Life on the Stage Part 6

"----I'll be with thee straight!"

the audience laughed openly and heartily at the star himself.

"Yes, sir," he snorted later on to Mr. Ellsler, "by heaven, sir! they laughed at me--AT ME! I have been made ridiculous by your measly little _Balthazar_--who should have been a man, sir! Yes, sir, a man, whom I could have chastised for making a fool of himself, sir! and a d----d fool of me, sir!"

For the real tragedy of that night lay in the wound given to the dignity of Mr. F. B. Conway, who played a measured and stately _Romeo_ to the handsome and mature _Juliet_ of his wife.

We had no young _Juliets_ just then, they were all rather advanced, rather settled in character for the reckless child of Verona. But every lady who played the part declared at rehearsal that Shakespeare had been foolish to make _Juliet_ so young--that no woman had learned enough to understand and play her before middle age at least.

Mrs. Bradshaw, one day, said laughingly to me: "By your looks you seemed to disagree with Mrs. Ellsler's remarks this morning. She, too, thinks a woman is not fit for _Juliet_ until she has learned much of nature and the world."

"But," I objected, lamely, "while they are learning so much about the world they are forgetting such a lot about girlhood!"

Her laughter confused and distressed me. "I can't say it!" I cried, "but you know how very forward _Juliet_ is in speech? If she _knew_, that would become brazen boldness! It isn't what she _knows_, but what she _feels_ without knowing that makes the tragedy!" And what Mrs. Bradshaw meant by muttering, "Babes and sucklings--from the mouths of babes and sucklings," I could not make out; perhaps, however, I should say that my mate Annie played few blankverse parts after _Balthazar_.

Then, one Sat.u.r.day night, we were all corralled by the prompter before we could depart for home, and were gravely addressed by the manager--the whole thing being ludicrously suggestive of the reading of the riot act; but after reminding us that Mr. James E. Murdoch would begin his engagement on Monday night, that the rehearsals would be long and important, he proceeded to poison the very source of our Sunday's rest and comfort by fell suggestions of some dire mishap threatening the gentleman through us. We exchanged wondering and troubled glances. What could this mean?

Mr. Ellsler went on: "You all know how precise Mr. Murdoch has always been about your readings; how exacting about where you should stand at this word or at that; how quickly his impatience of stupidity has burst into anger; but you probably do not know that since his serious sickness he is more exacting than ever, and has acquired the habit, when much annoyed, of--of--er--well, of having a fit."

"O-h!" it was unanimous, the groan that broke from our oppressed chests.

Stars who _gave us_ fits we were used to, but the star who went into fits himself--good heavens! good heavens!

Rather anxiously, Mr. Ellsler continued: "These fits, for all I know, may spell apoplexy--anyway, he is too frail a man to safely indulge in them; so, for heaven's sake, do nothing to cross him; be on time, be perfect--dead letter-perfect in your parts; write out all his directions if necessary; grin and bear anything, so long as he doesn't have a fit!

Good-night."

The riot act had been read, the mob dispersed, but the nerve of the most experienced was shaken by the prospect of acting a whole week with a gentleman who, at any moment, might get mad enough to have a fit.

Think, then, what must have been the state of mind of my other ballet-mate, Hattie, who, in her regular turn, had received a small part, but of real importance, and who had to address her lines to Mr. Murdoch himself. Poor girl, always nervous, this new terror made her doubly so.

She roused the star's wrath, even at rehearsal.

"Speak louder!" (imperatively). "_Will_ you speak louder?" (furiously).

"Perhaps, in the interest of those who will be in front to-night, I may suggest that you speak loud enough to be heard by--say--the first row!"

(satirically). Now a calmly controlled body is generally the property of a trained actress, not of a raw ballet-girl, and Hattie's restless s.h.i.+fting about and wriggling drove him into such a rage that, to the rest of us, he seemed to be trembling with inchoate fits, and I saw the property man get his hat and take his stand by the stage-door, ready to fly for the doctor, or, as he called him, "the fit sharp."

She, too, was to appear as a page. She was to enter hurriedly--always a difficult thing for a beginner to do. She was to address Mr. Murdoch in blank verse--a _more_ difficult thing--and implore him to come swiftly to prevent bloodshed, as a hostile meeting was taking place between young Count So-and-so and "your nephew, sir!"

This news was to shock the uncle so that he would stand dazed for a moment, when the page, looking off the stage, should cry:

"Ah, you are too late, sir, already their blades are out!

See how the foils writhe," etc.

With a cry, the uncle should recover himself, and furiously order the page to

"----call the watch!"

Alas! and alas! when the night, the play, the act, the cue came, Hattie, as handsome a boy as you could wish to see, went bravely on, as quickly, too, as her terror-chilled legs could carry her, but when she got there had no word to say--no, not one!

In a sort of icy rage, Mr. Murdoch gave her her line, speaking very low, of course:

"My lord--my lord! I do beseech you haste, Else here is murder done!"

But the poor girl, past prompting properly, only caught wildly at the _sense_ of the speech, and gasped out:

"Come on, quick!"

She saw his foot tapping with rage--thought his fits might begin that way, and madly cried, at the top of her voice:

"Be quick--see--see! publicly they cross their _financiers_!"

then, through the laughter, rushed from the stage, crying, with streaming tears: "I don't care if he has a dozen fits! He has just scared the words out of my head with them!"

And truly, when Mr. Murdoch, trembling with weakness, excitement, and anger, staggered backward, clasping his brow, everyone thought the dreaded fit had arrived.

Next day he reproachfully informed Mr. Ellsler that he could not yet see blank verse and the King's English (so he termed it) murdered without suffering physically as well as mentally from the shocking spectacle.

That he was an old man now, and should not be exposed to such tests of temper.

Yes, as he spoke, he was an old man--pallid, lined, weary-faced; but that same night he was young _Mirabel_--in spirit, voice, eye, and movement.

Fluttering through the play, "Wine Works Wonders," in his satins and his laces--young to the heart--young with the immortal youth of the true artist.

Both these girls spoke plain prose well enough, and always had their share of the parts in modern plays; but, as all was grist to my individual mill, most of the blankverse and Shakespearean small characters came to me. Nor was I the lucky girl they believed me; there was no luck about it. My small success can be explained in two words--extra work. When they studied their parts they were contented if they could repeat their lines perfectly in the quiet of their rooms, and made no allowance for possible accidents or annoyances with power to confuse the mind and so cause loss of memory and ensuing shame. But I was a careful young person, and would not trust even my own memory without first taking every possible precaution. Therefore the repeating of my lines correctly in my room was but the beginning of my study of them. In crossing the crowded street I suddenly demanded of myself my lines. At the table, when all were chatting, I again made sudden demand for the same. If on either occasion my heart gave a jump and my memory failed to present the exact word, I knew I was not yet perfect, and I would repeat those lines until, had the very roof blown off the theatre at night, I should not have missed one. Then only could I turn my attention to the acting of them--oh, bless you, yes! I quite thought I was acting, and at all events I was doing the next best thing, which was trying to act.

But a change was coming to me, an experience was approaching which I cannot explain to myself, neither has anyone else explained it for me; but I mention it because it made such a different thing of dramatic life for me. Aye, such a difficult thing as well. Looking back to that time I see that all my childhood, all my youth, was crowded into that first year on the stage. There I first knew liberty of speech, freedom of motion.

There I shared in the general brightness and seemed to live by right divine, not by the grudging permission of some task-mistress of my mother. I had had no youth before, for in what should have been babyhood I had been a troubled little woman, most wise in misery. In freedom my crushed spirits rose with a bound. The mimicry, the adaptability of childhood a.s.serted themselves--I pranced about the stage happily but thoughtlessly.

It seems to me I was like a blind puppy, born into warmth and comfort and enjoying both, without any fear of the things it could not see. As I have said before, I knew no fear, I had no ambition, I was just happy, blindly happy; and now, all suddenly, I was to exchange this freedom of unconsciousness for the slavery of consciousness.

CHAPTER TENTH

With Mr. Dan. Setch.e.l.l I Win Applause--A Strange Experience Comes to Me--I Know Both Fear and Ambition--The Actress is Born at Last

My manager considered me to have a real gift of comedy, and he several times declared that my being a girl was a distinct loss to the profession of a fine low comedian.

It was in playing a broad comedy bit that my odd experience came to me.

Mr. Dan. Setch.e.l.l was the star. He was an extravagantly funny comedian, and the laziest man I ever saw--too lazy even properly to rehea.r.s.e his most important scenes. He would sit on the prompt table--a table placed near the footlights at rehearsal, holding the ma.n.u.script, writing materials, etc., with a chair at either end, one for the star, the other for the prompter or stage manager--and with his short legs dangling he would doze a little through people's scenes, rousing himself reluctantly for his own, but instead of rising, taking his place upon the stage, and rehearsing properly, he would kick his legs back and forth, and, smiling pleasantly, would lazily repeat his lines where he was, adding: "I'll be on your right hand when I say that, Herbert. Oh, at your exit, Ellsler, you'll leave me in the centre, but when you come back you'll find me down left."

After telling James Lewis several times at what places he would find him at night, Lewis remarked, in despair: "Well, G.o.d knows where you'll find _me_ at night!"

"Oh, never mind, old man," answered the ever-smiling, steadily kicking Setch.e.l.l, "if you're there, all right; if you're not there, no matter!"

which was not exactly flattering.

Of course such rehearsals led to many errors at night, but Mr. Setch.e.l.l cleverly covered them up from the knowledge of the laughing audience.

It is hard to imagine that lazy, smiling presence in the midst of awful disaster, but he was one of the victims of a dreadful s.h.i.+pwreck while making the voyage to Australia. Bat-blind to the future, he at that time laughed and comfortably s.h.i.+rked his work in the day-time, and made others laugh when he did his work at night.

In one of his plays I did a small part with him--I was his wife, a former old maid of crabbed temper. I had asked Mr. Ellsler to make up my face for me as an old and ugly woman. I wore corkscrew side curls and an awful wrapper. I was a fearful object, and when Mr. Setch.e.l.l first saw me he stood silent a moment, then, after rubbing his stomach hard, and grimacing, he took both my hands, exclaiming: "Oh, you hideous jewel! you positively gave me a cramp at just sight of you! Go in, little girl, for all you're worth! and do just what you please--you deserve the liberty for that make-up!"