"You clumsy idiot!"

Riggin bent to retrieve the shards of glass and mop up the spilled water. He gathered the scattered roses together, placing them on the vanity.

"Not there!" Anastasia scowled.

He backed away, eyebrows raised. "My apologies, Miss Bradshaw."

"Just clean it up!" She waved a hand.

"Yes, Miss Bradshaw."

It was too bad, Riggin thought privately (aloud would no doubt get him slapped), that such beauty came with such a sour disposition. Or was it the other way around? he added wryly. He shook his head. She was probably having a bad day.

"Are you finished? I do need my dressing room for other things."

A bad week.

"Nearly, Miss Bradshaw."

"Nearly is not finished."

Bad month?

"She isn't really that bad," he told Ragtime, holding the back end of a flat and following Scarpetta's lead in putting it into place. "Just-" He grinned. "-prickly."

"Prickly! Prickly!" Curse Edwards laughed raucously, overhearing. "He calls Stacy f@#$in' prickly."

"That's one way a' puttin' it," laughed another of the stagehands.