Golden Threads

Chapter One "NEXT!" NICK RHODES GLANCED at the man sitting beside him and added in a much lower voice, "That makes eleven we've seen, and the last three could have" "No." The voice was deep, rich; the dark eyes twinkled gently in a benign face. "I haven't seen her yet." Sighing, Nick nodded toward his assistant to bring the next potential Rapunzel onto the stage. He wanted to swear over the lengthy selection process, but the old man beside him possessed the trick of making those around him mind their tongues. Besides that, he was putting up the money for the playwhich meant that he called the shots. Nick glanced at Cyrus Fortune again, thinking that he probably got chased down streets by children. Put him into a red suit, and he'd be the image of Santa Claus. "This is a small town," Nick reminded Mr. Fortune. "Not many actresses to choose from, and half of them are completely wrong for the part. If we don't find her soon" "There she is." Mr. Fortune was gazing toward the stage. He was beaming happily. "There's our Rapunzel." Nick's head swiveled toward the stage. He was prepared for almost anything, since Cyrus Fortune struck him as such an odd man. Now, seeing the young woman onstage, cautious relief was his strongest emotion. She waited somewhat nervously for instructions and could have been any age between twenty and thirty. She matched his mental vision of Rapunzel. She was petite, almost fragile, her pale gold hair pulled back from her face and held with a ribbon. Nick studied her with the critical eye of a director. A lovely face, he decided judiciously. And there was something about her, a quality he could see or sense even from his seat in the empty, darkened auditorium. Wariness? A look of loneliness? His gut reaction was that she would know just how to play a forlorn maiden locked in a tower. If she could act, of course. He leaned forward, propping his forearms on the seat in front of him. "What's your name?" he called. "Lara." Her voice was soft but curiously clear and distinct, reaching him easily. "Lara Callahan." "All right, Miss Callahan. If you'll read page twenty, please? Tim will cue you." He nodded toward his assistant. Then he settled back and listened as Rapunzel pleaded with the witch to allow her to go free. Lara Callahan's voice was sweet and unbearably sad, her plea so eloquent that Nick felt a feathery chill brush his spine. Cyrus Fortune was nodding, beaming. Above the bushy white beard, his cheeks shone like polished apples. He was leaning forward slightly in his seat, his elegant hands resting on the gold-handled cane between his knees. "There," he said softly. "There." There, indeed, Nick thought. He wondered why Lara Callahan had never auditioned for him before. Was she new to the relatively small town of Pinewood, Virginia? "Fine, Miss Callahan," he called as soon as she had finished the scene. "Rehearsals start day after tomorrow. Monday, six p.m." She looked almost comically startled. "You mean I got the part?" "Didn't you want it?" Nick laughed a little as Tim, clipboard in hand, led the bemused Rapunzel into the wings. "Tim," he called, "ask the crew to wait for a few minutes, will you?" "Sure, boss," Tim replied. Turning to face Mr. Fortune, Nick said, "The biggest part cast. Now we just have to worry about the parents and the witch." "And the prince," Fortune reminded him. Nick was conscious of his impatience, and tried to repress it. "Four actors showed up to audition for that part, and you dismissed all of them. We have to pick one of them" "You replaced tHooper, Kay is the author of 'Golden Threads' with ISBN 9780553805017 and ISBN 0553805010.