Part 44

She said I could at least be respectable, and that I was acting like I WANTED to be kidnaped.

And, you know, at times I do feel as if that might be my fate, "really. I am so psychic, you know, and psychics feel their fate coming on quicker than most people.

I told Mamma that I felt every woman had a right to choose the father of her own children, and she was shocked again. And then she wanted to know what being kidnaped by a Cave Man had to do with choosing the father of one's own children, and how did I know but these Cave Men kidnaped a different woman every year?

But I settled her.

"Mamma," I said, "you are NOT advanced, and so I cannot argue with you. You wouldn't understand. But if I AM primitive -- and I feel that I am -- whose fault is it? Who did I inherit it from?"

She couldn't say anything to that. She didn't like to own that I inherited it from her. And she knew if she blamed it onto Papa I would ask her how she DARED to deny me a primitive man when she had married one herself.

Finally she quit crying and said, pressing her lips together: "Hermione, do you KNOW any of those Cave Men?"

But I refused to answer. I went to my room.

Dissension disturb's the soul's harmony.

One's subliminal consciousness must ever vibrate in harmony with the Cosmic All.

I never fuss when a person disturbs me. I just go into the Silences and vibrate there.

But I kept thinking: "DO I know any Cave Men?"

I Think I do -- one. He tries to conceal it. But it's his secret. I'm sure.

He has the most luminous eyes!

Like a wolf's, you know, when it gallops across the waste places -- under the stars, alone!

And the way he eats! I don't mean that he's noisy, you know. But the way he crunched a chicken bone the last time he dined with me was perfectly WONDERFUL -- so nonchalant, you know, and loudly and -- and -- well, primitive! I'm SURE he's one!

I wouldn't go autoing with him for anything -- unless, of course, he gave me one of those compelling glances, like Cave Men do in the magazines, you know. Then I'd know it was destiny and useless to resist.

THE LITTLE GROUP GIVES A PAGAN MASQUE

The Little Group gave a party And all of the gods were there, From Thor to Miss Susan Astarte With doo-daddles gemming her hair,

Bill Baldur and Jane Aphrodite, Dick Vishnu and Benny O'Baal, And Bacchus came on in a nightie With little pink snakes in the tail;

Latin, Phoenician and Hindu Norse and Egyptian and Chink. . . . Castor was watching his Twin do Stunts, with a brotherly wink. . . .

Persephone swearing by Hades. . . . A Norn and Sibylline Simp. . . . A Momus, who showed up to the ladies The latest Olympian limp.

Was Hermione present? By Crikey! (This Crikey's a Whitechapel joss)

Our Hermy attended as Psyche -- She siked and she got it across

And Fothergil Finch, rather gaumy With Cosmic cosmetics, was there, But the Swami went just as the Swami, After oiling the kinks in his hair.

I said to Hermione: "Goddess! You're graceful, you're Greek, you're a rose, From the pinions that rise from your bodice To the raddle I note on your toes,

"And Fothergil, here, with his censer, And his little cheeks crimson as beets, Your acolyte, perfume-dispenser, Is sweet as a page out of Keats,

"But tell me, my Dea -- my Psyche! -- (With your wings outspread as to race With that swift and acephalous Nike Who lost her bean somewhere in Thrace) --