Read The Scottish Play Murder for Free Online

well, then, you fellows,” said Horatio, with only a hint of disapproval in his voice.
    First Witch brought himself up, chin high and indignant, and a wickedly dead-on effeminate posture. “Fellows? I vow I’m insulted!” He looked to the others, who confirmed they also felt insulted, nodding their heads at the neck like vultures eyeing a carcass.
    “
Sisters
. I meant weird sisters. Very weird indeed.”
    The three nodded, satisfied, and First Witch brushed back an imaginary lock of waist-length hair before crossing his arms over his chest with a
so there
sort of dignity.
    The rehearsal proceeded with the scene in which the witches made their good news prediction to Macbeth that he would be king, and as Suzanne watched she enjoyed it immensely. This scene was a short one, and though the memorization of lines was yet imperfect, none of the actors required prompting. That enabled them to work the blocking and quickly smooth out the movements and choreograph the dancing of the witches to be synchronous with the dialogue. Arturo and Willie were natural dancers. Arturo and his family were tumblers and all supremely agile. Willie often danced when he played his fiddle on street corners.
    However, Third Witch—the musician Tucker—was somewhat awkward and stumbled over his own feet. In a stroke of directorial creativity, Horatio put the odd man to good use, making him a comic stray struggling to keep up with the others and failing. Rather than urge the actor to be just like the others, Horatio encouraged him to fall behind even more and stumble over himself more broadly in his efforts to fit in. As they worked, the group smoothed out the blocking until the timing had no hitches. Soon they were comfortable enough with it to move on, and would perfect the blocking at the next rehearsal.
    Suzanne saw that the result was far more amusing and interesting to watch than would have been a perfect dancing trio. This was Horatio’s genius: to take a problem, turn it on its head, and make it a creative step forward. It provided a bit of comedy to put the audience off its guard at the beginning of the play, to let them relax and make them vulnerable to the intense scenes later on. Then when the sisters reappeared later to give their more ominous predictions, there would be no fooling around.
    Finally they worked through the scene’s ending, in which the three would vanish down one of the trapdoors in the stage. In performance they would do it behind the flash and smoke of gunpowder, and so needed to decide how they would lay the powder and set it off with an ember. This required a lengthy discussion, boring to Suzanne in her seat in the gallery. She couldn’t hear what was said and all she saw was several men gathered around an open trapdoor and pointing here and there.
    It was nearly noon, at which time they would all disperse to seek dinner. Someone settled into the seat next to Suzanne, and she sat back and turned to find Daniel there. A surge of pleasure filled her breast, but she fought it down, for too much pleasure in Daniel had always been her downfall and he’d ever disappointed her. She said, “Back so soon? You were here but three days ago.”
    “I couldn’t stay away, struggle as I might to do so. I’m curious about this Ramsay fellow you’ve hired. Is that the man down there? The big one? Looks as though he should be wearing armor and charging down the lists on a destrier with his plaid floating in the wind behind him.”
    “That is he. And what concern is he of yours?”
    Daniel shrugged with his habitual and often false insouciance. Suzanne was of the opinion he’d languished in France far too long, and had picked up some of their more annoying mannerisms. That was one of them. He told her, “I’ve made some inquiries about him, wishing to ascertain he is not an arsonist or madman of some sort who might burn down my theatre.”
    “He’s quite talented, and most of the players appear to like him. Short of