Summerlost (8 page)

11.

When I went downstairs to the costume shop before work, Meg wasn't at the table where she'd been before.

“She's in the back,” said a woman who was ironing a long piece of fabric. “I'll go get her.”

The one working at the computer didn't turn around.

The room was hot. They had a fan on, and every time it rotated past me it made the garbage bag I'd used to protect the special costume crinkle and strands of my hair blow into my eyes.

Meg brought my costume out on a hanger. “It's good to go,” she said, and I handed her the other dress back. The fan blew her bangs to one side. The safety pins she had stuck to the top of her apron glittered like a necklace. She had a serious face with lines around her mouth that looked like she frowned a lot but also lines around her eyes that made it seem like she laughed a lot too.

Talk, Cedar
, I told myself. But it was hard.

Did I honestly want to do this? Try to find out more about tunnels and Lisette? Did I really think a ghost was leaving
things on my windowsill? Did I want to spend my time in a costume shop where I didn't know anyone?

“I came in early because I thought maybe I could volunteer after all,” I said.

“Perfect,” Meg said. “We can use you to take over relabeling the boxes for now. That will free Emily up for other things I need her to do.”

“Hallelujah,” said the person at the computer. Emily.

“Okay,” I said.

12.

And so that's how I ended up typing a list that had things on it like this:

APRONS: WHITE AND OFF-WHITE

ASSES HEADS: ALL TYPES

BUM ROLLS: NO FARTHINGALES, BUSTLE PADS, OR RUFFLES

CROWNS: GOOD MEDIEVAL CROWNS

CROWNS: PLAIN MEDIEVAL CROWNS

FARTHINGALES

HATS: STRAW

HATS: BICORN

HATS: TRICORN

HORNS

MIDSUMMER ACCESSORIES

STOMACHERS

CODPIECES: SMALL

CODPIECES: LARGE

I couldn't help it. When I got to “codpieces,” I snickered.

“Is something funny?” Meg asked. I glanced at her. Her face was serious but her voice sounded dry, like she knew exactly why I was laughing.

“Um,” I said. “I've finished typing the list.”

“Good,” Meg said. “Print them out, one label to each page. Then take them to that row of boxes and replace the old labels with the new ones.”

And so I did.

I took the old labels off.

I taped the new labels on.

I laughed to myself when I got to
CODPIECES
.

And then it was time to go.

13.

“So you didn't get to ask Meg about the tunnels,” Leo said after work. We walked through the Portrait Hall on our way out and stopped in front of a painting of an old man with wiry white hair and a dull gold crown. The man held up his hands in front of him, making a dramatic gesture, and his blue veins seemed to course with blood.
RICHARD
SNOW
AS
KING
LEAR
,
the plaque under the painting said.

Whoever had painted this portrait had done a good job. I looked at the signature.
Arlene Stecki.
The same person who did Lisette Chamberlain's portrait.

“No,” I said. “Not really. I didn't talk to anyone, actually.”

“Was it boring?”

“It was fine,” I said. “It's sort of interesting to see all the costumes and all the work that goes into them.”

“Can you come over to my house sometime?” Leo asked. “I have a show I want you to see. Something with
real
acting in it. Not that crap you and Miles have been watching.”

“I don't know,” I said. “I'll ask my mom.”

“We could watch it on Friday,” he said. “That's my mom's day off so she'll be home. If that makes your mom feel better.”

“It will. But I still don't know if she'll let me come.”

“Tell her it's
The Tempest
starring Lisette Chamberlain as Miranda,” he said. “I got it from the festival archives.”

“It sounds boring.”

“It's not. I promise.”

14.

“Leo invited me over to watch a movie,” I said Friday after work. I shoved my sandals into the basket my mom kept by the front door for shoes and pulled on my flip-flops. They felt great. I felt sorry for all the people who had lived in England.

“A movie,” Mom said.

“Yes,” I said.

“That sounds like a date.”

My mother had a very firm NO DATES rule. Not until we were much, much older than twelve. Which was why I'd waited until the last possible minute to ask her. I was sure she'd say no.

“It's not a date,” I said. “His mom will be home. And it's with Leo.”

“What movie are you watching?”

“An old production of
The Tempest
,” I said. “Leo rented it from the Summerlost Festival library archives. It's a classic.”

“You can go if Miles goes with you,” Mom said.

“Mom,” I said. “He's going to be so bored.”

“I'm going to be so bored,” Miles confirmed from the couch. He didn't look up from his library book.

“Leo's
mom
will be home,” I said again. “It's during the day. He's a friend.
Please.
”

My mom relented. “All right.”

I couldn't believe it. Maybe staying up late working on the deck was making her too tired to argue.

When I got to Leo's house, his mom answered the door. She had short black hair. Her eyes were like Leo's, crinkly with laughter. She was beautiful. “Hello!” she said. “It's so nice to meet you, Cedar.”

“Thanks,” I said. “It's nice to meet you too.”

“I need to come by and say hello to your mother again,” Mrs. Bishop said. “I always think summer won't be as busy as the school year, and then of course it always is.”

“We still have your pan, I think,” I said.

“Oh, that's all right.” She waved her hand. “You should keep it. You probably didn't want to bring all your own cooking things down for the summer.”

She was right. We hadn't. We'd brought three pots, six plates, six bowls, six cups, six sets of cutlery. A couple of knives for chopping. A can opener. A cookie sheet. One pitcher. That was it. Everything else, my mom said, was too much hassle. We didn't even use the dishwasher very much. We mostly washed things right after we used them and put them back in the cupboard. Even Miles.

“Leo's downstairs,” Mrs. Bishop said, “getting everything all set up. Do you want anything to eat? Or drink?”

“I'm fine, thank you.”

“You can head on down, ” she said. “But I'll peek in on you now and then to make sure you don't need anything.”

When I got downstairs, Leo showed me the T-shirts he'd had made for us for the tour. They were black and had Lisette's face on them in white, kind of pop-arty, like that picture of Marilyn Monroe you see on towels and cheap blankets and T-shirts.

“Don't let anyone in my family see it,” he said, and I nodded. None of his family or mine knew about the tour.

“They look really good. Are you going to print up extra for us to sell?”

“I'm worried about liability,” he said. “Plus if people wear them around, other people might ask where they got them. Which would be great publicity, but also increases the chances that the festival finds out what we're doing and tells us to stop.”

“I still don't see why they would care.”

“We're using their grounds for part of the tour,” Leo said. “And whenever you want to do something and you're not an adult, people tell you to stop. Even when there's no real reason.”

That was true.

I sat down on the couch. It felt funny to not be watching
Times of Our Seasons
. “So,” I said, “
The Tempest
.”

“Yeah,” Leo said. He cued up the film.

“I haven't read it before. Will I still know what's going on?”

“Yeah. If you don't, ask me. I've watched it a bunch of times.”

“I'm sure you have,” I said.

Leo shot me a look then, one that I hadn't seen before. It was a look that seemed hurt. I felt bad.

So I didn't say anything when the play started and it was kind of funny and old. I didn't crack a single joke about the outfits the people in the audience wore or the actors running around onstage, pretending they were on a ship that was sinking. The seats surrounded the stage on three sides, so the actors were right in the middle of their audience.

And then a woman came onstage, wearing a cream-colored dress, tattered but beautiful. You couldn't yet see her face but the dress stood out against the dark beams, under the dim lights, like a butterfly at night, a white fish in a deep ocean.

I bet Meg made that dress
, I thought.

The camera went right to Lisette Chamberlain and a light bloomed around her on the stage as she spoke. Over her white dress she wore a military coat that was too big, like it had been her dad's and he'd given it to her to keep her warm. The coat was frayed and made of blue-gray velvet. She had bare feet, long red hair, beautiful eyes.

She was alive again, for now.

You could tell right away how good she was. The other actors were good too—how they'd memorized those long complicated lines, how they projected their voices out and moved
their bodies—but it seemed like they were talking to us all, speaking out to the audience at large. Lisette seemed like she was talking to you. And you. And you. It felt like she spoke to everyone individually, even though she couldn't possibly look each person in the eye.

The old man playing her father, Prospero, looked familiar too. I realized it was the guy from the King Lear portrait. The way he and Lisette interacted made me think
They could really be a father and his daughter
even though I didn't understand everything they were saying. I got most of it though. Somehow, he had the power to create a storm, and she wanted him to stop it because she worried about the people on the boat.

Lisette's character might be trapped on an island, but at least she had her dad, and he was magic.

Leo stopped the play right as a dark-haired man came onto the scene, a handsome guy staggering around as more fake wind and rain sounds hammered the stage.

“What are you doing?” I asked. I'd been getting into it.

“So the interesting thing about this play,” Leo said, “besides the fact that it's Lisette Chamberlain's final performance, is
this
guy. The actor playing Ferdinand, who's the love interest for Miranda.”

I leaned in to look at the man on the stage.

“Roger Marin,” Leo said.

“Whoa,” I said. “Roger Marin.” I knew the name from the tour. “The guy who was her second husband?”

“Yes.”

“And this is
after
they broke up?”

“Yeah, one year later,” Leo said. “Roger Marin never got as famous as Lisette did. He worked at Summerlost every summer, for the whole season. And that last year, when she came back, she starred opposite him one more time. In
this
performance. On the stage where they'd met years before.”

“Wow,” I said. “So she saw her ex-husband onstage the night she died.”

“Yeah,” Leo said. “And he visited her at the hotel that night too.”

“
What?
”

Leo nodded. “The police report says that two people visited her that night after the performance. The person with the room next to Lisette's told the police that she heard knocking and the door open and close and then voices. Twice. She admitted peeking out to see who the second person was.”

“And it was . . .”

“Roger Marin,” he said. “The lady next door heard them talking, but she couldn't tell what they said. Then she heard him leave. She peeked out then too. She was nosy. Back then all the rumors were that Lisette had never stopped loving Roger Marin. It was a big deal that they were performing together.
That woman had actually been to the play. So she couldn't help herself when she recognized the voices. Her name was Melissa Wells and she had come all the way from New York City to see the performance.”

“So Roger Marin visited Lisette at the hotel,” I said. “The very night she died.”

“Yup.”

“But there was no evidence of foul play.”

“Right,” Leo said.

“But maybe Roger Marin literally broke her heart. I mean, she
did
die of a heart attack.”

“Right again,” Leo said.

“Why don't you include any of this information on the tour?” I asked.

“The superfans know all of this already,” Leo said. “And they've got their own theories about her death. And if they get talking, they could go on for hours. Trust me. We don't want that.”

“How did you get a copy of the police report?”

“It's public information,” Leo said. “Anyone can ask for it. Plus it was printed in the newspapers back when she died. That's where I found it. Do you want to see?”

“Not really,” I said. And I think Leo could tell from my voice that I meant
Absolutely not
. I knew there was a police report written up about the accident with Dad and Ben. I had
never read it. And I never would. I knew the bits and pieces my mom told me back when it happened and that was more than enough.

“Yeah,” Leo said. “We don't have to talk about it. I wasn't thinking.” He sounded awkward and I could tell he had remembered about my family. He reached for the remote to start up the play again but I stopped him.

“What did Roger Marin say about that night?” I asked. “Was that in the police report too?” I didn't want to read it. But I wanted to know more.

“He said that Lisette hadn't been feeling great after the performance so he came over to check on her,” Leo said. “And that she seemed fine when he left. She was going to go to sleep.”

“Can
we
talk to Roger Marin?” I asked.

Leo shook his head. “He died two years ago. In Las Vegas. He worked in a show there for a long time after he stopped doing the plays at Summerlost.”

The play started up again. We watched for a while. “She doesn't have a very big part,” I said. “Considering it's her final performance.”

“She didn't know it was her final performance,” Leo said.

“Right.”

“I guess that during the last few years she liked having smaller parts so she didn't have to memorize too much,” Leo said. “Since she was only coming for one night.”

The camera zoomed closer on Lisette, so you could see only her. I looked at that dress again, at the way they'd done her hair, loose and wavy and beautiful. And then I noticed something else.

“That's weird,” I said.

“What is?” Leo asked.

“Pause it,” I said.

Leo did.

“Lisette's character, Miranda, isn't married,” I said. “But she's wearing a wedding ring.” I pointed at her hand, which she'd lifted up. Her mouth was frozen in a funny position, like she was yowling.

“How on earth did you notice that?” Leo asked.

“I guess because of the labels,” I said.

“What are you talking about?” Leo leaned in so that his face was comically close to the screen. “I don't see any labels.”

“I'm talking about the labels I made in the costume shop,” I said. “For the different boxes. The people in costume design pay attention to every little thing. They care about all the details. Look at this Miranda costume. It's perfect. I mean, you sort of take it for granted because it's so good, but it's exactly what Miranda would be wearing. And I know they wouldn't have given her a wedding ring to wear if her character wasn't married.”

“So it's probably Lisette's own ring,” Leo said.

“But Lisette wasn't married then. Right?”

“Right.”

We both stared at the screen.

“So why is she wearing the ring?” Leo asked.

“I don't know,” I said.

It was hard to see on the screen, but we could make out that it was a gold ring with three pale stones.

“It's the same ring she's wearing in the portrait,” I said. “I'm sure of it. It's on her left hand.”

“That's her wedding ring from Roger Marin,” Leo said. “It's in tons of the paparazzi photographs from when she was married to him. She wore it all the time.”

“Was that painting done when she was married to Roger?”

“Yeah,” Leo said. “I know from the costume she's wearing in the painting. It's from the year she played Desdemona in
Othello
. But it makes sense for her to have a wedding ring on in that picture, because Desdemona is married from the beginning of the play. So they must have let her leave it on for the painting because it fits the character. And it was an old ring, the biography said. Vintage. She and Roger found it in an antiques shop in Italy when they were on vacation.”

Leo really
did
know almost everything about Lisette Chamberlain.

“Maybe she wanted Roger to see her wearing it that last night,” I said. “Maybe she did still care about him. Or something.”

“Her character sort of gets married later in
The Tempest
,” Leo said. “But she's definitely not married yet.”

“Weird,” I said.

“Huh.” Leo reached for the remote to start up the play again but then he set it down. He frowned and scooted closer to the screen. I noticed, not for the first time, that even though his hair was very thick there were always a few strands sticking up in the back, a cowlick. It made me think of Ben.

“What's wrong?” I asked Leo.

“This ring thing is
really
weird,” Leo said. “So. She's wearing the ring the night she died. But it's not listed with the items that were found in her room with her the next morning. She wasn't wearing it then.”

“Are you sure?” I asked.