Peregrine
"And that's how I came to be in Michael's play, "said Julia.
Tom and I had pulled a couple of chairs close to the bed so that we could sit down whilst Julia gave us her account. Something was happening here that we were not a party to; we were pawns in a game at a much higher level.
I looked at the Julia version of Montana, and when our eyes met, my usual lurch of raw emotion was answered in kind, or so I thought. Perhaps it was just wishful thinking, but then that all too familiar blush rose in her cheeks, and it took all the willpower I had to prevent myself from gathering her up in my arms. What was going on? Completely without thinking, I reached over and took Julia's hand in mine. She did not resist, but when she looked up, her face was now pale and drawn.
"Peregrine, there is something that I must tell you. Michael has changed the ending of the play. . . You remember that scene in the study when you confront Cluan Cheap, and he flees.
"Yes."
"And then you spend your time gazing into the eyes of Agnes?"
"Montana!" I had forgotten for a moment it was Julia, "I told you that it was all a misunderstanding, and you forgave my stupidity. We laughed it all off."
Julia ignored my outburst and continued with her explanation.
"In the revised scene, Montana runs to her room, believing that you no longer love her."
Once more, she hesitated.
"She drinks from a bottle of laudanum taken from Aunty's medicine cabinet and falls on her bed. Peregrine comes in and thinks that she has killed herself over his suspected betrayal of Agnes. Overcome with grief, he poisons himself and collapses over her body just as she is awakening. Michael has written a very moving soliloquy for Montana in which she talks of her love for Peregrine and how she no longer wishes to live without him. A final moment of high drama, and then she stabs herself through the heart. The final scene is set in a cemetery where Ernest, Albert, and Aunty are standing by the grave where the 'star-crossed lovers' lie buried together.
The curtain comes up again, and Michael emerges and begins a dialogue with the audience as the cast joins him on stage. I am there, of course, but somebody else comes out to take the part of the dupe, not you."
She stopped and bit her lip, and I saw that her hands were trembling.
"Go on," I said, and I felt a sudden cramp in my stomach.
Julia took a deep breath and continued.
"You die, not only in the play, Peregrine, but in your home reality. The original play was meant to end with multiple marriages in the tradition of Shakespearean comedies, and our final scene was an adaptation of the end of AMidsummer Night's Dream. Now, Michael has changed the play from a Shakespearean comedy to a Shakespearean tragedy…"
"Romeo and Juliet?" I asked, but it had to be.
"That does not make any sense," Julia; they are two entirely different plays."
"I agree," she said. The original play was about a young student falling in love and going on a fantastical quest to search for a key to a portal to prevent the invasion of his home world. During his quest, he survives some life-changing experiences and arrives back home to save Montana, his girlfriend, from a fraudulent wedding contract. The play ends happily in three love matches. Do you not see? The play mirrors your life as it happened on Earth Minor. If you die here, it means that you died in your home world. We cannot allow Michael to stage the play in its revised form."
"This is the final proof, as if we needed any," I said. "Not only is the distinction between fact and fiction illusory, but they are of the same coin, and the faces are interchangeable. That is an overly simplistic description, and there is the added complication of 'action-at-a-distance' forces that connect two objects, in this case, the narrative of my life, even when they are far apart. The physics is too difficult for me to even attempt an explanation, but we should accept it as a given. You and I are two faces of that same coin, Julia, what to you is a play, is to me, an account of my real-life experiences," I said, "or what I believed to be real life."
"Do you believe my life is real?" said Julia.
I told her I did. Each dimension represents a reality; all are equal, and none has precedence. Julia was a version of Montana, in the same way that Agnes, or 'Millie' as she called herself when we met in London, the mother of Oliver Twist, was another version of Agnes who died giving birth to her son in a workhouse. But who is Peregrine 'the dupe' who was here before I parachuted in at the end of the rehearsal, and where was he now?
* * *
Julia urged us to move from Tony's room before he came back, and we crept down the corridor in the opposite direction from the rehearsal hall. Surprisingly, Julia did not seem to know her way around very well, but eventually, we stumbled onto a door with the sign 'Stage Entrance.'
We pushed our way through and found ourselves on a large wooden stage filled with various theatrical Theatre and bits of old scenery, mostly hand-painted 'flats,' lightweight timber frames covered with scenic canvas. There were also pieces of theatrical equipment in various states of repair, including a boxed construction containing metal pipes and valves and the original 'limelight' projector, first used in the nineteenth century. There was an air of dusty antiquity about the place, and Jack took an immediate interest in a large box containing posters and old programs, even parts of scripts.
I moved to centre stage, nearly tripping over a bucket of hardened whitewash, and peered out over an orchestra pit filled with broken chairs, which looked out onto a huge auditorium filled with rows of red, plush-lined seats. I saw a flash of blue light, and the whole of the dress circle suddenly appeared in space. The designers had ornately decorated the balcony in a mock Grecian style and below a platform, from where a limelight would have illuminated the whole stage with a gentle glow.
Nobody else seemed to have noticed the sudden appearance of the balcony. Jack was sitting on what may have once been a king's throne, still looking through some posters, and Julia was wandering about the stage as if she had never seen it before.
"Surely, this must all be familiar to you," I said.
"No," she replied, "we rehearsed back there, where we met originally… I think."
Her voice suddenly tailed off, and she sounded scared.
"Peregrine, I don't remember, not all of it, just bits; I think I may have filled in any gaps with my imagination, and now I am not sure what happened or what I made up."
"It's okay, Julia; keep calm; let's sit down."
I indicated a vast, overstuffed couch in a shade of hideous purple, and we sank into its voluminous embrace.
"That's not all, Peregrine. The fact is, it doesn't matter. Everything is make-believe: you, me, Jack, the theatre, the cast, this whole bloody theatre world."
She was crying now and buried her head on my shoulder.
I intuitively knew that Julia was telling the truth. My sideways slip into what initially appeared to be an alternative reality populated by actors was no accident. Despite what Julia had said, this was not a true world, but an artificial construction designed for a purpose. A benign power was directing us into a situation where we could change our unwanted destiny.
"Listen, Julia. I am going to do some exploring, but I should go alone. Keep your eye on Jack. I will not be too long."
I looked up, and Jack was still sitting on the throne, seemingly absorbed in reading the cache of posters and programs he had uncovered. There was something odd about his manner; he had become withdrawn and uncommunicative, different from his usual talkative self.
He had originally said that Uncle Albert would take us back home through a portal, but he had never mentioned it since. I had to leave it for now and find out more about where we were, but I would speak to Jack on my return.
I left by the same door as we had entered and walked back in the direction of the rehearsal room. I found the corridor that led to the door, and walking towards me was the actor, Tony, who had allowed me to use his bedroom.
I was determined to find out more, and speaking to Tony on his own, away from the others, might be useful.
I smiled at him as he approached me.
"Thanks for the loan of the bed, Tony. Have you got a moment for a quick chat?"
Tony did not reply and walked straight by me.
"Hey!" I grabbed him by the shoulder.
"I just asked you a question."
He didn't even turn his head, and although he didn't pull away from me, his feet continued to rise and fall as if he were still walking. I moved around to the front, still holding onto his shoulder, and looked straight at him.
I wish I hadn't.
He looked as if a sculptor had moulded his face in silicone but had yet to provide him with an expression. His eyes were wide open but unfocused, and his pupils appeared enlarged, but I doubted that he was under the influence of drugs; all human life had left him, and he had become an automaton.
"Can you speak, Tony?" I said, not expecting a response, but to my horror, his eyes blinked, and the corners of his mouth raised themselves to form a simulated smile. It was completely artificial, and it reminded me of the fear I had felt as a small child when I first saw a ventriloquist operating his dummy at a children's party.
Tony spoke.
"Oh, don't fuss," he said. "Come along, old chap, and let's make you comfortable."
He was trying to get back on script.
He shut down again, and his face was expressionless. If my guess was right, Tony was waiting for me to feed him the next line. What was it I said in reply?
I remembered.
"Thank you. I appreciate your offer."
"No problemo," said Tony, word perfect, and he toddled off down the corridor.
There was no point in detaining him, and I wondered what would happen when he reached his room. We had exchanged a few words before he left the first time around, and he would be standing by his bed, unable to move, waiting for a prompt that would never come.