Justin Davis, page 21
Justin would not deprive his mother and brother. The money he sent made a big difference to their lives. But this essential frugality threatened to expose him. How could he keep up with the White Hall social scene and sustain his Knight candidacy on his shamefully small budget?
He snuck into the scholarship office every time he went to collect his money. And he always implored the staff to keep his financial status strictly confidential. They assured him they did. But how long could he pretend that he was like other White Hall students, like his friends?
A few days later, Justin was speaking to his family on WhatsApp when Luke entered the room. Having told his family so much about Luke, and Luke so much about his family, he was anxious for them to finally meet. Handing the phone to Luke, Justin watched happily as Luke conversed graciously with Star Davis, and made Joey laugh.
After the call, Justin thanked his friend, who made Justin promise to speak soon with his parents, a promise eagerly given. Luke then looked gravely at Justin and said, “Did you notice that your phone is bugged?”
“Bugged? What do you mean?”
Luke nodded with complete assurance. “I mean someone has tapped into your phone and monitors your calls. Did you notice your phone makes little clicking sounds?”
“Yes, but I thought that’s because it’s old.”
“Not those clicks. Does your battery run down faster than it should?”
Yes, but I thought…so those are signs that someone is tapping my phone?”
“Exactly. Now we should test your mother’s phone. Call her from my phone and let me listen on the speaker.” Justin did so. He exchanged a few words with his mother and looked up at Luke, who nodded again. “Your mother’s phone is also being tapped.”
Alarmed, Justin said, “What can we do?” In all his success at White Hall, he had not worried about an Asura attack, but now fear for his family struck him.
Justin called his mother at once, told her what Luke had discovered, and urged her to change her SIM card immediately. Both Justin and his mother changed their cards. For now, the problem seemed solved. But Justin was reminded in a most disturbing way that forces beyond his power were likely observing him, and with threatening intent. Justin must alone bear the weight of this danger. To whom could he explain it, without calling into question, in their mind, his own sanity?
Justin now looked for possible danger everywhere. His friends noticed his anxiety and inquired. He replied that it was just a “little family problem, nothing serious.” His friends seemed satisfied with this explanation and Justin endeavored to seem like his normal self.
A day later, something happened that gave him both joy and increased anxiety. Scarlet said to Justin, “We have known each other for a while, yet you never ask me out. I must conclude that you do not really enjoy my company.” Justin knew that behind her teasing formality, she was displeased. He tried to placate her by treating her complaint as nothing but banter.
“That would be a very wrong conclusion,” Justin said, with a chivalrous bow. “Indeed, I treasure your company.”
“Well spoken, Prince Justin. So now I authorize you to ask me out.”
“I always wanted to,” Justin said, more seriously, “but I feared offending Mel. You know how he feels about you.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that,” she replied. “I already spoke to Mel. You see, White Hallians have a strict code. We respect each other’s freedom. I am determined to choose who I will be, and with whom. Mel honors that. He would never act against you if I chose to go out with you. And since you are so shy, I will ask you to go out with me.”
“Of course! I would be delighted. Really.”
“Excellent. We can go out Friday evening. And since you don’t have a car. I will drive. Tell me again why you don’t have a car.”
“Well,” he said, forcing a smile, “it’s an environmental statement.”
“Justin, you’re joking, right? Get a hybrid!”
“You know, I thought of that, but…well, even to manufacture a hybrid in a factory…there’s a lot of negative impact on the environment.”
“Well, you are a rabid ecologist. I assume you won’t object to traveling in my motorized vehicle. You did fly here from West Virginia. Or was that on the back of a large bird?”
Scarlet said this with utmost gravity, and then burst out laughing at him.
He forced another smile and said, “It was a large metal bird. Where would you like to go?”
“To a great French restaurant on the downtown mall in Charlottesville, next to the theater. We’ll do dinner and a play. And we’ll each pay for ourself. Okay?”
“Sounds great!” His face smiled, his heart sank, his mind was in turmoil.
“Come to my dorm Friday at seven p.m. Goodbye, Justin, I have to study. Oh, and by the way, wear nice clothes. We dress semiformal for dates. Do not embarrass me.”
As soon as he was alone, Justin found the restaurant and theater online and saw the prices. Then he looked up semiformal dress. He would need a dark business suit, dress shirt, tie, faux leather dress shoes, and dark dress socks. Well, he had dark socks.
This was an unmitigated disaster. For other White Hall students, the cost would be nothing. For Justin, the date would eliminate his semester savings. It was money his family desperately needed.
What would he tell Scarlet? His fragile hoax was crumbling. They would all say he lied, or at least misled them. Justin collapsed onto his bed, overcome with shame and worry.
This was a crisis. He would deeply offend Scarlet if he did not go out with her. He might lose her forever. Of course, Knighthood would also be over. He could not say no. He must eagerly accept her invitation, which he did. And he really wanted to go out with her. But how was he to pay for the date?
He was trapping himself in a web of deceit. Again and again, these words from Scott’s Marmion haunted him: “Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive!”
In the midst of this, he noticed that the first fall colors glittered on the high slopes. Desperate to escape the mounting pressures of White Hall, and desperate over his coming date with Scarlet, Justin left the campus after classes and hiked to the ridge of Pasture Fence Mountain. As he ascended, his body responded joyfully to the challenge. On the summit, he found a scenic ridge road. The dreaded witch house lay to the west. He went east, delighting in the sudden freedom, vast views, and pristine air.
Then a daring curiosity gripped him. Without breaking White Hall rules, he could behold dreaded Stonewood from a safe perch. He had binoculars!
With quickened pace, he strode the ridge till he stood high above the chaotic, crumbling campus of the Stonewood School for Girls. It lay in a cramped, dark glen, impervious to sunlight. To this benighted academy, the state of Virginia consigned those girls whose drug addiction, thievery, violence, and prostitution were judged implacable.
He studied the shabby clearing dotted with old, ramshackle structures. Once handsome, they were now plagued with broken walls and windows, and encircled by jungled lawns. He watched gray-clad girls range the glen.
Immersed in surveillance, sure of solitude, he did not notice that he was not alone, till a hostile voice chilled his nerves. “Like the view, White Hall boy?”
Ten feet away, a muscular Stonewood girl glared at him.
“Sorry,” he said. “I was just out for a walk.”
“Don’t be stupid,” she said. “Now pay for the view, rich boy.”
“I’m not rich,” he said, “and I don’t pay for public views. Sorry again.”
“You’re mocking me,” she said.
“No, I just told you the truth.” Justin tried for a minute to reason with her, but only succeeded in making her angrier.
“I’ve had enough,” she concluded, “so now I’ll pay you.”
She pulled out a knife. “Now get on your knees and beg.”
This was crazy. “Look,” Justin said, “I’m going now, so don’t bother me. I don’t want to hurt you.”
She called him several remarkably vulgar names, and tried, rather amateurishly, to stab him. He easily evaded her. Again she thrust and he danced away. This went on for a while until he realized she would not stop. And she blocked his way home. So, he grabbed and twisted the wrist of her knife hand until she dropped her weapon, which he kicked a good way down the mountain. As the raging girl shrieked maledictions, he ran so fast along the ridge toward White Hall that she could not follow him. He understood even more clearly now the widespread perception of Stonewood and its scholars.
As he started down the mountain toward campus, Justin heard the unmistakable roar of Brad Branley’s Rokon Trail-Breaker. Brad was zooming up and down the hills near him. A chilling thought froze Justin’s heart. He had spoken with a Stonie, grounds for expulsion from White Hall. Of course, the girl had threatened him with a knife, but he had not instantly left, he had stayed for a minute to amuse himself, before disarming her. Brad was riding nearby and could have seen him.
There was more danger. Local people walked the hills with binoculars and zoom cameras. What if someone took his picture with the Stonie? It was a remote possibility, or maybe not so remote.
Then, as soon as he crossed down into cell range, he received a text from the White Hall administration. He was to come at once to the school president’s office. This was crazy! How could they know? Justin hurried down to campus with catastrophic visions assaulting his mind.
CHAPTER 24
Justin’s stomach churned as he hurried to the president’s office. If White Hall expelled him, his life was over. He could never face family or friends in Davis. He would live as a hermit in the hills. He must convince them he was innocent of whatever they were going to accuse him of.
As he neared the administration building, he saw several black Cadillac Escalades with tinted windows parked at the entrance. Two big, strong men in dark suits and dark glasses stood by the entrance. They were obviously high-level bodyguards. But for whom?
Entering the building, he saw two more of these guards just outside the president’s suite. What was going on? As he approached the door, an agent stepped in front of him, politely asked his name, and checked his photo ID. Satisfied, the agent smiled, opened the door for Justin, and said, “Go right in. They’re waiting for you.”
President Lofter’s secretary also smiled at him, and ushered him into the president’s grand old office. Justin respectfully greeted her. And she also smiled. “So, you are Justin Davis,” Dr. Lofter said, both asking and telling him.
“Yes, I am,” Justin said with a slight bow of his head.
“Very good.” She then led Justin’s gaze to a couple sitting on the other side of her office in a living room setting. On the couch, looking steadily at Justin, sat Senator Hunter Clay and his wife, Dr. Barbara Clay. What was this?
President Lofter led Justin to the celebrated couple and said, “Please allow me to introduce our very distinguished alumnus, Senator Hunter Clay, and his wife, Dr. Barbara Clay.”
Astonished, and hardly knowing what he did, Justin gave the Clays his little bow. The senator said, “Glad to meet you, Justin,” and stretched out his hand. Justin rushed over and shook it. He then shook his wife’s hand. The couple’s relaxed, smiling demeanor almost put him at ease.
“It’s an honor to meet you,” Justin said with his own best campaign smile. This was supremely high stakes for Justin’s career. Every nerve was on alert. Justin sat in the chair that Dr. Lofter indicated for him.
Senator Clay smiled. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Justin. I heard from various sources that you showed real courage at the airport, that you wanted to fight the bad guys. Thank you for standing up for our White Hall family, for the Knights, and most importantly, for justice.”
Before Justin could mumble something humble, Dr. Lofter added, “Justin was a state champion in martial arts.”
“So we’ve heard,” Barbara Clay said with a glittering smile. Behind her smile, a steady, probing gaze showed Justin that she was no less alert and inquisitive than her husband.
Justin could not fail to be impressed by the handsome, famous couple, stylish and elegant, exuding the steady charm of perennial campaigners. The senator was a large, powerful man, who moved as if in excellent physical shape. He was about the age of Justin’s late father, in his mid-forties. It was a supreme priority for Justin to ingratiate himself with the Clays, and they seemed eager to give him that opportunity. They wanted to know more about him. He prayed they would not ask where he was from.
I know you’re from a small town in West Virginia,” Barbara said.
“Yes, I was born in Davis, West Virginia.”
“Of course,” Senator Clay said, “Barbara and I attended your dear father’s funeral. I’m so sorry about his passing.” Hunter glanced at Barbara.
“Yes, what a terrible loss,” Barbara said.
“It was most kind of you to attend the funeral,” Justin said. “It meant a lot to all my family.”
“We were glad we could be there,” Barbara said. “And your family is still there in Davis?”
“Yes, my mom and brother,” Justin explained.
“Yes, what a terrible loss,” Barbara said. “I’m so sorry for you, Justin.
Senator Clay lowered his head sadly. “I’m so sorry. I’m sure he’s looking down and very proud of you now.”
Hunter, as he insisted Justin call him, quickly changed the topic, and after some small talk about White Hall, said, “Justin, Barbara and I are interested in you. We help deserving White Hall students, and we would like to help you. That’s why we requested President Lofter to invite you here.”
Dr. Lofter praised the Clays’ generosity, mentioning their recent gift to expand the student health center.
“And now,” Dr. Lofter said, “this magnanimous couple wishes to do even more. They expressed a wish to help worthy students who could use a hand, and we told them about you, Justin. And out of the goodness of their hearts, Senator and Mrs. Clay want to significantly increase your scholarship. What do you say, Justin?”
Dr. Lofter nodded reverently to the Clays and leaned forward in her leather chair.
Justin’s jaw dropped. “I…I’m very grateful,” he stammered. “Senator and Mrs. Clay, I’m most grateful. I don’t know how to thank you. This will mean so much to my family and me.”
Dr. Lofter smiled approvingly at this fitting response. Senator Clay smiled kindly, and said, “Barbara and I have done well in life and we like to help deserving young people who need a little assistance.”
Senator Clay nodded to Dr. Lofter. She nodded back, and handed Justin a document showing that the senator’s gift would triple his available funds for October and every succeeding month. Justin received it with a joy and gratitude that pleased the Clays. His troubles were over. He could now dress like the other students, take out Scarlet, buy a decent computer, and give up his fear and shame.
“As we say,” Senator Clay said, “use it in the best of health. There will be an equal check every month, as long as you are in White Hall, and that includes your summer vacation. I want you to go out, enjoy yourself, and help your family.”
Justin eloquently expressed his heartfelt gratitude. The adults seemed fully pleased with him. Justin sensed that the meeting was about to end and was looking for a signal to get up and leave, when Hunter said to him, “As you may know, I created a national youth alliance called the Youth Corps. We help exceptional young people get involved in the political process. They work in my campaigns, serve as Senate pages, and help to spread our message. Our goal is to serve our country in the best possible way. Perhaps you might be interested, Justin. Young people join the Corps by invitation only.”
Many thoughts flashed through Justin’s mind in an instant. The Corps was a fast track to major success in the world. It also earned fame for its absolute loyalty to its founder, Hunter Clay. To join meant certain success, but at a price.
As if reading Justin’s mind, Hunter said, “I know it’s a big step for you, Justin. Give it some time, discuss my offer with your family and friends, and then let me know. Here’s a card with my secretary’s number. I’m sure you will respect my wish that you not share this number with anyone, not even your closest friends or family.”
“Of course, sir.” Justin took the precious card. “I will absolutely respect your privacy and wishes. And I sincerely thank you for the honor of your offer. As you said, it is only fair that I discuss this with my family, since it is such a big step in my life.”
Justin had dreamed of a bright career. But his dreams were manifesting at a speed he had not imagined. Hunter Clay was widely expected to run for president next year. Polls showed that he was the strongest candidate in the country from either party.
But there were dangers. Would Justin come under the control of a mission that was not exactly his own? Would he lose his independence? Would the senator approve of Justin’s serious metaphysical commitments? All of that remained to be seen. But Justin was hopeful. The potential for rapid ascension captivated his mind, even as worries remained.
“One last thing,” Hunter said. “Barbara and I would like to invite you to visit Clay Campus, my estate, just over the mountain. When you come, we can discuss my plans and yours, and hopefully they will be compatible.”
Senator Clay and his wife stood up and the others instantly followed. He and his wife warmly shook President Lofter’s hand and thanked her for her time. She could not thank them enough in return. He then gave Justin a firm handshake and patted him on the shoulder. After Barbara shook his hand, the couple quickly departed with their escort.
When they were gone, President Lofter said to the somewhat dazed Justin, “Congratulations, young man, on your extraordinary good fortune. Use these gifts wisely.”
Justin was cordially dismissed and headed back to his room in Oxford Hall, his feet hardly touching the ground. Tom and Scarlet intercepted him in the quadrangle and eagerly questioned him regarding his meeting with the Clays, about which they had been informed. The White Hall Academy was a tight network indeed.
