Murder on Opening Night

CHAPTER TWO-3

AT PRECISELY SEVEN-thirty, Myrtle’s doorbell rang. She opened the door and blinked at Miles for a moment. “Miles! You’re wearing a suit!”

“Naturally,” said Miles stiffly. “We’re going to the theater.” He studied Myrtle’s comfortable dark slacks, sensible shoes, and white tunic. “Aren’t we? It doesn’t look like you’re ready to go. Didn’t we say seven-thirty?”

Myrtle stood aside to allow Miles to step in. “This is community theater, Miles. There’s no need to look that nice at any art venue in Bradley. I feel as if I’m being accompanied by a waiter.”

Miles sighed. “I’ll leave the jacket here.”

“Can you leave the tie here, too?”

“Then I’d look silly,” said Miles.

“I suppose we don’t have time for you to change.” Myrtle picked up her pocketbook and fished the tickets out.

“It won’t take that long for us to get to the theater,” said Miles reasonably. “I can make a quick change.”

“But these are general admission tickets,” said Myrtle, peering at them. “Pooh. I should have noticed that. Technically, we should already be in line to ensure a good seat.”

Miles was looking less and less amused about their evening out.

Myrtle made a quick about-face in the interest of time. “Actually, you look very handsome. It’s good to show respect for the actors and the production, isn’t it? Let’s head out. Otherwise, we won’t even have time to grab a wine at the concession stand before going in.”

Myrtle, never one to be late, was tense in the car on the way over. But as soon as they strolled into the small theater downtown, she started to relax. “There aren’t so many people here. We should be able to get a good seat.”

Miles muttered, “May have something to do with the name of the play. Malaise doesn’t quite have the same ring to it as Fiddler on the Roof.”

“Let’s get that wine,” said Myrtle.

A few minutes later, wine in hand, they entered the theater. They were able to sit on the second row. And, since the seats were arranged stadium-style, they could see the stage perfectly.

Miles studied the program. “There doesn’t seem to be an intermission,” he fretted.

“Well, that’s all right, isn’t it? The play will be over sooner.” Myrtle watched the feet she could see under the small gap under the closed curtain on the stage.

“It’s just that with all this wine, I’ll have to visit the men’s room,” he sighed.

Myrtle switched seats with him so that Miles could sit on the aisle.

Right before the curtain went up, the theater owner, a Mr. Toucan, spoke a few words about the production and asked them to turn their phones off. He was a large man who wore an olive tie over a rather dingy khaki button-down shirt. He had orange hair and a matching mustache, and wore over-sized glasses and a pocket protector. “You’re in for a treat tonight, ladies and gentlemen!” he promised.

“I don’t think I know Mr. Toucan,” murmured Miles.

“He used to own the pet food store,” said Myrtle. “But apparently, owning a community theater has been his lifelong dream.”

“Imagine that,” said Miles in a stunned voice.

“We can’t all be CPAs, Miles,” said Myrtle reprovingly.

“Can’t all be engineers, you mean. I was an engineer,” said Miles in a tight voice.

“Same thing.”

As much as Myrtle was determined to enjoy her arts outing, she had to admit that the play was odd. It opened with a flashback of some sort. Then most of the actors had asides with the audience, breaking down the fourth wall in a way that Myrtle found distracting. There was then a set change behind the curtain with very loud music accompanying it. When the curtain opened, the stage was set for a dream sequence, complete with actress Veronica doing some sort of dreamy dancing while actress Nandina “slept” on a bed on the stage.

Myrtle glanced over at Miles. He appeared to be engaged in a dream sequence of his own. Myrtle elbowed him and he awoke with a start. “You’re missing it,” hissed Myrtle.

“I liked the performance in the diner better,” whispered Miles.

Myrtle frowned. “What’s going on now?” she said.

Nandina appeared to have missed a cue. The actor that they knew as Skip was repeating loudly, “Good morning, darling,” to a very still Nandina.

“Perhaps Nandina has fallen asleep, too,” suggested Miles dryly.

Skip apparently suspected so, too. He walked over to the bed and seemed to improvise a little. “I know it’s hard to wake up and face the day sometimes, dear, but we simply must, mustn’t we?”

Miles made a face at the stilted dialogue.

Skip lightly touched Nandina’s face. Then he abruptly dropped character and more roughly tugged her arm. Finally giving up all pretense of being in character, he said, “Nandina! Nandina!” He turned to look offstage. “She’s not breathing!”