When I first heard the accusation, I was shocked. It hardly seemed possible. But as the district attorney in my small Midwestern city — let's call it Springfield, in the interests of anonymity — I had little choice but to credit it with further investigation.

I heard the charge at my own dinner table. My daughter, Sandra, brought it up.

"Dad," she said, looking up from the bowl of pasta she had been picking at. "I heard something that I think you should know about, but I don't know how to tell you."

I exchanged a quick glance with my wife, Cynthia, and then looked at my fourteen-year-old daughter with concern. "What is it, honey?"

"You know Tamara, Tamara Wong?"

"Sure. What about her?" Of course I knew Tamara — she ate dinner at our home nearly every week.

"Well, um, she says something bad happened to her. That Mr. Johnson did something bad to her." This got my attention. Mr. Johnson was the gym teacher at Midland Junior High School, which both Sandra and Tamara attended as eighth-graders.

"What sort of 'bad' ... you mean something inappropriate?" Cynthia and I looked at each other again, and this time her face showed understandable alarm.

"She says ... Mr. Johnson, well ... she says he's had sex with her, in his office."

Well, I don't need to tell you that this was serious business indeed. Tamara Wong was a sweet little fourteen-year-old schoolgirl, and if she had been molested, particularly if by a man in a position of trust and authority over her, then my duty was clear. He must be brought to justice. Not to mention that this sort of case is always good for a politically ambitious district attorney. I promise you, however, that that element was only secondary in my thoughts, at least at first.

I assured my daughter that I would look into it without hesitation, and I did just that.

That very evening, I met two detectives in my office to lay out the story, as best I knew it. Tamara Wong was an immigrant, having arrived with her family about six years earlier from Taiwan. Tamara was her "American" name. I wasn't sure at the time what her original name was.

In addition to attending school with my daughter, she and her family could also claim some loyalty from me by virtue of being near-neighbors of ours. They lived a few blocks down the street from us in the same upscale South Hill neighborhood. Her father owned a profitable import business. Although I had only spoken with him and his wife a couple of times, I would do my best for them.

The first order of business was to talk to the girl. Detective Smith, a woman, would pull Tamara out of class in the morning and see if this was a serious accusation or just a tall tale among schoolgirls. No reason to raise a ruckus if it was just schoolgirl silliness.

However, if the claim was serious, the other detective, Sergeant Williams, would be waiting outside Judge Gonzales' chambers with the search warrant request we'd draft tonight. If he got the call from Detective Smith, within thirty minutes he and several uniformed officers would be searching Mr. Johnson's home for evidence, while another team took the offender into custody.

Sure enough, by one o'clock the following afternoon, I was sitting in my office with Tamara and her parents, hearing the story firsthand. She had earlier confirmed her charges to Detective Smith, after some initial hesitation, and shortly thereafter Mr. Timothy Johnson was taken to police headquarters for questioning. Although he denied everything, he matched the profile to a tee: forty years old, unmarried, and involved in a variety of activities which kept him in contact with children. He coached girls' gymnastics, girls' volleyball, and boys' wrestling, and he led a local Boy Scout troop. We'd have a lot of kids to interview to get some more charges; charges that I knew would be forthcoming.

The search of his home had been somewhat disappointing. No physical evidence and no outright kiddie porn. But the police had uncovered an album containing many photos of youngsters, kids from the teams he coached and the activities he led. Most of the photos were unremarkable, but in some the kids were in leotards, or swimsuits, or just gym shorts and T-shirts. In a parent's album, nothing to look twice at. But since we knew Johnson to be a pervert and a sex offender, we could use those otherwise innocent photos to charge him with child pornography as well. A sound and just distinction, I thought at the time.

"Tamara, please tell me exactly what happened. I know it's embarrassing, but I assure you that none of it was your fault."

After looking at her parents furtively, Tamara responded. "He called me into his office. A few weeks ago. He told me he knew that my parents wanted me to get straight 'A's'. He said, 'Do you know why I gave you a 'C' on your mid-term report card?' I told him 'no', and he said it was because he knew I'd have to do anything to get it up to an 'A' before the final report."

"Why did he think that?" I asked. Mr. Wong replied.

"Tamara must get straight 'A' on report card. No excuse." Mr. Wong's heavy accent contrasted sharply with his daughter's perfect, youthfully informal English.

"I see. Please, tell me Tamara, how did he use this information? What did you have to do?"

"He make me touch his thing, and he touched me, and then I had to put in it my mouth, and then he put it in my, you know."

"You mean he had intercourse with you?"

"Yeah, we had intercourse. More than once. He said I'd get my 'A'."

I looked at the cute little schoolgirl, for the first time actually visualizing her engaged in sexual acts. No question about it, she was beautiful. Her small mouth, with its thick, pursed lips, was nearly round, and in a perpetual pout. Her large, dark, almond eyes stared back at me in hurt innocence. Yes, she was quite attractive for such a young girl.

And young she was. Her long, silky black hair was pulled back in a juvenile ponytail, and her slight form had barely a curve to it. She couldn't have been over 4'10'', and I doubt if she weighed eighty pounds — more like seventy-five. Yes, I guessed that I could see how a pervert, if one were to be a pervert, could be attracted to her. Hell, I was perfectly normal, and for a moment, I was almost sexually drawn to her. The very fact that I was forced to recognize this attraction made me even angrier. Johnson would have to pay for bringing such a thought to my mind!

"Mr. and Mrs. Wong, I want you to know the extent of the outrage this community will feel at this incident. I assure you that justice will be done. I would like your permission to have a doctor look at Tamara, both to make sure she's okay, and to round out our evidence."

"Mr. Sanders, you are kind. But we don't want to — how do you say it — press the charge? This is bad experience for our family, and is best that no one know, please."

I was momentarily flabbergasted at Mr. Wong's reply. But this sort of thing happened from time to time. I'd just have to talk them into it.

"Mr. Wong ... Mrs. Wong ... no one will need to know the identity of the accuser. As a victim of what is effectively rape, and as a minor, Tamara's name will not be made public." The girl's parents looked uncertain.

Mr. Wong said something in Chinese, at which Tamara arose and left the room, closing the door behind her. Then Mr. Wong spoke again.

"Mr. Sanders, Tamara says lies sometimes. Maybe she lies so we don't punish her for getting 'C'. We don't want to cause trouble for innocent man."

"Mr. Wong, your reaction is a common one, a normal one. But I assure you, these terrible things do happen, more often than I'd like to believe, and very often the girl is afraid to come forward. I must tell you that we found some very damning evidence in her gym teacher's home," I exaggerated, "We probably have enough to proceed with the case, which we are obligated to do, with or without your permission. However, I would like your cooperation, and ask that you take her to our doctor for examination. Without a strong case, this pervert might get off, and do the same thing to more young girls. I know you don't want that."

"We will think on it, Mr. Sanders. We do appreciate all you do for us. But is very — humiliating — thing. We let you know, sir." They arose, so I did too, to walk them to the door.

Minutes after they left, I was before the local TV crews and print reporters, announcing our arrest.

"Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, I am Dan Sanders, your district attorney. I have a sobering announcement to make. This morning at ten a.m., Springfield Police arrested Mr. Timothy Johnson, a physical education instructor at Midland Junior High School. The charges include statutory rape, sexual assault of a minor, and child pornography. Mr. Johnson has coerced at least one child into sexual activity, and we have reason to believe there are many others. Your district attorney's office will uncover all of his misdeeds, and see that he is convicted and punished to the fullest extent of the law. More importantly, we will remove this menace from our community."

Needless to say, a juicy arrest like this had the press in a tizzy, and I basked for the next several minutes in their questions and in my authoritative answers. "It's just this sort of case that launches a political career," I thought to myself.

The next day, the papers were full of it, with my picture on the front page of both major dailies. My press conference had played on the evening and the morning news. Yes indeed, we had quite a big case here.

Tim Johnson was held without bail. Naturally, he denied everything, but they always do. The police began interviewing other children who had contact with Johnson — students, Scouts, kids from his church. Nothing had come up yet, but sometimes kids need to be coaxed to the tell truth about things like that. We'd keep after them until somebody else was willing to accuse the monster.

Our city isn't that large, so this story stayed near the front burner all week. Johnson's counsel tried the standard ploys to get the charges dismissed, and of course they failed.

A few days later, I had to take make car by the shop. The damned radio was out.

Stan, my mechanic, said he'd have to order a replacemnt. So as I drove to the office, for once over an hour-and-a-half late, I couldn't listen to the news. Instead, I mused upon the young victim, Tamara Wong. She had again eaten dinner at our place the night before last and I had discovered myself looking at her in a whole new light.

On that evening, in an effort to understand the crime, I had decided to try to imagine her as a sex object, and I had found that task easier than I would like to admit. She'd been wearing a tight pair of jeans that disclosed a slight swell beginning to develop in her adolescent hips. Her breasts were just starting to develop as well, and they poked through her T-shirt like a pair of ripening apricots. And the musical sound of her laughter when she and my blonde daughter shared a private joke easily pierced my heart. Yes, she was certainly attractive, even sexy. It wasn't so hard to see how someone like Johnson might be taken with her. But that's all the more reason to control it!

If all men, as I suspect, feel some attraction toward adolescent girls, then those who are weak, who give in to such urges, fail as men. Johnson's crime was to act upon his thoughts. Despicable! In contrast, I doubt whether a tawdry thought had ever crossed that poor young girl's mind, and it is the creeps like Johnson in this world, losers who can't control themselves, who rip some poor girl or another's innocence away long before its time, each and every day. Well, at least this time, the perpetrator would pay ... District Attorney Sanders would see to that!

TV crews were assembled on the courthouse steps as I pulled up. "What's this?" I thought. "Another feeding frenzy at the scent of doomed Tim Johnson?"

I have never been so outraged in my life. If I ever figure out who leaked that information to the press before even I was informed, heads will fucking roll!

The medical examiner had made a startling discovery. Tamara Wong was a virgin.

Needless to say, the case against Johnson was immediately dropped once the fourteen-year-old girl recanted her entire accusation. Apparently, she had invented the whole thing to cover her ass with her parents. Too bad this was no longer the late eighties. Back then, we'd throw the bastard in jail anyway, and haul in psychiatrists to tell the jury how Tamara was simply repressing the memory. Her physical state as a virgin would just necessitate the perpetrator's presumed point of "entry." Something like this would have never stopped a prosecution back in the hey-day of such cases.

Oh, the girl would be fine. Her parents would move her to a different school, and she'd get on with her deceitful little life. Meanwhile, my face — MY FACE — was now plastered on every paper with uncomplimentary captions. Every newscast made me a laughingstock. Commentators branded me as an "overzealous prosecutor." Bastards.

I tried to control my anger towards young Tamara. Although she had started all of this, she was just a girl, after all. Clearly, she had never intended for the story to get to the police. I'm sure she had only told Sandra the tale as backup, in case her parents should ask her friend for some sort of confirmation of the tale. She had probably counted on her parents' reluctance to risk embarrassment to prevent wider exposure, all to avoid her parents' wrath over a lousy grade.

But son of a bitch! A fiasco like this could take me years to get behind me if I ever hoped to run for public office.

My wife actually asked me if I was okay with Tamara continuing to visit our home. What could I say, but "of course?"

Tamara sat in her usual chair as we ate together that Friday evening. The girl had apologized profusely, and my wife and I repeatedly asked her to forget it. I couldn't forget it, though.

As I watched her chew, her delicate features so innocent and adorable, I was suddenly consumed with rage. This little bitch, who I had thought to be so innocent, was a conniving, manipulative little whore. In order to avoid a little parental discipline, she had wreaked havoc upon my career aspirations.

"So," I thought, "I was wrong. Tawdry thoughts have crossed this little cunt's mind."

If she could imagine herself getting fucked, at least coherently enough to invent such a story, then maybe she was ready to really get fucked. As Tamara, my daughter, and my wife ate their salads without an apparent care in the world, I thought about our guest's tiny little form, pinned down upon a bed. I imagined a man eating her probably-hairless fourteen-year-old sex. I imagined some unfeeling brute shoving his oversized manhood into her underaged hole.

I thought of all that, and I found the thoughts to be good. I actually felt some blood flowing into my groin as the unsuspecting teen continued her banter with my daughter. When the girls asked to be excused, my only vocalized response was a grunt, and to watch them walk out of the room. Just before exiting, Tamara bent over to pet my dog Rex where he lay. The shorts she was wearing rode up into her crack, and in an instant my prick swelled, and the thought of a man, this man, ripping those shorts down over her slender hips nearly floored me. Then she rose, and was gone.

Fifteen years of marriage had reduced our sex life to almost zero, but I can tell you that on this particular Friday night, my wife enjoyed a very sound thrashing indeed.

I hated myself all weekend and into the next week. How could I even think of such a thing? I was sworn to prosecute the sort of slime who did the kind of things I had been imagining.

By Wednesday, I had put it behind me. When my wife told me she had to fly to Chicago for the weekend for her sister's latest bridal shower (third time's a charm), and that she had given permission for Sandra to have Tamara spend the night on Friday, I readily agreed. Smugly, I congratulated myself upon mastering my baser instincts and rejoining the civilized. I actually was quite self-satisfied.

Until Friday morning.

That's when I read the editorial in the Ledger-Dispatch calling for my removal for trying to launch a prosecutorial "witch-hunt" with the Johnson case. Since my position wasn't an elected one, and the paper had a lot of enemies in the current state administration, I wasn't really worried about losing my job, but I was absolutely furious to be in a situation in which such an idea might be even contemplated.

And then at noon, I was served with papers naming me personally, along with the DA's office, in Johnson's wrongful arrest and defamation lawsuit. Again, prosecutors get sued all the time, but very seldom successfully. Nonetheless, I was irate.

I resolved that that evening I would take my revenge. Justice would be served.

After dinner, I carefully prepared two milkshakes for the girls. In one, I ground in two Valium that my wife had left over from a recent prescription. The other milkshake I left undrugged. After carefully blending in all the telltale evidence, I brought the girls their treats. I took care to ensure that each girl got the right one.

Not surprisingly, the girls were not up late, talking in the dark, as they usually were on these occasions. One of the girls went right to sleep, and quite soundly, so the other had no one to talk to. In fact, both girls were asleep when I crept into the room to begin my retributive agenda.

I looked at the matching twin beds, a young teen sleeping quietly in each. "How precious," I thought, observing how each pink coverlet underscored the girls' youth and innocence. I approached my target.

She awoke immediately when I shook her.

"Whaa... ?"

"Shhhh. Come with me."

I led the adorable Asian teen out of my daughter's room and down two flights of stairs to the family room in our walkout basement. My daughter would sleep blissfully in her drug-aided state, no matter what sort of noise we might make down there.

"Tamara, it's time we talked."

'Talked about what, Mr. Sanders?" Her nervous timbre suggested that she knew the cause of this nocturnal conclave, but I was sure she had no dream of its intended outcome.

"We're going to talk about a couple of things. We're going to talk about wronging others with our lies. We're going to talk about the boy — or rather the girl in this case — who cried 'wolf', and what happened to her — and what will happen to her. And we're going to talk about making things right."

"What do you mean, Mr. Sanders? You know I'm sorry..."

"Well, we'll see about that. You're going to have the chance to prove that you're sorry. Sit down."

She took a seat on the couch, her little pajama shorts riding up her tanned thighs. My prick twitched.

"I'm sure in your self-centered little life you have no idea what sort of embarrassment and difficulty you have caused me, do you?" She wisely did not attempt to respond to my rhetorical question. "Well let me tell you: it is considerable. Not to mention the trouble you caused for poor Coach Johnson. For that alone, you should probably be stripped and whipped publicly, but that's not the system we have here.

"Since you're a minor, I can't have you sent to a real jail, but I could have you sent to reformatory school. I'm sure your parents wouldn't care whether or not you got straight 'A's there."

"Wha..."

"Be quiet and let me finish! You have committed criminal acts, my dear. You have committed perjury, obstructed justice, and interfered with an investigation. I could have you shipped out tomorrow morning." A load of garbage, every bit of it, but I knew she'd believe me.

"Oh, please Mr. Sanders, I never meant..."

"Quiet, I said! You're going to have to start minding me better if you want out of this fix."

She relaxed visibly at my mention of a way out. Little did she know.

"Tamara, the way out I am going to offer you is not strictly legal, as you will immediately discern. It is, however, quite just, and legal or not, I very much think that it should be followed without obstruction. That's why we're going to talk about 'the girl who cried wolf'.

"I'm sure you understand that you have absolutely zero credibility after your little stunt. If you try to expose me for the offer I am about to make, in a pathetic attempt to prevent its execution, you will find that no one will believe you. In fact, there would instead be a groundswell of support behind me. The police and my DA's office will cheer as I cart you off to the reform school, charging you with an even more outrageous perjury than the burden you already carry. To be clear, 'perjury' means telling a lie in court or to the police. After your last big lie, another lie will be serious — even if it's really the truth. Do you understand me?"

Her earlier relaxation disappeared, to be replaced with an appropriate level of anxiety. "Yes, sir."

"Good. Finally, we're going to talk about making amends. You had me, your parents, and everyone else believing you were an innocent little girl. But only the slutty mind of a naughty little tramp would have dreamed up a scheme like yours. Imagine!"

"Really, Mr. Sanders, I never..."

"How many times do I have to tell you to listen?"

"Sorry." I did not respond, but simply stared sternly into her stunning almond eyes. She tried again. "Sorry, Sir," she practically squeaked.

"Alright then," I replied. "Here's the problem, as I see it. You have the mind, heart and soul of a whore, but you don't have the body to match. I intend to correct that. By the time I'm finished with you — that is, by the time you have fully made amends — no doctor's exam will ever mistake you for a virgin."