teeth, raising a hand as though to strike her before catching himself. “Blasphemous creature! If you must wear the Carnivale mask, it should be the moretta. Lips as foul as yours should remain forcibly buttoned.”
The moretta he referred to was a mask that covered the entire face but had no string attached to tie it fast. Instead, it was held in position by its wearer biting a button on the inside of the lips. This necessitated that its wearer remain mute or lose the mask!
“Have you ever been sexually aroused by a woman?” one of the drunkards inquired, drawing her gaze.
She shrugged, a little embarrassed. “Yes, but likely no more often than any of you have been aroused by a man. Whether its owner is male or female, a beautiful body, face, and spirit combined in one package tends to draw every eye. Do you not agree?”
The men shifted uncomfortably, unwilling to admit the truth of what she said.
“But if you were forced to choose one and only one gender as a sexual partner for the rest of your life on this earth, which would it be?” prodded the bishop.
It was a question that dogged her. Did the circumstances of her body dictate that she could never be satisfactorily partnered for life with only one gender? If so, how could she ever hope to find love—unless she found another hermaphrodite who happened to suit her disposition! And what were the chances of that?
“Must it be one or the other?” she asked. “Can your God not find it in His heart to allow the possibility that there might be a sliding scale in such matters? Can a body such as mine not seek its pleasure with both genders?”
The bishop’s doughy complexion turned an apoplectic hue. “Again you blaspheme!”
“But earlier tonight, you said you do not bleed,” the Englishman insisted, ignoring the outburst. “Aside from your breasts and vaginal canal, what is the source of this belief that you’re female?”
Tapping her head, then her chest, she said, “It’s something my mind and heart direct me toward.”
He nodded, seeming to understand.
Salerno gestured toward her testes and wilting cock. “I must agree with the good bishop. With these new developments, your claim to womanhood seems to be hanging by a fragile thread.”
He leaned low to her ear. “Perhaps my lie to your family was not so large after all.”
She turned her head, whispering, “Then your hold on my family lessens.”
His eyes slitted. She’d spoken unwisely.
When she averted her gaze from him, it fell on the bishop. He’d overheard their conversation, and she saw the flash of curiosity in his eyes. She patted her mask making certain it was still in place.
“What if you were to mate the subject with a man?” the Sicilian inquired suddenly. “If a child resulted, would that not prove it to be a female?”
The six men studied her speculatively.
Salerno tapped his chin with a long finger. “Or what if the subject were to mate with both a man and a woman, all under the strict surveillance of a theater full of medical men? And what if, in the course of such an experiment, La Maschera were to become both father and mother, all in the course of a single night?”
The Sicilian’s eyes lit. “Now that would be something to draw crowds!”
“I’ll never agree to such a thing,” said Jordan. “You know I wouldn’t. I’m no animal in heat to be caged and mated. And I would never indiscriminately bring children into this world. If I were ever so fortunate as to bear offspring, I would want to parent them for all the years afterward. If I were a wife—”
“What man would take you as a wife if it turns out that you cannot bear his children?” one of the Venetians countered.
“A man that loves me,” she replied heatedly, though even she didn’t believe her own claim.
Salerno raised his hands up and down as though patting out a fire. “Calm down. It’s not possible to experiment tonight anyway. To ensure accurate results, any woman you mated would have to be quarantined for nine months prior to copulation. And for as many months afterward, it would be someone’s task to ensure she remained celibate. That’s the only way to validate that any offspring she bore had resulted from your seed.”
“But what of my suggestion? The subject could still be given the ultimate test of femininity—one that would determine if it’s capable of motherhood,” the Sicilian insisted. From the bulge in his trousers, Jordan garnered the distinct impression he was willing to take on the job.
“My family wouldn’t be pleased by such a result,” she said, eyeing Salerno pointedly.
She sensed the bishop paying close attention. “Is there no medical inspection that could satisfactorily determine gender?” he inquired. “Some evaluation of femaleness other than the ability to bear children?”
Salerno shrugged. “A woman is what she is because of the uterus. This dictum has been relied upon by the medical establishment since first decreed by Jan Baptist van Helmont, the Flemish physician in the seventeenth century. However, the factual presence of such an organ can only be determined by an invasive physical search.”
“One that could be performed tonight?” the bishop prodded.
The spectacled Englishman spoke up, shaking his head. “Gentlemen! You’re not contemplating—? No! It’s too dangerous.”
“What would you have to do exactly?” Jordan asked, feeling reckless with the desire to strengthen her claim to femininity.
“Don’t agree to this,” the Englishman warned her.
“Bah!” Salerno said, waving away the other man’s plea for caution. “The subject is here to be explored of its own free will. What I suggest is a routine procedure I’ve done several times before. A well-informed hand such as mine, lubricated and inserted into its rectum, would quickly detect the shape, size, and location of a uterus if one exists. Any discomfort would be minimal.”
“Minimal!” scoffed the spectacled man.
Paling at the description of what was involved, Jordan beckoned Salerno closer.
“A private moment, gentlemen!” he told the others. They grudgingly turned away as he leaned in to listen to her.
“If you dare perform such a search,” Jordan whispered, “regardless of what you find, I swear to you I will put an end to these annual demonstrations.”
“What will your mother have to say on that?” he asked mildly, unconcerned at her threat. She’d made it many times before.
“I don’t care,” said Jordan firmly. But they both knew she was lying. Her mother was beautiful, sought after, and self-centered. Jewels, society, and gaiety were the substance of her life. Sudden poverty would not agree with her. If Jordan were exposed not to be a verifiable male, her cousin would inherit. She wouldn’t see her own mother cast into the streets, and Salerno knew it.
His beady bird eyes bored into hers. “Don’t make threats on which you cannot follow through.
