Chapter 13: The Urn

I couldn't stop looking at the dent in the lid.

I was standing beside Bettina on the church steps when the funeral man dropped it.

She screamed louder than anyone that day.

"Resign," I said. "That's the price?"

"Such an ugly word." Bettina smiled. "Step aside. Let the show open without all this drama."

"And Lenore?"

"Lenore gets her part back once you're gone. Your little church girl won't survive the critics."

My mother's bracelet slid down her wrist again. The tiny gold mask clicked against the brass.

"No," I said.

She tilted her head.

"No," I said again. "I'm not resigning. Not for him. Not for anything you've got."

"Three years, Cleo. You've begged me for three years."

"I know how long it's been."

"Then I'll put him back on the mantel." She patted the lid. "He likes it there. He's next to the clock."

"Dad called his last cue on that rail," I said. "He'd tell me to call the show."

She stepped closer. Her perfume was the same one she wore to his funeral.

"I have my pass now, sweetheart," she said softly. "Every floor of your building. I'll be seeing you."

She walked to a black car idling at the mouth of the alley.

The driver held the door.

She got in with my father on her lap, and the car turned onto 46th Street.

Ward was still up when I got to Bank Street.

He was at the kitchen table in his reading glasses with a cold cup of tea and the opening-night seating chart.

He took one look at me and pushed the chart away.

"Bettina," he said.

"How did you know?"

"You only look like that about her."

I sat down across from him and told him.

He listened, without moving.

"Tell me about him," he said when I was done. "Not the rail. I know the rail."

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