Murder in the Past Tense (Miss Prentice Cozy Mystery Series Book 3) Read online

  Lily and I shot glances at each other. Boys!

  Irene shook her head slightly as she continued applying the makeup base. “The stage lights make the paler shades bleach right out. You’d look like a ghost onstage in that color.” She began dabbing the makeup around her chin and down her neck. “By the way, you also don’t want to use any orangey shades of lipstick. They don’t look right under the stage lights, either. Be sure to wear something like this.” She held up a tube. “Fire and Ice. It’s kind of a blue-red.”

  In the intervening years since this tutorial, the rate of my makeup consumption would have put Revlon and Maybelline out of business. But at this age, I was only allowed to wear a little light pink lipstick and a touch of powder, so the process fascinated me. I watched intently as Irene proceeded to show us how to line our eyes.

  “Guys, too?” Ben Patchke whined. “Do we hafta wear that stuff too?”

  Irene was performing a dangerous-looking application of red to the inside corner of her eye. It was supposed to intensify the white part of your eyes. When she was finished, she answered, “Yes, but a little bit more modified. You’ll definitely need base, rouge, eyeliner and eyebrows to define your features onstage. You can go light on the lipstick and not bother with the eye shadow.”

  “Gee, thanks,” Ben muttered.

  Lily and I giggled.

  Lily raised her hand, just as though we were in school. “I brought my own makeup kit from last year.” She held up a small tackle box, only one tier. “Can we practice?”

  “Great idea,” Irene agreed.

  Lily grabbed my arm. “Come on,” she said, “You can use mine until you get your own.”

  “My mother says it’s not a good idea to share makeup.”

  “D’you think I’ve got cooties?”

  “No. Germs, maybe, but not cooties.”

  “All right, then!” Lily pushed me down in a chair in front of the long dressing room mirror. I noticed it was just a series of cheap full-length mirrors mounted horizontally on the wall. “Let’s start with the cream.”

  “We look like clowns,” I said as we trudged out of the dressing room an hour later. “It feels all heavy on my face. Why do we need so much?”

  “We look like actors.” Lily twirled, ballet-style, just before we entered the door behind the stage. “You heard Irene. Our faces would fade in the lights without this makeup.”

  “Quiet in the wings!” a voice bellowed.

  Chastened, I whispered, pointing to a printed list we’d been given. “I can’t afford all this stuff.”

  Lily smiled condescendingly and whispered, “I’ll share with you. You get your own eyeliners and things, but we can both use the stuff like powder and—”

  “I believe I said QUIET!” the bellower interrupted. It was Terence.

  I put a finger to my lips and pointed to the stage exit. We sneaked up the side aisle, looking back at the activity onstage. Neil was there, dancing, and so was Danny. They were each with their own partners, and not paying much attention to each other. Lily and I exchanged significant looks.

  Terence was really putting the principal actors through a dance workout. “Turn, turn, arabesque, entrechat, now lift!” he called, keeping time by beating the end of a yardstick on the stage floor. “No, no, no, she’s not a sack of potatoes, man. Lift! That’s right!”

  The theatre doors closed behind us. We spoke softly, but the lobby echoed as Lily whispered, “At least they didn’t start knocking each other around on stage.”

  I was optimistic. “Maybe they made up.”

  Lily shook her head doubtfully. “I hope so, but I doubt it. Maybe they’re just too tired right now to fight. Did you see how Terence was working them? They were all dripping with sweat. Boy, I’m glad I’m just in the ensemble! You want to split a Hershey bar?” She held up some coins.

  “Sure,” I said glumly. “Candy. It’s what children like, isn’t it?”

  “Oh, yeah, right.” She put the money in the snack machine. “Is your dad coming to get you again tonight?”

  I heaved a huge sigh. “Yes. And it’s no use arguing with him about it.”

  “Wait till the rehearsals go until three in the morning. I bet he’ll give you a break.”

  “Are you kidding? That’s when he’s even more likely to show up. Protect me from vampires or something, I suppose.” I accepted the chocolate and took a big bite.

  “Well, hello, Clarabelle! Or is it Bozo?”

  I whirled to see Gilly Dickensen, lighting a cigarette.

  “You’re not supposed to be doing that in here!” I hissed. A speck of chocolate flew from my mouth.

  He smiled lazily, pocketed his matches and took a long drag. “Whatcha gonna do, report me?”

  “I might.” I would have said more, but my mouth was full.

  He shook his head and stroked his practically nonexistent beard. “No way they’d get rid of me. I’m the only one they’ve got to help with sound.”

  I chewed and swallowed. “Terence could find somebody else.”

  He tossed his head to get hair out of his eyes. “Not somebody who works for free. I’m a volunteer, just like you are. They’re operating this thing on a shoestring.”

  “Well, you’re too young to smoke. You look ridiculous.” I licked chocolate off my fingertips. It wasn’t proper etiquette, but who cared what Gilly Dickensen thought?

  He took a long drag and blew a stream of smoke in my direction. “This is coming from somebody who looks like a baby raccoon. Speaking of kids, did you finish the Lifesavers I gave you?” Before I could splutter a correction—he’d given the candy to Lily, not me—he raised his cigarette hand. “Gotta book it. Peace.” He strolled away.

  Lily was licking chocolate off her fingers too. “What a nerd.”

  “You could have backed me up just now.”

  “It’s a waste of time. He’s turned into a terminal nerd. Nothing you can do about boys like that.”

  ~~~

  “I remember that now,” Gil admitted with a grin. “You were always Little Miss Mind the Rules. I got a kick out of making you mad.”

  “And, may I say, you were good at it.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Terence beamed at us as we all filed back into the theatre for rehearsal. Once we were assembled, he hopped easily onto the stage and scanned our faces.

  “People, I just received an important phone call and I have great news! We’re going on the road!”

  A murmur spread through the crowd. People looked at each other quizzically.

  Elm DeWitt stood. “ ’Scuse me, but where are we going? I can’t be gone very long. I’ve got classes I can’t cut.”

  Terence slapped his forehead. “Sorry, I should have made myself clearer. This is just a trial balloon, so to speak. We’re doing one performance,” he held up one finger, “just one, a matinee, Saturday after next at La Belle Colline Hotel in Lake Placid. If it goes as planned, they may want us to come back in the future. Does that sound better?”

  Elm smiled, nodded and folded his long legs back into a sitting position.

  “That’s a classy place,” Brenda Bernard whispered to Lily and me. “It’s where my aunt had her wedding reception. They have an indoor pool and everything.”

  “Since the hotel doesn’t have a stage,” Terence continued as if he’d heard Brenda, “we’ll be performing in the largest room they do have, by the indoor pool.”

  More murmurs, a few giggles.

  Hearing Ben Patchke snort, Terrence looked over at him. “I know how you guys are. Don’t even think about throwing anybody in the water. This is strictly business. It’s going to take extra work and some careful adjustments of the blocking, but remember, if we do well there, we’ll have repeat engagements. We’re a special treat for the hotel guests.”

  “This will be so cool!” Lily murmured.

  “We’ll be leaving at dawn, Saturday the twenty-sixth and coming back in the wee hours. No, we won’t spend the night. I’ve lined up
two buses. The trip should take about three hours one way. As soon as we arrive, we’ll set up and rehearse, then have lunch, smooth out any rough spots, and give our performance at five o’clock in the afternoon. Got it? Mark your calendars, people, and make your plans.”

  He consulted his clipboard. “In the meantime, choral rehearsal is in here with Irene.” He pointed to the piano, then moved his arm upward. “And I want the principals to run lines in the balcony. We’ve got to get it perfected now, gang, because we open one week from tomorrow!”

  As I headed down the aisle to the seats near the orchestra pit, I saw Janey, clinging anxiously to Terence’s elbow. He leaned down.

  “Don’t worry about a thing. Pat and I have it all worked out. You’ll be perfectly safe.”

  Even if it was the ritziest hotel in the North Country, I could understand Janey’s anxiety. Lake Placid was a lot more public than our small town. They’d even held the Winter Olympics there—twice. I wondered what plan Terence and Pat had worked out.

  The next few days flew by in a whirl of singing, pinning, ironing, and blocking, which I learned meant plotting out one’s position on the stage. I was learning a lot about the theatre.

  “From the top, Irene,” Terence said as we stood in groups on the stage. “Da-da-da, da-dum, da-da-da. That’s right, you townspeople, start out by standing there, then move over there, bit by bit, two or three at a time. Don’t forget to sing! That’s right.”

  He waved his hands as if conducting. “Greenwich Village—da-da-da, dum-de! Hold it!” He jumped up on the stage and grabbed me by the shoulders from behind. “Amelia, you’re turning your back on your audience too much. That’s called the closed position. We want to see your lovely face! Angle your body thusly, open left.” He turned me toward the auditorium. “Now move downstage left. It works well if you keep your shoulders parallel to the—good! You’ve got it now!” He hopped down into the orchestra pit once more and picked up the Almighty Clipboard.

  “Now, people, when the music ends, I want lots and lots of rhubarb.”

  He stuck the Mighty Clipboard under one arm and clapped loudly. “Okay, take it from, ‘Where have you been?’ ”

  We gave him lots of rhubarb.

  It was fascinating to watch him. He was surprisingly patient with minor tantrums and confusion. He kept the company in order and the rules obeyed, for the most part.

  It was interesting and a little disheartening to observe the pairings that had formed in the group: Lily and Neil, Elm and Celia Hurley (though I was shocked, since she was at least three years older than he was), and Danny, still spending most of his time with an enraptured Dierdre, but occasionally gravitating towards Janey. I watched him with wistful eyes.

  I’m sure that if Terence had been on hand at that rehearsal two days before the opening, the second dramatic episode with Danny DiNicco would never have taken place. Unfortunately, Chris Gold, big and amiable but lacking an air of personal authority, had been temporarily left in charge.

  It was the end of Scene One and Danny, as the faithless Lover, was saying goodbye to Johnsie (Janey) in the form of a passionate kiss. The music swelled, the scene ended, and Chris called out, “And . . . curtain! Okay! Get to your places for the street scene!”

  The curtains closed, then immediately opened, revealing Danny and Janey still enthusiastically kissing. In fact, they seemed to be totally oblivious to the rest of us.

  “Um, cut!” Chris called out, clapping like Terence. Then, more sharply, he growled, “DiNicco! Break it up, DiNicco!”

  Abruptly, the couple parted and each one moved to the opposite side of the stage.

  “I’m all for method acting, but let’s not get carried away. You get me, folks?”

  Chris was as angry as I’d ever seen him. I was pretty sure that he had his own crush on Janey.

  As Lily and I tripped up the side steps to take our places in the wings, we heard Dierdre say loudly, “Are you out of your mind? Don’t you know who he is? Who his family is? He’s related to the Berninis! His uncle is a don! Do you have a death wish?”

  Stage right, next to a flimsy stage storefront, Dierdre held a wide-eyed Janey by the elbow. Janey yanked her arm away and fled to the dressing rooms below as the entire cast along with the three-piece orchestra—piano, drums and flute—froze in place, filled with embarrassment and uncertainty.

  “Dierdre, come out here, right now!” Chris bellowed.

  Before he could continue, Danny walked calmly out onto the middle of the stage and said in his finest stage voice, “If I could have everyone’s attention for just a moment?” He glanced over at Chris for tacit permission, who granted it with a puzzled expression. Turning to address the rest of us, he continued, “I’m not sure where Dierdre gets her information, but this isn’t the first time I’ve had to deal with this issue, and it probably won’t be the last.”

  He looked meaningfully over at Neil, who turned away frowning. Danny sighed and walked a few paces.

  Dierdre came out on stage, glowering. She crossed her arms and cocked her head. Standing where I was, I could see her eyes were filled with tears.

  “Yes, my uncle is Gino Bernini. And yes, he’s some kind of, um, mobster in New York. He’s my mother’s much older stepbrother, but I’ve never, ever even met the man. My family—and I mean my immediate family, mom, dad and me—have never had anything to do with him. My dad’s a pharmacist in Queens, my mom’s a housewife. We stay as far away from my mom’s family as possible.”

  He looked around. “If anybody else has a problem with that, talk to me, and we’ll work it out.” He surveyed our faces, then made a calm and dignified exit, ignoring Dierdre completely.

  Lily and I looked over at Neil, who had slumped into an auditorium seat and was scowling as he quietly rubbed his jaw. Nobody seemed to know what to do.

  “Okay, everybody, get onstage for the Greenwich Village reprise!” Chris yelled. “And tell me if you don’t have enough time for the costume changes.”

  After the rehearsal, I saw one or two people slap Danny on the back and heard another cast member invite him out for a beer. I think they wanted to make up for the embarrassment he’d suffered.

  Neil was not among them.

  Neither was Dierdre. The gossip network generally agreed that her motive for causing the scene was jealousy. While it had blown over for the most part, her outburst seemed to have accomplished the desired effect. I never spotted Janey and Danny being affectionate again, and her performance when they did share the stage was strangely furtive, as if she didn’t quite trust him. The emotional distance worked perfectly in the context of the story.

  On the other hand, Dierdre hadn’t done herself any favors. I later observed her try to take Danny’s hand and saw her wounded expression as he pulled it from her grasp and walked away.

  ~~~

  “That DiNicco was a real chick magnet,” Gil remarked. “I could never understand it.”

  “Now you sound just like Gilly at seventeen.”

  “We’re all seventeen inside.”

  “True. But the word chick is no longer a part of your vocabulary, at least in these politically correct times.”

  He grinned. “I think I’ll reinstate it.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Under Lily’s tutelage, and with access to my parents’ charge account at the local drugstore, I was able to accumulate the suggested makeup items. When I arrived home with my bagful of cosmetic treasures, my mother had a surprise for me. She had emptied out the small metal box she used for buttons and glued a mirror in the lid.

  “See, there’s your name on it, too, in permanent Magic Marker. Now you’re just like the professionals.”

  My makeup case was gray with a handle on top, and I was proud to bring it to rehearsal until I entered the dressing room that evening and beheld the row of much larger and more spectacular tackle boxes that belonged to the Seasoned Broadway Professionals. I had already seen Irene’s box. It had two levels, but Celia Hurley’s, when
opened, closely resembled an overcrowded theatre with multiple balconies. She let us examine it.

  “Look at the little compartments,” I said, “Wow, there must be thirty different pencils there, all sorts of different colors.”

  “What’s that thing?” Ben Patchke pointed to a small mechanical device.

  I felt smug. “An eyelash curler. My mother has one.” I’d always been a little too scared to try it.

  “Well, I’m keeping my tackle box for bait and hooks and stuff. This is my makeup kit, right here.” He held up a small plastic bag and walked away.

  I looked at the mound of sponges in the bottom of the case. “Do you really use all these things? What’s ‘clown white,’ anyway?” I’d spotted the name on a container.

  Celia smiled, “Yes, I really do, in one part or another. And to answer your other question, clown white is used for clowns, of course, but it’s also good for highlighting planes on your face you want to stand out, like cheekbones or noses.”

  I was heading for the restroom when I saw Chris Gold step into the hall and grab Danny by the arm. They moved into a nook near the telephone booths.

  “DiNicco, what did your dad say about calling in that prescription?”

  Danny looked quizzically at the stage manager, who seemed to be trembling. “I didn’t ask him. He wouldn’t do it, Chris. He doesn’t even know you.”

  “It’s just a little Prozac, man. Just maybe a week’s worth. I’ll pay you. It’d be no trouble for him at all. Druggists do it for each other all the time! Emergencies and stuff.” Chris’s whisper was getting louder. “Give me a break!”

  “Leave me alone. I said no.” Danny jerked his arm away.

  I scurried into the ladies’ room with Chris’s bitterly muttered curses ringing in my ears.

  Dress rehearsal required that we be in costume. My own costume hadn’t turned out to be quite as glamorous as I had hoped. As Maud Kelly the washerwoman, I wore a drab brown collarless dress with a long apron and I carried a laundry basket. I’d twisted my hair into a little knot on top.