* * *
Pausert sat in the control room talking to Goth. The Venture was safely snugged into the latticework on the second tier. Her hold was now full of an assortment of ropes, screens, fake treasure chests, feather-light swords, and an eclectic collection of bric-a-brac furniture ranging from ornate ancient chairs to stools some showperson might just have stolen from an ultramodern bar somewhere.
"You got us a good deal," said Goth, hugging her knees and grinning. "You're a hot witch, Captain. I wouldn't have thought of that trick with the flowers. And I nearly died when the back of the allweather cloak lifted up so that we could see you and the keys." She started laughing again. "It was so neat! You had them all fooled."
"Actually, Goth, I didn't plan any of that. It was that dratted little vatch. It was playing its tricks on me. We were just lucky, I guess."
"Luck's a klatha thing too, Captain."
Pausert sighed. "We're going to need it, Goth. Everything has gone haywire on this trip. We expected an easy voyage . . . and look at it. We've lost our money, we've nearly lost our ship. I've even lost my best boots. I'm getting used to these new ones now, but they're not the same."
Goth examined the boots. "They're pretty spiffy ones, Captain. Looks like Lambidian iguana leather."
The captain looked at the boots in question. They were smarter looking than he remembered. "They're a spare pair I've had for years. I certainly never had the money for Lambidian iguana. Even my best pair were just tanned miffel-hide, but made to measure. Anyway, I think boots are going be the least of my problems. I'll have to try to get that bit of vatch stuff I gave to the little one back. I might be able to rely on that. I can't rely on the little vatch. I'll be all chained up on stage and it'll think it a capital joke to disappear."
"I wonder if I can talk Dame Ethulassia into being chained up in one of your performances?" asked Goth, innocently.
"You stay away from her," Pausert said sternly.
"You do the same, then," Goth growled. "Even if I'm not marriageable age yet, I don't want you fooling around with anybody else."
The captain rolled his eyes. "Great. Not only does it seem I've gotten myself a pint-sized fiancee—and how did that happen, exactly? I don't remember anybody asking me—but she's jealous as Medea to boot."
"Don't need to ask, not on Karres," Goth replied firmly. "What's bound to happen is bound to happen. Besides, fair's fair. I'm not fooling around with anybody else either."
"Of course you're not. You're only twelve years old!"
"Still. Fair's fair."
CHAPTER 12
"Well," Dame Ethulassia said, archly, surveying Pausert and the rest of his crew. "I suppose you want to know why I asked you—here."
She waved her hand at the rows and rows of theater seats beyond the stage. At least, Pausert thought there were rows and rows of seats out there; he could only see the first few.
Goth was paying no attention to the Dame at all. Instead, she was peering into the darkness. "Who's that?" she suddenly demanded.
"Richard Cravan," replied a rich and powerful voice from the darkness. The voice seemed to echo, as if in a great cavern.
"Sir Richard Cravan," said Dame Ethulassia, "The founder and director of our theatrical company."
To the captain's surprise, she dimpled. The smile made her seem a lot younger. A lot more attractive, too, than her earlier Great Vamp performance. For a moment, The Incredible Bosom even seemed to belong to a real woman.
"Poor Himbie! He thinks I make all the decisions about casting! But if he knew it was Sir Richard, he'd never let us have half the resources he gives me."
"My dear Lassia," chuckled The Voice, "You make as many decisions as I."
"But you are the heart and soul of the Company," Dame Ethulassia replied. Pausert would have expected her to simper, but she simply seemed serious, almost reverent. "Miss Hulik, would you step to the front of the stage, please?"
With a look of surprise, Hulik did so. As she did, Pausert saw words appearing in the air between them and the theater. "This is a love-speech, Miss Hulik," said The Voice. "The lady in question is very young, and so is her lover. They just met this evening, and fell instantly in love, even though their families are involved in a deadly feud. He has come to see if she feels as strongly as he does—as you do, Miss Hulik. He stands below you, beneath your balcony. Let me hear you speak to him, please."
Hulik stepped forward—and to Pausert's delight and surprise, seemed to shed years and become someone else altogether.
He had known, of course, that the do Eldel was an agent of the Empress, and as such, was capable of many roles. What he had not really understood was that she could act. Hulik started reading her lines from the words projected in the air without seeming even to pause.
"What man art thou," she whispered, "that thus bescreen'd in night so stumblest on my counsel?"
"By a name," The Voice replied, sounding impossibly adolescent, breathless and excited all at once, "I know not how to tell thee who I am: My name, dear Saint, is hateful to myself, because it is an enemy to thee. Had I it written, I would tear the word!"
Hulik clasped her hands before her, gasping with mingled consternation and delight. "My ears have yet not drunk a hundred words of thy tongue's uttering, yet I know the sound. Art thou not Romeo, and a Montague?"
Pausert listened and watched, holding his breath, and he was not the only one. Goth and even the Leewit were doing the same; the grik-dog actually lay down and was gazing up at Hulik soulfully. And when he looked out of the corner of his eye at the Dame, expecting to see her eyeing Hulik with jealousy, he was shocked to see a tear trickling down her cheek and an odd little smile playing on her lips.
Then Hulik finished a very long speech that ended: "And not impute this yielding to light love, which the dark night hath so discovered."
The Voice said, "Enough, Miss Hulik. Thank you. My dear Lassia? I believe you are correct. Historically, it should be the handsome young lady beside Captain Aron, of course, but—no. There are some things it is better not to be accurate about, and allowing Juliet to be portrayed by a young adolescent is one of them."
"It's been too long, dear Richard, since our little troupe has been able to stage Romeo and Juliet," the Dame said, with a passion that surprised Pausert. "I am many things, and capable of many roles, but I will no longer attempt to play a fourteen-year-old girl. It would be foolish."
"And you are no fool. Captain Aron?"
"Sir?" Pausert stepped forward.
"May I ask if you have ever handled a sword?"
As it happened, he had. Fencing was one of the sports provided at school on Nikkeldepain, and he'd tried it out of curiosity. He'd kept it up in the Nikkeldepain Navy, since swordsmanship was something of a tradition there. "I fence a bit, sir," he replied cautiously.
"Well! You surprise me pleasantly! A captain who actually knows how to use a sword. I thought that was illegal, these days."
In fact, The Voice did sound extremely pleased. But given that whoever The Voice belonged to was obviously a consummate actor, Pausert didn't know if he was or not.
"Come, Captain, step forward. You are Romeo's best friend Mercutio—older, something of a bully-boy, and just a little mad. It was a favored role of mine, but alas! I have accumulated too many years for it. Now, our hero has not met his Juliet at this point—he believes himself in love with another girl, and his friend Mercutio is trying to jolly him out of his depression by coaxing him to go to a party."