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“It wasn’t like that when I was dancing,” Emma said.<br />
“How would you know? Your eyes were closed.”<br />
“Not the whole time,” she said irritably, starting toward the rope. “I was looking up at the<br />
performance level for most of the lesson. I know what was in every corner.”<br />
“Leave it be,” Tom said. “You might bring a full model of a ship crashing down upon your<br />
head.”<br />
But Emma was already in the corner, looking up, frowning at a wad of fabric wedged near the<br />
top of the stage set. It appeared to be a rolled flag, evidently meant to be unfurled when the rope was<br />
cut, but there was more there too, something else crammed beneath the shape of the hull. “Do you<br />
have a knife?”<br />
“What are you talking about? We can’t go cutting up theatrical props because something<br />
doesn’t seem right to you.”<br />
“I swear to you that someone has altered this set.”<br />
“Look, Emma,” Tom said, his voice lower and kinder, “you’re rattled. We both are, and the<br />
others as well. We’ve all traveled a great distance with little preparation and come to such a<br />
different sort of place. Even Trevor has been set on edge. And now this day…this day in itself has<br />
been quite extraordinary.”<br />
“If you don’t have a knife, we’ll have to pull it,” she said. If she went up the steps to the very<br />
top, if she stood on one of the seats… She would still be at least four inches too low. She looked at<br />
Tom expectantly.<br />
“Very well,” he said, stepping onto one of the chairs and indicating with a turn of his hand that<br />
she should move closer to the wall. “But I will pull it, certainly not cut it, so that you can behold your<br />
flag and then we shall depart this bizarre place and go take a rest. I really think that the sight upstairs<br />
–“<br />
A single yank was enough. With the sound of an exhalation, an enormous Russian flag was<br />
released. It unfurled towards Tom and Emma’s upturned faces and, halfway through the process,<br />
released the dead body of Cynthia Kirby. She dropped past them and then began to roll down the<br />
steps, her head bouncing cruelly with every increment of her descent until she at last came to rest on<br />
the edge of the dance floor, sprawled with comic gusto beneath the great lights. She was dressed as<br />
the king of the gypsies.
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