#339 The No-Talent Kid- Kurt Vonnegut
Mr. George M. Helmholtz lived in a world of music, and even
the throbbing of his headache came to him musically, if painfully, as the "deep-throated boom of a bass drum seven feet in diameter.”
The Lincoln High School band had won every single band
competition the last ten years until last year, when the Johnstown High School
Band had stunned the judges with their amazing over-sized bass drum. The loss haunts Helmholtz as he tries to
prepare this year's band for the next competition.
Enter Walter Plummer, the least talented kid in the school: “No
one else. He realized, no matter how untalented, could fill the last chair of
the organization as well has Plummer had.”
When Plummer was able to procure an even larger drum, he
tried to make a deal with Helmholtz for a place of honor in the band. The
agreement they struck, as would this story, would make O. Henry proud.
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