The ape yanked at the chain, its great leathery paws digging at the ground in a vain attempt to free itself, and it seemed to whine with frustration. With the first impact of horror past, Sharon Court also became aware that the ape was not angry or belligerent, but was acting as if it wanted to be friendly. Was looking for affection the way a dog might. She hesitated…
And then she let her vision wander down the thick, shaggy stomach and to the huge dangling, hair-covered shaft of the ape's penis. A male… a fantastically huge male with a penis that seemed to be totally out of proportion to its size, Sharon blushed, though her eyes kept staring at his groin, and then as if in response, the ape's cock began to swell and perk upwards until it no longer hung downward like a third small arm but instead reared upwards in a decided curve.
The ape was excited. It was ready for intercourse… with her! Sharon let out another stifled scream, more of outraged revulsion than terror, and turned and fled from the round little building. She stumbled down the garden path, tears once more stinging her eyes at the thought of what was in the animal mind of the ape. She flung her head back and forth and staggered in blind hysteria…
And almost threw Lena Alvaro down on the ground in her haste to get away. Lena steadied the sobbing wife, putting her arms around her in a show of feminine concern, and even patted her back. Lena knew exactly what kind of experience Sharon had had seconds earlier, though she acted otherwise.
"A… an ape! There's an ape in that… that house back there!" Sharon was uncontrollable and choking on her words.
"For heaven's sake, calm down, Sharon," Lena said in soothing tones as she lied to still the younger woman's fears. "Of course there is. That's only Rajah, though, and he's not really an ape. Only a very harmless, very tame chimp."
"But… but he's so big!" In her mind came the vision of the monster penis, but Sharon couldn't tell her friends that she was thinking of his male member when she said he was so big.
"Chimps normally are around five feet tall, Sharon, and weigh about 130 or so pounds. They're very intelligent, you know, and highly sociable."
"What… what's it doing here?"
"I'll tell you on the way back to the house, Mark is in the study, I believe. He sent me out to look for you." They started along the path, Lena giving the still distraught young wife support. "Mark's father, Christopher Marlowe, brought Rajah home from tropical Africa as a baby chimp. Been part of the family for all these years; Mark played with Rajah as a child. Normally Mark lets the chimpanzee have complete freedom of the garden, and that's why there are such high walls around it. But he thought it best with you coming that he chain the beast up."
"Oh… Oh, I see," sobbed Sharon.
"Anybody would have been frightened at first. You should have been told. Come on, Sharon. We'll go see Mark and have a nice comforting glass of Sherry to calm your nerves. Won't that be nice?"
CHAPTER FIVE
Mark Marlowe was standing before the fireplace when the two women entered the library, and he studied the young blonde wife carefully as Lena led her across to the wide leather couch near the roaring blaze. Ah good, good! he thought, barely able to conceal his elation. She's seen Rajah, and judging from the whiteness of her face she perused my little collection of Copenhagen art, too! Things are progressing quite nicely… and it will only be a matter of moments now before I can possess that fine, voluptuous young body… those soft, warm red lips…
Expertly concealing his inner gloating, for he had had long practice at such veilings, the wealthy Lord of Marlowe Manor put on a grave, concerned expression as he approached the two women. "Why, Sharon my dear, what's the matter? You're as pale as a ghost. Did something frighten you?"
"I… I accidentally found your… pet," murmured Sharon as Lena sat her down on the couch. "He… frightened me for just a moment…"
"Ah yes, Rajah," said Mark smoothly. "But how stupid of me to have neglected to tell you about him; I should have expected that you would be exploring the garden. Can you forgive me such an oversight, my dear?"
"Why… yes, of course, Mark," Sharon favored him with a meager smile, while Lena patted her hand reassuringly.
"Let me get you a glass of Sherry," said Mark solicitously. "It will make you feel much better."
"Yes, I think I'd like some Sherry."
Mark smiled, his eyes touching Lena's briefly. Then he went to the handsome bar and poured a large glass full of ruby liquid from a decanter which sat atop the counter — a decanter which Wafto had gleefully placed there only minutes earlier. He carried the glass back to the couch, sitting down on the other side of Sharon from Lena, and handed the blonde wife the Sherry.
Sharon accepted the glass gratefully and raised it to her lips. She was still upset — she could not help but think about those awful, terrible booklets she had seen in the ape's stone hut, and wonder why they were there, whose they were; she wanted to ask Mark about them, but she couldn't seem to bring herself to voice the words. She had experienced the same difficulty even with Lena, her best friend, in the garden moments ago.
The beauteous American girl drank deeply of the warm, syrupy liquid, feeling it coursing the length of her throat and settling with a pleasant glow in her stomach. She did not see, as she drained the glass, the shining eyes of Mark Marlowe and Lena Alvaro, the lascivious eagerness in their momentarily unguarded faces…
Sharon placed the empty glass on one of the nearby tables, then leaned back, closing her eyes. I wish I'd never consented to come here, she thought. First that awful dream last night, and then waking up to find I'd lost control of myself in my sleep and orgasmed, and then seeing the ugly chimpanzee with its monstrous penis and those evil, filthy pornographic booklets… This isn't turning out to be a quiet, relaxing vacation at all; it's turning into a… a kind of nightmare, in which everything seems pleasant and nice on the surface, but underneath all is evil and perverted… I'm going to ask Neal to take me back to London, to take me home, as soon as he returns from Athens…
Sharon let her thoughts trail off as a strange sort of dreamy torpor seemed to envelope her whole being. She lay relaxed against the couch, between Lena and the Lord of Marlowe Manor, and suddenly she felt at ease, felt as if she were safe and protected. She seemed to realize, deep down, that this wasn't true — but the feeling persisted in her conscious mind. Her head was feathery, light, and her stomach and loins seemed to glow with pleasant warmth. Odd… her nipples were hardening beneath the culottes she wore, and… and she could feel a tingling of sexual desire in the soft, moist folds of her pussy…
Time seemed to stand still for Sharon Court, and it was as if she began drifting on a soft fleecy cloud of torpor. Yes, and it was as if hands, so soft and gentle, were beginning to caress her flesh slowly, tantalizingly, expertly moving over her breasts and her belly and her warmly flowering cunt, exciting her, soothing her, such nice, nice feelings…
If the young wife had known that her dreamy thoughts were more than merely mental — that soft, gentle hands were indeed moving slowly soothingly over her stilled body at that moment — she would have been shocked and horrified. But she did not know, had no awareness that both Mark Marlowe and her best friend, Lena Alvaro, were caressing her with their talented fingers; she did not know that what was causing her to feel so dreamy and floating was the potion, the powerful and carefully dosed aphrodisiac made by the evil dwarf Wafto; she did not know that the gentle caresses, part of the plan mapped out by Mark and Lena to put young Sharon at her ease in the beginning, would soon become something entirely different, something brutal and lusting and depraved…