I may not believe in fairies, the Holly King, or magical horsewhips. But I hoped holly had the power to protect me from evil spirits.
And murderers.
Chapter Twenty-two
My skin crawled even before I changed into my costume for dress rehearsal. The ghostly gray ensemble hung on the rack before me. At that moment I would have paid a hundred bucks for a washing machine to magically appear.
Tess, already in Mrs. Cratchit’s mobcap, ankle-length skirt, and paisley shawl, gave me a sympathetic smile. “Be of good cheer and put the silly clothes on. Otherwise Suzanne will order the crew to forcibly dress you. And I’m only half-kidding.”
With a resigned air, I pulled off my sweater and stepped out of my jeans.
Tess started to laugh. “What do you have on?”
“Thermal underwear. I need a layer of protection.” I pulled a shower cap from my cross-body bag on the dressing table. “And this is going on over my hair. Heaven knows how many decades of use Marley’s wig has seen. I’m not risking lice.”
Trying to keep a straight face, Tess helped me step into the stovepipe pants. “Your waist is smaller than his, so I’ll pin it. But you and old Everett apparently worked out at the same gym. The pant legs fit like a glove. What are you wearing for shoes? I can’t imagine your feet were the same size as his.”
“I found a pair of ugly gray flannel slippers in my closet. Never worn. I don’t even remember which relative gave them to me. But they’ll work fine for my Dickensian debut.”
“Have you had time to search the dressing room for the will yet?” she asked quietly, even though the dressing room door was closed.
“No. Suzanne keeps barging in every two minutes. I think she’s terrified I still don’t know my lines. I’ll sneak back during rehearsal. But the boxes and bookshelves might not be the only hiding place in here. We should look for pockets in the costume, too. Everett might have refused to clean his Jacob Marley getup because he hid the will in it somewhere.”
“Good idea.” Tess patted down my legs like a TSA inspector at airport security.
I explored the gray shirt and long frock coat. The coat pockets contained nothing but lint and a cellophane-wrapped peppermint candy. Next, I examined the interior for secret compartments. Nothing.
Tess wrinkled her nose.
“The costume stinks, doesn’t it?” I said.
“Smells like a cross between mildew, sweat, and sour milk.”
“Why is this costume so rancid?”
“We probably don’t want to know.” She held up her hand. “Wait one second.”
As Tess dashed out of the room, I turned my attention to the white periwig. It slipped on easily over the shower cap, thank goodness. Although I looked repulsive, not frightening. Or maybe that was because of my expression.
A breathless Tess returned with a small spray bottle. “My Black Opium by Yves Saint Laurent should mask the stench.”
“I wish you hadn’t used the word stench.”
She sprayed me generously from head to toe in what I knew was her favorite perfume. I made a note to buy her a bottle for Christmas.
Tess stood back and sniffed. “That’s better.”
I sniffed, too. “Although if anyone in the cast is allergic to perfume, this will send them into anaphylactic shock.”
“Five minutes!” Suzanne yelled from outside my door.
The babble of voices from the actors in their dressing rooms rose to a nervous roar.
“You’re not even made up yet.” Tess pushed me down onto the chair before the dressing table. “Don’t worry. I asked Suzanne about the makeup. The company buys new every year. Because there are so many ghosts in A Christmas Carol, they go through it quickly.”
That made me feel better.
“Keep your eyes closed,” Tess said as she covered my neck and face with white makeup.
When I saw myself in the mirror, I scared myself. “I look a fright. Literally.”
She giggled. “And you haven’t even put on the cloth to keep your dead jaws closed.”
Once the white kerchief had been wrapped beneath my chin and knotted at the top of my head, I no longer resembled a thirtysomething young woman in twenty-first-century America. Instead, I was the Victorian image of a cantankerous old male ghost.
I smiled at my ghoulish reflection. “This play might turn into a lot of fun. Think how I’ll scare everyone when I appear and rattle my chains.”
Tess brought the chains over.
“Onstage!” Suzanne bellowed.
“Wrap them crisscross around my body,” I instructed. “But leave enough chain for me to carry and rattle in one hand.”
“This is a real chain,” Tess observed. “It must feel heavy.”
“It’s not that bad. And the keys, padlocks, and cash boxes connected to the links make it look heavier than it is. Only I have to be careful not to get tangled up in anything.”
Tess and I exchanged smiles of approval at the final result in the mirror.
I made jazz hands and cried, “It’s showtime!”
Right before I locked the door, I grabbed my cross-body bag. Like any decent millennial, I refused to be away from my phone. Especially since I was getting updates from Kit and my parents about the weather and driving conditions. I was relieved that Kit had safely made the drive across the state earlier today. Now I only had his return trip to worry about.
Tess and I were the last to arrive in the upstairs auditorium. We took a seat in the fourth row, trying to be inconspicuous. Not an easy thing to do with my chains, keys, and padlocks clanging with every movement.
Andrew, who sat right in front of us, turned around. “I can’t believe I wasn’t there last night for all the drama. First, I miss Piper’s Christmas tree killing Santa Claus. Then I learn there was a big party at your house afterward.”
“You’re not seriously upset you weren’t there for a tragic death?” Tess shook her head.
“Why not? For your information, Oscar and I were stuck at the dullest Christmas party ever. They didn’t even serve alcohol. Or decent chip dip.”
I sighed. “You do love a good chip dip.”
“Absolutely. And don’t act like either of you were buddy-buddy with the duck decoy guy. Until this past week, we probably all said about six words to Gareth.”
“He still died unexpectedly,” Tess countered.
“Jeez, are you going to get upset about old Everett’s death as well?”
“Calm down, you two,” I chided. “The last thing we should fight about is anyone’s untimely end. Death is sad. Whether we knew the person well or not. As for my big party, it was just a bunch of us talking and eating grilled-cheese sandwiches and cookies at my house.”
“That’s a party!” Andrew protested.
A half dozen actors said, “Shhhh!”
Andrew sniffed. “What’s that odor? It smells like a wet dog fell into a vat of vanilla.”
“Turn around,” I said. “And take shallow breaths.”
“Attention!” Suzanne now faced the actors in the theater seats. She wore her holly-green Mrs. Fezziwig party gown, along with a long-suffering expression. I hoped our upcoming performance didn’t make her suffer even more.
“As all of you know, this is a dress rehearsal and a tech rehearsal. We will stop if one of you flubs a line, or if the wrong lighting cue goes off. Otherwise, we proceed to the end just as if there is a paying audience in the theater.” This was followed by a weighty pause: “As there will be tomorrow night.”
That sounded like a threat.
Before she stepped into the wings, Suzanne waved at the actor cast as the play’s narrator.
He sat on the corner of the stage, waiting for the spotlight to find him. When it finally did, he recited the opening lines of Dickens’s tale.
I leaned close to Tess. “Did you memorize your dialogue?”
“Mrs. Cratchit is easy to improvise for. I’m not worried.”
“Again!” An angry Su
zanne peeked around the curtain to glare at the narrator. “You skipped a line. This is unacceptable so close to opening!”
If I were Tess, I’d be worried. This must have given her pause as well. She reached for her script and began to thumb through the pages.
A half hour later, we still hadn’t gotten to my scene, and Marley appeared near the beginning of the play. I lost count of the technical glitches. The sound crackled, accompanied by an occasional deafening hum. Bob Cratchit got his scarf caught on a nail and nearly choked himself. One of the businessmen soliciting donations from Scrooge tripped and knocked over the coal scuttle. Numerous times the spotlight fell on the narrator when he wasn’t speaking, only to appear on the actors when they weren’t. At one point the spotlight lingered on the theater exit door. Which I bet Suzanne wanted to escape through.
“Did someone blindfold the lighting guy?” I asked Tess, who gave an amused snort.
At least Andrew’s performance went well. He looked dapper as Scrooge’s good-natured nephew. I paid close attention to the exchange between him and his miserly uncle. It included the now prophetic lines about being buried with a stake of holly through one’s heart.
My appearance was delayed when they couldn’t find the video of Marley’s ghost to project over Scrooge’s door knocker. It gave me a funny feeling to know the visage used was of Everett as Marley. As I stood in the backstage shadows, I imagined Everett’s ghost watching us. And not with approval.
Then I was on.
Miraculously, the spotlight fell on me as soon as I stood before Scrooge. I don’t think Ed Wolfson had seen me earlier in the auditorium because his Ebenezer looked quite frightened by my appearance. That, or our local contractor was a helluva actor.
When Scrooge asked what I wanted with him, I boomed back, “Much.”
Each line came easily. I heard the lines in my head right before I had to say them, as though an invisible audiobook prompted me.
My enthusiasm did bring things to a halt once. When I rattled my chain at Scrooge, I did it with a little too much force. Ebenezer/Ed jumped back to avoid being hit in the mouth with one of the chain’s padlocks, causing him to spill his bowl of gruel.
“Not the costume!” Suzanne shrieked as crew members rushed onstage to clean the mess before it stained Scrooge’s nightshirt.
“Sorry, I got carried away,” I said.
When we resumed, I kept my chain rattling to a minimum. Even when extending my arms as I proclaimed, “I wear the chain I forged in life.”
As our scene progressed, I suspected I might be stealing the scene from Ebenezer himself. By the time we got to my big finish, “I am here tonight to warn you, that you have yet a chance and hope of escaping my fate,” I was on a roll.
Suzanne gave a nod of approval as I rattled my way off the stage. “Good job.”
“You didn’t think I had it in me, did you?” I smiled.
“No, I didn’t.” She wasn’t joking.
“Since I don’t appear in any more scenes, is it okay if I run downstairs for a moment?”
“There’s a restroom in the lobby. No reason to go downstairs. Oh, wait. I do need something.”
I tried not to grin with relief. Sneaking off to the basement would be a piece of cake. Especially since now I didn’t have to sneak. “What do you want me to bring back?”
Suzanne sighed as the spotlight swept over part of the backstage area. “Let’s do that lighting cue again!” She turned her attention back to me. “I need the other crutch for Tiny Tim. It seems Brandon has gone through a growth spurt during the rehearsal period. He says the crutch we’ve been using is too short for him. But we have a bigger one downstairs.”
“I think I saw it by one of the prop trunks.”
“Bring it up as soon as you can. Brandon appears in the second act.”
That was welcome news. This rehearsal was crawling along. If it continued in this fashion, we had another five hours before we reached the end of the play.
More than enough time to search the dressing room for Everett’s will.
* * *
When I got back to the dressing room, I pulled out the three metal boxes beneath the makeup table. I shook each of them and felt things shift around. Now there was the matter of those locks.
I attempted to break the locks with the tip of Tiny Tim’s crutch, but only ended up shaving some wood off the crutch. I needed the key or keys. Maybe they were taped to something in the room.
After I examined the bottom of the chair and the makeup table, I looked behind the mirror. I stood on the chair and felt for a loose ceiling tile that might conceal a key. Next, I pulled out every book. I did discover that first edition of A Christmas Carol. An easy find. The red slipcover volume was covered in plastic. It took every bit of moral fortitude not to slip it into my parka so I could take it home with me later.
After replacing the book on the shelves, I returned my attention to the metal boxes. I tried the dressing-room key, but it was too large.
Maybe Everett didn’t hide the key here at all. I sat down with a clank in the rocking chair.
The noise made me look at the long chain wrapped about my body. As Dickens had described, Jacob Marley’s chain links held padlocks, cash boxes, ledgers, and keys. Lots of keys!
In an instant I had one of the boxes in my lap. I inserted one key after the other into the lock. The fifth one slid in perfectly. When the lock sprang open, I lifted back the lid. It held file folders, each marked with a printed label.
While the bulbs around the mirror were fine for applying makeup, they weren’t so great for reading papers. But the adjacent bathroom had megawatt illumination.
I picked up all three metal boxes and took them into the white-tiled bathroom. Even though I’d locked my dressing-room door, I closed the bathroom door behind me as well. If anyone came looking for me or Hostetter’s will, I wanted advance warning.
I sat cross-legged on the floor. Above I heard a hum of voices from the stage. I hoped Suzanne was so preoccupied with the play, she wouldn’t notice I hadn’t yet returned.
Pulling the opened box onto my lap, I rifled through the file folders. They contained letters, court documents, emails, bank transactions, tax statements. All pertaining to Anthony Thorne and the financial scandal at his company. The one he betrayed his friend over. Everett had amassed proof that his nephew was the guilty party. There was also evidence of credit card fraud by Anthony since his move to Oriole Point.
Mindful of the time, I put that box aside and tried the second box. I lucked out when the first key on my chain opened it. Inside were file folders containing proof that Janelle Davenport had given false testimony against witnesses, taken bribes, stolen evidence. I glanced at the third box. It must hold damning files against Katrina May.
I sat back, sweating profusely. It wasn’t the space heater in my dressing room since I had turned it off. Maybe I was overheating because of what I’d stumbled upon. Proof that Janelle, Anthony, and Katrina had broken the law. Evidence that Everett Hostetter had used to compel all of them to move to Oriole Point.
I heard a noise outside the locked door of my dressing room. How long had I been down here? From the sound of pounding feet and music above me, I knew they had reached Mr. Fezziwig’s party scene.
No time to look through the third box now. Instead, I locked up the other two boxes and stacked them in a corner of the bathroom. I had to get back upstairs.
But when I stood, I felt light-headed and overheated. In fact, the air seemed to shimmer around me. I took a deep breath. Although I smelled Black Opium first, there was something acrid as well. Smoke!
I opened the bathroom door to find my dressing room hazy with smoke. I raced for the outer door, only to yelp when my hand touched the doorknob. It was hot to the touch. Had a fire started in the basement?
Yanking off the kerchief wound about my head, I tied it over my nose and mouth. After I pulled my sleeve over my hand, I tried to open the dressing-room door again. Even thro
ugh the fabric, the doorknob’s fiery-hot metal made me cry out in pain.
Once I opened the door, I saw smoke and flames. The advice given by firefighters during school visits came back to me and I dropped to the floor. Terrified, I began to crawl out of the room only to bump into something hot to the touch. I panicked and retreated to the dressing room. Needing something to help clear my way, I grabbed Tiny Tim’s crutch.
This time when I crawled through the basement, I used the crutch to sweep aside any object in my path. Visibility was nonexistent, as the thick smoke made my eyes water. I choked beneath the kerchief about my mouth. And the linoleum felt dangerously hot.
The strongest wave of heat came from my right. I spotted flames through the open door of the women’s dressing room. Why didn’t the smoke alarms go off? And was anyone else down here? If so, I couldn’t do anything about it if I wanted to stay alive.
Keep crawling, I told myself. Keep crawling. Occasionally, the crutch I swung along the floor knocked something down. But it also helped clear a path to safety.
When I reached the stairs, I scrambled up the steps. I found myself using the crutch once more, this time as a support. I felt close to passing out. Behind me I heard a whooshing sound. I looked back as a sudden brightness illuminated the smoke. The fire had gotten bigger.
At last I came to the top of the stairs. Struggling for air, I stumbled toward the back exit and flung open the door. The icy winter air felt like a balm. I tore off my kerchief and took huge gulps.
Then I raced back into the theater. I had no idea where the fire extinguisher was. Or the fire alarm. But I had to get everyone out of the building.
I ran onstage, waving my crutch in the air. As my chains clanged with a fury, I burst right through the actors dancing a jig. Young Ebenezer was knocked to the ground.
Suzanne, now dancing about as Mrs. Fezziwig, threw me an astonished look.
“Marlee, what’s wrong?” Tess shouted from the audience.
“Fire! There’s a fire in the basement!” I waved the crutch toward the front of the theater. “Everyone get out! Now!”
Hollyberry Homicide Page 20
