Drums and bamboo flutes inserted sensuous melodies into the night and a dozen girls in tight, one-piece wraps danced back and forth across the white sand, plying large circles around three men who sat on the sand on tufted mats, watching the women with appreciation.
The biggest of the three men was Sammy Wanenko, who, along with the other two athletes, would represent his South Pacific island country of Baruba in the Moscow Olympic Games.
The hour neared midnight and soon the king of Baruba would select the three winners in the dancing competition. The three chosen women would spend the night with the three Olympic-bound athletes.
The island-country's custom was that all women of child-bearing age, whether married or not, must compete in the dance competition, and the hundreds of women had been narrowed down to these twelve finalists. The custom had just been invented, since this was Baruba's first Olympics, the country only recently having been accepted into the United Nations.
Baruba's membership had come after a week of debate. The non-aligned bloc in the UN demanded that Baruba change its name to the People's Demo-
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cratic Republic of Baruba, which the king agreed to after being assured that the name had nothing to do with democracy, but was merely a way for Communist dictatorships to recognize each other.
The second requirement for membership was that the king of Baruba had to issue a statement, which would be written for him, attacking the United States for its colonial, imperialistic, warmongering policies toward the Baruban people. The king had no trouble with this since he had never met an American, had only the vaguest idea where America was, and had been cautioned that if he didn't, the United States might sneak into his country some night and steal all the pineapples.
The third requirement for UN membership was that the delegate to the United Nations refrain from showing up at the sessions of that international body with a bone in his nose. The foreign minister was reluctant to agree to this because he felt undressed without a bone in Ms nose, but he was mollified when the king promised him that he could wear a shell necklace instead and it would be the biggest shell necklace that anyone in Baruba had ever worn including the king.
There was a fourth potential requirement but it was voted down by the United Nations general assembly as racist, imperialist, Zionist-stoogeist and war-mongerist. This was the tart suggestion of the British delegate that the Barubans stop eating each other.
So on a warm Tuesday, the Peoples' Democratic Republic of Baruba was admitted to the United Nations. On Wednesday, its UN representative made a speech, written for him by the Russians, attacking the United States as racist. On Thursday, Baruba filed a request-written by the Russians-with Washington, asking for reparations for psychological damage suffered by the Barubans because of the im-
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perialist Vietnam war. And on Friday night, they held a dancing contest to see which three women would sleep with the three Olympic-bound athletes. The three athletes enjoyed watching the dancing girls and Sammy Wanenko particularly liked watching a young girl named Lonie who was married to an older man who had been unable to compete for the honor of going to the Olympics because of his age. Baruba's king had decided the country would send only its very best athletes. He set the cutoff age for competition at twenty-one, which he said was the prime of life. The king was twenty-one.
Lonie had been casting longing eyes at Sammy for the last six months, every time their paths crossed on the small island. She was seventeen and ripe but Sammy had stayed away from her, respecting her status as a married woman. But now, he knew that when she won the dancing competition she would be his.
An hour later, the king presented her to Sammy for the night. Eyes downcast in shyness, she was about to walk off with the athlete when a voice rang out from the fringes of the smiling crowd. "No!"
Hundreds of heads turned, their smiles instantly frozen on their faces. A large man with muscled sloping shoulders, large rippling arms, and short powerful bull-like legs stepped out of the darkness at the edge of the crowd, where the pit fires had begun to burn down.
"It is Polo," someone hissed. "Lome's husband," said another. "This means trouble."
Polo pushed his way roughly through the crowd to the king's throne chair. He was twenty-seven years old.
"I will not allow it," Polo shouted. "If this Wanenko child wishes to sleep with my Lonie, he
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will have to defeat me. I will show you he is not the greatest athlete in Baruba. That honor belongs to me." He turned and stared at Sammy, only feet away from the feather-robed king. Lonie shrank away from the two men. Polo sneered at Sammy. "Let this pup defeat me. Then you may call him the greatest."
Sammy looked at Polo, then the king. He found that the king was looking at him quizzically. Sammy turned and saw Lonie watching him. He saw her flashing eyes, her ripe young breasts, her full mouth, and he knew he wanted to have her, almost as much as he wanted to go to the Olympics.
He turned back to Polo. "I agree," he said.
The king looked up at Polo and said "What sport . . ." but before he could finish, Polo lashed out with a thundering right hand that caught Sammy high on the cheek. With a laugh, Polo shouted, "Brawling is my sport."
The blow knocked Sammy off balance and sprawling. Polo moved after him, swinging wildly, trying to finish the younger man early. But Sammy ducked and the blows went over Ms head. He straightened up from his crouch and pushed a short left into Polo's stomach, ridged hard with muscle. It drove some wind from the bigger man.
Both men regained their balance and turned to face each other again, moving about, feinting, trying to grab the feel of the other's movements. Sammy waited until the older man made his move.
As he had guessed, Polo had muscle but no speed. When he threw a right at Sammy, the younger man moved his head aside and scored with a left to Polo's nose. And again. And again. Polo's nose turned red and began to bleed.
The blood trickling down his face seemed to anger him and he charged Sammy and wrapped his muscular arms around him, pinning Wanenko's own arms to his side. Sammy felt the backward pressure. It
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seemed as if his spine would snap. Polo increased the pressure and Sammy, clearing his head, suddenly stopped trying to fight the strength in those massive arms and instead brought his knee up into Polo's crotch. The older man let out a scream of pain and Sammy broke free. Once he did, the young champion hacked three consecutive lefts into Polo's face, each one snapping the man's head back until, after the third blow, Polo fell to the ground and lay still.
The crowd cheered the young champion. So did Lonie, who could not wait to feel him on her body.
The king motioned to Sammy and Lonie that they might leave. The feast was over.
Polo was left lying in the sand while the three athletes went off to their homes with the three young women. As Sammy lay down with Lonie, she asked with a laugh, "Why did you not use your right hand? You defeated Polo with only one hand."
Sammy laughed. "I did not want to damage my right hand. I will need it to win my gold medal. In boxing."
Lonie turned away from him in mock anger. "For a mere gold medal you will use two hands. But poor Lonie, she is only worth one hand."
"No," Sammy said. "Two hands and two arms and two legs and this and this and this . . ."
Flight Lieutenant Jack Mullin searched the sky for the airplane. It should be arriving soon, he thought. He turned and looked at the other four men with him. They were beginning to get restless, anxious for some action, and this pleased Mullin. He had drilled them long and hard and they were his four best. Everything should go perfectly.
The four light-skinned blacks also scanned the sky, searching for the plane, occasionally glancing at the British mercenary to see if he, too, was showing any signs of nervousness.