of a desert melon as the fate of women who cannot or will not be wed or cursed not to bear children. Onlookers felt moved toward traditional blessing and charms to ensure that they would become honorable women. The fete lasted well into the night and the slave began to feel the aches of the body grasping at her through her sheath. Thirst, a full bladder, and aching legs quivering in their honey-colored casing gave her a feeling of unease. Hands grasped her rear as they might a doll and one of the guests posed her to lie recumbent put her head upon her to rest as she talked to a peer causing her body even more distress. She did not have a name and nobody spoke of the woman before the mask. Her name was a sharp tug on a lead, a shove or a grasp at her tightly wrapped flesh. The master's wife knew of the woman under the encasement for she had schemed with the slave's master to remove her and place her in silent isolation and by doing so see her fortunes rise with his. The master's wife, who was left widowed after her former husband died on a hunt shortly after their wedding, consorted with the former husband of the masked woman with a plan to unify the eastern traditionalists and propel his career at the palace. It was master's wife who introduced him to Old Naws who would leave his then wife barren and