Gene Wolfe - An Evil Guest

“If I get any fatter that grass skirt’s going to slide down to my knees. Live and onstage.”

India muttered, “We should all be that fat. You can’t go much over a hundred pounds.”

“I don’t know. I’m afraid to get on a scale. I kind of liked the blond one.”

India shook her head.

Ebony said, “The thing is, Cassie — India explained it to me. We need somebody who will make you look as good as possible. That doesn’t mean somebody who’s as good as you are, which we couldn’t get anyway. It means somebody who’s pretty good, but in a mix-and-match way. You’re female. Very, very female, but in an energetic sort of hoydenish tomboy style. He ought to be a supercharged bad boy, and very male. Isn’t that right, India?”

“Exactly. That kind of a tenor, who can act a little and dance a little, too. The blond guy you liked was a scarecrow. A good scarecrow but a scarecrow, and that’s not what we need. Dean’s just bad. Male, but a second-rate tenor and a third-rate dancer. Donny Duke can dance the paper off the wall, but he’s not male and he can’t sing for shit.”

“So what are you going to do?” Cassie asked.

“Keep looking. That’s all I can do. I’ve buzzed all the agencies.” India heaved a sigh that bid fair to blow the chrome napkin-holder off the table. “If it gets any worse, I’ll put an ad in the paper.”

As he set her coffee in front of her, the counterman said, “There was a guy in here earlier. I bet he could do it.”

“Send him over,” India told him. “It couldn’t hurt.”

Ebony tittered, and pretended she had not when India glared at her.

A stocky man in a Delft sack suit was chatting with the desk clerk when Cassie got to her hotel. He followed her to the elevator and flipped open a badge case as soon as the doors had closed. “I talked to you on the phone, ma’am. Remember? I’m Agent Martin of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.”

“The show won’t start for another hour, Miss Casey.”

“You’re here.” Cassie was staring out the dressing room’s small and dirty window.

“I always come to the theater early, Miss Casey, to make sure everything’s all right before you put it on.”

“That’s good.”

“What’s troubling you, Miss Casey?”

Cassie pointed. “See that phone? I’m waiting for it to ring.”

“Really, Miss Casey?”

“Yes, Margaret. Really.” Cassie took a deep breath. “Margaret, I’m going to tell you something that I’m not going to tell India. I left a note for her, and I left a note for what’s his name? The stage manager?”

“Mickey, Miss Casey. Mickey Urbani.”

“I left a note for him to send India in here as soon as she came in. Remember the man in the gray suit? He was waiting in my dressing room last night.”

“Yes, I do, Miss Casey.”

“This phone rang while he was in here. I didn’t want to spill the beans, so I pretended it was Norma Peiper. It was really Gideon Chase. This is confidential, Margaret. Don’t repeat it to anybody.”

Margaret was opening her sewing kit. “I understand, Miss Casey. I won’t.”

“So he’s still alive, and I want — I want to see him again.”

“Yes, Miss Casey.”

“I want to help him if I can, even though I don’t know what I can do. I’ve been waiting for him to call.” Cassie paused. “I just thought of something, Margaret.”

Margaret nodded while biting a thread.

“How did he get the number? They have directories for these old-fashioned land lines, but I doubt that this one’s in there. The only number for this theater is probably the box office.”

“I can look, Miss Casey.”

“Do that, whenever you have time. Well, anyway, I’m going to tell India about the tall man in the gray suit and another man. You’ll probably hear all that, but I’m not going to tell her about Dr. Chase.”

Later, onstage, Aunt Jane sang.

Cassie, standing in the wings beside Vincent Palma, whispered, “Where the heck is India?”

Palma only shrugged.

A few minutes after that, when they were deep in the second dream scene, Cassie glimpsed India in the wings — and a familiar face next to hers. They were gone by the time the scene was over, and Margaret was there instead.

A small folding screen shielded Cassie from prurient eyes while she exchanged her faux-grass skirt and flowered bra for Mariah’s ankle-length white cotton nightgown. “I saw Zelda, Margaret. She was standing here with India, so something’s up. Do you know what’s going on?”

Margaret shook her head. “I don’t, Miss Casey. They went into your dressing room. Miss Dempster has a key. I told them they shouldn’t, but they said they’d leave if you didn’t want them in there. Shall I tell them to go?”

“If necessary — how’s my hair?”

“Beautiful, Miss Casey. Only I really ought to braid it.”

“Over my dead body.”

At which point Cassie had to sneak onto the darkened stage and into bed.

IN her dressing room after the show, she leveled fingers like pistols at her visitors. “I told Margaret that I’d drive you two out with a stick if I had to. I might do it, too, but not before Zelda tells me what made her take a hundred-mile drive.”

“I hopped.”

“Well lah-de-dah!”

“You’re down for two percent of the gross, Cassie, and I’m down for ten percent of you. I get two-tenths of one percent of everything this show brings in. I’ve got a cute little pink hopper now with three years to pay, and I don’t think they’re going to be repossessing it.”

India announced, “We’ve been negotiating a recording contract for you, Cassie. I represented Wally — he owns the songs. Zelda represented you.”

“It doesn’t mean a darned thing...” Cassie’s voice was muffled as she struggled out of her green gingham gown. “Unless I sign it.”

“ Until you sign it,” Zelda said firmly. “You will. Wait ’til you see it. For one or two mornings’ work.”

“I sleep in the morning.” Cassie switched on her fan.

“Ten to one, maybe. We can work that out with the studio.”

“I get up at eleven, don’t I, Margaret?”

When the contract had been signed and Zelda had left for her hotel, Cassie said, “I meant to talk to you about the FBI. I said I would, and I want to. But darn it, I need tea. I want to sit down and breathe and drink tea. Cookies, too. Gingersnaps or something. Only we can’t talk about this in a restaurant.”

“That stuff,” India said firmly, “is what assistant directors are for.” She got out her cell phone and gave orders.

“There was a man in here who said he was from the FBI,” Cassie began. “I’d gotten a call from the FBI, from an Agent Martin.” She recounted both conversations.

“This guy wasn’t for real?”

“No. He said he was from the FBI. He showed me his badge and everything, and he was carrying handcuffs.”

“He had a gun, too,” Margaret added softly.

“I didn’t see it, but he probably did. He said he was Agent Martin and he was looking for Gideon Chase. He gave me his card. Wait a minute.”

Margaret handed Cassie her purse.

“Are you sweet on this Chase?” India asked. “There was something in the paper about you two.”

“No! He’s just a friend.”

“Right.” India sighed. “Got it. Come to think of it, you’re supposed to be sweet on Wally.”

“I’m not!”

“One word, Cassie. Diamonds.”

Cassie looked up. “What’s that supposed to mean?”