Cleopatra's Perfume

Now I was alone without that hand, and that raw hunger for a man’s touch made me fierce with longing. I’d do anything to assuage that need so I could again experience the delicious sensations that made me breathless.

I beg your indulgence, dear reader, for allowing my female id to overwhelm my thoughts when I should capture them and put them into a cage with bars, a cage forged with words, for such is their power to hold the mind prisoner and that is what I must do, hold you prisoner while I tell you my tale, for I dare not lose you. My obsession with Ramzi is too incredible to believe: The attraction, the seduction, the promise. Yet the hour is late and I must finish my travel preparations. I leave London tomorrow on the first part of my journey to Berlin. En route, I will set the scene so that you, too, will understand why I didn’t resist, why I couldn’t. You must allow your subconscious to let go and come with me on my journey, for without you, no one will never know about the power of the perfume.

Cleopatra’s perfume.

3

Aboard a courier flight from Leuchars, Scotland, to Stockholm

April 7, 1941

I tremble, the ink staining my fingers as I hasten to finish describing the scene in the Bar Supplice invoking such pleasure in me.

Ramzi, Mahmoud and me.

A half-caste Egyptian, a Nubian and a white woman entwined in sexual exploration. Not a dream or a fantasy, but an integration of lips, hands and fingers, legs and thighs, touching, exploring, teasing, tasting, smelling each other until that supreme moment when black hands cupped my breasts, twisting my nipples until I cried out with exquisite joy, while the mysterious Egyptian touched me, held me, watched me, delighting in the sound when I groaned deep in my throat at the intense sensations overcoming me. Not one of us paid attention to a taboo forged with prejudices so strong not even the sharpest tongue could cut through its fibers.

Yet when I entered this exotic world hidden away on a backstreet in Port Said, I chose to rip apart that taboo with refined gestures that went beyond defiance because I ached with a hunger, a challenge I could no longer ignore, no longer deny.

Seducing a man like Ramzi.

I believed then as I do now that seeking divine pleasure is not a sin. I would have no regrets afterward, for was I not fulfilling my female impulses to mate? And in doing so, were not two men better than one?

These thoughts spun through my mind, trapping me in a web of intrigue. I am a woman of the world, having tasted variety in my choice of men based more on their ability to arise within me a deep response to please them and receive pleasure, rather than on their skin color, so I was in tune to the scene in the club that followed.

I let out a plaintive sigh and concentrated on the roiling emotions tantalizing my pubic area when Mahmoud parted my thighs and inserted two fingers inside me. With nary a glance in my direction, he began to rub my clit back and forth to increase the flow of my natural lubrication. Lolling my head from side to side, I imagined my cream coating his shiny black fingers as a sweet aroma hit my nostrils. I wasn’t alone in my reverie. Mahmoud also inhaled my scent, then grunted. Noting his deep breathing, I wondered what carnal thoughts filled the Nubian’s mind. Was he savoring the fragrance of my pussy? Or was he merely following orders?

He must have sensed what I was thinking because he swooped down on my breast with his hungry lips and bit at my nipple with his teeth hard enough to make me cry out, as if to assert his power to arouse me. I threw my head back, writhing as he did it again. Would Ramzi allow him to partake in the lovemaking? I wondered.

Indulging in bilateral sex acts was common in this part of the world since women were required to undergo female circumcision and were often addicted to masturbation with bananas, candles and other large objects that stretched their organs into wide orifices. When I first arrived in Egypt with my tap shoes slung over my shoulder, I’d seen ghāzīyeh, dancing girls, performing nude in Cairo clubs, pulling red or yellow or blue veils between their thighs and buttocks to achieve orgasm because they had no clit and must rub their pussies with ecstatic vigor to produce an orgasm.

I watched them dance, my adventurous soul falling in love with the erotic world of modern Cairo, my naughty side falling in love with its carnival-like atmosphere. Ah, but I was young and wanted only to laugh and drink and forget where I came from and be free. Wild, impetuous days when I possessed nothing but the shadows of the night to cloak my sins after I, too, shed my clothes to find my fortune.

Thinking back, I remember the first time I had two men pleasuring me, one man accommodating his entrance into me to the convenience of another. Once before I dug my fingernails into the back of a man while standing and two cocks filled me up, one penetrating me in front, the other from behind. The first man, a muscular Englishman, lifted up both my thighs as high as possible for deep thrusting while the other, a Hollander, took me from behind, his strong hands gripping me around the waist. Crushed between the two men, I cared not that I’d been duped into taking on both men by my youthful enthusiasm to dine with two titled gentlemen. I was barely twenty then, unmarried, dancing in a club in Berlin when I met Lord Marlowe and his Dutch friend.

The British lord climaxed first and afterward insisted he’d won the bet and I was his alone. I balked at the idea, fleeing into the arms of other admirers, but I soon came to realize the seductive power he possessed to satisfy a woman. His dominance over me was never threatening but loving. And I, the wandering girl I’d become in my search for artistic freedom, embraced his erotic amusements as my own. The way he looked at me—straight in the eye—and touched me with lingering caresses, enhanced the sexual act between us with a heat and intensity that spoiled me for other men. We shared our fantasies, shed supple tears together and dallied in our dreams. It was eight years of madness. Glorious madness. Since his death, I found no man who could satisfy me. No man.

Until I met Ramzi.

I basked in the violet light illuminating my nude body on display as Ramzi and Mahmoud performed an erotic pantomime around me, touching, kissing, caressing me. Stroking, ah, yes, stroking me as if the two men comforted me before leading me into a pyramid maze of sensations from which I had no intention of escaping.

I could see my nude breasts, flat belly and bare thighs glowing like liquid amethyst under the soft lighting as four hands rubbed sweetsmelling oil all over me, sliding between my thighs then slipping a finger inside me and seeking out my throbbing clitoris or crawling all over my body, cupping my buttocks, squeezing them. I twisted and turned to allow them greater access, emitting powerful groans when I felt an erection grinding against my arse and powerful hands savoring the feel of my buttocks; then a second erection nestled between my breasts, two hands pushing them together so his cock rubbed back and forth against them, stimulating me. All the while the mixture of sweat and fragrant oil hung heavy in the air.

I drew in my breath, eager to allow the floral scent of the essence to add to my experience. Jasmine, roses and something I couldn’t identify, but it had the power to make my head spin. I sighed and Ramzi’s tongue brushed my lower lip then slid down my throat to my breasts. He licked all around the mauve-tinted areola of my nipples without touching the tips, making me tense. At the same time I felt Mahmoud snake a finger into my anal hole and explore the nerve-rich endings inside with such expertise I found myself swaying in time to his leisurely movements. He withdrew his finger only to increase my pleasure with his hot tongue flicking over the tight puckered hole, then sweeping down over the delicate diamondshaped area of skin leading to the wetness oozing from me.

I closed my eyes and reveled in these lingering sensations while the hypnotic plucking of what I believed was a small lyre, simsimiyya, stimulated me with a driving percussion and the steady beating of drums. Dama, devotional music and love poetry. The music played on an unseen device, numerous scratches interrupting the flow of the music and attesting to how often I imagined Ramzi indulged his sensuality.

When I thought I could stand no more, Ramzi lay down beside me and pulled me on top of him. In my enthusiasm to seek closeness to the man, I wrapped my arms around him, crushing my breasts against his chest. Before I could find my breath, he rolled me over on my back and guided his cock into me, the loud groan erupting from his throat confirming what I already knew. I was a tight fit, which made him more determined to plunge his cock into me again and again with hard thrusts that made him labor and use all his strength. I moaned again, louder, my insides stretched by the size of him, my flesh quivering with feelings too long unstirred.

Before I knew what was happening, Mahmoud knelt down in front of me, his knees so close to the sides of my head the smell of his arousal overwhelmed me. Salty, musky, a deep penetrating odor that filled my lungs. His huge cock brushed my cheeks, my lips, but it wasn’t his own gratification he sought. He leaned over and grabbed my breasts, pinching them and sending exquisite sensations through my nipples. I couldn’t stop my pleasure from building, my pubic muscles from contracting deep inside me. Ramzi sensed my release was near and as if he willed it, he renewed his thrusts with a newfound vigor as orgasm overtook us both, the drums and percussion crashing in my head, sweat pouring down my face as the contractions engulfed me, prolonged groans escaping my lips as I sucked the entire length of him into me before I lapsed into a dreamy state of unconsciousness.

I believed then no man could ever satisfy me as Ramzi did, such was the deep pleasure and satisfaction he gave me in the days that followed. He had a way of looking at me with his left eyebrow raised in such a manner I never knew what he was thinking. Lowering my gaze, I detected much to my delight his cock also stiffened. With such magnificence about him—his nude muscular body, brown well-developed shoulders and chest—I shudder thinking about how he locked his fingers in my hair and pulled me to him and smothered my face with kisses, then turned me facedown into a valley of silk so smooth I swear I shed my skin only to take on a new one. Spreading my legs, he pressed his hand between my bare thighs and opened me to his touch. I cried out when his thumb pushed inside me, his fingers teasing my clitoris with masterful stroking before he thrust into me, deeper and deeper…

Yet I chose to ignore the rational mental vibrations sparking my brain, enjoying more the pleasant sensations contracting throughout my lower groin. Sleek wetness forms now between the folds and drips down the bare skin between my thighs when I bring it to mind, my silk slip sticking to me, prompting me that silk rubbing against skin brings so much pleasure.

Thinking, writing, I concentrate on my choice of words to describe my thoughts as the British transport pitches up and down—I grab the opened bottle of black India ink before it spills—as we fly against strong tailwinds, the insistent turbulence threatening to destroy my female fantasies with the claws of war since we’re flying over enemy territory. Am I afraid? Yes. Do I wish to turn back? No. I’m on a mission and I have my orders—no, I prefer to call them instructions, for I’m not a soldier. I’m doing a favor for Sir_____, an old friend of my late husband, a man to whom I owe allegiance, though I shall not reveal his identity because of security. At his insistence, I rode in a motorcar with blacked-out windows from London to the airfield at Leuchars, Scotland, before boarding the flight to Sweden.

Unlike official agents who carry a reichsmark-laden money belt, pistol, concentrated food pack and silk map of their operating area, I’m armed with an old satchel filled with personal items (including Cleopatra’s perfume). I don’t carry a small radio receiver or an entrenching tool since I’m not being dropped into Germany behind enemy lines like agents enlisted to help local resistance movements carry out what the Foreign Office calls sabotage and subversion.

I do have forged papers to identify me.

Once I arrive in Stockholm, I shall travel to Malmö by train then across the Baltic Sea by ferry to Copenhagen. I dare not try to cross the sea from Trelleborg, Sweden, into Germany and run the risk of coming into contact with Nazi troops rumored to be crossing secretly into Norway. It’s safer to cross from the Danish capital into the small seaside town of Warnemünde in Germany and continue by train to Berlin.

My pen shakes and drops of black ink dot the page like footprints tracing my path across Europe. I fear what awaits me in the Nazi stronghold, and it’s that fear that propels me to continue to record what happened to me in Port Said. I have no idea how much time I’ll have when I reach Berlin to finish how I came to take this extraordinary journey. I’m traveling under an American passport in my maiden name, Eve Charles, prepared for me by SIS, British Secret Intelligence Services, in London with the help of the U.S. Foreign Office. Yes, dear reader, I’m an American by birth, though I’m not comfortable with revealing the details of my life before I became Lady Marlowe. The job is dangerous and, unlike other agents, I speak only English and the limited German I learned as a child. Why I’m familiar with the guttural language of the stormtroopers is not important, for to reveal all would be to place myself in greater jeopardy. All you need to know is I’m not a spy—

I struck out that last sentence before the attendant insisted I put away my writing pen and ink. We’re headed through a thunderstorm with heavy rain and lightning. Everything in the cabin not secured tumbled onto the floor of the aircraft, including my cup of coffee, along with the diary. I grabbed it before the attendant could retrieve it, breaking my nail, then I asked her if we were turning back. No, she assured me, a straight course through the storm would get us out of danger.

Danger? How strange to hear the word spoken out loud when inside I cannot quell my anxiety. I push the wisps of hair sticking to my forehead off my face, scratching my skin with a broken nail. A few weeks ago I would have Mrs. Wills ring up my manicurist for immediate repair. Now it seems so unimportant. I chew on the ragged nail. I will know nothing but danger until I complete my mission.

Trembling, I hold the red silk book flush against my breasts and grip the armrest with my other hand while I stare out the window. I see nothing but large chunks of ice pelting the glass. My pulse races as the captain maneuvers the plane to hold the altitude, but the gale pitches us about in the sky up and down with such intensity I fear we’ll be torn apart in midair. What if we crash? What if my diary falls into enemy hands? Oh, God, what was I thinking? No, I can’t reveal the nature of my mission to you. My intent in writing this diary is to record what happened to me in Port Said and Cairo and what I believe will happen to me should I fail in Berlin and a bullet finds its mark. Nothing more.

Accordingly, I hesitate to regale you with a lonely woman’s sexual obsession, though depending on who you are, dear reader, you may find pleasure in my recounting of the man I came to know only as Ramzi. So I shall continue.

After that lascivious afternoon of sexual antics in Bar Supplice with Ramzi, I allowed my heated passions to cool, though he insisted on allowing him to show me the sights of Port Said. Eyes connecting, hands reaching, fingers touching, we competed at tennis, rode Arab steeds together and walked along the beach at sunset. Dabbing on heavy red lipstick to protect my lips from the sun but not from the burning kiss of my handsome Egyptian, I allowed him to exude his charm, though underneath I sensed his excessive callousness. I can’t deny that like most lonely women, I found myself fascinated by this extreme male example of sinfulness. Sitting outdoors over tea and a game of bridge at my hotel, he explained to me how he needed money to finance an expedition to the Valley of the Queens. A friend of his, he said, was close to unearthing the tomb of Cleopatra.

I raised an eyebrow, curious. Such an expedition could only be a hoax, a ruse to get money from me. Cleopatra died long after the time of the Pyramids. I laid down my cards, losing interest in the game. I was lonely, so I continued to listen.

What proof did he have? I demanded. He insisted the entire story of how Cleopatra died clutching a snake to her breast was a myth. He didn’t mind illustrating his point by circling my breast with his fingers, my nipple hardening. His bold gesture went unnoticed. Teatime had ended an hour ago and we were the sole occupants in the hotel restaurant.

I bent closer to him, wanting to hear more. The royal tale of incest, power, greed and bloodlust had a much different ending, he assured me, one he would share with me if I financed his expedition.

I must digress here, dear reader, and remind you I am no neophyte to the ways of the Near East. I explored the ancient Pyramids of Egypt with my husband, Lord Marlowe, on our honeymoon. He was a gentleman and a scholar. And the man who encouraged me to fulfill my darkest desires. Bent over the somber-faced sarcophagus of a pharaoh, my bare breasts resting in his stone mouth, my honey juices coating the gold detailing along his stone arms, I trembled and shivered with delight as I engaged in lessons in obedience and Egyptology.

Naked save for a pair of white satin pumps, sheer stockings and red garters, I squealed in delight as Lord Marlowe pinched my quivering buttocks while he expounded on the Roman conquest of Egypt, then he struck my bare backside with the thinnest of canes designed to evoke pleasure not pain. The light stinging blows startled me at first, but soon gave way to a sensation of warmth that enveloped my lower body with an intense heat.

I let go with a loud guttural cry, squeezing my eyes shut, the muscles in my buttocks tightening and contracting again and again each time I heard the whistle of the crop, knowing the exquisite pleasure I needed so desperately was about to find its mark. I contracted my pubic muscles, anticipating his cock driving deep into me, filling me, waiting. I cried out when he parted my cheeks and entered me. I bucked with wild abandon, grinding my hips against his groin harder, harder, until I could stand no more and I inserted one, then two fingers inside me and rubbed my burning clit until a rolling wave of pleasure overtook me, the rush of its power filling my ears and drowning out my screams of delight.

Afterward, lying in his arms, he’d tell me about Caesar and Cleopatra and how the deposed queen devised a plan to smuggle herself into the palace in Alexandria wrapped in a rug, her firm young body a gift for the emperor. Naked except for ribbons of pearls encircling her neck and swung over her hips, she enticed the Roman general with a sensual dance, swaying her hips and playing with her breasts, then climaxing her performance by pulling out a string of perfect white pearls from her anus while bending over, her calf muscles straining, her long beaded black wig snapping against her cheeks. All this, he was eager to tell me while fingering my anal hole and making me squirm with delight, to enlist the Roman’s help in her struggle to control the Egyptian throne.

I was intrigued with the story and, in a quasi-serious mood, I begged my dear husband to lay his supple cane upon my naked backside again and again to hear him tell me more stories. The reality was I thirsted for both the cane and knowledge. I left school when I was sixteen, not uncommon for girls of my class. I was uneducated, but savvy enough to know how to take care of myself from my travels around Europe, when and why is not important here. All you need know is I listened intently to Lord Marlowe schooling me in the fine arts, history and the ways of the ancients while he played with my nipples, flicking them back and forth, pinching them, nipping at them, then licking them to soothe the wild sensations sparking through me. I told him I imagined his cock spiraling up like an Egyptian cobra, naja haje, while he circled my breast with his tongue. That brought a chuckle to his lips. He informed me the cobra was more than six feet long and very thick. Like your cock? I’d quip. He laughed and continued his lecture, reminding me to listen well or I would again feel the fierce kiss of his cane upon my arse.

I’ve never forgotten those days. I was a willing pupil and an apt student in the ways of the flesh as well as the mysteries of the empires of Egypt, my naked body lying in repose on eiderdown so soft I floated upon it as well as in my dreams. Behind me, an intricately woven lattice concealed me from the world outside, revealing only my silhouette, my arms up above my head, my wrists secured to serpentine-slender gold poles, my legs spread, his tongue delving into me, his sun-darkened hands massaging my parted thighs while he gave me the pleasure I craved…

So it was I listened with a schooled ear to Ramzi extolling his fabricated tale to me, though my eyes widened with respect when he insisted the Romans, including Mark Antony, believed suicide to be an honorable death. But, he said, the ancient Egyptians believed it was a sin. (Cleopatra was Greek Macedonian, I knew.) I didn’t argue his point, though I wondered, Why was he lying to me about Cleopatra? I wanted to believe him, wanted to again lie my head on his shoulder, reach into his soul and pull him to me, but I held back, waiting. Waiting to see where this game would end. I had no idea what an extraordinary adventure awaited me.

“Cleopatra was murdered,” he told me, his hand lingering on my knee under the round teakwood table. His touch lit a fire between my legs, a slow burn igniting my female urge to again experience sex with this handsome but savage man, an act condemned by the dour-faced society matrons I once craved would accept me. No longer would I bow to the demands of café society. I had allowed a man of the desert to brand my white skin with his touch, a taboo in my world. Breaking such a taboo would sully my reputation, though I didn’t care what anyone thought, so strong was the scent exuding from him. I ignored the insistent voice telling me he was a denizen of falsehoods meant to snare me in his trap. I was more interested in allowing him access to the patch of bare skin above my stockings.

“Interesting theory you have about the death of the Egyptian queen,” I said, sipping my tea, though it had too much sugar for my taste and not enough milk. Thé à la menthe. Ramzi insisted it was a local favorite. “I suppose you also know who murdered her?”