The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)

Music and the Savage Beast

Previously: "Stormy Weather, Part 2" 

"What about David Kirkham?" you suggest.

There is the faintest stir among the others.

"We want ourselves at every level and corner of the school," you explain. "Even in the ... scummiest ... parts."

"Kirkham qualifies for that," Number Three dryly observes. "He even deals."

"He does?"

"A little. Patterson caught him trying to push some on the squad a couple of times."

That would make sense, because you've seen Kirkham hanging out with Gary Chen. But you also know there's more to him than that. "He plays in the orchestra," you muse aloud.

"He's in the chamber orchestra too," Number Four says. "And in a string quartet."

"What's his reputation with girls?"

"Scum," says Number Three. "He makes trouble everywhere he goes."

You like him the more you think about him. "Tell me about this string quartet," you order Number Four. "Do they play for money?"

"I've heard they do."

"Then that's how we'll catch him. Number One, Number Three, you can resume your characters and go. Number Four, let's talk."

"So, how's Gordon's cock tasting these days?" Number Three asks Number One as they exit. "Bite me, you shit," she snarls back. "Love to," he says, and she squawks as he pokes her in the ass.

* * * * *

Tuesday is better than Monday, possibly because Number Four has ceased to stir the pot, and possibly because the novelty of the scandal has begun to wear off. Joshua Call still glares at you in first period, and Phoebe is hardly more than civil in second, but there are no further explosions or surprises. During third period you slightly bend your student council privileges to get David Kirkham's class schedule from one of the office assistants, and find that he has the same lunch as you. So you skip the cafeteria to go looking for him.

It's a profitless search until you've wasted half the period making a circuit of the school, inside and out, until you happen to notice that the doors to the marching band practice room is open. It's empty, but you to look inside the others, and it's in the orchestra room that you find Kirkham, slouching in a chair with his arms folded across his chest and his legs stretched out in front of him. Despite cool, drizzly weather, he is in shorts that show strong, dark legs; but he is also wearing a hoodie. He's got earbuds in and would look asleep, but that he is rolling a toothpick around in his mouth. Some of his scum-sucking buddies—Brophy Maddox, Rich Austin, and Spencer Osbourne—are squatting nearby, sniggering and punching each other, but in the back of the room Tyler Burns, Abigail Kane, and a couple of other orchestra types are quietly chatting, unmolested.

The latter look up at you expectantly, but you shuffle over to Kirkham. He doesn't react, until you lean over to touch him on he knee. "I warned you motherfuckers," he growls, then gives a little start and sits up in his chair. His three friends watch, and snicker.

"Hey," you say after he has pulled a bud from his ear; from it blares something that sounds like thrash metal. "Can I talk to you a minute?"

"Sure," he says, sounding a little baffled. When you glance over at his friends, he says, "Oh. Okay, you cocksuckers can fuck off now."

Spencer grins. "He wants to talk to a pretty girl."

"Fuck off before I get a weed-eater and forceps and turn you into a pretty girl."

Spencer laughs, but there's a nervous edge to it, and he and the others lever themselves onto their feet. You wait until they're gone before taking a seat next to Kirkham. He turns off the music and pulls the other earbud out, but he continues to roll that toothpick around in his mouth while studying you from behind his shades.

"Two things," you tell him in a confiding tone. "First of all, a head's up. I know you, um, sometimes sell ... stuff ... on campus. I've heard that the administration might be getting, um, interested in it. Like, to stop it."

He sucks on the toothpick. "Yeah, okay," he says, "thanks for the word, it's sweet of you to think of me. But I don't got nothing to worry about. 'Cos if I deal, and I'm not saying I do, it's only to cocksuckers who know better than to narc. So what's your second of all?"

"Oh. Well. Second of all— You play in a string quartet, right?"

"Uh huh."

"For money?"

He rolls the toothpick to the other side of his mouth. "You make it sound like we're whores."

"Oh, I didn't mean—"

"I didn't think you did." One side of his mouth curls up. "I'm just telling you what it sounded like."

"Well— Okay, would you be interested in playing a ... gig?"

His head tilts fractionally. "Just me, or the whole quartet?"

"The quartet."

"When, where, what, and how much? Answer the last one first."

"Oh! Well, I don't know, I guess that ... could be negotiated? It would be at the country club, for a fundraiser. Um, probably closer to the holidays? And ... What else do you need to know?"

"The how much. It'll cost whoever it is at least—" He chews on the toothpick. "A thousand."

You suck in a breath. "Wow! Okay, um, would you be able to come out to Kelsey's after school, to talk about it? Because she's the one—"

"Kelsey Blankenship?" His brow furrows.

"Yeah. It would be her and her family setting it up. Well, mostly her. It's for a fundraiser, like I said—"

"So how come she didn't come ask me?"

"Oh, well, she mentioned it to me, and I said I'd ask you."

"Uh huh. Well, as long as you're acting like her lawyer or whatever, I'll want you coming out, too, for the ... negotiations."

"Oh, sure!" That is, after all, exactly what you want.

"Nice. What time? And how do I get out there?"

"It'll have to be six or so. She has tennis practice after school. But I can give you a ride to her place, I have to go out to see her anyway."

"We can't talk to her here at—? Never mind. As long as I'm getting a ride with you."

"Great, thanks! Come look for me in the office around five?"

"The office?"

"It's where I do my homework after classes."

"Okay. Oh, and Kim," he says after you get up to leave. "It'll be about suppertime when we're done. You mind if we stop and get something to eat on the way back out here?"

You dimple at him. "Sure! We'll probably have lots to talk about anyway!"

* * * * *

There's a rooster-like strut in Kirkham's stride as he accompanies you out to your car as the school is closing down, but he's always strutting, and otherwise he is a perfect gentleman on the drive out, even if the menace never quite evaporates from his low, soft voice. He tells you about the Wendigo String Quartet, as it is called, and how it came to be, and what kind of music they play. No Pachelbel, he warns you. If she makes us play Pachelbel, we'll set fire to the fucking place on our way out. You laugh, but it doesn't exactly sound like he's joking.

He looks over the front of Kelsey's house when you arrive but says nothing, and inside he nods curtly at Kelsey and makes no remarks as you and he follow her up into her game room. She is very chipper and asks if she can get him anything. "Let's talk business first," he says as he settles like a panther onto one of the sofas, laying his arm along its back and crossing an ankle over one knee. He had taken the toothpick out on entering, but he slips back inside a cheek now.

"Okay." Kelsey casts you a nervous glance as you move around to set your backpack on the nearby game table. "Kim says you'd charge a thousand dollars—"

"Minimum. You can add a piano and hire yourself a quintet, but that'd cost you an extra thousand. 'Cos it'd be Preston on the keyboard. He's been to nationals in Washington, you know."

"I know, that's impressive! But I think a thousand would—"

"What's it for?"

"The music? A fundraiser. For the country club."

"It's not for a charity?"

"Well, no."

"In that case, the fee is fifteen percent of the money raised, against the thousand as a minimum. How many people are we talking, and at what price admission?"

You've got the mask out of the bag, but you stop to listen and let him finish. You are finding it fascinating.

"Um ..." This beyond well what you and Number Four had invented as bait. You hadn't even invented a charitable cause, which is why she has had to make it a fundraiser for the country club itself. "Probably a hundred couples, at a hundred dollars a couple?"

Kirkham takes out the toothpick and points it at her. "Fifteen percent of the gross ticket sales, with a thousand-dollar minimum, plus thirty-five percent of everything over ten thousand."

"Jesus!"

"It's for a bunch of rich fucks trying to raise money off the the backs of some high school students. At the price I just quoted, we're probably talking no more than four hundred for each of us, with a balance of more than eight thousand going to your country club. Under the circumstances, I'd call my offer pretty goddamned generous." He slides the toothpick back in, and sits back to smile insolently up at Kelsey.

You and she exchange a look, then you go up behind him and slide the mask—which you prepped yesterday afternoon—over his face. It vanishes into him, and he sags. Too late you realize you set it on him while he was still wearing his shades and had that toothpick in his mouth, but it seems to have made no difference.

Next: "Some Talk Over Tacos" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 3)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)"