“Thank you,” she said. “I really appreciate it. And this, too. Letting me warm up and focus in here, I mean.”
“No problem. I’ll be back in about twenty minutes, but I won’t disturb you if you’re still here. Break a leg tonight, Cindy.”
Edmund was almost out the door when Cindy called after him: “Did you decide yet if you’re going to the cast party tomorrow night?”
“Probably not. I have a lot of work to do around the house this weekend.”
“Well, it might be fun if you made an appearance. I won’t be there long, either. Just a couple of drinks and I’ll have to stick around for Brown Bags. I know you’ve never been to a cast party here, but do you know what those are? Brown Bags, I mean?”
“Yes. I’ve heard people mention them in the scene shop. The awards the seniors make for people in the cast. Inside jokes written down on brown paper bags, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“I hear sometimes they can get pretty mean.”
“Yeah, they can, but it’s all in fun, I guess. You have to have a good sense of humor. I’m sure mine will be pretty brutal if Bradley has anything to say about it.”
Edmund said nothing.
“Anyway,” Cindy continued, “maybe you could come along and save me—not from my Brown Bag, I mean—but, well, I pretty much don’t like the people who are going to be there. I ’d rather talk to you than any of them, to be honest.”
“If you don’t like them, then why you going?”
His question was sincere and nonjudgmental—almost childlike in his curiosity, Cindy thought. “Because I’m weak,” she said. “Because I’ve gotten the reputation of being a snob, and I don’t want to give people the satisfaction of being able to say, ‘See? I told you she thinks her shit doesn’t stink.’” Edmund smiled vaguely and looked away from her for the first time. “I hope you don’t think less of me for admitting that to you.”
“Not at all.”
“I don’t know, maybe we could just hang out together, have a couple of drinks and just chill. Might be nice just to talk. You know, away from the theater, the show, all the stuff on our minds when we’re here.”
Edmund stood by the door, thinking. Cindy suddenly felt uncomfortable.
“If it’s too much of a big deal,” she said quickly, “like, if your girlfriend will get pissed off or something—well, I mean, I totally understand.”
“Let me see how things go tonight,” Edmund said finally. “Okay?”
“Okay.”
He smiled and was gone.
Alone in the electrics shop, Cindy suddenly became aware of her breathing and the steady thumping in her chest. Did she really just do that? Did she really just ask a man out on a date for the first time in her life?
But he didn’t say yes, said a voice in her head.
But he didn’t say no, either, replied another voice.
But he wanted to say yes, said the first voice. Couldn’t you tell?
You saw it in his eyes, too, then?
Yes, I did!
Cindy didn’t sit down in the chair Edmund had set out for her. She was too excited, felt a hundred pounds lighter, and began pacing behind the cable rack. She tried going over her lines, tried saying them out loud and imagining Edmund Lambert as Macbeth instead of douchebag Bradley Cox, but the voices in her head kept analyzing what had just passed between them, making her nervous but proud at the same time.
Edmund Lambert was going to come.
She just knew it.
Then, out of the corner of her eye, she spied his book bag on the chair by the electrics shop computer. She’d seen him with it many times and recognized the Army-issue camouflage.
She got an idea.
Cindy ran to the door and peeked out—saw a freshman, a pudgy kid who played one of Macbeth’s soldiers, heading toward the green room. Jonathan was his name—or at least, that’s what she thought his name was. She couldn’t remember; had never spoken to him before and wondered if she was confusing him with another freshman in Macbeth’s army. No time to worry; no time to feel guilty for using him.
“Jonathan?” Cindy called out impulsively. He stopped. She had gotten his name right, thank God! “Could you come here for a minute, please?”
The pudgy soldier sauntered over awkwardly, suspiciously.
“Would you mind doing me a favor?” Cindy asked.
“What kind of favor?”
“I got lucky getting in here to go over my speeches, but I need something from my dressing room. Would you mind holding the door for me while I go and get it? Otherwise it’ll shut and I’ll be locked out.”
“What, do I look like your bitch now?”
“Please, Jonathan. I don’t want to prop the door open. Someone might close it or steal the room from me. And it’d be a huge help, you have no idea, if you’re here to tell anybody who tries to do that I’ll be right back.”
“All right,” he sighed. “But make it quick. I got stuff to do, too, you know.”
Cindy thanked him and dashed down the hall.
Chapter 30
Twenty minutes later, Edmund Lambert returned to the electrics shop to find the white rose from Cindy Smith sticking out of his book bag. He knew it was from her; had seen one of the assistant stage managers carrying the vase into her dressing room earlier that afternoon when he arrived at the theater.
Edmund removed the flower and sniffed it—stroked the petals with the tip of his nose and wondered if it was a sign from the Prince.
He’d read the news on the electrics shop computer; had even gone to CNN.com to watch the video. The police had found Billy Canning, and the press had already tied him to Randall Donovan. They would no doubt unearth the connection to Leona Bonita and Angel’s very soon, too. In fact, Edmund suspected the police might already know about Angel’s; had probably pieced it together as soon as they found Donovan.
The General had been fortunate in the beginning. The police had bought his telephone call about the Latino gangs, but the General didn’t know why they never connected Rodriguez to Angel’s. All part of the equation, he’d concluded. It’d been the same for Billy Canning. And, after all, the Prince hadn’t been worried about the police finding him all the way out there in the woods anytime soon.
“Touch the doorway,” Edmund heard the General say in his mind. He closed his eyes and saw the sodomite staring up at him from the chair in horror—his eyes filled with tears, with the disbelieving desperation of one who had sinned. “Touch the doorway,” the General repeated.
“Please, God,” the sodomite cried as he raised a trembling hand—his one free hand—and touched the General’s chest. “Please, I did what you wanted me to do, now please let me go.”
“Will you know him when he comes for you?” the General asked, guiding the sodomite’s fingers along the outside of the doorway.
“Please, I did what you—”
“Will you know him when he comes for you?”
“Yes,” the sodomite said weakly. “Yes, now please let me go.”
“And what will you tell him, soldier?”
“Jesus Christ, I—”
“What will you tell him, soldier?”
“I accept my mission.”
“And why do you accept?”
“The nine to three,” the sodomite whimpered, his tears flowing freely. “It is my destiny as written in the stars.”