One Thousand White Women Read Online Free PDF Page A

maladies might be contagious.
    But apparently I passed my initial examination, for next I was interviewed by Mr. Benton himself, who also asked me a series of distinctly queer questions: Did I know how to cook over a campfire? Did I enjoy spending time outdoors? Did I enjoy sleeping out overnight? What was my personal estimation of the western savage?
    “The western savage?” I interrupted. “Having never met any western savages, Sir, it would be difficult for me to have formed any estimation of them one way or another.”
    Finally Mr. Benton got down to the business at hand: “Would you be willing to make a great personal sacrifice in the service of your government?” he asked.
    “But of course,” I answered without hesitation.
    “Would you consider an arranged marriage to a western savage for the express purpose of bearing a child with him?”
    “Hah!” I barked a laugh of utter astonishment. “But why on earth?” I asked, more curious than offended. “For what purpose?”
    “To ensure a lasting peace on the Great Plains,” Mr. Benton answered. “To provide safe passage to our courageous settlers from the constant depredations of the bloodthirsty barbarians.”
    “I see,” I said, but of course, I did not altogether.
    “As part of our agreement,” added Mr. Benton, “your President will demonstrate his eternal gratitude to you by arranging for your immediate release from this institution.”
    “Truly? I would be released from this place?” I asked, trying to conceal the trembling in my voice.
    “That is absolutely guaranteed,” he said, “assuming that your legal guardian, if such exists, is willing to sign the necessary consent forms.”
    Already I was formulating my plan for this last major hurdle to my freedom, and again I answered without a moment’s hesitation. I stood and curtsied deeply, weak in the knees, both from my months of idle confinement and pure excitement at the prospect of freedom: “I should be deeply honored, Sir, to perform this noble duty for my country,” I said, “to offer my humble services to the President of the United States.” The truth is that I would have gladly signed on for a trip to Hell to escape the lunatic asylum … and, yet, perhaps that is exactly what I have done …
    As to the critical matter of obtaining my parents’ consent, let me say in preface, that although I may have been accused of insanity and promiscuity, no one has ever taken me for an idiot.
    It was the responsibility of the hospital’s chief physician, my own preposterous diagnostician, Dr. Sidney Kaiser, to notify the families of those patients under consideration for the BFI program (these initials stand for “Brides for Indians” as Mr. Benton explained to us) and invite them to the hospital to be informed of the program and to obtain their signatures on the necessary release papers—at which time the patients would be free to participate in the program if they so chose. In the year and a half that I had been incarcerated there against my will, I had, as I may have mentioned, been visited only twice by the good doctor. However, through my repeated but futile efforts to obtain an audience with him, I had become acquainted with his assistant, Martha Atwood, a fine woman who took pity on me, who befriended me. Indeed, Martha became my sole friend and confidante in that wretched place. Without her sympathy and visits, and the many small kindnesses she bestowed upon me, I do not know how I could have survived.
    As we came to know one another, Martha was more than ever convinced that I did not belong in the asylum, that I was no more insane than she, and that, like other women there, I had been committed unjustly by my family. When this opportunity presented itself for me to “escape,” she agreed to help me in my desperate plan. First she “borrowed” correspondence from Father out of my file in Dr. Kaiser’s office, and she had made a duplicate of his personal letterhead. Together