and rights. Make them your mates and not simply breeders.”
“Never!” she cried, drawing her hand instantly away from me. “Betray my beliefs--never! I shall sacrifice myself but never my civilization! Understand that once and for all, Bogardus!”
“Incorruptible one!” I murmured in involuntary admiration. “Incorruptible as Robespierre,” I added to myself, “and just as implacable.”
“You will find as a matter of fact,” Acquilla added after a moment’s reflection, “that we are always guided by the strictest sense of justice. Our acquired scientific wisdom has laid down certain inviolable rules of conduct. If an individual refuses to conform we don’t avenge ourselves by any cruel or unusual method of punishment, we simply remove him to another civilization.”
“Nothing could be more just, oh, Solomon,” I admitted enthusiastically, “and you put to shame our archaic penal system where a man was not even permitted the right to take his own life.”
“Bear always in mind, dear,” said Acquilla with an approving nod, “that man’s logic always reasoned from traditions, whereas we women reason from the immediate necessity. Your brain was a deductive one, ours is always inductive. It is that power of divination, of sensing first what ought to be, that has produced the great feminine discoveries in science.”
During the conversation, I had become increasingly aware of the disturbance that my presence was creating. Groups of maidens passed and repassed, gazing at me with undisguised curiosity and admiration, until becoming bolder they remained in a whispering group gazing up at me. Whether a certain license was permitted at these affairs or whether Acquilla was moved by a sense of pride in a coveted possession, she made no effort to dispel these inquisitive groupings. I sustained this persistent admiration with as indifferent a countenance as possible until I noticed that the attraction I exerted was arousing the evident displeasure of the young males, who from their furious glances and mutterings seemed to regard my presence as an unwarranted intrusion. This attitude became so noticeable that I said hastily to Acquilla:
“My dear Acquilla, though a man of a certain vanity, I am unfortunately afflicted with a little modesty and as, after all, I am not on parade, couldn’t we leave the field to its rightful possessors?”
Acquilla rose and offering her arm drew me through the crowd which in response to a peremptory gesture, immediately dissolved and left us free. We passed thus, through this curiously inverted throng of lovers and arrived at the grove of the Histriones, where unfortunately my presence created an even greater disturbance. Dulcina and Carrilla came hurriedly forward and embraced me with a warmth that was noticeably displeasing to Acquilla.
I searched feverishly for my lovely Dianne and discovered her at length, in a farther group, devouring me with her ardent gaze. She laid her fingers on her lips, to signal to me to be patient, and I understood that, fearful of betraying her passion before Acquilla, she preferred to remain in the background.
The young males of the first year, were at this moment performing a ballet with the evident intention of attracting the attention of the most famous of the Histriones, and truth compels me to admit that in the grace of their flying movement, they surpassed any ballet that I had previously witnessed. The attention of the charming Histriones, which had been fixed on the _premiers danseurs_, was quite naturally diverted to me. The result was disastrous. The entire chorus, aware of the sudden relaxation in the attention of the audience, stopped, began to whisper and abruptly abandoned the scene. Before I could make my apologies for this regrettable interruption, a messenger approached Acquilla and summoned her to what I learned afterwards, was a suddenly convoked meeting of the Supreme Council. To leave me with the Histriones was extremely distasteful, but the summons being of a peremptory nature, she was forced to make the best of it.
Hardly had she disappeared, when Dianne seized my hand, and drawing me out of the crowd, led me into a shady grotto.
“I have only a moment to warn you,” she said hastily, “but the Council has been convoked on your account.”
“On mine?” I exclaimed, with a feeling of uneasiness.
“You see, your position here is an irregular one. You are of course, a man and subject to all the regulations, but you are enjoying the freedom that we permit only to our own sex. The young males are furious, naturally.”
“At last--” I exclaimed triumphantly. “Am I to be incarcerated then?”
“Don’t worry, my beloved,” said Dianne, putting her arm around my neck and looking at me with glowing eyes, “and forgive me if I’m a good deal in what is about to happen to you. For I can stand anything, rather than the thought of your being alone day and night with Acquilla. You will have to enter the Club for a short while, but by entering it, you will acquire a freedom of action that you never could have had as Acquilla’s prisoner.”
“You will take me out yourself, oh, Dianne!” I exclaimed, divining the whole stratagem in her amorous glances.
“You have always the right to refuse,” said the bewitching creature, drawing near me.
My answer was to fold her into my arms and gather her to me with a passion that obliterated all consciousness. All at once I felt a shudder pass through her soft body, and with a cry of alarm she sprang from me. I looked up. Acquilla, with blazing eyes, was staring at us.
“I might have guessed your stratagem, treacherous Histrione,” she cried bitterly. “Very well, the responsibility is on your head! Good-bye, Bogardus!”
Before we could stammer an excuse, she turned abruptly on her heel and went off with a final menacing gesture. The next moment the officials appeared and signified to me the decision of the Supreme Council.
“Courage, my beloved,” said Dianne, clasping me to her a last time. “Acquilla is a terrible enemy, but I too, have great influence. Only do be careful at the Club. Be patient until your friends can organize in your support. I’ll get you out as soon as I can.”