No sooner had I opened the door and saw her sitting near the window - as a waft of her perfume hit me in the face - than my head was filled with the strains of some demented feverish music, performed by a band whose musicians excelled in beating the drums with their heads and the heels of their shoes, and a guitarist who almost bit the strings and strummed them with his teeth, and howled his song. I stood at the door for an instant to regain my breath and remove the strain from my arm after carrying my suitcase. The woman raised her eyes towards me and in a corner of my memory night club lights flashed, the sort which blinked on and off in the fashion of fire engines, ambulances and police cars; and where the dancers underneath those lights gyrated hysterically as if worshipping god of violence, sex and crime.

I asked her permission to sit down and she nodded her head. In my mind there stirred images from spy thriller reels, scenes which alternated from police chases to torrid love adventures. Something about this woman exuded stimulation, seduction and sex appeal. She sat quietly in her seat, attentively reading a large book spread over her knees, and wearing eye glasses, for she had probably strained her eyesight in too much studying and reading.

She wore a grey jacket and had folded a long scarf several times round her neck. It appeared that she had made a fine art out of camouflage on this autumn day which had borrowed something from winter days. Yet in spite of all this protection she had the kind of beauty which would still proclaim itself no matter how well hidden. Hers was an aggressive beauty, like a tiger which is unleashed to devour you as soon as you approach; but it became apparent to me that she was greatly embarrassed by this beauty, with its violent, ferocious and torrid quality.

She wore her glasses and all those clothes and placed the largest books possible on her lap in a desperate effort to stem the rebelliousness of that unruly beauty. She even declined from wearing even a hint of lipstick or emollient so that her lips appeared parched and dry. She had bound her well-endowed and thrusting breasts within the most sedate and severe clothes, imprisoning them so cruelly. She chose the dullest shade of grey and bought a scarf at least a hundred feet long to rap round her neck to prevent even a glimmer of smooth marble-like neck from peeping out or twinkling through. As for those eyes with the thick long lashes which sent out flashes like the guns used by aliens from the other planets in science fiction films, with the power to smite and destroy, she had tried to remedy the situation by wearing her glasses, which she now uses for reading. One can sense from the first instant that she took great pains to conceal her beauty or at least to subdue and submerge it; for no doubt it had caused her a great deal of annoyance at every stage of her life. She had not been able to live anywhere without fights breaking out amongst the young men in the neighbourhood because of her. She had not been able to go out into the street without attracting a crowd, which in turn drew the attention of the keepers of law and order. She had not been able to enter a restaurant, or a place of public entertainment, or a shop or business premises without people neglecting their business to stare at her. Perhaps she had grown accustomed to this reaction and had reached a high standard of controlling her beauty, and taming its wildness. That's how she was able to walk down the street, and enter a restaurant or a place of entertainment and avoid all these demonstrations and rivalry. She had succeeded in keeping the tigers within her safely locked away in their cages and that's why she now sat calmly in her seat, unaware that those tigers only needed a tourist from an Eastern country like me, with a longing for life, to cause them to bound out of their cages, smashing their chains and breaking the locks to sink their claws and teeth into his flesh.

The thick fog outside was pressing like a pack of hyenas a few metres away from the station. I had sprawled on the opposite seat next to the door and wished I had the courage to sit next to her or directly opposite. This would facilitate the opportunity of striking up a conversation with her, but what could I do to change a shy nature that had been my lot all my life? It was brave enough of me to sit in a compartment alone with her at all, and not run away because of embarrassment, which her beauty was arousing in me. I thanked God that the train had moved before other passengers had the chance to occupy the seats which separated us. I didn't have the time to buy a newspaper or a magazine with which to occupy myself during the journey. I barely managed to catch the train at the last minute. She was content to read her book and had no need to turn to something else to pass the time, such as entering into a casual conversation with an unknown companion on the journey. She didn't lift her head off the book, for she had used it as a barricade .to discourage any intruders from approaching the gardens of her palace.

I started to invent reasons to justify my failure to strike up a conversation with her. I pretended that I would have succeeded with this woman if only I could have met her on her own without that accursed book. I watched the trees flashing past, and the fields which stretched far into the distance, shrouded in the morning mist and managed to pass the time by reading the book of nature. I started to invest the shapes outside covered by the mist with other meanings, imagining that some were tents, while others looked like riders wearing white-clothes, mounting white horses and stirring up clouds of dust around them, but suddenly nature disappeared.

The train entered a tunnel and I noticed that inside the compartment pale yellow lights became visible in the gloom. Their effect transformed the woman into what painters must have imagined the Virgin Mary to look like. I saw her suddenly acquire a saintly glow which endowed her with a calm strange beauty. She appeared as if she did not belong to this world. She was a saint reading her bible and intoning her prayers in a deserted temple high up on a mountain top, kneeling there at dawn and worshipping alone in the lamplight.

We emerged from the tunnel and the holy mantle slipped off. Once more the rowdy music started to flow from her breasts, her lips and her eyes. The reels of sex and violence once again emerged from the blonde hair cascading over her shoulders; the car chases and the fire engine flowed from the pages of the book spread over her knees. I instantly pictured her with various lovers and presumed that she was on her way back from visiting the one in the country, who had bought her a mansion there. She was now going to her lover who lived in the city. He had moved to live in with her after divorcing his wife and abandoning his children and quitting his job. She would then kick him out after squandering all his money.

There was also the student whom she had enticed away from his studies and who now made ends meet hanging round bars and night spots. The fourth, fifth or sixth who had spent all his money on her, even to the extent of selling his business and closing up shop or firm, had gone bankrupt.

The seventh or eighth had lost his job or his mind. She also had relationships with some politicians, in the event of one of them becoming a minister of state; but a rival for this lovely lady's affections was the chief editor of a national newspaper who had discovered a scandal concerning the minister and had exposed him.

This had caused a sensation in political circles which led to the downfall of the government and the current party in power was out of favour, having lost the confidence of the nation. She had now got rid of all her previous lovers and kept only one. I imagined him to be, in order to control her seductive powers, a very tough and cruel man with a powerful build. I chose for him a violent profession. In spite of losing the sight of one eye, he was the second-in-command of a large gang engaged in smuggling and drugs. I wanted him to be the second in command of the organisation because he would have to be the man of action, entrusted with the job of carrying things out. The top man always planned and organised. I didn't want him to be the brains, but merely the steel arm manipulated by the brains. I didn't mind reserving a place for him near the top of the ladder of success to which he aspired. His ambition would reveal other ugly aspects of his nature when a rival gang would use him to plot the elimination of his boss who was his benefactor and who had helped him and promoted him to his present position in the organisation.

I mused to myself that it was a great shame that she got herself involved in a relationship with the one-eyed man. Suffice it the wide age gap between them - for in spite of his powerfully large frame and a health as strong as an ox - he was approaching 50 while she was merely 2I or 22. I wished he could have valued that beauty, but even if he did appreciate it, he only persisted in vanquishing and humiliating it. He saw himself as an opponent in a battle in which his ugliness and uncouthness (his face was full of warts and he had a flat shaped bald head), would triumph over the charms of this woman, her allure and her bewitching beauty which shone from her eyes, her hair, her neck, her brow, her breasts and her lips. He realised that should he weaken, his defeat would be assured and he would lose that enchanting female forever. He had triumphed over her because from the very beginning he had treated her with viciousness, as if avenging all the ugly faces in the world against this woman who was the symbol of beauty, and who suffered on behalf of all the beautiful creatures on the face of this earth. He had discovered in treating her thus a new aspect to his personality, an agreeable and pleasing feeling, and he derived pleasure from hurting and humiliating her.

Whenever he desired her, he savagely tore the clothes off her, ripping them with his nails, piece by piece, until she was completely naked. I had guessed from his coarse features that he was not merely content with hitting her with his hands or kicking her with his feet, but that he used chairs, dishes, pieces of furniture and even kitchen utensils against her as a punishment, whenever she raised her voice at him. Despite her present demeanour which conveyed a regal dignity, I knew how she suffered and screamed as she knelt at his feet, weeping and begging for mercy and pity. This only increased his violence and his desire to humiliate and torment her. Afterwards he took her almost by force. I noticed a small scratch on her left temple which confirmed all my suspicions. I was certain that his fingernails had left their mark on her face. She was obviously trying to cover the traces beneath her hair and was using the heavy scarf to conceal the bruises which her neck had sustained as a result of his sadistic treatment.

The image of horses conjured up by the fog dissipated as the morning sun bathed the green fields which stretched as far as the horizon. The world appeared beautiful and cheerful. I realised that I was falling irresistibly in love with this woman whose delicious mouth burst with forbidden desires. She lifted her head off the pages of the book and her eyes swept across the floor of the compartment and came to rest on my face for a few seconds, as if she had just discovered my presence. I felt a tremor run through me, as if I had crept stealthily into a queen's bedchamber, who would then call the guards and have me killed. I dropped my gaze to the floor so our eyes would not meet, for fear that she might discover the thoughts which ran in my mind. She returned to her book, after she had excused and forgiven me. I felt remorseful for filling her life with all that terror and for having firmly secured its chains around her, like the three lower circles in Dante's hell. I thanked God that our thoughts had no voice, otherwise she would have screamed for help after discovering what I had been secretly thinking about her. If I was brave I could have approached her with a pleasant remark about the beauty of the morning. The shyness which had been my companion all my life prevented me from making the first move. I made a resolution that I would stop myself falling in love with all women, until I could find an exceptionally attractive woman who would strike up a conversation with me first! I would devote all my love to her! Still I remembered that there was an ogre in the life of this female, who laid siege around her and prevented her from addressing strangers. The shadow of the ugly man followed her everywhere she went. He watched all her looks, her words and her movements. I was certain that he had her followed and that someone was spying on us this very minute through a chink in the door. The poor wretch could not escape his clutches, for he had threatened her with death should she even contemplate leaving him. Yet there must be a way of saving her. Why didn't she leave him and escape to a distant country and put an end to this existence, filled with violence and misery? There was the problem of where she could find the money to enable her to afford the costs of the journey and settling down somewhere. She was of humble origins and her family were so poor they were reduced to begging. Her mother could not afford any medications and had died from a fever. Her father was taken to an old people's home. Her aunt lived in the country and that awful man did not allow her to visit except once or twice a year. The aunt lived alone and depended on some aid from her niece. She was probably back on her way from a short visit now. She had saved every extra penny she had to help out her aunt. What a noble character!

I was filled with pain, thinking of a way to save her from all this misery. I watched her as she read her book, exuding her magic in dignity and silence. My love for her increased and I wished that she was indeed a queen and I was her secret lover, visiting her furtively and enfolding her royal body tenderly. That body which was like a richly laded table, brimming with delicacies, strolling across its gardens filled with blooms, then ascending to its high balconies, picking what I fancied from its abundance of apples, grapes or pomegranates, and drinking from its mature vintage wines. In the midst of my ecstasy at possessing this body through whose veins blue blood ran, a thought struck me. Why didn't she inform the police about him?!

That was her only way out to free herself from his clutches and end her years of misery, spent in his company. He would be thrown behind bars and would not be released from a gloomy prison until he was a very old man.

Don't worry about what would happen to you afterwards. I shall hasten to your side. I shall labour and suffer to make you happy. Oh delight of my heart, I shall be your obedient servant worshipping at your altar. I shall help your beauty regain its respect and shall offer you such love as no man has given a woman before me. I had been looking at her, glad that the time was approaching to save her, but for some reason, I saw her throw the book she held between her hands to the floor. She leapt up, anger consuming her brow and her face darkened with a strange sorrow as if she had seen the most horrible and awful vision. She rapidly advanced towards me. I rose from my seat and looked at her with astonishment. I saw her hand rise and I felt the sting of a violent slap across my face, as if I had committed the most heinous crime against her!

'You scoundrel!'
I was so taken aback, I didn't know what to do. and remained standing there speechless. I hadn't been sitting close enough so that any movement on my part could have justified a mistaken interpretation. I tried to say something but I heard her shouting at me, tears stinging her eyes:

'What business is it of you to entertain such sick thoughts about saving me? Who gave you the right to interfere in my affairs or act on my behalf? It's my life and I am free to do whatever I like with it.'

I remained transfixed in my spot, overwhelmed with confusion and shock. I was transformed into a statue made of clay or wood, unable to comprehend or act or reason or see or hear or speak. I didn't know how much time elapsed while in this state. When life began to return to my wooden frame I felt the floor of the compartment shudder underneath my feet. I realised the train had put on its brakes and it reached the last station. A porter opened the door of the carriage and asked us to get ready to leave the train. He saw me standing there looking bewildered and saw her sitting there crying. He looked at me curiously and asked her what had happened, but she didn't reply. She collected her bags and hastily departed. The porter thought I was her companion and said with a smile:

'Don't worry about it! Tiffs will happen between lovers!'

I saw him standing there on the platform through the window. He was an immense giant of about fifty. His head was flat shaped and bald. His face was full of warts. One eye was covered by a patch, the other eye as expectantly looking at those descending the train.