A Midsummer Night's Scream jj-15

by Jill Churchill

  "I think I'm going to withdraw from providing the costumes," Tazz went on. "You can find them yourself." She picked up her belongings and started up the aisle.

  "Wait. Wait!" Imry shouted.

  "Wait for what?" Tazz replied. "An apology?" "Yes."

  Another long silence fell. Everybody was gazing critically at the director. "Get on with it and make it good, young man," John Bunting said.

  "I'm sorry for what I said, Ms. Tinker." He said this so quietly nobody quite understood it. "Speak up!" John barked.

  "I'm sorry for what I said, Ms. Tinker!" he shouted. "Now let's all get to work. That's what we're here for, in case you've forgotten."

  Tazz had returned to her seat, and now rose again. The rest of them also left their seats and followed her. All but Imry and his pet, Norman. Bill Denk muttered, "Exit to stage right."

  "I'll sue every single person who leaves! You're all in violation of your contracts."

  When the rest of them were halfway up the aisle to the lobby, a woman standing in the doorway stopped them. "Hold on," she said. "I'll get this sorted out. Go sit back down."

  She spoke with such authority that they obeyed, albeit reluctantly.

  The unknown woman followed them and approached the stage. "I'm Evelyn Chance. Remember me, Steven Imry?"

  The cast and crew had filed back to their seats to hear what she had to say.

  Ms. Chance went on, "I'm the person who helped the college solicit the funds to put this play on. I'm the one who's going to sue you for every penny I raised for this pitiful script, and for paying Mr. and Ms. Bunting, putting them up in the hotel, their airfare, their food, and rental car.

  I've also put in a lot of time promoting it, to my sorrow. Now, you will make a real apology, and mean it, to each and every one of us. Or we're all walking out and filing civil suits against you, you rude bastard. And keep in mind, too, that you are currently the most likely suspect for the murder of one of your actors. I've heard about him telling you off about your faulty grammar."

  Imry all but collapsed, mumbling incoherently. "Stand up straight, Steven. Don't be such a wimp," Evelyn Chance said.

  Imry stood, shaking with fury. Jane spotted Mel standing on the edge of the stage behind Imry, making notes.

  "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. But you have no right to say I'm a suspect. I've never even thrown a rock at a bird in my whole life."

  "Huh?" Shelley muttered to Jane.

  He went on. "In spite of all of you misjudging me, I do apologize. I'm under a lot of stress here. This whole production rests on my shoulders. Don't you understand that?"

  Ms. Chance stood her ground and said coldly, "That's not even a feeble apology. It's simply an arrogant attempt to justify your bad temper. I saw how you behaved the day before yesterday. Now start over and do it right."

  Finally, after dithering, Imry started over and made a semi-real apology.

  "I'm sincerely sorry if I offended anyone. As Isaid — no, never mind. I truly regret having been rude to anyone. The caterers, Ms. Nowack, and Ms. Jeffry. Ms. Tinker, Mr. and Ms. Bunting, Jake Stanton, Joani, Ms. Chance. Buddy Wilson, the head stagehand. Bill Denk, who plays the butler, and anyone I've left out by accident."

  Then he turned and walked unsteadily up onto the stage and through the door to the workroom.

  "I guess we'll have to stay," Tazz said. "Much as I regret it. I'd have liked to see him try to find the costumes by himself."

  "And find caterers," Shelley added.

  "And substitutes for us," John Bunting gloated.

  Nine

  When everyone had recovered from this scene, which was far more exciting and dramatic than anything in the script, the rehearsal went on. This time it was to work out where people stood or sat, or entered or left, in each scene. A sofa was represented by three chairs in a row, taken from the workroom. Three more of them represented armchairs. The placement of the doors was marked on the floors with chalk. Imry was subdued and relatively well behaved. When Bill Denk made another snide remark to the audience, Imry didn't even chide him.

  Evelyn Chance was still sitting in the front row, and Imry kept giving her anxious glances.

  Jane and Shelley took their needlepoint materials back to the workroom, after washing their hands as they'd been instructed. They left the door to the serving room open and the back door slightly ajar so they could hear when the catering truck arrived.

  When they were seated in two of the remaining chairs in the workroom and had their canvases out, Shelley asked, "Do you think everyone who was threatening to walk out would have done so if Ms. Chance hadn't stopped us?"

  "Wasn't she fabulous?" Jane replied. "I aspire to be that outspoken one day. Yes, I think they would have. All but Imry's replacement for Denny. Most of them are volunteers. Only Tazz and the Buntings stood to lose money. And there are probably others. I don't think you'd trust lighting to volunteers unless they were professional electricians and theater was a hobby."

  "You're forgetting me, Jane," Shelley said. "I'd have been out on the deposits to the caterers. But if he'd continued to be so obnoxious, it would have been well worth it."

  "Do you think he really learned anything about how to behave?"

  "Not at all. He was just cornered and scared spitless."

  "I wonder if Ms. Chance was right that he's the primary suspect for Denny's death? I'd guess that's what Mel thinks. Of course, I could be wrong about that. He never really said so," Jane qualified.

  "Everything we know, which isn't much, seems to point to him," Shelley said. "My impression of him is that he's one of those bullies who knows deep in his heart that he's not as smart or

  talented as those he's bullying, and furthermore, thinks they won't realize it."

  "It was unfortunate for him that he had a replacement lined up for Denny," Jane said. "And stupid besides. Denny was unwise, and was being a show-off by humiliating Imry in front of everyone, but the honorable thing for Imry would have been to fire Denny before choosing a successor. And Imry should have realized that Denny was right that Imry really should brush up on his grammar or hire someone to vet the script.

  "On the other hand," Jane went on, "Imry didn't seem to have the kind of courage it takes to actually kill someone."

  "It doesn't always take courage, Jane. Probably the fear of continuing humiliation could be enough to push someone as insecure as Imry to do something violent in the heat of anger."

  "You might be right."

  "Was that the sound of a truck?" Shelley asked. "It was. I'll put your needlepoint things away for you."

  That night's caterers were the most imaginative, Shelley later declared. Along with colorful, sturdy plastic plates, they also had provided fruits and vegetables, meaN and pastas, and sauces that were fresh and unusual. Broiled kiwi fruits with a mysterious tasty glaze. Tender scallops with lime sauce. Hot fingerling potatoes

  crusted with salt and some spice nobody could quite identify. There was also a creamy cooled rice salad with quartered green grapes, sliced blood oranges, and Vidalia onion chunks served with the best sourdough bread Jane had ever tasted.

  "This is a lot more than a mere snack," Tazz said, helping herself to generous portions of everything.

  "You get what you pay for," Shelley whispered to Jane.

  Even Steven Imry complimented the caterers. "Now, that sounded genuine," Shelley said to Jane in an undertone.

  When the meal was over, and Shelley had watched the cleanup and filled in her forms, they said good night to the others.

  "Want to stop at Starbucks for a cup of good coffee and a dessert?" Shelley asked.

  "Why not? All I need to do at home is replace the nasty triangle I needlepointed earlier."

  It was warm outside, but not as searingly hot as it had been earlier. They sat at a table where no one could overhear them.

  "Did you notice that Mel was on the stage, out of sight of Imry, when Evelyn Chance took him on?" Jane asked.

  "Yes, I did. He was
making notes."

  "Do you really think that Imry is capable of killing anyone?" Jane asked.

  "I think so. But we really don't know anything about him, Jane. Where and how he was brought up. What he's like with friends — if he has friends. Our sole experience with him is when he thinks he's in charge of something dear to him. His awful script. The accolades he's anticipating from the audience and his college."

  "Nor do we know much of anything else, and we'll never have the chance, or desire, to know him better," Jane said. "Probably Mel won't either. But Mel is the one entitled to ask hard questions and look into Imry's whole life. It will take a while, anyway, for the pathology report on the cause of death."

  "Shouldn't that be easy? Look for a wound or test for poison?" Shelley asked.

  "What if they find both? How would they decide what the primary cause was?"

  "Good point. Of course, having seen the body, Mel must have some idea of what might have killed him."

  "Even if he does know," Jane said, "it might not help him figure out who was responsible."

  "He'll find out eventually," Shelley stated. "He always does."

  "But a few times we've managed to provide a clue not available to him."

  "And you know how angry that makes him, Jane. I think we should probably stay out of this. It's not as if we're deeply involved with thesepeople. We hardly know most of them. And when the two weeks of rehearsals are over, we're probably not ever going to see any of them again."

  "Except for Gloria Bunting and Tazz Tinker, I wouldn't care. I like both of them. And while I admire Evelyn Chance, I wouldn't want to be chums with her. You don't have to keep catering when the production of this awful play starts, do you?" Jane asked.

  "No. It won't start until seven forty-five. That gives everyone involved plenty of time to provide their own dinner before they go on stage. Now they have to be there at six, which is why they need the snack supper."

  "Has doing this helped you with your catering problems?" Jane asked when they'd thrown their cups and napkins in the trash and started walking toward Shelley's minivan.

  "Unless someone does a whole lot better than tonight's catering, this catering company is the one I'll use for Paul's employee dinners. They were only slightly more than the cost of the first two, and much, much better at presentation, taste, imagination, and timely, efficient cleanup."

  When the rehearsal was over, Mel stepped out onto the stage and said, "I'm sorry, but you're all going to be a bit late getting home. I need to question everyone. I'll post an officer in the room with the big table and will summon you one at a time.

  You may use your cell phones, if you have one, to call home and warn your family."

  Clearly no one liked this, Mel included. This was just the first set of interviews he'd do himself, and it had been a long day already. He had an officer sitting behind the interviewees taking shorthand notes on what was said.

  The first person Mel called for was Norman Engel, the young man who was now the substitute for Denny' s role. Mel gave him the standard warning. Norman said he didn't need an attorney.

  He launched into his explanation without any prodding. "I'm one of Professor Imry's students. He asked me to turn up last night at the rehearsal. I had no idea why he wanted me there. So I obediently showed up. That's it."

  "He didn't explain that you were to replace Denny?"

  "Not a word. I went back to the dorm, wondering what the point had been. It wasn't until Imry called me early today that I understood. That's when he admitted he was going to drop Denny and replace him with me."

  "He didn't mention that Denny was already dead?"

  "Not until the end of the conversation. I'd told him I didn't think it would do my career any good to be secretly hired to replace another actor. That's when he told me that Denny had died, so Ihad to fill his shoes. Imry didn't even mention that it was murder."

  "Had you known Denny Roth before this production?" Mel asked smoothly, not commenting on the murder.

  "Not really. We were in one theater class together, but it was the one for all the students of the drama school. Not one of the small classes."

  "What are your feelings about Professor Imry?" Mel asked.

  "Not good ones. I never liked him to begin with, and when I learned what he'd planned to do, replacing another actor with me, I didn't like it. It's not professional."

  "Thank you, Mr. Engel. If I have other questions, I'll ask them later."

  The Buntings, together, were next. He gave the same warning, which they both waived. Mel asked them the same question he'd asked Norman Engel at the end of his interview. "Did you know Denny Roth before you got here?"

  Both said they hadn't.

  "What is your opinion of Professor Imry?"

  Gloria Bunting fielded this question. "We learned early in our professional lives never to give opinions of our co-workers."

  Mel had a grudging admiration for her speaking so plainly.

  "Where were you on Wednesday night?"

  John Bunting took over. "I was out late with

  old prep school and college friends." He named the bar and grill where they always met when he was in town.

  "And you, Ms. Bunting?"

  "Sound asleep. It had been a long day and I knew John wouldn't stagger in for hours."

  Mel dismissed them and doggedly worked his way through the rest of the cast and crew. Nobody admitted to knowing Denny before the rehearsals started. Nobody liked Professor Imry.

  When Jane arrived home, she tried to write another page or two of her manuscript, but her mind kept wandering back to the real murder.' Everything Shelley had said was true. They didn't have enough knowledge of any of these people to even guess who had committed the horrible act. Professor Imry was, in both their minds, the primary suspect. Which wasn't really fair.

  They'd made up their minds, as had most of the cast, that he wasn't a nice person. But that proved nothing. Lots of offensive people went through life without killing anyone. Hurting their feelings, yes. Maybe harming their career, yes, very likely. Though people like him, Jane guessed, never gave a thought to how much they'd harmed anyone with words alone.

  Shelley was also right to say that Mel would find out about everyone's background, and thatshe and Jane should stay out of it. Even petty crimes often showed up in legal records. And if not, acquaintances remembered them. Mel would have to dig deep into everyone's lives, even those who weren't actors. Denny might have done something awful to one of the other people involved in the production. Stagehands, the volunteer students who were making the set. Even Tazz or Evelyn Chance.

  On the other hand, Shelley and Jane had often provided information to Mel that only they knew. He'd seldom asked for their opinions. This time, he had asked Jane what she thought of Imry and even agreed with her. That made things different.

  Or did it? Jane and Shelley, like others, didn't like him. But Imry wasn't the victim. He was the primary suspect. Denny Roth was the victim. And they knew very little about him. He wasn't much nicer than Imry. Though he'd committed only one offense they knew of, which was telling off Imry about his bad grammar in front of others. Hardly a good motive for Imry to actually kill Denny. Unless this criticism hit Imry in his heart and ego so hard that it unbalanced him.

  She hadn't written a word. She had to stop worrying over this. Shelley was right. They weren't likely to become good friends of any of the people involved. The cast and crew would disperse in a matter of weeks. And Jane and Shelley themselves would step out of their involve‑

  ment as soon as the rehearsals were over in another week. But she'd like to keep in touch with Ms. Bunting and Tazz, if she could.

  Jane closed down her computer, went upstairs. She'd been so absorbed in her book that she hadn't been aware of the battle going on between her son and her daughter. Mike had his bedroom door open, music blaring. Katie was standing in the doorway, shouting, "I'm trying to talk on the phone. Could you hold the noise down?"


  Todd, at his own computer, was staying out of the fray.

  "Mike, Katie's right," Jane said. "Turn it down and close your door, please."

  The din of drums and screaming lyrics died down and finally stopped. Jane prepared for bed and went back to reading a Martha Grimes novel she had somehow missed finding till now. It was a very early one, in which Jury and Melrose had met only one time before. How could she have not read it yet?

  Ten

  Mel called at ten-fifteen Friday evening. "Is it too late to talk to you?" he asked.

  "It's never too late when it's you. I was reading a mystery novel I hadn't known existed. What's

  up?"

  "I have the preliminary report from Pathology."

  "Does it tell how he died?"

  "Sort of. He'd taken some whiskey. Quite a lot. And tranquilizers. There's no way to tell, at least yet, if the whiskey had the tranquilizers in it, or if he took them at different times."

  "No whiskey bottle?"

  "No sign of one. Not a bottle of pills either. He was unconscious. He'd apparently put his head down on the makeup table in his dressing room. Then someone took something heavy and vaguely oblong to the back of his head. Crushed the connection to the spine and disabled all of his nervous system. He must have died instantly. The

  blood-spatter pattern indicated that his head was on the table when he was struck. But he might have died of the whiskey and tranquilizers anyway."

  "How horrible," Jane exclaimed.

  "Slightly better than being on a respirator and a feeding tube for life," Mel said. "If he'd been hit a little bit lower, that's what could have happened."

  Jane thought for a moment, debating which of many questions she should ask. "Would this have taken a huge amount of strength?" was her first.