A Play Demonic (The Queen's Idle Fancy)

Part 10--A Play Demonic (The Queen's Idle Fancy)

By Thursday evening, most residents of Fidalgo Island concerned themselves with getting through the day. They looked forward to the weekend. Each morning, Roger had clocked in at the ferry terminal booth and sold tickets to Orcas Island and Friday Harbor, smiling at all the locals and tourists alike (fewer these gray storm-clouded days, but the crowds came and went all the same). 

Morton and Sally, twined in a pact of secrecy, met each evening in the late midnight hour, mated roughly, silently, under the eaves, the pocking sound of raindrops on Sally’s metal roof accompanying their lust. They both went to work raw. Thursday morning, someone asked Sally why she was limping, and her face grew red as she lied and then walked away as if under a spell. 

Even without the play in hand, Martin Belloon spent his nights reciting memorized portions of the play, acting out scenes with his wife, who grew more and more worried with each passing moment since she couldn’t remember the dialogue very well and didn’t know why, or how, her husband seemed to have the entire play juggling around in his head after only a few readings. Finally, grown weary, she’d say, “I’m not one of your actresses. Stop this!” 

“Discipline, a clear mind, serenity on the inside. No one should ever be aware of the human inside, the actor simply acting, especially while up on stage . . . your disbelief must be corrected,” Martin Belloon said before dragging Carole to their marriage bed, and handcuffing her to the bedpost (after a quick google search, the cuffs had arrived by FedEx Priority Overnight from a reliable online business). He’d wipe off all of her makeup with one of the pricier white towels, and then viciously have his way with her—she no longer protested anything he suggested.

Many other denizens of Fidalgo Island fed their kids dinner, chatted with friends about the rainy days stacking up, the weathermen proclaiming no sky clearance in the near future—think we’ll break a record for wettest November this year?—picked apart the arguments made by talking heads on the local and national news, and, usually, with more than a bit of disgust, changed the channel over to a game show, where they could play along, one second behind, thinking: I knew that. On the island with over sixteen thousand residents, only a miniscule portion of them had anything to do with the theater, had direct contact as a volunteer, an actor, actress, stage hand, costumer, ticket seller, enthusiast. All the better for Mr. Frederick Waltzcrop, who’d been away most of the week (he could travel far on one of his walkabouts), leaving preliminary duties to Camoustra and Frenalto, keeping Gerald Pommeroy busy in his home. Planning. Earlier in the morning, during a lull in the rainfall, they made Gerald dress down to his saggy boxers and stand out on his front stoop in a thoughtless state, turning in circles, and Camoustra, after several neighbors passed by in cars, gawking, or walked down the sidewalks with their dogs, umbrellas shielding them, played her part.

“Uncle! What? What are you doing out here? Come back inside.” Frenalto then appeared and they shrugged their shoulders at the neighbors, told them how sad and diminished Gerald had become, the dementia strengthening, finally steering Gerald back inside behind the castle walls.

“Good chap,” Frenalto said. “You must go rest now.”

Mr. Gerald Pommeroy’s mind had snapped hours, days, ago, and he willingly followed Frenalto’s orders, limping down to his basement air mattress. Camoustra and Frenalto heard him mewling in the darkness, and they laughed together.

“Next time you’re passing by, Sweetie-Darling, mind closing that door?” Frenalto shuffled, a Charlie-Chaplinesque jester, over to shut the basement door with a wide grin. He’d been pleasing Camoustra for so long now, it was second nature.

“Do you think we should check in with Kate? She’s so energized.”

“Soon. Maybe this weekend. After she’s read the play. Don’t let your impatience get the best of you. We have plenty of time. And there are others, many others, to visit.”