Bonnie May
[Illustration: She assumed a slightly careless air and looked airily at
imaginary objects.
(_Page 144._)]
Bonnie May
By
Louis Dodge
Illustrations by
Reginald Birch
_A strolling player comes_
New York
Charles Scribner’s Sons
1916
COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS
Published August, 1916
[Illustration]
TO
THE LITTLE NEW ENGLAND GIRL
WHO (IN COMPANY WITH HER MOTHER)
MADE FRIENDS WITH AN AMERICAN SOLDIER
ON A JUNE DAY IN 1898
IN THE MARKET-PLACE IN HONOLULU
AND PROMISED
“I SHALL NEVER FORGET YOU”
Contents
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE INTRUSION OF AN ACTRESS 1
II. A MOMENTOUS DECISION 15
III. MRS. BARON DECIDES 24
IV. A CRISIS 36
V. BONNIE MAY OPENS THE DOOR 46
VI. CONCERNING A FROCK 59
VII. A SUNDAY MORNING 75
VIII. STILL UNCLAIMED 86
IX. A DISAPPOINTING PERFORMANCE 95
X. THE WHITE ELEPHANT 110
XI. HOW A CONVEYANCE CAME FOR BONNIE MAY--AND HOW
IT WENT AWAY 121
XII. RELATES TO THE PLAYING OF PARTS 137
XIII. A MYSTERIOUS SEARCH BEGINS 146
XIV. MR. ADDIS RECEIVES SUPPORT 155
XV. A QUESTION OF RECONSTRUCTION 169
XVI. MRS. THORNBURG REVEALS A SECRET 184
XVII. “A KIND OF DUEL” 193
XVIII. MRS. BARON TAKES UP THE GAUNTLET 202
XIX. BONNIE MAY LOOKS BACK 218
XX. CONCERNING LAUGHTER 230
XXI. AN EXIT AND AN ENTRANCE 244
XXII. BAGGOT’S PLAY 257
XXIII. BARON COMES HOME ON A BEER-DRAY 267
XXIV. BONNIE MAY HIDES SOMETHING 279
XXV. BONNIE MAY SEES TWO FACES AT A WINDOW 289
XXVI. A GATHERING IN THE ATTIC 298
XXVII. WHAT HAPPENED IN THE ATTIC 310
XXVIII. AFTER THE CURTAIN WAS LOWERED 321
XXIX. THE MANSION IN SHADOW 331
XXX. “THE BREAK OF DAY” 339
Illustrations
She assumed a slightly careless air and looked airily
at imaginary objects _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
“I thought everybody knew me,” she said. “I’m Bonnie May” 8
“Good evening,” she said, as if she were addressing strangers 28
“You seem a little old for the part,” she suggested 54
A most extraordinary ancient man stood there watching her 82
“Enter the heroine!” was the child’s greeting 162
“They look as if they were quite happy--and didn’t care to be
anything else” 180
“I don’t know what you’re getting at!” he exclaimed. “If you’ve
got anything to say, why not say it and be done with it?” 196
“Dear child, do try to love me, won’t you?” 252
Thomason jerked his needle through a tough place and pulled it
out to arm’s length 292
“Look at them!” she screamed. “Look! Look!” 318
She had put her arms about the trembling old lady’s neck, and
for the moment they were both silent 352
Bonnie May
_Only women understand children thoroughly, but if a mere man keeps
very quiet and humbles himself properly, and refrains from talking
down to his superiors, children will sometimes be good to him and let
him see what they think about the world._
RUDYARD KIPLING.
Bonnie May
CHAPTER I
THE INTRUSION OF AN ACTRESS
Somewhere up in the gallery an usher opened a window. Instantly a shaft
of sunlight pierced the dark interior of the theatre. It created a
mote-filled aerial avenue across a vast space and came to an end in a
balcony box.
As if it were part of a general theatrical scheme it served as a
search-light and brought into brilliant relief the upper part of a
child’s body. There were blue eyes made lustrous by dark lashes; hair
the color of goldenrod, which fell forward over one shoulder and formed
a kind of radiant vehicle above for the support of a butterfly of blue
ribbon. There were delicate red lips, slightly parted.
The child leaned forward in her place and rested her elbows on the box
railing. Her chin nestled in a little crotch, formed by her two hands.
She would have resembled one of Rubens’s cherubs, if Rubens hadn’t
conceived his cherubs on quite such a vulgar plane.
It was so that Baron saw her during a brief interval. Then the window
up in the gallery was closed, and darkness reigned in the theatre
again. The child disappeared as Marguerite always disappears before
Faust has obtained more than a seductive glimpse of her.
Baron wondered who she was. She was so close to him that he could
have touched her. He wondered how she could have slipped into the box
without his seeing or hearing her. The lights had been on when he took
his seat, and at that time he had occupied the box alone. She must have
crept in with the cautiousness of a kitten; or perhaps she had come
under cover of the noise of applause.
Then he forgot her. All sorts of people were likely to come into a
playhouse during a matinée performance, he reflected.
Dawn was merging into day--in the play. The purple of a make-believe
sky turned to lavender, and to pink. The long, horizontal streaks of
color faded, and in the stronger light now turned on the stage a gypsy
woman who seemed to have been sleeping under a hedge came into view--a
young creature, who patted back a yawn which distorted her pretty
mouth. Other persons of the drama appeared.
Baron succumbed to the hypnotic power of the theatre: to the beguiling
illusions of the stage, with its beautiful voices; the relaxed
musicians, unobtrusively disinterested; the dark, indistinct rows of
alert forms down in the parquet. Despite what he was pleased to believe
was a distinguished indifference in his manner, he was passionately
fond of plays, amazingly susceptible to their appeal.
The act ended; light flooded the theatre. Baron’s glance again fell
upon the intruder who had come to share his box with him. The child
really might have been mistaken for an exquisite bit of architectural
ornamentation, if she had been placed in a niche in the big proscenium
arch. Color and pose and outline all suggested the idea. But now her
bearing changed. As she had been absorbed in the meaning of the play,
now she became equally interested in the audience, rising in long rows
from parquet to gallery. She looked almost aggressively from point to
point, with a lack of self-consciousness that was quite remarkable.
People in the audience were noticing her, too; and Baron felt suddenly
resentful at being so conspicuously perched before hundreds of eyes, in
company with a child he knew nothing about.
She appeared to have scrutinized “the house” to her satisfaction.
Then she turned as if she were slightly bored, and gazed with perfect
frankness into Baron’s eyes.
“Sold out,” she said, as if she were gratified.
Baron did not clearly grasp the fact that she was referring to “the
house.” A question as to her age occurred to him, but this he could
not answer. She must be absurdly young--a baby; yet he noted that she
had gained command of a glance that was almost maturely searching and
complacent. She was not the least bit agitated.
When, presently, she stood up on her chair to obtain a general view of
the audience, Baron frowned. She was really a brazen little thing, he
reflected, despite her angelic prettiness. And he had a swift fear that
she might fall. Looking at her uneasily, he realized now that she was
quite tawdrily dressed.
His first impression of her had been one of beauty unmarred. (He had
not seen immediately that the blue butterfly which rode jauntily on
her crown was soiled.) Now a closer inspection discovered a fantastic
little dress which might have been designed for a fancy ball--and it
was quite old, and almost shabby. Yet its gay colors, not wholly faded,
harmonized with some indefinable quality in the little creature, and
the whole garment derived a grace from its wearer which really amounted
to a kind of elfish distinction.
She spoke again presently, and now Baron was struck by the quality
of her voice. It was rather full for a little girl’s voice--not the
affected pipe of the average vain and pretty child. There was an oddly
frank, comrade-like quality in it.
“Do you know what I’ve got a notion to do?” she inquired.
Baron withdrew farther within himself. “I couldn’t possibly guess,” he
responded. He shook his head faintly, to indicate indifference. She
leaned so far over the edge of the box that he feared again for her
safety.
“I think you might possibly fall,” he said. “Would you mind sitting
down?”
She did as he suggested with a prompt and sweet spirit of obedience.
“I’m afraid I was careless,” she said. Then, looking over more
guardedly, she added: “I’ve got a notion to drop my programme down on
that old duck’s bald head.”
Baron looked down into the parquet. An elderly gentleman, conspicuously
bald-headed, sat just beneath them. Something about the shining dome
was almost comical. Yet he turned to the child coldly. He marvelled
that he had not detected a pert or self-conscious expression of
countenance to accompany the words she had spoken. But she was looking
into his eyes quite earnestly.
He turned his face away from her for an instant, and then, with an air
of having worked out a problem----
“I don’t believe I would,” he said.
“It might frighten him?” she suggested.
“Not that. He might not think it very polite.”
She looked at him studiously a little, her earnest eyes seeming to
search his soul. Then she ventured upon a story:
“I got on a street-car with Miss Barry to-day, and we sat down on a
seat with a fat woman; and, believe me, the big thing nearly squeezed
the gizzard out of me.”
Her eyes grew wide with excitement as she achieved the climax. She
waited for his comment.
His eyelids quivered slightly. He decided to pay no more attention to
her, despite her prettiness. What language! He stared resolutely at
his programme a full minute. But he could not shake off the influence
of her steady gaze. “I think you must be exaggerating,” he said
finally, with mild irritation.
“Not at all, really.”
“Well, then,” he added impatiently, “I think your language is--is
indelicate.”
“Do you, indeed?” She considered this. “Of course that’s a matter of
opinion.” She abandoned the subject and seemed to be searching his face
for a topic which might be more acceptable. “A good many things have
happened to me,” she ventured presently. “I came within an inch of
getting caught by the curtain once.”
He had no idea what she meant.
She continued: “It was in a regular tank town somewhere. I never pay
any attention to the names of the little towns.” Her tone clearly
conveyed the fact that she wished to get away from controversial
topics. She waited, plainly puzzled, rather than discouraged, because
she received no response. “You know,” she elaborated, “the audiences in
the little towns don’t care much whether it’s something legitimate, or
a tambourine show with a lot of musty jokes.”
Still Baron’s inclination was to make no response; but really there was
such an amazing contrast between her innocent beauty and her gamin-like
speech that he could not easily ignore her.
“I’m not sure I know the difference myself,” he confessed.
“Well, you’d rather see ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ than a lot of Honey Boys,
wouldn’t you?”
“I’m afraid I’d be in favor of the Honey Boys, whoever they are, unless
they are pretty bad.”
She looked incredulous, and then disappointed. For an instant she
turned her back on him with resolution. He observed that she squirmed
herself into a position of dignified uprightness in her chair.
After a brief interval she turned to him with renewed hope. “Maybe
you’re prejudiced against ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’?” she ventured.
“Frankly, I am.”
“You’re not down on the legitimate, though?”
“I like plays--if that’s what you mean.”
Her forehead wrinkled. “Certainly that’s what I mean. What did you
think I meant?”
“Why, you see, I wasn’t quite sure.”
She searched his eyes suspiciously; then suddenly she dimpled. “Tell
me--are you an actor? Or aren’t you?”
“No--assuredly not!”
She was genuinely embarrassed. She allowed her face to drop into her
hands, and Baron felt from her gesture that she must be blushing though
he could see that she was not.
After a little she laughed weakly. “How childish of me!” she exclaimed.
“I really had no right to make such a mistake. But please tell me how
you happen to be up in this box?”
“The manager was good enough to direct an usher to bring me here.”
“Well, you know, I thought this box was always given to us--to the
profession, I mean. I do hope you’ll forgive me.” She seemed prepared
to withdraw her interest from him then, as if he no longer concerned
her in any way.
But Baron was looking at her searchingly, almost rudely. “Are you
an--an actress?” he managed to ask.
Her manner changed. For the first time Baron detected an affectation.
She looked beyond him, out toward the chattering audience, with an
absurd assumption of weariness.
“I thought everybody knew me,” she said. “I’m Bonnie May. You’ve heard
of me, of course?” and she brought her eyes back to his anxiously.
“Why, yes, of course,” he assented. He was uncomfortable over the
untruth--or over the fact that he had not told it adroitly.
“I wouldn’t have talked to you so freely if I hadn’t thought you were
an actor,” she explained. “You know we always treat one another that
way.”
His manner softened. “I’m sure I understand,” he assured her.
[Illustration: “I thought everybody knew me,” she said. “I’m Bonnie
May.”]
He perceived that, despite the lightness of her manner, she was truly
ashamed of her mistake. It seemed to him that she was regretfully
slipping back into her own world, her own realm of thought. And she
was speedily becoming, to him, not a pert minx, but just a lonely,
friendly little child.
“I don’t believe I know just where you are appearing now,” he said. For
the moment he could not do less than appear to be interested in her.
She moved uncomfortably in her chair. “I’m not doing anything just
now,” she said. Then her eyes brightened. “The manager skipped just
when business was picking up. We had to close our season. Such a jay
town we closed in. The people wanted to hold our trunks!”
“But they didn’t?”
“No, we gave one more performance, so we could square up.”
“Why shouldn’t you have kept on giving performances?”
“Of course, you wouldn’t understand. You see, the manager was our Simon
Legree, and we couldn’t do without him.”
“But that last performance----”
“The constable who came to hold our things said he’d take the part of
Simon Legree just once, so we could pay our bills and get out of town.
He said there was sure to be a crowd if it was known that he would be
one of the actors. He said he’d always wanted to be an actor, but that
his parents thought it would be sinful for him to act.”
“But did he know the part?”
“He didn’t have to. Even in the profession there are a lot of us who
don’t know our parts half the time. You may have noticed. The constable
said he could ‘pop a whip’ and we told him that would do, if he would
remember to say ‘You black rascal!’ every little while. That would be
to Uncle Tom, you know. Our Uncle Tom did both parts. That happens lots
of times. With any play, I mean. He’d say: ‘Yo’ say Ah b’longs to you,
Massa Legree? Oh, no, Massa Legree, Ah don’ b’long to you. Yo’ may own
mah body, but yo’ don’ own mah soul.’ Saying both parts, you know.”
When Baron laughed at this she joined in the merriment and even
promoted it. “The constable enjoyed it,” she said. “He said he’d like
to leave town with us and play the part all the time.”
“He’d got over thinking it was sinful for him to act?”
“Yes, but the rest of us thought his first hunch was right. Besides,
there were other difficulties. You see, our Topsy was the manager’s
wife, and she wouldn’t play any more until she found her husband. She
wasn’t much of an artist. Anyway, we had to quit.”
Baron sent a wandering glance over the theatre; but he was thinking
of neither audience nor play. He wondered whose child this could be,
and by what chance a little creature so alert and so friendly in her
outlook upon life should be deeply submerged in the make-believe of
men, when she should have been reading only the primer of real things.
Then by chance his eyes fell upon Thornburg, the manager, who stood
just inside the foyer, engaged in what was seemingly an intense
conversation with a tall, decidedly striking-looking woman. And even
as his eyes rested upon these two they looked up at him as if he were
the subject of their conversation. Or were they not, more probably,
discussing the child who sat near him?
He had no time to pursue his reflections. The orchestra brought to
its climax the long overture which it had been playing with almost
grotesque inadequacy, and the curtain went up on the next act.
There was the sudden diminuendo of voices throughout the house, and the
stealthy disturbance of an individual here and there feeling his way to
his seat. Then again Baron was lost in the progress of the play.
The child shrank into herself again and became once more an absorbed,
unobtruding little creature.
Baron sat in rapt silence for half an hour; and then the master
dramatist, Fate, intervened, and proceeded to make him a figure in
one of those real dramas before which all make-believe fades into
insignificance.
At the left of the stage a flame went leaping up along the inner edge
of one of the wings, and took swift hold of a cloud of filmy fabric
overhead. The theatre was afire!
Baron saw and was incredulous. The child near him remained undisturbed.
The persons on the stage continued their work with an evenness which,
to Baron, became suddenly a deadly monotony. But back in those realms
in the theatre which were all but hidden from him he saw the swift
movements of men who were confronted with an unwonted, a fearful task.
He turned to the child with sudden purpose, with a manner that was
harsh and peremptory. “Come!” he said. His voice was subdued yet
vibrant.
The child noted the vibration and quickly caught the expression of
command in his eyes. She put out a hand toward him obediently, but he
excitedly ignored that. He gathered her into his arms and disappeared
from the box. In an instant he was carrying her cautiously yet swiftly
down a narrow stairway.
He skirted the wall of the theatre and passed the manager in the foyer.
He paused long enough to whisper a few startling words, and then
hurried toward the entrance. His ears were fortified for the screams
of women; but he heard only the dull sound of the asbestos curtain
being lowered as he passed out to the street. He did not hesitate
until he had turned a corner and was well out of the way of a possible
panic-stricken crowd.
He put the child down on the sidewalk; she was really a good deal above
the weight of those children who are usually carried. A few steps and
they had reached a confectioner’s shop, in which women and children
were sitting at little tables, oblivious to all menaces, far or near.
“Let’s go in here,” he said, trying to assume a matter-of-fact tone.
The child looked searchingly into his eyes. “What was it?” she asked.
“What was what?”
“Don’t!” she exclaimed with impatience. And then she looked up and down
the street, where the constant stream of strangers passed. She felt
forlorn, alone. She turned again to Baron as to a final refuge. “I
behaved myself,” she said. “I didn’t wait to ask what was the matter--I
didn’t say a word. But I knew something had happened. I could hear your
heart beating. I knew it was something terrible. But you could tell me
now!”
Baron guided her to a chair and released her with a feeling of relief.
His impulse was to take his departure and let the incident end as it
might. But that wouldn’t do, certainly! What would the confectioner do
with the child? Besides, there was something about her----
Through the fitful symphony of the city’s noises the clang of an
alarm-bell sounded.
The child lifted her head; her eyes became wide with excitement.
“There’s a fire!” she exclaimed.
“Yes,” admitted Baron. “It’s in the theatre. I thought we ought to come
out, though of course it may not amount to anything. We’ll wait here
until the excitement is over, and then we’ll go out and find your----”
He did not finish the sentence. He realized that he did not know how.
Instead he turned to a clerk and ordered something--he scarcely knew
what. He was listening to those noises out in the street; he was
noting, soon with great relief, that they were abating rapidly. Clearly
there had been no real danger, after all.
He led his charge from the place presently. He noticed that she had not
touched a little dish of something the clerk had set before her.
On the street again he was surprised to perceive that the normal
activities of the neighborhood had been resumed. The audience in the
theatre had been dismissed upon some pretext of a nature not at all
terrifying. The fire had been extinguished. The lobby was deserted.
No one was searching or waiting for a little girl, or seemed to be
remotely interested in one.
“Strange!” reflected Baron. He was wholly outside the realm of
make-believe now. He was amid painfully prosaic surroundings.
He turned to his companion. “Er--your name has escaped me for the
minute----”
“Bonnie May.”
“Of course. Well, Bonnie May, I think I’ll have to take you home.”
“Whose home--yours?” she asked.
“Good gracious, no! To your own!”
She peered into the lobby searchingly, the light slowly fading from her
eyes.
“But I haven’t any home,” she said.