Kelly shook her head in disapproval. "Daddy," she chided, "how can you eat all that red meat?"
"Easy," I returned. "Years of practice."
My comment provoked the slightest hint of a smile in the corners of Jeremy Cartwright's otherwise strained mouth. I wondered if he was nervous about having lunch with me. I certainly hoped so. I remembered being scared witless the first time I had dinner with Karen's folks.
"I have tickets for Majestic this afternoon, if you'd like to go," he offered.
"Oh, Jeremy. How awesome!" Kelly exclaimed, sounding every bit the eighteen-year-old she was.
"How did you manage that?"
Jeremy shrugged modestly. "Just lucky," he said.
Alexis Downey beamed. "Majestic's a terrific show. One of my favorites. I understand you play the Laredo Kid?"
"Yeah," he said. "I only auditioned for the part on a dare. I never thought I'd actually get it."
The in-crowd theater talk left me in the dark. "What's it about?" I asked.
"About this old-time movie character-that's me," Jeremy answered. "I appear like a vision to this other guy who grew up going to movies and watching those real old western serials."
Watch it, Buster, I thought. I used to love those "real old" western serials.
"Now he's out West working on an Indian reservation," Jeremy continued. "My character is stuck in the past with all these old scripts and stereotypes of what women should and shouldn't do. He can't adjust to this new kind of modern woman who can go to school, cook gourmet meals, fix her own car, and save her boyfriend every time he gets into hot water."
"Sounds fascinating," I said.
Alex kicked me in the shins. "It is," she said. "And we'll be delighted to go, Jeremy. It'll be a good counterpoint to Shrew tonight."
If I personally had any objections, they'd been summarily overruled. The waiter brought our orders. Even he looked somewhat disgusted as he slapped the loaded real meat hamburger platter on the table in front of me.
With the arrival of food, conversation ground to a halt. Uncomfortable silence expanded until it seemed to stretch to the far corners of the universe. Each bite of hamburger turned to dry saw-dust in my mouth, although everyone else at the table wolfed his or her food with obvious relish. I could just as well have ordered the eggplant.
"Is your mother coming to the wedding?" Alex asked, innocently lobbing a live hand grenade onto the table. Fortunately, I had just swallowed a mouthful of burger; otherwise I would have required an on-the-spot Heimlich maneuver. Kelly's gaze faltered, and her hands dropped nervously to her lap while a vivid flush spread up her neck and cheeks.
"Mom doesn't know about it," she responded. "Coming to the wedding would just upset her."
"Upset" didn't quite cover it. I doubt that's the word Dave Livingston would have used, either.
The expression on Alex's face remained utterly composed. "If I were your mother," she said with an impassive smile, "I'm afraid I'd be terribly hurt if I wasn't invited."
"Even if you thought your daughter was making a horrible mistake?" Jeremy chimed in.
I did choke at that one, couldn't help it. At least the kid was smart enough to recognize the lay of the land.
Alex nodded. "Even if," she replied.
That was followed by another period of dead silence. "We'll think about it," Kelly said finally, but Alex wasn't finished.
"If the wedding's tomorrow," she pressed, "there isn't much time for your mother to make arrangements. She's in California, isn't she?" Kelly nodded. "She'll have to make plane reservations, and all that."
"I'll try to decide today," Kelly agreed.
It was a major concession, and I wasn't entirely sure how it had happened. I smiled at Alex, grateful for the miracle, while Kelly changed the subject. "How was the backstage tour this morning, Jeremy?" she asked.
"Everybody's upset," he said, "because of the knife and all."
Knife? It was as if someone had twanged a gigantic rubber band in the middle of my forehead. "What knife?" I asked.
"The Henckels-the twelve-inch slicer-we use for Romeo. When the stage manager realized it was missing from the prop table this morning, he spent an hour looking before he had Dinky Holloway report it to Detective Fraymore. You know, because of what happened last night. Nobody knows when it disappeared…"
"I do," I interjected.
"You do?" Three pairs of eyes searched my face.
"It was missing when I looked at the props during the donor party," I said. "I remember seeing the empty orange outline on the table. At least it was something shaped like a knife. I didn't worry about it, though. It wasn't my problem."
"It's somebody's problem now. Dinky came back to the theater practically tearing her hair out. Fraymore was going out to the farm to take Tanya's fingerprints."
"Tanya's!" Kelly exclaimed. "Why would he do that?"
"Don't worry," I assured them. "It's just routine. If it is the knife from the show, both Juliet's and Romeo's prints may be on it. So a print technician will take both Tanya's and James Renthrow's prints as well as any stagehands who may have handled the knife. Once they catalog the known prints that should be there, then they can sort out the unknown ones that shouldn't."
"I see," Jeremy said. "So it's a process of elimination?"
"Right," I answered. "It's called disqualifying prints."
Jeremy breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm glad to hear that. I was afraid it meant she was really in trouble."
"Any reason why she should be?"
"Daddy," Kelly complained. "Stop being a detective."
"I can't help it. Curiosity becomes a way of life."
Iced tea and eggplant had evidently propped up Jeremy's confidence. He was feeling expansive. "It's just that Tanya's had so much bad luck," he said. "First her parents died in that fire when she was twelve. Then she got in a beef with her guardian and ended up on her own by the time she was fourteen. She's been self-supporting ever since. In all that time, she never lost track of her goal."
"Which was?"
"To be an actress. And look at her. She is. For someone her age, she's accomplished a lot. Especially when you consider she's raising Amber all by herself."
"What happened to her husband?"
"Oh him." Kelly sniffed disapprovingly. "I guess Bob couldn't stand the competition. He was ten years older than Tanya. When she landed better parts than he did, he took off."
"How old was Amber when he left?" I asked.
Kelly and Jeremy exchanged veiled glances before Kelly answered. "Tanya told me he left the day he found out she was pregnant."
Oops. One more time, open mouth and insert foot. Once again Alex came to my rescue. "How old is Amber?"
"Two and a half."
"I know what actors make around here," Alex continued. "It isn't much. How has Tanya managed?"
"She couldn't have if it hadn't been for Marjorie," Kelly explained. "That's Marjorie Connors," she added for Alex's benefit. "Our landlady. She runs Live Oak Farm, where we all live. Tanya couldn't afford an apartment by herself. She was about to be thrown into the street when Marjorie invited them to come stay with her."
Jeremy nodded. "Marjorie's great. That's the kind of thing she does. She was volunteering at the theaters when she heard about what was going on with Tanya and Amber. She knew Tanya was broke, so they worked out a way Tanya could help around the farm in exchange for the rent. That's what we all do, more or less."
"Is that how you ended up there, too?" Alex spoke with her eyes focused on Kelly's face. If I had asked the question, Kelly probably would have thrown the remainder of her eggplant burger in my face, told me it was none of my business, and stomped off in a huff. Since Alex asked, though, it was okay.