“Not my best interests!” The pilot was firm. "You should have thought of your survival before you used that third chute for the gold,” he added.
“If it had crashed with the plane, it might have been destroyed,” Dickson pointed out. “And remember what Goldwater37 said: ‘Property values are human values.’ ”
At this point in time the plane gave a horrible shudder from nose to tail.
“Sorry, but much as I’d like to continue our little talk,” the pilot said, “my knowledge of aerodynamics tells me I don’t have the time. Good-bye, Mr. President.” He jumped from the plane.
“Mr. Powers, I must speak very bluntly.” Dickson turned to me. “I am not going to do anything I believe would weaken the Presidency of the United States. Mr. Powers, in the name of long-term statesmanship, I order you to give me your parachute.”
Sorry, ducks. Well, actually, I didn’t put it quite as flippantly as that. But I did let Dickson know I had no intention of sacrificing myself for him.
“Dragging down Dickson drags down America,” he let me know. “Where’s your patriotism?”
“It runs second to my survival instinct.”
“And what about your obligation to me, your employer, as my bodyguard?”
“That runs third.”
“[Expletive deleted]! [Expletive removed]! [Characterization omitted]! [Unintelligible]! [Adjective omitted]! [Expletive removed]!” Dickson lost his temper.
The plane was shaking so hard now that I became afraid it might disintegrate before I had a chance to jump. Still, my goddam humanism got the better of me. I couldn’t just leave him there to die. I guess the truth was that I did feel I had some obligation to him. I wasn’t the first to get sucked in by Dickson that way.
I braced myself in the open hatchway, which wasn’t easy, and faced him. “Come here,” I instructed.
He bounded over like a cooker spaniel. I half expected him to piddle.
“Put your arms around my neck and wrap your legs around my waist,” I ordered.
“Let me make one thing perfectly clear. I am not now and have never been a homosexual. Nor have I ever experienced the slightest desire to relate to my fellow Americans, as I have often said, on my knees rather than on my feet.” The plane underwent a sudden, particularly violent tremor. “Under the circum- stances,” Dickson finished quickly, his words tumbling over one another, “it would not be appropriate for me to say anything further on this point.” He leaped into my arms, wrapping his limbs around me as I’d told him.
His momentum tore my grip from the sides of the hatchway. We plunged into space. The first sensation really was one of having been shot from a cannon. We actually skidded across the sky sideways instead of plummeting straight down.
Still, we started falling soon enough. As we did, Dickson’s knees slid from around my waist and it was only his arms around my neck which were keeping us together. The realization of this panicked him. He tightened his grip. He was choking me.
“You’re choking me!” I saw no reason not to mention it.
“It is not because of a lack of desire to cooperate,” he assured me, gasping. “I realize that there are those who may think that this is simply a way of saving my own life. But the real reason goes far deeper than that.”
His hands around my throat kept me from answering. I pried them loose with my two hands. He dropped with a jerk and the rate of our descent increased suddenly. Hand in hand—each of his in one of mine—we plunged into a low-lying cloud bank.
It was necessary at this point that I pull the ripcord. But the way he was holding my hands I couldn’t get to the metal loop at the front of the parachute harness which would release the chute. The only bright note was that he was sweating profusely and his hands were becoming very slippery. His face—b1ue with five-o’clock-shadow, or fear?—strained up at me.
“Let go of one hand,” I suggested. “I have to pull the ripcord.”
“Which hand?”
“It doesn’t matter. Either one. But hurry. “
“In order to make the decisions that a President must make—”
I cut him short by wrenching my right hand free. He grabbed wildly and obtained a handheld on the waistband of my pants. I jerked the ripcord. The chute strap between my legs snapped up and caught our joined hands in such a way as to force them to separate. Dickson grabbed at the seat of my pants frantically with his newly freed hand.
Now the parachute opened, jerking my body into an upright position. This second jerk also had its effect on Dickson. His full weight tugged at the waistband and seat of my pants. You guessed it. My pants were pulled through the chute straps and down around my knees.
Dickson panicked as he slipped down with the pants. He let go of the seat and flailed wildly to get a grip higher up on my body. But all he succeeded in doing was grabbing the crotch of my jockey shorts and pulling them down.
Suspended by the chute, we floated slowly downward now. My bared genitalia flapped gently in the breeze. The cold Swiss air made my pubic hair stand up and bristle.
Dickson managed to wrap one of his arms around one of my legs. In doing so, he yanked off my pants and underpants completely. Flailing wildly with his other hand, he finally grabbed my balls with it and held on for dear life.
Symbolic, what? My situation brought to mind the predicament of some countries I could mention . . . but I won’t. Nick Dickson had me by the balls! Being Nick Dickson, he squeezed!
That was too much. I did the only thing I could do in that position. I couldn’t quite reach him with my hands because of the parachute harness. So I kicked with my feet.
The maneuver had no effect whatsoever on the Dickson groin-clutch. But it did force his other arm from around my leg. Once again he grabbed frantically. This time he latched onto my penis.
You’d have thought he was a goddam subway straphanger! Unfeeling! That’s what he was! Yessir, nobody could ever accuse Nick Dickson of suffering from an overabundance of sensitivity!
I, however, was sensitive enough for both of us. With Dickson hanging onto my scrotum with one hand and my limp Lucifer with the other, you can bet I was as sensitive a male as ever floated over a Swiss mountainscape. “LET GO!” I screamed.
“Well, I think in response to that request, I should put it in perspective by pointing out that should I let go my very existence might well be forfeit.”
“HOLD ON TO SOMETHING ELSE!”
“The point that I’d like to elaborate on is that there is nothing else onto which I can hold.”
“Why me?” I moaned. “Why my balls? Why my prick?”
“I will not countenance the decline in moral standards to which such language must inevitably lead!”
“Screw you!” I cursed him. “If you want to play with somebody’s privates, go play with yourself!”
But he held on. In the throes of the most excruciating agony, we floated down the side of a Swiss mountain. It was only when we were safely on the ground that Dickson finally let go of my genitals. By then I appreciated the lesson so many Dickson aides had learned: When serving Nick Dickson, keep one hand defensively on your groin at all times!
I struggled to scramble out of the parachute harness. Now, when I needed it, the weight of Nick Dickson wasn’t there to provide ballast. The damn chute pulled me halfway down the mountainside before I was free of it. Then I cupped my stretched and swollen genitals in both hands and, naked from the waist down, bayed at the moon which was just rising over the mountains.
Dickson looked down at me disapprovingly. He was perched on a snow-covered ledge about a hundred feet above me. “Mr. Powers, are you doing something obscene?” he wanted to know. “If so, I order you to stop it immediately!”
I ignored him. I just kept on baying at the moon until the pain subsided. I scooped up snow and applied it to the injured area to make the swelling go down.