Reign (52 page)

And then he turned and left the stage, leaving Dennis with the knowledge that he was in a dream, for Richard had been dead for fifteen years, beaten to death by a burglar.

In reality, Dennis would have known his lines, his lyrics, his movements, but in the dream, and knowing that it was a dream, he did not. That knowledge did nothing, however, to lessen his panic. All he knew beyond the fact of the dream was that he did not know. He heard the music begin, and remembered dimly that the song was called "A Land Where We Can Love," but could recall none of the lyrics, did not remember how the song began, where he should be on the stage.

The introduction seemed to bubble on forever, pushing him closer to that moment when he would be expected to open his mouth and sing, and in desperation he crossed the stage, slapping his hands behind his back, wondering if he was past the point in the show where that gesture was first used. Striding to the stage right curtains he peered into the wings in hopes of seeing the prompter, but saw not even the dim light that guided the actors off stage. There was nothing there but darkness, a thick, inky blackness that seemed even more terrible than his fate were he to remain on stage until the time came for him to sing the song he did not know.

The introduction was finally coming to its end, and Dennis turned back toward the audience, his dream-self trembling. The upbeat was coming, and he opened his mouth, thinking that perhaps if he just began to sing, the right words would come out. After all, he had sung them thousands of times, they should, damn it, be there. They were not. The accompaniment of the unseen orchestra below him in the pit droned on, and he stood there, his mouth opening and closing, no words coming out, no song filling the air. The music got softer and softer, making his failure all the more obvious. What must they think of him? he wondered. They must think him a fool. And then, as if in universal agreement, they started to laugh.

Dennis recognized the laughter. It was the laughter of thousands laughing with one voice.

And the voice was that of the Emperor.

Then all the stage lights exploded into brightness, and in their glow Dennis saw row upon row of Dennis
Hamiltons
, of Emperors, of himself and of the beast, going back and out and up into the air, and the rows had no end, the theatre had no ceiling, and the world was girdled with images of himself, images with madness in their eyes, madness that seeped into his soul even as they stole that same soul away.

He woke up sweating, his stomach a churning pit of fire, his spine a rope of ice, and remembered waking up next to Robin after the other nightmares. But he wasn't next to Robin now. He was next to Ann, and the sounds of his awakening had not pierced the armor of her sleep. He listened to her breathing softly in the dark, the sound coming around the edges of the pounding of his own heart.

He thought he must have woken up quietly then, without a cry or a sudden motion. Of course. A cry would have taken emotion, wouldn't it? And though he felt it, it seemed as though his days of expressing it were far behind.

Lying in bed then, after the nightmare, he decided to call Ally
Terrazin
. She was the only person he knew who was serious about what the rest of his friends and acquaintances had regarded as silly. Perhaps, he thought, smiling inwardly as his self-perceived foolishness,
Ranthu
or
Ramcharger
, or whatever that damn thing's name was, could help. Dennis's skepticism toward the occult had taken a terrific beating.

He called her the next day at the lunch break, hoping she would be up by nine o'clock Pacific time. She was.

"Hello, Ally?"

"Dennis? Is that you?" Ally sounded, Dennis thought, just as perky and bouncy and unrelievedly west coast as she always did.

"Yes."

"God, how
are
you?"

"I'm . . . all right."

"Dennis, I'm so sorry about everything. I sent you cards, did you get them?"

He didn't know whether he had or not. "Yes. Thank you."

"I would've written, but I had two films back to back, just finished the second one. It shot in Spain. So how
are
you?" she asked for the second time.

"Fine, Ally. Listen, I wonder if you could give me some help."

"Sure. Oh, hey, I can't come to your show, though. I start another movie on the 24th, isn't that great?"

"I'm glad to hear you're keeping busy. But look, you remember when we talked about . . . was it
Ranthu
? The night . . . Tommy
Werton
was killed?"

"
Ranthu
, yeah?"

"Well, I might have a job for . . .
Ranthu
. I want him to find out if, well, if there's anything in the theatre when we go back next week."

"Anything. What, you mean like a presence? Like energy?"

"Yes. I guess so."

"Well, that's really not something that
Ranthu
handles. I mean you need like a psychic for that. And Bob — he's
Ranthu's
channeler
— he doesn't really do that sort of thing. I think you'd want somebody like
Bebe
Gonsalves
."

"Who's
Bebe
Gonsalves
?"

"Just the best damn psychic in L.A. You want her number?"

"You know her?"

"Oh yeah."

"Are you busy next week?"

"No, why?"

"Would you be willing to bring her to the theatre? Saturday's our last day of rehearsal here before we go back to Kirkland. I could meet you at the theatre on Sunday before rehearsals start down there. Could you fly Ms.
Gonsalves
out here and stay with her? I'll pay you all expenses plus whatever you want."

"Expenses are fine, but I'll come just to see you again. Besides, you're gonna pay through the nose for
Bebe
. She doesn't come cheap." She paused for a moment. "Dennis, what is it? What do you think is there?"

He lied. "I don't know, Ally. But I've exhausted all human explanations. So maybe there's a supernatural one."

They talked for a while longer, and then hung up. Dennis felt stupid speaking seriously of psychics, and particularly of
Ranthu
, but a year ago he would have felt stupid speaking of doppelgangers. He just didn't want to go back into the theatre blind. He had no idea what the Emperor had in store for him. Would it be stronger now? Or would all human absence from the building have weakened it, perhaps even to the point of nonexistence? Was his inability to act the result of the Emperor's draining away his strength, or was it purely psychological?

They were questions that had to be answered, questions that were plaguing him now even in his sleep. "Inquiring minds want to know," he said softly to himself, then headed back into the studio.

~ * ~

The Kirkland Hotel was barely prepared for the onslaught. Fifty cast members, fifteen crew people, and assorted spouses and lovers began to check in on Saturday evening and continued to do so until after midnight on Sunday. The original thought of lodging them in the Venetian Theatre building had been abandoned, as there was no time to prepare the largely unfurnished rooms and suites for occupancy, and, even if there had been, many of the party were nervous enough about rehearsing and performing in what they held to be, if not cursed, then at least a haunted theatre.

Dennis, Ann, Evan, and Terri drove down together Saturday after the last New York rehearsal. The route to the Kirkland Hotel did not pass the theatre building, for which all four were grateful. It was dark by the time they drove up the winding road to the hotel, a large Victorian hulk of a building that had originally been a sanitarium where David Kirk's mineral water was the main remedy. It sat on a hill overlooking the town, and when Dennis got out of the car he could not help but look down and see the complex that housed the Venetian Theatre. The lamps that lit the parking lot tinted the building with red, so that its dark spine of a roof shone through the evening mist like that of some giant, gleaming beast waiting to come to life, to rise and to strike.

When they entered the hotel, there was a message from Ally
Terrazin
at the front desk. She and
Bebe
Gonsalves
would arrive at the theatre at eleven o'clock the next morning, and hoped Dennis could meet them there. Exhausted and apprehensive, he fell asleep in Ann's arms. If he had dreams, he could not remember them in the morning.

By the time he and Ann had a small room service breakfast and read the Sunday
Times
, it was time to meet Ally and
Bebe
Gonsalves
. On their way through the lobby, they ran into John Steinberg, who asked them where they were off to. When they told him they were going to the theatre, he frowned.

"Do you think that's wise? No one's there yet. The crew doesn't go in until one this afternoon."

"We're meeting someone there, John," said Dennis. "An investigator.”

“Oh. Now a detective. Don't you think you could have told me?"

"It isn't a detective, John. It's . . .” Dennis cleared his throat. "It's a psychic investigator."

John did not respond. He only stood there looking at Dennis, his expression as unreadable as granite. "Psychic," he said at last, then nodded gravely, and continued on his way.

"I've been working with him for months now," Ann said, "and I've never seen that reaction."

"I have. It's meant to imply utter contempt." Dennis smiled in spite of himself. "When someone brings up something which John thinks isn't even worth discussing, since talking about it would mean that he's actually taking it seriously, he merely grunts a repetition, like, 'flying saucers,' or 'séances,' and then walks away." He took Ann's hand and gave it a squeeze. "You see now why I didn't want to tell him about the Emperor without having physical proof to show him. I swear to God, he'd have me committed."

"Maybe we'll have proof," Ann said.

"I hope not," said Dennis, leading her outside. "The thing I'd really like is to have that damned theatre as empty as an
ingenue's
head."

Bebe
Gonsalves
was not at all what Dennis had expected. He had thought to find a short and wide woman bedecked with
eyeblinding
prints and gaudy if authentic jewelry. But the woman who stood next to Ally
Terrazin
under the Venetian Theatre marquee was as striking as any actress he had ever met. It was only when he came near enough to see the thin web of wrinkles in the corners of her eyes that he knew she was, like himself, over forty. She wore a beautifully tailored top coat that was opened to display an even more perfectly cut suit beneath. She looked more like the owner of an upscale cosmetics firm than a psychic. Her hair was the blue-black of dark nights, and her skin a rich olive shade. Her only jewelry consisted of two small diamond earrings that seemed to catch the sun even on such a cloudy day.

Ally introduced
Bebe
Gonsalves
, and Dennis introduced Ann, and together they walked to the theatre door, which he unlocked.

"Your hand is shaking, Mr. Hamilton,"
Bebe
Gonsalves
said. "It is a cold morning."

"I'm afraid I'm a little nervous," Dennis said.

"At what you may find? Or what you may not?"

Now what in the hell
, Dennis thought,
did she mean by that?
At last the recalcitrant lock clicked, and Dennis ushered the others inside.

"Before we proceed,"
Bebe
Gonsalves
said, "I think it would be best if you tell me what it is that you think is here. I know of the things that have happened here, so you need not tell me of them, or if you think that what we are in search of has caused them. Just tell me what you think is here."

Dennis swallowed heavily, then spoke slowly and distinctly, not wanting to be misunderstood. "I don't think there's any name for it. It's a double, in a way. But it's not what they call a doppelganger. It's more like . . . part of me that got away. A bad part. And I need to get it back. Because on its own, away from me, it takes the energy that's stored here . . .” He glanced at Ally.

"The psychic energy," she explained. "From that catharsis thing?”

“I see," said
Bebe
Gonsalves
. "Go on."

"And it . . . and it does bad things with it, with the power. It wants . . . I don't know what the hell it wants — to be me, maybe, to replace me."

"It's real," Ann added. "I've seen it — it and Dennis at the same time.”

“I don't doubt what you say," the psychic told her.

"I went away," Dennis went on, "hoping that being away from me it might grow weak, maybe die. I thought that you might be able to tell,
to
. . . feel something, see if you think there's anything here."

Bebe
Gonsalves
pursed her full lips. "Theatres are difficult. There are so many things, so much activity, that it's hard to pinpoint any one phenomenon. But I'll try. Now. Where is the creature the strongest? Where have you seen it?"

"The stage, I suppose," Dennis said. "On the stage."