The Shakespeare Murders
Chapter One
This day was not going well for Tobias Blackwell. His parents had discouraged Toby from doing what he loved best, acting. They had wanted him to "do something worthwhile with his life" like become a lawyer. Instead he chose the path of the stage actor. Although his parents disapproved of his decision, they could not refuse their only son. This particular morning they had tried to reason with him one last time. Toby had seen a flier for Shakespeare's Hamlet at school and had made up his mind that he would audition. He had shaken off his mother and father's pleas to reconsider and set off for William Bard High in the blackest of moods. Unfortunately, the morning got increasingly worse as it went along. His teachers picked on him more than usual, the school jocks stole his lunch, and to top it all off, the prettiest girl in Bard High, Marie LeBlanc, had rejected him in front of the whole class. She had laughed in his face, telling him he was too silly and weird for her taste. Toby would have just called it a day and stormed off home to mope around, if it had not been for that audition. His mood lifting fractionally, Toby hurried toward the shadowy building at the rear of the campus that served as Bard High's Theater and Drama Club HQ. He pushed open the big front door and stepped inside, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the semi-darkness. When they finally adjusted, he looked down at the stage, seeing the figures seated in front of it and in the wings. He took a deep breath and released it, walking down to the stage like a prisoner to the gallows. I chose to do this and I'm going to go through with it if it kills me. "Hey! You! Get yer sorry self down here if yer gonna audition!" Toby jumped and practically ran down to the stage. The speaker, a large, jowly and red-faced man, glared at him, sitting at a table in front of the stage with another man and a woman. "Are you doin' this or not?" "Yes, sir, I am." "Then git yer bum up there and do it!" Toby swallowed and climbed up onto the stage. He could see other students off in the wings, whispering to each other. About how ridiculous he looked, no doubt. "BOY!" Toby jumped and realized he had been staring into the wings. "Sorry, sir." The jowly man sighed in exasperation."What part are you auditioning fer, eh?" Toby mumbled something incoherent. "What was that? Speak up boy!" "I said, um Hamlet." The man stared at Toby for a second and then started laughing. "You? Skinny and jumpy? Alright boy, let's see you make a fool out of yerself." Toby looked out at the empty theater and swallowed. "Just remember to breath, m'boy." The other man had said this. He was a tall and thin man with a salt-and-pepper goatee, smiling good-humoredly up at Toby. "If it helps, you can just not look at us." The speaker was the woman seated at the table. She had chin-length grey hair and rectangular glasses, looking every inch a kindly librarian. For some reason, Toby relaxed when he heard her low musical voice. He smiled grimly and started his monologue,
"O, that this too sullied flesh would melt, Thaw and resolve itself into a dew
Toby relaxed completely and his vice got stronger and more confidant.
Or that the Everlasting had not fixed His canon 'gainst self slaughter. O God, God! How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable Seem to me all the uses of this world! Fie on't, ah, fie, 'tis an unweeded garden That grows to seed. Things rank and gross in nature Possess it merely. That it should come to this, But two months dead, nay, not so much, not two, So excellent a king, that was to this Hyperion to a satyr, so loving to my mother That he might not beteem the winds of heaven Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth, Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him As if increase of appetite had grown By what it fed on, and yet within a month -- Let me not think on't; frailty, thy name is woman -- A little month, or ere those shoes were old With which she followed my poor father's body Like Niobe, all tears, why she, even she -- O God, a beast that wants discourse of reason Would have mourned longer -- married with my uncle, My father's brother, but no more like my father Than I to Hercules. Within a month, Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears Had left the flushing of her gallèd eyes, She married. O, most wicked speed, to post With such dexterity to incestuous sheets! It is not nor it cannot come to good. But break my heart, for I must hold my tongue.
There was dead silence in the theater. Toby cautiously looked at the table. The red-faced man was staring at him with him mouth hanging open. The woman was beaming at him, and her companion to the right was looking at him with admiration and tears in his eyes. The jowly man shut his mouth and grinned up at Toby. "That….wasn't too bad, boy." The tall and lean man smiled and said quietly, "Well done. Well done, indeed." The woman looked at her companions. "Well, my friends? What say we give him the part?" "Yeah, I guess he's the best we're gonna get." "Aye. He was the best." The woman smiled up at Toby. "Well,dear, I think that means you got the part!" Toby's pulse started to race. I got it? I actually got it? "You can close yer mouth now, boy" The red-faced man was grinning. "I'm Mr. Costas, the stage manager. This is Philomela and Gerald Grafton, the co-directors." Philomela waved. "Call me 'Mela, darling. Call him Gerry.", gesturing to her husband. Gerry grinned at Toby. "Go on in the back, lad, and find Liv, our costume designer. She'll get you all measured up and suited out." Toby nodded. "Thank you. I….thank you." Mr. Costas waved him off. "Git on with yeh, boy." Toby ran toward the wings. People he passed congratulated him and pounded him on the back. "That was awesome, dude!" "Wow, you were really good." "Great job!" Toby was elated. Finally, something had gone right. He kept jogging along, until he bumped into someone. "Sorry, didn't see…..you." He had just ran into Theo Mordain, the creepiest guy at Bard High. The sallow-faced senior glared at Toby, then stalked off, his longish brown-black hair curtaining his face. Jeez….What the hell is his problem? Toby shook his head. His happy mood deflated just slightly, he set off to find this Liv person, the costume designer.