Machinate

machinate
verb, intransitive. To engage in plots and intrigues; to scheme.
verb, transitive. To plot a malicious act.

The ruckus from the saxophone section behind her erupted just as Betty and the other flutes were inhaling in preparation for the intro to the next piece. The director's arms shot outward in the signal to stop playing. Betty propped her instrument on one thigh and gazed sadly at the sheet music, following the run of notes across the page as Mr. Reynolds chastised the sax players. She was in band because she loved music and loved playing music. She didn't understand why the students who always misbehaved and disrupted practice were here.

Betty had been disappointed when seat assignments were posted after the brief auditions at the end of marching season. She had earned First Flute, but she was first in the lower band. Band members were so numerous they had to be split into two groups for concert season. The best players were in the elite "Concert Band." The dregs were relegated to the other group. They played less-challenging pieces, and that was where all the discipline problems were.

As Betty listened to the continuing noise as Mr. Reynolds tried to impose order, she made up her mind. She was getting out of this crummy band. There was a system of "challenges" set up for that purpose, and she decided to use it.

After the period ended, she went to the band office and signed up for a challenge. Mr. Reynolds didn't comment as he marked his schedule and told her what piece to practice. There would also be a sight-reading contest, on a piece neither she nor the last-seated flutist in Concert Band had seen before. There was no way to practice for that. All Betty could do in preparation for it was randomly choose pieces out of the books of popular-song sheet music she had at home and attack them.

Betty watched Jenny--the flutist she was challenging--in a class they had together the next morning and wondered if the other girl was aware that Betty was machinating to get her seat. Jenny was the better player--that Betty knew. She had taken up the flute a year before Betty had, and her parents had paid for private lessons. Betty quelled such thoughts as she focused on her class work. It still might be possible to get into the good band, if she practiced hard every day. She had begun the previous afternoon.

How would she fit practice into the the rest of the week? She had play rehearsals every day immediately after band, then the bus ride home, then dinner, chores and finally homework before bed. She had to find a way, or her plan would fail.

The speech and dramatics teacher called her and her fellow actors to rehearse their scene first that afternoon. Afterward, she approached him.

"Mr. Boyd, is it okay if I duck out for half an hour to practice for my band challenge?"

He smiled at her, wishing all his students were as hard-working and considerate as Betty. "Of course. Take longer if you wish. I have a lot of work to do on other scenes. We won't need to go through yours again until much later."

She gushed her gratitude and left the auditorium. She found an empty practice room and spent the next hour working on the challenge piece.

She repeated that process for the rest of the week. On Friday, all the practice rooms were in use, so she practiced in the stage crew's lighting equipment room.

After band on Monday, she went to the practice room Mr. Reynolds used for challenges and did a brief warm-up. Mr. Reynolds joined her, then Jenny trailed in and got her flute out of its case.

As challenger, Betty was required to play first. She performed the challenge piece with one minor flaw and was fairly pleased at the end. She knew she stood a good chance of winning, even with that mistake. She moved on to the sight-reading piece apprehensively, but it wasn't as difficult as she had feared, and she got through it without too many halts and missed notes. Betty heaved a big sigh as she finished, knowing she had done her best.

Then it was Jenny's turn. After a few bars, it was obvious to Betty that the other girl hadn't practiced the challenge piece at all. Several times, she came to a complete halt. Her tone was breathy and her fingering clumsy. How had Jenny ever gotten into Concert Band? She played the sight-reading piece even more badly than she had played the challenge piece. With no surprise, Betty nodded when Mr. Reynolds announced that Betty was to take Jenny's chair in Concert Band the following day.

It was as wonderful as she had expected it to be: a full hour of practice on interesting music, without the frequent interruptions of noisy sax or brass players. She would do anything to stay in Concert Band for the rest of the school year, and the rest of her time in high school. As they swabbed out their flutes and packed them up after practice, Betty eyed the flutist who occupied the next-to-lowest seat and narrowed her eyes. Her best insurance to achieve her goal was to challenge her and win, thus placing herself one chair out of danger.

"Might as well strike while I'm hot," she thought, and headed for the band office to sign up for another challenge.

Definitions adapted from The New Oxford American Dictionary, Oxford University Press, Inc., 2005 (eBook Edition, copyright 2008), and from Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam Company, Publishers, Springfield, Massachusetts, USA, 1965, depending on which is more convenient to hand.