City of Ash (60 page)

“Of course.”

“—and tell me what you think I should do.”

“What does he look like?”

“I think you must recognize him,” I said. “His name is Nathan Langley.”

Dr. Reynolds looked taken aback. “The Nathan Langley?”

“Yes, I know. It’s very difficult, I’m sure you understand the situation. But”—here I wrung my hands in my skirt and tried to look distressed—“but I do think he might be dangerous, and I’m afraid.”

Reynolds said quietly, “Has he hurt you, Mrs. Wilkes?”

It was perfect, how well he played his part. I could not have
asked for better. Carefully, I pulled up my sleeve to show the edge of the bruise that covered nearly my whole arm now, and I was rewarded by his little gasp. “That’s only the start of it,” I confessed in a whisper.

“My dear Mrs. Wilkes.” He looked absolutely shocked and horrified.

“It’s all right.” I shoved the sleeve down again. “He was out of his head when he did it. I—I’m hoping it’s only that the fire, and the loss of his wife—”

“I think you should stay away from him. Until I have the chance to observe him for myself.”

“Then you’ll be at the performance?” I asked.

He nodded, his smile completely gone now, his mouth a tight line. “I would not miss it.”

S
o that was done, and I was relieved as I made my way to the relief tent for a meal and then back to the tent city, carrying my pile of bunting and the needles. I didn’t see Sebastian at either place—another relief, though I missed him, and that was not something I was used to.

Ginny was waiting in the tent, of course, lying on the bedroll and staring up at the ceiling, and I could tell the moment I came in that she’d been thinking, because what else did she have to do all day but that? I gave her the bread I’d brought, but she didn’t open the packet, just stared down at it unseeingly.

I sat down opposite from her and pulled out the needles and the thread and began to sew the domino. “I spoke to the good Dr. Reynolds this afternoon. He’s so ready to see Nathan as mad I think he might do so even without observation.”

Her gaze came up to meet mine. “Do you think this might do it? Do you think this could be the end of it?”

“Perhaps. And Ginny, you’ve got to keep your distance from him. I mean it. Promise me you will.”

Something came into her eyes then, some quick flash, and she thinned her lips the way she always did when she was readying to do something that mattered to her, and it shook me that I knew her well enough to know it. “My father will be there. Nathan wouldn’t dare hurt me.”

“I suppose not,” I said reluctantly. “But promise me all the same.”

She nodded. “I promise.”

She said it quickly, and with enough emphasis that I should have been reassured. But there was something else there too, her delight in risk, that edge that made her impossible to predict, and it made me think once again of
Macbeth
, the forest marching on the castle, the unexpected turn, and I was suddenly afraid.

“Just follow the plan, Ginny,” I told her.

She gave me a slow smile. “Of course I will. What else would I do?”

And it was stupid, I know, to be comforted, to bask in that smile of hers, but I was, and I did, and when I finally finished that domino, and we went to sleep, I’d forgotten all about that strange foreboding.

U
sually dress rehearsals were just short of tragedy in the sheer scope of disaster that accompanied them. We’d never had a dress rehearsal where it didn’t look like the show itself was doomed: people sticking, flats falling over and splintering, wrong backdrops, doors not opening as they were meant to … you name it, and it happened. But the one for
Much Ado
went off without a hitch, and that should have been my first clue that opening night itself would be a disaster.

Had it been any other performance, I would have known to expect it, and I had no excuse for ignoring it this time, because so much depended on it, and that alone should have raised an alarm. But the truth was that as nervous as I was that everything should go as it was supposed to, I was also excited—not only because of what Ginny and I meant to do tonight, but also because that was how I always was before a show, and it was hard to separate my excitement and dread from the nervousness I felt over our plan. This was my first performance as lead, besides, so
there was that too. And it had been weeks since I’d been in front of an audience. I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed it.

I’d sent a note to Nathan early that morning asking if I should save him tickets for the show, and he had sent the boy back with a yes. I hadn’t seen him for two days, and I hoped it wasn’t too long, that he hadn’t somehow found his sanity again in that time.

So given all that, I suppose it’s not too hard to imagine how much trouble I was having keeping a straight thought as I went down to the theater. Ginny was going to meet me there later, behind the tent, where the set carpenters had piled the crates and pieces of wood and barrels that they’d managed to collect. Easy for her to hide in and around. She had the rough domino I’d fashioned, and when I got to the Phoenix I saw the masks Mrs. Chace had made hanging from a nail in the tent post—not as elaborate as they would have been any other time, just painted papier-mâché on a stick, stuck with what looked like seagull feathers, which were never hard to find. Everything was as it was supposed to be. As I dressed in the butterfly gown and put on my makeup in the makeshift backstage space, my whole body seemed to hum; even my bruises didn’t hurt.

No separate dressing rooms here; there was barely room to move. We were practically falling over one another. The others were laughing and talking in low voices; we could hear the audience arriving, Lucius’s hearty voice as he welcomed them and collected the tickets. The tent could not hold even a quarter of the number of people we would usually have had on an opening night, and we were sold out within minutes. When I crossed the stage to peek through the curtain, I saw lumbermen and miners, one or two merchants I recognized. Dr. Reynolds about halfway. Sebastian standing at the back. I made myself look away, to find Nathan—ah, there he was, come just as we’d hoped, third row from the front. The oil lamps serving as footlights were lit, the reflection casting onto his face, but even allowing for that, he looked terrible, his eyes red-rimmed, the circles beneath them deep, shaded pockets. No macassar in his hair; in fact, it looked unbrushed, and his tie was so messy as to be nearly undone. He sat between two men who looked
prosperous—one should have been Ginny’s father, but neither looked old enough.

I backed away from the curtain. It was time to meet Ginny. I stepped off the stage, through the others—a few other supernumeraries standing about looking nervous, Brody and Susan snapping at each other as they always did, Aloys glancing up idly as he read the newspaper, Jack too busy trying to put on kohl by a tiny shaving mirror to pay attention. I grabbed one of the masks and slipped out the back. The sun had set, the shadows were growing. She was there, near the pile of salvaged wood.

She came from her hiding spot and glanced around nervously. “Is he here?” She was wearing the cape and had drawn the hood up over her hair.

I handed her the mask. “Yes. How old is your father?”

“Fifty-eight. Did you see him?”

“No. But I suppose he and Nathan might not be sitting together.”

She frowned. “Of course they would. He must be there somewhere.”

“I suppose you’re right. I wouldn’t know him anyway.” I looked her over. “Are you ready?”

Again, that expression I was beginning to recognize. “More than ready.”

“Then it’s time.”

I left her there and went back inside. One of the stagehands shouted, “Five minutes!”

I grabbed the prop boy, who was darting furiously about. “Peter, go tell Mr. Langley to meet me outside.”

He gave me an impatient look. “Bea, it’s five minutes, didn’t you hear? I don’t got time—”

“Just do it. I can’t go on without seeing him.”

Peter halted and sighed. No one checked an actor’s obsession with good luck; he was used to stupid little requests, strange whims; we all had them.

“All right,” he said sullenly and went to deliver my message.

I slipped out again, past the dark shadow of her huddling against the pile of wood pieces. She reached out a hand, and I grabbed it and squeezed, and then she released me and withdrew
deeper into the shadows, and I went around the corner to the side of the tent, out of sight of any last-minute stragglers. The night was warm, the talk loud, the tent pulsing with lamplight and bodies. My mouth was dry with nerves.

It seemed I waited forever, but it could not have been more than a few moments before Nathan came around the corner. His eyes still looked haunted, which reassured me. Whatever the two days apart from me had given him, peace was not it.

“What is it?” he asked. “The boy said you needed me.”

“You’re my good luck charm,” I said, drawing him close. “I wanted a kiss.”

Obediently, distractedly, he kissed me.

I said, “How are you? It’s been two days. I was worried.”

He looked away. “No one believes me.”

“About what?”

“That I keep seeing her. And my nightmares … they’ve grown worse.”

I noticed then that his hands were trembling. “I’m certain they’ll fade when her body is found. Has her father come? Is he here?”

Nathan shook his head. “His train was delayed. He won’t arrive until tomorrow.”

Not as we’d planned. I felt the change like a little jump. I tried to think … what to do? We needed him. There was no second doctor. Perhaps it would be better to postpone this, to tell Ginny to wait—

And just at that moment, with his usual impeccable timing, Sebastian came around the corner. “Bea, they’re ready to—”

Ginny swept out.

Sebastian stopped short. Beside me, Nathan froze.

“No,” I heard myself saying. “Oh no, no, no …”

Too late
. Too late to change anything, to do anything. Nathan grasped my bruised arm so hard I cried out in pain, and I saw the way Sebastian’s face paled, though he wasn’t looking at me. He was staring at her, and she had lowered the mask so Nathan could see her face, and I saw her shock too, her horror at seeing Sebastian, and then, quickly, she turned and ran back behind the tent. Not fast enough.

Nathan gasped, “Ginny!” His voice was a stifled scream. “Ginny!”

I grabbed his arm to hold him. “Nathan, for God’s sake—”

He jerked away. “Ginny!” He ran after her.

I shouted, “Nathan, don’t!” Desperately I glanced back at Sebastian, who gave me a look of pure fury as he tore off after Nathan, and I followed.

I came around the corner just in time to see Sebastian ducking through the back flap leading to backstage. Inside was chaos. Supernumeraries muttering, Jack on his feet, the kohl brush still in his hand. “What the hell—”

Nathan lunged, wrecking the place as he looked for her. Masks fell to the floor. Capes. A prop chair. “Where is she! Where are you hiding her?”

I screamed, “Nathan!”

Lucius stepped from the wings. “What the hell is this commotion?”

Nathan lurched up the two steps to the stage, pushing Lucius out of the way hard, sending him crashing into the backdrop. “Where is she? Where are you hiding her?” A flat clattered to the floor, and then another, as Nathan tore the set apart. I heard Aloysius’s deep voice shouting, “For God’s sake, stop him!” The audience was on its feet, unhappy murmurs, chaos, shouting. Some clapped and laughed as if they thought it part of the show.

Sebastian leaped up the stairs, tackling Nathan where he stood on the stage, and Nathan struggled and fought his hold, shouting, “You saw her! You saw her too, I know you did!”

Lucius struggled to his feet, but it was Aloys who plunged toward them, grabbing Nathan’s other arm to help Sebastian wrangle Nathan offstage, back into the wings. I stood at the bottom of the two stairs, and Nathan looked up at me, his face reddened, spittle flecking his lips.

And I froze, because that was the look I’d seen when he’d thrown me against that dresser. Pure murder, and I went cold with fear and grabbed Jack, who’d come up beside me, so he looked at me in confusion.

Lucius called out, “Calm down, Langley. For God’s sake, calm down or we shall have to call the police.”

But Nathan didn’t calm down. He snarled at me, “It’s you! It’s your fault. She comes for you!” He looked wild—there was nothing human behind those eyes—and at that moment he jerked, throwing both Sebastian and Aloys loose, and I turned and ran, pushing past Jack, past the supernumeraries, toward the back flap, only a few steps, but there was Mrs. Chace standing there, blocking my way.

“Move!” I screamed, and I saw her look up and past me, and her mouth opened, and I knew Nathan was there, just steps away—

Something crashed. Someone screamed, and I twisted to see where he was, and Jack made this flying leap like some mellie hero and Nathan went down under him like a sack of potatoes, and then Sebastian was pulling me hard out of the way.

“I apologize, ladies and gentlemen, but we will have no show tonight after all!” Lucius’s voice carried from the stage. “There will be another performance tomorrow night, hopefully with less disruption! Your tickets are still good!”

I thought:
there’s Lucius for you. Never offer a refund
. And then everything hit me, the way Nathan looked, his shouting, his near attack and Ginny’s escape and my fear, and I began to tremble. Jack was still sitting on Nathan and two soldiers with their rifles pushed through the crowd—thank God for the militia—along with Dr. Reynolds, who was saying, “Please. Please, I’m a doctor.”

“Let’s get you out of here,” Sebastian said, taking me out the back of the tent, but not gently, and when we stepped outside I realized I was still shaking.

But he wasn’t going to soothe me or comfort me; I saw that now. His eyes were blazing—black fury was a misnomer; it really should be called blue instead. He could set something afire with that heat. And then, you know, I realized that what he meant to set afire was me.