Chapter 71

“Where the hell could he be?” George Kiernan muttered, glancing at his watch.

1:51 p.m.

At first he’d been furious and started his note session chewing ass as planned. But soon his fury turned to panic when the minutes ticked by and Bradley Cox still didn’t show. The rest of his cast, including Cindy Smith, had gotten off light. He had bigger fish to fry now, and that son of a bitch Cox was going to get it. Kiernan would have him thrown out of the department unless he was dead, he told the rest of the cast, and sent a pair of assistant stage managers out looking for him.

But now, almost an hour later, the director was sorry he’d said that. Yeah, now George Kiernan was really worried about the kid. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes; he was sweating badly and could hardly keep the script in his hand from shaking as the costumer finished letting out the waistband on Bradley Cox’s pants.

At 1:40 he’d resigned himself that it was going to happen, but only at 1:50 did he actually begin to believe it. The show must go on, he said to himself over and over—but that he should have to go on in the title role of Macbeth? That was something George Kiernan would never have dreamed of in a million years. It wasn’t department policy to employ under-studies—not enough time for rehearsals, and the pool of actors was simply too small to cover even just the big roles adequately. And who wanted to get involved with parents bitching that their kid was entitled to go onstage “at least once” for all his hard work? Besides, George Kiernan couldn’t remember a student in a major role ever missing a performance while he was chair. Sure, things come up once in a while during tech week—but after a show had already opened? After it was too late to adapt and switch people around? Well, that kind of thing just didn’t happen in the Harriot University Department of Theatre and Dance.

But it had happened. And as George Kiernan caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror, he decided then and there that the department’s understudy policy would have to change.

“There’s no one at his apartment,” the stage manager said, rushing into the dressing room out of breath. “The landlord got us in. There were some clothes on the bed, but his cell phone was gone and the dead bolt locks from the outside. His car is gone, too—looks like he just took off.”

“Christ almighty,” Kiernan muttered, his mind spinning. Sure, he thought, Cox was a bit of a snake—a bit of a pussy, too—but just bailing on them after a shaky performance? That didn’t seem right.

“We called the police,” the stage manager continued. “Under the circumstances, they said there’s nothing they can do unless he’s gone for twenty-four hours. And then a family member has to—”

“All right, all right,” Kiernan said. “Tell the cast I’ll be going on for him script-in-hand—no, tell them all to meet me backstage left. I’ll break the news to them myself. Also, notify everybody on headset that I’ll be making a curtain speech before the show begins. When I’m clear, just call everything else as you normally do.”

The stage manager just stood there, frightened.

“Don’t worry,” Kiernan said, winking. “We’ll get through it.”

The stage manager nodded and was off.

Kiernan took another deep breath and asked the costumer if he could have a moment alone. She left, and the director sat down at the dressing table, thumbing absently through the script given to him by Cindy Smith. She’d already written down all of Cox’s blocking in the scenes with Lady Macbeth, and Kiernan figured he could remember the rest of it from his own promptbook, which was too thick, too heavy to carry around onstage.

He studied his face in the mirror—felt his breathing level off and his heart slow down. And when the announcement from the stage manager came over the intercom, the director calmly walked out of Bradley Cox’s dressing room and stood in the wings before his cast like a general.