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The safari wound its way back to the archeological
site that Larra had stumbled upon some months
before. Larra had lost her map
in her encounter with the fierce Maasi warriors, but she had studied the
map so thoroughly, that she had committed it almost entirely to
memory. It was but a matter of
course for her to follow the landmarks on her previous journey back to the
place where her expedition had come to so sudden and disastrous an
end. The Maasi ambush that had
destroyed her safari had caught the inexperienced Larra off guard, but this
time she hoped to turn the tables on the bloodthirsty Maasi, a people who
routinely tortured their captives to death.
It took four weeks to reach the site of the
ambush. The weather had not been
particularly cooperative, being much wetter than
usual. That had slowed the safari
down. But now they were reaching
the clearing in the rainforest where Larra’s ordeal had
begun.
As the expedition approached the site James
organized it in a defensive formation.
But it was the type of defence that he hoped would lure the Maasi
into a trap. As the safari moved
closer to the forest glade, James had the porters surround the armed men,
so that their presence was disguised.
Larra and James rode ahead of the
others. As they entered the clearing
Larra saw that it was as she remembered
it. In the center of the clearing
was the massive stone, rudely fashioned into the shape of a giant
phallus. She had not had time
to examine the discovery before, because her party had been almost immediately
attacked by the Maasi. This time
Larra hoped, she would have more time.
A disturbance at the end of the clearing caught
Larra’s eye. James and the
other white hunters saw it too.
Within a few seconds a tall, powerfully built black warrior stepped
into view. A dozen others immediately
followed him. If the Maasi followed
their previous form other warriors could be expected to converge on the safari
from all sides. As expected a
movement in the forest to both sides of the expedition revealed that this
was indeed happening. The Maasi
had sprung their trap!
The Maasi were an impressive
people. All the warriors were
at least six feet tall. Some
of them were over six foot six inches.
Each warrior carried a seven foot spear, the tip of which was pointed
with a razor sharp blade at least a foot
long. For defence each warrior
also carried a buffalo hide shield, shaped like an eye turned
vertically. Two or three ostrich
feathers adorned the head of each warrior, making them seem even taller than
they really were. Altogether,
Larra estimated that there were about 50 or 60
warriors. Their menacing faces
indicated that they intended her party no
good.
“Greetings, noble
Maasi!” Larra shouted in
perfect Maasi. She had had plenty
of time to use her language skills when she had been captured and held by
the Maasi for five weeks. “We
come in peace,” she continued.
“We intend you no harm and bring you
gifts.” The white hunters,
including James had been in favor of firing on the Maasi without warning,
but Larra had spoken against this, arguing that all the Maasi were doing
was defending their homeland, and since she was financing the expedition,
her arguments had won out. They
would try talk first and then use force if necessary.
By this time the safari’s porters, had
formed a square around the heavily armed men who were now crouched in the
center of the formation. From
the outside, they would be invisible to the
Maasi. In the event of a battle
James hoped that this tactic would give the safari the element of
surprise. The porters chosen
for the expedition had been the bravest men that James could
find. On Larra’s first
expedition Larra had been left to fend for herself against vastly superior
numbers when her guide and porters had fled in blind
panic.
The warriors seemed taken aback by Larra’s
speech. They had not expected
to meet anyone speaking their language.
Larra could hear the warriors engaging in whispered conversation all
around her. “White Witch,
White Witch…” She
recognized the name the Maasi had given
her. She had a reputation among
these people, having killed six of them, including the chief’s son,
Chui. She did not know if this
would help or hinder her dealings with them.
One of the warriors stepped
forward. He wore four ostrich
feathers in his headband, and his bearing seemed to suggest that he was the
leader. “White Witch!”
he screamed. “You have taken
my brother. I will not talk with
you! You must
die.” Without any other
warning he raised his spear and hurled at Larra’s
breast!
Larra had not expected such uncompromising
violence. She had expected the
Maasi to be willing to parley and was almost caught completely off guard
by the unprovoked assault. In
truth had the Maasi warrior attacked any other woman, she would have been
killed, but Larra was not an ordinary
woman. She twisted slightly in
the saddle, shifting her body to the
left. At the same time her right
hand flicked out and deflected the spear, her hand catching it just behind
the sharp spear-point. As the
spear flashed past her, her left hand caught the shaft of the spear and held
it, preventing it from striking anyone behind
her.
A second later, she was vaulting from the saddle, drawing her Browning
.45 semi-automatic from its holster while she was still in the
air. She hit the ground
firing. James also leapt from
his saddle drawing his Webley-Fosbery revolver as he did
so. The safari’s porters
had dropped to the ground, using their burdens as shelter from the Maasi
spears. Behind the porters, the
heavily armed soldiers and white hunters rose and opened fire with their
magazine rifles.
The surprised Maasi were hit with a hail of bullets, several hundred
rounds being fired within only a minute.
Larra herself got off three rounds before she even hit the ground
and another five in the next few seconds.
Her aim was deadly, each bullet finding a
target. The Maasi were mown down
like ripe wheat. In less that
a minute it was all over.
Approximately three dozen Maasi had been killed or wounded, with the
remainder fleeing into the forest.
The members of the expedition continued to fire after them long after
they had disappeared, until finally James sounded a
cease-fire.
After the slaughter, Larra counted up her
casualties. Not a single member
of her safari had been killed. The
only serious injuries were a couple of the porters who had been nicked by
spears, but their wounds were superficial.
Larra was saddened by the death of so many brave Maasi, but she felt
the fight had been forced on her.
She ordered her porters to help those members of the Maasi that were
not hopelessly injured. Those
who were beyond help she tried to make as comfortable as
possible.
Once the Maasi wounded were attended to her porters set up
camp. Within an hour everything
was in its place. She and James
had separate tents. It was thought
appropriate that they not sleep together on the expedition, for the sake
of propriety. By the time camp
was set up it was early evening.
There was not enough light to do any
exploring. The members of the
safari ate supper and then retired to bed, leaving a few of the soldiers
on guard.
About
Larra lay on top of James and kissed him
softly. She was wearing only
a filmy silk nighty that did very little to hide her
charms. It took James only a
few seconds to slide it over her hips and then pull it over her
head. Similarly, Larra soon had
James’ light pajamas off him and they lay together delighting in the
feel of their naked bodies against each
other. They kissed passionately,
their tongues entering one another’s mouths and
intertwining. Then they used
their hands and mouths to explore one anther’s
bodies.
James noticed that Larra seemed to be in a bit of a hurry
tonight. Already her hands had
moved to his penis and were in the process of stroking it to a full erection,
not that he needed very much of that sort of
coaxing. Within a few seconds
he was as rigid as a flagpole.
Larra straddled his body and slowly lowered herself toward his
manhood. James’ questing
hands had determined that Larra’s vagina was thoroughly lubricated and
ready for penetration. James
was surprised. This was very
much unlike Larra, who usually liked to draw out their nights of passion
for as long as possible.
The lips of Larra’s vagina were now pressing against the glans
of his penis. Larra was ready
for entry. James reached into
the drawer of a small side table next to the
cot. From the drawer he took
two strips of white cloth. James
and Larra had found it necessary to gag one another in order to keep from
calling out during their lovemaking.
It would not do to disturb the other
campers. Larra’s screams
of ecstasy would have wakened the dead if they had not been
muffled.
Ever so slowly, Larra lowered herself onto James’ massive sex
organ. It took quite a bit of
effort to get James inside her, even when she was fully
lubricated. James was very large,
and Larra was very tight. James
tied the gag tightly across Larra’s
mouth. Already she was beginning
to moan softly. James then gagged
himself, stifling a groan as he did so.
Larra began to move her body up and down, slowly impaling herself
on James swollen phallus. James
reached up and squeezed her breasts.
He had found that Larra liked them squeezed hard when she was fully
aroused, and incredibly she seemed to be in that condition
now. He had never seen her become
excited so quickly before.
“Mmppphh!” Larra moaned beneath the
gag. Although her words were
incoherent, James knew that it meant Larra needed him
now. He squeezed hard on her
breasts and Larra arched her back in
rapture. She had now worked about
three inches of James’ penis into her wet vagina and was pumping up
and down vigorously. James moved
his hands to the small of her arched back and pulled
hard. Larra gained another two
inches of penetration. Unlike
most women, Larra’s entire vaginal canal was highly
sensitive. The more a penis
penetrated her, the more stimulated she
became.
“Mmmmpppphhhhh!!!!
The sound would have carried for half a mile if she had not been tightly
gagged.
Holding Larra firmly, James pulled her to him and then rolled over
so that he was now on top of her.
Larra’s hands immediately moved to James’ buttocks where
she attempted to pull him deeper into
her. James partly withdrew, then
in a series of powerful thrusts burred himself deep inside
her. Larra convulsed and cried
out so loudly that she almost overcame the restrictions of her
gag. James had fully penetrated
her. Larra’s back arched
and her swollen breasts heaved as she climaxed in a complete sexual
frenzy. James joined her a few
seconds later, ejaculating powerfully into her
womb. Exhausted the lovers simply
clung to each other for the next hour, before Larra quietly disengaged herself
and crept back to her tent.
Morning found both James and Larra somewhat
lethargic. It was difficult to
shake off the effects of the previous
night. But the smell of breakfast
and the knowledge that important things were to be done that day encouraged
them to get up.
By
Larra was holding on to the end of a measuring tape near the back
of the huge block of stone when she came upon pictographs inscribed into
the rock. Closer investigation
revealed that the pictographs were actually Chinese
script. Although Larra could
speak Mandarin, she was far from being familiar with all of the thousands
of characters that made up the Chinese written
language. However, she was able
to read enough of it to realize that she had made a major
discovery. What she had was proof
that the Chinese had made contact with central
Much of the script was heavily overgrown with moss and various other
forms of vegetation, but Larra carefully scraped most of it
away. Eventually she was able
to decipher much of what was cut into the stone, and what she learned filled
her with an almost overwhelming
excitement. “My God,”
she thought, “this is almost better than
sex.” She gave a loving
glance at James. He caught her
look.
“What is it darling?” he inquired.
“I’m not sure,” Larra said, almost giddy with excitement,
“but I think that this writing is a set of directions to an even more
important discovery. This large
stone is simply a marker to make the main site easier to
find.”
“What does it say, exactly?
“As far as I can determine, about 50 feet behind us should be
a cliff face. And in that cliff
face there should be an entrance to some sort of tunnel or
cave. The inscription doesn’t
tell me exactly what it is.”
Both James and Larra turned.
All that they could see behind them was the solid wall of the
rainforest. “There is only
one way to find out,” said Larra, and she strode toward the dense
vegetation.
“Don’t be too hasty, my dear,” said James and he picked
up his rifle. “You never
know what might be lurking in the jungle.”
Larra pushed on into the bush.
She soon found that it was pretty heavy going, until by accident she
happened upon a path that led in the direction she wanted to
go. Within a few seconds Larra
found herself standing before a massive natural stone
formation. And in the center
of the huge rock wall was a low dark opening just large enough for a man
to enter.
Larra peered into the opening.
“You’re not going in there?” James
protested.
“Not without a torch,” Larra
replied. She smiled at
him. “Come on lover, let’s
get the proper equipment.”
A few minutes later, Larra had all the gear she
wanted. She had a couple of electric
torches, a length of rope, a small hammer, and her
notebook. “I’m ready,
she said. “Let’s
go.”
“Don’t you think this might be
dangerous? I think we should
send one of the boys on ahead,” said James.
“Don’t you think it might be dangerous for him too?”
said Larra. James was a fine
man. The finest man, she thought,
that she had ever met, but he had real trouble understanding Larra’s
attitudes towards Africans. To
James they were just blacks or even worse,
savages. He had trouble understanding
that Larra considered them worth protecting.
A few minutes later, Larra cautiously entered the rock
opening. The light of her torch
revealed that she was in a rough passage that had been cut with considerable
labor through the solid rock.
Whomever had made the passage had expended a lot of effort in its
construction.
The passage seemed to go almost straight back into the
rock. By now Larra and James
had progressed far enough that it was very
dark. Only the light of their
torches provided any illumination.
Larra looked back. The
entrance was a small square of light blocked by the members of her
expedition. The other whites
and several of the black soldiers had followed her into the
tunnel. She moved quite
slowly. She did not want to overlook
anything, and she was not sure that the tunnel was
safe. The rock looked solid enough,
but there was always the possibility of a cave-in.
The light of her torch revealed that the tunnel seemed to be coming
to an end. Was it possible that
someone had constructed it, but that it led
nowhere? That did not make
sense. The tunnel ended in a
blank wall of stone. There did
not appear to be any way through, but on careful inspection, Larra’s
torch revealed a hairline crack directly in front of
her. Her torch followed the crack
around and she was able to make out that the line traced a path in the wall
very much like that of a door. Was
there a way through?
Larra pushed on the
“door.” It was absolutely
solid. James came up and helped
her, but the wall would not budge.
“Looks like a dead end,” said James.
“Perhaps,” replied Larra, but she continued to move her
torch over the wall. He torchlight
revealed four small holes to the right of the
door. They were about the right
size to insert a finger. Larra
bent down and studied them intently.
“What is it, old girl?"
inquired James, bending down beside
her. He reached out a finger
toward one of the holes.
Larra struck his hand away.
Startled, James looked a little
hurt. “Just a second,
love,” said Larra. She took
out her pencil and pushed it into the
hole. There was a sharp
CHUNK! And the end
of her pencil was sheered off.
“That could have been your finger,
dear.”
“Good grief! “ exclaimed
James. “What is
it?”
“It is a finger lock.
It opens if you insert your fingers into the holes in the correct
sequence. If you make a mistake,
it cuts them off.”
“What a fiendish device!
Do you think you can open it?”
“Oh yes,” Larra chuckled, “provided I don’t run
out of fingers.”
Larra continued to shine her torch around the
wall. Near the top of the doorway
she was able to make out faint scratches in the
rock. “I thought so,”
she said. “I think the builder
of this door may have left us a
key.”
Standing on tiptoes she was able to make out faint Chinese
markings. “It seems to be
numbers,” she said. Three,
two, four, one. That must be
the order we are supposed to insert our
fingers. Most likely it will
not unlock unless all four fingers are inserted at the same
time.” Larra broke her pencil
into four parts. “Let’s
see,” she mused. “Do
the holes number up or down?”
She inserted the first piece of pencil in the second hole from the
bottom. Nothing
happened. She inserted the next
piece into the second hole from the top.
Still nothing happened. The
next two pieces of pencil went into the bottom hole and then the top
hole. There was a clunking sound
like the noise a lock makes when a key turns in
it. “I think we have it!”
Larra exulted.
Larra pushed on the face of the stone
door. To her surprise, it began
to move back at the top and out at the
bottom. Eventually the door pivoted
until it was horizontal, turning on hidden supports at its
center. The space over the top
of the door showed nothing but a blank
wall. The space under the door,
however, revealed an opening, through which could be seen
light. Cautiously, Larra bent
over and began to climb through the
opening. James grabbed her
arm. “You’re not going
to go through there!?” It
was both a question and a challenge.
“Of course,” replied
Larra. “How else am I going
to see what is on the other side?
“Then, at least let me go
first. It could be very
dangerous.”
“As I said before, darling it would also be dangerous for
you. This is my expedition, let
me have the glory.”
James released his grip.
Larra was right. It was
her expedition, and if there was a great discovery on the other side, she
should be the one to make it.
On her hands and knees Larra scrambled through the
opening. She found herself in
a short tunnel, about two feet high and three feet
wide. The end of the tunnel was
well lit. “There must be
some connection with the surface,” thought
Larra.
By now she was almost at the end.
Behind her she could hear James
shouting. “What have you
found? Does the tunnel go
anywhere?”
Larra poked her head out of the end of the
tunnel. What she saw made her
gasp in amazement. She turned
her head and yelled back.
“It’s just like what Howard Carter said when he peeked into
Tutankhamun’s tomb. I see
wondrous things.”
Larra scrambled into a gigantic cathedral-like
room. It measured about 300 feet
across and arched up to a ceiling at least 150 feet
high. Through a small opening
at the top light streamed into the cave in a dazzling golden
stream. Thousands of stalactites
pointed down from the ceiling and equally large number of stalagmites stretched
toward the ceiling. The rock
material of these natural formations was multihued, with dozens of colors
and shades of color giving the cave an even more spectacular
aspect. All about her Larra could
hear the measured sound of dripping water as nature continued its magnificent
work. Larra had never seen anything
like it. But it was something
else that really caught her attention.
Situated in the center of the cave, right under the opening in the
roof was a huge altar. It was
carved out of a massive block of stone, and was framed by huge pillars of
stone at least forty feet high. The
pillars appeared to have been fashioned from natural
stalagmites. In the center
of the altar was another stalagmite,
about 20 feet high, which had been fashioned by crude tools into an enormous
phallus. Scattered over the floor
in front of this awe-inspiring monument were fragments of hundreds of human
bones and thousands of pieces of pottery.
And strewn amongst the pieces of pottery and bone were what appeared
to be gold ornaments and sparkling gems.
Larra simply stared dumbfounded at the spectacle, until a touch on
her leg from behind let her know that James was right behind
her. “Move over my dear,”
he said. “Let’s see
what is so amazing.”
Larra crawled fully into the cave and stood
up. “No wonder the Maasi
tried to protect this place, it’s incredible!”
James joined her. Behind
him, Larra could hear the other members of the expedition crawling into the
short tunnel. Suddenly there
was a loud grinding sound from immediately above their
heads. With an enormous thud
a huge block of stone dropped in front of the
opening. It crashed to the floor
of the cave only inches from James and
Larra. They were
trapped!
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