CALLING ON THE MANAGER
It was the last week of the season at the Globe Theatre, and it was
closing in a blaze of glory. To leave a good taste in the mouth of the
public, the actor-manager, Stewart Thrall, had given it a final week of
Shakspere. "Romeo and Juliet" was playing with a very good and beautiful
young woman as star, who could not quite hide her contemptuous
misunderstanding of the passion-shaken little maid of Verona, the
swiftness of whose love is ever matched by its purity; and who,
therefore, seized upon the potion scene, making much of it and of the
final scene of all, so that it was not an ideal Juliet, but a most
beautiful woman in a rich and picturesque setting, who, brilliantly
successful in other characters, was accepted readily in this, because,
forsooth, nothing is so successful as success.
A large and beefy but an emphatic Romeo, who had to enthuse for two, an
exquisite Mercutio, a deliriously droll Nurse, and an excellent general
cast by their united efforts gave this very pleasing performance, whose
seven repetitions would do much to dim the memory of the many French
abominations that earlier in the season had freely scattered wink,
innuendo, and double-entendre while trailing their chic indecencies
about the same stage. Of course a few real lovers and students of
Shakspere felt the pity of the marred, misunderstood characters, while
keenly enjoying other more poetic presentations; but Stewart Thrall was
appealing to another class, the great uncultivated, who, though secretly
bored to extinction, dearly loved to pose (for one week only) as patrons
of the Bard; and as they exchanged platitudes with one another, when
meeting by chance at the box-office window, they invariably
congratulated themselves upon having one manager in their midst who
dared to produce Shakspere.
And some declared, with enthusiasm, that he deserved a public vote of
thanks for thus giving their sons and daughters an opportunity to study
a Shaksperian drama. And Mr. Thrall, sitting in the box-office out of
sight, but not out of hearing, smiled sardonically, and signed a cable
order to his Paris agent to secure a great Frenchman's newest, wittiest
indecency for New York's future delight, knowing well that the
Shaksperian poseurs outside would be found among its most generous
patrons.
Then, glancing at the treasurer, busy over his floor-plans,
change-drawer, and ticket stamps, he said: "By the way, Barney, you
reserved the wrong box for Claire Morrell last night. I told you plainly
the right box--didn't you understand me so?"
"Yes, sir," replied that young man of amazing collars, throwing back his
head and tilting up his cruelly scraped jaw in an effort to escape the
strangle-hold of the white linen long enough to answer his employer's
question. "Yes, sir; but--but you remember you were standing on the
stage when you called out to me to hold the right-hand box, and I
thought you meant the box to your right as you stood, and that, of
course, is the left box on the seat chart; and so I reserved that,
and----"
"And spoiled the evening for Miss Morrell, who, for some reason, will
never occupy a seat on the left of the house if she can help it."
"Well, sir, I thought----" writhed and twisted he of the collar.
"Don't think, then, Barney. I'll do the thinking if you'll do the
obeying. Next time ask--that's easier than thinking, or [with a laugh]
it would be to anyone else. Barney, that infernal collar will cut your
head off one of these days. Why don't you have it lowered a couple of
inches and enjoy some of the comforts of life?" And, striking a match,
he lifted it toward his cigar, stopped suddenly, shook out the small
flame, put the cigar back into the box on the shelf, and turning to
Barney said: "I'll take your place five minutes. I want you to run as
quickly as you can round to the confectioner's and get me some sugared
violets. Hurry, now, that's a good fellow!"
And Barney, snatching his hat from the nail, made a dash for the street,
wondering as he ran "who was coming to see the governor, for, of course,
he wasn't going to squat down there alone and stuff himself with
violets." By which anyone can see what a coarse-minded young person this
seller of tickets was.
But he was swift of foot, and was soon back in his place at the office
window, while, dainty package in hand, his employer came out, crossed
the vestibule, and, entering his private office, proceeded to untie his
parcel and pour the fragrant, crystallized violets into a charming
bonbonniere standing on the corner of his desk.
The prevailing tone of this room was a dull, rich red, and it made an
agreeable background for the figure of the man standing there, Stewart
Thrall, the actor-manager of the Globe Theatre, who was at that moment
expecting a call from the popular actress, Claire Morrell, and a certain
young lady who wished (oh, foolish young lady!) to go upon the stage. A
tall man, of excellent figure. He was a well-groomed, clean-skinned man.
There was nothing of the long-haired, floating necktied, fur-coated,
comic-journal actor about him. He was no "beauty man," either; but, as a
certain very great lady had once truly said, "He had eyes and a manner."
A charming manner it was--gracious, graceful, sincere. And as one takes
a certain simple base for a sauce, and, by adding various flavors or
acids, produces innumerable different sauces, so to that natural manner
he, by adding a touch of dignity or sternness or jollity or deprecation,
came very near making himself all things to all men. His closely cropped
hair was black--not the blue-black of the Latins, but that darkest brown
that is America's black--and his eyes were those Irish blue ones that
are "smudged in" with black lashes, luminous, quick sparkling, softly
darkening, wooing, winning, faithless eyes--an actor's eyes par
excellence, but with a droop of the heavily fringed lids that played sad
havoc with the dreams of the romantic girl patrons of the theatre.
Stewart Thrall was a popular idol. His stroll down the sweet sunny side
of Broadway was a triumphal progress. Glances, smiles, turning heads,
and flattering remarks trailed after him like a tail to the kite of his
vogue. He had earned his popularity--it had not been thrust upon him. He
had been shrewd and clever and determined. He had acted up to the motto
of his choice: "To be agreeable." He made everything serve him. If he
had a friend in a high place he never forgot it or allowed anyone else
to forget it either. If he went occasionally to church on a fine Sunday,
where wealthy pewholders vied with one another in courteous hospitality,
he saw to it that that was the church attended by his banker. "The
recollection will do him no harm and may do me a service," he would say
to himself with a laugh. When he went to a dance he never failed to
bestow attentions upon any homely girl or woman who wore jewels, and in
more than one instance the effects of such a one's gratitude had been
distinctly felt in the box-office.
But these wealthy wall-flowers were never waltzed with. The very
prettiest girl in the room could be relied upon to arrange her card to
favor this man with the speaking eyes. And so, with drooping lids in
full evidence, he swayed and whirled, reversed and backed, apparently by
instinct, since his challenging glance never left his partner's face. He
would think triumphantly of the two birds he had brought down with one
stone, winning gratitude from one and a flirtation from another.
Nor did he fail "to be agreeable" to humble people, for no one knew
better than he how swift were the ups and downs of his profession.
Therefore, he treated with friendly consideration the "nobody" who might
be a "somebody" the next time he saw him. Gravely respectful to the gray
old solid men of commerce, hail fellow with that body of men known as
"the boys," gambling just enough to keep in friendly touch with the big
guns of the business, and seemingly ready to give up his very soul to
the reporters, he was a matinee idol, a successful man, a general
favorite. And yet, after all, disappointed; so many brief, transient
loves had he known; so many charming hypocrites had made a farce of the
grand passion, depriving it of any touch of sanctity, that now an
apathetic weariness had come upon him, and yet that was not the worst.
No one could have forced the confession from him, but in his heart he
admitted his defeat. He had started out to win fame, but had attained
only notoriety; and though he sneered and said to himself: "Fame has
generally gone hungry, and I at least am well fed and have a nice little
story to read in my bank-book," he was, all the same, a disappointed
man.
As he turned to toss the paper wrapper and bits of ribbon from his
parcel into the waste-basket his eyes encountered a picture of himself
as the young Laertes. And he paused, looked at it frowningly, and
commented: "You poor young fool! What a burning mass of hope and
ambition you were! So honestly believing in acting as a veritable art,
and--and forgetting everything in the joy of it! Damned if you didn't!
But Lord! that was before you found your motto and began 'to be
agreeable' to the world! Couldn't serve two gods, could you, sonny?
Well, being agreeable has paid, in some ways. But I have put up with
your reproachful glances long enough. I think I'll take you down from
there and send you over to the Missus. You won't hurt her the way you do
me!" And, with a half-laughing, half-frowning face, he stepped on a low
couch, that he might reach and lift down the offending, boyish Laertes.
He hurried a bit, for he knew that Claire Morrell was very exact in
keeping her appointments, and that she might come in at any moment now,
with her confounded stage-struck protegee, to whom he would never have
given a thought, let alone an engagement, for he hated amateurs, had it
not been that he had met the clever and witty, if ancient, Mrs. Van
Camp, and knew her to be of the best old Dutch stock. Therefore, it
would rather flatter his vanity to be able to exploit the name of her
god-daughter as a member of his company, if only she might not be too
heavy a load of awkward self-consciousness--if only she might be
moderately good-looking. And then he set the picture down hard, with its
long wire hooping, and coiling, like a live and very angry thing about
it, and whistled, exclaiming aloud: "Oh, by Jove! I wonder if either of
those bright and pretty girls the Morrell had with her last night might
be the protegee? They were both charming, but how that dark one did
light up when Morrell led the applause for my Queen Mab speech! But no
such luck, I suppose!"
And, man-fashion, he drew out his handkerchief to dust the small
wingless Love on the pedestal between the draped curtains of a
mock-window, whose long Holland shade really covered a very narrow door,
spring locked and never used--never, one could readily understand that
from the inconvenience of its approach, but Mr. Thrall carried the key.
And out in Broadway Claire Morrell was saying: "It's so very tiring,
this shopping; suppose, Miss Lawton, that we step in at the theatre and
see if Mr. Thrall is there now, instead of making a special trip
to-morrow. If he is in he will see us, if he has gone home we can cool
off in the dark auditorium. What do you say, Miss Dorothy?"
For Miss Morrell had kept her talk with the manager and her appointment
a secret, feeling that Sybil would thus be more at her ease, more
natural in manner, than she could possibly be if she knew she was being
inspected or examined, like a servant seeking a new place. And now, as
the sisters smilingly consented to her plan, she turned in between the
big billboards that announced the week's run of "Romeo and Juliet," with
the name of the lady star in very, very large letters and "supported by"
in small type. Then the name of the gentleman who played Romeo appeared
in letters two sizes smaller than those of the star, and lower down, in
quite small type, one read: "Mr. Stewart Thrall as Mercutio."
And Sybil tapped the letters with her parasol-tip, and said: "His
performance was the best in the play. Why are his letters not the
biggest?"
And the actress laughed, as she answered: "Children always ask difficult
questions. Wait till you're older, my dear. Perhaps this time next year
all this mystery of type and printers' ink will be clear to your
understanding. But you are right about the acting of Thrall; his
Mercutio is the best of his time."
She went to the box-office window, and learning from the half-strangled
Barney that the manager was in his private office, she swept them across
the vestibule, from whose walls the gold-framed pictured actors looked
down inquiringly, tapped at a door, and, in answer to a cheery "Entrez!"
entered the room, crying: "May I bring up my light infantry?"
And in answer to his laughing "By all means--I'm in need of
reinforcements, you know!" she drew the girls inside, saying: "The
Misses Lawton, Mr. Thrall, who ask of your grace a few moments
hospitality and rest, as they, like myself, are country bred, and
therefore easily shop-wearied."
"Well, none of you are shop-worn, at all events!" He laughed, as he
found seats for them by the simple process of sweeping manuscripts,
sheet-music, and what-not from the chair to the floor in a corner.
"Ah!" exclaimed Miss Morrell to the girls, "would he not make a blithe
and bonnie housekeeper?"
And Sybil acquiesced with: "A place for everything and everything in
that one place," while Thrall drew up the shade of the one real window,
and let the full light into the dull red room, showing the
age-blackened, iron-heavy, splendidly carved table and desk and chair
and the freshness of the two young creatures looking up at him with such
honest admiration in their innocent eyes as to fairly embarrass him.
And, so strange a thing is memory, for just one moment he was a boy
again in roundabout jacket and broad white collar, and his only sister,
seventeen years old, stood at the altar with her young minister
bridegroom, and looked at him with just such sweetly innocent eyes. He
shook his head sharply and passed his hand across his eyes. His sister
had been dead these twenty years--what had come over him?
And then Miss Morrell, who had been peering under and over everything in
the room, asked, plaintively: "Where is it, Stewart, mon ami? What have
you done with it? Am I to die before your eyes from sheer exhaustion,
and without even an effort on your part to save me?"
And he, pointing to a hanging cabinet, said: "There's the life-saving
station!" and threw open the door, revealing a complete outfit for
coffee-making. Then, noting the girls' surprised looks, he went on: "Ah!
I see you are not very well acquainted with my friend here, or has she
been clever enough to conceal her dissipation? Be that as it may, we
have here an awful example--a victim to----"
"Stewart Thrall!" threateningly exclaimed Miss Morrell, as she lighted
the spirit-lamp beneath the coffee-pot.
"A victim to coffee! Morning, noon, or night, her one cry is 'Coffee!'
Ah, it's sad! Such a promising young-creature as she was, too! But you
see what coffee has brought her to!"
"I'll buy a French pot and a bottle of alcohol on the way home," laughed
Sybil, "and see where it will land me!"
"Gracious!" cried Dorothy, "you will land in a sanitarium if you attempt
to increase the amount of coffee you are taking already!"
"Oh, are you one of the devotees of the little brown berry?" asked Miss
Morrell. "Well, we are three, then, for that man there adores it, in
spite of his jibes at me!"
"I drink but a reasonable amount," declared Thrall, "while you--Miss
Lawton, will you push that biscuit-jar this way? Do you know, when the
rehearsal is called, this enslaved creature drinks coffee because work
is beginning. Later she drinks coffee because work is over. When it is
cold, she drinks coffee to warm her. When it is warm, she drinks coffee
to cool her!"
"My very dear friend," interrupted Miss Morrell, "there is a strangely
familiar sound about all that. Do you really believe no one else ever
heard of Thackeray?"
"And Thackeray's daughter?" laughed Sybil.
"Who read Dickens," added Dorothy, with dancing eyes.
"'When she was glad, she read Dickens,'" quoted Miss Morrell.
"'When she was sad, she read Dickens,'" added Sybil.
"So you see, sir," continued the actress, "even if quotations are not
exact to the letter, they are sufficient to prove you are a plagiarist!"
"Good heavens! Who would have believed so many people remembered a man
named Thackeray!" said Thrall, with mock astonishment. "Now Vanity Fair
forgets him entirely."
"A very natural revenge! Who cares to remember the artist who paints an
unflattering portrait? Poor Vanity Fair wanted to be idealized a bit.
Oh, wait, Stewart--wait! Don't pour yet, there's a cigar-clip and a
postage-stamp in the bottom of that cup! Now pour! If only you could be
induced to write a few 'Household Hints' for the aid of young
house-keepers!"
"Yes! My services to domestic science would about equal in value my
services to art!" he jeered.
Honest little Dorothy, accepting the Sevres cup extended to her, lifted
clear blue eyes to her host's face, saying: "You should not speak so
contemptuously of what you have done, Mr. Thrall. If acting is an art,
as persons say, a man who acts Shaksperian characters very beautifully
does a real service to that art--I think!"
"Bravo!" cried Miss Morrell, tapping her spoon against her cup. "Bravo,
little play-lover! A charming compliment, and a very just rebuke also
for your insincerity of speech, Stewart, my friend!"
And he, jumping to the conclusion that it was Dorothy who wanted to go
upon the stage, felt a pang of disappointment that surprised him by its
sharpness, as he somewhat gravely answered: "It was not insincere. You
know well enough," nodding his head toward Claire Morrell, "that this
week's return to the fountain-head of English drama has not been made
from love or from a desire to improve public taste. You know it is but a
catch-penny device--an advertisement. I might"--he glanced at the wrapt
face of the young Laertes as he spoke--"I might have served art once.
Indeed, I know it; but"--he laughed a hard little laugh--"art and mammon
are no more to be served by the same man than God and mammon, and he who
serves art entirely and lovingly will have mighty little to show for his
labor!"
"At least," broke in Sybil, hotly, with dark face aglow, "he would have
the joy of his unskimped service and the comfort of a thorough
self-respect!"
And again Thrall felt that swift pang of regret that this was not the
stage aspirant. For to himself he had been saying: "These innocent,
wholesome girls are two buds in the garden of life. This fair one, like
a pale blush-rose, reaches her most perfect beauty now, in the
close-folded bud form; later its perfect blossoming will reveal it pale
and shallow, though very sweet. But the other one, she with the lustrous
eyes and the mutinous red mouth, is like one of the red damask buds of
Southern France, now ideally beautiful, yet the opening of velvety
petals will betray depth after depth of deepening color, free wave after
wave of perfume, until the very sweetest, the very purest tint of
glowing color, will be found at last in the deep splendor of the fully
open heart! Yes, this girl will blossom into a splendid womanhood. And
what a face for the stage!"
And then he was aware of Miss Morrell setting down her cup and saying,
briskly: "A little business now, Mr. Manager, if you please! Miss Lawton
here is very keen to go upon the stage. She is immensely ambitious,
absolutely without experience, but humble in mind enough to be willing
to begin at the bottomest bottom. I would gladly give her her start in
my company, if I had room for her, and I would not ask you to consider
her wish if I did not truly believe she had in her the making of a good
actress."
Mr. Thrall turned surprised eyes toward the happily smiling Dorothy.
Sybil had gone white when her friend began to speak for her, and sat
still and cold, waiting for her doom.
"In heaven's name!" thought he. "What has come to the Morrell--to think
that child can act?" Then he glanced at the rigid figure of Sybil, and
said, slowly: "And you--have you no desire for the stage life?"
She raised her dark eyes, and said, very low: "I would give my soul to
act!"
Miss Morrell's nervous fingers closed sharply. She wished the girl had
not said that, and in the same instant Dorothy exclaimed: "Oh, Miss
Morrell, Mr. Thrall thought you were speaking of me!"
And actor as he was, the man turned suddenly to his desk to hide the
color he knew was burning over his face, and the senseless delight that
flashed through him at the words. Presently he asked if her friends
permitted her to take this step. Being reassured on that point, he
inquired if she had had any experience as an amateur. And when she
replied "No!" with a sadly fallen countenance, he smilingly commented:
"No tears are called for yet!"
And Miss Morrell broke in with: "And no lessons in elocution has she
had--no, not one!"
"Thank God!" fervently exclaimed Thrall. "Decidedly, your case looks
hopeful, Miss Lawton."
After some further conversation, finding Sybil would be in town for a
day or two, he asked permission to call on her at Mrs. Van Camp's home
and let her know what his decision was. As he spoke he caught the swift
expression of anxiety on Dorothy's face and followed her glance, and,
noting the close attention Sybil was bestowing on a picture, knew she
was hiding the tears of disappointment, of fear, and felt a throb of
sympathy. Poor little soul! Had he not been just as impatient, just as
sensitive--once? So, while Dorothy gathered up the fans and parcels, and
Miss Morrell paused to place a candied violet between her lips, Stewart
Thrall stepped close to Sybil's side, and said, very low: "Don't be
distressed--you shall have the engagement. Only I don't know yet just
how or where I can place you!"
And the incredulous joy flashing through the tears, the tremulous smile
on her lips, as she turned her face to him, made him exclaim, mentally:
"Good God! If she could do but the half of that upon the stage!"
Then, as they were ready to depart, ever punctually exact in the small
courtesies, he placed himself at Miss Morrell's side and led the way to
the vestibule, where a tall, shabby fellow was slouching before the
box-office window, while young Barney could be plainly heard refusing to
give him money without Mr. Thrall's order.
Hearing advancing footsteps, the man turned a pale, liquor-soddened face
toward them, and, seeing the ladies, he let go of the window-ledge he
had clung to, removed his hat with a trembling hand, advanced
hesitatingly, and attempted to address Thrall, who said, savagely: "Step
aside! I'll speak to you presently!" And, as the poor wreck drew back,
they passed on to the open front doors.
And Claire Morrell raised mildly surprised eyes, and said: "Jim Roberts
is still with you, then?"
And Thrall, with a shrug of his shoulders, answered, flippantly: "Like
the poor!" and bowed them out.