Read It and Weep (A Library Lover's Mystery)

by Jenn McKinlay

  Sully muttered something under his breath that did not flatter Ian, and Lindsey bit her lower lip to keep from smiling.

  “Excuse me, duty calls,” Sully said.

  Together they strode in through the door that Ian held open, and Lindsey could swear she saw a mischievous sparkle glinting in Ian’s eye.

  Ian and Sully jostled one another as they strode down the side aisle that led backstage. Lindsey shook her head and went across the theater toward the costume room.

  Once she got there, Nancy grabbed her by the arm and said, “Thank goodness you’re here. Dress rehearsal is tomorrow and I swear Brian has put on ten pounds since I measured him for his costume. Could you let it out?”

  Without waiting for an answer, Nancy shoved the costume into Lindsey’s hands and grabbed a rolling rack of costumes, which she began to push toward the stage.

  “Let me help you,” Lindsey said. She draped Brian’s tunic over her shoulder, grabbed the back of the rack and helped Nancy wheel it out the door toward the stage.

  The costume-changing area backstage was a small one, but most of the players had few costume changes, and they were at staggered times, so the rolling rack would provide all of the cover they might need. There was also a small makeup table for touch-ups.

  Nancy wheeled the rack into position, and then had the actors playing Demetrius and Helena, come and try on their costumes. Kitty was playing Helena and Lindsey was pleased to see that although she looked a bit down, she was polite to Nancy during the costuming and even managed to thank her.

  One of Lindsey’s favorite parts of A Midsummer Night’s Dream was the complicated love lives of Shakespeare’s young lovers. Hermia loves Lysander, but her father wants her to marry Demetrius, and he has Theseus threaten her with a convent or death if she doesn’t comply with her father’s wishes. So, of course, Helena, who was thrown over by Demetrius when he fell for Hermia, rats out Lysander and Hermia when they plan to elope. It was great stuff.

  Lindsey helped the actors with their costumes, and when everything was a go, Nancy sent them away and called in the actors playing Hermia and Lysander. Lola was playing Hermia, and Lindsey was pleased to see that she hadn’t quit the show despite her grief.

  “How are you holding up?” she asked the fragile-looking brunette as she adjusted the actress’s headpiece.

  Lola tipped her chin up and said, “I know Robbie would want me to give the performance of my life. So that’s what I plan to do.”

  “That’s the spirit,” Lindsey said. She watched as Lola walked out onto the stage to have Violet approve her final costume.

  While Nancy cinched Lysander’s tunic, Lindsey heard harsh whispers coming from behind her. She turned her head, trying to see in the gloomy light. No luck. She went into the shadows and paused.

  “Don’t lie to me,” a man said.

  Lindsey peeped around a large canvas backdrop and saw Brian standing there, looking red-faced and angry, with his hands on his hips.

  “I’m not lying,” a woman answered.

  Lindsey leaned farther forward and saw that it was Brian’s wife, Brandy.

  “I didn’t sleep with Robbie,” she said. Her voice sounded weary, as if she’d had this argument so many times she was utterly bored by it.

  “You’re lying,” Brian snapped. “Do you think I can’t tell? You don’t want me to touch you anymore. You’re always tired or have a headache.”

  “Why do you suppose that is?” Brandy asked. “You exhaust me with your crazy, jealous hysteria.”

  Before Brandy could react, Brian grabbed her by the throat and shoved her up against the wall. Lindsey jumped forward as Brandy clawed at Brian’s hand.

  “Let her go!” Lindsey snapped.

  “Mind your own business!” Brian retorted, but he released Brandy, who was gasping. “Stick to papier-mâché, Lindsey, or you’ll regret it.”

  “Like Robbie did?” she asked.

  He narrowed his eyes and reached out to grab Brandy’s hand.

  “Don’t touch me!” she snarled. “Ever again.”

  “What are you saying?” he asked.

  “I want a divorce,” Brandy said.

  “You can’t do that,” he argued.

  “Oh, yes, I can,” she said. “Because now I have bruises and a witness.”

  Brian’s face crumpled and he looked as if he were about to cry. Brandy stepped up close to him and said, “We’re through, and just so you know, I never slept with Robbie.” She glanced at Lindsey. “His interest was elsewhere, but if he had ever offered, oh yeah, I’d have been with him in a heartbeat.”

  Brian swung his arm back and Brandy clenched herself tight while Lindsey stepped forward to stop the blow. It never came.

  Instead, Brian’s arm was twisted behind his back, and he dropped to his knees with a yelp of pain.

  19

  “I never could stomach a man who would hit a woman,” Emma Plewicki said. She bent over and cuffed Brian’s hands behind his back. “Come on, we’re going to take a little stroll over to the station.”

  She hauled Brian up to his feet and dragged him out behind the curtain onto the stage. Lindsey and Brandy followed as if to be certain that he was being taken off of the premises.

  “You can’t arrest me!” Brian protested. “I’m in the show.”

  “Not anymore you’re not,” Emma said. “Violet, you’re going to need a replacement for the part of Nick Bottom. This one was roughing up his wife, so I think we need to go have a little chat about his anger management issues.”

  Violet took in the scene at a glance. One eyebrow was raised in silent question.

  “I’ll let you know,” Emma said.

  Lindsey knew the unspoken question was whether Brian was Robbie’s killer or not.

  “Fine,” Violet said. “Brian, you’re out. Do not return to this theater again or you’ll be arrested for trespassing. Am I clear?”

  “What? No!” Brian protested. “It’s her fault!” He nodded his head toward Brandy. “If she wasn’t such a slut, I wouldn’t have had to do it.”

  “Brian Loeb, you have the right to remain silent . . .” Emma read him his Miranda rights while she dragged him up the main aisle to the front of the theater.

  “All right,” Violet said. “We need a new Nick Bottom. Who was slated to understudy that part?”

  The cast on stage looked at one another. No one stepped forward. Violet frowned and looked down at her legal pad, where she kept all of her notes.

  “Oh, my god,” she cried. “I never assigned an understudy to that part because Brian was such an ass—literally—that I knew he’d rather die than miss his performance. Opening night is two days away. What am I going to do?”

  “Don’t panic.” Nancy stepped from behind the curtain and crouched down at the edge of the stage, in front of which Violet was now pacing. “We’ll figure it out.”

  “How?” Violet cried. “Who here knows Nick Bottom’s part? Anyone?”

  “‘That will ask some tears in the true performing of it: if I do it, let the audience look to their eyes; I will move storms, I will condole in some measure,’” a deep voice said from the back of the stage.

  “What?” Violet looked up. “Who said that? That’s Bottom’s part in Act I, Scene II. Continue!”

  Ian Murphy strode forward and bowed. Then he continued, “‘To the rest: yet my chief humour is for a tyrant: I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in, to make all split.’”

  “Ian Murphy, I could kiss you, you brilliant man,” Violet said. “Why haven’t you auditioned before?”

  Ian looked down as he scuffed the toe of his shoe on the wooden floor of the stage. “I’m shy.”

  “Ha!” Violet laughed. “Well, now you’re a star. Lindsey, take him to Mary to get fitted. Ian, I want you back here in fifteen minutes for a run-thro
ugh.”

  “Yes ma’am,” they said together. Ian gave Violet a snappy salute and jumped off the stage to stand beside Lindsey.

  Lindsey led him to the back room, where Mary stood finalizing the stitching on one of the faerie costumes. She glanced up in surprise and looked questioningly at Ian.

  “Mary, meet our new Nick Bottom,” Lindsey said. “I think you might be familiar with his measurements.”

  “What?” Mary asked. “Ian, what is she talking about?”

  “Brian, the original Nick Bottom has been fired,” Ian said. “Apparently Violet didn’t assign anyone as understudy, so she needed someone who knew the part.”

  “You do?” Mary asked. She looked at Lindsey. “How do I not know this about my husband?”

  Lindsey shrugged.

  “So, I need a costume,” Ian said. “What do you think of a pair of leopard-print tights and a gold lamé tunic or is that too much?”

  Mary grinned at him and shook her head. “Well, the donkey mask will certainly be appropriate.”

  “Hee-haw.” Ian brayed and pranced around his wife while she laughed.

  “Don’t forget, you have fifteen minutes until Violet wants you on stage,” Lindsey said.

  “Oh yeah, that’s right. I have to admit, I’m a little afraid of Violet,” Ian said. He stopped prancing while Mary got out her measuring tape.

  “We all are,” Mary agreed.

  Lindsey left the room and went back into the theater to see if Nancy needed any help. The players were on the stage and Dylan was practicing his final speech as Puck.

  “‘If we shadows have offended, think but this and all is mended, That you have but slumber’d here. While these visions did appear.’”

  Not wanting to interrupt, Lindsey sat and watched him. He was a perfect Puck: less polished than Robbie, but he had the same twinkle in his eye and the same perfect pitch with his delivery.

  She saw his mother sitting in the row in front of her. She was mouthing the lines with her son, and Lindsey thought it was remarkable how her tune had changed with his advancement to a larger role.

  When Dylan finished, Violet called him forward. “That was excellent,” she said. “You’ve really nailed it.”

  Dylan beamed at her, and Lindsey noted that his mother looked quite pleased. She found this ironic given how much she had previously expressed her dislike of Violet and her immoral lifestyle.

  As Joanie Peet rose, Lindsey leaned forward and said, “He really is a wonderful actor. He must have some very strong acting DNA.”

  Joanie frowned at her. “Why do you say that?”

  “He just seems gifted,” she said. “He almost looks like Robbie Vine up there.”

  “I don’t see any resemblance,” Joanie said. “In fact, I think Mr. Vine’s talents were always a bit overrated.”

  “Oh, well, I’m sorry,” Lindsey said. “I meant it as a compliment. Dylan is very talented for a seventeen-year-old.”

  “He’ll be eighteen in a few weeks,” she said. “He’s very mature for his age.”

  “Yes, well, he’s really something special,” Lindsey said. She was getting the feeling that Joanie was annoyed with her, but she couldn’t for the life of her think why unless she really resented having her son compared to Robbie Vine.

  “I’m fully aware of how special my son is,” Joanie said. She moved around Lindsey. “I haven’t spent all these years nursing my sickly boy back to health to not know what a gift he is. Please, excuse me.”

  Lindsey watched as she approached her son. He was crouched on the edge of the stage, listening to directions from Violet. When he turned his head, the lighting lit up his reddish-brown hair and he grinned a sort of sideways smile that looked so much like Robbie Vine’s that Lindsey felt her breath catch.

  Suddenly, Lindsey remembered the tattoo on Robbie’s arm. It was a stylized sun with a date in the middle of it. He had told her that the date was a reminder of the most significant day of his life.

  It had been 10-23-95, just a few weeks short of being eighteen years ago. Lindsey had assumed it was the date of a big show or maybe the first lead role Robbie had gotten, but looking at Dylan and remembering the article about Robbie having fathered a child, she wondered.

  She must be crazy. No, it was impossible. But hadn’t Heather said that Dylan told her he was adopted? Still, the odds that he was Robbie’s son were slim to none. And yet, she couldn’t help but wonder if perhaps it was true. There was only one way to be sure.

  She made her way down to the edge of the stage, where Joanie was listening in on Violet’s instructions to Dylan.

  “Now remember,” Violet was saying, “you are Puck, the merry wanderer of the night. When you cross the stage, it needs to have a certain ethereal magic to it.”

  “You aren’t suggesting he prance and mince his steps, are you?” Joanie asked. “That would make him look silly.”

  Violet turned her head to look at her. Lindsey knew Violet well enough to know that she was not pleased to have Joanie adding her two cents to her directions.

  The fire in her eyes made it quite clear that if Joanie didn’t shut her yap, she was going to go the way of Brian Loeb and be banned from the theater for the duration of the show.

  Lindsey stepped forward. “Dylan, you were wonderful. Robbie would be very proud.”

  Dylan flushed and looked down at the stage. Lindsey couldn’t tell if it was pleasure or embarrassment making him shy. She hoped it was the former.

  “Thank you, Ms. Norris,” he said.

  “Your mother tells me you’re having a birthday soon,” she said. “What date is it? I’ll be sure to have cupcakes at the library just for you, our star.”

  “It’s the twenty-third of October,” he said.

  Lindsey had to concentrate on keeping her expression completely neutral. She could feel her blood pounding through her body. She did not believe in coincidences, and this was a huge one.

  “I’ll be sure to note it on the calendar,” she said.

  “If you two don’t mind,” Violet said, “Dylan and I have work to do.”

  “Yes, of course,” Lindsey said. “I’m heading back to wardrobe right now.”

  Violet turned to Joanie and asked, “Aren’t you assisting with ticket sales and ushering?” Her point that Joanie needed to go find something else to do was lost on no one. Joanie’s mouth turned down in the corners.

  “Yes, I am.” She turned to her son. “I’ll meet you here after rehearsal.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” he said.

  Lindsey watched as Dylan’s mother made her way up to the front of the theater, where the ticket office was. She knew that several of the spouses and parents of the cast and crew were helping to take turns selling tickets and working as ushers on the nights of the performance. Right now they were all meeting in the lobby of the theater for training.

  “Your mother seems very excited about your part in the play,” Lindsey said.

  “She’s done so much for me,” Dylan said. “I’d do anything to repay her.”

  He had a fierce light in his eye, and Lindsey felt a sense of unease drape over her like a cloak. She couldn’t help but wonder exactly how far he would go to repay his mother for all her years of care.

  20

  “Dylan? Our Dylan?” Beth asked. “You can’t be serious.”

  “You should have seen his face,” Lindsey said. “He looked as if he would do anything for his mother.”

  “Wanting to please your parents does not make you a murderer,” Beth said.

  They were seated in the staff lounge of the library, enjoying a lunch of clam chowder and clam fritters, which Beth had picked up at the Blue Anchor.

  Lindsey dunked her fritter into the hot chowder before taking a bite of the chewy, broth-soaked cake. Delicious.

  “But what if he is Robbie’
s son?” Lindsey asked when she finished chewing. “Wouldn’t you hate your father for abandoning you, especially if your father turned out to be a rich and famous star?”

  “Maybe,” Beth said.

  She sounded reluctant. Beth loved their teen workers and always took it personally if any of them ever got into trouble, which they frequently did with Ms. Cole.

  “But I thought Brian was the chief suspect now, since he was so angry about his wife and Robbie.”

  “As far as I know, he’s still in custody,” Lindsey said. “But I can’t shake the feeling that Robbie’s death has something to do with Dylan.”

  “Just because Dylan’s birth date is the same date tattooed on Robbie’s arm doesn’t mean that there is a connection.”

  “Even though the tattoo is of a sun?” Lindsey asked. “You know, sun could represent son.”

  “Reaching,” Beth said. She spooned up some chowder. “Besides, Robbie’s gone. It’s not like you can ask him what the tattoo signified.”

  “No, but I bet Kitty knows,” she said.

  “She hates you,” Beth said.

  “I don’t know that I would say hate, exactly,” Lindsey said.

  “Oh, no, it’s definitely hate, loathing, abhorrence, antipathy . . .”

  “Okay, I get it,” Lindsey said. “You can stop now, really.”

  Beth shrugged and spooned up more chowder.

  Lindsey frowned into her cardboard to-go bowl. She watched the potatoes and chunks of clam swirl around as she stirred. Was Beth right? Did Kitty hate her that much? And if so, how was she going to get her to talk?

  There was no help for it. She’d just have to go to the beach house that she knew Robbie, Kitty and Lola had been renting and try to charm Kitty into telling her about the tattoo on Robbie’s arm. She doubted that Lola knew what it meant.

  Kitty had been Robbie’s wife, and even though their marriage was apparently in name only, Lindsey had gotten the feeling that Robbie confided in Kitty. Lola, on the other hand, seemed entirely too fragile.

  “Uh-oh,” Beth said.