“Oh.” Greta was disappointed, and she made no effort to hide it. “Then the Berlin Wall stays up,” she said philosophically, after a moment of thought.
“I’m afraid so.”
“Then I suppose you may as well cease your assault upon it.”
“That is exactly what I would like to do. But what I’m trying to explain is that this is impossible in my present state.”
“Ahh. Now I really do see. That is quite a problem, Herr Victor. But we must solve it. After all, we can’t go through life like this.”
“I agree. But I don’t seem to be able to relax; I got a little panicky at this point. “We may have to break the cast,” I told her.
"Absolutely not! Do you want to injure me permanently? That cast comes off when my doctor takes it ff, and not before!”
“And when will that be?”
“The day after tomorrow."
“I see. Then would you mind turning on your side?” In gentlemanly fashion, I’d been resting my weight on my elbows, and they were killing me.
“Of course." She did as I asked and now we were face to face, still joined at the fulcrum like a pair of obscene Siamese twins. “But you really must relax, Herr Victor. This is ridicuIous!” The situation had made her cast off any furthcr thought of sex. “What can I do to take your mind off it?“ she asked.
“Umm. Well, perhaps if you pulled the blanket over your—” I gestured and my hand grazed her breasts, with the immediate result that I became lodged more securely than ever. "
She did as I asked. After a moment, she made another suggestion. “Perhaps if you drank enough Scotch—I mean, liquor does make some men less able—”
“Not me.” I told her truthfully. “It may increase the desire and decrease the ability of some guys, but not me.”
“I see. Then let us talk about something else. Perhaps by distracting your mind—”
“I’m game. What’ll we talk about?”
“I know!” She clapped her hands, inadvertently catching my nose between them. “Sorry!” she apologized.
“It’s all right.” I brushed away the tears the sudden pain had brought to my eyes.
“Are you sure?”
“Sure. Don’t worry. The bleeding will stop in a minute.”
“Perhaps if you threw your head back-—”
I did as she suggested, with the result that the lower half of my body lunged forward.
“Whee-ee!” Greta exclaimed. “You almost--”
“But not quite!” I moved my head forward again, and the intolerable pressure below was relaxed. “It’s impossible, I tell you!”
“Sorry. Just for a minute there, I hoped—”
“Well, don’t. Don’t hope. Let’s just concentrate on getting untangled. You had an idea before?”
“Oh. Yes. I remember reading somewhere that one cannot sustain passion and laugh at the same time. Perhaps if I told you some jokes-—”
“It’s an idea. Go ahead. Try it."
“Well, there was this farmer’s daughter taking a swim in the nude one day when a traveling salesman came along, and--”
“Ouch!” I interrupted as the vise-like pressure increased. “I’m sorry, but I don’t think that kind of joke is going to serve our purpose. You see, I can’t help visualizing, and-”
“I see. But that's the only sort of joke I know," Greta confessed. She thought a moment. “Maybe if I tickle you—?"
“I'm not ticklish."
“Let’s see.” Her fingers danced under one of my arms.
“Stop it! Stop it!" I begged. “It only makes me feel more aroused.”
She stopped. We were both silent for a long time. Then a look of sheer cruelty filled her customarily vacant face. “I am the victim of your lust as much as you are, Herr Victor,” she snarled through clenched teeth. “But I will suffer this no longer. From now on, all the suffering is yours!"
“What are you—?” I was alarmed by her sudden viciousness.
“Just this!” She had been reaching behind her back to grope on the night table. Now her hand emerged clutching a pair of scissors. There was a savage sound as she snapped them shut once in the empty air. “I shall cut us loose!” she announced, opening the scissors again and lowering them.
“No-o-o!” I howled with sudden panic. The very idea filled me with Freudian terror. For an instant, I went limp with fear!
Limp all over. Yes, there too. Greta pulled backwards and I was suddenly free. She put the scissors back on the night table and started giggling. “I thought that would do it." she told me. “Fear is the most overwhelming of all the emotions. No man's lust can stand up to it.”
“Phew!” I heaved a mighty sigh of relief. “You sure had me scared. I actually believed you were serious.”
“And are you sure now that I wasn’t?”
“Well, were you?” I edged back a little as she considered the answer.
“I don’t know,” she said. “After all, it was a drastic predicament. So it called for a drastic solution.”
“Not that drastic!" I was miffed. “Good evening, Frau-lein." I picked up what was left of my bottle of Scotch and stalked out of her room.
“Nein. Not a very good evening.” Her sigh wafted after me as I closed the door.
My pique had worn off by the time Greta’s cast was removed a few days later. So when she asked me to go bob-sledding with her. I figured that if she was willing to let bygones be bygones, so was I. “I have been cooped up so long that I just can’t wait to get out on the slopes in the open air," she told me.
“Are you sure you aren’t rushing things?” I asked.
“Not at all. The doctor says I am as good as new. He said my body knits remarkably well—or that it is remarkably well-knit—-something like that.”
“Well, if it’s good enough for him, it’s good enough for me. Lead the way to the Flexible Flyers.”
Greta was experienced with bobsleds, which I wasn't, and so she decided to steer. “Now you sit here behind me,” she instructed, “and wrap your legs around me. That’s it. Hug my hips with your knees.”
“Isn’t the sled kind of superfluous?” I murmured.
She ignored it. “Now, reach under my arms and get a good grip. That’s it, -hold on tightly.”
“Aren’t you cold?" I asked as I appreciated that there was nothing between my eager hands and her warm breasts save the loose-knit sweater she was wearing.
“Not at all. The exhilaration of the sport keeps me warm.”
“Yeah. I see what you mean. Me, too. Still, don’t you think you should be wearing a bra? As a precaution, I mean?”
“A precaution against what?”
“Well, this thing goes at a pretty high speed, doesn’t it?"
“We should do better than a hundred miles an hour,” she told me.
“Well aren’t you afraid one of your--you know—might fly off?”
Greta giggled and shot me a coy look over her shoulder. “That’s why you have to hold on very tight,” she explained demurely.
“Like this?” I squeezed suggestively.
"Ja!" And she released the brake suddenly. Before I knew it, we were hurtling down the slope like a bullet with a lemming complex.
Automatically, my hands clutched her breasts against the thrust of the bobsled. “Ahh, that feels very nice, Steve."
She turned around to wink at me.
“Look out!” I screamed in mortal terror as the side of the mountain rushed toward us.
She leaned solidly against my right hand and the sled straightened out. “Do not be nervous, Steve,” she told me. “I am an expert at this.”
“Experts get killed every day.” I squeezed my eyes shut tight.
"Ja. The mortality rate is most unfortunate. But that is because of reckless ones who do stupid things like this.” She stuck her leg out, and it propelled us away from the mountainside and toward the edge of the sled-run.
I opened my eyes to see what had happened to my stomach. But all I saw was the empty space of the abyss we were rocketing toward. Then she lifted her leg and somehow we were back on the run again.