My Double Life: The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt Part 52

The pleading of Maitre Allou was very, successful: he claimed three hundred thousand francs damages, in addition to the confiscation for the benefit of the Comedie Francaise of the forty-three thousand francs which that theatre owed me.

Maitre Barboux was my advocate. He was an intimate friend of Perrin. He defended me very indifferently. I was condemned to pay a hundred thousand francs to the Comedie Francaise and to lose the forty-three thousand francs which I had left with the management. I may say that I did not trouble much about this law-suit.

Three days after my resignation Jarrett called upon me. He proposed to me, for the third time, to make a contract for America. This time I lent an ear to his propositions. We had never spoken about terms, and this is what he proposed:

Five thousand francs for each performance and one-half of the receipts above fifteen thousand francs; that is to say, the day the receipts reached the sum of twenty thousand francs I should receive seven thousand five hundred francs. In addition, one thousand francs per week for my hotel bill; also a special Pullman car, on all railway journeys, containing a bedroom, a drawing-room with a piano, four beds for my staff, and two cooks to cook for me on the way. Mr. Jarrett was to have ten per cent, on all sums received by me.

I accepted everything. I was anxious to leave Paris. Jarrett immediately sent a telegram to Mr. Abbey, the great American _impresario_, and he landed on this side thirteen days later. I signed the contract made by Jarrett, which was discussed clause by clause with the American manager.

I was given, on signing the contract, one hundred thousand francs as advance payment for my expenses before departure. I was to play eight pieces: _Hernani, Phedre, Adrienne Lecouvreur, Froufrou, La Dame aux Camelias, Le Sphinx, L'Etrangere_, and _La Princesse Georges_.

I ordered twenty-five modern dresses at Laferriere's, of whom I was then a customer.

At Baron's I ordered six costumes for _Adrienne Lecouvreur_ and four costumes for _Hernani_. I ordered from a young theatre _costumier_ named Lepaul my costume for _Phedre_. These thirty-six costumes cost me sixty-one thousand francs; but out of this my costume for _Phedre_ alone cost four thousand francs. The poor _artist-costumier_ had embroidered it himself. It was a marvel. It was brought to me two days before my departure, and I cannot think of this moment without emotion. Irritated by long waiting, I was writing an angry letter to the _costumier_ when he was announced. At first I received him very badly, but I found him looking so unwell, the poor man, that I made him sit down and asked how he came to be so ill.

"Yes, I am not at all well," he said in such a weak voice that I was quite upset. "I wanted to finish this dress, and I have worked at it three days and nights. But look how nice your costume is!" And he spread it out with loving respect before me.

"Look!" remarked Guerard, "a little spot!"

"Ah, I p.r.i.c.ked myself," answered the poor artist quickly.

But I had just caught sight of a drop of blood at the corner of his lips. He wiped it quickly away, so that it should not fall on the pretty costume as the other little spot had done. I gave the artist the four thousand francs, which he took with trembling hands. He murmured some unintelligible words and withdrew.

"Take away this costume, take it away!" I cried to _mon pet.i.t Dame_ and my maid. And I cried so much that I had the hiccoughs all the evening.

n.o.body understood why I was crying. But I reproached myself bitterly for having worried the poor man. It was plain that he was dying. And by the force of circ.u.mstances I had unwittingly forged the first link of the chain of death which was dragging to the tomb this youth of twenty-two--this artist with a future before him.

I would never wear this costume. It is still in its box, yellowed with age. Its gold embroidery is tarnished by time, and the little spot of blood has slightly eaten away the stuff. As to the poor artist, I learnt of his death during my stay in London in the month of May, for before leaving for America I signed with Hollingshead and Mayer, the _impresarii_ of the Comedie, a contract which bound me to them from May 24 to June 24 (1880).

It was during this period that the law-suit which the Comedie Francaise brought against me was decided.

Maitre Barboux did not consult me about anything, and my success in London, which was achieved without the help of the Comedie, irritated the committee, the Press, and the public.

Maitre Allou in his pleadings pretended that the London public had tired of me very quickly, and did not care to come to the performances of the Comedie in which I appeared.

The following list gives the best possible denial to the a.s.sertions of Maitre Allou:

PERFORMANCES GIVEN BY THE COMeDIE FRANcAISE AT THE GAIETY THEATRE

(The * indicates the pieces in which I appeared.)

1879. Plays. Receipts in Francs June 2. Le Misanthrope (Prologue); *13,080 Phedre (Acte II.); Les Precieuses Ridicules " 3. L'Etrangere *12,565 " 4. Le Fils naturel 9,300 June 5. Les Caprices de Marianne; La Joie fait Peur 10,100 " 6. Le Menteur; Le Medecin malgre lui 9,530 " 7. Le Marquis de Villemer 9,960 " 7. Tartuffe (matinee); La Joie fait Peur 8,700 " 9. Hernani *13,600 " 10. Le Demi-monde 11,525 " 11. Mlle. de Belle-Isle; Il faut qu'une porte soit ouverte ou fermee 10,420 " 12. Le Post-Scriptum; Le Gendre de M. Poirier 10,445 " 13. Phedre *13,920 " 14. Le Luthier de Cremone; Le Sphinx *13,350 " 14. Le Misanthrope (matinee); Les Plaideurs 8,800 " 16. L'Ami Fritz 9,375 " 17. Zare; Les Precieuses Ridicules *13,075 " 18. Le Jeu de l'amour et du hasard; Il ne faut jurer de rien 11,550 " 18. Le Demi-monde 12,160 " 20. Les Fourchambault 11,200 " 21. Hernani *13,375 " 21. Tartufe (matinee); Il faut qu'une porte soit ouverte ou fermee 2,115 " 23. Gringoire; On ne badine pas avec l'amour 11,080 " 24. Chez l'avocat; Mlle. de la Seigliere 9,660 " 25. L'Etrangere (matinee) *11,710 " 25. Le Barbier de Seville 9,180 " 26. Andromaque; Les Plaideurs *13,350 " 27. L'Avare; L'Etincelle 11,775 " 28. Le Sphinx; Le Depit amoureux *12,860 " 28. Hernani (matinee) *13,730 " 30. Ruy-Blas *13,660 July 1. Mercadet; L'Ete de la St. Martin 9,850 " 2. Ruy-Blas *13,160 " 3. Le Mariage de Victorine; Les Fourberies de Scapin 10,165 " 4. Les Femmes savantes; L'Etincelle 11,960 " 5. Les Fourchambault 10,700 " 5. Phedre (matinee); La Joie fait Peur *14,265 " 7. Le Marquis de Villemer 10,565 " 8. L'Ami Fritz 11,005 " 9. Hernani *14,275 " 10. Le Sphinx *13,775 " 11. Philiberte; L'Etourdi 11,500 " 12. Ruy-Blas *12,660 " 12. Gringoire (matinee); Hernani (Acte V.); La Benediction; Davenant; L'Etincelle *13,725

Total receipts ... 492,150 francs

The average of the receipts was about 11,715 francs. These figures show that, out of the forty-three performances given by the Comedie Francaise, the eighteen performances in which I took part gave an average of 13,350 francs each, while the twenty-five other performances gave an average of 10,000 francs.

While I was in London I learned that I had lost my lawsuit. "The Court--with its 'Inasmuch as,' 'Nevertheless,' &c.--declares hereby that Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt loses all the rights, privileges, and advantages, resulting to her profit from the engagement which she contracted with the company by authentic decree of March 24, 1875, and condemns her to pay to the plaintiff in his lawful quality the sum of one hundred thousand francs damages."

I gave my last performance in London the very day that the papers published this unjust verdict. I was applauded, and the public overwhelmed me with flowers.

I had taken with me Madame Devoyod, Mary Jullien, Kalb, my sister Jeanne, Pierre Berton, Train, Talbot, Dieudonne--all artistes of great repute.

I played all the pieces which I was to play in America.

Vitu, Sarcey, Lapommeraye had said so much against me that I was stupefied to learn from Mayer that they had arrived in London to be present at my performances.

I could no longer understand what it all meant. I thought that the Parisian journalists were leaving me in peace at last, and here were my worst enemies coming across the sea to see and hear me. Perhaps they were hoping--like the Englishman who followed the lion-tamer to see him devoured by his lions!

Vitu in the _Figaro_ had finished one of his bitter articles with these words:

"But we have heard enough, surely, of Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt! Let her go abroad with her monotonous voice and her funereal fantasies! Here we have nothing new to learn from her talents or her caprices...."

Sarcey, in an equally bitter article, _a propos_ of my resignation at the Comedie, had finished in these terms:

"There comes a time when naughty children must go to bed."

As to the amiable Lapommeraye, he had showered on my devoted head all the rumours that he had collected from all sides. But as they said he had no originality, he tried to show that he also could dip his pen in venom, and he had cried, "Pleasant journey!" And here they all came, these three, and others with them. And the day following my first performance of _Adrienne Lecouvreur_, Auguste Vitu telegraphed to the _Figaro_ a long article, in which he criticised me in certain scenes, regretting that I had not followed the example of Rachel, whom I had never seen. And he finished his article thus:

"The sincerity of my admiration cannot be doubted when I avow that in the fifth act Sarah Bernhardt rose to a height of dramatic power, to a force of expression which could not be surpa.s.sed. She played the long and cruel scene in which Adrienne, poisoned by the d.u.c.h.esse de Bouillon, struggles against death in her fearful agony, not only with immense talent, but with a science of art which up to the present she has never revealed. If the Parisian public had heard, or ever hears, Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt cry out with the piercing accent which she put into her words that evening, 'I will not die, I will not die!' it would weep with her."

Sarcey finished an admirable critique with these words:

"She is prodigious!"

And Lapommeraye, who had once more become amiable begged me to go back to the Comedie, which was waiting for me, which would kill the fatted calf on the return of its prodigal child.

Sarcey, in his article in the _Temps_, consecrated five columns of praises to me, and finished his article with these words:

"Nothing, nothing can ever take the place of this last act of _Adrienne Lecouvreur_ at the Comedie. Ah! she should have stayed at the Comedie.

Yes, I come back to my litany! I cannot help it! We shall lose as much as she will. Yes, I know that we can say Mlle. Dudlay is left to us. Oh, she will always stay with us! I cannot help saying it. What a pity! What a pity!"

And eight days after, on June 7, he wrote in his theatrical _feuilleton_, on the first performance of _Froufrou_:

"I do not think that the emotion at any theatre has ever been so profound. There are, in the dramatic art, exceptional times when the artistes are transported out of themselves, carried above themselves, and compelled to obey this inward 'demon' (I should have said 'G.o.d'), who whispered to Corneille his immortal verses.

"'Well,' said I to Mlle. Sarah Bernhardt, after the play: 'this is an evening which will open to you, if you wish, the doors of the Comedie Francaise. 'Do not speak of it,' said she, 'to me. 'We will not speak of it.' But what a pity! What a pity!"

My success in _Froufrou_ was so marked that it filled the void left by Coquelin, who, after having signed, with the consent of Perrin, with Messrs, Mayer and Hollingshead, declared that he could not keep his engagements. It was a nasty _coup de Jarnac_ by which Perrin hoped to injure my London performances. He had previously sent Got to me to ask officially if I would not come back to the Comedie. He said I should be permitted to make my American tour, and that everything would be arranged on my return. But he should not have sent Got. He should have sent Worms or _le pet.i.t pere Franchise_--Delaunay. The one might have persuaded me by his affectionate reasoning and the other by the falsity of arguments presented with such grace that it would have been difficult to refuse.

Got declared that I should be only too happy to come back to the Comedie on my return to America, "For you know," he added, "you know, my little one, that you will die in that country. And if you come back you will perhaps be only too glad to return to the Comedie Francaise, for you will be in a bad state of health, and it will take some time before you are right again. Believe me, sign, and it is not we who will benefit by it, but you!"

"I thank you," I answered, "but I prefer to choose my hospital myself on my return. And now you can go and leave me in peace." I fancy I said, "Get out!"

That evening he was present at a performance of _Froufrou_; he came to my dressing-room and said:

"You had better sign, believe me! And come back to commence with _Froufrou_! I promise you a happy return!"