A Midsummer Eve's Nightmare (17 page)

“Unless there’s something we don’t know yet.”

“Oh, I think there’s quite a few things we don’t know yet. And I intend to start by confronting our favorite electrician.” He signaled the waitress for the bill.

The Green Show was just beginning when they were welcomed to the theatre by a lady in a gold and green Tudor gown. Elizabeth took one of her cards to fill out. She most certainly wanted to be on the mailing list for next year’s festival. “You enjoy the dancers. I’ll be back soon,” Richard said.

“Where are you going?”

“Backstage.”

“Not without me, you aren’t.”

“I thought you loved Elizabethan dancing.”

“Not as much as I love you.” She held tightly to his arm.

Locating Larry was no problem. He was at his console, concentrating on some mysterious movement of electrons in his usual stoop-shouldered, nearsighted way. “Okay, Larry,” Richard didn’t waste any time. “We know about the ticket scalping and pilfering the electrical supplies. I just want to hear your version of it.”

Larry flipped his hair out of his face and blinked at Richard. “So if you know so much, what do you need to hear from me?”

“I know what you’re doing. I don’t know why. Drug habit to support? Sick mother needs an operation? You like the thrill of the game? You must have some excuse.”

Larry shrugged. “Nothing so dramatic. I liked having pocket money. It wasn’t much, but it was something.”

His tone changed from defiant to bitter. “Kids at school always laughed at me for being a nerd. I didn’t mind that so much. I like being a nerd—but I hated being the only one who never had fifty cents in his pocket to go out for a coke. I never dated because I couldn’t. Money I got from jobs I had to spend on essentials.”

His face suddenly twisted with grief. “Then I met Sally this summer, and she smiled at me—she had the cutest smile. She seemed really interested in technical problems with the lights. I decided it would be different this time. I’d find a way to have some pocket money.” He paused for a long time, and his shoulders dropped even lower. “Now I’ve got the spare change but nothing to spend it on. So what are you doing to do? Call the police?”

Richard hesitated.

“He won’t have to.” Trevor Stevens stepped around a pile of flats stacked beside the console. “It’s my budget he’s messed up. I’ll deal with it.”

“And the tickets?” Richard asked.

“Tickets? Did I miss something?”

Richard told him what they suspected about the scalping operation. “Yes, the authorities should know about that,” Trevor agreed just as the trumpet fanfare accompanying the raising of the flag sounded above their heads. “But there’s a play ready to go on the boards here right now. Can you folks find your seats all right?”

They found their seats. But Elizabeth wasn’t satisfied. “So where does all that get us?”

“Probably no closer to the real solution.”

“You don’t think he said all that about Sally to throw us off?”

“Possible, but I doubt it. He certainly seemed truly grieved.”

“What about Trevor? Do you think he will take care of it, or was he covering? Maybe he’s part of the group.”

Richard he broke into a smile. “I must say, you have an admirably suspicious mind, Mrs. Spenser.” Then he frowned. “But I’ll have to agree. At this point anything seems feasible.”

“I know. But nothing seems sensible.”

THE TEMPEST

Our revels now are ended; these actors,

As I foretold you, were all spirits, and

Are melted into air, into thin air.

- Prospero

Chapter 22

THE LIGHTS CAME UP onstage. Prospero, wearing Tori’s masterpiece of jewel-toned enchanter’s cape, stood on the highest balcony and held his magician’s staff over the wave-tossed ship on the stage below. The mariners did fierce battle with Prospero’s violent tempest until a rending noise and great crash accompanied the total blackout of the lights. Then silence.

A moment later lights flooded Prospero’s charmed island. And never before had the art of stagecraft worked such enchantment. Elizabeth caught her breath at the beauty of it. The rocky caverns and wild vegetation shimmered as if fashioned of crystal and fire. One didn’t need to know the play to be certain that strange and ethereal beings waited behind every iridescent rock and luminous tree. Miranda, Prospero’s daughter—his most precious jewel—in a gown of a gauzelike fabric that might have been spun from fabulous gems, ran to her father and set the theme for the play with her plea for the lives of the sailors.

As the story of Prospero and Miranda’s banishment by the brother who now lay shipwrecked on the very same island unfolded, Elizabeth found herself gripped on a new level. The play she had always loved simply for its poetry and enchanted beauty now spoke to her far more deeply of forgiveness and redemption. Especially the redemptive power of beauty.

Even Caliban, the witch’s son condemned to monster status for plotting to ravish Miranda, moved Elizabeth to pity for the harshness of his punishment. For even that hideous creature was so capable of being moved by beauty he could declare, “When I wak’d I cried to dream again.”

Elizabeth swallowed hard, knowing that the beauty surrounding her that night would so remain in her dreams.

Then Ariel, the spirit of air, as Caliban was the spirit of earth, in his costume seemingly woven of down, dew and silver cobwebs, found Prospero gloating that his enemies were now all at his mercy. He should shortly have his revenge. But the magic-maker, newly moved by his daughter’s love for the son of Prospero’s own double-dealing brother, was ripe for Ariel’s plea for pity.

“The rarer action is In Virtue, than in vengeance,” Prospero declared and released his enemies.

And with that swift action of forgiveness and redemption, it was actually Prospero himself who was restored to full humanity as he left enchantment to return to the world of men with the vow, “This rough magic I here abjure.”

Elizabeth’s heart filled to overflowing when, having relinquished his magic powers and thereby taken another step toward his own redemption, Prospero embraced his former enemies. “I do forgive thy rankest fault.” And in forgiving others Prospero himself found forgiveness.

Elizabeth looked to her right where Tori and Gregg sat, holding hands. Elizabeth had earlier diagnosed Gregg’s need for forgiveness. But now she saw her own need to forgive. She had been holding Gregg’s past faults against him, just as Prospero had his brother’s. Gregg and Tori needed the same freedom to find their happiness that Prospero granted Miranda and Ferdinand. For as Prospero returned to humanity, so could his daughter. Her eyes were opened to the world of people: “O wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world that has such people in‘t!”

Now Elizabeth knew what she would say to Gregg at her first opportunity. She would speak to him in his own language and remind him of the words he himself had quoted in Jacksonville, “Do as the heavens have done, forget your evil; with them forgive yourself.”

On the stage Prospero brought the tangled plot to its joyous conclusion: “And my ending is despair unless I be reliev’d by prayer, Which pierces so, that it assaults Mercy itself, and frees all faults. As you from crimes would pardon’d be, let your indulgence set me free.”

With the departure of the humans the gently glowing stage was left to its spirits, now freed from the magician’s control. The enchantment of mystical music floated from above. The gossamer Ariel and a no-longer-monstrous Caliban led the nymphs, fairies and sprites in a light, flowing dance with garlands of flowers while glitter like stardust fell on them through the glimmering lights.

And just when Elizabeth thought it was over and she, like Prospero, would have to return to the real world while everything in her cried for the magic and beauty to go on and on, Prospero appeared on the upper level, splendid in his ducal robes and crown. With a wave of his hand the dance below stopped and the spirits disappeared from sight. Then, to Elizabeth’s great thrill, Prospero repeated the lines that she loved most in all of Shakespeare; possibly the loveliest piece of poetry in the English language; Shakespeare at his most mature:

Our revels now are ended: these actors

(As I foretold you) were all spirits, and

Are melted in air, into thin air,

And like the baseless fabric of this vision

The cloud-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces,

The solemn temples, the great globe itself,

Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,

And like this insubstantial pageant faded

Leave not a rack behind: we are such stuff

As dreams are made on; and our little life

Is rounded with a sleep.

The applause around her went on and on, but Elizabeth couldn’t move for fear of breaking the spell. At last Richard leaned over. “We should go congratulate Erin.”

“Oh.” Elizabeth blinked, as if waking from a sleep. “Yes. Her dancing was wonderful.” She said the words, and she moved with the others, but she still wasn’t fully returned to the solid world. Not to a world where murderers and kidnappers lived.

Chapter 23

EVEN BACKSTAGE, THAT GREAT squelcher of magic and debunker of dreams, seemed almost enchanted tonight as fairies and sprites, still carrying their floral hoops and shedding bits of the glitter that had fallen on them like snow moved every direction through the cast and technicians. “There she is.” Elizabeth pointed to a spirit in palest pink and yellow chiffon with flowers and jewels twined in her long blond hair. Elizabeth waved across the crowd, and Erin waved back.

They were halfway to Erin when Elizabeth saw Trevor talking to Larry over by the lighting console. Then she remembered what she had failed to tell the director earlier. She turned to Richard. “There’s Trevor. I must tell him about the bulbs.” Richard nodded and followed her through the press of people, each one hurrying a different direction, each intent on their own business.

Elizabeth went first to the trash barrel and retrieved the sack of shattered bulbs. “Trevor, I need to tell you something.” She explained about finding them in the rolled carpet. And that it was her fault they were broken.

Larry was shrinking back into the shadows, but Trevor stopped him. “Getting a good price for high intensity bulbs, were you? Listen, I’m not going to be a party to your crime by concealing this. You’re a brilliant electrician. The best way I can keep you from ruining your future is by making you face the music.”

“So that’s me fired.” Larry did a poor job of acting defiantly nonchalant.

“Not a bit of it. I’m not going to press charges. Think I want to lose my best technician in the middle of the season?”

Larry blinked confusedly, then broke into a transforming smile that was like one of his own lighting banks turning on.

Trevor gave a jerk of a nod. “Right.” Then he turned to Richard. “Keep an eye on him for me. I have to report this or our insurance won’t help on any of the loss—” he held up the bag of broken bulbs “— beyond what you’ll be paying back.” He finished with a final look at Larry before striding off to get Rory Fellows who, as Erin’s guard for the evening, was waiting patiently in the background.

When Elizabeth had repeated her story for Officer Fellows she turned to look for Erin. The girl was so sensitive she might be offended if they waited too long before coming to her. But where was she? The backstage crush was thinning out a bit, so it shouldn’t be difficult to spot her now. She was nowhere near the area Elizabeth had first seen her.

But after all, that had been several minutes ago. She had probably moved on with some friends. Tori and Gregg had told Elizabeth and Richard they would meet them back at the apartment, but perhaps they had changed their minds and come to see Erin. Or perhaps she had gone on with Dirk, although surely she wouldn’t have done that without waiting to say hello. An icy chill seized Elizabeth. Erin couldn’t possibly have been abducted again, could she?

Then Elizabeth realized how obvious the answer was. Why did her imagination always insist on making a big deal of the simplest thing? Of course, Erin had gone to the dressing room to change out of her costume. Elizabeth went along the corridor.

Three other spirits were just emerging from their dream-spun costumes, now wearing jeans and sweatshirts. “Erin?” A short redhead answered Elizabeth’s query. “Yeah, she was changing when we came in.” She pointed to the pastel costume left in a heap on the floor. “Then she got a note and hurried out.”

“It better be important,” a dancer with startling blue eyes said. “She’ll get blazes from wardrobe for leaving her costume like that.”

The three girls walked on. Elizabeth looked around. She tried to tell herself she was being silly, but Erin’s disappearing so precipitously as that did worry her. She took a hanger off the rack and crossed the room to pick up the abandoned costume. The piece of crumpled paper was under it.

Playground. Now.
The terse message chilled Elizabeth. “Wait!” She ran after Erin’s fellow dancers. “Who brought this?”

The dancers looked at each other, then all shook their heads and shrugged. None had noticed. One thought it was a fellow. “Maybe tall with blondish hair, wearing something dark?” the redhead suggested.

Her companion laughed. “I would have said it could have been a young girl. I saw someone back here earlier.”

Elizabeth thanked them and looked around for Richard. The men were no longer by the console. A rattle on the catwalk made her look up. Trevor and Richard seemed to be intent on some explanation Larry was giving the policeman. They were about where the case had fell on her. So it must have been Larry all along. Once his confession started he must be pouring it all out. She supposed he had been trying to scare Erin away from finding out about his shenanigans. Well, if so, Erin would be safe now.

But Elizabeth wouldn’t be satisfied until she found Erin. “
Playground. Now,”
pushed in her mind, “
Now.”
She dropped the paper she still held in her hand and rushed toward the stage door.