Anonymous - Dara

I never did understand fully how the electropathic treatment worked. According to the doctor, a high electrostatic shock was transmitted from a friction machine, through wire, to the coppered pads placed on the patient's body. After the doctor had located the seat of the trouble, it was my responsibility to take the patient behind a screen where she bared that part of her flesh that would receive the electric shock. When she had laid herself down on the couch I would place the coppered pads on that part of the body that was causing the trouble and the doctor would then cause the machine to transmit the electricity.

The ladies were most impressed, declaring how much better they felt after the electric shocks. I could do no other than believe them as they came back frequently for more of the same treatment. Word soon spread among the womenfolk of the town of how efficacious this magical machine was at curing ailments peculiar to women that soon we were taking as much money in the afternoons as we were with the men in the evenings.

In the mornings the three of us were kept busy mixing herbs and preparing the powders, salves and medicines. When I was alone with Bob Derry he was usually talkative, self-opinionated and bossy. With the doctor he was always very deferential. Any knowledge Bob Derry had about medical matters was shallow and superficial and he knew it. He was a young man anxious to go ahead no matter how, and never missed an opportunity to ingratiate himself with the doctor in the hope of learning more about the health business. I thought that was all there was to it until I observed him skimming a percentage of the takings. With the sales money he was always perfectly accurate and remarkably quick at giving change and, as he twisted and turned, you needed sharp eyes to see how some of the dollars found their way into his own pockets instead of the bag hanging at his waist. Keeping a very careful watch on him, I calculated that he was stealing about twenty dollars a night.

Much to my surprise the doctor just nodded his head and walked away when I told him what I had seen. Following him into the office, I asked, Aren't you going to do something about Bob skimming the takings?'

Seated at his desk, he said wearily in a voice so low that I could hardly hear him, 'No, I am not going to do anything about it.'

Seeing the puzzled, anxious look on my face he said by way of an explanation, 'Bob Derry is excellent as a barker and a clerk. I don't think there is anyone around here who could do it better.'

'But he's stealing!' I interjected.

'He thinks he's stealing and you think he is deceiving me. It's not so and I will tell you why. The institution is taking a lot more money than I ever expected it to and that is mainly due to Bob's persuasive talk at the front and the extra sales he makes after the patients leave my consulting rooms. You must admit that is true.'

I nodded my head in agreement.

'If he had been an honest man he would have asked for commission on the sales or for more money, or both, and in view of the undoubted success of the business and my need to retain his services, I would have given him, within reason, whatever he asked for. But he is not an honest man and prefers to steal what I would have given him freely. It has gone too far for me to do anything about it. If I was to accuse him of stealing now I would have no option but to terminate his employment and then try to find someone as equally good as he is as a barker and clerk.'

I had another complaint about Bob Deny but, in view of the doctor's attitude about the stolen money, I decided to remain silent and deal with the matter myself. Bob was the type of man who, whenever he found himself alone with a young woman, couldn't keep his hands to himself. I was never at ease in his company, not knowing from one moment to another when he would attempt to take liberties with me. Impertinent as a monkey and as lecherous as a goat, he constantly took advantage of me, fondling the cheeks of my bottom when my hands were immersed in a bowl of claggy medical mixture. Oh yes, he knew when to make his approach, creeping up on me when I was least expecting him to attack. Twice he got a hand down my blouse and grabbed one of my breasts. It was most painful trying to loosen the grip of his fingers on my tender flesh.

I began to view him with an excess of loathing and, to make matters worse, when I reprimanded him he would just stand looking at me with a sneer on his face. It was as if he was devoid of any feelings of sensitivity and got some sort of perverse pleasure in seeing me in a state of nervous agitation and distress.

One day, exasperated beyond endurance, I screamed, 'For God's sake leave me alone.'

Nothing deterred him. With a lascivious smile on his face he came up to me and began to stroke my back. 'Now, now, Dara, don't take on so, and don't bring God into this. You don't fool me. You and I are two of a kind. Like me, you live under Sod's Law not God's Law.'

I pushed him away and bent down to pick up a mixing bowl on the floor. He was on me in a trice, holding up the back of my skirt he tugged at the hairs around my slot with his fingers. My forbearance snapped. Turning round swiftly, I grabbed him by the ears and, in a boiling rage, pulled him towards me and brought my knee up sharply against the balls between his legs. With an agonized expression he crouched with protective hands covering his privates. I was so angry I kicked his backside so hard that he fell on his face. As he lay on the floor gasping for breath, I bent down and said in a quiet voice, 'You'll get the same again if ever you try to take liberties with me.'

From that day on he remained distant and reserved, but he never gave me any more trouble.

Thinking back over the years to the times of Bob Deny makes me reflect on experiences with other men who also had his attitude to the female sex. Thank goodness all men are not like that. Nevertheless, far too many, with an innate arrogance, think we females exist just for their pleasure. They cannot understand why we don't swoon with submissive desire when they grab at our breasts and roughly finger our private parts. The sight of our soft delicate flesh so often brings to the surface their animal instinct for dominance and cruelty.

My talks with married women have revealed how few of them have been warmed by loving caresses. Night after night they are raped by their husbands. How else can it be described when a man without one word of love roughly pulls up a wife's nightgown and, with grunts and groans, empties his lust into her, only to roll onto his back to snore and snuffle through the rest of the night. This bondaged enslavement to a man is the price women must pay to satisfy their instinctive desire for a home and babies.

Maidens yearn for the day when some man will sweep them off their feet and into a marriage which will be a romantic love story of a kind so different in every way from the lives of the unfortunate drudges who are already married. In their nubile fancies they live only for true love, for to them it is the only reality that gives meaning to life. Every romantic thought that comes into their heads is a silent prayer for love, prepared to sacrifice everything for the one they favour. If only men were less aggressive and domineering and received their wives' gentle affections with tenderness and appreciation, then conjugal bliss would be within the reach of everyone.

With the approach of the fall the daylight hours lessened before the long shadows of night and so it was with the number of patients seeking our services in the evenings. These extra hours of leisure were absorbed by readings from one or other of the many plays written by William Shakespeare.

Luckily there was no falling off in the number of ladies requiring treatment from the Electropathic Machine in the afternoons. Without their money the health institution could not have continued as a viable business. Bob Derry's income from his skimmings must have lessened too. Rather than see him standing bored and idle, the doctor often sent Bob off earlier than usual. I was always delighted to see the front doors locked after Bob's departure for this meant another evening devoted to the works of Shakespeare.