Fist Of Gold

I think it was the rumble of the engines of the Air France S.O.30 Bretagne commercial airliner flying into African airspace, reaching out for a landing in Bamako, Mali, that brought up the memory as I dozed. Or maybe it was my returning to Africa for the first time since departing from Morocco for the Anzio Invasion eight years previously. Or the images surfaced by looking at the animated slender hands of the Italian businessman sitting beside me. Of maybe it was all three.

The rumble was the sound of the German tanks grinding by too close to us as we hid beside the road. And the chatter was Tony, another GI of Italian origin, egging me on to rise from our hiding place when the tanks were abreast of us. "Come on, Lieutenant; they won't be able to see us from inside those tin cans," I heard him saying, waving his hands in front of me. The sound of someone standing in the aisle of the plane, opening and closing a briefcase in the overhead bin—snap, snap, snap—translated into the machinegun fire that mowed us both down.

After that I was in an entirely different world, a world of white and red and moaning and pain. A hospital ward in Naples. Of pain and more pain—in my thigh and torso and shoulder—and the maddening repeat of "You were the lucky one," when I damn well knew that Tony wasn't the lucky one if I was still alive and he wasn't. And of Miranda, the nurse, with smiles and encouragement, laughter, cheery English accent, and kisses and more when I regained my mobility. And of Tom, the orderly, understanding, flirting in his own way. The Australian Tom of the "No worries" at my involuntary hardening during the bed baths and massages. Tom of the slender, relief-giving hand. Tom of the magic hand and introduction of the fist.

"What river is that down there?"

"Excuse me?" I asked, coming out of my remembrance doze.

"Oh, sorry. Were you asleep?"

"Just dozing," I answered. "What did you ask?" He was a handsome man. Maybe in his forties. Dark and sensual looking, the graying sideburns only adding to his attractiveness. Trim, but well muscled, expensive Italian suit—and those slender, expressive hands with the long, groomed fingers. He had a hand on my thigh as he leaned over to look out of the window. It was all so casually done, but it was as if he knew I wouldn't mind having it there—or higher even. We had eyed each other as early as the departure lounge in Paris, and I'd felt a jolt of electricity go up my spine when I saw that we would be first-class seatmates.

"I asked if you knew what river that was down there."

"It's the Niger. We'll use it as a landmark as we fly into Mali and land at Bamako."

"Oh. Have you been here before? Do you have business in Mali? Sorry, my name is Antonio Corti. I'm a mining engineer. Here on business. My first time here."

"Kyle Kendrick," I answered. "I'm an archeologist, here to consult on a Mali Empire dig. And, no I haven't been to Mali before. I was in Morocco a few years past."

"The Mali Empire? There's history here?"

"Oh, yes, there was quite a powerful empire here—based on the gold trade—for a good eight hundred years starting about AD 800. Not my specialty. But my former professor at Oxford believes there are enough similarities with the Incas and what he's found here for me to be useful."

"Oxford? But you're not English, are you? Or French?" He was giving me a warm smile. He'd taken his hand off the top of my thigh, but it lay against the side of the thigh on the low console between us, the fingers spread out against my leg. I looked down at the hand, and so did he. He didn't take it away and I made no move to move my thigh away from it. I knew he was signaling, and I strongly suspect he knew that I knew.

When I didn't move my thigh away, I was signaling too.

I smiled back. What can I say? He was a handsome man, with slender, expressive hands. Even though Miranda and I knew the score between us and what both of our preferences were, when I was at her family's country estate in York and even more at the family townhouse in London, I was on a pretty tight leash. I was in the wild of Africa now, and I'd come when Sir Geoffrey Bentham, my mentor at Oxford, had called because of what he had been to me and had initiated me in. I had come for more of an adventure than consulting on an archeological dig on the banks of the Niger forty miles outside of Bamako.

I keyed in on this man's signals because I had been revved up for it since I'd received Geoffrey's letter of invitation.

The fingers of his hand spread and acquired more pressure. I moved my thigh into them, thus spreading my legs a bit. I looked at his hand again, then up into his face, and, finally, lowered my eyes, dipping my head a bit. A signal of submission. His grip tightened in recognition of my acquiescence.

"No, I'm American. My graduate studies were at Oxford."

"Ah, American. I see that you have a cane and walked with a limp when you climbed the stairs into the plane. A war wound, perhaps?"

"Yes," I answered.

"Does it—?"

"It doesn't keep me from functioning in any way I want," I answered, anticipating the question.

"Good," he said, moving his had to on top of my thigh. Again, I permitted him that intimacy. It was enough to signal that I'd permit him other intimacies, should the opportunity arise. He was signaling domination. He was a top.

"I was in Southeast Asia—Thailand—for the duration of the war," he said. "I'm Italian, from Brindisi," he added.

He wanted me to know he wasn't in Europe for the war. The Italians were Axis; the Americans were Allied. I didn't want to tell him that I'd been in the Italian campaign, marching from the tip of the peninsula, at Anzio, as far as the monastery at Monte Cassino, before I was wounded and taken to Naples, where my war ended. We had bombed the shit out Monte Cassino, an Italian historical treasure. He wouldn't want to know that. I picked up the hand he had laying on my thigh and gently squeezed the fingers together with my hand, running my fingers over the span of the knuckles.

Another signal—a very special signal. I wondered if he would recognize it and would still be interested. Not every man was.

"You have very nice hands," I said. "Slender. I'll bet there is less than a nine-centimeter span from knuckle to knuckle." That would be no more than three-and-a-half inches in American and British terms. I looked into his eyes, wondering again if he would pick up on, correctly interpret, and respond to the signal.

He smiled back. "Yes, I believe the span is no wider than that. I can make that useful."

When I put his hand back, it was on the inside of my thigh and I closed my thighs on it. He left it there, opening and closing his grip on the inside of my thigh rhythmically.

"Are you staying at a hotel in Bamako or heading directly to your dig?" he asked.

"I'm being met. I have been given the option of staying the night in Bamako, though, and am tentatively booked at the Le Grand Hotel."

"Aren't we all?" Corti asked, with a winning smile. "Do stay the night in Bamako. I'm sure you'll find it very satisfactory. You're an unusually handsome young man. I'm sure you will find the servicing at Le Grand quite satisfying. Perhaps we could take dinner together if you didn't have other plans."

He'd called me a young man. He had me at that. It perhaps was for no other reason than I was within two months of losing my youth—turning thirty—that I was answering Geoffrey's call to come to him in Mali. I was scared of what I would become after thirty. I'd always been the desirable, handsome young man. What was there after thirty?

"Dinner would be very pleasant, if my reception party doesn't insist I go out to the camp tonight."

"Ah, tonight," Corti said, giving me another sunny smile. His hand moved up to brush my basket and then he pulled it away, both of us seeing the stewardess starting down the aisle to announce that we were descending into Bamako.

Corti helped me descend the stairway onto the Bamako tarmac, his support as much hindrance as help, but I sensed that he wanted demonstrate possession by having an excuse to put an arm around my back, and, as long as I would get what I wanted out of him, I could feel the arousal of being the submissive.

Geoffrey had written me that I wouldn't have any trouble identifying the reception party at the airport, and he was right. He'd already told me that he'd hired Mandinka tribesmen for the dig because of their long association with the area and unbroken line of connection the Mali Empire. I'd looked the name up to discover that, along with the Masai of Kenya, the Mandinka were the tallest peoples on earth, ranging up to seven feet tall. Two ebony men, looking very dignified and swathed in cloth, stood head and shoulders above everyone else in the reception hall. I knew even before I saw the sign with "Kendrick" on it that the taller of the two—reaching possibly six feet ten inches—was holding up that they had come for me.

They were handsome creatures in their own way. Seemingly beanpoles, with elongated features, until you stood next to them and found that they were as muscular as most men—just that everything was stretched out.

The taller of two, and obvious leader, identified himself as Tejon Darany. He was quite dignified of carriage—and reserved, although perfectly civil. He spoke impeccable English. His French also probably was impeccable, but since mine wasn't, I couldn't assess him on that. The other, shorter—if something around six feet eight could be considered shorter—and younger man was identified only as Modibo. He spoke no English and only broken French, so our exchanges were awkward, brief, and rare. He obviously was under the wing of Tejon, as he looked to the older tribesman in all matters and only shyly at me. Of the two, he was the more handsome in Western terms, but these two men were so exotic that I couldn't think of them in Western terms.

Tejon didn't seem the least bit upset when I told him I wanted to extend my touch with civilization by spending my first night in Mali at Le Grand Hotel. He said that he and Modibo had places they could stay and families they could visit that evening, and, with very little other verbal exchange, he drove me to the hotel in a dusty Land Rover and said they would pick me up there at 10:00 the next morning.

* * * *

I was huffing and puffing—but in seventh heaven, albeit its pain wing—as Corti's knuckles rubbed against the rim of my ass entrance. He'd taken several minutes getting to this point, aided by gobs of the vegetable grease lubricant I had gotten from a market near the hotel. We were both naked and stretched out against each other on my hotel bed—on rubber matting I'd also found in the market.

Corti's body was beautiful, which speeded my arousal, and his quick erection indicated he was pleased with mine, as well. He had the olive skin of Mediterranean climes and was covered with an arousing pattern of curly black hair that swirled around his nipples and descended into his neatly trimmed pubic bush. The curly hair covered his forearms and thighs as well and curled in his pits, also neatly trimmed. Everything about his body spoke of grooming to accentuate his beauty. His body was thick and muscular, more of a Zeus than an Apollo—promising the experience of a mature man. And experienced he was; he didn't bat an eye about giving me the servicing and release that I sought.

He had started slow, sensually, running his hands over my body as we lay stretched out against each other when we were naked. He kissed and fondled my body, spending considerable time on the puckered bullet wounds on my thigh, torso, and shoulder. He wanted to know the circumstance of them, but of course I couldn't give him the specifics, so, instead, I murmured, "I want you to fuck me and then give me what I want. Then I'll give you whatever you want. Don't make me wait."

He didn't make me wait. His hands went to my thighs, coaxing them apart, pressing my legs to bend, my feet to go flat on the surface of the bed, and my pelvis to roll up, as he entered me with three fingers—I ached for more—and slowly pumped me to shuddering and begging for his cock. And then he rolled over on top of me, entered me strongly, deeply, thickly and took me quickly and efficiently.

After we had rested, he held me close into his body, with a towel-covered bolster under the small of my back that elevated my pelvis. My right leg was bent and pressed into his chest. His left arm was embracing my torso; his lips were possessing mine in a tongue-down-the-throat kiss. I was gripping his left shoulder with my right hand and beating myself off with my left. He had four fingers and the thumb of his right hand inside me, moving them in and out, searching for, finding, and giving attention to my prostate.

He asked no question about what to do to arouse and please me. He'd obviously fisted men before.

"Please be careful," I murmured. "I want it, but I have my limits."

"Limits we must both respect and challenge," he whispered, "for therein lies the pleasure for us both." He pulled his hand back and then pressed in again. I arched my back and moaned.

I jerked my mouth away from his, arched my head back, and gave a little cry of "Shit!," then "Fuck!" and then another and another, as the knuckles of his slender hand breached my rim and his fist was inside me and bunched to stretch my passage to the limit. He expanded and contract the fist, a knuckle pressed into my prostate. Expand, contract. I dug my fingernails into his biceps. "Oh, god," I moaned. He stifled further exclamations and sobs by taking my lips in his. Expand, contract. I involuntarily tried to pull away from him, but he held me too tightly. Expand and move a fraction deeper. I tore my mouth away from his, arched my head back, and cried out to the ceiling. "Oh, fuckin' shit!" I shot my load, and he pulled his knuckles back out of my ass almost immediately. He had known exactly what to do to give me the maximum pain-pleasure in my ejaculation.

He held me there, in his arms, holding my eyes with his. "Is that the way you want it?" he murmured.

"That was . . . it," I whispered, being at a loss for what to say. Never had I been so much on the edge, crossing into the divine, as with that. He was a master of the art.

"Well, here it comes again," he growled, holding me tight, as I writhed under him and began to pant in response to the pressure of the fist.

Afterward, we kissed deeply again, and when he pulled away from me, he murmured, "And now may I take my pleasure of your body."

"Of course," I responded. "I think I am too weak to resist anything you do now anyway."

He laughed.

"Are there any limits now to what I can do with you?"

"Try me," I answered.

He did—effectively, efficiently, totally, and exhaustingly into the dark of the night. He made me feel young and flexible again.

Before he left in the first streaks of light before dawn, he told me how long he would be in Bamako and where he could be reached.

"If it becomes convenient, I would like to use you again," he said.

"I would like that too," I responded. Normally I would think that his choice of "use" was a translation problem, but he had, in fact, used my body as a vessel of his methodical, efficient lust, and I had come twice more for him before he was finished. That he had used my body seemed to be a perfect description that I could not object to or complain about. I had certainly used his hand to get myself off on. Everything after that was icing on the cake.

* * * *

"I didn't see your dig reported anywhere. And I looked in a lot of media sources for it."

It was evening and we'd had dinner out under the stars. It looked like we were going to be doing a lot of things under the stars. There were tents, in two circles, but except for the communal tents and Sir Bentham's, they didn't look too commodious. We—Geoffrey Bentham; his French colleague, Perrin Tolbert; and I—were sitting around a fire pit in the circle of our tents and the communal ones. The Mandinka workers were in the circle of tents that met our circle at a tent assigned to Tejon Darany. Tejon and Modibo were still in our circle, passing out after-dinner drinks and cigars. The rest of the Mandinka were in their circle. Drums were softly playing, matched by low chanting by male voices. Some of the tents were lit up internally, casting shadows through thin material of what was inside. All very atmospheric. I was in Africa. The sky overhead was a cobalt blue, the stars seemingly suspended just a few feet over our heads.

"I should hope to God you didn't see mention of this dig—or tell anyone you're coming here," Bentham blustered. "This is really hush hush. There are few in the Mali government who know about it either."

Bentham was sitting within fondling distance of me, which I sort of expected him to have gotten around to doing before now. He was my dominating top when I was at Oxford after the war. And he was a power top with perhaps the biggest dick in England. He had to fist me just to be able to screw me later.

But I had to admit that the last five years, since I'd seen him last, hadn't been kind to him. He was gaunt and looked emaciated. And he had a wildness about his eyes and spoke more rapidly than I'd known him to do before—like he was on borrowed time. How old would he be now, I wondered. Funny that I hadn't wondered about that when we were together in Oxford. He'd said a few times then that he was twice my age. But now it seemed like maybe that was off, like he was more than twice my age. He looked well into his late sixties now.

But then, maybe he was waiting for the others—the Mandinka servants and his colleague, Tolbert—to leave us before he became intimate with me.

"So, what is it about this dig that's so secret and important, Geoffrey?" I asked. "I trust that, since it's close to the river, the site is buried."

"Tejon, go fetch the treasure box, please. Then you and Modibo may retire," Bentham said. Then he turned to me. "You've heard of the writer named Rihlah, haven't you, Kyle?"

"I believe so. The Arab who traversed northern Africa early in the fourteenth century and wrote of his travels."

"The same. He wrote of a Temple of Kongoba, but although there is a village by the name—just over the hill there—no one but he wrote about a temple."

"And you have found the temple site?"

"The site, yes, but I don't think it actually was a temple. More of a storehouse. I don't think the Malian guides leveled with him when he asked what the edifice was."

"Storing what?"

"What is Mali famous for? What was its leading trading good during the Mali Empire? Do you know?"

"You think that gold was stored at this Kongoba site?"

"Not was. Is. Ah, thank you, Tejon. I'll just show our colleague here what we have and then you can take it back."

Bentham opened the rectangular box that was more than a foot long and took out a solid gold rod. It was nearly a foot long, an inch and a half wide up the base, and a good three inches or more at the bulb.

"A dildo?" I said, with a laugh. "Is this a supersized phallus?"

"A dildo perhaps," Bentham said, smiling, "but look again. You of all people should recognize what it is."

I drew in my breath. It wasn't a phallus at all. It was a stylized arm rising up into a fist.

"Is that?" I asked with a stammer.

"Yes, I believe this is an ancient dildo in the form of an arm and fist," Bentham said. "Tejon thinks so too. There are rituals among the Mandinka that go back to that era. They are, as you can see, an outsized race—outsized in nearly every way. Many of their rituals were sexual. Thank you, Tejon. You and Modibo can retire now."

I watched the two, swathed in billowy cloth, walk to Tejon's tent. Bentham had said they were outsized in every way and my mind was savoring what that could mean. Not in every way, I would have said. As with all men, I had assessed the knuckle span of both of the Mali tribesmen when they had met me at the plane. Both had slender hands and were within my tolerances.