Midsummer Mayhem Read online

  Here come the lovers, full of joy and mirth.

  5.1.28

  Chapter 4

  Penelope hurried off, and Pru continued to the corner and turned right into a long, wide green corridor formed from the yew—the theater lawn lay on the other side of it—and a wall of hornbeam to her left. Golden ivy, trained into five-foot-high cones, ran up the middle at evenly spaced intervals, apart from a gap about halfway along, where stood a flat stone with a bronze plaque at its base that read: HERE LIES RICHARD III, BEST FRIEND AND MOST EXCELLENT BIRD DOG.

  Pru’s journey was a slow one, ensnared as she was by garden rooms she longed to explore. She stepped into the orchard but leaned out again as movement caught her eye from the direction she’d just come. It must be one of the actors, already arriving. She’d continue up to the stage, but the drone of bees drew her back into the orchard.

  The trees—about two dozen of them dotted with clusters of small green apples—were ringed like an Elizabethan collar by a thick border of blue flowers that curled at the top like a fern frond. Phacelia, the bee plant, an excellent aid in pollination of fruit trees.

  Nothing stirred in the green corridor, and so Pru put her nose in the rose garden. All the shrubs were underplanted with hardy geranium, and there were no signs of trampling in the borders, as Jeremy had accused the company. Perhaps the mere presence of other people had set him off.

  She’d just walked into the dahlia courtyard when she heard giggling and the rustling of leaves. She peeked cautiously round the corner to see a man and woman dashing across the corridor between the yew and the hornbeam—he, tall and well built with a shock of dark blond hair, and she, short with golden curls. At the carved stone monument, she grabbed his hand, threw herself back onto the surface, and pulled him to her. He flung his leather satchel to the ground and kissed her hard as her hands went to the zipper of his trousers and his hands slid up her bare thighs, pushing the hem of her skirt up to her hips and beyond. Pru leapt back and turned away, her face blazing.

  “Lysander!”

  The deep voice bellowed throughout the landscape. Pru heard the nearby couple curse, and the woman say, “Later—in the stables.”

  Pru kept to her hiding place, wondering if the coast was clear, until she heard voices from the lawn and Penelope say, “No, I haven’t lost her. Pru? Where’ve you gone?”

  She rushed out and up to the corner, turned, and spilled out onto the green stage with a handful of people on the lawn staring up at her. Her voice caught in her throat, but as she hurried down the slope, she managed, “Sorry, I was just…” Just what—playing the Peeping Tom on the other side of the hedge?

  “Here we are now.” Penelope put a hand lightly on Pru’s back to draw her into the center of the group. “Introductions all round. Ambrose Grant, he’s Oberon and Theseus, dual roles.” There was a face Pru recognized.

  “And Hermia, Nell Malone.” Ah, the blonde with the curls.

  “Over there, Lysander, Gabriel Gibb.” Tall, well built, shock of dark blond hair. Not only Hermia’s lover, but he must’ve been the fellow Pru had seen at the end of the corridor.

  “And Puck—our Robin Goodfellow—Les Buchan.” He was about Pru’s age, a few inches shorter with an infectious grin.

  “Here is Demetrius, Will Abbott.” Also tall and well built, but his hair was brown and short.

  “Now, where’s Helena?”

  “Arrived.” A young woman—lithe with milk-chocolate skin and a massive amount of cinnamon-colored hair that fell in tight waves to her shoulders—strolled up and smiled. “Morning, all. Sorry I’m late.” Her words may have been meant for all present, but her eyes were on Lysander.

  “Good—here is Anna Hutton, Helena.”

  Too many names, Pru thought. How would she ever remember them? Would she be expected to?

  “And here he is”—the stage manager paused for a moment—“our director, Max Stirling. Everyone, Pru Parke, set decorator.”

  Max Stirling was a tall and solidly built man who might’ve been in his mid-seventies, with a craggy face and thick, swept-back silver hair. He wore a linen jacket, comfortably wrinkled, and a light scarf, one end thrown over his shoulder, and glasses hanging from a black lanyard. Pru wouldn’t’ve been surprised if he’d been wearing a beret.

  “Hello, pleased to meet you,” she said to the director, matching his firm grip when they shook hands. “Pleased to meet you all. I’m very happy to be here.”

  Everyone in the group offered a smile and a “how do you do.” Lysander’s smile was slow as his languid gaze drifted down Pru’s body and up again—not quite level with her eyes.

  “Pru.” Max seemed to be testing her name as he kept hold of her hand. She heard a light accent and remembered from her online research he’d come from Russia as a young man. “I think you are not a Prudence.”

  She blushed pink. “No, I’m not.”

  “Ah,” Max said, one eyebrow raised, “I knew it. You are Prunella.”

  Pink deepened to red. “Yes, but I go by Pru.”

  He dropped her hand and swept his arm across the set. “Your task here, Prunella, is a great one. It is you who has the ability to inform, influence, and inspire not only our audiences, but also the cast. Your work is as important as any word spoken on the stage.”

  The group watched her in silence, and Pru wished she could crawl away behind the hedge and hide. “Well, I’ll certainly do what I can,” she offered.

  “For one of your skill,” Max said, “I expect nothing less than perfection. Now, you must get a sense of the place as it will be, so please do not let us disturb you as we run through a few scenes.”

  Pru shook her head. “No, of course not. That is, yes—thank you.”

  “Demetrius,” Max said, “we begin with I love thee not. Helena, places. I want to reblock this scene. Oberon, Puck, don’t go far. Lysander, Hermia, I’ll want you later.”

  “Right,” Hermia said, her blond curls bobbing. “I’ll put the kettle on, shall I?”

  * * *

  —

  Penelope unfolded two camp chairs, and Max took a seat in one, while Oberon and Puck set up a small awning over him. Actors—both men and women—had piled their bags, rucksacks, and satchels on the ground next to Penelope, forming a cluttered pyramid. Pru saw Lysander trail after Hermia as she left for the gardener’s cottage, but no one else took notice—apart from Helena, who gave them a backward glance as she tossed her hair over her shoulder. The director got to work, and Pru stood behind him on the lawn, drawing a rough sketch of the stage area.

  The actors had spoken only a few lines before Max cut in. “Keep her at arm’s length, Demetrius. Mock her—Do I entice you? And, Helena, you are his spaniel—his words hurt, but do not deter.”

  The scene resumed, but not for long.

  “Prunella!” Max thundered, and she hurried forward. “Something tall, round, and soft here, downstage left, but with room for Demetrius and Helena to run round as she pursues him.”

  “Max,” Ambrose broke in. “After my line I am invisible—isn’t that where you placed me?”

  Pru understood most of these directions, because for the week leading up to this first visit to the set, she had studied A Midsummer Night’s Dream as if she were cramming for a final exam, watching two different movie versions, poring over a modern analysis of the play, and reading the entire script through three times.

  “Prunella,” Max said, “we’ll need two—place one upstage for Oberon.”

  “Two, tall, soft, round,” she said as she scribbled.

  “And while we’re stopped,” Max continued, “it’s there, downstage right, where I see Titania’s bower—full, lush, verdant. But no flowers on our set—only the many shades of greens, and the red, gold, and silver we find in leaves.”

  “No flowers,” Pru repeated as she made the note.
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  “Apart from that suggestion, everything is entirely up to you.”

  * * *

  —

  Nothing, Pru discovered, was entirely up to her. Max had a clear vision and—along with giving Demetrius and Helena direction—he took every opportunity to impart to Pru his ideas for the living scenery. He decided to move Oberon to stand behind a tall, narrow plant—“Do you have something that resembles a Greek column? It could be used in Theseus’s court as well.” And wanted her to thread lavender ribbon through the bed of thyme for a bit of color. She rather liked that idea, but would now have to find the nearest fabric shop. But she couldn’t fault him for knowing what he wanted—he was, after all, the director, and she wasn’t creating a real garden, only a make-believe fairy woodland.

  An hour later, and just as Lysander and Hermia rejoined the group—appearing from different sides of the stage—Max called lunch. “And after that, Prunella, we’ll discuss what we might need for Oberon and Puck.”

  Everyone departed for the cottage, except for Penelope, who stayed behind writing in her fat three-ring binder.

  “Penny!” Max called back to her. “Come along.”

  Penelope stood, shut the binder. “Yes, on my way.”

  Ambrose joined Pru walking across the lawn. “She hates being called Penny,” he said quietly. “After all—Penny Farthing. And I suspect you aren’t that fond of Prunella.”

  Pru shrugged. “I don’t mind—although my mother was the only one to call me that, and when I hear it, I can’t help but think I’m in trouble.”

  “Have you done set design before?” Ambrose asked.

  “Set design? No, I’m a gardener. I agreed to provide plants, that’s all. Mr. Stirling doesn’t think I’m a set designer, does he?”

  “What Max thinks and what he wants you to think he thinks—those can be two very different things.”

  “Have you worked with him before?”

  Ambrose smiled. “God, yes. He gave me my first break—cast me as Hamlet in a production he was doing in Bath. He’d set the play in the Regency period and made it a play-within-a-play, as it were. As if Jane Austen were putting it on.”

  “My,” was all Pru could think to reply. Ambrose as the young Dane must’ve been several decades earlier. Although he was still a good-looking man now, with hazel eyes and an animated face that reflected the passing years—no Botox jabs there. His hair—a great mop of rusty brown with a smattering of silver—dipped over his forehead on one side but couldn’t quite disguise the receding hairline.

  * * *

  —

  The gardener’s cottage, the stables, and a shed formed three sides of a gravel yard, and beyond the stables, the light shimmered through a copse of river birches with peeling reddish-brown bark. Pru snapped a quick photo and one of a pyracantha espaliered against the cottage wall in a crisscross fashion called a Belgian fence. The shrub was in full bloom—its musky scent hung heavy in the air, and the small white flowers thrummed with bees.

  In the cottage, Penelope and Hermia set out sandwiches and drinks, and the cast surged forward. Pru paused inside the door and sent Evelyn a text: Will stay for afternoon rehearsal. Back later, and then scanned her surroundings. Kitchen, bedroom through one door, bathroom beyond. Through a door off the sitting room she saw a smaller, dimly lit space that held a desk and empty bookshelves.

  When Penelope saw Pru hanging back, she waved her up to the food. “Plenty for all.”

  Three sandwiches were left—one prawn cocktail and two cheese-and-pickle. Pru picked up one of the latter just as Lysander came up to the counter and, facing her, leaned in for full-body contact to choose the same sandwich. As he wrapped his hand over hers, his voice was low in her ear. “We seem to have the same tastes.”

  Pru stepped back. Releasing the sandwich and shaking off Lysander’s hand, she said, “Good thing there are two of them.” She picked up the other cheese-and-pickle and moved off to the sofa, catching Helena quickly look away from the exchange. When Pru glanced back over her shoulder, she saw Lysander take the prawn cocktail sandwich instead. Cheeky.

  During lunch, Max and Ambrose chatted at the kitchen table, and Lysander engaged Demetrius in a heated argument about a recent cricket match, while Hermia and Helena perched next to each other on a window seat and remained silent. Puck—oh dear, Pru thought, she’d already forgotten everyone’s real name—leaned against the counter watching the two young men as if he might have an opinion about cricket, but instead he dropped onto the footstool next to Pru and asked about a rambling rose in his garden that refused to bloom.

  * * *

  —

  As if an inner alarm had gone off, everyone rose at the same time and returned to the theater lawn.

  “Lysander, Hermia,” Max called. “How now, my love. Up you go.”

  The scene began, and Pru took up a post in the middle of the lawn—well behind the director and stage manager—and listened while she conjured visions of her decorated set and remained on alert for Max’s next suggestion.

  “Ay me! For…line!” Lysander called.

  “For aught that I could,” Penelope read out.

  The scene continued.

  “O hell!—to choose love by another’s eyes.”

  Hermia had a clear voice and it carried well, but when Lysander spoke, Pru had to strain to understand, even when the words were familiar.

  “The course of true love never did run smooth—”

  As the actors carried on, Max walked away from the stage until he stood next to Pru, who opened her notebook and waited for instructions.

  Lysander screwed up his face. “Line!”

  “A good persuasion,” Penelope read.

  “A good persuasion,” Lysander repeated, although faintly.

  “I cannot hear your words,” Max boomed, and Pru flinched.

  Lysander broke with Hermia and took a step to the edge of the grassy stage. “You see, Max, it’s as I said before, I really think I ought to be miked for this.”

  In the moment of silence that followed, Pru saw Penelope look up from the script in her lap, and Oberon and Puck, waiting offstage, suspend their quiet conversation. Demetrius, stretched out on the grass, grinned, and Helena covered a smile.

  “Are you a pop star?” Max asked in a voice that was quiet yet magnified. Pru wanted to take a step or two away, but she dared not.

  Lysander swallowed. “It’s only that—”

  “No, you are not.” The quiet voice began to grow. “And neither are you a weak television personality who is babied by electronic amplification and cannot speak above a whisper. You”—the sound reverberated against the yew hedges—“are a stage actor, and as such you will learn to project!”

  “I’ll lose my voice!” Lysander shouted.

  “Not if you have the sense to do it correctly,” Max countered. “Oberon! You will teach the young pup what it is to be an actor.”

  “I don’t need to take lessons from him,” Lysander complained.

  “You do if you want to keep this role.”

  …Reason and love keep little

  company together nowadays

  3.1.136–37

  Chapter 5

  Afternoon tea break took just long enough for a cuppa and an Eccles cake, and they were back at it—Oberon and Puck scheming to trick Titania and the lovers. Pru enjoyed watching the two men—obviously veterans of the stage, they were easy in their movements and willing to take direction from Max. At one pause, the director asked Puck to climb up the platforms to the top as quickly as he could, “jump, frolic, bound.”

  Puck put his hands on his hips. “I’m no longer twenty, Max,” he called and then smiled. “But I’ll see what I can do.”

  When Oberon asked, “Has thou the flower there?” Max interrupted.

  “Prunella! Here is where we wi
ll need a flower—something easily seen. A bright color, a long stem. Nothing too gaudy. Not an iris, not a rose. Perhaps clusters of small flowers. A yellow—or red?”

  “Yes, of course,” she mumbled as she scribbled, but then repeated her answer louder in case he thought to tell her she needed lessons in how to project.

  Rehearsal wrapped up at five o’clock with notes, and although Pru had not been the one to bound up the multiplatformed structure, she certainly felt as if she’d accompanied Puck many times over.

  “Penny,” Max said after giving the actors his comments, “do we have anything for Prunella?”

  Pru steeled herself. She already had a dozen sketches and five pages of dense writing—mostly Max’s “suggestions”—and this was only her first day.

  “Nothing else,” Penelope replied.

  “Well, then, esteemed set decorator”—Pru thought she detected a twinkle in those dark eyes—“we begin tomorrow, late morning. The crew will be in to do a bit of work early on, and we want to stay out of their way.”

  “Tomorrow afternoon we’ll have the fairies,” Penelope called out as the company gathered bags and made to leave.

  “That’s grand.” Puck grinned at Pru. “Means ice lollies for our tea break.”

  They walked out as a group, but just short of the gate, Helena stopped.

  “Oh, wait—I’m on the rota to clean the kitchen today. You all go on, and I’ll close the gate when I leave.”

  Lysander strolled back and ran a finger up her bare arm. “Can’t have you scrubbing the floors on your own. I’ll help.”

  “There’s no need for you to stay with her.” Hermia’s voice had a tinny ring to it. “I’ll do it.”

  A slow half-smile grew on Helena’s face. “Not your afternoon, is it?”

  Hermia’s blond curls trembled, and without another word, she pivoted and stomped away.