Bertie widened her eyes as far as they would go. "I'm here in a professional capacity this afternoon. You would do well to remember that."

The Stage Manager clapped his headset on and disappeared into the wings with a muttered, "Argh!"

The fairies giggled, and Bertie drank the last of her coffee just as another appeared over her left shoulder.

"I thought ye might need this." Nate took a hesitant sip from his own cup and grimaced.

Bertie accepted the cup and peered into it. "Is this from the Green Room?"

"Aye. Bilgewater 'tis today."

"Will it put hair on her chest?" asked Moth.

"Yuck! Girls shouldn't have hair on their chests!" said Cobweb.

"Hey, Nate!" Mustardseed popped his head up over the chair back. "We saved you a lemon tart!"

"Did ye, ye wee beastie?" Nate settled into the seat behind Bertie. "That must have taken tremendous restraint."

"It did!" Cobweb agreed with a wag of his head as the other boys pushed the nearly empty pink box under the seats.

Nate leaned forward to snag the piece of pastry before one of them stepped in it. "My thanks."

"Sorry about what Mrs. Edith said to you." Bertie sipped the coffee and confirmed it tasted as awful as it smelled. "That whole 'defiler of innocents' line was a bit much."

" 'Tis all right. I can't blame her, considerin' what it must have looked like." Nate concentrated very hard on his dessert. Bertie finished her bilgewater, not knowing what else to say as the Players trickled in, singly or in groups of two or three. Gertrude arrived with her entourage, which included minor characters from other productions.

"This is a closed rehearsal," Bertie said, jumping up from her seat and hurrying onstage. "You weren't called."

"But we want to see the changes."

"Like when Ophelia forgot her lines-"

"It isn't fair to keep us away!"

"No, no, no, no." Bertie herded them to the stage door. "Out. All of you."

"Excuse me, Mesdemoiselles." Mr. Hastings sidled through the clucking women, burdened with an a.s.sortment of Egyptian antiquities.

"What are you doing here?" Bertie closed the door firmly behind him, despite the protests of the banished.

"The Theater Manager thought you ought to have some properties to set the mood, and you did ask for asps."

Bertie looked over the dangerous a.s.sortment of daggers, vials of poison, and a basket that hissed a warning. "Plastic snakes, right?"

"Of course." Mr. Hastings adjusted his spectacles.

"Where do you want the pyramids?" Mr. Tibbs arrived, sneaking covert glances at Mr. Hastings' contributions.

Bertie blinked. "How many are there?"

"Three," he said, scattering ash on the stage.

"Arrange them as you see fit," Bertie said. "I trust your judgment implicitly."

"Is that so?" Mr. Tibbs shifted his cigar around his mouth, trying not to look pleased and failing. He stomped off past a distracted Ophelia, who wandered in the wings near Mrs. Edith. The Wardrobe Mistress appeared to be wrestling the sheet off the Ghost of Hamlet's Father.

Bertie turned to Peaseblossom. "What's Mrs. Edith doing?"

"She said she needs that sheet. Something about using it for a template to make his new costume."

The first of the pyramids landed Center Stage as the Danish Prince slouched in, eyes deceptively lazy.

"So glad you could join us," Bertie said. "I hope the call didn't inconvenience you."

Hamlet leaned against the flat and took a long drag off a cigarette. "Not at all."

"Put that out," Bertie said, though she longed to join him. "We have rules about smoking in the theater."

Hamlet rearranged his beautiful mouth into a scowl, dropped the cigarette, and ground it out. "Better?"

"Nearly. Now pick up your litter and put it where it belongs," Bertie said.

Hamlet gaped at her. "That's the Stage Manager's job!"

"If I see you make the mess, you get to clean up after yourself like a good little boy."

They glared at each other for a moment, and Bertie wondered if Nate would have had something to say if his mouth hadn't been full of lemon tart. In the end, the prince shrugged, picked the b.u.t.t off the floor, and flicked it into a nearby wastebasket.

"There," said Bertie with an insincere smile. "That wasn't so hard, was it?" She turned to the rest of the a.s.sembled Players. "And let me take the opportunity to announce that henceforth, latecomers will be replaced by their understudies."

There was a collective intake of breath from the princ.i.p.als while every member of the Gentlemen's and Ladies' Choruses straightened.

"Can that even be done?" Peaseblossom whispered to Bertie.

"It's just a threat," Hamlet said.

"Try me." Bertie returned his cold stare, frost for frost. "Now, if I could have everyone sit down."

With impressive silence, the Players took their seats around the stage. Gertrude arranged the skirts of her practice costume. Polonius lingered next to the curtains. The Ghost of Hamlet's Father sulked near the edge of the center pyramid.

"Mrs. Edith couldn't have found a less distracting subst.i.tute than a pink sheet with flowers on it?" Bertie demanded of the fairies.

"I guess not," said Moth between hiccups of laughter.

Bertie watched the Ghost b.u.mp repeatedly into the wooden flat. "It's really s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g with his head."

"He'll get over it," Cobweb said.

"Let's hope so." Bertie moved to the front of the stage and raised her voice. "This afternoon, I'd like to start by explaining the changes we'll be making to our production. We've set the stage to help you envision Ancient Egypt."

"I thought something was foul in the state of Denmark," someone protested.

"Yes, but we're restaging it," said Bertie.

"Are we changing the lines?" came from the back of the room.

"We don't have to change the words to change the play," Bertie said. "We'll say Denmark, but the audience will know we mean Egypt. The Scenic and Properties departments will set the stage in shades of gold and lapis. Mrs. Edith will have Hamlet dressed as a young pharaoh."

Everyone nodded and murmured things like "I suppose so" and "I hope this works."

Coffee sloshed about in Bertie's middle, and she did her best not to think about the large quant.i.ty of baguette and whipped pastry cream she'd just snarfed down. "I also thought it would be interesting to reinterpret the poison theme. Asps are appropriate for the setting-"

"Snakes?!" That was a horrified Gertrude.

Bertie faltered. "Yes, snakes."

Gertrude shivered as though something had already wriggled up her stocking. "I don't work with reptiles."

Hamlet stopped leaning on the pyramid he'd been holding up since his dressing-down. "But think of the impact you could have, using live ones! Imagine Mother Dearest as a reincarnation of Cleopatra, with an asp clasped to her breast."

"Leave my b.r.e.a.s.t.s out of it, you little degenerate!" Gertrude threw her cup at him.

He dodged remarkably fast for a melancholy introvert. Most of the coffee ended up on Polonius, who shrieked and attempted to dry himself on the curtains.

"Let's just fetch out one of the dear creatures." Hamlet peeked into the basket and grinned. A premonition of doom slid through Bertie, but before she could stop him, the prince dumped out the slithering contents of the basket, and a dozen glittering, very-much-alive asps wiggled free.

Gertrude screamed and jumped onto her chair as the rest of the cast scattered to the outermost edges of the stage.

Bertie hopped from one foot to the other, trying to make sense of it. "Someone call a Snake Charmer!"

"Help!" Gertrude shrieked. "Murder! Sabotage!"

Yes, sabotage. Probably by Ariel's hand.

Bertie caught sight of the Stage Manager smirking into his headset.

Except it's not just Ariel who wants to see me fail. I have more enemies than Hamlet himself.

"A little help, if ye please!" Nate had leapt onstage to grab snakes and shove them back into the basket.

Bertie flapped at her sleeves until they covered her hands-hardly protection against a venomous bite, but it was better than nothing. She grabbed an asp by the tail and flung it at him, doing her best not to shriek.

"Well done!" Moth yelled, flying past her to help.

"Don't touch them," Bertie said, catching hold of two more and feeling her skin p.r.i.c.kle all over as she dropped them in the basket. "I don't want any of you getting bitten."

Nate returned with a wiggling handful.

"Bertie!" Peaseblossom cried, pointing at the side door. "The Players are running away!"

Bertie raised her voice to a shout. "Everyone is going to take their places for Act One, Scene One, this instant!"

"What about the snakes?" Gertrude demanded, poised to make a grand exit. Her Ladies-in-Waiting agreed with clucks and murmurs of equal parts sympathy and vitriol.

"We got them," Nate announced as he clapped the lid back on the basket. "Every last one."

"We haven't any time to waste," Bertie said, standing on tiptoe to make her entreaty. "We need to make it through the play at least once this afternoon!"

Amidst grumbles and confusion, everyone moved into position while keeping a careful watch on the floor. Bertie went out into the auditorium and took a seat, signaling to Francisco and Bernardo.

The latter clomped over to stand in front of the center pyramid. "Who's there?"

The Ghost of Hamlet's Father shoved past him. "Whooooooooo!" He circled the astounded sentries with his costume flapping.

"That's not the cue for your entrance," Bertie said, addressing the pink-flowered sheet. "Excuse me! Stop that immediately."

He continued to flap around the stage like an enormous, psychotic bird. "Whoop, whoop, whooooo!"

"I think the costume change might have broken his head," Bertie said. "Can I get some help, please?"

Marcellus and Horatio joined Bernardo and Francisco. The four of them chased the Ghost around the pyramids and into the orchestra pit.

"Your cue," Bertie yelled over the din of overturned instruments and creative cursing, "is 'the bell then beating one.' Get backstage, and change out of that ridiculous thing."

The Ghost obediently ripped off his sheet with a flourish. Gertrude put a hand to her forehead and swooned against the nearest Lady-in-Waiting.

"Oh, please!" said Claudius. "You were married to him!"

Gertrude stopped overdramatizing long enough to glare at him. "So?"

"So, unless Hamlet was an immaculate conception, there's nothing going on there that you haven't seen before. Stop playing the dewy-eyed virgin." Claudius jabbed a finger in Ophelia's direction. "That's her job!"

"If you like her so much, why don't you marry her?"

"Maybe I will!" Claudius took Ophelia by the hand and began to kiss his way up her arm.

"Let me go!" Ophelia struggled, but she was no match for the portly king.

"Cad! Philanderer!" Gertrude closed her fan and hit Claudius with it.

"h.e.l.lcat!" he yelped even as an angry, red welt bloomed on his cheek.

Gertrude swung at Claudius again. When he turned to run, he collided with the naked Ghost, and the two men went down in a tangle of limbs.

"Line!" Hamlet yelled. "For mercy's sake, someone give me the line!"

Bertie watched with growing horror as the brawl expanded to include most of the Ladies-in-Waiting and Rosencrantz. Guildenstern abandoned the fray to lick all the swords in sight, testing for poison. Someone in the very back row of the auditorium snickered.