Free Act of Revenge by Robert K. Tanenbaum Page B

could and could not do in the way of protection and site hardening. This included building surveys, installation of equipment and architectural mods, security seminars for clinic staff, and the provision of bonded square-badge guards. The woman listened, took some notes, asked the usual questions. Marlene could see she was disappointed, had expected something else, something more ardently feminist, a source of emotional support rather than a security firm functionary, which is why she had called Osborne and asked for Marlene by name. Marlene couldn’t help that (it happened a lot), nor could she help what she felt about the clinic. This emerged, too, in the conversation.
    At the end, the director made some noncommittal remarks that they’d be in touch. Marlene doubted this; she was being given the boot. She was not exactly famous, but she’d been in the news enough over the past decade so that there were people who would call for an appointment just to take a look, and others who wanted the cachet of having her guard their bodies, and others who thought she was in the business of shooting unwanted males on order. Marlene figured that Alice Reiss-Kessler’s initial thought in the immediate aftermath of the attack had been punishment and revenge, and since she came from a class and subculture that did not trust the police to have the right attitude toward feminist issues, she had sought a private enforcer.
    Which Marlene was not, and had made that clear, and now, leaving the sooty storefront, wondered why it was easier for her to be nice to horrible male-chauvinist cops than to a perfectly decent woman with the right liberal opinions on every subject. To be fair, she was just as impatient with the right-wing verities of most cops. And of her mother.
    She walked now, head down and grumpy, to her car, an old Volvo 240 station wagon in the usual faded orange, parked illegally on Tenth. Her personal assistant was sitting in the passenger seat. He grunted a greeting as she entered.
    â€œI don’t know, Sweets,” she said when the car was moving in the south-bound flow. “I screwed that up for no reason. I had to give that dumb speech about the cops, and what she wanted was the us girls against the men business, oh, bite my tongue, not girls , of course, and I had to sound off about abortion, but when she said that about those abortion-is-murder nuts, and said well, it is and they’re not all nuts, and she gave me that you can’t be serious look, and I said well, yeah, legal, safe, and available, sure, I’m for that, but you’re also killing babies, you should stand up for that, and be sad, I’d like to see more tears, more anguish, I mean it’s not a haircut and a rinse, is it? And she got chillier and chillier, and then I cracked wise about me participating in a number of post-natal abortions and I didn’t care for those either, and then we went back to talking about doors and bomb barriers. And of course, she’s big in New York feminist circles, and she’s going to spread the word about what a traitor I am to the cause, which will not help with the celebrity jobs either, and Osborne is going to start having second thoughts about bringing me in. I mean, really, Sweets, what is going on here? How can you be more of a feminist than me? Huh?”
    Sweety offered a shrug and a sympathetic look.
    â€œDo I put my fucking body on the line? Do I actually protect women from men ? I do. And what do I get for it, huh? I’ll tell you what I don’t get. I don’t get no respect. My husband hates what I do. My daughter just hates me whatever I do, poor Marlene , and after today I doubt I’ll be invited to sit on the dais at the NOW meeting, and I bought the most darling little black dress. . . . Sweety! Talk to me! I need advice.”
    In response to this, Sweety dropped his massive head on her lap and dispensed a half cup of saliva directly onto her crotch.