"Sir? Why didn't you have an audition for Touchstone's part?"
"I didn't have to. You dropped in at the right moment and seemed adequate." Gladhand rolled forward. "The truth is," he whispered over his shoulder, "I hate auditions. I never really know how to handle them."
He was at the edge of the stage again. "Ladies, it will not be necessary to do readings. I have made my choice. The ones not chosen may pick up free tickets to the performance from the young man by the door there. And the part of Rosalind, I've decided, goes to you." He pointed to Thomas's choice. The others stood up and shambled out.
The woman in the gray sweater stepped to the stage and, resting one hand lightly on the edge, vaulted gracefully up onto it. Thomas noted that she was wearing faded black corduroy pants. She was somewhat short, and her figure was full but certainly not plump.
Somehow Gladhand managed to bow in his wheelchair. "I am Nathan Gladhand, and this is Rufus Pennick," he said. "You are… ?"
"Cleopatra Pearl," she said.
"Cleopatra Pearl," Gladhand repeated gloomily.
"My mother thought it sounded sharp," the girl said apologetically. "I can't help it. Call me Pat."
Gladhand brightened. "Pat it is. Well Pat, like yourself, Rufus here is a newcomer to our company, so I'll explain our rules and customs to both of you at once." He plucked a cigar out of his pocket and struck a match on the arm of the wheelchair. "First, know your lines. I realize you two haven't had a chance to yet, but starting tomorrow I will expect every actor to have his or her lines down pat, so we can spend our time on movement and inflection and things like that. Second: what I say is law. You may make suggestions from time to time, but you may never persist in disagreement. Third: nothing is beneath an actor's dignity. Everybody builds sets, hangs lights, paints backdrops, goes next door to fetch chop suey and eggrolls. Let's see, what am I on, fourth? Fourth: there are no fights within my troupe. In the event of a fight, both parties are expelled, no matter who it might be." He pinched out the cigar and replaced it in his pocket. "And there's no smoking in the auditorium. That's all the rules I can think of for now. If any more occur to me I'll let you know. We have a rehearsal in about an hour; you two needn't participate yet, but you should watch. I'll see both of you later. Rufus, show her around."
"Aye, aye." Thomas led Pat away into the wings while Gladhand wheeled himself away in the opposite direction. "Actually," Thomas confessed to her, "I don't really know my way around the place yet. I've only—"
"You've got a cold, haven't you?" she interrupted.
"What? Oh, yes. Haven't been taking care of myself these past couple of days. Anyway, I can show you the greenroom—it's painted yellow, by the way; I guess it used to be green. So far, that's the only landmark I know."
"What did you do before you came here, Rufus? Where did you live?"
"I—" He couldn't tell her he was a ward of the local cloistered monastery, he realized. She'd recoil. And he had ditched that identity anyway. "I was a student at Berkeley. I was expelled, though, for punching the dean one night, so I signed aboard a tramp steamer and came to Los Angeles. Oh," he added, "and I'm a poet in my spare time." That much, at least, was true.
"A poet?" she echoed, her voice a blend of doubt and awe, as if he'd claimed that he'd been brought up by wolves.
"Well, yes," Thomas said, a little disconcerted. "A few sonnets and things. I haven't been published yet."
They walked on in silence to the greenroom. "This is where everybody seems to congregate," he told her, though the only one there at present was Negri, who was combing his hair in front of a mirror. "Bob," Thomas said, "this is Pat Pearl. Pat, Bob Negri. Pat is taking the Rosalind part."
Negri turned around and gave the girl a prolonged scrutiny. "Well, hello," he said with a slow smile.
"I'll show you the rest of the place, Pat," said Thomas quickly, taking her arm.
"That's all right, Rufus," she said. "We can explore later. Right now I'd better get my things out of my cart. It's parked out back and somebody's likely to grab them."
"I could help you carry them in," Thomas pointed out.
"No, it's only one bag. I'll be okay." She waved and strode away down the hall.
"Now there's a piece," commented Negri. "I wouldn't kick her out of bed."
Thomas looked at him sharply. "Damn, Negri, you sure adapt quickly."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Give it some thought."
Angry, Thomas left the room and walked out to the lobby. Bright sunlight glittered on the asphalt of Second Street outside the windows, and Thomas stepped out for some fresh air.
Spencer was slouched against the wall, smoking a cigarette. "You've got no shoes on, Rufe," he observed.
"You're right." Thomas leaned on the wall, too. "I don't like Negri."
Spencer squinted through the tobacco smoke. "I hear the new girl's real pretty," he said.
"True." Thomas relaxed and looked idly up and down the street. "Say did you ever find Evelyn last night?"
"Yeah. Finally convinced her that I hadn't intentionally stood her up. Lied like a bastard, too. I couldn't tell her the truth."
"I suppose not Gladhand wasn't real pleased about last night, was he?"
Spencer grinned. "Oh, he didn't really mind so much. When he's fatherly-stern you know he's not genuinely upset. He just doesn't want his people to get killed running off to act on drunken inspirations."
"Oh." A beer trunk rattled by, pursued by a gang of little boys. The city seemed to be about its usual business. "How's Pelias?" Thomas asked. "Have you heard?"
"Yeah. The official word is—give up?—he's still in a coma."
"I didn't know you could be in a coma this long."
"Oh, sure. Three days isn't the world record. I think he's alive," Spencer said, "because Lloyd, the major-domo, hasn't named a successor, and he hasn't tried to take the office himself, either. I'm sure he'd have done one or the other if Pelias was dead." Spencer pointed over the rooftops at a trailing plume of smoke that stood out sharply against the blue sky. "Roughly Alameda and Third Street, I'd guess. And I heard exchanges of gunfire three times this morning, in the south. Somebody'd better take charge pretty soon."
Thomas nodded helplessly. "Uh… will there be a funeral or something for Jean?" he asked.
"No. Not for us, anyway. She has some folks in Glendale, and Gladhand had her body sent there."
For a while neither of them spoke, and finally Thomas turned to reenter the theater. "You heard right," he said. "The new girl is real pretty."
CHAPTER 6: The Dark-Rum Queen
Two seats over from Thomas, Gladhand puffed on a cigar and regarded the stage activity through narrowed eyes. The short-haired man, Lambert, whom Thomas had met earlier in the greenroom, stood with Alice in the foreground; behind them were a young man and woman Thomas didn't know and, holding a script, Pat Pearl.
They'd begun rehearsing the fifth scene of act three. Phebe, played by Alice, was unsympathetically explaining to Lambert's Silvius that she wished he'd stop bothering her with his wooing.
"That's good," called Gladhand. "Just the right amount of impatience. Silvius, try to look anguished, will you? Dumb, sure, but anguished too. All right, now, Rosalind, walk over to Phebe."
Pat stepped forward, and Thomas envied her air of self-possession. Gladhand had decided that his two new players ought to at least walk through their parts, reading from scripts, and Thomas feared that he'd bungle even that. Uneasily he remembered the panic that had always assailed him when, as a boy, he'd been called on to serve Mass.
Rosalind was now advising Phebe at length to take Silvius at his word. "Sell when you can; you are not for all markets," she told her finally. It was a long speech, but Pat read it well and with conviction.