"Two nine eight."

"The Club can't compete with that-their combined total isn't even half that. If he started telling stories, we'd still be listening six months later. You're talking about a lot of egos getting crushed beyond recognition. KK's had ma.s.ses of stuff written about him, MTV specials have been broadcast, he's had TV movies made about him, there's even talk of a serial killer soap opera. We're dealing with the equivalent of Elvis here, the members are cruise ship crooners in comparison."

"Which is why you've got to get him to join. You have to take out the top guy. He probably inspires as many people as he kills. It's not a good thing him being out there. Besides, I want every last serial killer, Dougie."

"How, though? The cops, the CIA, even your FBI people can't catch him. How d'you think we're gonna do it?"

"You know how to communicate with him, to draw him out. Sure, he might be more famous than an astronaut, but no one has any idea who he is. Those movies they made of him, in one he was Caucasian, another Hispanic, another he was African, another he was in a wheelchair. He could be anyone. You. Me. Anyone."

I shake my head again, knowing this is crazy. "If Tony says no, then Tony means no."

"Think about the victims a minute, Dougie. You want to be a hero, right? Then save all those people who are going to buy some fast food, walk out into the midday sun, and then be found half an hour later with a KFC family meal carton dumped over their heads. Abject souls with lemon-scented hand wipes stuffed down their throats and the menu for a new secret recipe stapled to their foreheads. What about them, Dougie? Huh? Come on, hero-what about them?"

I look away, don't know how to answer that.

"Imagine your last moment on earth being an argument with a KFC employee as you try desperately to make them understand your order. Life can get cheap, Dougie, but that's no way to use up your last few minutes before KK strikes."

"Tony won't allow it. . . ." I know this sounds weak, and Agent Wade comes in for the kill.

"Five years he's been out there killing roughly one a week. And you're right, we can't find him because we can't man every single KFC outlet, it's impossible. You're the last chance we have, Dougie."

"I wish I could help . . . I honestly do. But-"

"Get them to invite him, Douglas." Agent Wade gives me a no-nonsense look, spelling his words out, making sure I understand fully what I've got to do. "He has to join."

"No."

"Do it for me, then. For your old pal Agent Wade."

"The Club'll get suspicious-they're already asking a lot of questions."

Agent Wade is not going to take no for an answer. "Who saved your life, Dougie? Who did that, huh? Not once, though, but twice. Who was there for you?"

I hate to admit it, but I think he's got me there.

"Agent Wade came good for you, Dougie, so it's time you came good for Agent Wade, don't you think?"

I give him a reluctant shrug, know he's got me backed into a corner. "I guess I could try. But I can't promise anything."

Agent Wade suddenly switches tack and gives me that handsome grin of his again. "Dougie . . . you're Club secretary, you've got sway. And I've seen the way you talk to girls, I know you can charm anyone into doing anything. Trust me. You're a natural. . . ."

I can't help the sudden and glowing sensation spreading through me.

Agent Wade finishes the can of Dr Pepper in three big, greedy gulps and then gives me a proud wink. "You're the man, Dougie!"

TENSE WITHOUT TALLULAH.

A GENT WADE GENT WADE has made me take the rather clever precaution of hiding the ink dots I received from Tallulah's needle attack under two sporty-looking wristbands. We went shopping together, and he helped me choose several pairs in different colors, and the red ones currently match the jersey I have tied around my shoulders. I turned up at the Club carrying a sports bag with a tennis racket inside it to help the overall image-I took this as a memento from Stan Laurel, who toured as a pro for some years. has made me take the rather clever precaution of hiding the ink dots I received from Tallulah's needle attack under two sporty-looking wristbands. We went shopping together, and he helped me choose several pairs in different colors, and the red ones currently match the jersey I have tied around my shoulders. I turned up at the Club carrying a sports bag with a tennis racket inside it to help the overall image-I took this as a memento from Stan Laurel, who toured as a pro for some years.

"Hey, everyone, look at the athlete." Chuck points to me and grins as the others turn. I nod back to them, feeling good that they've bought the image.

"They lower the net specially for you?" I pretend to enjoy this joke from Burt, laughing along with Betty and the others, though secretly I want to bury my tennis racket in Burt's face.

"Tallulah's late." Tony licks Cher's soup spoon before plunging it into what's left of her chicken broth. How polite of them to start without me.

Tony's voice seems heavy and weary, and he isn't interested in any of the gags flying around.

"She's never late." Richard shifts in his seat.

There's an undeniable tension in the air that is mushrooming over the table. "I really like Tallulah."

The contempt I feel for Richard is slowly eating away at my insides. So far, he's told everybody but me that he likes them.

"Mother says she may have just got held up." James Mason offers this, even though he knows it sounds weak.

"Maybe her needle jammed." I can't help myself. I have to laugh along with Chuck.

Cher isn't amused. "What's happening, Mr. Curtis? What the h.e.l.l is going on?"

"Jesus . . . cool it, will ya? Like Jimmy says, maybe she's stuck in traffic."

"Mother said it, not me," James corrects Tony.

"Crawl off and die, Jimmy." James is making himself a strong candidate for Tony's next kill.

I lean forward, putting on my best helpful look. "I heard flash flood warnings over the radio." I don't even have a radio. Not one that works, anyway.

"There you go, then. Little Dougie there's just given us the answer."

I bathe in Tony's grat.i.tude, but Cher isn't convinced.

"Miss Bankhead would get here whatever. I know that for sure."

"And how'd you know that, exactly?" Tony is quick to jump on this. I find that I'm enjoying their sparring session.

"I know how much the Club means to her."

"Sounds like you and her are pretty tight. Anything else you want to tell us?"

"Like what?"

"I'm waitin' to hear."

Cher glares at Tony, who glowers back. I catch sight of Betty, and she looks very nervous. She obviously isn't a big fan of confrontation. I then see Burt sneak her a furtive smile of a.s.surance. I don't like that-I wanted to do that.

Tony and Cher are still eyeballing each other.

"Why's she not here, Cher?"

"You tell me."

"Hey . . . I asked first."

"Come on, guys, huh? This is crazy." Chuck stabs out his Marlboro. "Lighten up. The Club's meant to be a fun night."

"It will be without Tallulah around." I throw in this great joke and laugh heartily. It takes me ten seconds to realize that everyone is scowling at me. Even Betty. "Drink, anyone?"

"f.u.c.k Tallulah, I don't give a pig's nipple about her." Tony is sure in a foul mood tonight. "What I wanna know is, which one of you chooks did this?"

Tony yanks a crumpled copy of the evening edition out of his jacket pocket and hurls it onto the table in front of everyone. It is open at the personals column, and I go weak at the knees when I see it.

King of Kentucky, It's time to chow down with your brethren. Looking forward to some fast food and fast times. It's time to chow down with your brethren. Looking forward to some fast food and fast times. Yours, Yours, Chairman Tony Tony glares darkly at all of us in turn. "I'm waitin'."

There is complete silence. I look at Betty. She in turn looks at Burt. Cher glances at Chuck, and I turn away when he looks at me, only to find James staring my way. Richard reaches over and turns the newspaper around so he can read it. Or, in his case, try to read it.

"What am I meant to be looking at?"

Tony shakes his great head. "f.u.c.kin' half-wit."

The silence stretches and expands until it seems the very air around us is going to burst.

"Who ran the ad? Come on . . . spill."

"It sure wasn't me-or Mother."

I realize that we are s.p.a.ced farther apart around the table, and this lends a sense of isolation to each of us. I feel like I could swing a cat round my head and not hit anyone. I don't like being so prominent, because the one thing I can't do now is draw any attention to myself.

Tony is still waiting for an answer.

"I'm gonna find out one way or another." He says this directly to Cher, and I guess with the way she is so keen to get KK to join, it's only natural that he suspects her.

She knows this and looks edgy. She scans the faces of the others and realizes they are thinking the same thing. "Why's everyone looking at me?"

"Why do you think?" I see no harm in really pointing the finger at her.

Cher's face reddens with anger. "You're Club secretary, you're the one who runs the ads."

"Which would be pretty stupid of him to do this, don't you think?" Chuck squeezes out an ironic laugh, and I hold out my arms and shrug like an Italian toward Cher.

"Totally dumb."

"Maybe it was Mr. Fairbanks, then. Cuz it's obviously the work of an a.s.shole."

For some reason, the longer I know Cher, the more I find myself hating her.

"You're the only one who wants him to join, though." Betty's lilting voice soothes my inner panic, and I look up at her, giving her the broadest smile I can muster. I stay that way long enough for her to get the message that I'm very grateful to her.

"Could someone read it to me?" Richard's illiteracy is irritating the h.e.l.l out of everyone, and they are glad to have a target to aim their pent-up tensions at.

"Mr. Burton, don't you think it's about time you learned to read and write? I mean, how old are you, for chrissakes?"

"Yeah, I'm sick of reading the menu to you every time we meet here." Chuck eyeb.a.l.l.s Richard. "A fetus is brighter than you are." G.o.d, I enjoy that.

Tony s.n.a.t.c.hes up the evening edition and starts tearing it angrily into strips. "One thing I won't tolerate is disobedience in the Club."

Cher doesn't like the way Tony is still staring at her and bows her head and tries to force down a mouthful of raw-looking venison that has just arrived in front of her.

"Let's just hope ole KK doesn't see this."

"But what if he does?" Burt considers Tony for a moment. "What if he responds?"

"We are getting kinda short on members." Richard sticks out a flabby finger and starts counting out loudly. "One, two, three, four . . ."

Tony bats the finger down hard, and Richard recoils. "I think I've noticed."

"Sorry, Tony."

There is no sign of any lightening up for the rest of the evening. It is a bleak and tense meeting, and as if to reflect this, the darkest clouds I have ever seen gather in the hundreds outside. Not even the television psychiatrist revealing a new and quite hilarious method for catching skillers can break the bleak mood. From what I could make out, it has something to do with urine samples and a test scientists can then carry out. So far, the idea is only in its infancy, as it would entail the whole of America sending their labeled p.i.s.s to a small three-man lab in southern Alaska.

Later Chuck decides he needs to help lift the mood and rises to tell the story of his latest kill. If anyone is going to get the night back on track, it's going to be the great Chuck Norris. Cher calls him our movie star killer and she would know, considering she's our rock star killer.

"So I'm in this girl's closet. One of those walk-in closets that you always see in horror movies, you know, with the thin white slats in the door, all the clothes hanging up behind you, and the killer's in the bedroom, thinking, Duh, I wonder where she's hiding? And it never occurs to him that she's in the closet even though it's about the only place she can be hiding, and he's not only walked slowly past it five or six times, but he's just got to have seen at least one horror movie in his life. So you think he'd figure it out, right? Anyway, things are different on this particular night, cuz the killer is in the closet this time, and the girl, who is running late by the way, should in fact be in the bedroom."

I immediately laugh. "That's hysterical."

No one else seems to get the joke and I feel I have to point it up. "It's usually the killer who's outside the closet. But Chuck's inside it."

I get a few blank looks but most people are waiting for Chuck to continue. I shake my head, turn to Chuck. "Don't worry, I get where you're coming from."

"Would you shut the f.u.c.k up?" Tony glares at me, and all I can do is shrug at him.

"I'm just-"

"I mean it, Junior. Another word and you can go sit in the kitchen."

I shake my head, making a point of sighing loudly. Sometimes I think I'm too good for them.

Chuck replays a little of what he's already said, trying to find where he left off. Then he clears his throat and continues.

"Anyway, I'm in the closet. And after an hour of sitting with her lingerie draping itself around my ears, I'm wondering where the h.e.l.l my victim has got to. I've stalked her for a month and I pretty much know her routine by heart. Tonight, Thursday, is the night she comes home from work, runs a bath, then watches her favorite TV program, taking advantage of the commercial breaks to go check on the water or add some bath salts."

"She only bathes once a week?" I am stunned by this.

I ignore the scowls that shoot my way from the members.

"She showers the other days," Chuck explains, and for a moment he looks tired. I'm starting to wonder at just how long he was in that closet. It seems to have drained him of his usual sparkle.