Disappearing Nightly

Luna

Idespise movies where the heroine is threatened and simplyignores it, acting as if there's nothing to worry about. I mean,if you got a mysterious note telling you not to go into the attic,and you knew that the last person who'd gone into the attichad gotten into a whole lot of trouble — well, would you reallyjust shrug, toss the note aside, and head for the attic withoutanother thought?

If you would, then frankly, you're the kind of person whodeserves what's going to happen to you up there.

So naturally, when I received my mysterious threateningnote, I gave it my full attention.

It arrived a few days after Golly Gee disappeared.

The night of the performance the stage manager hadbrought the curtain down in front of a surprised audience, thehapless house manager had announced that there'd been anaccident backstage and the show was over, and we had spentthe rest of the evening giving our statements to the police — who were less interested in the case than you might suppose.

Golly wasn't all that stable to begin with, and her recentdiscovery, during hypnotherapy, that she had been MarilynMonroe in a previous incarnation had resulted in some verystrange behavior, including a marked obsession with theKennedy family.

The police seemed to think Golly had walked out in themiddle of the performance and gone off on some bizarre quest.Since there was no sign of violence or foul play, the good-looking detective who interviewed Joe and me evidently didn'tplan to do much more than file a missing persons report ifGolly didn't reappear (so to speak) in a couple of days.

I didn't necessarily agree with Detective Lopez's view of thematter, but I hardly knew Golly and certainly couldn't claimto miss her. Besides, with the leading lady missing (and inbreach of contract), I finally had that big break I'd been fanta-sizing about since the beginning of rehearsals: I'd be playingVirtue from now on. If, that is, we could get Joe back onstage.

The night Golly vanished, Joe had been too hysterical togive a coherent statement to Detective Lopez — who had, in anycase, not seemed to expect much coherence from any of theactors. (I sensed that our being painted green and covered inglitter affected the detective's impression of us.) Joe seemed toblame himself for Golly's disappearance, and he refused to dothe show again. Consequently, Matilda was forced to cancel ournext few performances while she tried to talk some sense intohim. We didn't have an understudy for Joe. He was the show.

We couldn't even get him into the theater for the rehearsalI had requested. I didn't want to go on as Virtue without a complete run-through. For one thing, there had been several changes in the show since my last rehearsal in the role. Moreimportantly, I wanted to make sure I could trust Joe to pullhimself together before I let him saw me in half, balance mybody on the point of a sword or do the flame-throwing routine with me. Things can go terribly wrong onstage when people lose their concentration. Actors have been stabbed to deathwhile playing Richard III. They've been shot to death with mis-loaded prop guns, as well as strangled to death in malfunctioning harnesses. It's a much riskier profession than you mightsuppose, and I was determined not to be among the ranks ofthespians whose reviews read "R.I.P."

It was in this frame of mind that I read the messages handedto me by the assistant stage manager as I arrived at the theateron Tuesday. The first note informed me that Joe would not beat rehearsal today. The second note advised me that therewould be an Equity meeting that afternoon to discuss our circumstances; in other words, the actors would all get togetherto fret about whether we were going to lose our jobs, as wellas to make empty threats about what we'd do to managementif they folded the show on us just because a pop singer hadgone AWOL and a magician was having a nervous breakdown.

The third note was handwritten on expensive monogrammed paper, initials M.Z. It was written with a black fountain pen in elegant, archaic-looking script. It read:

As you value your life, do not go into the crystal cage.There is Evil among us.

"I'm looking for Detective Lopez," I told the uniformed sergeant at the muster desk. The precinct house was chaotic andnoisy, just like in the movies. I had practically sprinted herefrom the theater on Christopher Street. The desk sergeant sentme upstairs to the squad room, a large, cluttered, overcrowdedarea painted a vile green.

I spotted Lopez right away. He was sitting at his desk, apparently begging a chubby white man with a loud tie not toforce a large, overflowing box of file folders on him. The man,whose expression was irritable, dropped the box on Lopez'sdesk and walked away. Lopez, looking like he wanted to weep,lowered his head and banged it against his desk a few times.

Perhaps I had come at a bad time.

However, the mysterious note was burning a hole in mypocket, and there was no way I was going to turn around andleave without reporting it to the police.

I took a breath and squared my shoulders as Lopez liftedhis head and reached for his ringing phone. After a moment,he cradled the phone between his ear and his shoulder and,still talking, started unpacking the overflowing box. It appeared to contain a lifetime supply of old paperwork — dog-eared, a little dusty and flaking. Frowning, Lopez brushedsomething away from his face and kept unpacking the boxwhile he continued his phone conversation.

I crossed the room, nearly bumping into someone whosehooker costume looked really authentic, right down to therunny mascara and handcuffs. Lopez, whose gaze was fixed onhis mountain of paperwork, didn't see me. His jacket wasslung over the back of his chair. He wore a holster over hisshirt; the gun inside it looked really authentic, too. I stared atit while he kept talking on the phone.

He had the body of an athlete — soccer or tennis, perhaps,a sport that required lithe muscles and physical grace. He wasaround thirty years old, and he had a dark, strong, slightly exotic face framed by thick, straight, jet-black hair. His eyeswere blue, and just as I was wondering where that trait hadcome from, I read the nameplate on his desk: Detective Connor Lopez.

"Connor?" I said in surprise. He didn't look like a Connor.He glanced up and saw me. There was no look of recognition, but my use of his name must have made him realize I wasthere to see him. He gestured to a utilitarian chair next to hisdesk, and I sat down.

"Uh-huh," he said into the phone. "Yes. No. What time?...

Can't you get it to me any sooner? I need it before I can applyfor a warrant."

Someone called across the squad room, "Lopez, line four!"He raised a hand in acknowledgment, then closed his eyesand rubbed his forehead as if it ached. Well, he had banged itrather hard against the desk. "One hour," he said firmly. "No,one hour. Please." He grinned after a moment and said, "I almost love you right now." Then he hung up and said to me,"I'm sorry, miss, I'll be with you in a minute." He hit anotherphone line and said, "Detective Lopez."

It was clear from his expression a moment later that the callwas personal. "Hi. Uh-huh... What?" His expression darkened. Turning away from me, he said, "No, I can't."

Though I could tell he didn't remember me, he had certainlymade a memorable impression on the cast of Sorcerer!...