He must have noticed my twisted eyebrows, my inability to speak. I looked around the shop. Plywood. Nails. Building accoutrements. To my relief, he spoke. “Jaime filled me in. You apprenticed up here that summer, right? Worked with my dad or something?”
“We worked on props. Your dad was really...” I hesitated. What did Jed know about his father? He couldn’t have been more than two years old back then. Again, my eyes moved around the shop. Sledgehammer. Axe. Building sets, then tearing them down. “He was a talented artist. Loved his work. Did they ever...”
“Find the body?” Jed asked. It wasn’t what I’d planned to say. I sucked in my breath. Waited. “My mom is still under the delusion that he’ll come back some day. Thinks he’s probably living the life in Rio with some underage hussy. Guess he had a thing for younger girls or something. Anyway, let’s get you into that blue room. Jaime must like you a lot. That’s definitely the sweetest room in the Cottage.” Jed snapped a large ring of keys off of his tool belt and led the way.
Jaime met us outside the Cottage, and led me up to the blue room, as Jed slinked back to the shop. The Cottage. I’d barely set foot in it back in the day. That’s where the real actors stayed — the professionals. Perhaps a visiting playwright. The apprentices were squeezed into a dilapidated ski shack on the outskirts of town.
“I see you made it. Drive up okay?” Jaime made her way up the winding wooden stairs to the blue room. Polished oak. They creaked with age.
“I left early. No traffic, if you can believe that. And once I got out of the city...”
“I’m so glad you could come up here.” Jaime fumbled with the key, hand shaking. Arthritis, and years of nightly wine. She was a silver-haired woman, probably close to seventy by now. Strong chins seemed to be bred in those Vermont hills, but her eyes were soft, her cheeks finely wrinkled. She looked prim, conservative, in her long denim skirt and pastel top. It was hard to believe she’d had a sordid past. An affair with Sir Laurence Olivier (or someone like that). An illegitimate child born backstage on the road, left on the doorstep of an orphanage. Those had been the rumors. But we knew her as artistic director extraordinaire. She’d taken an empty barn and turned it into an award-winning summer playhouse. Back then she’d been like a mother to me, to all of the apprentices. I almost felt guilty for not staying in touch. “I think you’ll get a lot of writing done.”
“I hope so. I’m still wondering...” I trailed off.
“Yes?” Jaime looked up at me, inquisitively. She seemed so much older, more tired. It had been fifteen years.
“How did you ever get in touch with me?” Her call had been more than unexpected. It shattered a certain silence that had crept over my life. I’d left more than Vermont behind that summer. I’d stopped acting. Decided to turn my attention to writing.
“Ginny Carson read a review of your book in the Times. A few phone calls was all it took to track you down.”
“Not Ginny—” So it was Ginny. “Ginny who went home with mono that summer?”
“Yes, that Ginny. She’s directing our outdoor Shakespeare this season. She had quite a smash off-Broadway last year, you know.”
“Did she?” I stayed away from the theater these days.
“It tickles me pink to see my apprentices hitting the big time. First Ginny, then you.”
“I would hardly say that I’ve hit the big time.”
“But of course you have.”
“Your invitation came at a good time for me. I’ve been working on my next novel. They say the second one is always more difficult to...”
Jaime cut me off with a wave of her hand. “Say nothing of it. I always said that our apprentices become part of the family, forever, for life.” And then she changed the subject. “The Mousetrap closes tonight. I’ve reserved a seat for you. It’s been sold out. They just love mysteries up here. And then we’re on to Shakespeare. They’ve built the stage, and the set is almost ready. You must have seen it on your drive in.”
“Oh, yes,” I lied. I hadn’t noticed. Too many other things on my mind.
“We’re doing Hamlet again. Haven’t done it in ages. I think the last time was, well, the summer you were up here. How long ago was that? They come from all over now. Free Shakespeare. Outdoors. You were our Ophelia, weren’t you?”
I set my bags down in the far corner of the blue room — which was indeed blue. Dusty blue walls. Blue floral bedspread. Blue curtains. Everything trimmed with lace. It was the only room on the top floor of the Cottage — thank God for central air conditioning.
“The understudy.”
“But you performed. And you were precious. Why did you stop acting?”
I shrugged. “The room is lovely.” I sat on the bed, attempting to end the conversation.
“I always said we are family here, that you’d keep coming back. Of course, it has been too long since you’ve been up here to see us. You’ll see some familiar faces at dinner tonight. You will join us at the Inn, won’t you?”
I nodded reluctantly. I’d have to eat eventually. And Jaime didn’t know. No one really knew what had happened that summer. I’d managed to convince myself that I’d forgotten.
A nap, a shower, a change of clothes. On my way to the Inn, I passed a group of grungy twenty-somethings. Apprentices. They looked so young. Had I really been like them? They were piling set pieces into the back of the pickup truck.
I heard one of them whine about a splinter. Another one complained about unfinished props.
“You just gonna use that skull from the prop room?”
“Yeah. It looks real enough.”
“Dude, I think it is real.”
“Alas, poor Yorick.” One of them began to spout Shakespeare — overacted, a farce. “I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.”
They had dark circles under their eyes and dirt beneath their fingernails to prove that they’d been slaving away for half the summer. One show up, one show down. And if they were lucky, an actor they were understudying would fall sick (which practically never happened).
The Inn hadn’t changed in fifteen years. The smell of pork loin and roast potatoes was permanently embedded in the wallpaper.
“Over here.” Jaime waved me over to her table. She wasn’t alone. “We saved you a spot.” And the introductions began. “You remember Gavin, of course.” My Laertes. “He’s playing Polonius this summer.”
“My darling Ophelia. I’ve been meaning to read your book. Really.”
“And do you remember Bristol Dell, our lighting designer? Weren’t you here that summer?”
“No, no, I wasn’t here that summer. That was the summer I worked at Williamstown. Missed all the excitement.” Bristol shook my hand.
“Sheila, I barely recognized you!” I didn’t recognize her at all, but I knew it was Ginny. Her faced had filled out, as had the rest of her. But her voice was still gratingly high. I had barely known her. She worked props with Harrison, and then got sick, and that was that. She would have been the last of our apprentice class I’d have pegged for success. Fifteen years, and she hugged me like I was her long-lost lover.
Menus were passed around. “Sheila’s seeing the show at eight.”
“Shouldn’t we wait for Dara? I thought she was joining us,” asked Ginny, in between bites of butter-soaked bread.
Gavin coughed, looked down at his empty plate. “You sure about that?” he muttered. I could feel his eyes peer in my direction.
“Oh, you don’t think... no, that was so long ago.”