Eyes Like Stars: Theatre Illuminata, Act I Read online

  The water-maiden looked left, then right, as though to reassure herself that no one could hear her piercing stage whisper. “He could escape.”

  Despite the temperature of the water, Bertie went cold. “What did you say?”

  “Hm?” Ophelia lifted her foot; distracted by her dripping toes, she didn’t answer.

  Peaseblossom landed on Bertie’s shoulder. “The idea’s ridiculous.”

  “Ridiculous in the best possible way!” Moth said with a snicker. “Can you picture him tunneling out with a spoon?”

  “Bedsheet ladder out the window!” said Cobweb.

  Ophelia frowned. “I don’t know about spoons and sheets, but if he tears his entrance page out of The Book, he’ll be able to leave the Théâtre.”

  Bertie stared at Ophelia through air so thick with water vapor and revelations that it hurt her lungs. The fairies choked on mouthfuls of bathwater.

  “Good golly!” Mustardseed sputtered when he was finally able to breath again. The others echoed his sentiments while Nate swore under his breath.

  “Ophelia?” Bertie said.

  “Yes?”

  “Whatever would give you that idea? That someone could tear a page out of The Book?”

  “Oh, that’s not important,” Ophelia said with a graceful wave of her hand.

  “It’s important to me.”

  The other girl smiled. “Because I did it once.”

  Ariel wasn’t the one who escaped. It was Ophelia. “You ripped The Book?”

  “I pulled out my page. The one I make my first entrance on.” Ophelia shook her head as though clearing it of spiderwebs. “Then I saw the Exit sign.” Her eyes flicked toward the neon-green light at the back of the auditorium. “I’d never noticed it before.”

  Bertie was afraid to ask, but she had to know. “Then what did you do?”

  “I waited for a quiet moment,” Ophelia said, wiggling her fingers, “and I slipped out.”

  “You went through the door.”

  “Yes.”

  “Into the lobby?”

  “Yes.”

  “And then?”

  “Out a revolving door.”

  Bertie swallowed. “You left the theater?”

  “Yes.”

  An errant draft stirred the moist air, chasing most of the steam into the flies. Bertie glanced at Nate, who looked as shocked as she felt.

  “I didn’t think it possible!” he said.

  “Anyway, I just thought I should warn you.” Ophelia stood, smoothed her skirts, and departed without explanation or apology, leaving perfect wet footprints in her wake.

  All the words Bertie wanted to say stuck in her throat, like the bits of mosaic decorating the back wall. She thought the members of the Greek Chorus shifted to leer at her.

  “Bertie—” Peaseblossom tugged at her ear.

  “Shut up, Pease.” Bertie had a million and one questions to ask, and none of them good.

  “But, Bertie—”

  “I mean it!”

  “It’s just—”

  “Beatrice Shakespeare Smith!” Mrs. Edith strode onstage holding a plush bathrobe in one hand and a towel in the other. Her mouth was pinched together so tightly with displeasure that she looked as though she’d been sucking lemons. “The Stage Manager came to tell me you were bathing, so I thought I’d bring you these. And this is what I find!”

  “It’s not anything, really.” Bertie reached for the robe, but her arm wasn’t quite long enough.

  “Then why are you sitting here naked and in the company of a pirate?”

  “He was dirty, and I didn’t see how it could hurt.”

  “Of course you didn’t, because you never think these things through.” Mrs. Edith draped the robe around Bertie’s shoulders and heaved her out of the soaking pool with surprising strength. “When are you going to realize that you’re not a child anymore? There are those who would take advantage of you—”

  “Now, see here,” Nate protested. “We weren’t doin’ anythin’ improper.”

  Mrs. Edith pointed a bony finger at him. “You hold your tongue this second. I shall speak to the Theater Manager about this, you defiler of innocents.”

  “I defiled nothin’!” Nate jumped out of the pool and strode toward them. Mrs. Edith shrieked and clapped her hands over Bertie’s eyes.

  Bertie twisted away from the Wardrobe Mistress, glimpsing the full extent of what had so shocked her. Nate suddenly reconsidered his advance, turning and sprinting to his clothes. The water spangling his legs made it difficult for him to pull on his trousers, but he managed it. Bundling up the rest of his things, he nearly impaled himself on his cutlass, twisting it aside only just in time.

  “Be careful, Nate!” Moth said. “You don’t want to lop off anything vital!”

  Red with more than just the heat of the water, Nate strode past them with a muttered, “I’ll come find ye later, Bertie.”

  Bertie turned a pleading gaze upon Mrs. Edith. “I know you’re mad, but I need to speak to the Theater Manager. It’s about something very important—”

  “Out of the question,” the Wardrobe Mistress said as she gathered Bertie’s dirty clothes. “You are going to stay in your room, young lady, until your rehearsal. If you set so much as a toe off this stage, I’ll know about it, and if I have to leave the Wardrobe Department a second time, there will be precious little chance of your costumes being completed before Friday. Am I making myself clear?”

  Bertie nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

  The formidable lady bustled offstage, muttering, “What in heaven’s name has gotten into you?”

  What has gotten into me? Fear, maybe? A whiff of life outside the theater, brought in by a wayward girl too crazy to know her own mind?

  The Turkish Bath set disappeared whence it had come, and Bertie’s bedroom took its place. Her gaze drifted to the far corner of Stage Left, just in front of the proscenium arch, where The Book glowed with serene and even light. The fairies at her heels, she crept to the pedestal.

  “D’you suppose it’s booby-trapped?” Moth asked.

  “Trip wires,” Mustardseed guessed, surveying it with a clinical eye.

  “Laser-triggered alarm system,” Cobweb ventured.

  Bertie reached out one shaking hand and touched a fingertip to The Book, fully expecting red-lit alarums and perhaps guards armed with spears to descend from the rafters. But nothing happened to stop her, so she lifted The Book and hugged it against her chest, feeling very scared indeed.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Chaos Is

  Come Again

  You need to disguise The Book if you’re going to keep it with you,” said Peaseblossom. “If the Players notice it’s gone, they’ll raise a ruckus.”

  “Right after the rehearsal, I’ll give it to the Theater Manager for safekeeping.” Bertie rummaged in her desk drawer until she found a piece of discarded silk. After a few minutes of cutting and folding, The Book’s rich leather binding was obscured by fabric.

  “Is that enough of a disguise?” asked Moth.

  “It’ll have to be.” Bertie bypassed the black slacks and button-down shirt she’d intended for that morning’s rehearsal, reaching instead for her jeans. “If I leave the stage now, Mrs. Edith will have a fit, and if she has a fit, that’s just time taken away from her finishing the alterations on the Hamlet costumes.”

  “Are you really going to wear that ratty old thing?” Peaseblossom asked.

  Bertie looked down at the shirt in her hand. It was one of Nate’s cast-offs, the creamy cotton so soft, it was practically a security blanket. “I am.”

  “You don’t want something more professional?” the fairy suggested.

  “The last time I wanted to look professional, I ended up in a corset,” Bertie said.

  “What are we going to do about lunch?” Moth whined. “I’m famished!”

  Cobweb sucked in his tiny gut. “I’m wasting away for want of cake!”

  “We might not be able to ge
t to the Green Room,” Bertie said, marching over to the headset, “but I think I can manage some refreshments.”

  A French Patisserie landed Center Stage, all gleaming wood and sparkling glass. The fairies followed her inside with screams of delight, lured by the intoxicating scents of buttery pastry and caffè lattes. Bertie lolled against the marble counter and admired the copper behemoth of an espresso machine.

  “Can I help you?” One of the Chorus Girls bustled in, wearing a candy-striped shirtwaist and a frilled apron.

  Bertie looked from the tarts decorated with whirls of sliced apple to the croissants oozing chocolate from their middles. “Mr. Hastings outdid himself with this lot.”

  “Pick something with whipped cream,” Moth prompted.

  “Something that will explode when you take the first bite,” advised Mustardseed.

  “Explode and scatter crumbs,” said Cobweb with his nose pressed to the glass case. “The crumbly ones are the best.”

  Bertie eyed thick sandwiches constructed on baguettes. “Maybe something without sugar?” The fairies jeered, but she was undeterred. “I’ll have one with ham and cheese.”

  The girl rolled Bertie’s sandwich in white paper, then used squares of tissue to arrange pastries in a pink box. After she tied strings around everything, she measured out freshly ground coffee and steamed milk to produce a cappuccino so exquisite, it brought tears of gratitude to Bertie’s eyes.

  “Thank you!” Bertie managed to gather up the sandwich, the string-wrapped box, and her brown paper coffee cup while still holding The Book under one arm.

  Outside the Patisserie, the Players passed by in grand Parisian style: on bicycles, with much elaborate cursing and bell ringing. Bertie dodged the traffic, skipped down the stairs, and settled into a plush red-upholstered seat Fifth Row, Center.

  The fairies rushed to keep up, apparently convinced she was going to horde the bounty. Bertie took an extra moment to shove the silk-wrapped Book under her chair, and Moth groaned.

  “Get to the food already!”

  Bertie held the box up. “You want this?”

  “Yes!”

  “You sure?”

  “YES!”

  Bertie laughed and yanked at the twine. The fairies danced a jig on the armrests and pinched each other at the prospect of sugar. She left them to it, interspersing bites of her sandwich with appreciative sips of coffee before claiming a tartlet filled with lemon curd.

  By the time the Stage Manager arrived at a quarter to one, Bertie and her comrades were already licking the last smears of dark chocolate off their fingers. The only evidence of their lunch was a trail of crumbs and the lingering scents of fresh bread and cigarette smoke, as Bertie had long since banished the Patisserie set.

  “Good afternoon.” He gave her a barely civil inclination of the head.

  “Yes, it is,” Bertie replied, toasting him with what was left of her cappuccino.

  He glared at her with suspicion and held up his headset. “Have you been mucking about with this?”

  Bertie widened her eyes as far as they would go. “I’m here in a professional capacity this afternoon. You would do well to remember that.”

  The Stage Manager clapped his headset on and disappeared into the wings with a muttered, “Argh!”

  The fairies giggled, and Bertie drank the last of her coffee just as another appeared over her left shoulder.

  “I thought ye might need this.” Nate took a hesitant sip from his own cup and grimaced.

  Bertie accepted the cup and peered into it. “Is this from the Green Room?”

  “Aye. Bilgewater ’tis today.”

  “Will it put hair on her chest?” asked Moth.

  “Yuck! Girls shouldn’t have hair on their chests!” said Cobweb.

  “Hey, Nate!” Mustardseed popped his head up over the chair back. “We saved you a lemon tart!”

  “Did ye, ye wee beastie?” Nate settled into the seat behind Bertie. “That must have taken tremendous restraint.”

  “It did!” Cobweb agreed with a wag of his head as the other boys pushed the nearly empty pink box under the seats.

  Nate leaned forward to snag the piece of pastry before one of them stepped in it. “My thanks.”

  “Sorry about what Mrs. Edith said to you.” Bertie sipped the coffee and confirmed it tasted as awful as it smelled. “That whole ‘defiler of innocents’ line was a bit much.”

  “ ’Tis all right. I can’t blame her, considerin’ what it must have looked like.” Nate concentrated very hard on his dessert. Bertie finished her bilgewater, not knowing what else to say as the Players trickled in, singly or in groups of two or three. Gertrude arrived with her entourage, which included minor characters from other productions.

  “This is a closed rehearsal,” Bertie said, jumping up from her seat and hurrying onstage. “You weren’t called.”

  “But we want to see the changes.”

  “Like when Ophelia forgot her lines—”

  “It isn’t fair to keep us away!”

  “No, no, no, no.” Bertie herded them to the stage door. “Out. All of you.”

  “Excuse me, Mesdemoiselles.” Mr. Hastings sidled through the clucking women, burdened with an assortment of Egyptian antiquities.

  “What are you doing here?” Bertie closed the door firmly behind him, despite the protests of the banished.

  “The Theater Manager thought you ought to have some properties to set the mood, and you did ask for asps.”

  Bertie looked over the dangerous assortment of daggers, vials of poison, and a basket that hissed a warning. “Plastic snakes, right?”

  “Of course.” Mr. Hastings adjusted his spectacles.

  “Where do you want the pyramids?” Mr. Tibbs arrived, sneaking covert glances at Mr. Hastings’ contributions.

  Bertie blinked. “How many are there?”

  “Three,” he said, scattering ash on the stage.

  “Arrange them as you see fit,” Bertie said. “I trust your judgment implicitly.”

  “Is that so?” Mr. Tibbs shifted his cigar around his mouth, trying not to look pleased and failing. He stomped off past a distracted Ophelia, who wandered in the wings near Mrs. Edith. The Wardrobe Mistress appeared to be wrestling the sheet off the Ghost of Hamlet’s Father.

  Bertie turned to Peaseblossom. “What’s Mrs. Edith doing?”

  “She said she needs that sheet. Something about using it for a template to make his new costume.”

  The first of the pyramids landed Center Stage as the Danish Prince slouched in, eyes deceptively lazy.

  “So glad you could join us,” Bertie said. “I hope the call didn’t inconvenience you.”

  Hamlet leaned against the flat and took a long drag off a cigarette. “Not at all.”

  “Put that out,” Bertie said, though she longed to join him. “We have rules about smoking in the theater.”

  Hamlet rearranged his beautiful mouth into a scowl, dropped the cigarette, and ground it out. “Better?”

  “Nearly. Now pick up your litter and put it where it belongs,” Bertie said.

  Hamlet gaped at her. “That’s the Stage Manager’s job!”

  “If I see you make the mess, you get to clean up after yourself like a good little boy.”

  They glared at each other for a moment, and Bertie wondered if Nate would have had something to say if his mouth hadn’t been full of lemon tart. In the end, the prince shrugged, picked the butt off the floor, and flicked it into a nearby wastebasket.

  “There,” said Bertie with an insincere smile. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?” She turned to the rest of the assembled Players. “And let me take the opportunity to announce that henceforth, latecomers will be replaced by their understudies.”

  There was a collective intake of breath from the principals while every member of the Gentlemen’s and Ladies’ Choruses straightened.

  “Can that even be done?” Peaseblossom whispered to Bertie.

  “It’s just a threat,
” Hamlet said.

  “Try me.” Bertie returned his cold stare, frost for frost. “Now, if I could have everyone sit down.”

  With impressive silence, the Players took their seats around the stage. Gertrude arranged the skirts of her practice costume. Polonius lingered next to the curtains. The Ghost of Hamlet’s Father sulked near the edge of the center pyramid.

  “Mrs. Edith couldn’t have found a less distracting substitute than a pink sheet with flowers on it?” Bertie demanded of the fairies.

  “I guess not,” said Moth between hiccups of laughter.

  Bertie watched the Ghost bump repeatedly into the wooden flat. “It’s really screwing with his head.”

  “He’ll get over it,” Cobweb said.

  “Let’s hope so.” Bertie moved to the front of the stage and raised her voice. “This afternoon, I’d like to start by explaining the changes we’ll be making to our production. We’ve set the stage to help you envision Ancient Egypt.”

  “I thought something was foul in the state of Denmark,” someone protested.

  “Yes, but we’re restaging it,” said Bertie.

  “Are we changing the lines?” came from the back of the room.

  “We don’t have to change the words to change the play,” Bertie said. “We’ll say Denmark, but the audience will know we mean Egypt. The Scenic and Properties departments will set the stage in shades of gold and lapis. Mrs. Edith will have Hamlet dressed as a young pharaoh.”

  Everyone nodded and murmured things like “I suppose so” and “I hope this works.”

  Coffee sloshed about in Bertie’s middle, and she did her best not to think about the large quantity of baguette and whipped pastry cream she’d just snarfed down. “I also thought it would be interesting to reinterpret the poison theme. Asps are appropriate for the setting—”

  “Snakes?!” That was a horrified Gertrude.

  Bertie faltered. “Yes, snakes.”

  Gertrude shivered as though something had already wriggled up her stocking. “I don’t work with reptiles.”

  Hamlet stopped leaning on the pyramid he’d been holding up since his dressing-down. “But think of the impact you could have, using live ones! Imagine Mother Dearest as a reincarnation of Cleopatra, with an asp clasped to her breast.”