Tap & Gown Read Online Free Page B

any pretense of paying attention.
    Big Demon appeared to be counting the stars painted on our ceiling. I was pretty sure Lucky was Page 16

    surreptitiously checking her e-mail on her iPhone. (Either that or she was texting Tristram Shandy, who also had his head lowered and his robe-draped hands hidden underneath the table.) Kismet, Frodo, and Bond looked wearily on as Juno, Thorndike, and Soze battled it out. I leaned my left elbow on the carved armrest of the throne, rested my chin in my hand, and watched.
    And watched.
    And watched.
    I couldn’t even think of anything more to say at this point. I wasn’t entirely sure what the scope of the argument was anymore. I’d had it in my mind fifteen minutes ago … but now all I could think about was my five-page-a-day diet to get my thesis done on time. I guess tonight’s schedule was shot. My right hand dangled the gavel over the side of the armrest, the nape of my neck grew irritated from the rasp of the robe against my skin, and my left foot began to go to sleep.
    CRACK!
    Everyone looked up. I scrambled off the throne to retrieve the gavel from the floor. “Sorry,” I said, tripping over my robes as I climbed back up the dais. “You were saying, Thorndike?”
    “No,” said Angel. “I think you were saying, as Uncle Tony, that we need to get the hell on with this.”
    “I agree,” said Lucky. “Maybe dropping that gavel was an act of God.”
    “Persephone,” said Juno.
    “Whatever. It means the time for discussion is over. I second the Knight Bugaboo’s motion that this debate be brought to a close.”
    “Um, all in favor?” I said, leaping at the opportunity.
    Unsurprisingly, the motion passed.
    “So what are we left with?” Lil’ Demon asked. “I can’t even follow anymore.”
    “Fifteen of each marble, and we pick at random,” Soze grumbled. “This is going to be a disaster.”
    “It’s only fair,” Thorndike said smugly.
    “Fine!” Soze crossed the room and from a cabinet withdrew a vase and a leather bag filled with marbles.
    “For the purpose of this operation, black marbles will be for men, red marbles for women—no discussion, okay?”
    Thirteen heads nodded. Soze counted them out, poured them into the vase, and shook it around.
    “Everyone pick, but keep your hand closed. We’ll reveal them at the same time.”
    He walked around the table, and each knight picked a marble. He approached me, and I stuck my hand into the vase, rooted around a bit, then closed my fingers around one and pulled it out. The glass sphere felt cool and solid inside my fist. Soze picked last, then held the vase out to me again. “As the evening’s Uncle Tony, please pick a second marble for our missing fifteenth member.”
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    “Our what?”
    Soze cleared his throat and mumbled, “Howard.”
    I did, with my left hand.
    I spoke. “Knights of Persephone, rise.” Around the table, everyone stood and held out their fists. “At the count of three: one, two, three.”
    Everyone opened his or her hand. My right palm held a red marble, my left held black. I glanced around the room, making a quick calculation.
    Nine black. Six red.
    Exactly what we already had.
    1*And some of my friends were still muttering the word “Stockholm” in my vicinity.
    2*Upon closer examination … no, he did not. Then again, two theses.
    “I can’t believe it,” Josh said, punctuating his sentence with a well-aimed kick at the edge of the walk.
    “All those hours, wasted.”
    “Were I a religious man,” George said, strolling along the deserted sidewalk two steps behind us, hands resting easily in his jacket pockets, “I’d say this was the universe’s way of telling you people to chill out.”
    Josh stopped dead and whirled around. “Well, maybe if you picked up some of the slack around here, we could. You’ve never taken society matters seriously enough.”
    “Yeah,” George replied. “Wonder why that is?”
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    Not entirely true. George knew when to