A Midsummer Eve's Nightmare (5 page)

At the apartment she gave Richard a quick good-bye kiss, then jumped out of the car. She ran up the sidewalk behind Tori, then turned back to wave to Richard. She was still turned away from the door as she took another step. “Oh!” she cried, as something tangled in her feet and she went sprawling into the grass.

A pair of strong hands helped her upright. “Are you hurt?” Gregg’s mellow voice asked her.

“No, I don’t think so. But what happened?”

“Thompkins,” Tori answered from the open doorway. “Our landlady has about ten cats. They’re an awful nuisance.” As she spoke a large white fluff of angora joined the grey creature that had scampered away from Elizabeth’s feet. Both cats scooted through the open door into Tori’s apartment. “Out!” Victoria commanded. The angora jumped onto the bookshelf, almost knocking off a pair of large china dogs. “Oh, no, you don’t, Angie.” She carefully retrieved the enormous ball of white hair. “Erin would kill you if you broke her dogs. She’s not a cat lover in the best of times.”

“Angie! Thompkins! Here kitty, kitty. Here, Thompkins, come to mama,” Mrs. Martin, the landlady, called to her charges from the porch of her big house to which the apartment was attached. The cats bounded out.

“I came by to see if you want to run up to SOSC with me,” Gregg said. “I have to pick up some materials for the institute class I’m teaching next week.”

“Sure,” Tori said. “Okay with you, Lizzybeth?”

Elizabeth laughed. “Why not? It must be important to you, you only use my childhood name when you’re pleading. But what’s SOSC?”

“Southern Oregon State College. You probably remember it as just SOC.”

“Right.” Elizabeth found a notepad and began scribbling a note to Richard in case he returned before they did. “So you’re teaching at the Institute of Renaissance Studies along with all your acting?” She looked up at Gregg. “You have a busy summer.”

“Yes, but I love the teaching. Having an educational division of the festival is a great concept.”

As they drove up the boulevard and turned into the sweeping grassy expanse of campus before the large golden-stucco, tile-roofed administration building, Gregg talked with enthusiasm about the summer program where teachers, festival staff and students studied Shakespeare’s works as the author meant them to be—not as novels or poems, but as plays in production. “We get some terrifically lively discussions going.”

Tori laughed as they all scrambled out of the car and headed toward the drama department. “He’s a born teacher, and I get all his lectures. Free.”

“Not lectures, they’re interactive discussions, thank you. You’d never guess after our discussion last night, but the class I’m assisting with is ‘Shakespeare and the Drama of Religion.’”

“One of those cases where the teacher learns more than the students?” Elizabeth asked.

“I hope we’re all learning.” Gregg led the way to a modern classroom with a small stage.

Elizabeth looked around in fascination. “So this is where Angus Bowmer was teaching when he got the idea of trying out his ideas of starting a Shakespearean festival. I read his autobiography a few years ago.”

“Well, you aren’t exactly standing on holy ground. These are new facilities, but you’ve got the right idea.” Gregg was rummaging through a file drawer. “Rats! I know I left those notes here somewhere. You ladies mind waiting here a minute while I check next door?”

Tori was examining some books on costume design and a pile of fabric samples on the far side of the room. Elizabeth wandered across to the stage. Noises from behind the curtains made her want to see what preparations were being made for the class presentation.

Stepping through the curtains was like entering a small chapel. Gentle light glowed behind a hanging stained-glass window. Candles flickered on an altar before a prie-dieu. Elizabeth smiled and stepped forward, expecting to hear Gregorian chant from off-stage. Instead she heard hideous laughter. There was a flash of light. A cloud of smoke exploded almost in her face. She jumped back, coughing. She stumbled over a lighting cable running across the stage. Demons and monsters jumped at her from every side of the stage.

Realizing she had blundered into a rehearsal, she started to back up when the cable snaking beneath her feet coiled around her ankles and pulled her over. This time she didn’t land softly in grass, as in her earlier tangle with Thompkins, but hit the hardwood stage with a painful crash.

A sharp pain stabbed through Elizabeth’s knee. She wanted just to sit there and rub it for a minute, but the demons and monsters rushed to help her, apologizing profusely. She submitted to their ministrations without protest. They almost had her untangled when a strident voice called from backstage. “All right! Who fouled my cord up? I can’t spend all day here with this amateur stuff.”

His electrician’s tools clanging at this side, the technician she had noted running the lights for
Othello
walked around the flat. He stopped, gave Elizabeth a cross stare, as if she had tangled in his cord on purpose, then continued winding up his cable.

“Elizabeth, what’s going on?” Tori parted the curtains, started toward her, then with the dedication of her profession, stopped to adjust an imp’s costume that had gone askew.

“I see what Gregg means by interactive.” Elizabeth laughed shakily as she and Tori made their way off stage. She stopped to rub her throbbing knee but insisted she was fine when her sister noticed. Upsetting Victoria was the last thing she wanted to do.

Gregg returned with the missing file, and in a few minutes they were back at the apartment.

Richard was there before them, waiting with the gentle smile that crinkled the corners of his eyes and never failed to make Elizabeth catch her breath. And his announcement made her forget her paining knee. “Good news. Medical examiner said natural causes. The play can go on.”

Elizabeth closed her eyes and breathed a thank you. Getting tangled in a murder investigation was the last thing she wanted.

Gregg threw both hands to his forehead and sank into the nearest chair. “Oh, what a relief! I don’t think I slept more than ten minutes last night thinking I might have killed that woman.”

Elizabeth looked at him with surprise. He hadn’t seemed to be giving Sally’s death a thought this afternoon.

“And no poisoned darts in the costume.” Tori grinned. “I never did put much credence in that theory anyway.”

“Tell us what the doctor said,” Elizabeth urged.

“Apparently Sally’s heart just stopped. Seems she had a rheumatic condition—probably from an untreated case of strep throat as a kid. It may have been that the strain of stepping so suddenly into the starring role was just too much stress.”

The color drained from Gregg’s naturally pale cheeks. “Wait a minute. Does that mean she was already weak and something like my holding the pillow down too hard
could
have been fatal—like putting a glass over a candle?
Did
I kill her?”

“Oh, Gregg. . .” Tori held her hand out to him, but her voice choked before she could say more.

Richard stepped in. “Gregg, you’re taking too much on yourself. You don’t have to carry the responsibility for everything all alone.”

Tori slipped from the room, and Elizabeth followed her as the men continued talking. As soon as the bedroom door closed Tori flung herself into her sister’s arms. “Please help him!”

Elizabeth moved her sister to arm’s length and shoved a tissue into her hand. “Tori, what have you gotten yourself into? What do you know about this man?”

Tori sat on the end of her bed and dabbed at her eyes. “I don’t know anything much. Just that I love him.”

Elizabeth dropped to the bed and put her arm around the sister she had been a mother to for almost ten years. All her objections and doubts about this admittedly attractive man rose in her mind while her heart gripped her with fear. She was far more afraid for Victoria than she was for the physically threatened Erin.

Chapter 7

LESS THAN AN HOUR later, back in their B & B, Elizabeth gave the ends of her shiny black hair a final fillip with the brush and was admiring her softly-flared apricot skirt and pastel-flowered knit top in the mirror when the phone rang in the hall. Richard answered Mrs. Landor’s brisk knock calling him to the phone. When he returned a few minutes later Elizabeth was all ready to go to dinner and the play—even holding their tartan lap rug in her arms. But at Richard’s words she dropped the blanket on the bed and sat down beside it. “Looks like Erin was right. About half the capsules in the bottle were potassium chloride. The other half were sugar.”

“Oh, Richard. What does that mean?” She didn’t want to accept the obvious answer.

Richard sat beside her. “It means someone tampered with them for some reason.”

She nodded. “Someone is out to get Erin. But who could it be? And why?”

“I suppose we should start by asking who’s had access to Erin’s kitchen cupboard.”

Elizabeth wrinkled her brow and pursed her lips in thought. “Richard!” She cried as he leaned over and kissed her puckered lips. “I’m trying to think.”

“Sorry, but you looked adorable. I couldn’t resist.”

“Ohhhh!” She flung her arms around him and pulled him down on the bed for a very thorough kiss.

“What if
I
want to think?” he asked, several moments later.

“Well, it
is
supposed to be our honeymoon.” She sat up and adjusted her hair with her fingers. “Now, back to business. Who would know about Erin’s pills and who could get to them? I suppose her penchant for taking masses of vitamins was general knowledge. Apparently Tori was always teasing her about it. Besides, I’ll bet about everyone in the company does the same thing. Actors are legendary hypochondriacs and health nuts—like race car drivers are fanatic about their engines—it’s all they have to work with.”

“Right. But who would have known about the potassium chloride? Missing a calcium supplement or a vitamin C tablet wouldn’t be likely to cause a medical emergency.”

“Well, Dirk would probably have known. He’s known her longest of anyone around here.” Elizabeth paused. “And Gregg. He seems to always be hanging around there.”

“And Tori.”

“Richard!”

“Well, she does have access.”

“Tori is as likely a suspect as Erin herself.”

“All right. I apologize.” Richard took her hand and gave it a little squeeze.

“Do the police know this?”

“Yes. That was Sergeant Carson on the phone.”

Elizabeth frowned. “But will they do anything about it? Or will they just pass it off as actor’s hysteria or another prank?”

“I don’t know. But in the meantime, I suppose we could ask Tori who’s been to their apartment lately.”

Elizabeth jumped to her feet so sharply she nearly bounced Richard off the bed. “Right!” She grabbed the blanket. “Let’s stop by there now. But not for long. I’m starving!”

Tori opened the door to their knock. “See who’s back!” She flung her arm toward Erin lounging on the sofa in a pink sweatsuit. She still looked pale, with her long blond hair loose around her face, but seemed much more vigorous than she had in the hospital.

Since they were anxious to get on to the restaurant, Richard went straight to the point and reported the findings about the altered pills. Elizabeth had feared Erin might get upset again, but she took the news calmly—even triumphantly. “See! What did I tell you? I knew I didn’t forget to take them.”

“Oh,” Elizabeth had a sudden thought. “Your pills are still at the lab. Do you have any to take?”

“Sure. The hospital sent me home well supplied. I’m fine. It’s such a relief to know people don’t think I’m going crazy.”

“No one ever thought that.” Tori reached out to her roommate.

“The thing now is to try to figure out who could have tampered with your pills,” Richard said. “Who’s been in your kitchen lately?”

Erin and Tori looked at each other. Tori spoke. “About half the company. We had a party two weeks ago for Erin’s birthday. Just a casual drop-in thing so people could come between rehearsals or performances or whatever they had.”

Erin shook her head. “Everyone came, and they were all over the apartment. I could never remember who all was here.”

“Besides the party. Who else? It would have been tricky to do anything at a party with people milling all over the place. They could have been discovered at any minute.”

“Well, we’ve been pretty busy since then. They just added
Tempest
to the schedule, so that’s meant more costume fittings for me and rehearsals for Erin.”

“What do you play in that? Miranda?” Elizabeth asked.

Erin laughed. “Goodness, no. Desdemona and Olivia are quite enough strain. I’m just one of the spirits. It’s great, I don’t often get a chance to use my dance training.”

Richard looked at his watch, and Elizabeth’s stomach growled. “So no one’s been here that you can remember?”

Tori shook her head. Then Erin spoke. “Besides Dirk and Gregg, there was just Larry as far as I can remember.”

“Larry?”

“Larry Bohanon. He’s a genius with wires and light bulbs and things. We couldn’t get Mrs. Martin to have that light over the sink repaired, so I asked Larry to stop by and do it for us. I don’t think it took him more than fifteen minutes. It was driving me crazy having it flicker off and on.”

“Oh, I remember,” Tori added. “Sally came with him, too.”

“That’s right.” Erin put her hand to her mouth. “I hadn’t thought of that. Oh, poor Larry. I think they really liked each other.”

Elizabeth recalled the thin young man in tight jeans and a faded T-shirt. “The one who did the lights for
Othello
? He didn’t seem to be particularly upset last night, and he was working at SOSC today.”

“I—” Tori only got the one word out when Erin sprang off the sofa with a cry, seized a heavy book off the table and flung it through the window.

“Leave me alone!” She screamed to the sound of shattering glass. In spite of the fact that she was barefoot, she rushed toward the window over a carpet sprayed with glass fragments.