Chapter #65The Girl at the Back of the Boat by: Seuzz   "What will you do with her?" you ask Professor Hyde-White. You stare at a spot on the bathroom wall, halfway between the professor—who is standing in the doorway—and the bathtub, which holds the naked girl. Even knowing that you'd soon be walking around under a facsimile of her body, you'd found it mortifying to peel the clothes off her.
"We'll put her someplace for temporary safekeeping."
"Where?"
The professor's tone turns chilly. "That's not really your concern, Mr. Prescott."
You glance over at him. It surprises you a little that you should challenge him now, when you didn't challenge him over Paige Knotts. Still, you say nothing.
But that glance seems to discomfit the professor a little. "Well, what would you do," he asks with faint asperity. "You've had some experience—recently, too—in keeping people out of the way during an impersonation."
Your face burns a little. Why are you so worried about what the professor will do with these victims? As he says, you're just doing more of what you had been doing before. You don't voice the bitter suspicion you harbor: that the professor's organization—this "Fane" company—might not have qualms about killing your victims.
Instead, you just answer his question. "I'd hide her under a mask."
"As you say," the professor replies. "We have any number of places to put Ms. Dunsdale. Under the mask of Paige Knotts, for example."
"I thought you said you put that mask on a golem."
"The golem can go in storage, and Ms. Dunsdale can go under the mask. For the duration."
A pit forms in your stomach, but you ask the question anyway: "What did you do with Paige?"
"That really is not your business. But something similar. There's any number of anonymous faces we could hide someone under."
You choose to be mollified by this. And just in time, too, as the mask comes out of Mary Dunsdale.
* * * * *
"Oh, wake up, Lurch," you hiss, and shake Graham Lundesky more roughly. This time, at least, a little groan escapes his throat. "Did you have to use so much of that crap on him," you ask the professor.
"Better too much than too little," he says.
You sigh deeply at Lundesky. How to wake him up? Well, if he's anything like his roommate ... "Turn around and don't watch, okay?" you snap at Hyde-White. A supercilious sneer crosses his face, but he leaves the room.
You stroke Lundesky's sunburned cheek with the palm of your hand. "Graham crackers," you softly call him. You lean in close and let your warm breath enwreathe his face as you continue stroking him. You press a knee between his legs and gently press it into his crotch. He grunts again.
Fuck, why is it less weird to do this as Mary than it was to fantasize about doing it as McQuillen? Maybe because Mary actually doesn't feel that much for Lundesky? (Which is why she calls him "Lurch" behind his back.) You put your face to his and, without kissing him exactly, rub your lips back and forth across his.
He takes a deep breath, and you feel a hand on your butt—
"Okay, that's enough foreplay," you snap, and slap him sharply on the cheek. "Get up."
"Ow!" Graham comes alive with a jerk, and blinks rapidly. His eyes gradually focus on you. "What the fuck, Dunsdale?"
"Come on, get up, we should go." You try to pull him from the sofa; you might as well try dragging a cement truck.
"What happened?" he asks.
"It was that anise shit the professor gave us. It knocked me for a loop and knocked you out cold."
"The hell you say. Where is the fucker?"
"Shut up. He went to get our coats or something. We only just noticed you'd passed out. That stuff was hard liquor, Lur— Lundesky. You don't slam it like beer."
He turns very red. "I didn't— I wasn't—" He blinks rapidly. "I don't remember." With a deep groan he leans forward. "I feel like someone punched me in the head."
I wanted to, you don't say.
He looks up at you from under his eyebrows. "Were you—? Did you try—?"
"No." You feel yourself redden as his eyes narrow. "I don't care what it felt like, Lundesky. I was just trying to wake you up."
"Huh." With another deep groan, he gets to his feet, where he sways a bit.
The professor comes in with two coats over his arm. "Ah, well, it's been a delightful evening. But all good things, as they say." He hands you a fleece-lined jacket, and a knee-length coat to Lundesky. "I am so delighted you accepted my invitation. It makes one feel young again," he says with a wistful tone, "to be in the company of young people. Do give my regards to Mr. Dawes."
You thank him for the evening, and with a further clutch of "Good nights" you and Lundesky head out into the dark night and back toward your rooms. Neither of you talk much—you'd exhausted most of your derision for the professor in asides when he was out of the room—and soon part for your separate quarters. You're not sure what irritates you more: that Lundesky didn't invite you back to his rooms with Phil Dawes, or that by not inviting you he didn't give you a chance to tell him to go fuck himself. You just make your way back to Wyndham Court. You glance at the door across the hall from yours before going into your rooms.
* * * * *
A week ago:
"Get a lock of her hair," Dawes says. "Or at least a few strands."
You've got a few strands of his chest hair twined in your fingers. His skin is dry and a little rough, just the kind of dry roughness that makes you want to rub yourself up and down all over him. You straddle Dawes, then lay atop him, and scrape your cheek down his. "Whose hair? What hair? For what?"
"That girl we were talking about. Miss Mousypants across the hall from you."
You raise up. "What do you want her—? Have you got some kind of kinky—? Do you have some of my hair?"
Dawes laughs. "Nah. I want hers for a project."
"For a kinky sex—?"
"No," he says firmly. "Something to help us in the race against Oxford."
"Like a good luck charm?"
"Exactly. Something to, you know, put on the boat."
"You've got a whole girl—me—in the boat."
"Yeah, but you're not a virgin. Oof!"
You punch him again in the chest. "What the fuck does—? Guys are such assholes," you spit. "Always obsessed with girls' virginity." Dawes's snicker turns into another gasp as you punch him a third time. "You don't hear girls always speculating about—"
"You know we got a virginity detector back home, in Medfield," he says.
You roll your eyes. "You don't need a detector, Dawes, you just need a—"
"It's on the local college campus. It's a statue of Cesar Arno."
The fuck is he babbling about? "Who's Cesar Arno?"
"I dunno. Some asshole who paid them to put his statue up, I guess. He's seated out in front of Higgins Hall. But anyway, yeah, the statue's a virgin detector." He grins. "It stands up when a virgin walks by."
"You're fucking with me," you gasp. "People have seen this happen?"
He stares at you. "Oh God, Dunsdale," he groans. "Why do you have to be such a stereotypical blonde?"
"How can a statue stand up?" you insist. "How can it know when a virgin—?"
"It doesn't stand up! Don't you get it?"
"If it doesn't stand up, how can it be a virgin detector?"
"It stands up when a virgin walks by," he shouts. "But there aren't any virgins at Medfield College, so it never stands up! Jesus!"
"I don't get what you're talking about, Dawes." Despite your irritation, you lay back next to him, wrapping your arms about his bare torso and your bare legs about his. "You know, if you weren't such an asshole, I might have a thing for you."
"That's okay," he says. "I've got a thing for you."
You raise your head fractionally.
He grasps your hand and guides it down to his cock, which is swelling again. "And there it is."
This time he only laughs when you hit him. "Just get me some of that girl's hair. I don't need a statue of Cesar Arno to tell that she's a virgin."
* * * * *
But Mary never did. And after badgering her for a few days, Dawes dropped the subject.
It preys on you, though, as you bend over Dunsdale's homework for tomorrow. See to it that they perform the Ceremony of Ankh, Professor Hyde-White had told you. You need not participate in it yourself, but be sure they have the supplies for it, and the intent, and that they follow through on it.
So, the very least—and maybe the very most—you need to do is get the hair that Dawes asked for. The girl across the hall ...
Does it have to be a virgin, you wonder. Or was that just Dawes being a prick? There's no way you could tell just by looking at her, but you're pretty sure Dawes is right. The girl is rather pretty, or would be if she lost those thick glasses. She has flame-red hair that trails behind her as she hurries from place to place, and a quick, darting manner; she jumps a little every time someone talks to her. Not that Mary has paid much attention to her. Between her Health Science classes and her coxswain duties for the rowing team—you glance at the wall calendar showing the practice schedule—Mary hasn't got much time for anything. Which is why she mostly socializes with the rowers.
At least that will make it easy for you to concentrate on doing the job that Hyde-White has given you.  You have the following choice: 1. Continue |
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