I keep my head up and look each man in the face, an absolutely cold look. The innocents, I’m sure, must now believe I have overnight transformed into another woman—a Fury without a shred of civility—and the guilty party, what does he think? That he has had a nasty, smutty little victory? I am half crazy to know which man it was and half crazy with dread to see in someone’s face the filthy smugness that must give him away to me, and what will I do then? I imagine mayhem—a knife cutting through his smirk—a fire poker swung square up between his legs—but go on sitting here writing as if all is not utterly changed and I am not rocked by humiliation and rage and—impotence. A hard rain fell in the night, the noise deafening inside the crowded tent, and I woke enough to realize the change in the weather—too tired or hopeless to grieve for Harriet, a shameful worry whether we were to suffer flooding, wet blankets—and then slept deeper and woke again—how much later?—pitch black, the rain still loud—to feel something warm and damp was on me, in me, and groggily thought it must be my monthly flow—an inward groan, oh dear— and then my brain fluttering to life, something flashing through my lower limbs, an awakening, a realization, and I scrambled in the blankets, trying to get up, to get away, but the blankets tangling, and the man’s hand still between my legs—his fingers inside me—and I made a desperate sound, I know I did, but not a word, it was a guttural animal noise such as a cow must make when her belly is torn away by wolves, and he made a sound, an obscene whispery breath which he may have meant as hushing—he was surprised, afraid to be found out?
