Unhonored Read Online Free PDF

roared, “and let the comedy begin!”
    Merrick swung around to Ellis’s left, his right hand closing on her upper arm in a viselike grip. On her right, Alicia had locked her arm through Ellis’s. Both of them at once began drawing Ellis through the crowd past the doorway into the green room and toward the orange room beyond. The laughing and excited masked figures around her were moving in that direction, too, forming an inexorable river of flesh and propelling her forward.
    Ellis swallowed hard. The crush of the masked costumes around her made her want to scream but she was determined to learn the rules of the game that everyone else was playing. She glanced at Merrick, trying to ask a question as casually as she could. “What is this comedy about?”
    Merrick gave a lopsided grin. “Truth, Ellis. Truth and the past.”
    Three sets of double doors were open on the far side of the orange room. The crowd was pouring through them into the darkness of the theater beyond.
    Ellis forced herself to take a deep breath. “And who is the principal character in this farce?”
    Merrick bared his teeth again. “Why, you are, of course!”

 
    4
    SHADOW PLAY
    As Ellis was ushered through the theater doors, the gaslights along the walls burst into light, illuminating the room. It was a dreadfully small space for a theater. There were only eight chairs across in each row with no center aisle. Indeed, she half expected there to be pews rather than the chairs, for the space reminded her more of a private chapel on an estate than a proper theater, despite the slanting angle of the floor toward the stage. Fresco panels adorned the arched ceiling depicting characters wearing both tragic and comedic masks in what appeared to be unsettling scenes. One depicted a child in the crib fitted with a mask of a wailing baby while a pair of figures in elegant costumes and masked as crows leaned over the child. Another showed a gate, overgrown with vines, brush and trees to the point of it being nearly completely obscured. A third showed a comically small sailing ship tossed in a storm with the four hapless members of its crew all staring back at her through tragic masks. This last particularly caught her attention as she could make out the smallest figure of a lighthouse far in the background of the image. The edges of each fresco were heavily gilded in gold leaf or possibly paint. The stage at the front was narrow and tall, an arched proscenium filled entirely by a lush, red velvet curtain. The slight, bold thrust of the stage in front of the curtain was rimmed with footlights that illuminated the curtain. A matching set of short stairs gave access to the front of the stage from the aisles on either side of the main floor. There was a small balcony in the back that had already filled in its few seats with the costumed and masked audience. Still others in the balcony stood at its edges and crowded the exits. The revelers from the masquerade who rushed onto the main floor moved down either side, laughing and chattering as they, too, rushed for the few available seats. Despite the press, three chairs remained vacant in the center of the front row. It was toward these that Merrick and Alicia quickly guided Ellis.
    â€œIsn’t this wondrous, Ellis?” Alicia beamed as she guided Ellis toward the center open seat in the front row.
    â€œThat would be one word for it,” Ellis responded, licking her lips.
    â€œWe spared nothing in preparing this for you, Ellis,” Merrick said. “This is our gift to you for all you’ve done for us.”
    Ellis merely smiled politely as she sat down, the clown costume rustling slightly. She reminded herself to keep breathing.
    A figure in the caricature of a French officer’s uniform strutted onto the stage from the wings. He wore an oversized bicorne hat and a smiling mask of pallid blue with red streaks coming from the eye sockets that gave the