Everybody was doing it. Fifteen naked people in a group-grope, kissing, sucking... and the vibrators working all over. It was tremendous. Jane felt like she was literally coming all over, through every pore of her body! She couldn't bear to wait then, using the hard solid attachment on her own breasts while fingering her pussy. She could actually feel the sensation of the buzzing vibrator running over her full, ripe breasts, all around them, under them, on the sides, teasing herself until she was almost hysterical before using it on her swollen nipples... just barely touching at first, then bearing down until her breast quivered like a bowl of jelly and Jane Morrow was screaming with joy... and she couldn't keep still, squirming all over the bed and screaming... "oh fuck... fuck me... "
When she awoke from the torrid dream, she reached down under the covers and felt her pussy dripping. Still not completely out of sleep, she turned her face to the pillow, a face wracked with pain that hurt so good...
In her mind's eye, as she lay there, the vibrator was still on her nipples, even though the dream was over and little by little she was becoming wide awake. Her hand under the covers rotated, then the heel of that hand dug inside of her slurping vagina. She kept coming and she had to keep going faster and faster, doing more, moving more, imagining more so she could come some more. She punished herself by taking her hand away, and then she pinched her nipples until they were sore to the touch. She had to hold back a scream. She lay there and pictured a huge cock coming closer and closer, smiling at it as if it was really there, and the excitement inside her brain kept building and building. Her hand went back down to her crotch, picturing a fingernail as a tooth, and that tooth was nipping little bites at her clit while the warm flesh of her hand pressed at all the gooey mass of vaginal walls she could press it to. A finger jerked at her vaginal lips, making it redder. Then the clit between two fingers, jerking it all around! It hurt but she didn't care. Her tears, dropping on the pillow, were mixed with joy, and she wanted it to go on and on.
But it didn't. It never did. Her dreams always ended like that, with her trying to get her breath back, realizing where she was, in her own bed, a bed she had shared with Bill, her stale husband, a husband who barely touched her any more. Their marriage, which had started off so wildly, even frantically, had chilled suddenly in the face of the realities. And so Jane was left with these damned... wonderful! dreams. Jane's mouth turned up at the corner suddenly. "The realities" -- what a term to use for things as mundane as having to look at each other early in the morning, or having to plan evenings out when a sitter was available. And yet the term applied. The "realities" were there, and they had to be faced from day to day. And it was that the necessity of having to look at each other every single day -- which had sounded out the death knell for their marriage. At first, Jane had thought that the children would cement the marriage, would give them some basis in common. But the opposite effect had been achieved. Bill, normally a bit reticent, now turned to his work completely, and abandoned her to her task of taking care of the children.
And now here she was, a thirty-four-year-old house-wife, dreaming of the wild and free love that a teenager usually dreams of.
Jane dosed her eyes against the pillow. So much of her life seemed to balance out to -- zero. A safe, secure marriage... and no romance at all. Wonderful children -- and a father who was never around to get to know them. She had made his breakfast this morning, given him the usual peck on the cheek and sent him off to work. Then she had climbed back into the huge, lonely bed, planning just to dose her eyes and think. Instead she had fallen back to sleep. And then that dream again.
She got up, splashed water in her pretty face, and then walked down into her spacious living room, with its low-swept, modern furniture, soft sofa, and thick beige carpet.
"That does it," Jane announced to herself. "I've got to break this routine, or I'm finished."
The words sounded strange to her ears, and Jane could hardly believe she'd had the nerve to admit out loud what she'd been thinking and dreaming of, privately, for months. And, oddly, it was as though, by saying the words, Jane had freed herself of the last restraints upon her being. She was now open, come what might, to any opportunity for escape. Her "opportunity" was to present itself that very afternoon.
* * *
The way the boy in the coffee shop looked at her was flattering. No man or boy back in her section of San Francisco would ever look at her that way. But that is why I've driven down into this ghetto, isn't it?, she asked herself, sipping the coke. To be looked at that way! And how he was looking! He wore a black leather jacket, and couldn't have been more than seventeen, though a bit on the tough-looking side.
"Pass the sugar," he said, and their eyes met again. He didn't ask, he commanded. And strangely, that thrilled her too. He was staring at Jane's slim legs, her full tits, her tightly rounded ass sitting on the counter stool. She sipped the last of her drink. Silly, she thought, I'm old enough to be his mother. But his eyes! They never left her, and that, for some strange reason; had her breathing heavily. She paid her bill and walked to the door, playing lightly with the fantasy of an hour alone with him -- where no one else could see. She raised her arm to open the door, but his hand was on it first, his young, clear blue eyes staring into hers. He pointed to her car, parked at the curb.
"Your wheels?"
Jane couldn't speak, she just nodded her head. She felt her knees go weak.
"Now that's a righteous short!" he grinned, boyishly.
"A what?"
"It stokes me, dig?"
"Is that good or bad?" Jane asked, having a feeling there would be no turning back now.
"Why don't you invite me for a spin and find out?" he sneered.
Dumbly, weakly, she moved to the door of the car, turned awkwardly to see if he was still behind her. He was, his bulging-at-the-crotch jeans just a few inches behind her bouncing buttocks. He opened that door for her too, then skipped around to the passenger side. That door was locked, and Jane only paused for an instant before reaching over to snap the latch for him.
As she pulled away from the curb, she felt she had to say something, so she said, "My, you are quite bold, aren't you! I don't even know your name."
"Better that way. I don't know yours, you don't know mine. Isn't that the game you're playing? Rich lady down here for an afternoon of slumming. Ain't that what you rich dames call it? You think you're the only old married chick that jumps down here for an afternoon of fun?"
"I'm not rich and I'm not an old married... chick!" She knew her lip quivered as she said it.
"Turn left at the next corner. I know a place." He was grinning that boyish grin again, eyeing her slim legs, looking down at her gloved hands gripping the steering wheel, catching a glimpse of her soft inner thigh as her short skirt rode higher as she raised her leg to touch the brake.
"A place? A place for what?" But even as Jane said it, she could hardly wait to get him inside of her, feel his young, strong body working over her. She couldn't know that the boy sitting next to her was thinking, Something about these snotty old bitches, they all need the same thing. A good, hard young cock.
Jane felt glued to the leather car seat, where the now slushy warmth of her crotch mashed wetly underneath her. Ten minutes later, at his directions, the car swung off the highway and careened up a dusty road leading to a sheltered meadow near the county reservoir. Jane knew her short skirt had slipped even higher, giving his eager eyes a glimpse at her stained panties, at the tempting band of lily-white silk that stretched tightly over the mounding triangle that tapered down to her perfect thighs. As she stopped the motor, he leaned forward, placing a smooth hand on her bosom and pushing her back, making her lean hard back in the seat. His other hand yanked up her skirt in a quick motion, baring the junction of legs and the low-slung cradle of her panties. He jabbed with his forefinger, lewdly boring between her silken thighs with the digit until his fingertip was hooking up into the sodden squinching fabric that concealed her dampened bush.
"Son of a bitch!" he smiled, his lips close to her ear. "You're just running with it, ain'tcha? Got that pussy juice running right down your leg, eh, babe?"
"I beg your par... yieeee! What are you doing? No! Stop!" Jane sank away from his obscene exploration of her body, her ears burning at his words. She tried to worm away, but he quickly straddled her leg and pressed her deeper down in the seat. His lips came down on hers, and she felt herself going, melting, feeling his fumbling hands pulling off her panties, hooking his strong fingers in the flimsy waist-band and dragging them down, baring her creamy belly with its fine line of delicate hairs crawling between the dimple of her navel and the glossy, full bush of her protective pubic hair. The steering wheel was getting in the way, and he brought her to his side of the car. She stopped resisting, now, knowing he had worked her panties down over her ivory hips, as his eyes gleamed at the pelvic perimeter which framed her female treasure, knowing she was open and exposed to him.
When he had the soiled silk down to her knees, he moved his hand up between her thighs, skewering up with his finger, momentarily diddling the delightful thicket of her moistened crotch fur, and then jabbing up and back, sinking his finger between the puffy lips of her vulva, right into the warm mush of her shivering sex, pushing up to find the smaller ruffled inner hole of her cream-lined cunt, and in, past the second knuckle, until the boy had accomplished the finger-rape of her inviting, glassy channel.
Jane gasped at the sudden flow of new desire. flooding from her top to her bottom, flushing all other thoughts and principles away, telling her that finally she had found what she wanted, though he was just a dirty boy, savage in his ignorant way, but at the moment able to satisfy as Bill had not in years.
Jane stared down at his hand as it worked between her legs. The absolute brazenness of the finger digging inside her, revolving around and around, stroking the rim of her vaginal vortex with unbearable friction, delighted her to the very core of her being.
She looked into his young face at last, studying the knotted muscles of his almost-beardless jaw, the matted, unkempt hair which curled over his ears. She couldn't meet his eyes. They were too busy watching his own hand, feasting on the spectacle of his own fingers sullying her sensitive secret sex parts.
Jane gave a sigh and sagged a bit, closing her eyes as if to deny the guilt that lingered in her as the boy responded by thrusting his finger up farther into her hole, driving it in to the hilt, then rubbing his calloused palm against the jellying hair-lined fissure of her vulva with maddening sensual motions.
"Please don't stop, I beg you, don't stop! Ohhhh!" she groaned, baring her white teeth and tossing her head wildly against the back of the seat. She closed her thighs around his hand, desperate to keep the hardness of his finger within the itching, burning circlet of her orifice.
"Spread your legs, mama," he whispered in her ear.
He crooked his legs, angling under her, and when he rose up the blunt head of his member pushed against the heated damp of her genital gorge.
"Yes, yes, I can feel your cock. Come into me now, now!" Jane gurgled, saliva forming at the corner of her parted lips.
He let his prick skate up the creamy crack until, at a certain point, her outer fatty lips seemed to part for it, to pull at the rounded end.
"I can't stand the wait, oh put it in, pleeeese!"
He nudged up a little more, savoring the way his foreskin was swallowed right up between the soft slippery walls of the gulch her bending body presented to him. He pushed a little more and sighed with pleasure. Jane was moaning with joy as his thickness plunged into her time and time again, faster and faster, hotter and hotter, sending chills through her bowels, up her spine. His hands jerked the bunched blouse, swam up under the fabric, poking into the lacy cups of her bra, pushing the garment up and off her tender, rigid nippled breasts, then cupping them, squeezing them, taking them into his mouth and sucking on them like a baby, never once missing his up-and-down strokes that went thickly into her insides.
"My baby, my baby!" she murmurred into his ear. "Oh yes, yes, do it! Oh, it's delightful! So good, so good! Come, my baby, come with me, I'm going to come! Ohhh! Oh yessssss -- ahhhhh!"
* * *
It took a long time for Jane's thoughts to return to her husband Bill. She had dropped the boy off at a grubby clubhouse, and was halfway home by the time she even brought her mind back to reality. "Realities," she repeated, for the umpteenth time that day.
CHAPTER TWO
Strangely alone.
And painfully together. Jane and Bill. They huddled beneath their private solutions like wanting-to-jump frogs under a rock. The patterns of their lives were spinning out in different worlds, as so often happens. The San Francisco house, where they lived as two separate entities in one cubicle, was situated in one of the plushier sections of town. That night they watched Maude, The Jefferson, and Adam Twelve. And that was it. But Jane's mind couldn't center in on any of the T.V. shows; it kept wandering, remembering the afternoon, some on-again-off-again feelings of guilt, some on-again-off-again warm smiles to herself, something that confused Bill, but he never bothered to ask about it.
Jane had to ask herself, Am I a double personality? Was that really me that did that this afternoon? And another question: When will I feel the urge to do it again? Bill was laughing at something Maude was saying, and Jane watched his face, the slight greying of his hair, the fortyish body, so unlike the young animal that had devoured her just a few hours before.
Was that really me? she asked herself again during Adam Twelve. She was to learn the answer to that one two days later.
* * *
It was raining, and her car had stalled downtown, just after her morning of shopping and a quick lunch at a chain coffee shop. Jane was standing under the overhang of an office building, debating what to do until the mechanic finished the overcharged repair. Then she heard a young male voice yell, "Hey, Mrs. Morrow! I'm Glen -- saw you when you were towed into the garage. I work for Don, the mechanic that's working on your car. Want a lift home? Don's a slow worker, may be hours before he locates the trouble."
He sat there and smiled at her, a young, boyish smile again, from his beat-up 1965 Rambler.
Jane smiled thinly, thinking that a ride would be better than getting wet. Besides, she liked his looks, had even noticed his tall and thin frame bending over the fender of a car when she talked to the mechanic. She nodded, putting a package over her new hairdo, protecting it from the rain, and tried to run to the car gracefully. The rain was coming down harder, and although she had thoughts of her own as they rode through the downtown traffic, she managed to look flabbergasted when she felt the boy's hand on her knee after he stopped for a red light. But she was even more -- and sincerely -- flabbergasted when she found she enjoyed the feel of his hand moving higher! She did not attempt to remove his fingers, slowly crawling up her leg, along her thigh, past the top of her stocking, while the teenager with the shiny, apple-cheeked face drove with one hand on the wheel.
His fingers lay there, tapping impatiently until he finally parked the car in a deserted section of town, beside an abandoned warehouse. Then his soft lips came down upon hers and his fingers continued their journey underneath the elastic of her panties, until they were actually thrusting through the hot moist lips of her cunt.
Jane just stared out the car window, watching the sprinkle of rain with glaring, hot eyes, not daring to look at the boy's face; for it would remind her that he was fifteen or sixteen years younger than she. "I have to go home now," she said, but not convincingly, and still not looking at him.
"Don't you like it, huh, Mrs. Morrow?"
"It's -- it's not that. I... "
"Because I'm a kid?"
"No, no. It's -- Glen, I've been so lonely, so lonely, but... "
The finger kept at its circling motion inside her cunt. Jane was having trouble getting her breath. Her attractive face was getting filmed with perspiration. But she didn't move away from that wonderful finger!
"Just put your hand on this hard-on a minute, that's all, Mrs. Morrow. Gee, I watched you walkn' around the garage, talking to Don and... "
His finger was working a new and faster rhythm, flicking at the moist lips of her vulva. Jane gasped in sheer delight, naked passion claiming her entire body, heating her vagina to a white-hot rage. Yet she still remembered where and who she was -- My God, I'm -- I'm old enough to be his mother -- and remembered she had had that same thought just two days before. She tried to mutter something, but not loudly, certainly not at all convincingly. "N-no! NO! Y-You must not -- I - ohbhhhhhhhhhh!"
The rain continued to tip-tap on the car, clouding the windows, and Glen, his face a mask of half grin and all lust, continued to work his fingers in Jane's vulva. She opened her thighs to permit better ingress, moaned slightly when she felt his other hand move over her breasts.
"Faster! Do it FASTER! DO IT FASTERRRR! Uhhhhh!", she finally moaned, giving in to that other self of hers.
"I've got -- got a big hard-on," Glen said, a whine to his voice. He knew this woman was at fever pitch and figured if he insisted, if he pushed long enough, she would consent. She was hardly conscious of his words, lost completely in her first orgasm, and as the intense heavenly joy of come began to subside, Jane was all-possessed with the consuming desire to see his prick. She wanted to feel it, twist it. She wanted it in her mouth.
She put her hand on Glen's lap, felt the stiff hardness, the throbbing rise imprisoned within his struggling trousers. Not caring anymore, she unzipped the youth's pants and pulled out his pulsing penis, gasping under his kiss when she felt the size of the handsome young prick She pulled away from his kiss and looked down at it. It was very white and bigger than Bill's. She began to masturbate Glen, firmly clutching the hard, pulsing shaft, working it with an experienced hand.
With jerky movements, young Glen continued to finger-fuck her, gasping and sobbing, twisting and squirming, as Jane's hand raced up and down his cock.
"L-let -- me -- p-put -- on a r-rubber," the boy sobbed, feebly attempting to open the compartment in the dash. Jane ignored his request, continued to jack him, working her hand faster and faster over his inflamed peter.
"Ohhhhh -- uhhhbh!" he finally cried, automatically raising his loins and ejaculating with such intensity that some of his semen splattered on the windshield over the dash. Then Jane cried, having still another orgasm, which even pulled at the roots of her hair. She couldn't resist. She lowered her head and licked the weakening peter dry.
"Oh, lady, lady," the boy grinned, "I love to watch your mouth going up and down on my prick!"
His organ was growing hard again. Jane took it all. Murmuring, whimpering, sobbing, licking, sucking, groaning... and sometimes gagging at the swollen size of it.
* * *
In the early morning hours of the next day, Jane was awakened by a hand on her smooth, long thigh. It was Bill, and he was not just straightening the blanket.
As she rolled over, Jane was reminded of the first days of their marriage -- the lovemaking bouts in the bedroom, on the living room floor, on the stairs, even once when she was in the bathtub.
She came awake abruptly, as she felt Bill's hand now slip beneath the covers and slide over her willowy thigh. The hand searched, and searched, and finally found its nest, like a large, meaty bird.
Jane closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
"Now!" she whispered, shivering at his touch, her lips parted. "Right now, Bill!"
Slowly, Bill's body moved over hers, and she slid out of her nightie audaciously, quickly. She wanted him inside of her, wanted the last chance for her life to return to its norm... before she went mad. Abandoning herself to this last hope, Jane flung wide her thighs, wrapping her fine, sinewy legs around Bill, who rose over her, rampant, like a lion.
"Take me!" she whispered, shutting her eyes tightly, as she felt herself moisten, warming at the center to the good, full entry which she expected.
And then, oddly, Jane felt herself relax, as she knew the hard, insistent thrusting of the man -- that self-centered ramming which told her that Bill was interested exclusively in his own pleasure. She let out a tiny groan which Bill, in his eagerness, mistook for passion. It was actually a groan of disappointment.
At last, Bill let out a long grunt as he discharged within her, plunging and bucking to the end of his own climax. Once finished, he rolled over and in a few minutes was sound asleep again.
Jane turned over in the bed, and put her back to his. She squinted at the alarm clock, and saw that she still had an hour before she had to get up. Already, she could hear the first stirrings from the children's room. It would not be long now before the morning "realities" had to be faced. Getting Bill off to work, getting the kids off to school.
A tear formed at the corner of Jane's right eye, and she blinked twice, sending the drop of moisture rolling across her right cheek.
What, Jane wondered silently, had ever become of the man she married.
And what, she then asked herself, was becoming of her?
CHAPTER THREE
Jane felt "that feeling" moving in on her again, in the early afternoon, two days later. She knew what had started her thinking in that direction. It was the young boy doing the gardening outside her window. She tried to remember his name. She knew that he had worked for the Japanese gardener that Bill had contracted with a year before to keep their hedges trimmed, the roses pruned, and that sort of thing. The boy had been coming around once a week since school closed for summer vacation, so she knew he couldn't be more than sixteen, probably a junior at Preston High.
What was his name? She searched her memory. She stared out at him, the wonder of his youth exciting her.
The itch between her legs was a beautiful itch. If she could only take the time to explore it, her fingers would emerge from the wetness of it, warm with her juices. Oh, why was she like this! But she didn't have time to think of that now. He would be through with the hedges within the hour. No, no time now, but very soon though, she was confident she would have something much more gratifying than her fingers to make that itch swell and finally burst. Jerry! That was his name. Jerry Nelson. She remembered now, and had to plan quickly, not really knowing why she was doing all this.
The drapes in the living room were open. She raised her skirt and went about the business of adjusting a garter strap that was already taut and straight. She was hot, and her hands were atremble in their deliberate work. Throughout her body, warm and delicious anticipation was mounting.
She ran her fingers up under the white garter and into the smooth nylon of her white panties, slipping them just inside the elastic to snap the flimsy material better over her full, womanly crotch. She drew the panties up tighter and smoothed her hand over the cloth, drum-tight over her bulging pubic mound, and she traced a circular pattern there while she continued to hold her skirt at her waist.
She knew Jerry Nelson was looking at her, and it took an effort on her part not to look back through the big window at the boy. Mustn't hurry things. He was there, numbly and dumbly going through the motions of running the electric hedges over the tops of the bushes, while he gaped at Jane's living room window, and at the woman carelessly exposing herself through it.
He was hot and this would show in his face, in the adolescent discomfiture that he was feeling in his loins. If she looked up now, she would see a full, lovely bulge in his cutoffs -- not one so large as the boy's in the ghetto -- but for some reason infinitely more exciting to her. More exciting, perhaps, because she was maneuvering this scene, and the boy in the slums of San Francisco had maneuvered his own scene, taking her instead of being taken.
It was understandable. Any sixteen-year-old boy would be shakily aroused by the forbidden sight of a mature woman like her, exposing herself to him so very accidentally. But whatever his arousal was, it could not match hers then, for she had full knowledge of what was to come.
She made a half turn, still looking down at herself, presenting a fine view of lushly curved, thinly clad female buttocks. Jane felt giddy with excitement, wet and swollen and wonderfully alive with a warmth and tingling that only this sort of sex seemed to bring to her lately. Her tits felt full and engorged with her lust, even larger than they actually were. Her fine, long tapered legs felt powerful, even as they quaked with the instinct-compulsion to spread themselves for the young cock out there in the back yard that she had decided soon would be hers. Her clothing felt terribly restrictive, and she had the impulse to strip herself nude, then and there, to expose herself entirely to the boy outside her window.
But that would ruin it all. That would end it too quickly and deprive her of the sweetest, most deliriously exciting moments of the game she was coming to treasure.
She went on with it.
She turned slowly, her left hand still holding her skirt up, her right hand still cupping her cunt and moving about in her crotch until she was facing where young Jerry stood. And then she froze, looking at him with anger as she allowed the skirt to fall and cover her thickly moistening snatch.
It was a signal for the boy, Jerry, to perk up to life, and he presented a beautiful picture to Jane in all his innocence and consternation. His eyes were wide beneath the tousled blond hair, and his mouth hung open, gawking. It was a good mouth, Jane thought, a mouth that was surely almost totally unaware of the softness of a woman. Jane smiled, but only to herself. She would change that.
His sturdy young chest, not yet that of a man, was heaving with his breathing, and she could clearly discern that this was not the only sign of the boy's excitement. In his fashionably threadbare cutoffs could be seen the bulge of his young cock, thoroughly thrilling to Jane. And then he snapped completely rigid, as Jane turned her face directly toward him, letting him know she'd seen him, and then raised one hand to slowly beckon him to come into the house.
He reacted by pointing dumbly to himself, all innocence, and Jane nodded to him. The sight of him barefooted, his head hung, so docilely coming to her, stirred her deeply. She continued to stare at him until he'd entered through the sliding glass doors and stood with hands clasped before him, trying to hide his erect cock, staring down at his feet.
"You were watching me, weren't you, Jerry," she said.
"No... no... I mean... I couldn't help it. Sorry." His voice was strained, but even this delighted Jane, knowing he was at her mercy now.
"You didn't mean to! Oh, come now, Jerry. You meant to. You're a perfectly natural young man. It would be an insult to me if I thought you didn't want to see my body." She came a step closer, her hands on her hips.
"Oh, I'd never insult you! I just... "
She arched an eyebrow and contemplated him coolly. "Don't be ashamed of being yourself, Jerry. I understand. Frankly, I'd love to watch you undressing, myself. I guess we're both peeping Toms, eh?" His eyes widened in disbelief. "Would you undress for me to watch. Jerry?"
Minutes later, Jane had the frightened boy on the couch. She was fondling his neck, and finally dropping her hand to the zipper of his cut-offs, while still "scolding" him for being "such a naughty boy." Her two delicate fingers ran the zipper open, and the boy's erection snapped out abruptly.
"You just relax, honey," she soothed, as she stroked his cock, paying particular attention to the sensitive skin at the top. She worked it now with only two fingers -- a thumb and a forefinger -- working the stalk of it, slowly, in long, light strokes, all the way from the testes to the head. "Now stop trembling," she said. "Feel nice?"
He made an incoherent sound. Now Jane was stroking it steadily with her full hand, full strokes. She could smell the wonderful, meaty, aromatic aroma that her cunny always emitted when it got this worked up, this juiced for action. She wondered if the boy was inhaling the woman-smell too. Juices were flowing every which way inside Jane, all the way up to her kidneys, with the very thought of having this virgin-boy inside her. She couldn't resist a slight up-and-down motion of her hips. She moved her face closer to him, knowing he'd have to drink in that beauty that had helped her to win the lusty stares of men in the days before her marriage to Bill. "Kiss me," she whispered. She mashed her breasts against his chest, feeling her lips flatten against his, her tongue worming its way into his trembling mouth. She then flicked her tongue into his ear, making the boy groan. She kissed him on the mouth again, using her tongue to prod his to life. She teased it out until it was between her lips, then closed her mouth on it and sucked it gently.
Jane was almost dizzy with her mounting passion; his erect and pulsing penis was still being worked in her fist.
Jane slid down away from the kiss and knelt on the carpet. She pushed his legs apart and took his penis slowly, sip by sip, gulp by gulp, into her warm mouth. She twisted her lips around on the thermos-tube flesh. She could feel the wetness between her own legs, rolling down her thighs. She moaned on her mouthful of meat and closed her hand around the thick base of it She trembled, panting her pleasure, letting her tongue quickly seek out that humid slit that was already leaking its first white and sticky emissions.
"Ohhh... the feel of it in my mouth... on my tongue... oooh... " she moaned on it again.
Even as she bobbed up and down on his lap lewdly, running the full length of him in and out of her saliva'd mouth, she wondered at the strange, wonderful lust building in the nipples of her breasts. The boy strained upwards at the wet, warm feel of her soft lips slipping easily up and down over his staff. He trembled as her tongue swirled over the satin plum, polishing it, loving it. Then her hollowed cheeks pulled more of the throbbing bar of meat into her throat, as she mewled with her lust. He was starting his orgasm, and she increased her motions of mouth and tongue and hands before the first of his gush of sperm sprang, hot and pure and good in her mouth.
"Aagghhh!" the boy screamed, grabbing at the back of Jane's head.
The doorbell rang!
The boy scrambled off the couch, fell on the floor, half crawled, half ran toward the back door.
"No... no!" Jane screamed, come dripping from her lips. "Come back! It's all right!"
But he was gone, halfway across the back lawn by now, zipping his dampened jeans closed.
Jane sat on the floor and ran the back of her hand over her drenched mouth. The doorbell rang again.
"Special Delivery!" came a voice from outside.
She tried to stand, tried to wipe her mouth dry with a hanky. At the door, trembling, she opened it just a crack, just enough to permit the mailman's hand to slip in and hand her the letter. She was thankful she didn't have to sign for it. She couldn't have managed that, her hands were trembling so.
* * *
Two hours later Jane was still sitting on the couch, wondering if she should do it. The letter had been a long one, six pages, from her old schooldays' chum, Madeleine. Jane had not seen her in years, but had heard from previous letters that Madeleine had married a rich Englishman. This letter described a vacation resort they owned in Haiti, near Port-au-Prince. Madeleine, in her letter, went on and on about how she had missed Jane, and practically insisted that Jane come and visit her and her husband for a couple of weeks. Just to make the offer stronger, there was an airline ticket enclosed in the pages. Of course, Jane could send the ticket back with a letter explaining that she just couldn't leave her family... but... the thought of getting away, just as Madeleine had suggested, grew more and more attractive by the moment. Perhaps it was just what she needed to break this pattern of madness she had been living these past few months.
By the time Bill arrived home from work, she had decided. She'd do it!
Bill offered only slight resistance, acting as if he really didn't give a damn.
And so it was that three days later, after two long-distance phone calls to Madeleine accepting and verifying the offer, Jane found herself on Eastern Airlines flight six-twenty-three, on her way.
The first hour of the trip was misery, for Jane was seated next to a boozed-up salesman who lost no time in propositioning her. But after the stewardess changed her seat, Jane settled down to napping... and dreaming of the wonderful adventure ahead of her.
CHAPTER FOUR
The plane touched down at Port-au-Prince, its wheels zipping on the runway as it rolled quickly along, and Jane was treated to a horizon of green, lush jungle and bright sunshine. It was a beautiful day, and Jane could not wait to get outside.
A spasm of guilt touched her stomach as she thought of Bill, but she quickly brushed it aside.
"Let him take care of himself," she muttered, as she climbed out of the seat and went slowly down the aisle, moving toward the front of the plane. As she neared the door, she could see the stewardesses smiling at the crowd as it filed out. There was a sweet, full wash of air which swept over the runway, coming out of the jungle and over Jane, who stepped lightly off the ramp stairway and onto the hard concrete, her high heels clattering loudly. She looked for Madeleine, putting her hand over her eyes, but could not find her in the crowd which thronged the gate.
Moving forward swiftly, Jane felt her lungs fill with the rich, incredibly sensuous air of Haiti. She walked more briskly still.
If the days were like this, Jane wondered to herself, what in the world would the nights be like?
Glancing over the crowd, Jane spotted a tall, blade skinned man, coining toward her purposefully, an intent expression on his face. As he neared, Jane was somewhat taken aback by his appearance, and by the way he was looking at her. He was very tall -- well over six feet two, Jane guessed, her eyes running over his length from head to foot. He was broad-shouldered, and wore a grey, conservatively cut business suit and black knit tie. The suit was, Jane surmised, the sort that would have been popular in the United States ten years ago.
The tall, black, incredibly handsome man in the grey suit stopped in front of Jane Morrow, and smiled.
"Mrs. Morrow?" he asked softly.
Jane blushed. His voice had a deep, resonant hue to it, and seemed to reverberate out of somewhere deep in his broad chest. It rumbled outward, slow and powerful and full of character. The eyes were deep, rich brown, and seemed to shine in the glare that bounced off the concrete runway.
"Y yes," Jane blurted, her voice a bit unsteady. She was, to her amazement, absolutely overcome by the presence -- no, by the nearness -- of this huge, black male. He was so big. Although every inch a man, he was young. How young? Jane asked herself. Nineteen? Twenty? Twenty-one at the most, she decided.
"I'm Alexander," he rumbled, from somewhere deep in his chest. "Miss Madeleine asked me to see you to the house. Is your luggage off the plane yet?"
Without waiting for a reply, Alexander took Jane gently by the elbow, leading her to the gate of the terminal, and then to the baggage rack.
As she walked beside the huge black man, Jane was almost dizzy with shock. He had assumed command of her, seen to her personal affairs, and was now taking charge of her trip to Madeleine's beach resort. And all of this without a question, a complaint, or a by-your-leave.
While slightly miffed at such behavior, Jane was well aware that she would never, probably, be able to sustain an active dislike for the huge, masterful black man who walked beside her. She turned her head, looking at the man beside her, as he towered over her, his profile like carved ebony against the blue Haitian sky. Jane was not a short girl, and she was willowy, which gave an added impression of height. But this man, like a block of granite beside her here in the sunshine, made her feel tiny indeed -- frail, even. Jane swallowed loudly, her heart thumping in her chest like an angry, fluttering hawk trying to get out.
"Is... it far?" she blurted, her eyes widening as she looked at the profile beside her. The nostrils were large, finely chiseled, the nose broad and strong. The cheekbones were prominent, large and flat, above a wide, expressive mouth. The lips were full, and had the smooth strength of absolute sensuality, above a long, prominent jawline. The jaw was, indeed, like the prow of a ship, jutting upward suddenly and coming to a point. The neck was thick, and strong.
"Not far at all, miss," he rumbled. "Just a fifteen-minute drive is all. We'll be there in no time."
Jane relaxed all at once. She felt, oddly, protected in the presence of this man. It was as though nothing bad, or wicked, or horrible, could happen to her while he was with her. She had not felt that way since she was a little girl.
Hold on, now, Jane thought to herself, a twinge of uneasiness starting in her stomach, let's not go over-board for the...
Jane's mind jogged a bit, coming to a stop suddenly. She had almost said "houseboy" there in her mind, but, as she looked at Alexander, it became evident that this male beside her was no part of a boy. He was a full-grown, independent, fully developed man.
Jane, who had always considered herself fairly liberal in racial matters, was pleased to learn, checking her feelings carefully, that there was no spot of prejudice toward this man beside her. In fact, though she had never thought very much about it, she liked the idea of his complete independence. He seemed to be much more of a man than her Bill -- at least on first meeting. At any rate, matters of race were regarded much differently here in the islands than they were in the United States. Being in the Caribbean certainly had its advantages, Jane reflected, glancing once more at Alexander. To her delight, she noted that her presence beside a black man, here in this terminal, was a matter of no note to passers-by. A confirmation of her earlier judgment about this island, and a pleasing one.
Jane felt a sudden surge of guilty excitement as she considered the possibilities of that last thought. She straightened her posture unconsciously, pressing her lips together tightly. Mustn't think sinful things.
Jane snuck another glance at Alexander, and put her gloved hand to her mouth, coughing to suppress a giggle. Feeling bubbly and slightly hysterical, Jane allowed herself to be led out the back doors of the airport, to a waiting station wagon.
As Alexander opened the door for her, Jane frowned.
"Can't I help you with anything?" Jane asked, and Alexander laughed and shook his bead.
"No ma'am," he said, his eyes lighting up suddenly, with something more than glee.
Jane blushed. Her leg, on the ground, was drawn halfway into the seat, as she sat, half-in and half-out of the car, talking to Alexander. A good length of ankle, calf and knee was showing, all of it shapely and very, very womanly. Jane noticed Alexander's bold stare, but made no effort to cover herself, nor to get into the car completely.
"No ma'am, I'll manage just fine," Alexander continued, talking to Jane but still looking at her legs.
Finally, Alexander tore his gaze from Jane, and turned, walking with long strides into the terminal. Jane got into the car completely, shutting the door after her, and looked at the tall black man's retreating back.
"That must be quite a hunk of man," she whispered to herself idly. Then, Jane caught herself abruptly. She must remember not to think out loud -- it could be very embarrassing. Especially when she was looking at something as scrumptious as that Alexander.
Jane smiled to herself. Here she was, a grown woman, over thirty (way over), lusting after the man who drove the car -- and probably watered the lawn. Not thirty minutes in the country, and already she was chasing the natives.
But Jane caught herself abruptly. No, that was not right. Not right at all. This Alexander was no native with a bone through his nose -- (or was that the cannibals, Jane thought to herself suddenly, suppressing a giggle) -- no, this fellow was no native by any stretch of the imagination. He was, if appearances could tell anything, a mature, intelligent adult. A sophisticated man, quick to pick up the nuances of her offer to help with the luggage, and also quick to appreciate a good pair of legs when they were... displayed.
Jane took a quick breath, putting her hand to her mouth. She had almost thought offered, instead of displayed. Jane felt a sudden expansion, a swelling tightness in her chest and throat. She was becoming quite the temptress, and in one big hell of a hurry. Jane shrugged her shoulders quickly, the movement eloquently expressing her state of mind.
Well, so what if she did find this Alexander attractive? She was, no doubt, not the only woman to find him so. And yet...
A cloying doubt nibbled at Jane's stomach, and her eyes clouded suddenly. And yet, she knew, she had never had that sort of reaction to any man before now -- not even toward her own husband. She thought again of her feelings upon seeing him for the first time. She had never had any feeling to even approach what she had felt when she first set eyes on Alexander. It was as though she were seeing someone she'd known all her life, but had never been introduced to. There was a familiarity there, and ease at being in each other's company-a rapport. That was the word for it. She felt, oddly and completely, a strong rapport with the huge black man, who was so stately looking, and yet so human.
Watch it, sister, said a part of Jane's mind -- perhaps the largest part. Warning bells were going off inside her head, as loud as a set of burglar alarms, as she watched Alexander appear at the door, a bag in each hand.
"I'd better watch myself," Jane muttered, smiling at Alexander as he walked toward the car. It was a natural exchange, completely spontaneous and completely friendly. Jane realized with some shock that she had not smiled like that in years. It had, literally, been years.
As Alexander loaded the back seat with her luggage, Jane noted the ease with which his powerful body took the grips and placed them just so, not leaving so much as a single mark on the shiny leather surfaces.
At last, Alexander slid into the driver's seat, his hands huge and competent on the steering wheel. He whistled a little tune as he wheeled the station wagon out of the terminal, going onto the main highway quickly, expertly.
Among his other talents, Jane noted, Alexander was also a good driver. Jane bit her lip as she thought of what the other talents he possessed might include. These island girls didn't know what they had, Jane reflected, thinking wistfully of her Bill, with his paunch which hung over his belt, every night, as he sat watching the Late Show. Or maybe they did, she suddenly thought maybe the girls here did know what they had, and were glad they had it. Jane cast a sidelong glance at Alexander, noting his movements behind the wheel of the car. There could be no possible doubt about his virility -- it was in his every movement, in the way he spoke, in the way he had handled that luggage so masterfully. It was, even, a tangible presence on him, playing off his huge frame like a living force. This was a man.
To her discomfort and excitement :Jane felt herself moisten at the thought of Alexander here beside her.
"Are you comfortable, miss?" Alexander "said suddenly, his deep voice abrupt in the stillness of the car.
Jane suppressed an hysterical impulse to laugh.
Was she comfortable?
Yes, she felt like saying, I am comfortable. I am more than comfortable. I am out-of-my-mind aroused by your presence next to me. Won't you please, god-damit, stop this car and strip me down and take me buck naked in the back seat? If you're as much man between the legs as you are everywhere else, you'll leave me fucked, yes, and damn well fucked. I don't want you to inquire about my health -- I want you to fuck me to death, the way you obviously can!
"Yes, Alexander, I'm fine," Jane replied.
Alexander smiled, his eyes on the road, cuffing to the side every few moments to look at Jane.
"You're a very attractive woman, miss," he said, quickly adding: "If you don't mind my saying so, that is."
Jane almost screamed out loud.
"Why, thank you, Alexander," he managed to breathe, expelling a loud breath of air, her face hot, her heart going like a trip-hammer in her chest.
"Can you stay with us long, miss?" Alexander said, his eyes covering the road ahead.
"My name is Jane," came the reply from across the sun-drenched seat.
"Yes mi -- yes, Jane," Alexander said. "Are you staying long in Haiti?"
Jane shook her head.
"No, darnit -- only two weeks."
Alexander nodded his head. "I hope you enjoy your vacation... Jane," he said.
Jane glanced at him sharply, her pulse rate rising all at once.
Was it her imagination, or did she detect an unusual warmth in Alexander's use of her name? Could that be? Or perhaps he meant only to be friendly.
"I'm sure I will, Alexander," Jane replied, and meant it. How could she help but enjoy a place like this?
Even as the thought ran through her mind, Jane's gaze was drawn to the long line of beach, with the ocean beyond, sparkling and blue, incredibly inviting. Sunshine played over sea and beachline, illuminating the shore and turning it to warm surfaces of sand and water. The green, green jungle, which began on the other side of the narrow highway, was no less inviting, although different. As Jane gazed at the deep green, dense foliage, she felt a sudden impulse to put her foot across the floor and step on the brakes, leaving her and Alexander alone on this windy road. She would take him by the hand, and, stripping herself naked, would lead him, also naked, into the jungle. Once there, they would never come out. She would be his woman... his jungle woman...
Sitting in the front seat of the station wagon, the warm breeze on her face and sunlight warming her whole body, Jane felt bathed in a luxuriant wash of pleasure.
Better watch it, old girl, she thought to herself. You are going to find yourself in deep trouble, if you keep on thinking this way...
Abruptly, Jane turned that part of her mind off, and kept it off. Why the hell shouldn't she enjoy herself in these few weeks here? And that did not necessarily include sleeping with Alexander -- though God knows she was tempted. She could, after all, still have her little daydreams, if she kept them to herself. No one need know. She would certainly never tell anyone about them!
"Too much air on you... er, Jane?" came the deep, melodious voice.
Jane stirred herself, and brushed back her long, blond hair with a careless gesture of her right hand. "No... I'm fine."
Relaxing slowly, Jane felt the warm, soft breeze on her legs and inner thighs, and sighed loudly, stretching her long, sinewy legs slowly, yawning luxuriously.
"Did you have a nice trip from the United States?" Alexander inquired politely.
"Yes, Alexander, very nice -- not too bumpy. By the way, did Madeleine tell you that I'd never met her husband Frederick?"
Alexander smiled politely, a wry twinkle in his eye.
"Why yes, I believe she did mention it," he replied.
Alexander nodded his head slowly. "Yes ma'am -- I mean, yes Jane -- he's an Englishman."
"Is he very handsomer Jane asked blithely, looking for a reaction.
She got the reaction she was expecting. Alexander's eyebrows shot up, and he hesitated.
"Well?" Jane asked, enjoying the man's discomfort. There was something about him which brought out the wildness -- the bitchiness, even -- in Jane's makeup. This black man was having and odd effect on her indeed.
Alexander wetted his lips with his tongue, and did not reply for a moment.
"Well, I don't know, miss... I... "
There was a slight pause.
"Yes," said Alexander, "I suppose you could say that."
"As handsome as you, Alexander?" Jane asked softly.
Alexander's eyes widened abruptly, and he let out a little laugh of surprise. He said nothing.
Let him know it, Jane thought to herself mildly. Let him know I think he's attractive. God knows he is.
Jane said nothing further, and an embarrassed silence fell over the car as it sped along the sunny highway.
The embarrassment was all Alexander's.
* * *
Shortly thereafter, the long station wagon pulled into the driveway of a run-down-looking beach house which skirted the ocean. It was a one-story structure, and covered the top of a slight rise, in front of which a long, green, smooth lawn extended. The house had vines running from it, and had a ramshackle appearance -- at least from the outside.
Jane indicated the lawn.
"Your work, Alexander?" Jane asked.
Alexander grinned, pulling the car up to the garage at the side of the sloping, sprawling house.
"Yes, Jane, it is," he said, his eyebrow lifting slightly. "It's as smooth as any golf course on the island. Smoother than most."
Jane looked at Alexander for a moment.
"You speak excellent English, Alexander," she said softly.
"Thank you," he replied, his eyes moving over Jane's lush, mature form hungrily. "I might add that you manage to make yourself understood pretty well, too," he said, his eyes drifting to Jane's smooth thighs, traveling down her legs to her knees, then to her shapely ankles.
Blushing furiously, Jane scrambled out of the car, and walked to the side doors.
"I'll manage the luggage, Jane,' Alexander "said, nodding toward the house as he spoke. "I imagine Miss Madeleine and her husband will be expecting you inside."
Jane turned on her heel, and walked toward the house, her hands clenched into fists. She had never been so angry at anyone in her life. Immediately, Jane decided to freeze Alexander out, from this moment forward. She wouldn't so much as acknowledge that he existed, save for routine courtesy!
Breathing hard, Jane reached the front door, and put her hand on the knob. She paused, senseless with fury.
Make herself understood indeed! As though she had made the man an offer... or a proposition, like one of these cheap island tramps of his!
Taking her hand from the door hastily, Jane knocked three times on the thick paneling. There was a pause, and then the door swung open, revealing Madeleine in shorts and halter.
"Come in this house!" Madeleine shouted, calling over her shoulder:
"FREDERICK?... FREDERICK!... COME OUT HERE, ON THE DOUBLE...!"
Turning back to Jane, Madeleine opened the door completely, and let the taller woman come through.
"Well," she said, "did you have a nice flight? Let me take your bag! Have you met Alexander -- of course you have, how silly of me! He came out to get you at the airport, didn't he?"
A torrent of words flooded from Madeleine's lips as she led Jane into the interior of the house. Jane was surprised at the difference between interior and exterior, and told Madeleine so.
"Well," Madeleine said, "we have a very well-to-do clientele. They like the trimmings on the outside, the native stuff, but they like their comfort, too."
Jane smiled.
"Do 'rimmings' include Alexander?" she asked, her eyes twinkling. To her surprise, Madeleine shook her head.
"Definitely not. Alexander is an expert boatman, as well as skindiver. He also doubles as fishing guide and handyman. He's indispensable around here."
Jane was suddenly curious about what the term "indispensable" might include. She decided to risk it, and ask -- not expecting any kind of definite answer out of Madeleine.
"Is he `indispensable' in other ways, too?" Jane murmured.
Madeleine's face was blank. And then, "suddenly, her eyes lit up, like two candles in a cathedral.
"Yes, some of our female guests find they can't do without him, on those moonlight swims."
Jane's heart skipped a beat. So that was it. She might have guessed that so incredible a specimen of male strength would not be around simply for decoration. It had been naive of her to think otherwise. And suddenly, Jane found that she was not angry at Alexander any longer, either. He probably got so many offers from women, of all ages and sizes, that he had come to regard it as routine. He had automatically assumed, from past experience, that Jane was propositioning him, there in the car. Jane's mind stopped.
Well, wasn't that exactly what she'd been doing? Propositioning him?
Jane shook off the thought, and proceeded with Madeleine across the sumptuous living room. The room was, as Madeleine had indicated, elegant indeed. A thick blue carpet spread, like a soft, deep sea, beneath Jane's feet. In the corner was a long bar of polished mahogany. Beside the bar was a huge picture window, which opened onto a magnificent view of beach and sea. There was a long divan on the other side of the living room, which fronted the window, and beyond that, a spacious kitchen. On the right-hand side of the door was a wide hallway which included, Jane imagined, the guest rooms.
A man walked through that hallway now, and into the spacious living room.
"Hel-lo? Who's this?"
Jane looked at a man of medium height, with slightly greying hair and sandy complexion, blue eyes which were the color of the sea, deep and dark and rather cold. He was dressed in a tan lounging jacket, blue slacks and slippers, and had a scotch and soda in is right hand. He held the drink lightly, expertly, as though from long practice.
"This," Madeleine said smoothly, "is Jane Morrow, of San Francisco," (this last said in a regal way, as though being from San Francisco were a title of some sort). "And this," Madeleine continued, indicating the man who stood before her, "is my husband Frederick. Or what's left of him, at any rate."
Frederick cut his eyes at Madeleine, looking her up and down.
"Let's ease up on the bitchery, shall we, old girl?" he said evenly. "Let's remember that we have guests." Madeleine smiled sweetly.
"Frederick drinks," she explained to the startled, benumbed Jane, "and we usually fight in the evenings, when he drinks the most. That way I can have a drink with him."
Madeleine eyed Frederick for a moment, then added: "Frederick hates to drink alone."
Her face numb with shock, Jane put out her hand, and shook Frederick's. It was a soft hand, and showed no evidence of work. Jane decided that she would stay as much away from the subject of Frederick's duties as much as she possibly could. Evidently, Madeleine ran the establishment practically singlehanded -- with the help of Alexander, of course.
Idly, Jane wondered if Alexander helped Madeleine with matters of any other sort.
"I'm very pleased to meet you, Mr. Ashley," Jane said.
"Call me Frederick," the sandy-haired, loosely built man before her replied. He had, Jane noted, a rather interesting face. The nose was flattened down, like a prizefighter's, and the cheeks were high and solid looking. The ears were flattened against the head, and slightly bulbous.
"Frederick used to be a boxer," Madeleine said, noticing Jane's covert examination of her husband. "He was also in the War -- but that was a long time ago. Now he just drinks."
"Madeleine... please! We have guests!"
There was, Jane noted to her sorrow, a tone of bra ken pleading in his voice. All at once, Jane did not like Madeleine very much. Those letters, telling of Frederick's business prowess, had evidently been lies.
Jane caught herself abruptly. She must get out of this habit of judging people too quickly -- and too harshly. Perhaps there was good reason for Madeleine to lie in her letters. This, evidently, was a very unpleasant situation indeed. Still, Madeleine might have prepared her a little bit, Jane reflected.
"I've heard that the hunting and fishing around here are excellent," Jane said brightly, turning to Frederick all at once. Frederick smiled.
"Yes, they're quite good, actually. Though we'll have to wait a bit on the fishing part. There's been word of a storm coming our way. Heard it only an hour ago, on the radio."
Madeleine snorted loudly.
"There's been a storm brewing around here for a long, long time," she said darkly.
"Madeleine, would you fix the young lady a drink?" Frederick said quickly, tinkling the ice in his glass. "And freshen mine while you're at it." Madeleine turned abruptly, and beaded for the bar.
"Will you be staying with us long?" Frederick asked, his eyebrows raising slightly as he looked at the tall, willowy woman before him.
"No, not really," Jane said quickly, "only for a few weeks, actually."
"Well, you can have a damned good time for yourself, let me tell you."
Jane nodded her head.
"Yes, I imagine so," she said quietly.
"More than 'imagine,' my dear. Fortunately for you, this is our slack season -- not many people come this way this time of year. You'll have the place more or less to yourself."
"That will be nice," Jane said, feeling a bit awkward before this slightly drunk man, who was looking at her legs so boldly, with undisguised admiration.
Madeleine returned with the drinks.
"You didn't tell me you had such an attractive friend, Madeleine," Frederick said, accepting the drink which his wife handed him. He stayed, Jane noted, in the same pose as before, drink in hand.
"You didn't ask," Madeleine replied.
Frederick laughed, taking a sip of his drink. "I suppose not," he said. "I suppose I didn't."
"Well," Madeleine said, "if you've finished feasting your eyes on my guest, I'll show her to her room."
Slightly bewildered by the ferocity of the exchange between the "happily married couple" before her, Jane allowed herself to be led to the guest room, which had been prepared for her arrival.
As she walked into the guest bedroom, Jane was a bit surprised to find her luggage already resting by the bed. She went to the soft, blue-dyed bedspread, and sat down.
"I'm sure you must be tired after your long trip," Madeleine said. "Why don't you take your things off and relax? There's a shower adjoining this room, and I've laid out towels."
Jane, who was feeling the beginnings of a very painful headache, smiled gratefully.
"Thank you, Madeleine," she said, "I am awfully tired."
Madeleine smiled, and nodded her head.
"If there's anything you need, just holler," she said, turning and starting to go out the door.
"Madeleine?"
Madeleine turned, and looked at Jane, who was rubbing her forehead with the tips of her fingers. "Some aspirin?" Jane said, smiling weakly.
"Coming right up," Madeleine said, going out of the room briskly.
Later, showered and in a new terry cloth bathrobe, lying atop the soft, comfortable bed, Jane took two aspirin tablets and drank a glass of water.
As she felt the tablets take effect, Jane closed her eyes, and thought of the day which had just passed. There had been precious little time for thinking, that was certain. She had met two new people -- one of whom she liked (yes, Jane thought to herself, she really did like Alexander, in spite of herself) and one of whom she pitied. And there was always Madeleine to be considered. That side -- the vicious one, which Madeleine had concealed so cleverly in their girlhood together -- was fully in evidence now, and fully developed. There was, indeed, something odd about Madeleine -- something evil, which she had missed completely before.
And Alexander. Like a homing pigeon back to roost, Jane's mind always came back to him. He was so strong -- it was visible, a scalding presence on his young, black skin.
Bright and early the next morning, Jane was out of bed and dressed, eager to try the beach, which had looked so inviting the day before.
At six A.M., she was in her bathing suit, wrapped in a robe, cap in her lap, sitting at the large kitchen table, thinking of the incredibly sensuous odor of the coffee which Madeleine was brewing. Looking over her shoulder briefly, she eyed Madeleine, who was in a houserobe, bent over the sizzling skillet.
"Well!" Jane said, smiling brightly. "How's the water? Have you been outside?"
Madeleine shook her head, and returned to the eggs she was frying. "Nope," she said, "haven't been out. The water's usually warm this time of day, though. Six is all right. Seven is perfect though, let me tell you the water's clear as glass, and you can see every fish in the ocean."
"It sounds marvelous," Jane exulted.
Madeleine turned to Jane for a moment. "You know how to use an aqualung?"
Jane shook her head.
"Well, it's just as well, this first time in. There are flippers and face mask in the beach house -- it's a little hut by the shoreline. You can't miss it."
Abruptly, Madeleine turned and dished four eggs onto a plate, turning and carrying the plate to the table.
"Hope your appetite's up," Madeleine said briskly, as she shoveled an egg onto Jane's plate. "The toast'll be ready in exactly two minutes."
Jane looked up quickly.
"Isn't Frederick eating with us?" she asked, her eyes wide, as she cut the egg with her fork.
"No -- he drank his breakfast this morning. He's sleeping it off. Probably won't be up till noon."
"Oh," Jane said in a small voice, going back to her egg.
By the time the toast arrived, Jane had started on her second egg. She would, she decided, have no trouble making up the difference of Frederick's not being there. She was wolfishly hungry.
* * *
Alexander, on this particular morning, had gotten up even earlier than Jane.
Coming awake in the small house he occupied, which adjoined the main building, he was slow in getting out of bed.
"Damned tourtist," he muttered, thinking of Jane Morrow, and of the bold way she'd offered herself to him. The white women who came to this beach house -- this resort that Madeleine and Frederick Ashley ran for a mixture of idle fun and still-more-idle profit were more abandoned, and more lacking in the simple proprieties, than his native girl, Odetta.
Alexander thought of Odetta for a moment. She, with her "primitive" ways and "simple" life style, was much more a lady than this Jane Morrow -- or any of her white sisterhood who used this resort as a rutting-spot, with Alexander as stud bull and Master of Midnight Boating Excursions. Odetta.
Alexander felt the old, familiar, powerful stirring of his loins, at the thought of her. He thought also of how long it had been since he'd seen her. Two weeks, and not a word from her. Abruptly, he decided to pay her a visit this fine morning.
Alexander smiled. Since Odetta never got up before ten o'clock in the morning, it might do her good to get a visit from someone at this hour. It would certainly be a new experience in her young life.
Putting on a pair of swim trunks hurriedly, Alexander went out the door, his footprints marking the smooth sand by the tiny hut which he reluctantly called home.
* * *
Odetta, contrary to Alexander's uncharitable estimate, was really only half asleep.
Her hair in her face, she lolled to and fro lazily, in the tiny hut which she occupied at the edge of the sea. She was, in an odd way, a sort of celebrity among the guests who frequented the Ashley's beach resort: Odetta's mother, Mama Lu, was the chief voodoo priestess of the island. This title, hereditary and highly significant to the native population of the island, was a phantom distinction in the world of broad daylight and everyday business. But when night fell, Odetta was no longer a poor, rather idle native girl. She was the daughter of the famous (and infamous) Mama Lu, the heir-apparent to all the secrets which that elderly, and very distinguished, woman had accumulated. And, despite this, Odetta was frustrated by the whole whorl of events which every day brought to her ken. By day, she could hope for nothing more than an odd-job existence, doing minor service for the Ashley's guests. It was only at night, during the festivals that the people of the island gave, that Odetta could hope to shine. And Haiti was changing: every day saw new industries, new businesses, and new people pouring into the island. The steady, persistent encroachment of civilization, with all its attendant benefits and ills, were anathema to the native culture which supported the idea of Mama Lu, and of Odetta herself. With every passing day, the old people were dying off, and fewer, and fewer people remained who had any faith in the old ways, the old magic. And so Odetta found herself on a steadily shrinking island of faith, in a world that she, truly and completely, had never made.
Sleeping half the day away, Odetta found, was an excellent way to avoid the world.
Half turning on the straw mat, inside the tiny hut, Odetta smiled sleepily, feeling the heat from the sun as it came through the open doorway. She stretched herself slowly, unwilling to open her eyes, for fear of waking up.
As the long, hot day started, Odetta knew that she would get some relief from swimming. And, perhaps, there would be a shower later in the day -- one of those short, benevolent washes of freshness that came and went so quickly here.
Odetta felt her body, tawny and feline, dark and smooth, stretched upon the mat. Her hands traced, with vague, satisfied little gestures, the curve of her hip, and the smooth fullness of her breasts. Naked except for filmy, brief pants and halter -- and that a concession to only the barest of proprieties -- Odetta let the idea of her body seep through her sleep-benumbed consciousness. It was a savage, beautiful, forbidding body that she had, a body all the more beautiful for its blackness. Odetta knew the effect that her black, heavy hair and black eyes and skin had on the males who frequented the Ashleys' club -- she could see it in the jealous, outraged expressions on their wives' faces. Odetta was a past master at the art of making white men's wives jealous. And yet, oddly, she had never allowed a white man to touch her. Something in her nature, and in the way she had been looked upon by whites all of her life, forbade it. And that, she knew, was why she was drawn to Alexander. He, also, had that haughty, proud air about him -- that pride in his blackness which decades of bad, haughty treatment by whites had produced. Alexander knew the position his skin color put him in, and regarded the white world with contempt because of its blindness to his qualities. His hatred for whites was based, she knew, upon their inability to see beneath his skin. They could not -- or would not recognize his strength of character. And so, at every opportunity, he threw it in their faces.
Odetta almost groaned, as she thought of Alexander, and what he had meant to her here, in these years, when her own world was steadily dwindling around her.
She turned restlessly, her lips swollen, slightly parted, as she stretched herself luxuriously.
And, all at once, she felt a shadow, cool and absolute, which blocked the doorway of the hut, shutting out the early-morning sunlight. She turned, frowning, her eyes red-rimmed and sleepy, and looked toward the door.
"W-who... who's there?" she muttered, shaping a tall figure through the blurred lens of her watering eyes.
The figure came forward, and bent over suddenly, its bulk very, very near.
Odetta tensed her tawny, savage body, her hips and thighs tightening, smooth black flanks turning slowly. Her breathing was rapid, her breasts heaving under the filmy halter she wore.
A hand fastened on her hip, and another on her breast.
She paused, there in the hut, her breathing shallow, her mind dulled.
"Alexander?" she breathed. The figure did not reply.
And, all at once, by the feel of the broad, powerful hands, she knew that it was he.
"It's been a long time," came the deep, rumbling voice, and Odetta's eyes cleared. She looked up at Alexander, her face twisting into an angry frown.
"You might have told me you were coming," she breathed.
Still, the hands were on her warm, bare skin, and had not moved.
"How could I surprise you, then? Like this?"
He gave a little squeeze, with both hands, and Odetta giggled shrilly. Alexander smiled, the corners of his mouth turning up, his eyes twinkling.
Odetta stretched out, spreading her arms and legs wide, closing her eyes.
She gasped sharply, then sighed as she felt the hands begin their caressing journey over her full, dark, and tremblingly expectant form.
"I I-love it... when you do that," Odetta gasped, shuddering under the powerful, stroking hands.
Silently, Alexander moved over the supple, trembling form, feeling the small, female shudders as his hands moved down thighs, over breasts, and along smooth black belly and legs. Odetta was no longer silent -- her breath coming in short, quick gasps, her eyes fluttering, she felt herself slipping from that shore of ordinary sensation, and ordinary feeling, toward that other world, the magic world of passion, in which only sensation mattered. Buoyed up by the force of her body's yearning, by its trembling need, Odetta felt the force of the ages, that mighty force which nothing could quell, once it was aroused. She wanted Alexander, and she wanted hard, savage violation. Odetta gritted her teeth, and shut her eyes tightly.
"Oh, please... please... " she groaned, writhing on the mat beneath the huge, broad-backed figure which towered over her, half-kneeling, like a doctor ministering to a patient.
"Oh... Goddamit... OH -- I" Odetta's voice rose to a tremulous shout as, slowly, the hands found the filmy halter, and flimsy pants, removing them with great delicacy, as a doctor removes a bandage.
Odetta writhed on the mat, her hands fluttering like delicate blackbirds against the tan fibres of the bed, which, for her, had suddenly become a magic carpet.
She heard the sharp zipping sound of the side of Alexander's bathing trunks, as they were opened, revealing a tensed brown flank.
Kneeling beside the supine girl, Alexander pulled the trunks downward, past his inner thighs and knees, kicking the trunks off as he rolled to the side, resting on his muscular hips. In a twinkling he was back, kneeling beside Odetta, his huge log exposed, bare and savage, as he opened his powerful, muscular inner thighs to the girl before him.
Odetta gasped, her eyes widening at the sight of him. Even now, after all this time together, she could never adjust herself to the unexpected sight of Alexander naked. So massive were his proportions, and so magnificent the equipment between his massive legs, that she was stunned, beyond speech, at the "sight of him. His prick was massive, and seemed to extend halfway to his knees, his testes as large as Odetta's closed fists.
She regarded him in "silence, watching the slow, inexorable rise of his cock, his life itself. She reached out, touching the hard meat with the tips of her fingers, and let out a tiny gasp.
With a loud groan, Alexander moved, and moved again.
Odetta watched him with half-closed eyes, her breath coming in quick, sharp gasps. She felt the slow, smooth parting of her thighs, and stirred, her ripe buttocks patting the mat softly as she enfolded Alexander's waist with her full, black legs. She felt his urgency, and reached down, manipulating the fore-skin with both her hands, in a soft, rubbing, up-and-down motion. She rocked to and fro, manipulating the huge erection, which was, moment by moment, turning to stone under her hands.
She felt her center part, and moisten, as Alexander's long, muscular body moved over hers, the length of him stroking her inner thighs, probing and urgent.
Odetta took him in both her hands, guiding him to her quick, to her very being.
With one thrust of his thickly muscled hips, Alexander moved into Odetta completely, and she cried out loud, her lips parting and forming an O, her eyes shut tightly.
It was as before: she could never get used to the immensity of him, to the sheer bulk of him there, rifling her between the legs, so powerfully and pain-fully.
Odetta winced, her features contracting toward the center of her face as she felt his full, potent entry. There was no man on the island like Alexander -- that she knew. She had been with other men, many of them large and strong men, but with this one, this Alexander, she always felt as though she was being split apart. She could well understand why the Ashleys' guests were constantly in pursuit of him -- the female guests, at least.
"OH... OHHHH!... OHHHH YES!" Odetta whispered, thrusting herself upward, toward the cruel, descending immensity of Alexander. Delirious, she began to sob softly, tightening the grip of her legs around him, her hips working frantically against his powerful, driving movements. The sobbing grew louder, as the huge hands found her inner thighs, opening her outward, so that she was raw and exposed to the cruel, insistent rhythm of his body. Through half-open eyes, Odetta could see the broad, muscular shoulders and firm chest, the incredibly developed biceps and forearms. She felt as though she were in the grip of an octopus, so possessive were the hands, the enfolding arms, the powerfully gripping thighs. And all of it was directed to that central act, the long, urgent, plunging rhythm of his lovemaking.
Odetta moved her hips frantically, in an effort to accommodate the surging, ballooning bulb, which possessed her very core so powerfully and completely.
"OOO!... AAAAAH... AAAAAH -- OHI OH... ! UNNNGH...!"
Odetta felt as though she were being reamed by a tree stump, so violent and massive was the attack.
With long, slow movements, Alexander rocked forward and backward, sending long shivers of delight through Odetta. Her hair flying as she turned her bead to and fro, Odetta moaned out loud, her face tear stained.
"OHHHHH DO IT... ! JUST DO IT... OH-HHHH YES... !THAT'S IT... THAT'S... THAT'S... "
And then she was silent under the insistent rhythm of Alexander's lovemaking.
The soft, slapping sounds of love filled the hut, mixing with the warm, smooth odors of coupling. The rich, man-woman aroma, so exciting to both, filled their nostrils.
With new urgency, Alexander moved over the poised, splayed beauty of Odetta's dark, kinky womanhood, his breathing coming in loud, rasping gasps as he felt himself begin.
Her body shining like an ebony statue, Odetta sensed the approach of her own climax, and bit the thick pad of muscle which ran from Alexander's shoulder to his neck.
Their sweat mingling, their bodies hot and sticky with passion, both met in the final frenzy of love -- that slippery, hot, urgent explosion which marks the pinnacle of life.
With a loud scream, clamping her hips around the driving, surging immensity of Alexander, Odetta felt herself swept to the sky, burning and incandescent, as the slap-slap sound of their clasping-unclasping bodies rose to its final pitch.
In one surging, incredible moment, Alexander exploded into Odetta, and she, in her turn, discharged around him, so that a new, full wetness marked the union of their loins.
Odetta relaxed, as she felt the warm, surging ocean of sperm rise within her, seeping to her inmost depths. Alexander was frantic under the burden of his passion, and was discharging like a stallion. With a final, upward surge of their loins, man and woman drained into each other, and were joined in a final, clasping union of mutual passion.
Sleepily, warmly, Odetta relaxed in Alexander's arms, her mouth curving into a satisfied smile. She was full of him now, awash with him, and she could feel his thick, hot butter as it coated the walls of her vagina.
She stirred, softly stroking the small of Alexander's back with the tips of her fingers, as he moved over her powerfully. She sighed loudly, her hips moving upward to receive the massive black column, which slid into her raw wound smoothly, like a precision instrument.
At last, Alexander slowed his rhythm, stopping finally and covering Odetta with his body. They clung together, gasping, their bodies moving in a fluid rhythm, seeking the essence of union.
Odetta sighed loudly, closing her eyes, groaning softly as she felt his potent entry once more. Alexander was suspended over her, fixing her to the mat with the root of his being, his arms strong, commanding.
"Have you missed me?" he said, his arms encircling her tightly, crushing her against him, so that she groaned loudly.
"Y-yes," she whispered, her eyes shut tightly.
"How much have you missed me?" he asked.
Odetta sighed loudly. It was the games that Alexander played with his women that made him so attractive. He would put them in the most compromising situations, and then ask them if they loved him. He was in many ways, Odetta thought to herself, still a little boy.
"I have missed you very much," she whispered.
As her reward, Alexander drove inward, hard, to the base of himself.
Odetta let out a little cry at the violence of the sudden entry, her whole body stiffening suddenly.
"Do you love me?" he whispered.
"Yes."
"How much do you love me?"
"V-very much," Odetta gasped, feeling him withdraw and then re-enter her, savagely and suddenly.
"OH . OH YES!" Odetta moaned out loud, clutching Alexander around the waist. "Yea... now," she hissed, her eyes shut tightly, her full, eager thighs and arms gripping the man above her, clinging to him blindly.
Alexander chuckled, and began slowly, caressingly, that powerful, almost awesome, act of complete possession.
Odetta moaned again, as a thin film of moisture appeared like a new skin over her chocolate body. Her labia began to flutter, and the lips of her vagina were beginning a motion that resembled a mouth chewing a piece of steak. But the morsel that hungry "mouth" wanted wasn't a piece of steak. Alexander once again placed the knob of his shaft against the grinding pussy.
Odetta boosted herself slightly, and Alexander felt the snapping cunt lap, capture and swallow the head of his huge erection. The slick heat engulfed him, and the womanly flesh gobbled at his prong, the hot, strong muscles gnawing hungrily at his offering. He jammed his hard rod as far as he could and Odetta whimpered happily, flexing her thighs to take in more of him. With still another lunge he rammed all the way home, and the girl was numb with exquisite sensations as he furiously ground and rotated his pubic bush into her smooth, slick love mound, and he felt the hot sweaty flesh of her buttocks caressing his buffeting balls. The domes of Odetta's nipples pointed up into Alexander's heavy-breathing chest like projectiles. They were like bits of chocolate candy, puffing as if they were being cooked hot over a stove.
The dark girl's muscled cunny rippled again, and Alexander grunted, pulling his slick cock time and again from the tight vise which grabbed it, then ramming it home into her very depths, moist, velvety, sweet.
"Ayeee!" Odetta screamed, wrapping her legs tighter around him and constricting her entire body. Each of his huge hands gripped a dark breast and shook it hard as he plunged and lifted, building the intense heat, while the vaginal muscles threatened to pull the big bat from his body and swallow it forever.
"Take it, you lovely little bitch!" he swore. "Hmmm, open that hot volcano and take all of me!" He was showing more control now, pulling his penis out slowly, then jabbing it home in inch-gaining thrusts, sometimes retreating so that the head could caress parts of the velvety sex canal he hadn't attended to.
Odetta's eyes rolled and her bony ass churned furiously "Oh... ohhh... no one ever like you!" she screeched. Alexander shot her up with a new tremendous burst of energy and raw muscle power.
He smiled grimly as Odetta fell back in a spread-eagle position, her eyes closed, and she was sweating, moaning and loose. He raised himself up and looked down at the slack vagina, its darkish-pink lips puffed and drooling around his thick shaft, still hungry for his ever hard penis.
He chuckled, pushing in and out with ease, wriggling his cock sideways, sensing the give of her warm inner flesh against his meaty erection. He eased his frame against the marvelous cushions of her black breasts and turned his head to suck, to chew on a taut and hardened nipple. Odetta sobbed and tried to turn herself inside out around his still screwing shaft. The restrengthened cunny crawled along the length of him like a man-eating clam, sucking and squeezing for a greater purchase. The long glove of wet flesh mauled and wrung his aching prong, a wild pubis madly sucking at him.
And then they were both lost in the uncontrollable, shuddering, throes of terrific climax, with Odetta raising her head, clamping her cannibal mouth to one of his flat masculine nipples, sucking and biting at it, as her nails scraped at his muscle-taut back.
CHAPTER FIVE
Jane Morrow was lying on the beach the following morning, a blanket beneath her, bare to the ten o'clock sun save for the briefest of bathing suits -- a strip of cloth for bottom and top.
She spread her legs, finding the bottle of suntan lotion with her right hand, opening the top and spreading the thick, oily, warm fluid on white shoulders and arms, then moving to chest and stomach. As her hands went over the smooth whiteness of her skin, she could feel the warmth beginning along the very surface of herself, the searing bite of the sun. Her hair was spread in a soft, diffuse carpet behind her head, blond and soft and very, very womanly. She felt a sudden giddiness.
If someone were to be passing by, and see her here, she would surely fall victim to an attack. Her mind went to the scantiness of her costume, and she smiled behind dark sunglasses, her eyelids warm. My, my, aren't we the reluctant virgin? came the words, there in Jane's mind. Ready for anything, on a two-week break in the routine. A twinge of guilt throbbed through Jane's middle, and she brushed it aside quickly.
I thought we weren't going to have any of that guilt business, Mrs. Morrow, said the corner of her mind which was addressing her so coolly.
"Quite right," Jane murmured, feeling a soft breeze come wafting off the ocean. She was grateful for the breeze -- with the oil which was spread over her, it felt like a wash of cold water.
"Absolutely right," Jane repeated, her lips barely moving.
"What is right, miss?"
The voice had come from directly beside her, and Jane jumped up quickly, shielding her eyes from the sun as she whipped off her dark glasses. She stared upward at the tall, square-shouldered form which towered over her.
"What in the... " Jane gasped, making out the grinning face of Alexander. She felt her heartbeat accelerate suddenly, and knew that it wasn't entirely from shock.
"You looked as though you were making up your mind to something, miss," he said, his voice rumbling over Jane like a clap of thunder. Goosebumps formed on Jane's arms and legs.
"Do you always sneak up on your guests, Alexander?" Jane asked, a high arch in her voice as she regarded him coolly.
In spite of herself, Jane was having difficulty keeping up a severe pose, in the face of Alexander.
"Only when the guests are as beautiful, and as desirable, as you, miss."
Jane's mouth dropped open at his words. Her face numb with shock, she took a deep breath. Had she heard right?
"I... I beg your pardon," Jane breathed, "... what did you say?"
There was a moment's silence, and Jane could hear the beating of her heart, through the stillness of the moment.
"I said," Alexander continued, "that I only sneak up on beautiful lady guests. And only when they want me to sneak up on them."
"Well," Jane said, her shock subsiding, as she looked at Alexander with her best imitation of an outraged expression, "do you think that's entirely appropriate?"
"In your case, yes, I do," came the reply.
Jane gasped, as, all at once, Alexander knelt beside her in the sand.
"Will you go hunting with me tomorrow?" he asked, his eyes level with hers.
Jane blushed, and tried to cover it up with a movement of her band. Alexander reached out, and brought her hand down, keeping her hand in his.
Her face red as a fire engine, Jane sat, looking at Alexander, her mouth slightly open, lips parted. It was as though an electric charge had gone through her at his touch.
"Will you come and hunt with me tomorrow?" he asked, his voice grave, intent. "The Ashleys won't mind. They'll be glad to get you out of their hair, in fact."
The silence between the pair was intense, prolonged, the only sound the distant lapping of the waves against the beach. Overhead, abruptly, a seagull cried out, its voice plaintive and lonely in the bright sun-light.
"Well, I don't know... " Jane stammered, her eyes dropping from Alexander's suddenly. It was as though there were pent heat inside of him, the way his eyes seemed to glow, here in broad daylight.
"To make up for my rudeness yesterday," Alexander added, increasing the pressure of his grip suddenly. Jane felt something give way inside her, and nodded her head, smiling.
"That's much better," Alexander said, smiling back at Jane, who was getting even redder at his words. "I'll come and get you tomorrow afternoon, at two o'clock sharp. We'll take one of the cars. I know a place that hasn't been tried yet."
Jane nodded her head once more, and suddenly Alexander got up, rising smoothly and powerfully from the sand. She looked at him for a moment, sensing the strength which was contained in the body. She had never seen him dressed only in bathing trunks before, and the sight took her breath away. His chest was broad and massive, his arms thickly muscled, his forearms stout. His legs were like two massive black pillars. Jane swallowed loudly.
"I'll see you tomorrow -- Jane," he rumbled at her, turning and walking away slowly, his broad back like a wall, which tapered slowly to a slim waist.
Jane watched him as he walked away, diminishing slowly across the pale sand, until he was only a black speck in the distance. She shook her head, still not believing her ears.
"What in the world prompted him to do that?" she muttered, her glance moving downward to include her tawny, long-legged form. She looked at her legs, and at her hips, seeing the muscles firm, the flesh taut, with no mark of age or childbearing. She shook her head.
God... if it could only be me he wants! came the thought, quickly banished from Jane's mind. Jane could not, she knew, hope to compete with girls in their early twenties -- not for the serious attentions of youth as obviously well-developed as Alexander. No, it had probably been just a "courtesy" which he extended, out of habit, to Madeleine Ashely's guests.
And yet, there had been that electric moment when he had touched her...
Could he really want me? Jane mused, her fore-head furrowing as her eyes searched the sand before her.
A thought flashed through Jane's mind, making her gasp with alarm: never once, in her whole life, had she held a gun in her hands.
Jane smiled a secret smile. She would, she decided, certainly have to learn.
* * *
The following afternoon, Jane was waiting by the back door of the resort, dressed in boots, trousers, and blouse, the tan trousers shining against the deep, crisp blue of the stiffly-starched blouse. She had been waiting for fifteen minutes, and she was getting restless -- not to mention a little bored. Boredom, Jane had read somewhere, always indicated some sort of undischarged tension.
She paced back and forth quickly, her eyes darting over the sandy reaches of the shoreline, looking for Alexander. She bit her thumbnail absently, making small expressions of irritation with her mouth.
He had suggested this hunting excursion, and he had damned well better show up.
Jane flicked small runnels of sand with the tip of her boot, sending a fine spray cascading forward, a satiny ebullience, small-grained in the afternoon sunlight.
"Well, did you think I was never coming?"
Jane started, her eyes bugging out, as she wheeled around, her hands at her sides. There was Alexander, his hands on his hips, in khaki trousers and short-sleeved shirt, rough brown boots and wide-brimmed hat. His black countenance, boldly chiseled, shone with amusement as he regarded the so recently startled woman before him.
"Couldn't you have cleared your throat, or something?" Jane gasped, a note of outrage in her voice. "You came up on me without making a sound."
Alexander smiled at the blond American woman before him.
"Stealth is not a bad quality in a man -- especially one who's going hunting."
Jane looked at the tall black youth before her, pondering the ambiguous -- and suggestive-statement he had just made to her. She decided to let it pass.
"Though it may be of discomfort to you now," Alexander added quickly, noting Jane's silence, "I think you'll find it of value later."
Jane looked up at him. He was grinning broadly.
"When we got hunting -- that's what you mean, of course," Jane added, a sardonic note in her voice.
"Of course, madam," Alexander said formally, bowing slightly to the blond-beaded woman before him. 'What else could I have meant by such a statement?"
"What else indeed," Jane observed.
Alexander pointed to the station wagon, which was parked at the side of the main building.
"I've packed the rifles and ammunition in the back seat," he said, taking Jane by the elbow and leading her to the car. "There are some excellent spots near here. Have you ever hunted wild pig before, miss?"
Jane shook her head. "No. I can't say I have."
"Ever done any hunting of any kind?"
Jane shook her head once more.
"Well, now's a good time to learn," he added, opening the side door so she could climb into the front seat.
Raising an eyebrow at his cavalier manner, Jane shut the door herself, fending off his efforts to help her.
In a moment, Alexander was beside her in the front seat, and the hunting expedition formally began.
As the car sped along the highway, Jane was silent and still, watching the heavy, lush greenness of the jungle zip by her. She took a deep breath of air, and let her head loll on the doorframe, the wind from the open window making heavy, sweet taffy of her hair. She closed her eyes, feeling the sun warm and solid on her eyelids, like luminous paint.
"These wild boar are dangerous, tricky animals. Some people not far from here have brought stories to me about a tusker that's eating crops in this area. They've asked me to look into it. Inviting you, I tried to mix business with pleasure."
Jane looked at Alexander for a long moment.
"I've heard that's not a good idea," she observed dryly, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye.
Alexander chuckled softly.
"Here, pleasure is my business."
He glanced at Jane, and then added quickly! "As a rule for guests only, of course."
Jane smiled.
"Do you think of me as a guest?" she asked softly. Alexander shrugged his shoulders. It was, Jane noted, an expressive gesture.
"Aren't you a guest?" he asked, turning his eyes from the road and looking at the woman beside him, his eyes level, blank.
Jane paused for a long moment, and then nodded her head.
"I suppose I am," she said absently, her hair blowing in the wind like a yellow cloud, soft and delicate and very, very fine.
"Then it's my duty to please you," Alexander said, "that's what the Ashleys pay me for. That's the reason for this trip."
Jane looked at him for a moment, and frowned.
"But you just got through saying you were going to do it anyway -- shoot some wild pig or other," Jane protested.
"Two birds with one stone," he replied evenly, and Jane lapsed into silence.
The country grew wilder and wilder by the moment. Always, there were fewer people and more stretches of jungle, till at last the view was one of uninterrupted brush and densely thicketed clumps of trees. The long, tropical vines, which hung down onto the road, seemed to reach out for her, so that she drew back instinctively. The vines swayed before the oncoming car, as the quality of the road grew poorer and poorer.
At last, Alexander pulled the car onto a side trail, leaving the main highway completely.
Abruptly, Jane could tell the difference, as the car rolled over the bumpy, unpaved road -- which, by now, was little more than a jungle trail. She looked at Alexander inquiringly, and then back at the pockmarked, stone-filled, red dirt line which extended in front of the advancing car. On either side of the narrow path, the jungle loomed, dark and densely green and for-bidding, seeming to choke off the trail as the station wagon advanced slowly.
"Do... I mean, do you really think we'll find anything?" Jane asked through her teeth, her voice a low whisper.
Alexander nodded his massive head, his forearms flexing powerfully, so that the muscles stood out in finely chiseled lines.
Noticing the massive arms, Jane looked at the man beside her for a moment.
"Yes," Alexander replied after a long pause, "I think we'll be in luck. This old sow has been hitting the crops along here like a tidal wave. She'll be out, foraging for her piglets."
Jane felt a rush of sympathy for the sow, and felt a bit foolish all at once.
"I -- didn't know she was a mother," Jane said. Alexander grinned all at once, his eyes crinkling up above his strong, prominent cheekbones.
"Don't feel bad about it," Alexander said smoothly. "That old sow pig killed a man last weekend, just for trying to get her off his crops."
Jane let herself relax, a tremor of apprehension running down the back of her neck. Suddenly, she was very glad that it was Alexander who was leading the expedition.
"What should I do if it charges?" Jane asked slowly.
Alexander shook his head.
"Don't worry about that. I'll lead the way. If you can get off a shot, shoot for the shoulder. Shoot for bone, and break the old girl down that way."
"You sound as though you've done this before," Jane said.
"I have," Alexander replied.
There was a long, painful moment of silence, broken only by the loud thumping of the tires over the pitted, bumpy road. Then Jane spoke: "You speak excellent English," Jane said suddenly, glancing at Alexander, who showed no visible reaction to what she'd just said. She remembered she'd said it before.
My God but he's strong, Jane thought to herself, looking at the hard, rough-hewn features on the man's face. Strong and tough.
Finally, Alexander nodded.
"Thank you," he said. "I learned in school here, from the Jesuits."
Deciding not to pursue the subject any further, Jane rolled up the window and shivered. There were branches poking at the side of the car, and one of them had just scraped her arm.
Glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, Alexander indicated her arm with a nod of his head.
"I'll put some iodine on that when we stop," he said.
"It's all right," Jane said, noticing the long, deep scratch which ran down the side of her slender forearm. "It's nothing really."
Alexander shook his head.
"I'll have to insist. Can't have you getting infected on me out here."
Jane said nothing, but felt a tremor go through her bowels at his voice. He was not to be brooked in anything, that was certain. Whatever he made up his mind to do, he did.
I wonder if that includes me.
The thought slipped idly through Jane's consciousness, as she lolled in the sun-filled front seat.
Abruptly, the car stopped, so that she put her hand on the dashboard, her feet bracing. Alexander turned to her.
"This is just about as far as we can go in this "station wagon. If we had a jeep, it would be another story. I'm afraid from here on it'll have to be under our own power."
"Is it far?" Jane whispered, looking uneasily at the dense foliage which spread against the closed windows like spinach on a thin glass.
"Not so far," Alexander replied, reaching across the seat and opening the glove compartment. He withdrew a medical kit, breaking open a bottle of deep-hued red fluid with thumb and forefinger.
"But first we take care of that cut," he said evenly, a look of absolute, calm determination in his eye.
Jane winced as she felt the long, cool swab across her skin, saw the deep red line of medicinal hue, and smelled the sharp iodine.
"Hurt much?" Alexander asked, his bands amazingly gentle as he held her forearm delicately. Jane blushed.
"Not very much," she said, her voice noncommittal.
"Just let it dry, and it'll be all right," he said, turning to get out of the car. "Leave it open to the air, and don't try to bandage it," he added, getting out of the car with difficulty.
In a few moments, Alexander had broken out the rifles, locked up the car, and was leading Jane along the narrow path which led into the jungle.
As they passed the tall, densely packed trees, Jane was drawn, closer and closer, to Alexander. She edged away from the undergrowth through which they passed, expecting at any moment to see a long, deadly snake drop out of the sky onto her head. So heavy was the rifle in her hands that, after carrying it a short distance, she was covered with sweat, and trembling.
"Alexander... " she gasped, "I -- I don't think I'm going to be able to carry this thing much further... "
Alexander laughed, taking the rifle from her hands and bringing it to sling-arms on his broad, powerful shoulder.
"Don't worry about that," he said, "just relax and enjoy the walk."
Jane was free now to "enjoy" the walk, and soon found herself tangled in a long, branching root which angled across the path. Both stopped, and Alexander looked down as Jane struggled to free herself.
"Did you get a sprain?" he asked, looking down at the struggling girl once more, a hint of amusement on his broad, strong face.
"No, I... I don't think so... " Jane gasped, bringing her foot free and testing the ankle gently, gingerly.
It was, oddly, as though Alexander were making fun of her in some odd way -- of her inexperience in "roughing it," of her physical softness, even of the fact that she was an American housewife, far from home.
As they proceeded, Jane felt a great, swelling resentment in her breast, looking at Alexander closely, her face knitted into a frown. Noticing her expression, Alexander's own face took on a look of concern.
"Are you in pain?" he asked.
Sweating and gasping, dodging branches and long, clinging vine tendrils, Jane could not help herself:
"Only from your high-handedness," she replied curtly, and Alexander turned away, a puzzled look on his face.
Immediately, Jane was torn by remorse, and guilt. She should not have been so curt with him. After all, he had carried the rifle for her, and he had been as attentive as anyone could possibly be. She must, Jane decided, apologize to this tall, broad-shouldered youth beside her.
"Alexander, I... " she began, but was stopped by a hand across her chest. Halting her on the trail, Alexander pointed to an open clearing just beyond the edge of the jungle before them. The clearing was a carpet of tall grass, and beyond it were regularly spaced fields. In the distance, the squawking of domestic animals could be heard.
"This is the place the sow was last seen," Alexander said, in a low voice.
Jane looked at Alexander for a moment.
"Is there a house near here?" she whispered.
"Not far," Alexander replied.
Jane was miffed.
"If... if there's human settlement around here, why didn't we just drive here in the station wagon, instead of going through all that... all that jungle back there?"
Jane's ankle was sore, and there was a note of outrage in her voice as she asked the question.
Alexander shook his head angrily.
"The man who lives in this house is not friendly to us -- to me," he whispered. "He would not like me walking across his fields, hunting a wild pig."
Jane was mystified, and looked it.
"Even if the -- if the pig was eating his crops?"
"Even then," Alexander replied. "Now that's enough talk. Here's your rifle. just follow me, and try not to make any noise." Slowly, foot by foot, Jane and Alexander advanced through the tall grass, their footfalls soundless. Jane could hear the wind whistling in the trees behind her, and could see the faint, black finger of smoke from a fire in the distance, rising over the trees and drifting horizontally across the sky.
The occasional call of a jungle bird, shrill and raucous, split the stillness and caused Jane to jump involuntarily. It seemed to her that Alexander took a devilish delight in her discomfort, and she would cast a malignant glance at him every now and then.
As they advanced across the wild, densely weeded clearing, Jane's eyes roamed the fields before them, looking for movement.
Alexander nodded his head, and indicated the rows of well-tilled crops. "Look for movement," he said, "this is their favorite time to feed, while it's still cool. When that heat moves in, she'll go back into the jungle."
Jane, wiping beaded drops of perspiration from her forehead, wondered just how it would be when the heat really "moved in" -- she was dying from it now.
As they covered the fields, foot by foot, Jane grew steadily more tired, and more discouraged. She was coming to believe, more and more, that Alexander had led her on a wild goose chase, just to punish her for some obscure offense that she'd unknowingly committed.
At last, Alexander let out a long sigh, and shook his head.
"I can't understand it," he muttered, watching Jane walk beside him, her rifle in her hands. "Every sign pointed to it... and now nothing. Not a plant's been dug up, not a tuber's been eaten. It's just as though nothing had ever been in these fields but a hoe and a rake."
Shaking his head once more, Alexander turned, and, guiding Jane with his hand, he led her toward the edge of the clearing.
Jane, meanwhile, was more than a little bit angry. She hated the idea that all this -- the trip, the heat, her ankle, the whole business -- had been for nothing. Shaking her head disgustedly, she strode ahead of Alexander, her shoulders stiff. Alexander let her go, and said nothing, but only looked at her retreating back angrily, his mood matching hers.
As she moved, the tall grass whipping her thighs so that it stung, Jane did not look to left or to right, but only at the ground. She had never felt so angry, or so humiliated, in her life. At the back of her mind was the nasty, cloying suspicion that Alexander had taken her out here for nothing, knowing that they would find no game whatever. Jane's eyes narrowed: she had been played for a fool! Alexander had probably enjoyed every moment of her discomfort' "Wild pig" indeed!
So angry was Jane, and so caught up in her own thoughts, that she did not pay any attention to where she was walking. All at once, she heard something, ahead of her, there in the grass, and stopped.
Jane raised her eyes, and her mouth dropped open all at once. The heavy weight of the rifle slipped from her limp hands, and the stock hit the ground. Slowly, the rifle toppled, falling through the densely packed grass, coming to rest on the ground. There was a moment of complete silence, the only sound the rushing of blood in Jane's ears, sent upward from her frantically pounding heart.
Directly ahead of her, in a circle of smashed-down grass, was the low-built, stout form of a wild pig. The body was like a barrel, the hide thick, the legs stout looking and solid. The hide shook in a sudden spasm, as a fly lighted on it, sending a quiver through the animal. It grunted loudly, and shook its head. The snout was huge, and tubular, with two long, vicious-looking, upturned tusks at the front of the animal's mouth. Its eyes were small and beady, its ears bent and flopping over a thick neck. The odor of the animal was one of sweat, urine, and musk. It stood twenty feet away from Jane, watching her closely.
"Don't... move," came Alexander's voice from behind her. "Don't... move... a... muscle... " came the voice once more.
Jane stood like a statue, and watched the low-built, massive animal before her. She sensed that, in a moment, it was going to make up its mind and charge her.
This is my last moment on earth, came the thought into Jane's mind. This is definitely, truly and finally, the end of my life.
There was a pause, and Jane could feel the breeze across the back of her neck, there in the stillness.
The moments passed, and Jane had, suddenly, the horrible thought that Alexander had turned, run away, and deserted her, making no noise as he departed.
He's run away and left me, Jane thought feverishly. He's left me here to die.
All at once, the air was split by a thunderous roar, and Jane jumped, gasping out loud, her eyes wide. The boar staggered, but stayed on its feet. Jane turned, and looked at Alexander. He was standing stock still, the rifle seeming a part of his body. There was literally no way of telling where man left off and rifle began. As she watched him, he fired twice more, the muzzle of the rifle jumping up sharply as a tongue of flame went out the barrel.
The boar sow staggered, toppling onto its side, its legs short and stiff, its body barrel like and solid.
Jane ran to Alexander, her face drained of color.
"My... my goodness," she gasped, unable to convey the feelings which were like a whirling, rippling tide within her.
Alexander pointed to the grass.
"Get your rifle," he said, his voice even and steady.
Jane turned and went to the edge of the smashed-down grass, retrieving the rifle, and glancing at the boar sow as she picked up the heavy weapon gingerly.
Alexander walked to the side of the animal, flicking a pebble onto its snout. The boar remained still.
"She's dead," he announced to Jane, looking back at the tall girl with the rifle, a wistful expression on his face.
"Poor old girl," Alexander added, under his breath, his eyes traveling over the gaping bullet wounds in the now inert animal. Jane was struck by the note of -- yes, of tenderness -- that he used toward the animal. It was as though they'd known each other for a long while, and had been friends, in some odd, muted sort of way that Jane could not begin to understand.
She shook her head. A strange men, this Alexander. A strange, rather mysterious man.
Jane cleared her throat abruptly, and Alexander looked at her.
"Hadn't we better tell whoever owns this piece of property about what we've done?" Jane murmured.
Alexander nodded his head sadly.
"That," he said slowly, "is the least enjoyable part."
* * *
Some time later, the boar sow disposed of (she would feed two families for a week), Jane and Alexander were retracing their steps to the car.
As she walked along the narrow trail, Jane, who had been solid as a rock all through the incident with the wild pig, suddenly found that she could no longer move under her own steam.
Wobbling slightly, Jane grabbed Alexander's arm, clawing frantically, as he grabbed her shoulders, easing her slowly onto the ground.
"It's a nervous reaction," Alexander said soothingly, as Jane sat down, tears rolling down her cheeks. "It's perfectly natural, just rest for a bit and you'll be all right" Seeing her comfortably settled, Alexander rose up, rubbing his hands on his trousers.
"The surprising thing," he said slowly, "is that you didn't go to pieces just after it happened. Most women would have come apart completely. I don't know a single one that wouldn't, under the circumstances, and considering what you went through."
Somewhat comforted by his words, but still much too wobbly to get to her feet, Jane nodded her bead. She was, for a moment, unable to form words herself, and could only indicate her feelings by slight, feeble gestures.
The whole array of light and color around Jane added to her sense of confusion. The sunlight which fell through the trees overhead was warm, and spotted Jane's blouse like gold coins sprinkled over her -- coins which shifted and swept over the lovely hair and face, the delicate features.
Alexander knelt beside her, and put a hand on her smooth yellow hair, stroking it gently.
Feeling the tears rolling off her cheeks, Jane brushed them away, shaking her head and smiling.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"It's all right," Alexander replied, his voice smooth, making her relax as he put his large, warm, gentle hands on her shoulders. "We'll rest here a bit."
It was not, Jane reflected, a bad spot to rest, really. There was a thick, dry, mossy surface to this part of the trail, and it was in shadow mostly, shielded from the sun by the large, overhanging trees. There was even a slight breeze which filtered, now and then, through the dense green foliage. The spot was, in fact, completely secluded: a stranger could have walked down the trail, not three feet away, and missed them completely.
Jane watched the patches of sunlight dance over the ancient spot, a crazy-quilting of brilliant color over the thick moss, which was smooth as the surface of a billiard table. She stirred restlessly, her head clearing, her senses returning to her slowly so that she could make out the objects around her, and identify them by name. She had never blacked out-come apart -- like that in her adult life. It was, to say the least, a terrifying experience.
Taking a deep breath, Jane closed her eyes, her shoulders sagging.
"Just rest," came the deep, "soothing voice from above her, and Jane looked upward at the face of Alexander. His features were drawn, his face etched with concern. Instantly, Jane was sorry that she'd been rude to him earlier. He was, clearly, protective of her in every way.
And then Jane remembered the central thing -- this new reality -- which had joined them: Alexander had saved her life. There it was. It was not to be avoided, or kidded, about, or swept under the rug. He had, literally, saved her life, less than two hours ago. Jane's eyes widened slightly as the full meaning of that act dawned on her.
How could she ever repay a debt like that?
A sudden rush of wath, of kindness, swept over her as she regarded the figure which towered over her.
He had saved her life.
Jane was silent for a moment, her eyes half shut, her breathing suddenly rapid, gasping, and ragged.
"Is something wrong?" Alexander asked, looking down at Jane steadily. She felt his eyes on her -- on the top button of her blouse, which had been loosened to allow her to breathe.
She took a deep breath.
"No," she said, "nothing."
And then, all at once, without warning, Jane reached up and put her hand on Alexander's face. The touch was so sudden, and so unexpected, that Alexander drew back, touching his chin with his right hand, his eyes full of puzzlement.
Jane's mind was spinning with thoughts, none of which made any clear sense to her at the moment. Only one thing was clear: she was feeling a large, full swelling at her breast an aching feeling of wanting to be comforted, of wanting something which she could not reasonably have. It was a feeling of absolute desolation, and of absolute need.
She reached up once more, and put her hand around the back of Alexander's neck, pulling him down to her suddenly.
His eyes clearing as he understood, suddenly and completely, what it was that Jane wanted, Alexander put a hand on her shoulder suddenly. Jane felt her mind melt out, and could only feel, and feel... and feel.
"Ohhhhhh... Alexander... oh please... God . oh no... oh ..
Her words rushed out in a sudden torrent, and she was caught, babbling, her eyes half closed, her head turning from side to side. Alexander, slowly and tenderly, stretched her on the mossy, soft floor of the jungle, covering her with his body gently.
Jane felt herself relax, the tension of the past few hours draining out of her as she felt the bulk of Alexander, the strength of his embrace.
"Oh no," she whispered, "we shouldn't, really. I mean... "
Then she was silent under the slow, caressing movement of his hands.
Jane had never felt anything like this in her life. With the smooth, dappled light from the tree branches overhead, Jane was warmed and soothed, so that Alexander's hands seemed only a welcome continuation of that warmth. The hands moved slowly, assertively, to Jane's blue blouse, which by now was no longer quite so crisply starched. One by one, the buttons on her blouse came undone, and she felt the cool jungle breeze on her hot skin. The flimsy bra came off in Alexander's huge hands, and the breasts were bared. They were magnificent breasts, full and supple and very, very white against the green back-drop of jungle vines and brush. The aureoles were pink and large, rosy hued and rigid, with tiny bumps around the rim, and freckles spotting the upper half of the conelike fullness. The nipples were taut, rigid protrusions, which poked lustily outward from the fullness around them.
Jane gasped as she felt Alexander's warm, wide mouth descend on her left breast, covering nipple and aureole in one hungry, gulping embrace. The mouth was wet and warm, and sucked gently, puffing at the warm, rigid female flesh.
"Oh, my God," Jane groaned, feeling the warm, insistent mouth which covered her aching flesh with moistness. The sucking became harder, more insistent, as the mouth widened, engulfing a still larger expanse of breast, the tongue and lips puffing strongly and evenly. The sucking went on, and on, until Jane thought that she could certainly stand it no longer -- not a single moment longer.
And then, abruptly, the mouth slid off the nipple, leaving the breast wet and cool in the breeze. Jane's eyes widened as she felt the mouth, insistent on its pleasure, close over her right breast. Alexander moved over her, straddling her firmly, so that there was no space for Jane to move, either to the right or to the left.
Motionless, Jane endured the tender torture of Alexander's mouth, her eyes shut tightly. She moaned out loud, murmuring little piteous cries, her lips swollen, wet, her expression rapt, completely abandoned to the pleasure-giving mouth.
She felt his hands at her waist, loosening the blouse so that it dropped away, baring Jane's magnificent torso to the breeze. Her upper body was well formed, womanly, and very, very pale against the green, mossy backdrop of the jungle floor. She felt his mouth move over her breasts, kissing and licking slowly, so that her whole chest was wet and shining with the evidence of his passion. She shifted herself beneath him, completely straddled and completely dominated by the brawny black man, her hair spread over the jungle floor like a mass of fine, golden seaweed. Jane shut her eyes, feeling the mouth move over shoulders, arms, ribs, stomach, and back to breasts.
She sighed loudly, as she felt the large, capable bands move to her waist. Suddenly, there was a feeling of looseness, as the trousers were drawn down, exposing full, white, womanly thighs and legs. The air was cool on Jane's hot, firm flesh, as she felt the filmy panties begin to descend.
"Oh, oh... " Jane murmured, her eyes half shut, her head lolling to and fro, "oh... "
And then it was as though a dam had burst within her.
"... oh... oh yess... oh fuck me please... fuck me now... hard... I want it now... oh, oh please yes... oh God... oh my God yes... oh please... "
Mindlessly, Jane babbled out her need, as Alexander viciously, savagely moved over her, stripping her down completely, from head to foot, so that soon she was stretched out, bare, on the mossy ground, her thighs wet with passion, the blond clump of loveliness between her legs on fire with need.
Aching for him with every nerve and fibre of her being, Jane jackknifed her legs, opening her thighs to his potent entry. She let out a shrill little cry as her center turned molten, her eyes shut tightly, as she waited, voyaging through every single moment of intense longing, like a mariner on rough, untried seas.
Alexander was naked in a swift, hurried moment, and knelt rampant between Jane's legs. He put both hands on Jane's hips, gripping hard, his hands like a brand on her flesh. Jane groaned loudly at the feel of his hands, and opened her eyes.
Abruptly, her eyes widened so that the whites showed clearly.
Before her was the biggest erection that she had ever seen in her life. It stood like the stump of a swamp tree, spreading outward from broad, strong roots. It was thick, and knobby, like the trunk of a black cypress, and the glans was smooth and wide and murderous looking.
Jane gasped, and felt her stomach tighten abruptly.
"Oh my God," she whispered, her voice breaking in the middle, half from fear and half from excitement Alexander was a great deal of man.
"Oh," Jane murmured, tears forming in her eyes, "oh please be gentle."
Alexander came forward slowly, his hands traveling up Jane's thighs, along her waist, and to her ribs, so that the muscles in her loins trembled with the passage of his broad, powerful fingers. She felt the length of his naked body against hers.
"Oh please be gentle with me, Alexander," she breathed into his broad, knotty neck and shoulders, her hands going around his waist and upward, over his broad, muscular back.
Like tiny white birds, the hands fluttered over the broad expanse of muscle on either side of Alexander's strong spine, caressing and stroking gently.
As she felt the tautness of the muscles, and sensed the power that lay concealed within the huge frame, Jane shuddered. She felt open, exposed, vulnerable -- and suddenly afraid. If this man wanted to, he could literally kill her. Rip her apart with his broad, powerful hands -- or with that massive thing that stood between his legs like the trunk of a tree.
Jane began to tremble visibly, her eyes tightly shut. Whatever she had gotten herself into, it was too late to do anything about it now. You could not go this far, and then deny a man like Alexander. That much she knew for sure. He really would kill her then.
"Oh... please... oh my Lord," she gasped, her head tossing from side to side.
And then, all at once, she felt Alexander's massive hand beneath her buttocks, lifting her up. His other hand was beneath her head, grasping a huge handful of her thick, honey-hued hair. She raised herself up slightly, gasping for breath, completely in the grip of the huge black man who loomed over her like an enormous predatory animal.
And then slowly, completely, she felt him enter her.
And it was not as she had thought it would be. Instead of the brutal thrust she had expected, there came instead a slow spreading of her channel, painful but sweet, a pressure insistent and not to be denied. Jane gasped loudly, her eyes shut, as she felt the unbearably tender entry. Her flesh raw, open, begging to be taken, she felt the slow, potent thrusting of Alexander, and knew for a moment what it might be like to truly belong to him, to be his woman.
"Oh Alexander," she whispered, her eyes shut tightly, "it's so... so nice."
Wordlessly, Alexander plunged to the full extent, embedding himself completely within her, bringing his loins to hers and fusing them there, welding her to him in a single firm, gentle motion of his powerful hips.
Jane paused, suspended in midair, her hips thrust upwards, spitted upon the immensity of him. She felt as though her inner channel, wet and sopping with passion as it was, would burst. Never, in her wildest imaginings, had Jane known that there could be such a feeling as was now coursing through her quivering, suspended body. It was as though a long, electric current of pleasure was emanating from the center of her, where Alexander was embedded firmly. He had, in some odd way, sent a continuous charge of absolute, tingling delight through Jane's whole body, by his penetration of her.
And then, slowly, he withdrew, sending a shudder of pure loss through Jane's loins. She quivered for a moment, the muscles on either side of her belly rippling.
"Oh, Alexander," she whispered from between clenched teeth, "put it back where it belongs, in the name of God."
As though in answer to her frantic pleading, Alexander sent himself through her more firmly now, sliding inward with one full rush, which drew a gasping cry from Jane.
Gripping her firmly with his whole body, Alexander swept over Jane savagely, in one long, pulsating rhythm of hips, legs, shoulders and arms. So complete, so savage, and so abrupt was his possession of her that Jane felt, for a moment, as though she were being lifted off the ground and carried away. She let out tiny, strangled cries as his lovemaking grew more and more intense. Struggling beneath him, and finally finding his rhythm and moving with him, Jane was as delirious as he, wanting desperately to do it right for him.
"Ohhhhhh... Oh. Dear. God... Yesyesyes... ohhhh... oh... ahhhhhh ..." Jane's soft, babbling murmur was a low, gentle accompaniment to the hard, fluid, rhythmic pattern of Alexander's lovemaking " I t s... so... h a r d ..:" she groaned, her voice desperate with need. "It's... so... so... oh!... oh Al... lex... a n... der... har-der... har-der... pleeeze!... Oh Dear God... "
Alexander was so thick, so erect, and Jane had to close her eyes to the feel of his young cock sliding in and out of her. Inside her belly, Alexander's enormous swelling rosied up the walls of her gushing vagina. Their bodies were swinging like a pendulum, with Jane's breasts springing loose, then tight, two white marble globes topped with two taut, ripe, red cherries. The bulging prong had a hydraulic action to it, in and out, in and out, first fast, then slow, then fast again.
His mouth sipped at Jane's hot-tipped nipples, and he rolled his warm tongue around on them, letting low, throaty groans escape against them.
Time and again his sturdy prick spread the folds of white meat, and drove up the warm passage, right up to the thick hilt.
On one particular stroke he withdrew from her and looked down at the honey-soaked cock. Then Jane found herself gurgling again at the wonderful, clutching, mind-blinding sensation as she swarmed the muscles inside around the vibrant, meaty prong.
Alexander banged more ferociously up and into her. Jane's bubbly pussy swallowed it the way an eager mouth would, a buttery inlet stuffed with hard, thick, wild meat.
Heady cries rang out from deep in Jane's throat. "Ahhh, AHHHHHHI AHH!"
Jane spread her breasts wide apart with her own hands and Alexander buried his nose in between them, their strange warmth scorching around his black ears. His lips were crazy with sucking, licking, chewing; their bodies were sweating, salty, yet perfumed.
Suddenly, the pitch of Jane's voice rose, and she shut her eyes tightly.
With one long, plunging movement, Alexander exploded within her. At the same time, to her joyous surprise, Jane felt herself go off the edge of the precipice, into sheer blazing ecstasy.
She let out a low, shrill scream, her thighs banging against his, as she felt him rush into her in a warm, 'sweet, sticky flood. His lurching, surging loins were buttered by the warm, soft fluids of Jane's passion, as she also came to blinding climax, her whole body arching frantically to receive him.
In a moment, their passion spent for now, both sub-sided into a warm bath of rubbing, sweaty, oozing aftermath; sticky sweat and warm, even molten fluids met and coursed together like two frantic, primitive streams of longing.
Her body moist, clinging to the massive black man above her, Jane could only feel, and not think. She felt herself drifting peacefully into a kind of warm, glowing nimbus of pleasure.
"That was... wonderful... " she murmured, rubbing the man's back with her hands, kneading and massaging the hard, rigid muscles she found there. Alexander's rhythm eased, and finally he withdrew completely, and crushed Jane against him.
"Ohhhhhh," Jane breathed happily, "my goodness."
"My goodness indeed," Alexander chuckled softly, going into her once more, this time gently and sweetly.
Jane sighed loudly, her eyes shut, a look of utter, absolute satisfaction on her face.
"It feels so good to have you . . have you in me," she murmured, half embarrassed at this frank telling of her need.
There was a moment of silence, then Alexander spoke: "It's good to be in you," he said softly, smoothly massaging Jane's back, buttocks and legs with his huge, warm hands.
"Soon... soon we'll have to go," Jane said, whispering into his massive neck. "I wish we never had to leave here," she added.
"I wish that too," Alexander said slowly, suddenly gripping her buttocks and seating himself firmly, painfully within her.
"My God, but you're huge," Jane said, wincing with the pain of his entry. "So I'm told," Alexander said softly, his voice full of gentle amusement.
After a brief interlude, Jane and Alexander collected their clothes, got dressed, and proceeded on their way. The drive back to the Ashleys was passed in silence, with one incident only to mark the difference that now existed between the pair: all during the ride, Jane kept her hand placed firmly, knowingly, on the inside of Alexander's right thigh.
CHAPTER SIX
The following morning, Jane found herself being treated to a tour of the club by Frederick. Promptly at eight o'clock, he roused her out of bed and insisted that she dress in something "informal" as he put it.
After a half hour of casual strolling, Jane and Frederick found themselves at the seashore, beside a steep sand dune. It seemed to Jane, in fact, that the purpose of the tour, by a slightly boozed-up Frederick, was to get her to exactly this spot. As they rounded the dune, putting them out of sight of the main house, Frederick suddenly grabbed Jane around the waist, pulling her to him roughly.
"What the... " Jane gasped, blinking her eyes frantically as she felt herself drawn to the man beside her. Frederick was looking very distraught -- and very handsome in a slightly dissipated way. Jane struggled briefly, and then slapped Frederick hard, across the mouth. He staggered backward, his eyes widening suddenly, his fists clenching.
"You're quite the virtuous lady, aren't you?" he gasped, wiping the side of his mouth with the back of his hand.
"That's exactly right," Jane said, turning and walking quickly away, across the beach, not looking back.
As she neared the main house, she saw Madeleine approaching, coming quickly out of the back door. Jane bowed her head, looking at the sand which passed slowly beneath her feet, careful not to look up.
"Have you seen Frederick?" Madeleine asked, glancing at Jane briefly, her eyes full of concern.
"Yes, be... he's behind the dune, over there next to the shoreline."
Not saying anything more, Jane took a few tentative steps in the direction of the main house. She felt a hand on her arm, and looked up. Madeleine's eyes were fixed on hers, and contained more than a hint of suspicion.
"What happened out there?" she asked.
Jane shook her head, and said nothing. Madeleine's eyes narrowed suddenly.
"Did he make a pass at you?"
Jane hesitated for a moment, and then nodded her head.
Madeleine let out a tiny whistle of surprise, and shook her head in an amused fashion.
"Well I'll be damned. Looks as though you made a hit. That old bastard hasn't stepped out of line like that in years. It's literally been years Jane sidestepped Madeleine, slightly stunned at what she'd heard.
"Excuse me," she muttered, going past Madeleine suddenly.
"Jane?"
Jane stopped and looked back, seeing Madeleine small and dark and very pretty against the backdrop of turquoise ocean.
"Just forget this entirely. I'll have a word with Frederick."
Without answering, Jane turned and walked away, her features tightening with concern. Not the least disturbing, she reflected, was the fact that Madeleine had taken the incident so lightly. There was something sinister about Madeleine. Something that did not encourage trust. It was a quality that Jane had discounted, until this moment. Madeleine, Jane reflected with some shock, would, under the proper circumstances, literally be capable of anything.
Jane walked toward the main building, an expression of double concern on her face -- at what had just happened, and, at Madeleine's oddly libertine reaction to it.
Jane's forehead was creased with worry.
"What in the world have I gotten myself into?" she mused, kicking the sand with the tip of her shoe.
The only reply was the distant, mournful calling of the seagulls which clustered near the shore, looking for the tiny fish which lingered there, unaware of danger.
CHAPTER SEVEN
That same afternoon, Jane found her steps turning in the direction of Alexander's tiny apartment, as she wandered over the broad shoreline. She had been more or less on her own since her arrival -- barring Frederick's sudden attack of lust, of course -- and both Madeleine and her husband had been rather reclusive in regard to her. Lacking any other explanation, Jane supposed that they were both a bit embarrassed by the surprise she had shown at Frederick's heavy drinking. Evidently, Madeleine had not prepared Frederick for the fact of Jane's innocence about his drinking, and now they were, within the limits of courtesy, keeping to themselves.
As she neared the small apartment, which bulged like some odd growth from the main house, Jane was oddly relieved at Alexander's presence here. It lent an air of friendliness to the embarrassed silence which permeated the Ashleys' club. As she thought of Alexander, and of what had happened in the jungle, it seemed to her that it had not really happened. And yet it had -- the sore, delightfully painful fact asserted itself every time Jane moved her legs. God, what a man he was. No wonder the girls on the island pursued him so frantically.
Jane put her hand on the door of Alexander's apartment, and knocked softly, three times. At first, she didn't think that anyone was there. As the silence eased onward, amid the tropical sun and breeze, Jane began to feel a bit foolish standing by the door of his room. Almost, she reflected to herself with amusement, like a concubine.
And then all at once the door opened, and there was Alexander. He was standing in a pair of light summer slacks, with a loose, flowing, short-sleeved shirt. The slacks were tan, and the shirt was bright yellow, contrasting brightly with Alexander's ebony-hued arms and face. The muscles on his forearms stood out, rigid and firm, and seemed to dance in the dim light as he opened the door, his hand on the knob.
"Yes?" he said, blinking at Jane appraisingly. Evidently, he had been taking a nap. Jane felt a flurry of apprehension in her stomach.
"I... " she began, and then halted abruptly. "Well, I... "
"Yes? 'What is it?" Jane was in an agony of embarrassment.
"Well, I just... " she began again, and then ground to a halt.
Alexander's eyes gleamed with amusement suddenly.
"I'll tell you one thing," he said softly. "If you don't come in out of the hot sun you'll melt in a hurry."
Jane nodded her head gratefully, and quickly stepped inside, feeling at once the coolness of the small apartment.
"Have a seat," Alexander said, indicating an over-stuffed chair by the wall.
As Jane studied the place, she noticed that it was furnished with male simplicity -- a bed, two chairs, a small writing table, and hard wooden floor with no rug anywhere to be seen. Indeed, it was an almost Spartan simplicity, and bespoke an occupant of great severity, and great strength of character.
Jane noticed that she was sitting in the softest chair in the small room. Directly adjoining the room was a small bathroom and shower.
"Well," Jane said, breathing a great sigh of relief, "it's certainly nice to get out from under that blistering sun."
Alexander walked to the bed, and sat down lightly on its edge, looking at her closely, his expression intent, his eyes shining in the dim light. He was less than six feet away from her, and Jane was overcome by his size. His shoulders seemed to reach the ceiling.
"Is there anything in particular that you wanted?" he growled, his eyebrows raising slightly.
It was, Jane noted, a mock gruffness, and had no hint of real severity in it.
"Well, I... " Jane began, and stammered to a halt, completely mesmerized by Alexander's stare. The silence in the room was unbearable, and still he refused to say a thing. As their eyes met and neither broke the look, both felt that something odd, something beyond the physical attraction, was happening to them.
After what seemed an eternity, Alexander finally spoke: "Do you want love?"
So simple, and yet so elegant, was the question, that Jane was unable to respond for a moment. At last, she opened her mouth to speak. To her extreme embarrassment she could not form words, and could only move her lips. Finally, she was able to croak out one word: "Yes."
And then, like a rushing torrent, the reply came, and was, indeed, an expression of how very much Jane wanted to give herself: "Yes... yes... yes... yes... yes ..." Over and over, like a mystic chant, the word came forth from Jane's swollen, half-parted lips. She closed her eyes, and continued to say the word, as though it were a chant of magic powers.
All at once, her mouth was stopped by Alexander's, and she continued to nod her head, kissing him deeply as he loomed over her. She swayed to and fro, her eyes shut, her head uplifted, her lovely hair falling about her shoulders in a soft cascade, tumbling slowly in the sunlight.
And then Alexander's huge black fist closed on the honeyed yellow hair, pulling Jane's head back slowly, so that her long, slender throat was exposed.
With a tiny, soft moan, she felt his mouth cover her neck, and his lips slide down the soft, pale flesh of her throat.
With a sudden, incredibly powerful movement, Alexander picked the blond, well-proportioned young white woman up, literally lifting her off the chair and throwing her on the bed.
Jane landed with a bounce, her soft, yellow silken dress flying up, revealing long, lovely legs. The dress seemed to float downward in the heavy air, and before the hem of the dress hit her lovely knees, Jane was feeling sensations of another sort.
She shut her eyes and groaned, as Alexander's hands traveled the length of smooth calf, pretty knees, and warm, moist thighs.
"Ohhhh," she sighed, her legs spreading apart slowly, her knees coming up, as the dress slid down to her hips. The large, broad hands swept over Jane's hot, inner thighs, as she wiggled her hips wildly. She felt the bare coolness of her womanhood as it was exposed to the air, and felt also the hard, rubbing grasp of Alexander's fingers as he drew the filmy under-things away, exposing the bushy mat of warm, soft fleece.
"Oh, Alexander," Jane "sobbed, as suddenly, she felt him grip her ankles. Kneeling before her on the bed, Alexander widened the gap between Jane's smooth, white thighs, drawing her pretty ankles over him, one on each shoulder. And now, suddenly, the bend in Jane's knees was resting on the broad, powerful black shoulders, as Alexander swooped downward, toward Jane's moist, quivering center.
Her mouth went open as she felt the strong, smooth lips go to her molten womanhood. Jane shifted her legs, opening herself wildly, frantically, to the seeking mouth.
Like a bolt of flame, she felt the tongue slide through her waiting passage, long and wet and warm.
"Ohhhhh yes!" Jane moaned, as a long, hard shudder went through her lithe, attractive form. She felt raw, raunchy, wanted. Slowly, she began to wiggle her hips, in rhythm with Alexander's working mouth and strong, probing neck. As his caresses became stronger, wetter, and more forceful, Jane's abandon increased. She reached forward, grasping him by the back of the head and drawing him still closer, pulling at the large, pleasure-giving head of Alexander, her moist center seeking his mouth like a soft flower spreading itself to a large, brawny bumble bee.
At last, Jane could contain herself no longer.
"Oh please, Alexander," she babbled, her eyes shut tightly, "do it with me the right way, please."
Alexander, with a single movement, undid Jane's dress and drew it over her head, leaving her completely naked on the bed. At the same time, he was wiggling out of the slacks, unbuttoning the shirt and kicking off his jockey underwear. Jane blinked, a look of utter peace coming over her face.
Alexander was splayed before her on the rumpled 'sheets, filling half the bed, that marvelous limber thing that she loved probing the air before him.
Fascinated, Jane watched as the huge, ponderous organ swayed to and fro, like a great prehistoric animal seeking its prey. She watched in silence as the massive erection grew, and stiffened, and lengthened, expanding powerfully beneath her gaze.
At last, with a tiny whimper, Jane swept forward, taking the hard, rigid manhood in her mouth and loving it with her tongue, lips and teeth. Alexander groaned out loud, as he felt the sharp, sweet bite of the teeth, his face contracting into an expression of agonized pleasure.
"Oh yes, Jane... do it," he groaned, his hip's pistoning slowly in time to Jane's bobbing blond head.
Her eyes closed, Jane could feel only the massive, rigid mouthful which seemed to encompass her whole being. She moaned softly, from the back of her throat, as she sought to take Alexander still further into her. She felt his tip strike the back of her throat, and she gagged slightly, her mouth working frantically.
Suddenly, his whole body stiffened in an agonized movement of buttocks and legs, his mouth dropping open as he let out a loud, full bellow.
Gratefully, Jane felt the warm, copious spending, the fluid washing down her throat in a thick, rich balm of love. Wanting to do it right for him, her heart pounding, Jane sucked furiously at the long, stiffened organ, her eyes shut tightly, her face intent. She worked the length of the thick, hard blackness, 'swallowing furiously.
Alexander moved his hips once, twice, and Jane felt as though she would drown if he did not stop. The long, gliding movements slowed gradually, and Jane, tears streaming down her face, her blond hair tangled and in disarray, embraced Alexander with both arms, her hands finding his buttocks as she drew him to her.
"Oh Alexander, I love you so," she sobbed, not knowing the full meaning of what she was saying, unconscious even of her own deepest feelings.
Slowly, like a great ship sinking, Alexander reclined onto his back, his long, wet, rigid manhood probing the air lustily.
Obediently, Jane swept over his long, heavily muscled form, her hungry mouth seeking every crevice. She kissed his lower legs, his thighs, the hairy insides of the thighs, and finally hips and buttocks, her mouth hungry, seeking. Each kiss was a caress.
Alexander closed his eyes, feeling only the gently lapping tongue and soft lips, his thighs steamy and moist. Soon, the tongue was making its gentle, probing way along his inner thighs. He leaned his head forward, looking down the length of his chest at Jane. She was bent over his loins, her mouth working hungrily, her soft hair spread like sunlight over his black, thick stomach.
"Oh yes, sugar," he groaned, spreading his powerful, thick legs, their expanse black and hairy, with the blond, white woman at his loins. He gripped the sheets to keep from crying out.
Jane was working busily, her mouth at his huge, swollen balls. She licked hungrily, taking first one and then the other into her mouth, and sucking gently. At the gentle pressure, she heard him groan out loud, and was filled with an odd, female delight: she was giving her man pleasure. More than that -- she was driving him out of his mind.
Taking the long, limber erection into her mouth, Jane sucked lustily, dragging the last full measure of good, hot masculine butter from her man.
She sighed, covering his belly with kisses. She laid her head on his lower abdomen, closed her eyes, and smiled. She was at peace.
* * *
An hour later, to Jane's delight, Alexander suggested that they take a trip to the beach for a swim.
Piling out of the tiny apartment, Jane fetched her suit from the house, and together they made a run for the water. As she ran, Jane took in great lungsful of the rich, warm air, her legs long and tawny in the skimpy suit. As she neared the water, Jane could feel the sunlight on her face and arms, and her hair rushed in the warm breeze. Her hair spread out behind her, in long streamers, and blew in the wind like cotton candy at the county fair.
Jane closed her eyes, and laughed out loud, her laughter lost in the rushing wind. And beside her was the tall, lithe, broad-shouldered Alexander. She caught a glimpse of him as he ran, and noted that he looked like a huge, black cat running across the yellow sand. Never in her life had she felt so young, and so alive.
As she went skidding into the water, Jane felt the smooth wetness envelop her, lapping first around her thighs, then around her belly, and finally around her neck.
Her head above water, Jane could see that Alexander was still at chest-level, his muscular body surging forward as he left his feet, cutting the water smoothly.
Jane watched in fascination. He was, she could tell, an excellent swimmer -- much better than she was. His body, black and lithe and beautiful, seemed to move effortlessly through the water, as though propelled by some mysterious force. Alexander knew how to use the water to his advantage, and not work against it. That, plus his incredible strength, made Alexander a surpassingly beautiful sight.
"He swims like a crocodile," she muttered to herself as she watched him, her lips slightly parted.
As he turned, Alexander beckoned to Jane, who shook her head sorrowfully.
"I can't," she yelled, "it's much too deep where you are!"
Alexander laughed, shaking his head, and began to swim forward, toward Jane. At first, she thought that he hadn't heard her. Then, it became hideously apparent that Alexander had heard her, all too well! He was swimming toward her, a wicked gleam in his eye. Terrified, as she finally realized what was on his mind, Jane began to back away suddenly, her hands flailing the water frantically as she back-paddled.
"No! No... " Jane breathed, as she watched his approach.
All at once, in one startling moment, he was upon her.
Jane struggled briefly, and then felt herself being lifted, borne on the water. Her worst fears were realized.
She was being carried out to seal Struggling frantically, Jane was gulping for air, her throat constricting with fear.
Alexander calmed her struggles with a quick, deft movement of his arms.
"Easy," he said, "you're all right. just relax and enjoy the ride."
Jane did relax, and found that she was being carried through the water by Alexander. Never in her life had she encountered someone as strong as this man. He was unbelievable! Jane was traveling through the water in an arc, borne by the man beneath her, her hair wet against her neck and chest. She watched the shoreline as it disappeared, and noticed that the house was disappearing behind a long line of trees. She was being carried along the coast-line, to some destination.
"Alex... Alexander," Jane gasped, noticing how far the shore was now, and how cold the water was becoming.
"Relax," Alexander said, his voice deep and soothing. "We're going to a favorite place of mine."
Jane tried to paddle a bit, but soon gave it up: he was definitely in command of this expedition.
After a time, Alexander began to paddle toward shore, but it was an unfamiliar stretch of beach. Unlike the shoreline near the Ashleys' club, this shore was overgrown with brush, and wild looking. Trees lined the shore, and it looked as though there had been no people there for a long, long time.
"Are you surer Jane gasped, her chin just above the water.
Alexander nodded, and continued to swim for shore.
As they neared the beach, Jane put her feet clown on the sandy bottom, feeling the soft, silty mud on her bare skin. She began to wade to shore, and was guided by Alexander's strong hands around her waist.
Walking over the sand, she saw a strip of grass just beyond the shoreline, and it was there that she guided her steps, with Alexander following close behind.
As she reached the grass, she sat down quickly, soaked, and dripping onto the ground, the water running from her hair in long runnels. She squeezed her hair into a knot, wringing out the sea water, as Alexander, also dripping, knelt beside her.
He put his warm, firm hands on her shoulders, and Jane shivered slightly, closing her eyes.
"It's so -- so cold," she murmured, as a sudden chill went through her lithe, supple form.
Alexander chuckled softly.
"It's the shock of coming out of the water so quickly," he said. "Here. I'll take it away."
And with that, Alexander did indeed proceed to take it away. His warm, firm hands went over the back of Jane's neck, making her shiver slightly, and proceeded down her back. Stroking and rubbing, the hands traveled over Jane's stomach, thighs and legs, making her shudder as new warmth came into her. She closed her eyes as the hands traveled over her powerfully, bringing her to the ground and running the full length of her body.
Stretched upon the grass, the cool breeze from the ocean washing over her, Jane glanced past Alexander at the late-afternoon sunlight. She stirred, and rose up, looking at Alexander dourly.
"Alexander," she said, "we're going to have to be getting back. We should have gotten an earlier start."
With that, Jane rose, and began to shake out her hair.
Uttering an outraged cry, Alexander rose beside her, pushing her down, not too gently, onto the soft grass. Jane looked up at him for a moment, her mouth dropping open slightly. He towered over her like a colossus, his expression angry, outraged, and not to be argued with.
"I didn't swim all this way, with you on my back, to have you go scampering off at a moment's notice, lady. So just stay where you are."
Jane stayed where she was.
Alexander stood over her for a moment, looking down at her menacingly.
"But the Ashleys will think I've... " she began.
"Fuck the Ashleys. The hell with the Ashleys. They'll think you're safe, with me."
Jane's eyes widened.
"You mean... " she began, and closed her mouth abruptly.
"I mean," Alexander said forcefully, "that Madeleine has known about this ever since you arrived here."
Jane's face reddened slightly, and she blinked her eyes angrily.
"By 'this,' I suppose you mean 'us,' " she drawled, her voice loaded with sarcasm.
"That's exactly what I mean."
Jane bit her lip angrily.
"Alexander," she said, "I have never been so humiliated in my life. You mean that Madeleine knew all along, and said nothing?"
"Why should she?" Alexander said cruelly. "I perform this service for all her guests!"
With a tiny cry of rage, Jane rose from the ground, and started for Alexander, her nails red and clawing.
Alexander shoved her down, and looked at her, his eyes level, dangerous. All at once, Jane was afraid.
"I said you were one of the rest -- I didn't say that you were like the rest," he said slowly.
"Oh, go to hell!" Jane sneered.
Reaching down, Alexander hit Jane across the face, hard, sending her swinging away from his out-stretched hand, her hair flying.
"Don't you ever say that to me again," he said, hissing it between his teeth, staring down at the woman who stared back at him defiantly.
And suddenly Alexander was On the grass also, beside Jane, his hands not smooth and caressing any longer, but rough and demanding.
"No... no don't!" Jane pleaded, her eyes brimming with tears of rage. She reached out, slapping him sharply on the cheek. She slapped him with the other hand, and let out a tiny, angry cry.
Alexander laughed harshly, and threw Jane onto the grass roughly, his hands quickly stripping her of the flimsy bathing suit.
All at once, he was over her, his body cruel, demanding. Jane struggled violently, kicking and flailing with arms and legs, sobbing wildly, completely naked.
"You... bastard!" she gasped, gripping his powerful wrists and wrenching herself around, so that he had to use both arms to pin her shoulders to the grass.
"You dirty... filthy, black -- " she gasped, kicking violently outward.
"You... OH!... OH NO!... OOOOOH AAAAAAGH!" Jane shrieked loudly as Alexander thrust himself brutally between her legs, slamming himself into her with a loud THUD.
Pinned and gasping for breath, Jane let out little curses as she tried to close her legs.
But he was too strong for her. Slowly, centimeter by centimeter, Jane felt her thighs opened under his powerful grip, until she was splayed wide, cursing and spitting, her hair in her face. Like a wildcat, Jane fought the muscular black man who ranged over her like a rampant lion.
The struggle was all too brief. With one single, forceful shove, Alexander drove himself to the hilt into the blond white woman beneath him. She let out another piercing shriek, as the form which towered over her took complete possession.
Faster and faster, Alexander drove himself into the unwilling woman, and, in one shattering moment, he climaxed within her, riding her roughly, like a stallion rides a mare, his hands full of her wet, soft hair.
At last, he came to a stop, spending into the suppliant girl who shivered beneath him, her eyes shut.
He settled himself onto her, plunging deeply and forcefully, so that she could not mistake his mood.
Finally, gathering her in his arms, he caressed her softly, running his hands through her hair once, twice, and then flattening her on the grass.
"You... bastard... " she breathed, her eyes half shut, her mouth swollen with his kisses. Her face contorted into an expression of pain as he drove into her once more, then she relaxed as he withdrew and lay on the grass beside her.
"Well," she said, her eyes shut, "I suppose you think you proved your point."
"You're damned right I did, lady!"
Jane was silent for a moment, and then she rose up "suddenly, slapping Alexander, hard, on the face. She subsided, closing her mouth and shutting her eyes.
"Feel better?" he asked, resting his head on his crossed arms and looking at the sky.
"You bet I do," Jane said, her features knit into an angry grimace.
There was a long "silence between the two, the washing of the surf the only sound in the odd, still restlessness of late afternoon.
Finally, Alexander spokes
"I wonder how you'd behave if my skin were white."
Jane looked at him quickly.
"Alexander, that has nothing to do with it," she said decisively, her hardness of expression vanishing as she thought of the events of the last fifteen minutes.
"Don't tell me about it," he said, his weight shifting on the grass as he looked at the white woman beside him.
"I won't tell you a thing," Jane said, looking away from him and wetting her lips with her tongue.
There was another silence, this time filled with an odd tension. As the moments dragged on, Jane felt as though she were being drawn apart, piece by piece. Finally, she spoke: "I just don't see how you can take the attitude you have, when I've done nothing to... "
"The hell you haven't," Alexander said.
"But I haven't," Jane protested.
Alexander looked at her coolly, his eyes reflecting the few white clouds that were to be seen in the blue Haitian sky.
"No, you haven't. Nor have all the other rich, "spoiled white women who come here with their husbands. But they think I'm a beach boy, and they try to use me accordingly. They never say anything."
Sensing the depth of bitterness behind his words, Jane instinctively reached for his hand, which he withdrew.
"I don't see why you have to be so childish about this, really," she protested, blinking back angry tears.
As though struck by a hot iron, Alexander sat bolt upright, and stared down at Jane menacingly.
"I was born in a shanty not five miles from where we're sitting. The only thing I can remember about my childhood is being hungry. When I was eight years old, I found out pretty fast one day that I was black. A white tourist spat on me while I was trying to sell him a newspaper."
Jane listened in silence, as Alexander continued, his voice low, almost casual in its aloofness:
"After that, I smartened up in a hurry. Cheated the tourists any way I could."
Jane stiffened. She had, for a moment, a glimpse of bow she must have looked in these days, seen through Alexander's eyes. She shuddered.
"Alexander, I never meant to... I mean, I didn't "Alexander waved her off.
"Yes, I know you didn't. But that's the way it worked out. That's the way it always works out. But you didn't let me finish."
Jane looked at him for a moment, and pursed her lips. She had committed no crime, she told herself silently, as she watched Alexander begin to speak.
"As I was saying, the tourists were my objective. I used them in many different ways. When I got a bit older, I learned to use the white women -- just as they sought to use me. You can play a woman like a guitar. It's simple, really -- just take care to never mean anything you say. That's the key to it."
Jane, to her embarrassment, felt tears well up in her eyes as she beard him speak.
"And of course, that's all I mean to you, too, isn't it?"
Alexander frowned, and shook his head slowly.
"No," he said, "that's not all you mean to me."
Jane gave a short, bitter laugh.
"Do you expect me to believe that, after what you've just told me?"
"Yes," he said, "I do expect you to believe it."
Jane looked at him for a moment, and suddenly, oddly, she did believe him! In spite of all that she knew, about him and about herself, she really did believe that he was telling her the truth. There was that odd, magnetic attraction which was between them, a tangible presence. She could tell that Alexander felt it, too, Low the way he acted toward her.
Acting out of that attraction -- that terrible, all-pervading magnetism which drew them together, and would not release them -- Alexander reached for Jane's arm, and drew her to him.
"Oh no, no please," Jane whispered, shaking her head.
Alexander drew her to him gently, and kissed her on the mouth, crushing her against him so that she groaned.
Jane shut her eyes, and abandoned herself to the searching, caressing hands. "Now I'm going to fuck you again, lady. And after that, again and again. I'm going to fuck you all afternoon, until you beg me never to stop fucking you, until you can't live a day for the rest of your life without my fucking!"
Much later, the sun down and a warm, tropical night covering the small glen and flat, smooth seashore, Alexander planted a long, lingering kiss on Jane's vague, passion-swollen mouth.
They had dressed, and Alexander had built a small fire, which flickered brightly in the darkness. Jane drew closer to the fire, and shivered slightly.
"It's odd how cool the nights are, considering the days," she said softly.
"Yes," he said, "this fire will help. It's only a short walk back to the house, anyway."
"Alexander?"
The black man looked up, the light shining in his eyes, two flames that darted out of his face at Jane, who stared at him in fascination.
"Yes?"
Jane cleared her throat softly, as though unsure of how to proceed.
"Do you remember what I said to you this afternoon, in your apartment?"
Alexander's face was blank for a moment, and then it changed slightly in recognition.
"You mean about loving me?"
"Yes," Jane said, "that's exactly what I mean. I want you to know that I meant every word of it."
Alexander said nothing, and remained an ebony statue, outlined by the firelight, reclining against the soft grass, propped on an elbow. He looked at Jane appraisingly.
"I think I love you, too," he said finally.
With a sudden, angry gesture, he threw a piece of wood into the fire.
"What can I do about it, though?" he said, his voice rasping with anger. "I can't change this skin, even if I wanted to -- which I don't. And you can't change what and who -- you are."
Jane smiled, looking slightly puzzled.
"And what am I, then?" she asked suddenly.
Alexander gave an angry toss of his head.
"You are a married woman, with children. You are a rich American woman, on a holiday in the Caribbean. That's what you are."
Alexander's voice was deep, mellow, and persuasive. It continued:
"And that's what you'll remain."
Jane shook her head, her expression full of amusement.
"I'm not rich," she said, patting the grass with the flat of her right hand.
Alexander laughed out loud.
'"To me, any American is rich. Compared to what we have, you are all millionaires."
"That may be, but what does it have to do with us?" she asked.
Alexander looked at her across the fire, his gaze unblinking.
"You are being evasive. You know very well that there could never be anything of any lasting value between us," he said. "Because my skin is black, and yours is white."
Jane frowned, and clenched her fists.
"I can't accept that," she said softly.
"You'll have to. That's the way things are. Now get some rest, and we'll be on our way."
Jane reclined on the grass, but kept her eyes open. They were wide, unblinking.
"I'll rest," she said, talking across the fire to the long, rugged shape of Alexander, "but I won't accept what you said."
Alexander did not reply.
As she looked upward, seeing the myriad stars which swept across the black face of the night, tiny points of cold, icy light, Jane was chilled once more, and not by the night air. She was chilled by the fact that she knew, deep within herself, that everything that Alexander had said was true.
She would, she decided, find a way to get around that fact. She would not, if it was humanly possible, surrender him, and what was developing between them now, to the grim clutches of "reality." She simply would not.
"Alexander?" she whispered.
"Hm?"
"I'm going to be staying here longer than two weeks. Do you think Madeleine would object?"
There was a pause.
"No, probably not. You've seen the way things are between her and her husband. She'd probably like the company."
"Would you tell her, Alexander?"
"Be glad to," came the sleepy reply.
Jane smiled. She had, at least, driven a salient into this terrible enemy -- the modem world.
She rolled onto her side, and closed her eyes. In a moment, she was asleep.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Early next morning, Jane awoke to find a note under her door-
Mrs. Morrow:
If you'd like, I can arrange a riding date for you at a local stable. If interested, tell Mrs. Ashley, and she will tell me. Morning is the best time.
Alexander
Filled with excitement, Jane rushed to dress and get to the breakfast table, where Madeleine was seated, halfway through a bowl of cereal.
""Well! The early riser cometh!" Madeleine crowed triumphantly, pulling out a chair for Jane, who seated herself quickly.
"Isn't Frederick here?" Jane asked, nodding to the empty seat.
Madeleine made a sour face, and shook her head.
"No, he's not in condition for breakfast. He has to train for that, you know."
"It seems to me that you're pretty hard on Frederick," Jane said.
"He's pretty hard on me, too -- only you don't see that part of it."
Jane was silent, unsure of how to reply. She decided to change the subject.
"Did Alexander ask you about staying a little longer?" Jane blurted suddenly.
Madeleine smiled knowingly.
"It's perfectly all right with me," she purred.
"Good. I just feel that I'd enjoy the rest."
"You'll also have time to enjoy Alexander."
Jane's pale face reddened slightly.
"You have no right to say that, here. It isn't that way between us."
She nodded her head.
"Of course. Just be sure you don't get too fond of him, that's all."
"What do you mean by that?" Jane asked suddenly. Madeleine shook her head slowly, from side to side.
"Never mind. Just enjoy yourself while you're here."
Jane thought of continuing the argument, and then was silent.
"By the way," Madeleine laid slowly, "did Alexander mention a riding date to you this morning?"
"Why yes, as a matter of fact, he did. Why?"
Madeleine shook her head.
"He won't be able to make it," she said abruptly, her eyes hard and cool and unsympathetic.
"Why not?" Jane asked, her face growing even redder. She was not liking this side of Madeleine at all. Not in the least bit.
"I have other work for him. Other duties. He Ls an employee around here, you know. Not just a midnight swimming companion."
Jane's stomach knotted up at Madeleine's words, but she kept silent, with some effort.
"Now," Madeleine said cheerfully, "how about some breakfast?"
* * *
Later, with Madeleine gone, Jane was sitting at the kitchen table, drinking a second cup of coffee. She lifted the cup to her lips, and drank deeply, putting the cup down with a loud clatter. She pursed her lips.
Madeleine's contemptuous words had stung her beyond measure. Midnight swimming indeed!
But at the back of her mind, there was the knowledge that Madeleine was right. She had, after all, used Alexander for a midnight swimming companion -- not exactly midnight, but it was close enough.
Was she any different from the bored, rich American tourists who used Alexander? Jane shook her head, her eyes narrowing in concentration.
She honestly did not know.
CHAPTER NINE
Exactly one hour after her little "talk" with Jane, Madeleine summoned Alexander to her room, for an audience. She was, she conceded, a bit like the Pope -- her running of this establishment entitled her to a certain deference. Madeleine snorted disgustedly. There was certainly nothing that weakling Frederick could do around here any more. In fact, she was damned if she would concede the slightest thing to him. They had not slept together for years -- Alexander had become her staff of life in that department. Madeleine smiled. "Staff of Life" was it, all right. There was no doubt about that. God, but what a stud that boy was! Lightly, her thoughts turned back to Frederick. That booze-hound. He hadn't done a thing around the club for half a dozen years. And that did not include drinking his head off. And now, to top it all off, there was this Jane Morrow, her "old school chum," panting and fawning around Alexander like the bored, frustrated housewife she was. It had been only for amusement that Madeleine had invited her here in the first place, to get away from that bullying husband of hers. It would be, Madeleine had thought, a welcome relief from the constant round of rich tourists. She smiled suddenly. Now that Alexander was escorting her around, the problem was how to pry her loose from him. The silly goose had obviously fallen in love with him, black as he was.
Slowly, and with a native lack of charity, Madeleine considered the various ways that Jane had made a fool of herself in the past few days. The ways were legion. And now this last this business of falling in love with Alexander and wanting to extend her vacation to be with him.
What a show!
Angrily, Madeleine threw her hairbrush onto her vanity table, and tossed her dark, tightly packed hair on her head, seeing it fly back into place automatically. That, at least, she had done -- she had trained her hair so that it would stay in place with almost no combing.
She drew herself up, and looked at her slender form in the mirror. There was still quite a bit of woman there, she thought to herself with satisfaction. Certainly too much woman for that fool Frederick. He drank so much, he probably wasn't any good in bed any more anyway.
With that thought running through her brain, Madeleine regarded the breasts which peeked through the filmy negligee she wore, her eyes hard, speculative. Yes, she thought to herself, she could match herself against Jane, or any woman, for that matter.
Then came a sly, mocking voice from the back of her mind: Why do you feel the need for Alexander, a black man, if you can capture any white man you please?
A slow, fuming hatred for Alexander began deep within her, rising to the surface slowly, and cascading over her mind like scalding water. She thought of his strength, his slightly mocking expression which he wore like a Halloween mask, his cool, offhand manner with the guests. His blackness.
She despised Alexander, with a force that was steady and implacable.
The thing she despised most about him, she knew, was her own need of him -- and what only he could do for her.
Madeleine picked up the brush, and began to run it through her hair, combing it back with quick, angry tugs, her face sullen, expectant.
And all at once, as though on cue, Alexander came through the door of her bedroom.
"You rang, miss?" he said, his voice loaded with sarcasm. Madeleine looked at him in the mirror, her back to him, her eyebrows raised.
"You aren't the butler, Alexander," she said softly.
"I know," he replied, "I do quite a bit more than that for you."
Madeleine looked at him for a long moment, then continued to brush her hair.
"Do you think that's why I've sent for you?" she asked softly, her expression deceptively pleasant, accommodating.
"Why else?" Alexander drawled, his face filled with the feigned boredom of one who is denied dignity, and knows it.
"You've been seeing quite a bit of little Jane, haven't you?" she purred, her eyes on the broad, square frame which seemed to hover in the mirror before her.
"That's my job -- what you pay me so lavishly for," Alexander replied.
"I don't pay you to fall in love with her."
Alexander's shoulders straightened, his eyes narrowing slightly as he looked at the woman before him. He had never hated her more than at this moment.
"No, you just pay me to make love to your bored, rich friends -- and to you, when that lush of a husband can't cut the mustard any more."
The hair brush clattered onto the vanity, and Madeleine's face reddened.
"SHUT... YOUR... MOUTH," she said, loudly and evenly, so that she could not be misunderstood.
Alexander cocked his head backward involuntarily, looking at Madeleine with a stiff, frozen expression of dread on his face. This woman was a witch -- there was no doubt of it. He remained silent.
"That's better," Madeleine breathed, her attention going back to her hair. She brushed it carefully, evenly, and spoke to him as she did it, emphasizing each complete thought with a quick, vicious little twist of the brush.
"I want you to have nothing to do with her. Do you understand me? I do not want her encouraged any further."
Alexander pursed his lips, his features seeming to draw together as he watched Madeleine brush her hair.
"Am I to ignore her, then?" he asked softly. Madeleine shook her head.
Madeleine shook her head, and continued to stare at him in the mirror.
"I don't care how you do it. Come on, Alexander, you're no amateur at this game -- you know how to turn a woman on and then turn her off again. I've certainly seen you do it enough times, God knows."
"Thank you very much."
"Don't get sarcastic with me, Alexander. If it weren't for me, you'd still be loading freight at the docks."
"As you never tire of reminding me."
Madeleine smiled sweetly.
"Just to keep you in line, my love. Just to keep you in line."
Alexander "stirred, restless in the presence of this woman, eager to be gone.
"Will that be all?"
"Will you do as I said?"
Alexander considered his position for a moment. This woman, no matter how clever, could not keep track of his affair with Jane Morrow. There weren't that many hours in the day. And, now that he was on his guard, he would be careful to conceal Jane's feeling from Madeleine. It would be tricky, but he could do it. Inwardly, Alexander smiled. Madeleine, without knowing it, had committed a grave strategic blunder by telling him of her jealousy this way. She was vicious, but she was not very smart, really. That, Alexander knew, was his only real advantage in this game -- be could outwit her any time he wished. And suddenly it had become very important to him that he win. This Jane Morrow was not like the others. She had a kind of quiet dignity about her that the loud, coarse, rich women who usually frequented Madeleine's club lacked completely. She was, though Alexander was a bit ill-at-ease with the term, a lady.
"Yes. I'll do as you said," Alexander replied to this woman before him, whom he considered less than dirt.
Madeleine smiled.
"That's better. That's much better. Now, when I've finished combing my hair, we'll have a drink."
Inwardly, Alexander shuddered. He knew what "a drink" meant, all right. He had been around Madeleine for a long time now, and fed her appetites in an obliging sort of way. Abruptly, Alexander found that he did not want to play the game any more -- not with this spoiled, vicious white woman, who had been his "boss lady" four years now, since he was seventeen years old.
"Thanks anyway," he Said, moving toward the door. "I'll pass it up."
"No you won't," came the reply, soft as the idle rattle of a snake's warning.
Alexander stood still for a moment, looking at the woman who faced the mirror. Slowly, Madeleine got up, and turned around, facing Alexander.
"My hair is finished," she announced, loosing the fastenings of the negligee slowly, with delicate movements of her long, red-nailed fingers. "Now muss it up for me, Alexander."
The filmy negligee, soft as down, dropped to the floor, and Madeleine stood before Alexander, naked. He watched her, fascinated, as she moved across the length of the bedroom, her hips swinging lithely, her legs powerful.
She was, Alexander had to admit, an attractive woman. Her body, though small, was compactly built, her breasts wide and large, her hips and legs full, without being chunky. Her waist was narrow, her buttocks small and athletic. Her close-cropped dark hair outlined her oval face, making the features stand out, with firm chin and full lips, her eyes seeming to glow, rich and brown and full of cunning.
As she advanced, Alexander inhaled deeply, trying to hide his already well-advanced arousal. They had both committed themselves in an odd, covert way -- he with his very presence here, and she with her provocative actions.
Aggressively, demandingly, Madeleine joined with Alexander, her mouth seeking his, her body pressing against his. At once, her fingers were busy, seeking him out, and drawing off first his shirt, and then his loose-fitting trousers. Alexander gasped slightly as the long, cool fingers of Madeleine's right hand closed on the hard flesh of his manhood. The nails were sharp, and bit into the immensity of the stirring erection painfully, so that he winced.
"You going... to rape me?" Alexander gasped, his eyes only half amused by Madeleine's stroking of his member. The sharp nails made long lines in his flesh, drawing him to full arousal quickly, painfully.
"Not a bad idea," Madeleine purred, stripping him of his last vestiges of clothing.
His passion rising, Alexander felt the old, familiar woman-hunger mount up, from the base of his belly, stirring his loins powerfully. He gripped Madeleine with real ferocity, his mouth as hungry, as seeking, as hers. He drew her to the wide, soft bed which had become so familiar to them both, tossing her onto it carelessly, as though she were a feather. Ranging over her, Alexander reached out to grasp a handful of her hair.
And then, like a tawny, female wrestler, Madeleine slipped from his grasp, sliding from beneath him and pushing at his arms and legs powerfully.
"On your back," she rasped, her pupils dilated, her hair in her face, like a wire brush over her eyebrows.
Alexander groaned loudly, rolling onto his back slowly. He sighed. She wanted it this way again. He gritted his teeth, looking up at the smiling Madeleine. There was something about this manner of lovemaking that grated on his nerves, and well she knew ft. He could see it in her eyes as she assumed the dominant position, her face flushed, her features creased with passion.
"You won't have it any other way, will you?" he rasped, his voice heavy with lust.
"No," Madeleine replied succinctly, straddling him and gripping his loins with her smooth, muscular thighs.
Alexander waited for a moment, until she was suspended above him, her thighs parted, warm and wet. Madeleine shut her eyes.
"Oh, go ahead," she pleaded, "put it right through me!"
Alexander obliged. At the exact moment of her greatest need, he drove himself upward, brutally, with a blow that would have split a plank. Their loins smashed together, and Madeleine emitted a long, shrill cry at the pain of his sudden entry.
Alexander heard the thin, piercing wail, and smiled. He had hurt her -- he could, at least, have that satisfaction.
* * *
At the exact moment that Alexander was enjoying his slender triumph over Madeleine, Jane was walking quietly down the carpeted hallway, her eyes downcast. As she neared Madeleine's room, the solid determination to talk to her hostess welled up in her. She would explain what had happened between her and Alexander, and try to make Madeleine understand. It was not a cheap affair between a bored tourist and an islander. She would make Madeleine see that, if it killed her. The conversation this morning between them had been unbearably nasty, and she would do what she could to mend a few fences.
Putting her hand on the door knob, Jane turned it slowly, and opened the door wide, preparing herself for the job of convincing Madeleine of her good intentions.
The sight which met her eyes caused her to close the door quickly, her eyes bugging out, her breath choking in her throat. She opened the door a bit, peeking through the narrow space carefully, unable to believe what she was witnessing.
On the bed, Madeleine was astride Alexander, resting atop him as though to balance on the union of their loins. His legs joined, Alexander was driving upward, moving his huge, wet trunk of an erection into Madeleine. He gave short gasps with each upward movement, his face contorted with urgency.
Madeleine, her thighs streaming with the hot, wet evidence of her passion, was bobbing atop Alexander like a tiny boat on a rough ocean. Her head flew from side to side, her arms making tiny, helpless gestures as she rose over him like a lithe, prehensile animal. Her sobbing was loud in the room, her babbled words incoherent as she rose upward, then downward, borne in the air by the long, muscular, coiled spring of a body which was Alexander. With a long, rocking motion, he rose upward, bearing her with him, then bringing her down sharply, cruelly, and piercing her to the quick as their sopping loins met with a loud SMACK.
Madeleine's voice was rough, demanding, and Jane was gripped with nausea as she watched the thick, steaming union of their loins, the visible evidence of their passion, unfold itself on the bed, joining and re-joining incessantly.
Jane's hand gripped the doorknob, the knuckles whitening, as she watched the scene unfold itself before her eyes.
Madeleine's full breasts shook wildly, her buttocks quivering, as she descended once more onto the hard, rifling manhood which possessed her very being. Her eyes were wild, delirious, as a thin film of shiny perspiration covered her lithe, finely muscled body. Now, tiny sobs of agony were escaping her swollen lips, as Alexander's movements became more urgent, his demands more savage and incessant. It was as though they were both mountain climbers, laboring to the summit after a long, hard climb.
With a great shout, Alexander pulled himself into her fiercely, spending hard, driving his seed deep into her loins. At the same time, Madeleine shrieked loudly, and began to buck furiously upon him, like a wild, frantic mare.
After a moment, spent, both Madeleine and Alexander collapsed onto the bed, lying motionless, as though dead.
Physically sick, Jane shut the door to Madeleine's bedroom carefully, finding her way somehow down the hallway to her room.
As she walked, her mind was a whirlwind of feeling, of thought, of impulse. Hatred for Madeleine, distrust and contempt for Alexander, pity for Frederick, the cuckolded husband. And most of all, a searing, burning disappointment in Alexander.
Jane went into her room, slamming the door behind her so that it made a BANG down the silent, carpeted hallway.
CHAPTER TEN
As night fell, Jane found that her mood of fury at Alexander had not waned. In fact, it was stronger than ever. Sitting on the terrace which fronted the club, she played idly with a bourbon and water, which was rapidly becoming water and bourbon, and watched the cool, green lawn against the flame-red sunset. The sun had disappeared only a moment before, and now a cool breeze swept across the well-cared-for grass, coming from the line of trees on the horizon. The distant call of a jungle bird split the stillness abruptly, as the sound of a cricket began near the side of the house. Over the scene, the sky seemed to draw the flame from the distant horizon, bringing it out in long, golden strands, cloud-by-cloud, across the expanse of gathering night.
In light yellow dress, crisp and clean, with fresh nylons, Jane relaxed in the soft, cool confines of the camp chair, her eyes heavy-lidded. The glass set on a small table beside the chair, she stretched luxuriously, her long legs lovely in the light from the dying sun. Jane yawned, feeling drowsy and supple and ready for bed.
On the inside, she was not relaxed at all. A molten ball of hate for Alexander, and for what she had seen him doing earlier in the day, burned in Jane's stomach.
How could he have been so unfeeling? Talking to her as he had, even telling her of his love for her, and then going right ahead and doing that!
A brief replay of the scene Jane had witnessed went through her mind. On the screen which she kept inside her head, she saw once more the passion-wracked figure of Madeleine. And beneath her, driving upward relentlessly with his massive sex, the suppliant Alexander. The scene flickered, and faded from Jane's mind. She took a quick, angry sip of her drink, and put the glass back on the table.
Probably, Alexander and Madeleine had joked with each other later, about Jane's foolishness in falling in love with him. They had probably had a good laugh about it.
Jane took another sip of her drink, swallowing the watery whisky quickly, as though to erase the memory of the morning. The door opened slowly, and Jane turned, looking at Frederick, who was just coming out of the house onto the terrace. The terrace was screened, and the red sunset cast a mesh of shadows, bloody looking, a patchwork of scarlet cut by black lines, across the worn, seamy face of Frederick Ashley.
"God damn that nigger!" he said abruptly, his voice raspy and rough from too much drinking over too short a space of time.
"What?" Jane gasped, taken aback by his coarse, insistent crudity of tone and expression. "What did you say?"
Frederick shook his head angrily.
"That nigger Alexander," Frederick rasped, "has taken off without getting a fresh supply of whisky. Probably off with that nigger wench of his."
"I wish you wouldn't use that expression, Mr. Ashley," Jane replied, taking another sip of her drink. Already, this man's presence was annoying her, making her uneasy. She wished that he would go back into the house -- and the sooner the better.
"What expression, in the name of God?" Frederick blustered, giving Jane a drunken, accusing stare. Jane did not reply.
"You mean nig... "
"I wish you would just go inside, Mr. Ashley. You've had too much to drink."
Frederick Ashley stared at Jane for an uncomfortably long time, as a silence fell between them. Finally, he broke the silence abruptly: "Been talking to Madeleine, eh?"
Jane did not reply.
"Well let me tell you something, my dear girl," Frederick began, ignoring her silence. "My little wife is a little bitch."
Frederick staggered drunkenly, his eyes going blank for a moment, then refocusing.
"Yessir," he lisped, "a scalding little bitch, is my wife!"
In spite of herself, Jane found herself in sympathy with the man before her. The more she learned of Madeleine's real nature, the more sorry for him she became. Being married to her was, probably, a hell on earth -- that might even be what had started him on the bottle.
With that cheerful thought in her bead, Jane watched the man before her as he stumbled against the door, waving an arm at her in an odd gesture of warning.
"I," he lisped, "am a prophet, my dear. I solemnly prophesy ..
Losing his train of thought for a moment, Frederick faltered, his hand wiping his mouth.
"I solm... ly... predict, that you will run afoul of her."
Jane, fascinated, continued to regard Frederick in silence.
"The way I did!" he finished triumphantly. Jane shook her head.
"Mr. Ashley, I really don't see what this has to do with... "
"With you?" he finished for her, blowing a strong breath of whisky in Jane's face. She drew back instinctively, away from the whisky breath, thinking for a moment of the drunk in the plane who had propositioned her so crudely, a few days ago, in San Francisco. Jane frowned. Had it only been a few days? It seemed that she had been here, at this spot on the earth, all of her life.
"What has it to do with you? Nothing directly, my dear girl."
Frederick wheeled dramatically, his index finger jabbing the air before him.
"But mark me in this, miss Jane. One day, Frederick will get enough. Do you hear me? One of these days, old Frederick will get enough, and blow little Madeleine's head off. I didn't serve in the Royal Marines for five years for nothing, my dear. Believe it."
Jane shuddered. There was something hard, and rugged, in the way Frederick had made the threat -- as though a former self, a self buried by years of drinking and neglect, had suddenly come to the surface and spoken to her. It was that former self which she had just seem emerge from Frederick, which chilled her to the marrow of her bones. She looked at Frederick for a moment, with veiled respect.
In this time, in the years before the advent of Madeleine into his life, he must have been quite a man indeed.
"I think you'd better go back inside, Mr. Ashley," Jane said, not unkindly.
Frederick nodded his head.
"Of course, my dear," he mumbled, "sorry to be rude -- must have spoiled your evening."
"Nothing of the sort," Jane lied, smiling at the aging drunk who, backing to the door, found the knob with his open hand. He turned, going back inside the house abruptly, his shoulders bent.
Jane turned away, picking up her drink and then setting it down again abruptly. A sour knot had formed in her stomach, and she could not have finished the drink if her life had depended on it. Abruptly, she opened the screen door and walked outside, savoring the night air, breathing deeply. To her grateful surprise, Jane found that she felt better immediately. She decided to take a walk, alone, around the grounds.
Stepping briskly, Jane felt the air like smooth liquid against her face, the night breeze rustling her skirts and lifting her hair in a soft, downy veil around her pretty face.
As she rounded the side of the house, Jane halted abruptly.
In front of her, standing in the gathering darkness of the deep green lawn, was Alexander. He cleared his throat.
"I'd like to take you to a festival tomorrow evening," he began, the wind ruffling his white shirt, contrasting with light blue, tight-fitting pants.
Jane was puzzled, and a bit uneasy. His sudden appearance had startled her, and left her at a loss as to bow to act toward him. Should she be aloof? Or should she be angry?
"I would think," Jane began, "that Madeleine might have some further use of your services tomorrow."
Alexander's eyes widened slightly, and he took a step backward involuntarily.
"I mean," Jane continued, "what if Madeleine decides that she needs you here -- the way she obviously needed you this morning."
Alexander cleared his throat.
"If you're going to judge me on that basis, let's just forget the whole thing. I work for Madeleine, you know -- that means that she signs the checks. If you don't like what I do, then clear the hell out. But don't come whining to me when you get an eyeful."
With that, Alexander turned and walked across the grass, soundlessly padding, like a huge, lithe cat.
A spasm of remorse clutched at Jane's stomach, and she waved her hand frantically.
"Alexander? ALEXANDER? COME BACK... PLEASE!"
Her voice sounded plaintive across the evening silence, and for a moment she wondered if he had heard. Then, he turned slowly, and looked back.
"Yes?" he said, his voice rumbling across the grass like a low roll of thunder. He did not take a step in Jane's direction.
"Alexander, I... I'll come!" Jane blurted. "Where shall I meet you?"
"Come to my room at seven," he called over his shoulder, striding away powerfully, not looking back.
Jane turned and retraced her steps, back to the house, and to the safety of her room -- which, after the scene which had just played itself out, was very warm and inviting indeed.
* * *
Two hours later, showered and in bed, a book on her lap, Jane heard a knock at her door.
Getting out of bed slowly, and putting on her houserobe, Jane went to the door and opened it.
Standing before her was what looked like an apparition from another world. An old woman, bent and worn, dressed in a long, flowing robe of some light material, stood before her. Her face was black as mid-night, her nose bent sharply in a hook, her cheekbones high and prominent, her cheeks sunken. Her eyes seemed to be on fire with tiny points of red light. A fiery quality to the irises made the pupils seem pinpoints in the dim hallway.
"Hello," the old woman croaked, "I'm Mama Lu. May I come in?"
An odd, hypnotic quality to the woman's gaze made Jane go backward, almost involuntarily, and open the door wide.
"Yes," she gasped, "I suppose so. Yes, of course. Come in."
Mama Lu made her way into the small apartment, nodding her head and cooing softly as she noticed the elegant furniture in the room.
"Mrs. Ashley is an elegant hostess, isn't she?" said Mama Lu softly. The voice, though rather harsh, was oddly lilting, and full of a strange power.
The eyes were keen, and inquisitive, full of a strange power that made Jane somehow uneasy. She stirred herself as a chill passed through her, and looked at the ancient bent woman inquiringly.
"Is there anything I can do for your Jane said softly.
Mama Lu nodded, grinning in sudden recognition. Jane was startled to see a lovely, even row of teeth in the old woman's mouth. They were strong, and shiny. Jane guessed that this woman had never had a day's dental work in her life -- which must have encompassed at least sixty years.
"Of course," she acknowledged, "you must be wondering at the reason for my visit."
There was a sudden, slightly awkward pause.
"The reason I have come is simple. You have perhaps heard of my daughter Odetta?"
Jane shook her head, and Mama Lu frowned suddenly.
"You mean that Alexander has not mentioned her to you?"
Jane shook her head, her eyes widening slightly.
"You know Alexander?" she asked softly, and the old woman laughed out loud.
"I was midwife at his birth," she replied. "He is a good friend of my daughter. They were raised together, side by side."
"Oh, I see," Jane said softly, averting her eyes from the old woman for a moment.
Why hadn't Alexander told her this? And why was she hearing it, now, from this woman?
"Odetta," Mama Lu continued, "is having a festival at a village near here. The planting season approaches rapidly, and every year, a festival of fertility is given. Last year, it was I who organized it. But, now, I find that I am too old, and have lost too much strength. And so my daughter carries on the tradition for me." Mama Lu chuckled softly, and then was silent.
While he had been speaking, Alexander's invitation earlier in the evening flashed through Jane's mind.
So that was the reason for the invitation! Alexander's native girl was giving a party! Jane's face reddened slightly.
"I'm sorry, Mama Lu," Jane said, "but if this is an invitation, I'm afraid I'll have to decline. And you might tell Alexander the same thing when you see him."
Suddenly, Mama Lu put a withered hand on Jane's arm.
"Do not be jealous of Odetta," Mama Lu said softly, "for she has been out of his life for a long time. He will never take her for his wife. I have known that for a long time."
Jane started to speak, but the older woman waved her off.
"That is what you were thinking, wasn't it?" the old woman crooned.
Jane smiled, in spite of herself.
"You are perceptive," she said softly.
Mama Lu chuckled, squeezing Jane's arm.
"Alexander thinks a great deal of you. Otherwise, he would not have invited you to come. Do you regard him highly?"
Jane gave a barely perceptible nod of her head.
Mama Lu smiled, and an odd process of analysis, of measuring, seemed to be going on behind the old, bright eyes.
"Yes, I believe that you do," she murmured, her hand squeezing Jane's arm briskly.
Jane smiled abruptly.
"You have a good use of the English language, Mama Lu," she said, as the older woman nodded brightly.
"Yes I do. And now, I must ask you if you want Alexander to love you, in return."
After a moment's hesitation, Jane nodded her head.
Mama Lu smiled once more, and spoke: "I have prepared a special mixture -- a drink which you will give Alexander tomorrow evening. It will make him love you."
"And what am I to do for you in return?" Jane asked, only half believing what the woman had said about the potion.
Mama Lu shook her head.
"Nothing for me. I am much too old to make bargains with young American women. just make sure that you are worthy of his love, when you receive it."
Jane nodded her head.
"Yes, of course. Incidentally, how will I receive this -- er, this drink?"
"I will give it to you, saying the words, `May luck and health stay by you.' When you hear that from me, you will know that the drink is in your hands."
Feeling a bit odd, Jane nodded her head. "Is the drink's effect permanent? Will he love me forever?"
Mama Lu nodded her head.
"Forever."
"What if it doesn't work?"
"It will work. You can only break the spell by betraying his love with another man. In that case, Alexander will die." With that, Mama Lu moved toward the door slowly, her walk a bit unsteady. She seemed to have a slight limp.
As she opened the door, she looked back at Jane, and smiled sweetly.
"I'll see you tomorrow," she whispered, closing the door behind her softly.
Jane, alone in the silence of her room, thought about the odd visitor she had just received. It was, she knew, no accident that Mama Lu knew where to find her. There was something strange, almost mystical, about that woman. Even now, it was hard for Jane to believe that she had actually been in the room. She seemed to exist in another world, this old woman -- a world just slightly removed from the real one.
Jane shook her head, as though to clear it. There was one thing that was certain, she thought to herself, sitting on the edge of the bed in the empty room:
Tomorrow was going to be one hell of an interesting evening.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The following evening, Jane arrived promptly at Alexander's room, and the two, at seven sharp, left for the neighboring village in the Ashley's jeep.
The road was bumpy, but Alexander was an excellent driver, and there was little Jane could find to criticize in his treatment of her. She was, she found, still a bit miffed about the incident with Madeleine, and could not keep it out of her manner, or her speech. Still, knowing Madeleine much better now, she could well understand how Alexander had been coerced into bed.
Jane smiled. There had, probably, been precious little persuading on Madeleine's part -- she was, after all, an attractive woman. And she would be more than happy to have the huge black man within her power -- physically as well as economically.
Turning her mind from Madeleine, Jane looked at Alexander, who was ruggedly handsome as he sat beside her in the front seat of the jeep.
"Alexander?"
"Yes?"
"How much longer till we get there?"
Alexander smiled, turning to Jane, his eyes darting from the road to her, and back to the road.
"Not long. Are you in a hurry?"
Jane looked at the rows of shanties, and at the half-naked children running beside the jeep, like lithe young panthers, dancing in the headlights and jumping out of the way.
"I'm always in a hurry to get away from poverty," she said, indicating the shanties with a nod of her head. Alexander looked at her for a moment, then back at the road.
"This is where I grew up -- right along here," he said, his voice rising above the sound of the jeep's engine.
"Must have been ghastly," Jane said, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye.
"Not so bad -- not like you rich Americans, of course."
"Ouch!"
Alexander grinned. "Does the truth hurt?"
Jane said nothing, but continued to watch the shanties which zipped along the roadway.
"Has it always been like this?" she said.
Alexander nodded.
"Always."
Jane was silent for the rest of the ride.
As the jeep rolled into the dark main street, the village seemed deserted, except for a ragtag of roosters and hens by a small, half-ruined hut in the center of the road.
"Mama Lu used to live there, when I was a little boy," Alexander whispered, his voice a low murmur in the darkness. "She was a young woman then."
"Like Odetta is now?" Jane whispered back.
Alexander did not answer, but instead kept his eyes on the road. The jeep slowed as it drove just past the village, stopping with a sudden creaking sound.
Both Jane and Alexander listened, their breathing soft Across the grassy expanse of field, the sound of drums could be heard, steady and insistent, and a small fire could be detected through the tightly clustered grove of trees.
"The festival," Alexander said, nodding at the trees.
Suddenly, Jane was filled with doubt. It cloyed her stomach, a delicate nausea which she could find no relief for, except in questioning Alexander further.
"Do you really think I should have come along?" she asked softly.
"You're my guest," Alexander replied, just as softly, getting out of the jeep and going around to Jane's side. He opened the door and let her out, guiding her by the arm down a narrow path, toward the grove of trees in the distance.
As she walked, Jane's mind was a flurry of impulses, many of which she did not understand. There was, of course, no reason to be afraid, since Alexander was with her now. On the other hand, there was no telling what she might witness in the clearing, or what the evening might bring. She thought of Mama Lu, and the "potion" she had prepared.
Jane smiled. The old woman was, clearly, senile. There could be no doubt of that. Love potion indeed. Jane had, of course, joked her along, to get her out of the room. But there could be no possibility of the "potion's" being effective.
Could there?
Jane's first impulse was to believe the old woman, of course. But the years of living in an "enlightened" society had bred out of her any capacity for belief in such things.
There were no herbs or spices which could make a man fall in love, unfortunately. With that thought in mind, Jane let herself be guided along the path, her eyes on the grove of trees ahead.
As they neared, she noticed that the trees cast shadows into the darkened field, which waved across her and Alexander like ghostly forms dancing in the firelight.
Alexander took her hand, and together they entered the grove of trees, coming into the clearing abruptly.
Around the blazing fire, a small circle of people were sitting, their skins ebony, reflecting the firelight which flickered in their eyes as they looked at Jane and Alexander.
"Welcome!"
The voice was that of Mama Lu, and carried across the blazing fire, loud and throaty and resonant.
"Good evening, Mama Lu!" Alexander exclaimed, acknowledging her with a nod of his massive head.
Jane separated herself from Alexander and walked across the open space to Mama Lu. As she passed, she noticed a circle of men in the shadows, around the edge of the clearing, covering its circumference. They had drums before them, and were pounding out a steady, insistent rhythm.
Mama Lu came forward to meet Jane, and held out a cup for her.
"May luck and health stay by you," the old woman intoned, nodding eagerly, her eyes darting to Alexander, then back to Jane. Mama Lu's eyes were bright and shining in the firelight.
"Thank you, Mama Lu," Jane whispered, a merry gleam in her eye.
With that, Jane turned and walked back to Alexander, who was in the process of taking off his shirt. His broad chest shone in the firelight, his features standing out, his legs like pillars.
Jane came forward, handing them the cup, which he took.
"Drink," Jane said, feeling a bit odd as she said it.
A bit doubtfully, Alexander raised the cup to his mouth, and drank. Draining the cup to the dregs, he gave Jane back the tiny vessel, blinking his huge eyes once, twice.
"What is it?" he asked. "Never tasted anything remotely like it before."
Jane smiled, and shook her head.
"You'll not know from me," she said softly, as he took her by the hand and guided her to a spot in the circle.
Sitting down, Jane looked around the circle of faces, her eyes passing first to one, and then to the other.
"What happens now?" she asked, shaking her head slowly.
"Watch and see," Alexander replied, fixing his eye's on the center of the circle of drums.
Suddenly, from a section of the clearing just beyond the blazing fire, appeared a tawny, black, lithe form in very brief top and bottom.
Jane looked closely, and saw that it was a young girl -- probably Odetta.
The girl flung herself outward, toward the fire, until it seemed to Jane that she would topple into it. Jane let out a little cry, as the girl swayed backward, just short of the flames.
With that, the drums rose in pitch and cadence, seeming to send out invisible arms which caught and held the lithe, voluptuous girl in their grasp. Odetta writhed and jumped, her breasts shaking, as, slowly, she went around the circle of men. Jane felt oddly out of place, her white skin shining like a beacon in the dimness of the surrounding night.
At last, Odetta stopped, directly in front of Alexander, her body moving in a jumble of quick, jerking movements, her eyes glazed. Backing up slowly, she put herself on full display by the roaring fire, her arms reaching out, seeking Alexander, who was sitting on the hard earth, staring intently at the girl before him.
Odetta was, by the symbolic ritual of the dance, offering herself to Alexander. Acid entered Jane.
Abruptly, Jane punched Alexander on the shoulder, her voice a barely concealed whisper.
"Let's go," she whispered, but Alexander shook his head vigorously.
"It's too early," he whispered back, "and besides, Mama Lu would never forgive me."
And so, for the next fifteen minutes, Jane was treated to the sight of Odetta offering herself to Alexander. At the end of the dance, exhausted, Odetta leaned her sweat-shining upper body toward the fire, suddenly removing the upper part of her flimsy covering.
Her great breasts heaved and shuddered, shaking savagely in Alexander's direction. Alexander smiled at the offered loveliness, and laughed out loud as Odetta fled from the firesite, her dance completed. Jane was finding herself, steadily, more and more uncomfortable.
All at once, she noticed that bowls of liquid were being passed around the circle of men and women. Alexander, his eyes hazing, put a hand to his fore-head, and closed his eyes.
"Not feeling well, Alexander?" Jane whispered, leaning toward him in the half-light of the fire.
"I'll be all right," he said, taking a cup and passing it to Jane. "None for me," be added quickly, "I've got a bad stomach."
All at once, Jane was filled with anxiety. Had she made a mistake in giving Mama Lu's potion to Alexander?
A thrill of apprehension went down Jane's back. What if the "potion" turned out to be poison? Jane cast a quick look at Mama Lu, and then looked away. She might have poisoned Alexander unknowingly.
To Jane's immense relief, Alexander's condition did not worsen. In fact, he began to sip on the remains of Jane's drink, few moments after his refusing the other cup of the gritty, pungent liquid.
He looked at her for a moment, and nodded in the direction of Odetta's flight.
"Did you like the dance?" he asked, his right eye-brow raised, his expression slightly amused.
"Yes, of course I did," Jane murmured, averting her eyes from Alexander's for a moment.
"I'll bet," Alexander chuckled.
"Do you think I'm jealous of Odetta?" Jane asked softly.
"Yes."
Jane smiled. `"Well, perhaps I am, in a way. After all, you've known her all your life -- and you've only known me for a few days."
As the drinks passed around the circle, Jane felt herself becoming more and more relaxed. The pungency of the drink, at first annoying, after a time became delightful. She found that the drinks had a soothing effect upon her and that, after a time, she no longer noticed where one drink began and the other drink left off.
Finally, Jane was feeling the full effect of a half hour of steady imbibing, and was noticing also that Alexander seemed unaffected by his steady indulging in the rough, coarse beverage.
Suddenly, Jane leaned forward, and looked at Alexander dolefully, her long hair falling about her shoulders.
"Do you desire me, Alexander?" she asked softly, a feeling of disbelief spreading through her at her words. Jane could not believe her boldness.
"I don't know," Alexander said, a twinkle in his eye. "Why don't you try me and find out?"
Suddenly, Jane was on her feet.
She jumped into the middle of the circle of drums, her hair flying wildly, her eyes blazing. Immediately, she stripped herself of her clothes, and began a throbbing, wild dance of such passionate intensity that the crowd of onlookers gasped in amazement.
As the drums beat faster, Jane felt herself losing control of her impulses, as the ancient, primitive lust of the natural woman overtook her. It was as though she were caught up in a hurricane of feeling over which she had absolutely no control whatever. Her eyes glazing, she felt herself melt into the feeling of the moment -- each movement was an expression of desire, each swaying of the hips an incredible gesture of longing. It was a dance of hunger which Jane executed, and it was directed at Alexander. As she moved, her generous breasts shook passionately, her willowy thighs flexing wildly to the rhythm of the drums. At last, the dance finished, Jane subsided, to the appreciative hoots of the audience -- which was mostly male.
Alexander smiled, seeing Jane fetch her clothing self-consciously and put it on.
"That," he said evenly, "was quite a performance."
"A lot you seemed to notice! You looked like you enjoyed Odetta's `performance' much better!"
Alexander shrugged his shoulders. "I enjoyed them both."
"Oh!" Jane exulted. "A politician!"
Alexander glanced at Jane speculatively.
"I don't play politics."
Jane snorted disgustedly.
"You were supposed to react passionately' At least, that's what Mama Lu promised!"
Alexander grabbed Jane's arm angrily.
"What did Mama Lu tell you?"
His grip on her arm told Jane that Alexander meant business.
"She gave me a -- a love potion -- and told me that it would make you want me." A half-puzzled look came over Alexander's features suddenly.
"Is that what you gave me when we first got here -- that drink that tasted funny?"
Jane nodded her head shamefacedly.
"Yes," she said.
Alexander laughed out loud.
"I don't need any damn love potion!" he growled, taking Jane by the arm and hauling her out of the clearing abruptly.
Finding a trail that led out of the grove of trees, Alexander led Jane along it roughly, so that her feet barely touched the ground.
He pitched her onto the earth, which was warm and soft, and in an instant Jane's skin was exposed, warm and bare, to the heavy night air. The air felt like liquid to Jane's trembling body, as Alexander took possession of her roughly, urgently.
With one mighty plunge, his staff pierced her to the quick, and she was crying out, gasping involuntarily, as she felt the strength of his embrace.
Slowly, inch by wonderfully painful inch, Jane felt the immensity of him as he entered her. She closed her eyes, moving her hands over his magnificent, broad back, her breath coming in tiny, spurting gasps.
"Oh Alexander," she whispered urgently. "Oh it feels wonderful... oh God yes... do it... oh yes... oh please... it feels so... so... oh... ohhhhhh yes!"
With a strong, rifling rhythm, Alexander probed the white woman beneath him, plunging himself into her, cruelly, savagely.
Jane let out a whimper, which soon turned into a scream, as she felt the hard, manhood pierce her to the hilt. The low, heavy, slapping sound of love filled the jungle night, as, there on the narrow trail, Jane learned a variety of pleasures -- and pains -- that a man could visit upon a woman.
At last, rising to the extremity, Alexander let out a great shout as he exploded into the eager, sobbing woman beneath him. The lovemaking continued on and on, rising to a crescendo and falling off slowly, passionately.
"Oh my Lord," Jane gasped, "oh dear God ..
Her words caught in her throat as she felt the last full measure of Alexander's warm, rippling life flow into her.
Gripping him passionately, eagerly, with her loins, Jane let herself be caressed into a half-dreaming state, her eyes half closed, her breathing soft, delicate.
It was fully an hour before Jane, in sweet exhaustion, entered the clearing in the center of the grove of trees.
Noticing her disheveled appearance, Mama Lu approached Jane stealthily.
"Did my potion work?" she whispered, her eyes traveling the length of the well-loved young white woman.
Jane Morrow breathed a long sigh, and gazed happily at the old woman before her.
"Oh boy!" she said. "Did it ever!"
CHAPTER TWELVE
The following morning, Jane was at the small writing desk which Madeleine had thoughtfully provided, trying to compose a' letter to her husband. She would get halfway through the first paragraph, and stop. There was no way, seemingly, that she could communicate with him effectively. He was as remote as -- as the South Pole. There was no point of contact -- of communication, in fact -- between them at this late date. And so, Jane had been wracking her brains for a satisfactory way to tell him that she no longer cared for him. By this time, Jane was on the verge of beginning divorce proceedings. These past days, here in Haiti, had put things into focus quite nicely. It was now apparent that Jane could not and, indeed, would not -- consent to live with Bill Morrow as his wife. Whatever happened here, at this seaside resort, would have no effect on her decision. She simply could not tolerate being married to that man any longer. And Alexander had entered her life. That, really, had been the catalyst which had brought her so quickly to this irrevocable, decisive step.
And now the only problem was to put it down on paper.
With attention to detail, Jane began again: Dear Bill, I am sure that this will be a terrific shock to you, and there is no way in the world that I can soften the ...
Abruptly, Jane tore the thin sheet of writing paper in half, and put it in the wastebasket. She took another sheet from the drawer, put it flat on the small table, and began again: Dear Bill, This will probably be the nastiest letter you'll ever get from me, but there's just no way to soften the blow. I have felt for a long time that things have not been quite right between us, and I ...
Jane stopped writing all at once, and suddenly crumpled the sheet of paper into a tight ball, throwing it into the wastebasket angrily, so that it made a small Chunk when it struck the metal bottom of the pail.
"Well I'll be damned," Jane said quietly, shaking her head and looking at the ball-point pen in her hand. "I'll just be damned. I can't seem to write a simple letter anymore!"
But, at the back of her mind, Jane knew that this was not a "simple letter" at all -- it was the most important letter she had ever written in her life.
She began again: Dear Bill, This letter is probably the most painful that I have ever written...
All at once, there was a loud knock at the door, and Jane stopped writing. Giving up completely, she threw the crumpled paper into the metal pail, closed the drawer with a BANG, and walked to the door of her bedroom.
She opened the door, and saw Madeleine standing before her, with a big smile on her face.
"You're pretty happy for this time of the morning, Madeleine my dear," Jane said, a hint of sarcasm in her voice.
"Clean conscience does it," Madeleine replied. "May I come in?"
"Certainly," Jane replied, stepping aside to let the short, darker woman into her bedroom.
Madeleine walked into the bedroom slowly, like a sergeant inspecting a private soldier's bunk.
"You've certainly made yourself at home. I hope you're enjoying your stay with us."
Jane felt a twinge of apprehension in her stomach, and nodded her head.
"I'm having a nice time," she said simply.
Madeleine sat on the edge of the bed, and looked up at Jane speculatively, her eyes narrowing suddenly.
"I understand you attended the festival in the village last night Was Alexander there?"
Jane nodded her head.
"Yes, he was there. Why do you ask?"
"No reason, actually," Madeleine said, her eyes covering the room quickly, darting over the carpet and chairs and writing table.
"You like Alexander quite a lot, don't you, Jane?"
Jane looked at Madeleine for a moment, her eyes narrowing suddenly.
"What's this all about?" she said slowly. "Have I done something wrong? Is there any reason why Alexander and I shouldn't see each other?"
"I don't want you to get too fond of him, Jane. That's all."
"Why in the world not?
Madeleine's face, small and oval, framed by her thick dark hair, hardened suddenly.
"Because it wouldn't be good for you, that's all."
Jane felt her face grow hot, and knew, from Madeleine's amused expression, that she was blushing furiously.
"It certainly seems to be good for you," Jane replied tartly, her eyes wide with rage.
Madeleine's amused expression vanished abruptly.
"Just what the hell do you mean by that?" Madeleine said, her voice soft, deadly. Menace was in the marrow of her tone. Jane was, suddenly, afraid of Madeleine as never before.
"Just a manner of speaking," Jane replied noncommittally, edging away from Madeleine instinctively.
Abruptly, Madeleine was off the bed, and moving toward Jane. She slapped Jane, hard, with the flat of her open hand, and left a white mark on the taller woman's cheek.
Her hand going to her face, Jane staggered back, her eyes filling abruptly with tears.
"I want an explanation of that last remark," Madeleine said evenly.
Jane, her eyes blazing with hate, struck back, but verbally:
"You certainly don't mind sleeping with him, though, do you? You aren't above doing that, are you?"
To Jane's amazement, Madeleine's eyes widened. She let out a harsh, abrupt laugh.
"Of course I sleep with him, you ninny! You don't think I'd go near that dipso husband of mine, do you? Be real, my dear, naive friend."
Madeleine sat back on the bed, and laughed out loud.
"Did you really think I'd have that big hunk of man around here and not make use of him? You idiot."
Jane felt puzzled, unsure.
"Then... then why did you get angry just now?" she asked, her hand trailing to her cheek, which was still smarting from the slap.
"Knowing it is one thing," Madeleine purred, leaning forward slightly, "being told about it is something else again. My dear girl, have you ever heard of minding your own business?"
Jane blinked, and shook her bead.
"I just don't understand you, Madeleine."
Madeleine smiled. "It's not necessary that you understand me. just that you do as I say.
Jane looked up abruptly.
"What?"
Madeleine looked Jane in the eye.
"Frederick and I are going away for a couple of days. Since you're here, I'd like you to sort of look after the place while we're gone."
Jane, somewhat mollified, nodded her head.
"All right, Madeleine -- of course I'll be glad to do you that favor. Just one more thing."
Madeleine nodded her head.
"Sure. just name it."
Jane slapped Madeleine across the face, hard.
"You don't go around slapping me in the face," she said, looking Madeleine in the eye.
Laughing, Madeleine turned, shrugging off the blow as though it had never happened.
"Anything else?" Madeleine asked, her eyes bright, merry.
"No, I guess not -- except for one thing. When are you leaving?"
"This afternoon. I'll give you a few details at lunch. Nothing to it, really. just lock up and see that the lights are off."
Jane nodded, and looked at Madeleine inquiringly. Secretly, she was amazed at the aplomb with which Madeleine had shrugged off that slap in the face. She must have an interior of chrome steel, Jane mused, looking at the slight, bright-eyed woman before her.
"So long," Madeleine said, smiling and shutting the door behind her as she left.
As soon as the door was closed, Jane sat on the edge of the bed, and let herself relax slowly, exhaling a full breath of air loudly. That Madeleine was unbelievable -- hard and unbelievably tough, that was it.
Silently, to herself, Jane wondered at the combination of circumstances that could produce someone like Madeleine.
She shook her head. She could not even guess at them.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Jane was barricaded in her room, the Ashleys having left six hours earlier. It had been a simple enough task, really -- all she'd had to do was shut off all the appliances, lock the doors, and fix herself a drink.
Then, with the house shut up, Jane had found herself mixing several drinks. By seven o'clock in the evening, she found that she had quite a little buzz on.
She giggled. Since there was no earthly reason for her to busy herself at anything, she might as well enjoy herself.
Faintly, as though from a long distance, Jane heard the sound of knocking. She frowned. It must be someone at the front door.
Getting up quickly, Jane walked, rather unsteadily, to the front door. She was dressed in a pair of red short-shorts and a white, crisp blouse. As she opened the door, her eyes widened slightly. There was Alexander, in slacks and a flowing, short-sleeved shirt.
"May I come in?" he asked evenly, his eyes on Jane as she widened the door slightly.
"Yes, certainly," she replied, standing aside to let him pass. "Is there something you need?"
Alexander looked at her for a long moment, his face expressionless.
"Yes. I need you."
So abrupt was his declaration, and so unexpected, that Jane could not reply for a moment. Then, she took a deep breath.
"Oh Alexander," she said, closing her eyes and feeling a bit faint, "I need you, too."
So faint was Jane Morrow that, for a moment, she thought that her knees would buckle.
Then they did buckle.
As she felt herself begin to fall, Jane's only thought was how long it would take for Alexander to grab her, and hold her up.
It did not take long.
She felt his arms around her immediately, lifting her off her feet and carrying her through the long hallway to her room. As though in a dream, she felt him lay her gently on the bed in her room, standing over her, his face full of concern.
"Are you all right?" he asked, passing a hand through Jane's honey-blond hair. His fingers were wide and strong.
"Yes, I'm fine. Just let me catch my breath for a moment."
Jane felt as though she were drifting on a cloud, so magnificent was the feeling of rapture which swept through her. She knew that she would never feel this way again -- not if she lived to be a hundred.
"Oh my Lord," she murmured, "I'm afraid I'll never be able to get off this bed, if I'm not careful."
"Then stay where you are," Alexander said softly, sliding onto the bed beside her. "I'll come down to you."
Jane giggled abruptly, the sound unexpectedly shrill in the silent room.
"You're a little long for this bed, Alexander," she purred, turning so that her arms were about his waist.
"So true," he said, suddenly covering her with his long, powerful body. "Let's use the mistress's bed, shall we?"
Jane looked at Alexander for a long moment.
"You mean use... use Madeleine's bed? Oh, Alexander... we, we couldn't."
"We just have," Alexander said, hoisting Jane up and carrying her out of the room, heading for the plush confines of Madeleine's bedroom.
Throwing her on the bed, Alexander began slowly to strip Jane of every shred of clothing. She let out tiny gasps as, finally, she found herself naked on Madeleine's large, soft bed. Above her, Alexander, stripping away the last of his clothing, stood naked before her. His long, thick manhood extended over the bed, so that Jane reached out and stroked its length. Her white hand, like a leaf against the massive black trunk, swept its length lightly, the fingers soft and moist.
The shaft jumped, and Jane let out a surprised little chuckle. She tried to collar the erection by joining the thumb and little finger of her right hand, and found that she could not.
Jane giggled.
"Oh Alexander," she said, "you're wonderful."
Abruptly, Alexander straddled Jane's midsection with his massive legs, the erection brushing against her lips, long and rigid and wet at the broad tip. With a whimper, Jane opened her mouth, her soft lips trembling. She put her right hand on the shaft, and accepted the immensity of Alexander into her mouth, stretching her jaws so that they would accommodate him. With a slow, back-and-forth movement, Alexander adjusted his hips, driving slowly forward into Jane, so that she felt she would strangle. She moved her tongue and lips smoothly, massaging the rocklike shaft steadily, and with great tenderness.
Alexander groaned, shutting his eyes and grabbing two handfuls of Jane's yellow hair, moving her mouth over his manhood so that the black immensity glistened in the dim light of the bedroom. In the still air, the soft, gentle lapping of Jane's mouth, and Alexander's protracted groans, spoke eloquently of the quality and intensity of their lovemaking. At last, with a loud cry, Alexander threw his head back and moved into Jane with long, swooping plunges, driving to the base of her throat with each frantic stroke. Jane's head bobbed savagely, her hair flying wildly now, as Alexander's hands sought her breasts, her face.
And, with one loud groan, Alexander tensed his flanks, so that Jane's hands went to his buttocks instinctively.
She closed her eyes, feeling the sudden tightening of his whole body under her kneading, pulling hands and mouth. She knew that it could not be long now.
And then, in one instinctive, groaning spasm, it began.
A copious flood of Alexander's rich, warm, buttery manhood swept into the back of Jane's throat. Her eyes watering, she swallowed furiously, moving her mouth over the ballooning erection, her lips and tongue working furiously.
Slowly, and with great pleasure, Alexander emptied himself into Jane's open mouth, his hips working faster and faster, his face creased with lines of lust. Jane felt as though she would strangle, but swallowed dutifully, her face intent on his pleasure, on his satisfaction.
Alexander grasped Jane's hair once more, moving her head slowly over his swollen, rigid manhood, his hips working furiously.
At last, he subsided, his erection wet and limber in the air, shining like a great black stump in the dimness of the bedroom. Flat on his back, with Jane rampant over him now, Alexander stretched luxuriously.
"That," he said slowly, "was sensational."
Jane chuckled, bending over and kissing him on the stomach.
"Mmmmmmm," Alexander purred, "that's nice."
"Glad you like it," Jane said softly. "We'll do it again sometime."
"Like right now?"
Jane smiled.
"Like right now, indeed," she murmured, and put her soft, soft lips on Alexander's quivering black belly.
Slowly, the mouth traced the midline of Alexander's stomach, ending at the kinky mass of hair which marked the join of his legs.
Jane kissed the base of his manhood, causing the half-limber erection to stir slightly, wobbling in the air lustily. She moved her mouth upward, along the side of the shaft, feeling it stiffen under the caressing motion of her lips. She reached the tip of the penis, and covered the glans with her mouth, sucking gently. She moved her head to and fro, covering the thick staff with her long, smooth, wet tongue, until it glistened in the dimness.
Alexander groaned out loud, and opened his legs wide.
Like a ferret, Jane went to his groin, her mouth hungry, seeking. She found one of his huge, bloated testes, and took it in her mouth, sucking gently, her eyes closed. She sensed his whole body stiffen as she increased the pressure slightly. Releasing him, she managed to cover the insides of his thighs with kisses, her tongue probing his trembling groin like a tiny snake, red and wet against the black expanse of him.
Finally, moving up his abdomen, Jane kissed the stomach, her tongue going into his navel briefly, wet and seeking.
Taking her head in his huge hands, Alexander drew Jane upward, until her long, lovely white body was stretched over his broad, muscular black one.
"Satisfied?" she murmured.
"Yes."
With that, Jane relaxed, easing her softness over the hard, rigid outlines of Alexander. In a moment, she had fallen into the deepest slumber that she had ever known.
* * *
When she awoke, it was with a sudden pang at her groin.
Alexander had moved slightly, and was now at the moist, vulnerable passage of Jane's womanhood. The blond clump of loveliness, moving to accommodate the probing member, was split, suddenly and pain-fully, by the entry.
"Oh!" Jane cried, gasping for breath quickly. "Oh, Alexander!"
The massive staff disappeared quickly into Jane's belly, as she began sobbing, whimpering, at the vigor of Alexander's loving.
"Ohhhhhh... oh please... OOOOOOoooooo! OOOoo... ! ah... ah... aaaaaaaaaah... ! oh... oh... oh... ! o h... ! o h God yes... don't stop... harder... oh yes that's it... deep... deep... rip me wide open... ! put it right through me... ! oh yes... yes... "
Eyes shut tightly, legs straddling the bucking, surging column of Alexander's sex, Jane rode out the hard, rifling rhythm, her mind ablaze with pleasure. Each upward surge brought a new sensation of pleasure-pain, and each downward movement a sense of pure loss. So furious was Alexander's rhythm, and so passionate his embrace, that Jane soon forgot where she was, and even who she was. Her mind was focused, only and always, upon the hard, driving violation of her passage.
Her loins wet, the inside of her thighs "sopping with warm, rich fluids, Jane let out a little cry of sheer delight, as, suddenly. her channel widened, her whole body tensing as the blazing, insane pleasure of her climax began.
And at that moment, to her intense delight, she felt Alexander, as delirious as she, begin to discharge into her. His spending was hot, warm, and good, and traveled in long, lusty streamers, into the depths of her womanhood.
At last, slowly slightly, Jane began a series of long, looping downward plunges onto Alexander, as their loins met in a hard, mutually satisfying rhythm.
Jane burst into long, loud sobs. Never had she known anything so satisfying! She could well understand why Madeleine preferred her lovemaking in this position. It was so... so refreshing! Jane felt irrigated, and thoroughly cleansed, by the hard, satisfying climax she had just experienced. She caught a glimpse of Alexander, still working beneath her.
From his looks, he was having a time for himself, too.
A pang of guilt went through Jane. She did not, ordinarily enjoy playing the dominant role. But this... well, this had just happened. Jane frowned suddenly.
Or had it just "happened?"
Jane was finding out some things about herself that she had never known before. Perhaps, after all, she did enjoy dominating men!
The thought sent a chill down Jane's spine.
Surely not. No, she would have noticed such a thing before this. And yet, here she was, atop Alexander, her hair flying wildly, having a good, vigorous love passage!
Jane eased herself downward, splitting herself upon the immensity that was Alexander. She sighed deeply, closing her eyes and kissing his broad, masculine chest. Settling atop him peacefully, she ran her tongue around his nipple, teasing the firm flesh with the pink tip. She kissed both his nipples lustily.
"That was... nice," he whispered, closing his eyes and raising his hips slightly, seating his immensity in the warm, furry softness of Jane. She groaned with satisfaction.
"Oh yes... yes it was... is... " she murmured.
Alexander chuckled, and put his hands on Jane's buttocks, feeling the plump firmness there, gripping it hard.
"You enjoy being above me, don't you?" he asked, his hips giving a vicious little tilt, so that Jane gasped.
"Y-yes," she stammered, closing her eyes tightly.
"I think that that's the position you prefer, Jane," Alexander observed, giving his hips another twist, so that his vast erection pierced her to the core. Jane whimpered out loud, and shook her head from side to side furiously, so that her hair flew and floated like yellow seaweed.
"N-no, that's not right," she whispered, her soft, full breasts bouncing slightly, quivering. Alexander rose abruptly, still in her, and put his mouth on her firm nipples, so that she gasped.
"Oh... oh Alexander," she whimpered, as his mouth clamped down, hard, biting her on the soft loveliness.
She let out a shrill little yipe, and put her hands on Alexander's shoulders. The mouth moved to her other breast, and continued its work, as Alexander's tongue and teeth and lips executed their tender torture. At last, Jane's soft, full, lovely breasts shining with the caresses of his mouth, Alexander withdrew, and lay back slowly, leaving Jane above him.
"Yes," he said slowly, "you always seek to put yourself above me in some way."
Jane shook her head, so that her hair flew in a soft cloud.
"You know that's not right," she said softly, as, suddenly, Alexander drew her to him, rolling over her so that he, suddenly and completely, straddled her soft, just-loved body.
"I know it now," he rasped, his eyes dark, and full of amusement. Jane groaned with pain at the sudden pressure of his loins, feeling the thickness of him there, in her channel.
"Oh Alexander," she groaned, her eyelids fluttering, "it hurts so good."
Alexander did not reply, but instead began his hard, insistent rhythm within her, so that she gasped out loud, feeling as though he would split her wide open.
As the moments passed, Jane found herself wishing that he would.
* * *
Several hours later, Jane eased herself against Alexander, and slipped an arm around his waist. She formed herself against the S-curve of his body, and kissed him on the back of the neck. He stirred, as she fitted her knees to the contour of his legs, her stomach sealing itself to the small of his back.
Jane squeezed his middle, and giggled softly, as he stirred.
"Are you comfortable?" Alexander whispered, stretching his long body in the bed slowly, with Jane attached, like a prehensile animal.
"Lord yes," she murmured, closing her eyes.
All at once, she felt him stir beside her, so that her grip was loosed. Then, she felt his weight.
"Ohhhhhh," she breathed, as her thighs opened slowly. "Oh... oh... aaaaaaah... ! that's good... that's... that's... "
Jane was silent, as the room filled with the rhythmic, slapping sound of Alexander's lovemaking.
She groaned once, and then was silent.
The room became warmer, and filled with the warm, rich odor of coupling.
* * *
Outside, in the stillness, an ancient, bent figure watched the scene play itself out.
Mama Lu, peering through a window, saw the changing expressions of ecstasy pass over Jane's face. She saw also the hard, rhythmic movement of the white woman's hips and legs, as she twisted and writhed beneath the hard, solid frame of Alexander. At the climax, Mama Lu heard, faintly, the shouts of ecstasy from Jane's lips, and saw her hair, yellow as gold, spread across the whiteness of the pillow. She saw the final, hard, plunging movements of Jane's hips, searching, seeking the long, hard, rifling ecstasy that was Alexander's potency.
At the final extremity, seeing the passion of the couple spend itself, Mama Lu shook her head, and walked slowly down the darkened pathway to the road. She would be in the village in thirty minutes at the most -- away from this pollution.
"He will die!" she hissed, her mind full of what she had just witnessed. "If he stays with her, he will die!"
Her life almost over, her prophecies ignored for over a decade, Mama Lu alone knew of the meaning of this woman -- this Jane. She had hoped that the failure of the "love potion" (a few herbs mixed with sugar water) would dampen Jane's ardor. But, alas, it seemed that the opposite had indeed happened. Instead of becoming cool, and full of disappointment, Jane had waxed full of passion. And Alexander was responding to her. Mama Lu had seen the insides of Jane's hands, and had known from the first that she was poison for Alexander. And she was poison for everyone else -- including the Ashleys.
An old, bent woman, Mama Lu walked along the road, shaking her head angrily.
Finally, everyone -- including Odetta -- would believe her. But by then, of course, it would be too late.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The following morning, Jane got a letter from her husband.
As she walked back to her quarters, Jane was filled with puzzlement. Why would Bill choose to write her here, of all places?
She opened the letter: Dear Jane: I hope you are having a nice time, and do give my regards to Madeleine and her husband. I'd like very much to take you to dinner when you return, as well as to a few shows here in town. Do hurry back, and give me a chance to show how much I adore you.
Love, Bill
* * *
Jane put down the letter slowly, her forehead knitting into a frown. What in the world was she going to do?
Slowly, a new feeling for Bill was kindling itself in her breast. He did care about her! The realization of that fact, long buried in their relationship, was like a sudden bath in cold water to Jane. She could not, from now on, simply ignore the fact that Bill cared for her. It was there, like a palpable presence.
All at once, Jane knew that she would return to San Francisco -- at least long enough to say goodbye to Bill. She owed him that much. She was, after all, his wife.
Abruptly, Jane decided to call the airport in a few days, for a ticket home. Whatever she and Bill had to say to each other could wait till then.
A cold chill went through Jane.
What would become of Alexander? Would he wait for her? He would be "losing" her for a few days only, to be sure. As soon as her affairs in San Francisco were finished, she would be coming back to Haiti, and to him. Of course she wouldn't lose him.
With that, Jane went about her business, slightly worried by the presence, in the back of her mind, of the thought of leaving Alexander.
* * *
That afternoon, Madeleine and Frederick returned, and opened up the house.
Three hours after their return, in late afternoon, Jane was going to their room to ask Madeleine about arrangements for her flight home.
As she neared Madeleine's room, it became apparent that a fight was in progress.
"I don't give a damn about your maidenly chastity -- or what's left of it!"
The voice was Frederick's, and it was loud, angry, and full of outrage.
"And I'll tell you something else -- I'd not mind, even, if you took up with a white man! But when you take a liking to a nigger, and then propose that I stand by, while... while... "
Frederick's voice faltered, and Jane, half embarrassed, leaned her ear against the door of Madeleine's bedroom.
"You just shut your mouth!"
The voice was Madeleine's, and it was shrill, almost hysterical.
"I will not shut my mouth! You have been laying with that nigger stud behind my back, old girl! One time more, and I warn you... I warn you... "
Madeleine's voice cut in sharply.
"You'll what? What will you do?"
There was an uncomfortable pause.
"Go on, tell me what you'll do -- you rotten, rummy old bastard ..."
There was a loud slap -- the sound of a hand hitting a face. Jane winced, as though feeling the blow herself.
Frederick's voice was shaky, full of anger.
"That's only a sample, old girl! I have stood for this much too long, as it is. Much too goddamned long!"
"Get OUT!" Madeleine's voice was shrill, hysterical.
"Oh, go to hell!" Frederick replied.
"And I suppose you don't have women on the side, my dear old boy... "
Madeleine's voice, hate-filled, was loaded with sarcasm.
"With those... those tramps you were with in town yesterday!"
Frederick's voice was tired?
"Oh, shove it along, old girl. You know damned well I could never match your rotten show with that... that Alexander!"
Frederick's voice was heavy with sarcasm -- and a touch of obscenity -- when he spoke the name.
"Though I will say," he continued, chuckling softly, "he certainly manages to amuse himself with that... that lane woman."
Madeleine chuckled loudly.
"Yes," she conceded, "isn't she a silly goose? And running after Alexander that way -- it's shameful. I wouldn't do such a thing -- and I pay the bastard's salary. God, what a silly idiot she is! I wish I'd never invited her. And then wanting to stay that way -- to be with him, I suppose."
Jane, numb with shock, took her ear from the door, and ran down the hallway.
She had never been so humiliated in her life!
Tearfully, she went to her room, and began to pack. Furiously, through dimmed eyes, Jane began to throw her clothes willy-nilly into her set of luggage (a present, so thoughtfully provided by Bill, last Christmas).
"How could I have been such a fool?" she gasped, finishing the job of filling a suitcase, doing it carelessly, only half aware of her actions.
Finally, after fifteen furious minutes, Jane was packed and ready to go. She would take a taxi to town, and stay in a hotel tonight. She would leave tomorrow, and never be back! Oh God -- the humiliation of it!
A sudden, savage wave of anger swept through Jane's whole body, as she turned to go out the door, her eyes narrowed, her steps precise. Her hands were knotted at her sides.
She would, at least, have the pleasure of upbraiding Alexander! She would not let him get away scot-free. He, Frederick and Madeleine -- what a team they must have been, laughing at the romantic fulminations of a middle-class American housewife!
She banged out the door, the screen almost ripping with the shove she gave it, and headed around the house, to Alexander's quarters.
Nearing his door, Jane quickened her steps slightly. She knocked three times, the door opened, and there was Alexander, his eyes wide, his mouth gaping. The look of surprise on his face was patent, sincere. Even Jane, in her anger, could not miss it. She decided to overlook it, and was lost in the fullness of her anger -- her humiliation.
"Alexander," she began, her voice shaking with anger, "you are the lowest, most contemptible human being I... I have ever met. I hate you... hate you... you sonofabitch!"
"Jane," he began, his mouth working, numb with shock, "wh-what in the world?' He stopped, looking at the enraged, blond, white, American housewife before him. She had never seemed further from him than at this moment.
"Jane, what... if you'll let me... "
"Let you explain?" Jane raged, beside herself, hardly aware of her words. "So you can have a... a good laugh about it with Madeleine and that lush of a husband? Is that it, Alexander? Do you want to explain how you've... you've used me, in these past few days? How you made a fool of me, and... and LAUGHED behind my back?"
Jane wheeled, unable to continue, and, sobbing loudly, ran toward the front of the house, where her luggage was packed and waiting.
* * *
For several minutes, stunned, Alexander sat on the edge of his bed, staring at the floor.
What in the world had brought that on? He had, he knew, done nothing that could possibly anger Jane.
His eyes narrowed suddenly. What had Jane been thinking of? What had Madeleine been telling her? The sudden thought of his intimacy with Madeleine made Alexander shudder. Was Jane judging him for having to do with that twisted, perverted woman, and her weakling of a husband? They had hired him, after all!
With a single movement, Alexander rose from the bed, banging out the door and walking across the yard angrily.
He would sure as hell find out what was going on here -- and in a hurry, too.
He spotted Odetta, who was walking toward him rapidly from the shoreline, and quickened his steps. He certainly did not want to see Odetta, at this stage of the game!
"Alexander?"
He continued walking.
"ALEXANDER?" she shouted, rushing to him and grabbing his arm. He twisted out of her grasp, and continued walking. Finally, feeling her hands on his shoulder, he stopped.
"Odetta, will you please leave me alone? I've told you a thousand times, there isn't anything between ..."
"I'm not talking about us," Odetta gasped, out of breath, "I'm talking about you. Come away from here."
Alexander looked at Odetta for a long moment -- at her long, voluptuous shape, her hair, that well-known body, which he had made such enjoyable love to.
"And why should I come away? Will you tell me that?"
"Yes! Yes, I'll tell you why!" Odetta gasped. "Because of Mama Lu! You must come away from here, and at once! There is great danger for you here, in this house!"
Alexander smiled.
"Is that what Mama Lu told you?"
"Yes! Just now. She begged me to come and tell you, and to bring you back with me!"
The corners of Alexander's mouth curled down with thinly veiled contempt.
"The old ways are dead, Odetta. Mama Lu is from another age -- another time. She doesn't know what she says any more. That's all."
Turning away abruptly, Alexander moved with long strides to the front of the house. He did not slacken his pace, and paid no attention to the loud sobs of Odetta, which grew fainter as he neared the verandah.
Jane, meanwhile, was in the process of carrying her luggage to the front of the house. Frederick had, ungallantly, avoided helping her in any way -- though Jane would have spurned his help, in any case.
Undaunted, Jane set the last piece of luggage on the verandah, and straightened up, feeling twinges in her back. She looked around, and noticed that the house was silent. The Ashleys, probably guessing what was in her mind, had discreetly vanished.
Jane pursed her lips, her eyes roving the horizon, scanning the jungle trees, which seemed to hover in the distance.
Yes, she would leave here, and leave these people, without so much as a goodbye. They were, after all, not her sort of people.
Jane smiled, the corners of her mouth turning up slightly. Alexander had been right in the beginning -- she was, finally, just a tourist. With a twinge of pain, Jane wished that she had kept that in mind from the beginning. She thought of Bill, and of his thoughtful letter, and was warmed by the idea of him. There was, after all, something to be said for being a woman who belonged to one man -- and that man her husband. But would that purity of thought last, once she was home again? Or would she start glancing at the bodies of young boys again?
She would try again. Yes, she would put these past few days behind her, and see if she could put some life back into her marriage. It was, after all, a two-way street, and she had not been a bargain for Bill, in many ways. Preoccupation with the children, the daily tensions, her irritability -- all of these had been factors in their trouble. Jane was, suddenly, filled with a new resolve.
From now on, things were going to be different.
Jane's reverie was shattered, suddenly and completely, by the sound of the front door banging open.
"GOD DAMMIT! WHERE IS THAT NIGGER!" Jane spun around, terrified at the rough, whisky voice which announced the arrival of Frederick She looked at him, her eyes widening with shock. Frederick was dressed in a pair of charcoal-gray slacks, and was naked above the waist. His physique was blockish, the torso surprisingly muscular for a man of his age and living habits.
So it occurred to Jane, as she watched, fascinated, her heart pounding. Her eyes drifted to his right hand, which he held stiffly outward. She gasped.
In Frederick's right hand was a British Service Revolver. He held it as though he knew how to use it.
"WHERE is that GODDAM NIGGER!"
Frederick's eyes were blazing, his mouth set in a hard, unresponsive line, his left cheek twitching slightly.
"WHERE IS HE! COME OUT, YOU BLACKASSED BASTARD!"
Suddenly, from the open doorway, Madeleine appeared, her face white.
"Frederick, for God's sake!" she hissed, her eyes full of anger -- and terror.
Frederick turned to his wife slowly.
"You," he said evenly, swaying slightly, the rich odor of bourbon wafting off him, "can shut your god-damned mouth."
"WHERE ARE YOU!" he bellowed, his eyes searching the ground beyond the verandah. "COME OUT, YOU DAMNED NIGGER STUD! COME OUT AND FACE ME LIKE A MAN!"
Jane's whole body was numb with shock and fear. She watched the heavy, blue-steel revolver sway, like a deadly snake, on the end of Frederick's careless hand. She restrained a sudden impulse to scream.
Hesitantly at first, and then more boldly, Madeleine took a step, then two steps, toward her swaying, drunken husband.
"Frederick, for God's sake," Madeleine hissed, her voice imploring, insistent.
Frederick's whole body, all at once, seemed to stiffen. His features froze -- he was literally mesmerized with hate.
"GODDAMNED SLUT!" he roared, turning on Madeleine suddenly. "SLEEP WITH A NIGGER LIKE A GODDAMNED TRASHY WHORE! CHEAT ON ME, WILL YOU? BETRAY ME, WILL YOU? WELL, ROT IN HELL!"
Jane's eardrums were blasted by the concussion of the revolver going off, and her eyes watered from the smell of cordite, pungent and cloying.
When the blur went out of her eyes, she saw Madeleine propped against the door, stiffly, her mouth open, her eyes wide with terror. Slowly, Madeleine descended, clutching her middle. As she fell, Jane noticed a shattered pane of glass in the door, the pieces handing from the calking like long, icy fingers. Madeleine slid downward, to a sitting position on the hard concrete of the verandah, clutching her middle tightly.
It was then that Jane saw the blood. It was spreading slowly, in a circle, from Madeleine's middle, a bright stain that would not be stemmed.
Jane's scream was long and loud, and cut the air like a sires It seemed to Jane that her voice was not a part of her, really -- it seemed, in fact, to have a life of its own, continuing on and on, apart from the will that was within her.
Frederick was oblivious, it seemed, to Jane's presence on the verandah. He seemed to be in a world of his own. He scanned the front yard, and abruptly his eyes widened.
"THERE YOU ARE, YOU DAMNED NIGGER STUD! YOU'RE GOING TO PAY, YOU BLACKASSED SON OF A... "
Jane had stopped listening to Frederick, and had turned, to look out, at the front lawn. Her stomach balled into a knot of sheer terror. On the lawn, unsuspecting, coming toward them, with a puzzled look on his face, was Alexander. He had just rounded the side of the house, and was coming toward the verandah rapidly.
"NO! NO, ALEXANDER! GO BACK!"
Jane's warning, unheeded, acted as a spur to Alexander's curiosity. He quickened his stride.
Jane moved toward Frederick, in a frantic attempt to stop him -- but too late. He was through the screen door, and onto the lawn.
Horrified, Jane watched Alexander's expression change from puzzlement to fear, as he took a good look at Frederick, and the heavy pistol that was in his hand.
Abruptly, but too late, Alexander turned, sprinting across the lawn, trying to escape the raving, wild-eyed man with the heavy revolver. Jane watched, her breath frozen in her throat, as Frederick took careful aim.
The report of the revolver was loud in the stillness, like a cannon, and Jane flinched, letting out a shrill cry. Alexander was down, lying motionless, like a huge black deer shot by a hunter. Frederick approached the body, leaned forward slightly, and fired again.
Straightening up, he looked across the cool, silent lawn at Jane, and smiled.
"TIME TO GO NOW!" Frederick announced loudly, putting the muzzle of his revolver to his own temple.
He pulled the trigger.
Jane screamed, her hands to her mouth, as she watched the side of Frederick's head explode outward. He toppled onto the grass, beside Alexander, and was still.
Blind, numb, Jane made her way across the lawn, away from the house, heading for the line of trees in the distance.
Stumbling, and halting, running faster and faster, Jane finally reached the trees, crashing through the heavy secondary growth, the thorns and branches tearing at her tender flesh. Her face marked by cruel, whipping branches, her legs lacerated by the wait-a-bit thorns which clustered on bushes and grass, Jane moved forward, blindly, unknowing and uncaring.
She could not see, she could not hear. Her only thought was to get away from the horror of that house. The back of her neck tingled with sheer terror, as she sensed that something was creeping up on her, following her.
And she was right. Terror itself was following her, and it was like a hand lifting up the back of her brain.
* * *
Jane was of little help at the inquest. It was obvious she had gone off the deep end, her brain a blank, her expression the same. She was free to go home, the authorities finally told her. They even supplied her with transportation to the airport, where she caught the first plane back to the United States, and to the sanity of her own, safe house. Bill knew nothing of what had happened, and she never told him. He did notice that she had changed, somehow. Those long... sometimes hours! of silence, just staring off into space.
It was a full two months later before she seemed to suddenly return to her old self again, the high spirits, the ready smile. Bill thought it was simply because she had found a part-time job at the local high school as a "proctor," which Jane explained meant keeping an eye out for drugs being brought onto the grounds, "searching lockers, and that sort of thing. But there was more to Jane's recovery than that. Actually, She wasn't applying for the job that day she drove a neighbor over to make application for the position. The neighbor didn't qualify, and while Jane was waiting out in the car for her, she spotted a black boy playing volley ball on the school courts. He was head and shoulders taller than the rest of the seniors be played with. Jane ran her eyes over his young, muscled body, all two hundred and twenty pounds of it. His hands were big and sure as they deftly handled the ball, and he moved like a panther... he moved like Alexander!
Her heard leaped back to life again. She went into the principal's office and landed herself the job, and the next day made a point of striking up an acquaintance with the huge black youth. The "acquaintance" soon became a "relationship," with Jane's careful maneuvering. His name was Tim, but Jane insisted on calling him "Alexander." He hated that. But he simply loved the way she took his giant, rock-hard penis in her mouth, slurped her warm tongue around it, drained him dry, afternoon after afternoon, after school closed. Jane had rented a small beach "hut," cheap, but efficient for her "needs." She bought Tim clothes, a used car, a guitar. And she taught him the art of making love... just as Alexander had taught her.
"Jesus, Jane, you'll kill me yet!" Tim would often "say, lying naked on the bed in the hut, while Jane straddled her body over his black torso, bucking, squirming, working that wonderful young peter up into her love canal until she would scream, "Ahhhhh! AHHHHH! Now! Now! IT'S COMING AGAIN, ALEXANDER, JUST FOR YOU! ALL FOR YOU! TAKE IT. TAKE ME!"
But then, many nights, when driving home to make Bill's dinner, she'd re-hear Tim's deep voice saying, "You'll kill me yet!"
