MR. WUFF'S "NEW STAR."
"Miss Constance Greenwood, the new actress!" "Go and see Constance
Greenwood on the 18th!" "Constance Greenwood as Lady Malkinshaw!" Such
were the placards in enormous letters which glared upon Laurence
Alsager from every dead wall and hoarding on his passage from the
railway-station to his old rooms in Jermyn Street. Laurence could not
forbear smiling as he glanced at them--could not forbear a laugh as,
at the Club over his dinner, he read the advertisements of the
forthcoming appearance of Miss Greenwood at the Theatre Royal, Hatton
Garden, for which national establishment she had been secured by the
_impresario_, Mr. Wuff, at an expense hitherto unparalleled--at least
so said the advertisements.
Yes; Mr. Wuff had done it at last! He had cut himself adrift from the
moorings of mediocrity, as his nautical dramatist expressed it, and it
was now sink or swim with him. He was "going in a perisher," he said
himself; and having set his fortune on a die, he was just waiting to
see whether it turned up six or ace.
When Mr. Wuff came into a sum of money on the death of a distant
relative, and, forsaking the necessary but hardly popular calling of a
sheriff's-officer, took the Theatre Royal, Hatton Garden, and opened
it with a revival of the legitimate drama in general and of
Shakespearian plays in particular, he made a very great hit. It was so
long since any one had attempted to represent Shakespeare, that an
entirely new generation had sprung up, which, egged on by its elders,
went religiously to the first performance of all the celebrated plays,
and tried very hard indeed to think they both understood and liked
them. The newspaper press too was very noble on the subject. Mr. Wuff,
so said the critics, was the great dramatic resuscitator of the age.
What! People had said that the taste for the legitimate was exploded!
The answer to that was in the crowds that thronged to T. R., Hatton
Garden. And then the critics went on to say that the scenery by Mr.
Slapp, with wonderful moonlight effects such as had never previously
been seen, was thoroughly appreciated; and that the mechanical
arrangement for the appearance of Banquo's ghost amongst the
unconscious Thanes was a marvel of theatrical deception. Was it
Shakespeare or Slapp who drew? Buncle, a heavy, ignorant, ill-educated
man, who had played fourth-rate parts with the _Dii majores_ in those
"palmy days" of which we read, and who now, _faute de mieux_, found
himself pitch-forked into the leading characters, thought it was
Shakespeare--and Buncle! The knowing ones thought it was the novelty
of the reproduction and the excellence of Slapp's scenery which caused
the success; and the knowing ones were right. Shakespeare, as
interpreted by Buncle, Mrs. Buncle, and Stampede--whom Buncle always
took about with him to play his seconds--drew for a certain length of
time. Then the audience thinned gradually, and Wuff found it necessary
to supplement _King Lear_ with the _Harem Beauties_--a ballet
supported by the best band of _coryphées_ in Europe; and that was a
really good stroke of policy. While Buncle was lying down and dying as
Lear, the club-men came trooping into the house; and Buncle's
apostrophes to his dead daughter Cordelia were nearly inaudible in the
creaking of boots and the settling into seats. The pit cried "Hush!"
and "Shame!" but the swells did not care about the pit, and the
curtain fell on Buncle thirsting for aristocratic blood. The ballet at
first attracted largely. As the time for its commencement approached,
the military clubs were drained of their members, who went away in a
procession of hansoms from Pall Mall to Hatton Garden; and you could
have counted more peers within Wuff's walls at one time than were to
be found, save on special occasions, at St. Stephen's.
But the ballet, after a time, ceased to draw; and Mr. Wuff could not
supplement it by another, for the _coryphées_ had all returned to
their allegiance to the manager of the Opera-house, whose season had
just commenced. Mr. Wuff was in despair; he dared not shut the house,
for he had to make up his rent, which was required with inexorable
punctuality by the committee of gentlemen who owned the theatre. He
must try something; but what was it to be? Wuff and his treasurer, Mr.
Bond,--always known as Tommy Bond, an apple-faced, white-headed old
gentleman, who had dropped into the theatrical world no one ever knew
whence, and who had held a place of trust with all the great managers
of the T. R., Hatton Garden, for thirty years,--were closeted
together.
"What's it to be, Tommy?" repeated Mr. Wuff for the twentieth time.
"They've had it all round, hot and strong; and what's the caper for
'em now, I don't know."
"What do you think of reviving _Julius Caesar?_ The classic costume
has not been seen on these boards for years."
"What! Billy's _Julius Caesar?_ No, thank you! I've had enough of Bill
to last me some time--and that brute Buncle drawing fifteen pounds a
week, and bellowing his lungs out to thirty people in the pit! No, no!
Is there a good lion-and-camel lot about?"
Mr. Bond shuddered; he was frequently prompted to shudder in his
conversation with Mr. Wuff. He was a great believer in the elevating
tendencies of the drama; and when he thought of lions and camels on
the same boards which he had seen trodden at different times by those
great actors and rivals, Grumble and Green, he could not refrain from
shuddering. But his business instincts made him turn to a file of the
_Era_ on the table, and he said, after consulting it:
"There's Roker's troupe at North Shields."
"How long since they've been in town?"
"Oh, two years; and then they were only at the Wells--you can scarcely
call that town; and it didn't interfere a bit with our people, you
know."
"Roker's are performing lions, ain't they?"
"Yes; they'll let him do anything to them, when they're in a proper
state."
"All right! Write to him about terms at once; and send to Darn and
tell him we want a piece to bring out this lot at once. Must be
Eastern, because of the camel--long procession, slaves, caskets, and
all that kind of thing, and a fight with the lion for Roker. That's
all Roker's to do, mind; he can't act a bit."
Mr. Roker was driving such an excellent trade with the pitmen of the
North, that he refused to come to London except on terms which Mr.
Wuff would not give; and so that enterprising manager was again in a
strait. Mr. Trapman had been called into council, had ransacked his
books and his brain in search for novelty, but all to no purpose; and
things were looking very serious for Mr. Wuff, when one morning
Trapman rushed from his office and arrived breathless in the manager's
sanctum.
"What is it?" asked Wuff, who was sitting vacantly looking at Bond,
poring over files of old paybills.
"We've got it at last, I think!" said Trapman, pointing to an open
letter in his hand "You've heard of Constance Greenwood?"
"Yes, yes!" struck in Mr. Bond eagerly. "Milman was here last week,
just arrived from New York,--and he says that for the leading-lady
business--modern time, I mean--he'd never seen anything like her."
"Yankee, ain't she?" asked Wuff coldly.
"Not a bit of it," replied Trapman. "She's English bred and born; only
been out there three months; never played anywhere before, and made a
most tre-mendous hit. I saw the New York papers about her first night.
They'd got up a report that she was the daughter of an English
nobleman, and had run away because her father was cruel to her; and
this crammed the house. The girl's acting did the rest. Every one says
she's very clever, and she was making no end of dollars a-night."
"Well?" said Wuff, who was working up into excitement.
"Oh, I thought you did not care about it," said Trapman. "I've a
letter from her here in my hand, saying she's taken a sudden desire to
England, and wants me to get her an engagement in a first-class
theatre. I've got newspapers by the same mail, describing her farewell
benefit, and speculating, in the way those chaps do over there, about
what can have made her want to go to England so suddenly. But there's
no doubt she's a clipper, and I came at once to offer her to you."
"I'll have her!" shouted Wuff, jumping up. "First-class theatre she
wants, eh? This is the shop. Let's have a look at her letter?"
"Can't do that,--it's a private letter," said Trapman; "but I'll tell
you her terms: ten pound a-night settled, and a share after a
hundred."
"That'll do. Now, Tommy Bond, just sit down and write a stunnin'
advertisement, and put that story about her being a nobleman's
daughter into shape,--only make her run away because she was in
love, and wanted to earn money for the support of her lover, who was
blind.--Eh, Trapman, that ought to wake 'em up?--And send the story to
little Shiffon, who does that column of lies, and ask him to stick it
in next week.--What's her line, Trapman?"
"Genteel comedy and interesting business of the highest class,--lady
of the present day, you know."
"All right; then I shan't want Buncle."
"Not a bit; get rid of him at once. But I'll tell you what;
Pontifex has quarrelled with the Parthenium people--he was with me
yesterday--and I'd pick him up to support her."
Mr. Wuff agreed to this, and told Mr. Trapman to take the necessary
steps; and that gentleman then took his departure.
"Wasn't going to let Wuff look at her letter," said he, as he walked
away; "wouldn't do at all. What a doosed clever gal! What does she
say?" and he pulled the letter from his pocket: "'Not a word to any
one until after my appearance. After that I shan't care.' All right,
my dear; you may depend upon me."
Mr. Wuff went to work with a will, and spared no expense in his bills
and advertisements. The nobleman's daughter's story was duly filtered
through the newspapers, and popular curiosity was excited. Miss
Constance Greenwood arrived from America by the next mail, bringing
with her an American play, founded on a French subject, full of
interest, and what we should in the present day call sensation, but
wretchedly written. This play was given to the accomplished Spofforth;
and under his manipulation it became a very capital acting drama, with
a splendid character for Miss Greenwood, and very good chances for
Pontifex. Wuff, Bond, Spofforth, and Oldboy, the critic of the
_Statesman_, had a little dinner at Wuff's house before the evening
dress-rehearsal, which Miss Greenwood had requested before the
production of the piece; and they were all delighted with what they
saw. Oldboy was especially pleased. "I thought," said he, "that
ladylike women left the stage with Miss Fortescue; but this girl
restores my hopes." And Wuff winked at Spofforth, and they both knew
that meant a column and a half the morning after the performance.
Sir Laurence Alsager drove straight from the railway-station to the
Maecenas Club, where his servant was waiting for him with his
dressing-things. As he pushed through the streets, the placards on the
walls announcing the theatrical novelty for the evening recalled to
his mind the night of his return from the East. Then he drove to the
Club, then he had returned to be present at the first representation
of a theatrical novelty; but ah, how different was his state of mind
then from what it was now! Then the iron had passed over the slight
scratch which he at that time imagined was a wound, and had completely
cicatrized it; now a real wound was gaping and bare. Kismet! kismet!
the old story. That night he saw Georgie Mitford for the first time;
and ever since then what had he not suffered on her account! Ah, what
had she herself not suffered, poor child! His absence from London and
his manner of life down at Knockholt had precluded him from hearing
any recent news of her; and he wondered whether the lapse of time had
had any effect on Sir Charles Mitford's mad infatuation, or whether it
still continued. More than anything else, Laurence wanted to know
whether Lady Mitford's domestic misery was known to the world at
large, or confined to the few acquaintances who had such splendid
opportunities of inspecting in the quiet of Redmoor. He knew that her
first appearance in society had excited a great deal of notice, a
great deal of admiration, and, consequently, a great deal of envy; and
he was too much a man of the world not to feel certain that anything
to her disadvantage would be sought out with the greatest
perseverance, and spread abroad with the greatest alacrity. And it was
to her disadvantage in the eyes of society, that her home was unhappy;
there were people in numbers who would declare that the result was her
fault; that she was prim, puritanical, bad-tempered; that her jealousy
was perfectly ridiculous; that her missy ways and affectation rendered
it impossible for any man to live with her. There were numbers of
people who would take an opposite view of the question, and who would
pity her--not indeed with that pity which is akin to love, but from a
feeling springing from a very different source,--a pity which consists
in loudly denouncing the cause for compassion, and wondering how the
person to be compassionated can endure what has to be gone through.
There would be people who could not understand how anything otherwise
could have been expected: a young person from the _bourgeoisie_
introduced into the _nous-autres_ class must expect that the silly
fancy which had captivated her husband would not last, and must be
prepared to take the consequences of her vaulting ambition. The
Clanronald and Tappington set would infallibly regard it from this
last-mentioned point of view, accordingly.
How Laurence Alsager's blood boiled within him as all these thoughts
passed through his mind! During the quietude of his life at Knockholt,
he had had sufficient opportunities so thoroughly to catechise
himself, so perfectly to dissect the feelings of his breast, as to
leave no doubt in his own mind that he loved Lady Mitford deeply and
passionately. The notion of the guardian angel, the protecting genius,
which he had so encouraged at first, had now entirely faded out, and
he had not scrupled to show to himself the actual state of his
feelings towards her. Not that they would ever be known; he had made
up his mind to keep them rigidly locked in his own bosom. But still it
was worse than horrible to think that the woman in whose service he
would willingly have perilled his life, was in all probability
dragging on a miserable existence, exposed to the perverse
misunderstandings or degrading pity of the world! On these latter
points he should soon be assured. They discussed everybody at the
Maecenas; and if there had been anything sufficiently noticeable in
the Mitford _ménage_ to call for comment, it was sure to receive the
freest and most outspoken discussion in the tabak-parliament of the
Club.
Meanwhile, the mere notion of being back in London conduced in no
small degree to raise Laurence's spirits. His time at Knockholt had
been, he felt, far from unprofitably spent; he had had opportunities
not merely of examining his own heart, but of making himself
acquainted with the hopes and fears, the wishes and prospects, of some
of those with whose lives he was to a certain extent concerned. He had
had opportunities of carrying out certain pet projects of the good old
man, whose last days he had been permitted to console; and he had been
enabled to take up that position in his county which was required of
him, not merely by the hollow ordinances of "gentility," but by the
great binding rivets of society. He hoped in all honesty and humility
to be able "to do his duty in that state of life unto which God had
called him;" but he felt all the delight of a schoolboy out of bounds
in laying-by the county magnate, the landed proprietor, the many-acred
wealthy baronet, for a time, and making a very small unit in the grand
population of London. The crowded streets, the gas-lamps, the dull
rumble of the passing vehicles,--all were delightful to him; and as he
drew up at the club-door he felt happier than he had done for many a
long day.
He dressed himself and went down into the coffee-room, which he found
thronged. Mr. Wuff's advertisements and bills had been so far
fruitful, that two-thirds of the diners at the Maecenas seemed from
their talk to be going to the Hatton-Garden Theatre. Laurence was
welcomed with great cordiality by all who knew him, and had numerous
offers of "joining tables;" but he expected George Bertram, and when
he found that that pillar of the state did not arrive, he preferred
dining by himself. The solitary life he had been leading, the event
which had led to that life, the reflections which had engrossed him
since he had led it,--all concurred to prevent him from suddenly
plunging into the light gossip of a club-room. After dinner, finding
that the piece in which Miss Constance Greenwood was to appear did not
commence until half-past eight, he went into the smoking-room, where
most of the diners had assembled, and in addition to them, Lord
Dollamore. He looked up and saw Alsager's entrance; then stretched out
his hand, and pointed to a vacant seat on the couch beside him.
"My dear Alsager, delighted to see you,--honestly and truly delighted!
How are you? What a hermit you have become! though of course I
understand,--family-business and all that; and what has brought you up
at last--not this new play?"
"Well, I can scarcely say that; but I wanted a something to come up
for--a something, I mean, beyond law-business--and perhaps this
wondrous advertisement of Wuff's turned the scale."
"They tell me the gal's deuced good. Spofforth, who saw her last
night, was here this morning, and says she's really wonderful. This is
the second time you've done this sort of thing,--coming back on the
first night of a great theatrical event. It's not half a bad idea,
because you see a lot of people you know, and get rid of
'how-d'ye-do's' in one large parcel."
"There are some who were present on the last occasion whom I shall not
see to-night, I suppose," said Laurence. "I was thinking," he added,
as he saw Dollamore whispering to his stick, "of George Bertram."
"No!" said Dollamore, "the Blab has been missing for the last
fortnight. It's rumoured that he has gone as a mute into the service
of the Pasha of Egypt. I thought you were alluding to our friends in
Devonshire: a nice business that."
"Indeed! I, as you know, have been absent from town for months, and
have heard nothing."
"Well, you won't listen to me, I suppose, because you'll imagine I am
prejudiced, recollecting all I said to you on the subject in this very
room after Spofforth's play. But you won't deny that, so far as you
had opportunities of judging while we were down at Redmoor, I was
right?"
"Right so far as your estimation of the man went, certainly--"
"Oh, as for the lady, there is no one can entertain a higher opinion
of Lady Mitford than myself. The degradation that that brute is
bringing upon her--"
"Degradation! Do you mean to say that Mitford's infidelities are
known--about--generally?"
"My dear Alsager, you think I colour and exaggerate. Let us pump that
well of candour, Cis Hetherington. If there is an honest opinion
about, it will be procurable from that son of Anak.--Well, Cis, going
to the play?"
"Course I am," responded that scion of the aristocracy, lazily lifting
his head from the ottoman; "everybody's going, seems to me. What's the
woman like? Yankee, ain't she? Don't like Yankees,--all speak through
their noses, and say 'I guess;' at, least, all that I've ever seen do,
and that's only on the stage."
"She's not Yankee; she's an Englishwoman, they tell me; though of
course that story of the nobleman's daughter is all bosh. However,
Wuff has worked the oracle splendidly. Everybody's going. Here's
Alsager come up to town on purpose."
"Is that Alsager sitting next to you?" asked Cis Hetherington, raising
himself on his elbow and looking full at Laurence. "I thought it
looked like him, and I wondered he didn't speak to me. But I suppose
he's grown proud since he's become a Bart."
"You old idiot! I shook hands with you in the hall as I came in," said
Laurence, laughing. "What's the news, Cis? how are all your people?"
"First-rate, old boy! Westonhanger's gone abroad--to America, I mean;
Sioux Indians, and that sort of thing. Wanted you awfully to go with
him, but thought you were doing monseigneur on your _terre_. Asked
about you no end, give you my word! And the Duke's really tremendous!
'pon my soul, some fellow ought to put him in a book! Ever since the
row about the repeal of the Corn Laws has been coming to a head, he's
been like a lunatic. He thinks it's all up with everything, and is
sure we shall have a revolution, and that he'll have his head cut off
by the mob and stuck on a pike, and all that kind of thing."
"And Algy Forrester?" asked Dollamore.
"Algy Forrester was here to-day," said Hetherington; "came to me about
a devilish unpleasant thing. That fellow Mitford, whom you both know"
("Now, then, listen!" said Dollamore),--"that fellow Mitford has asked
him--Algy, I mean--to put him up here. And Algy came to ask if I'd
second him, and I told him I'd see Mitford d--d first. And so I would.
I ain't a strait-laced party, and don't go in for being particularly
virtuous myself; but I'm a bachelor, and am on my own hook. But the
way that fellow Mitford treats that nice wife of his is neither more
nor less than blackguardly, I think; and so I wouldn't mind telling
him, if I'd the chance."
"Hallo, Cis!" said Markham Bowers, who was sitting near; "shut your
stupid old mouth. You'll get into a mess if you give tongue like
that,--get cut off in the flower of your youth; and then what weeping
and wailing there'll be among the ten tribes, and among those
unfortunate Christians who have been speculating on your autograph.
Not that you're wrong in what you say about Mitford; for if ever a cad
walked this earth, that's the man."
"Ah! and isn't she a nice woman?" said Hetherington. "When she first
showed in town last season, she took everybody's fancy; even Runnymede
admired her, and the Duchess asked to be introduced, and they were
quite thick. Wonderful! wasn't it? And to think of that snob Mitford
treating her as he does, completely neglecting her, while he's--Well,
I don't know; I suppose it's all right; but there ain't many things
that would please me better than dropping on to that party--heavy."
"You're always dropping on to parties, Cis," said Bowers; "but you had
better keep quiet in this case, please. You would have to make your
own chance of getting into a row, for of course the lady's name must
not appear--"
"Oh, don't you be afraid of me, Marky; I'm all right!" said Cis,
rising and stretching himself. "You won't mind my stamping on
Mitford's feet,--accidentally, of course,--if we find him in the
stalls." And the two Guardsmen started away together.
"Well," said Lord Dollamore, leaning forward towards his companion,
"was I right or wrong?"
"Right! terribly right!" said Alsager, with a set rigid face.
"You would not have accepted my testimony, thinking perhaps that I had
motives for exaggeration, or was prompted by an _arrière pensée_, in
which, on my word of honour, you're wrong. But those fellows are
merely types of society; and their opinion, somewhat differently
expressed, is society's opinion."
"Has not Mitford's madness cooled down at all?"
"It is worse, far and away,--worse than ever--"
"And that woman?"
"Ah," said Lord Dollamore, "she's been very quiet lately, owing to her
husband's death. Poor old boy! poor old Percy Hammond! But she's up in
town, I understand, now; and I don't think--" and here Dollamore's
crutch-handled stick was evidently whispering confidences into his
master's ear,--"I don't think Master Mitford will find it all straight
sailing in that quarter just now."
"How do you mean? What would induce her to change to him?"
"Well, you see, she's a widow now, with a comparatively small income;
for I suspect poor old Percy knew more than he ever let on, and
instructed Trivett to prepare his will accordingly. So that, besides
wanting a husband, she'll want him rich; for she's one of the best
hands at getting through money in England. With a husband _in posse_,
Mitford's attentions would not do at all."
"Ah, I see; but is not her character too well known?"
"Not a bit of it; her powers of attraction are enormous still. Why, if
I'm rightly informed, a Russian whom you know, I think,--Tchernigow by
name,-is making the running there already."
"I know him; he was madly in love with her, I heard, the season before
last; followed her to Baden and about."
"That's the man! Well, he's _revenu_--not to his _premier_, which was
probably some Cossack peasant-girl--but to one of his _amours_, and is
desperate."
"He's enormously wealthy. If she accepted him, there might yet be a
chance of happiness for Georgie,--Lady Mitford, I mean."
"Don't you believe that for an instant, Alsager!" said Dollamore,
looking keenly at him; "you're not posted up in that family history.
Matters have gone too far now; there is only one way in which Sir
Charles Mitford could really be of service to his wife, and that is by
dying. But I'm afraid she would not think so, poor girl!" Then seeing
his companion looking very grave, he said, "Come, it's no use brooding
over these matters; let us go to the theatre."
The theatre was crammed, as Mr. Wuff had anticipated. The audience was
composed of pretty much the same class of people as those present on
the first night of Mr. Spofforth's play at the Parthenium; with the
exception of those who were most strongly remembered by Alsager. He
had known that the Mitfords and Mrs. Hammond could not be there, and
there was little to interest him among the audience. The curtain rose
on the piece of the evening, and everybody's attention concentrated on
the stage. Shortly afterwards came the appearance of the new actress,
who was hailed with shouts of encouragement and applause by Mr. Wuff's
supporters in boxes, pit, and gallery. She seemed not in the least
overcome by her reception, but bowed gracefully, and entered
immediately on the business of the piece. The character she played was
that of a highbred wealthy girl, beloved by a young yeoman-farmer of
the neighbourhood, who proposes to her, but she mocks at his
_gaucheries_, and rejects him with scorn. He accepts his defeat, and
goes away to travel on the Continent with his brother. It is not until
he is gone that she finds how deeply she had really loved him; but he
is gone never to return, and so she accepts the attention of, and is
engaged to, a silly peer. Then comes the Nemesis. The girl's father is
ruined, the peer jilts her, and she is left in wretchedness, when the
yeoman-farmer comes back a polished gentleman. There is an admirable
scene of intensity between them, and, of course, all ends happily. The
character of the heroine seemed excellently suited for Miss Greenwood,
who, gradually winning the confidence of the audience, worked them to
a pitch of enthusiasm in the last scene, and brought down the curtain
with a universal verdict of her combining thorough knowledge of the
usages of society and ladylike manners with great dramatic power.
Of course she was recalled before the curtain; and then as she swept
across the stage, clasping her bouquet to her bosom, and occasionally
bowing low, her eyes lit full on those of Laurence Alsager. And then
for the first time Laurence Alsager, who had been puzzling his brain
about her ever since she appeared on the scene, recollected who she
was, and said half aloud, "The woman who wrote me the note!--Miss
Gillespie, without a doubt!"