I could a tale unfold - 27

Ross continued reading the journal.

Life was just as I could have hoped, despite the still unwanted attention that the actor playing Hamlet was paying my Otis. Otis told me, whenever I asked, that he managed to avoid being alone with him. It was apparent however that he was upset with the entire situation, as he did his best to avoid talking about it.

Then, the evening before opening night, after a long and stressful day of full rehearsals, my father came by the theater. He told me in no uncertain terms that I was to come to supper with him. I had no reason to refuse. I knew even pleading exhaustion would carry no weight with him. That supper was an exercise in tense conversation, without even the relief of good liquor or wine as father was a teetotaler. Finally, as the evening drew to a close, he came to the point of why he had me there. He insisted, in fact he ordered me to cease my apparent friendship with ‘that pervert, Otis’.

I remember the shock that rolled through me as I sputtered out that he must be mistaken. That Otis was nothing of the sort. He replied that he had in on the unimpeachable word of a man that he trusted that Otis was a sodomite. He then told me that ‘that boy’ would perform on opening night, only because there was no one to replace him on such short notice, and then he would be gone.

I was devastated, although I knew that there was nothing I could say to him that would change his mind. So I listened like the dutiful son, and then told him I needed to go back to my apartment and get some rest. He quickly debased me of that idea, telling me that I would be going home with him. I knew instantly that he was afraid I would somehow warn Otis, and he was correct. If I could have, I would have.

“Well now,” Ross said slowly when he finished that section.

“Are you thinking what I am, that the ‘unimpeachable’ source was the assistant director, and that there is at least a slim possibility that they colluded to kill Otis?”

Ross looked at Kirk and nodded.

Otis tapped Ross’ arm to get his attention before writing. “That is why his father took him away so fast that next night?”

“It would certainly make sense. It would have kept you from going to Charles’s dressing room for any reason.”

“And then, one would suspect, he told Charles that he had given you your notice and you had vanished like the bad coin, pervert that you were,” Kirk added.

“I was not!” Otis said emphatically.

Everyone froze when he spoke.