Pathetic,
absolutely pathetic. I should have known better than to expect anything as the
book is from 1919 even though when I started reading it I had no idea it was
that old. Hull barely describes the ridiculous Sheik kissing Diana, let alone
fucking her. This book is such a waste of time. Instead of saying she was raped
she writes, ‘She had experienced his tremendous strength.’ The book’s archaic.
The Sheik (1919), by E. M. Hull. Excerpts form
an eBook.
END OF
CHAPTER II
"Why have you brought me here?"
she asked, fighting down the fear that was growing more terrible every moment.
He repeated her words with a slow smile.
"Why have I brought you here? Bon Dieu! Are you not woman enough to
know?"
She shrank back further, a wave of colour
rushing into her face that receded immediately, leaving her whiter than she had
been before. Her eyes fell under the kindling flame in his. "I don't know
what you mean," she whispered faintly, with shaking lips.
"I think you do." He laughed
softly, and his laugh frightened her more than anything he had said. He came
towards her, and although she was swaying on her feet, desperately she tried to
evade him, but with a quick movement he caught her in his arms.
Terror, agonising, soul-shaking terror such
as she had never imagined, took hold of her. The flaming light of desire
burning in his eyes turned her sick and faint. Her body throbbed with the
consciousness of a knowledge that appalled her. She understood his purpose with
a horror that made each separate nerve in her system shrink against the
understanding that had come to her under the consuming fire of his ardent gaze,
and in the fierce embrace that was drawing her shaking limbs closer and closer
against the man's own pulsating body. She writhed in his arms as he crushed her
to him in a sudden access of possessive passion. His head bent slowly down to
her, his eyes burned deeper, and, held immovable, she endured the first kiss
she had ever received. And the touch of his scorching lips, the clasp of his
arms, the close union with his warm, strong body robbed her of all strength, of
all power of resistance.
With a great sob her eyes closed wearily,
the hot mouth pressed on hers was like a narcotic, drugging her almost into
insensibility. Numbly she felt him gather her high up into his arms, his lips
still clinging closely, and carry her across the tent through curtains into an
adjoining room. He laid her down on soft cushions. "Do not make me wait
too long," he whispered, and left her.
And the whispered words sent a shock
through her that seemed to wrench her deadened nerves apart, galvanising her
into sudden strength. She sprang up with wild, despairing eyes, and hands
clenched frantically across her heaving breast; then, with a bitter cry, she
dropped on to the floor, her arms flung out across the wide, luxurious bed. It
was not true! It was not true! It could not be—this awful thing that had
happened to her—not to her, Diana Mayo! It was a dream, a ghastly dream that
would pass and free her from this agony. Shuddering, she raised her head. The
strange room swam before her eyes. Oh, God! It was not a dream. It was real, it
was an actual fact from which there was no escape. She was trapped, powerless,
defenceless, and behind the heavy curtains near her was the man waiting to
claim what he had taken. Any moment he might come; the thought sent her
shivering closer to the ground with limbs that trembled uncontrollably. Her
courage, that had faced dangers and even death without flinching, broke down
before the horror that awaited her. It was inevitable; there was no help to be
expected, no mercy to be hoped for. She had felt the crushing strength against
which she was helpless. She would struggle, but it would be useless; she would
fight, but it would make no difference. Within the tent she was alone, ready to
his hand like a snared animal; without, the place was swarming with the man's
followers. There was nowhere she could turn, there was no one she could turn
to. The certainty of the accomplishment of what she dreaded crushed her with
its surety. All power of action was gone. She could only wait and suffer in the
complete moral collapse that overwhelmed her, and that was rendered greater by
her peculiar temperament. Her body was aching with the grip of his powerful
arms, her mouth was bruised with his savage kisses. She clenched her hands in
anguish. "Oh, God!" she sobbed, with scalding tears that scorched her
cheeks. "Curse him! Curse him!"
And with the words on her lips he came,
silent, noiseless, to her side. With his hands on her shoulders he forced her
to her feet. His eyes were fierce, his stern mouth parted in a cruel smile, his
deep, slow voice half angry, half impatiently amused. "Must I be valet, as
well as lover?"
CHAPTER III
The warm sunshine was flooding the tent
when Diana awoke from the deep sleep of exhaustion that had been almost
insensibility, awoke to immediate and complete remembrance. One quick, fearful
glance around the big room assured her that she was alone. She sat up slowly,
her eyes shadowy with pain, looking listlessly at the luxurious appointments of
the tent. She looked dry-eyed, she had no tears left. They had all been
expended when she had grovelled at his feet imploring the mercy he had not
accorded her. She had fought until the unequal struggle had left her exhausted
and helpless in his arms, until her whole body was one agonised ache from the
brutal hands that forced her to compliance, until her courageous spirit was
crushed by the realisation of her own powerlessness, and by the strange fear
that the man himself had awakened in her, which had driven her at last moaning
to her knees. And the recollection of her abject prayers and weeping
supplications filled her with a burning shame. She loathed herself with bitter
contempt. Her courage had broken down; even her pride had failed her.
--
"Why have you done this?" she
murmured faintly.
Then for a moment her heart stood still,
her eyes dilating. He had come close behind her, and she waited in an agony,
until he caught her to him, crushing her against him, forcing her head back on
his arm.
"Because I wanted you. Because one day
in Biskra, four weeks ago, I saw you for a few moments, long enough to know
that I wanted you. And what I want I take. You played into my hands. You
arranged a tour in the desert. The rest was easy."
Her eyes were shut, the long dark lashes
quivering on her pale cheeks so that she could not see his face, but she felt
him draw her closer to him and then his fierce kisses on her mouth. She
struggled frantically, but she was helpless, and he laughed softly as he kissed
her lips, her hair, her eyes passionately. He stood quite still, but she felt
the heavy beating of his heart under her cheek, and understood dimly the
passion that she had aroused in him. She had experienced his tremendous
strength. She realised from what he had told her that he recognised no law
beyond his own wishes, and was prepared to go to any lengths to fulfil them.
She knew that her life was in his hands, that he could break her with his lean
brown fingers like a toy is broken, and all at once she felt pitifully weak and
frightened. She was utterly in his power and at his mercy—the mercy of an Arab
who was merciless.
She gave in suddenly, lying quiet in his
arms. She had touched the lowest depths of degradation; he could do nothing
more to her than he had done. For the moment she could fight no further, she
was worn out and utterly weary. A numb feeling of despair came over her and
with it a sense of unreality, as if it were a hideous nightmare from which she
would wake, for the truth seemed too impossible, the setting too theatrical.
The man himself was a mystery. She could not reconcile him and the barbaric
display in which he lived with the evidences of refinement and education that
the well-worn books in the tent evinced. The fastidious ordering of his
appointments puzzled her; it was strange to find in such a place. A dozen
incongruities that she had noticed during the day crowded into her recollection
until her head reeled. She turned from them wearily; she was too tired to
think, too spent in mind and body. And with the despair a kind of indifference
stole over her. She had suffered so much that nothing more mattered.
The strong arms around her tightened
slowly. "Look at me," he said in the soft slow voice that seemed
habitual to him, and which contrasted oddly with the neat, clipping French that
he spoke. She shivered and her dark lashes flickered for a moment. "Look
at me." His voice was just as slow, just as soft, but into it had crept an
inflection that was unmistakable.
Twenty-four hours ago Diana Mayo had not
known the meaning of the word fear, and had never in all her life obeyed any
one against her inclination, but in twenty-four hours she had lived through
years of emotions. For the first time she had pitted her will against a will
that was stronger than her own, for the first time she had met an arrogance
that was greater and a determination that was firmer than hers. For the first
time she had met a man who had failed to bow to her wishes, whom a look had
been powerless to transform into a willing slave. In a few hours that had
elapsed she had learned fear, a terrible fear that left her sick with
apprehension, and she was learning obedience. Obedient now, she forced herself
to lift her eyes to his, and the shamed blood surged slowly into her cheeks.
His dark, passionate eyes burnt into her like a hot flame. His encircling arms
were like bands of fire, scorching her. His touch was torture. Helpless, like a
trapped wild thing, she lay against him, panting, trembling, her wide eyes
fixed on him, held against their will. Fascinated she could not turn them away,
and the image of the brown, handsome face with its flashing eyes, straight,
cruel mouth and strong chin seemed searing into her brain. The faint indefinite
scent of an uncommon Turkish tobacco clung about him, enveloping her. She had
been conscious of the same scent the previous day when he had held her in his
arms during the wild ride across the desert.
He smiled down at her suddenly. "Bon
Dieu! Do you know how beautiful you are?" he murmured. But the sound of
his voice seemed to break a spell that had kept her dumb. She struggled again
to free herself.
"Let me go!" she cried piteously,
and it was her complete immunity from him that she prayed for, but he chose
wilfully to misunderstand her. The passion faded from his eyes, giving place to
a gleam of mockery.
"There is plenty of time. Gaston is
the most discreet servant. We shall hear him when he comes," he said with
a low laugh.
But she persisted with the courage of
desperation. "When will you let me go?"
With an exclamation of impatience he put
her from him roughly, and going to the divan flung himself down on the
cushions, lit another cigarette and picked up a magazine that was lying on an
inlaid stool beside him.
She bit her lips to keep back the
hysterical sobs that rose in her throat, nerving herself with clenched hands,
and followed him. "You must tell me. I must know. When will you let me
go?"
He turned a page with deliberation, and
flicked the ash from his cigarette before looking up. A heavy scowl gathered on
his face, and his eyes swept her from head to foot with a slow scrutiny that
made her shrink. "When I am tired of you," he said coldly.
She shuddered violently and turned away
with a little moan, stumbling blindly towards the inner room, but as she
reached the curtains his voice arrested her. He had thrown aside the magazine
and was lying back on the divan, his long limbs stretched out indolently, his
hands clasped behind his head.
"You make a very charming boy,"
he said lightly, with a faint smile, "but it was not a boy that I saw in
Biskra. You understand?"
Beyond the curtains she stood a moment,
shaking all over, her face hidden in her hands, able to relax a little the hold
she was keeping on herself. Yes! She understood, plainly enough. The
understanding had already been forced upon her. It was an order from one who
was prepared to compel his commands, to make herself more attractive with all
that it implied in the eyes of the man who held her in his power and who looked
at her as no other man had ever dared to look, with appraising criticism that
made her acutely conscious of her sex, that made her feel like a slave exposed
for sale in a public market.
She must take off the boyish clothes that
somehow seemed to lend her courage and substitute, to gratify the whim of the
savage in the next room, the womanly dress that revealed more intimately the
slender lines of her figure and intensified the uncommon beauty of her face.
--
Her tired
body shrank from the struggle that must recommence so soon. If he would only
spare her until this numbing weariness that made her so powerless should
lessen. She heard his voice at the door and her icy fingers grasped at the book
that had slipped to the ground. The thick rugs deadened the sound of his
movements, but she knew instinctively that he had come in and gone back to the
divan where he had been sitting before. She knew that he was looking at her.
She could feel his eyes fixed on her and she quivered with the consciousness of
his stare. She waited, shivering, for him to speak or move. His methods of
torture were diverse, she thought with dreary bitterness. Behind the tent in
the men's lines a tom-tom was beating, and the irregular rhythm seemed
hammering inside her own head. She could have shrieked with the agony of it.
"Come here—Diane."
--The proprietory tone in his voice roused
all her inherent obstinacy. She was not his to go at his call. What he wanted
he must take—she would never give voluntarily. She sat with her hands gripped
tightly in her lap, breathing rapidly, her eyes dark with apprehension.
"Come here," he repeated sharply.
Still she took no notice, but the face that
he could not see was growing very white.
"I am not accustomed to having my
orders disobeyed," he said at last, very slowly.
"And I am not accustomed to obeying
orders," she retorted fiercely, though her lips were trembling.
"You will learn." The sinister
accent of his voice almost shattered her remaining courage.
She crouched, gasping, on the ground, the
same horrible terror that had come to her last night stealing over her
irresistibly, paralyzing her. Waiting, listening, agonizing, the tom-tom
growing louder and louder—or was it only the throbbing in her own head? With a
choking cry she leaped to her feet suddenly and fled from him, back till the
side of the tent stopped her and she stood, with wide-flung arms, gripping the
black and silver hangings until he reached her.
--"Little fool," he said with a
deepening smile. "Better me than my men."
The gibe broke her silence.
"Oh, you brute! You brute!" she
wailed, until his kisses silenced her.
CHAPTER IV
--Her mind
travelled back slowly over the days and nights of anguished revolt, the
perpetual clash of will against will, the enforced obedience that had made up
this month of horror. A month of experience of such bitterness that she
wondered dully how she still had the courage to rebel. For the first time in
her life she had had to obey. For the first time in her life she was of no
account. For the first time she had been made conscious of the inferiority of
her sex. The training of years had broken down under the experience. The
hypothetical status in which she had stood with regard to Aubrey and his
friends was not tolerated here, where every moment she was made to feel acutely
that she was a woman, forced to submit to everything to which her womanhood
exposed her, forced to endure everything that he might put upon her—a chattel,
a slave to do his bidding, to bear his pleasure and his displeasure, shaken to
the very foundation of her being with the upheaval of her convictions and the
ruthless violence done to her cold, sexless temperament. The humiliation of it
seared her proud heart. He was pitiless in his arrogance, pitiless in his
Oriental disregard of the woman subjugated. He was an Arab, to whom the feelings
of a woman were non-existent. He had taken her to please himself and he kept
her to please himself, to amuse him in his moments of relaxation.
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