The Big Broad Jump Read online

  The terminal was bursting with nice-looking broads in mini-skirts going in all directions, and a pair of swivel-hipped airline stewardesses made me even more homesick but duty called.

  Walrus-moustache’s report was another of his masterful exercises in cliche prose and dire prophecy. I had practically memorized the damn thing.

  It went something like this:

  DAMON:

  A foreign power, not yet known to us, has come up with a truly phenomenal gimmick.* You will recall the Russian lady scientist who lessened the virility of the males of the country of Sarmania by liberally dosing the food with a special chemical? You went there and were able to neutralize that situation. Well, now there is a new idea this foreign power has come up with. This country has invented the ‘silver pill’. Any man who takes one has the sexual stamina of a young stud—the effects of this pill can make the male potently aggressive for at least five or six hours!

  *Had Any Lately? © 1969

  I had thought of it and it was ridiculous. So what? If a guy could make the scene for as long as six hours, how the hell could that affect the country or the world? It was progress, real progress, if they asked me. What had that to do with war and bad times? Hard times, maybe, but not the kind that would make any average, healthy, uncomplicated male unhappy!

  But Walrus-moustache had his usual boatload of theories and questions. He never lets up. The report went on:

  Now, in the town of Betchnika, population, 10.647, a group of 25 men over the age of 60(!) were given these silver pills. Either by controlled experiment or subversively—you shall have to find out. These elderly gentlemen were so rejuvenated and miraculously aroused that they, in turn, fornicated with their wives, girls on the street, harlots, teenagers and quite truthfully, anything they could get their hands on. (Check also on incident of one of the men with a cow!) Following this curious orgy of plenty, a very curious thing happened. The women of Betchnika began to fight for these men in a jealous rage; and the rest of the men in town began fighting the 25 men who had been ingested with these silver pills. A few days later these 25 men were found hanged in a barn. Yes, hanged! The ghastly affair was hushed up but our Intelligence sources learned of the tragedy through a Red defector we caught in the usual net.

  You see how it is? The poor old bastards were having a ball and nobody could leave them alone. What a lousy world it is!

  Walrus-moustache’s questions nailed down exactly what he and the Thaddeus X. Coxe Foundation wanted to know. But from where I sat all it looked like was that the silver pills were worth having. Look at all the old-timers who’d give their soul for a Fountain of Youth gimmick like that one! A pill that could make you go for six hours—jinkies!

  1. What were in these pills?

  2. Were there any dangerous side effects?

  3. For what purpose were they created?

  4. Was there a counterdrug, or could the pills be neutralized in any way?

  5. If there is a nefarious scheme involved, you are under open orders to use whatever means necessary (including execution) to expedite matters.

  I wasn’t dense. Open orders, hah. They had the umbrella opened and were asking me to bend over as usual. Just to track down some wonder drug that revitalized the sex glands in some European town in the middle of nowhere. It was all so stupid, really. Medical Science should be interested, sure. But why the Coxe Foundation? How in hell could a high-potency aphrodisiac of some kind threaten the world in any way? Except maybe by overpopulating that world. Having babies is no crime. Or is it?

  I didn’t want to have to kill anybody either. With or without sex.

  From the telephone booth closest to the entrance gate to Flight 117, I dialed Walrus-moustache’s special number at exactly eleven thirty. I had ten minutes in which to do all the complaining I had in me. The terminal was cold and windy, and the black, black night was far from cheering. Especially when I could be back in my private rooms at the university giving more French lessons to Suzanne and Annette. The Coxe Foundation sure knew how to hurt a guy.

  The tall trim bastard jumped on the phone after the first ring.

  “Ah, Damon. There you are.” His slightly English lord-of-the-manor style puts my teeth on edge sometimes. This was one of those times.

  “I’d like to strangle you with your old school tie. What the hell is this you’re sending me on? This silver pill is a boon, not a menace. You ought to send Schweitzer or Salk—”

  “Hush. Don’t discuss the project by specifics, if you please. You’ve read the report?”

  “No. I’ve been out dancing with Elizabeth Taylor. Of course, I read the report. You hear those jet engines in the background? I’m not calling you from some bedroom!”

  His chuckle was the four aces kind, as usual. He had me and he knew it. I wasn’t kidding him about the engines. They were thundering.

  “Good. What do you think of the report?”

  “Just what I said. What’s the threat? Who’s worried? How does it get anybody in trouble?”

  “Damon, Damon. Twenty-five senior citizens were murdered. Hanged. Doesn’t that suggest foul play?”

  “Sure does. The old guys acted like roosters, and as happens to roosters the world over, they got hung up.”

  “Precisely. But we’d be fools to think jealousy was the outstanding motive. At any rate, we must investigate this. If the—ah—pill is a certitude, then we must command its use, at any cost. Don’t you see what a weapon it could be in the wrong hands?”

  “Killjoy. So what if the kids got hold of it—you were young once too, you know.”

  “I am not speaking of kids or children or teenagers. I speak of the hostile powers. Sex, as you know, is still the greatest secret weapon in the world. Who knows how they could use it to their benefit? That I should have to tell you this, of all people—”

  “Yeah, but it’s no secret with me.” I looked at my watch. Five minutes had sped by. “Okay, okay. So I go to Munich. To do what?”

  His tone became brisk. He likes dishing out instructions. Some guys have that hang-up. And he has, in spades.

  “Good man. Your first set of directions are simple. You will receive further instructions in relays, as you go along. Now, you will arrive in Munich tomorrow and go to a place known as The King's Inn. It’s rather an old meeting-place tavern where the locals gather to eat and drink their Bavarian beer. There you will meet another agent, one Christina Ketch. A very beautiful woman, which should be to your tastes. She is five-foot-nine, flaxen-haired, very fair-skinned and quite authoritative, they tell me. You’ll have no trouble spotting her. Make connections with her. You will both remain in the inn until you are contacted. Is that clear?”

  “It’s a long way to go just to meet a blonde. Okay. Any code? Password? How will she know me?”

  He chuckled again.

  “You do manage to think like an agent for a time, don’t you? Very good. When you see her, simply walk up to her and say—and this I confess is my own notion— ‘What’s a nice girl like you doing in a Bavarian joint like this?’ Those must be the exact words, you see. Not a preposition or noun off. And she will answer, again without any deviation from the letter of the reply— ‘Waiting for lightning to hit my rod!’ There, what do you think of that?”

  “Brilliant. You ought to write material for the Joey Bishop Show.”

  “Thought you’d like it Now, get going. You’ve got just about five minutes to catch that plane. A pleasant flight, my dear Damon.”

  “Up yours, Walrus-moustache.”

  “Certainly. Ta.” I never offended him, not while he was winning. After all, he wasn’t the one who had to fly to Europe in the dead of night.

  Controlling my temper, I flung out of the phone booth, dodged a fat female in furs fiddling with a big, black pocketbook and headed out to the waiting plane. It looked like a big silver arrow in the lights of the runway. Silver. Aggrrrhhh. All that did was remind me of my mission and I wasn’t kindly disposed toward Silver that night. I t
hink I would have kicked the Lone Ranger’s horse in the ass if he had come pounding across the field in a cloud of dust with the speed of light.

  And then I saw the stewardess on the airstair of Flight 117 and the world turned over on its back and lay down. Va-va-voom and ring-a-ding-ding! Munich flights had their rewards after all.

  I practically galloped up the airstair and made sure I collided with her as she came forward to greet me. There was a line of passengers flowing up the stair, but I didn’t let that bother me.

  “Welcome to Lufthansa,” she said in the usual, cheery greeting that was spaded out for all comers, but by that time I had missed her smile and deftly bumped into her body. I didn’t lay a glove on her but she couldn’t have missed the solid presence of one Rod Damon. She didn’t. The creamiest skin this side of vanilla ice cream flushed and she tried to smile as she re-righted her sky cap atop her lovely head. She was a medium-sized, but staggeringly endowed young woman, and not even the blue pert uniform could hide the finely feminine lines they contained.

  “’Scuse me,” I said. “I get dizzy on stairs.”

  “That’s quite all right, sir—” she stammered. She was stammering because she couldn’t believe I was not carrying a cane or baseball bat or something. Anything that could have caused that very definite lump she had felt. I brushed by her and that opportunity afforded one more passage of arms. Again, she recoiled, she blushed and her eyes followed me as I went down the thickly carpeted aisle toward my seat at the rear of the plane. I was smiling to myself because I knew I had her. I had to have. She was about twenty by 36X24X36 and how much could she have lived in such a short time? Coffee, Tea or Me? is a hoax.

  So I sat in my comfortable rear window chair, watched the lights of the field, waited for the roar of the engines and lapsed into a nice tranquil frame of mind. Luck was on my side too. The seat next to me was vacant. And nobody showed up to take it. I forgot all about Munich and silver pills and let the jet rock me into a state of euphoria. It always feels great when you know there is a great-looking, very curious broad in your immediate vicinity. Curiosity doesn’t only kill cats; it draws virgins like files. There are things about men they just have to find out for themselves.

  We were airborne in no time at all. I forgot all about the other passengers too. The old people who needed pillows and comforters; the yawning, frightened folk taking maybe their very first flight; and all the seasoned veterans who were already too drunk to notice much. Lots of people drink their flight nerves away in the airport bar hours before flight time. It was a quiet bunch all around. Especially since it was almost midnight and most of the good S.O.B.’s were already trying to catch some shut-eye. Somebody was already snoring.

  The lights of the city below were behind us in no time at all. Space and the inky blue sky beckoned. Flight 117 roared on toward the ocean. And the Atlantic. And Munich. And God knows what else.

  I waited only about an hour. The plane droned on, peacefully, no turbulence, no talking. All was quiet on the airline front. I lay back in my chair in the window seat and closed my eyes. She’d come, all right, or I didn’t know anything about women. Or virgins, that very rare breed.

  When I heard her drop lightly into the seat next to me, I also felt her sturdy leg brush against my ankle. It was warm and vibrant, that leg.

  “Sorry,” she murmured. “Mind if I catch a smoke back here? This seat’s empty—”

  “Be my guest.”

  I opened my eyes and looked at her. Her profile was splendid. A turned-up nose, hollow cheeks and a fine chin. The rest of her profile was sheer whistle-stuff. I leaned toward her and made myself more comfortable. I took her hand and she shivered slightly but she didn’t try to take it away. After all, the rear of the cabin was dark and the couple directly across the aisle, a middle-aged married team, were fast, fast asleep.

  Her glowing cigarette tip lit up her face. She was heavenly-looking, even if the figure was hellish.

  “Wilhelmina is my name,” she said softly.

  “I’m Rod,” I said. I played with her fingers. She let me. Even when I strayed them toward my lap, she didn’t flinch. She was finally getting exactly what she came for. But she was trembling just the same.

  “What kind of work are you in?” Now I could hear the barest traces of German accent. A Rhineland maiden, all right, even if the name wasn’t proof positive.

  “I’m a houseboy at a dice table,” I said.

  She was as green as a salad. “Really? What kind of work is that?”

  “Child’s play. Tell me about yourself, Wilhelmina. You look so young and pretty and young and pretty—”

  She laughed and began to tamp the cigarette out in her seat ashtray. She had to swivel her body to do that. Her beam was so good I wanted to run my hands all over it. But I restrained myself. I couldn’t give her the excuse to fly until she had gotten her hands on what she had come to find out. Was aching to find out.

  With the cigarette extinguished, she turned to me again and I took the bull by the horns. I took her hands and placed them across my crotch. Her sharp hiss of breath should have wakened the whole sleeping plane but it didn’t. She inclined toward me and our faces were inches apart. I kissed the tip of her nose.

  “I don’t believe it,” she whispered.

  “Seeing is believing. Touching is. Be my guest.”

  “You’re sure you don’t mind? It’s just that how often does—”

  She stopped herself, shaking her head, but I didn’t give her time to renege. In two seconds flat, I unsheathed and the miracle popped into view, snaking through her fingers. Again she almost blurted, but this time, she very wisely trapped it in her hands and held it. Her palms were cool, her fingers soothing. I sat back and smiled. I felt marvelous. Reborn, as it were. Without silver pills.

  “Talk to me,” I said.

  “I don’t want to talk—Rod. It’s amazing how big things look from up here, isn’t it?”

  “Ain’t it the truth?”

  “Like you could reach down and touch it with your hand. And stroke it. And hold it and squeeze it. Airplane travel is the end-all, isn’t it?”

  “It sure is.”

  “You know something—if I could take a cloud in my hand I’d like nothing better than to fluff it, pat it and make a pillow for my head.”

  “Hey. You’re a poet. Poetess. You know that?”

  She was also very smart. Virgin or not. She was speaking at a conversational level all the time while her magical hands had their play with me. I was beginning to feel the pressure. I grew and grew, swelling and ballooning, and Wilhelmina was becoming goggle-eyed with disbelief and wonder. The time had come.

  “Wilhelmina, I’m cold. Could you fetch a blanket?”

  “Certainly. Back in a minute—” She broke all the records getting out of her seat and tripping down the aisle. Even before I could rearrange my chair to a full reclining position she was back. Breathless. Eyes shining in the dark. The family jewels do it every time.

  She plumped the comforter over me, hiding me from the world at large, rambling on about St. Moritz being lovely this time of year and how much she liked to take a week’s vacation skiing in the Alps. By that time, she had squirmed down beside me, still staring straight ahead, but under the blanket, her hips had done an amazing swivel to the left, facing me and we were off to the races. Further conversation was not necessary. Virgins these days are very smart. While she had gone off to fetch the blanket, she had also gotten rid of her panties and bra. Instinctively, she knew all the right moves. Or I had underestimated her badly. But I still didn’t think so. Her time had merely come, that was all, and Damon brings out the best in everybody.

  She came around with her hips, and suddenly under the blanket, the creamiest, softest thighs in all creation had parted to meet Noah’s Ark. I slipped in, guided not only by my native experience but by her trained, cooling hands. She was a virgin, all right but she was eager, excited and willing to be hurt a little to get a lot. She started
lubricating like mad as soon as I found the glory hole, and after that, we settled into a nice, smooth orgiastic dance of hips, knees, thighs and navels. She was fragrant, clean and delicious. The blanket began to bob like a big cork on the waves. The Yankowski ploy was made for forty-five degree angles.

  “Rod—do you often fly like this?”

  “Every time I get the chance.”

  “God, how wonderful!”

  “You like flying, Wilhelmina?”

  “It’s marvelous!”

  “It has its points,” I agreed.

  She sighed dreamily as a shaft of light, gold and pure moonbeams, inundated her. She twitched gratefully and then she rammed her pelvis at me with one long fervent thrust. I met it and we held the moment for a full ten seconds before she moaned as quietly as a kitten and sank down into her seat. Her skycap was askew, her blonde hair was awry and her airstair was thoroughly renovated. Victory Through Air Power was mine once again. Yankowski’s Method of Angular Attack!

  And once more the hours, the miles of flight had swept by incredibly fast. Unnoticed and unboringly happy. And busy.

  Suddenly she was sobbing. Soft and low. Frowning, because she might wake up my sleeping fellow passengers, I huddled her in my arms. She wept on, sniffing now, crying like a teenybopper who missed a pot party.

  “Willie, what’s the matter?”

  “It’s nothing,” she whimpered. “I’ll be all right. It’s just that I knew my first time would be in the sky. I knew it would happen that way. It was meant to be. And now that it has happened—I’m so happppppy!”

  That brought on a fresh deluge of tears. A Niagara. I had to shut her up. Somehow. I did, the only way I knew how. I drew her toward me, found the airstair and made another three-point landing. Tip and ball contact. She stopped crying. She vibrated like a tuning fork and hummed.