LITMIR.BIZ

       CHAPTER 1 First Week

      Peregrine Jay heard the stage door at the Dolphin open and shut and the sound of voices. His scenic and costume designer and lights manager came through to the open stage. They wheeled out three specially built racks, unrolled their drawings for the production of Macbeth and pinned them up.

      They were stunning. A permanent central rough stone stairway curving up to Duncan’s chamber. Two turntables articulating with this to represent, on the right, the outer façade of Inverness Castle or the inner courtyard with, on the left, a high stone platform with a gallows and a dangling rag-covered skeleton, or, turned, another wall of the courtyard. The central wall was a dull red arras behind the stairway and open sky.

      The lighting director showed a dozen big drawings of the various sets with the startling changes brought about by his craft. One of these was quite lovely: an opulent evening in front of the castle with the setting sun bathing everything in splendour. One felt the air to be calm, gentle and full of the sound of wings. And then, next to it, the same scene with the enormous doors opened, a dark interior, torches, a piper and the Lady in scarlet coming to welcome the fated visitor.

      Jeremy,’ Peregrine said, ‘you’ve done us proud.’

      ‘OK?’

      ‘It’s so right! It’s so bloody right. Here! Let’s up with the curtain. Jeremy?’

      The

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