Paul Erdman - The Billion Dollar Sure Thing

The bill proved staggering, but Stanley paid it with a flourish worthy of the Aga Khan. Back in the Bentley, Claudine took his head between her two gloved hands and pecked him ever so slightly on the nose.

“That was lovely,” she said, “and now let’s go back to my apartment.”

“No,” said Stanley, “there’s one place I’ve always wanted to go to, but somehow never made it. I know it’s a bit touristy, but—”

“Not the Moulin Rouge?” exclaimed Claudine.

“No. The Crazy Horse Saloon.”

So the Crazy Horse Saloon it was. Packed as usual, but as always with space for people who waved $10 bills. Stanley and Claudine ended up beside each other, jammed behind a table squeezed onto a semicircular extended settee immediately in front of the small stage. The din was deafening, the smoke in the room overpowering, and the number of Midwestern Americans with their plastic wives astounding.

“It’s wonderful!” screamed Claudine, as the music started, adding yet another claustrophobic element to the atmosphere of total suffocation already pervading the place. But in spite of it all, the show was full of electric excitement from the very outset. The flashing lights, the kooky costumes, the gorgeous girls brought the temperature of the room up another ten degrees within minutes. The middle-aged woman from Little Rock pressed between Stanley and her husband, one elbow stubbornly imbedded in Stanley’s ribs, noticeably recoiled when one of the girls damn near shoved her well-groomed pubic hair into her hubby’s rather red nose. The man’s self-control collapsed completely, as he broke into a series of violent sneezes.

Claudine thought this was hilarious and burst into pealing laughter, soon infecting the dozens of people immediately around them, especially when the nice American lady, with a touch of silver in her hair, turned to her embarrassed spouse and said, in a loud voice, “Henry! Don’t make a fucking ass of yourself.”

The tableaux on the stage before them changed, this time to an African pair. Soon all female attention in the room was riveted on the crotch of the enormous black man, as, with a rather noticeable swelling where it counted most, he began a relentless pursuit of his virginal partner. As the room became increasingly hushed, Stanley stiffened. For there, tugging at his zipper with immediate and complete success, was a hand. And as soon as he was totally unleashed, yet another hand took a firm hold.

“Jeezus,” whispered Stanley out of the side of his mouth. “What’re you trying to do?”

The only reply came from the two hands, which slowly began to move in rhythm with the pulsing drums, now providing the background to the frenzy of the increasingly entangled pair on the stage. As the climax slowly began the approach, the room went into total darkness. The two carefully prepared naked bodies reflected the ultraviolet lights which now played upon them, creating images of dark and eerie sex.

At this point the American lady on Stanley’s left stirred. To his utter horror, a third hand was laid upon him. Ever so cagily it had dropped to his knee, as if by accident under the crowded circumstances. But then, purposefully, it began inching its way up. There wasn’t a goddamned thing Stanley could do but sit there in awful anticipation, since he was totally wedged in by solid flesh on both sides and blocked by the table in front. The rather oversized tablecloth which, thankfully, concealed Stanley’s lap, started to flutter like a tent in a hurricane, as the confusion below increased. He could almost feel the anticipation of the new set of chubby fingers as they worked their way, ever faster, toward the target area. They paused, thrown into doubt as contact was made with that other set of busy French fingers. But then, with regained courage, they searched for, and found, if not all, at least the tip of the object which had developed such enormous local popularity.

By now it appeared to dawn on Claudine that something extraordinary was happening.

“Is that you?” she whispered.

Stanley was too paralyzed to reply, but words were hardly necessary since there, right on top of the table, his white cuffs—two of them—unmistakably reflected the bluish light of the ultraviolet lamps. Suddenly Claudine’s hands withdrew, and with the air of royalty she leaned past Stanley and said in the sweetest of loud voices to the matron on his left, whose hand was firmly clutching its prize:

“Madame, would you mind taking your hand off my friend’s cock?”

Which she did, as Stanley went into violent withdrawal symptoms that became even more accentuated when Claudine went on, equally loud, “Stanley, zip up your trousers. We’re leaving.”

One would think that this happened every night at the Crazy Horse Saloon, for not a head turned during the entire episode. The American lady, now primly clutching her husband’s arm, did not even take her eyes from the stage as Stanley struggled to his feet and wrestled his way to freedom, with Claudine following haughtily behind. But then her giggles started again, and she couldn’t stop until they had stepped outside the club onto the Avenue George V, after Stanley, in midflight, had hurriedly pressed $50 into a surprised waiter’s hand.

“Stanley,” she said when finally calmed down, “at least you’ve got to give her credit for having good taste. Although, come to think of it, she didn’t get that far. Poor thing. She’ll never know what she’s missing. But maybe you prefer threesomes?”

Stanley was still too unnerved to either laugh or cry. But then slowly he had to admit to himself that, until Claudine had broken up things, they had been moving toward a rather interesting crescendo. In fact, the more he thought of it, of the very audacity of the situation, the more he began to anticipate the rest of the evening. By the time Claudine and he had entered his hotel suite, both were in a state of white heat. But again it was Claudine who took the lead.

“I want you, Stanley. Now!”

She flung the mink aside and pulled Rosen into the bedroom. Her urgency was so great that the white mini stayed on until both had reached a crashing climax, which left Claudine—all six feet of her—thrashing on top of him, as she came time and time again. Finally she lay still. Then breathing hard, she rose to remove the rest of her clothes. She did the same for Stanley, her hands busy with his body all the time. Suddenly she disappeared into the living room, to return carrying a chilled bottle of champagne and two glasses.

“You stay right there,” she said to Rosen, as he lay sprawled across the bed. “From now on, I’m going to provide the treats.”

With just a flick of the thumbs, the cork flew off. Claudine filled the glasses to the brim, handed them to Stanley, then climbed into the large bed, pulling the eiderdown on top of both in a series of easy movements. She retrieved one of the glasses and tipped it toward Stanley.

“Stanley darling. You are such a wonderful man. Except for one thing.”

Rosen was startled again. He was not used to complaints in bedrooms.

“There was something wrong?” he asked anxiously. “After what that woman pulled, I wouldn’t be surprised. The bloody nerve!”

“No, nothing wrong, darling,” she said laughing. “Just that you would be absolutely perfect if you had a moustache.”

“Aha,” said Stanley, relieved. “You mean like your little banking friend from Switzerland.” Now he took his first sip of champagne.

“Yes.”

“But I thought, from what you told me last time, that he turned out to be a total failure on his last trip.”

“Well, not total. He at least had a stiff moustache. But let’s not talk about him.”

“But,” insisted Stanley, “I’d like to. Just for a minute. The guy intrigues me.”