Witness in Death (In Death 10)

“Well now. Gosh.” He blew out a breath, glanced toward his link. “I don’t guess I’ll bother her now. She’s pretty busy.”

“Why don’t you start by telling me what happened last night.”

“You mean…” He shuddered visibly. “I was in the wings. Stage left. It was brilliant, just brilliant. I remember thinking that if the play had a long run, I’d get a chance to be Vole. Draco was bound to miss a performance or two along the way…”

He trailed off, looked stunned, then appalled. “I don’t mean to say…I never wished for anything bad to happen to him. It was more thinking that he’d catch a cold or something, or maybe just need a night off. Like that.”

“Sure. And what did you see from the wings, stage left, in the last scene?”

“He was perfect,” Proctor murmured, those deep green eyes going dreamy. “Arrogant, careless, smooth. The way he celebrated his acquittal even as he cast Christine off like a leftover bone. His pleasure in winning, in circumventing the system, fooling everyone. Then the shock, the shock in his eyes, in his body, when she turned on him with the knife. I watched, knowing I could never reach that high. Never find so much in myself. I didn’t realize, even after everyone broke character, it didn’t sink in.”

He lifted his hands, let them fall. “I’m not sure it has yet.”

“When did you realize that Draco wasn’t acting?”

“I think—I think when Areena screamed. At least, I knew then that something was horribly wrong. Then everything happened so quickly. People were running to him, and shouting. They brought the curtain down, very fast,” he remembered. “And he was still lying there.”

Hard to jump up and take your bows with eight inches of steel in your heart. Eve thought. “What was your personal relationship with Richard Draco?”

“I don’t suppose we had one.”

“You had no personal conversations with him, no interactions?”

“Well, um…” The fingers started dancing again. “Sure, we spoke a couple of times. I’m afraid I irritated him.”

“In what way?”

“You see, Lieutenant, I watch. People,” he added with another of those shaky smiles. “To develop character types, to learn. I guess my watching him put Draco off, and he told me to keep out of his sight or…or he’d, hmmm, he’d see to it that the only acting job I got was in sex holograms. I apologized right away.”

“And?”

“He threw a paperweight at me. The prop paperweight on Sir Wilfred’s desk.” Proctor winced. “He missed. I’m sure he meant to.”

“That must have pissed you off.”

“No, not really. I was embarrassed to have annoyed him during rehearsal. He had to take the rest of the day off to calm down.”

“A guy threatens your livelihood, throws a paperweight at you, and you don’t get pissed off?”

“It was Draco.” Proctor’s tone was reverent. “He’s—he was—one of the finest actors of the century. The pinnacle. His temperament is part—was part—of making him what he was.”

“You admired him.”

“Oh yes. I’ve studied his work as long as I can remember. I have discs and recordings of every one of his plays. When I had a chance to understudy Vole, I jumped at it. I think it’s the turning point in my career.” His eyes were shining now. “All my life I dreamed of walking the same stage as Richard Draco, and there I was.”

“But you wouldn’t walk that stage unless something happened to him.”

“Not exactly.” In his enthusiasm, Proctor leaned forward. The cheap chair creaked ominously. “But I had to rehearse the same lines, the same blocking, know the same cues. It was almost like being him. In a way. You know.”

“Now, you’ll have a shot at stepping onto his—what do you call it—his mark, won’t you?”

“Yes.” Proctor’s smile was brilliant, and quickly gone. “I know how awful, how selfish and cold that must sound. I don’t mean it that way.”

“You’re having some financial difficulties, Mr. Proctor.”

He flushed, winced, tried that smile again. “Yes, ah, well…One doesn’t go into the theater for money but for love.”

“But money comes in handy for things like eating and keeping a roof over your head. You’re behind on your rent.”