I Come to a Turning-Point in my Dramatic Life--I play my First Crying
Part with Miss Sallie St. Clair.
We were in Columbus; things were moving along smoothly and quietly, when
suddenly that incident occurred which had the power to change completely
my dramatic prospects, while at the same time it convinced the people
about me, in theatrical parlance, my head was "well screwed on," meaning
it was not to be turned by praise.
Miss Sallie St. Clair was the star of the week, and she was billed to
appear on Friday and Saturday nights in an adaptation of "La Maison
Rouge." I am not certain as to the title she gave it, but I think it was
"The Lone House on the Bridge." She was to play the dual characters--a
count and a gypsy boy. The leading female part Mrs. Ellsler declined,
because she would not play second to a woman. The young lady who had been
engaged for the juvenile business (which comes between leading parts and
walking ladies) had a very poor study, and tearfully declared she simply
_could_ not study the part in time--"No--no! she co--co--could not, so
now!"
There, then, was Blanche's chance. The part was sentimental, tearful, and
declamatory at the last, a good part--indeed, what is vulgarly known
to-day as a "fat" part, "fat" meaning lines sure to provoke applause.
Mrs. Bradshaw, who was herself ever ready to oblige her manager, could
not serve him in this instance, as the part was that of a very young
heroine, but she gladly offered her daughter's services in the emergency.
So sending for her to come to the theatre, the mother awaited her
arrival. She was very ambitious for Blanche, who had absolutely no
ambition for herself, outside of music, and here was the double
opportunity of playing a leading part, next to the star, and of obliging
the manager just at the time when contracts for the next season were in
order of consideration. No girl could help grasping at it eagerly, and
while Blanche studied the part, she, the mother, would baste up some
breadths of satin she had by her into a court dress. As she thus happily
planned it all Blanche sauntered in to inform her mother and her manager
that she would not do the part. _Would_ not, mind you; she did not
condescend to claim she _could_ not. Poor Mrs. Bradshaw drew her heavy
veil over her face with a shaking hand and moved silently away, only
waiting to reach the friendly privacy of her own room before yielding to
the tears caused by this cruel indifference to her wishes and to their
mutual welfare.
Mr. Ellsler then tried, in vain, to induce Blanche to undertake the part.
He tried to bribe her, promising certain gifts. He tried to arouse her
pride--he absolutely commanded her to take the part.
"Oh, very well, if you like," she answered, "but I'll spoil the play if I
do, you know!" And indeed he did "know" what she was capable of in the
line of mischief; and, knowing, gave her up in angry despair. There was
then but one chance left for the production of the play, to give the part
to one of the ballet-girls.
And Mr. Ellsler, who felt a strong friendship for the brave,
hard-working, much-enduring Miss St. Clair and her devoted if eccentric
husband, said, gently: "I'm sorry, Sallie, but it's no fault of mine; you
know I can't give memories to these two women, who say they can't study
the part. The girl I want to offer it to now will speak the words
perfectly to the last letter, and that's all we can expect of her, but
that's better than changing the bill."
Then I was called. I adored Miss St. Clair, as everyone else did. I
heard, I saw the long part, but instead of the instant smiling assent Mr.
Ellsler expected, I shook my head silently. Miss St. Clair groaned, Mr.
Barras snuffled loudly, and stammered: "W--what did you expect, if the
others can't study it, how can she?"
"Oh," I answered, "I can study the lines, Mr. Barras, but," big tears
came into my eyes, I was so sorry to disappoint the lovely blond star,
"it's--it's a crying part--a great lady and a crying part! I--I--oh, if
you please, I can't cry. I can laugh and dance and sing and scold, but I
don't know how to cry; and look here," I caught up the part and fluttered
over the leaves and pointed to the oft-repeated word "weeps--weeps,"
"and, Miss St. Clair," I excitedly finished, "I can't weep, and I won't
have a stitch of clothes for her back either!"
All three hearers burst out laughing. Miss St. Clair was in radiant
good-humor in an instant. She dried my eyes, and said: "Child, if you
really can study that long part, and just walk through it after only one
rehearsal, you will be a very clever little girl. You need not try to
act, just give me the lines and hold a handkerchief to your eyes when
tears are called for. You shall have one of my prettiest dresses for the
court scene, and I guess you have a white muslin of your own for the
garden scene, have not you?"
I had, yes, and so I went home, heavy-hearted, to undertake the study of
my first crying part.
Good heavens! In spite of this memory, I catch myself wondering was there
ever a _first one_--did I ever do anything else. For it seems to me I
have cried steadily through all the years of my dramatic life. Tears
gentle, regretful; tears petulant, fretful; tears stormy, passionate;
tears slow, despairing; with a light patter, now and then, of my own
particular brand, kept for the expression of my own personal
troubles--very bitter, briny tears they are, and I find that a very few
answer my purpose nicely.
Miss St. Clair, who was tall as well as fair, had measured the length of
my skirt in front, so that she might have one of her dresses shortened
for me during the afternoon, thus leaving me all the time possible for
study. After I had learned the words by heart, I began to study out the
character. It was an excellent acting part, very sweet and tenderly
pathetic in the first act, very passionate and fierce in the second, and
the better I understood the requirements of the part, the greater became
my terror of it. My room-mate tried to comfort me. "Think," she cried,
"of wearing one of Miss St. Clair's own dresses! I'll wager it will be an
awful nice one, too, since you are obliging her, and she is always kind,
anyway."
But that leaden weight at my heart was too great for gratified vanity to
lift. "Bother the tears," she added; "I heard Mr. Barras say the tears of
all actresses were in their handkerchiefs."
"Oh, yes, I heard him, too," I answered, "but he was just talking for
effect. There must be something else, something more. You can't move
anyone's heart by showing a handkerchief."
"Well," she exclaimed, a bit impatiently, "what do you _want_ to do? You
don't expect to shed real tears, do you?"
"N-n-no!" I hesitated, "not exactly that, but there's a tone--a--Hattie,
last Wednesday, when you quarrelled with young Fleming--I was not
present, you know--but that night, a half-hour after our light was out,
you spoke to me in the darkness, and I instantly asked you why you were
crying and if you had been quarrelling, though you had not even reached
the sobbing stage yet. Now how did I know you were crying?"
"I don't know--anyway I had no handkerchief," she laughed; "you heard it
maybe in my voice."
"Yes," I answered, eagerly, "that was it. That curious veiling of the
voice. Oh, Hattie, if I could only get that tone, but I can't, I've tried
and tried!"
"Why," she exclaimed, "you've got it now--this very moment!"
"Yes," I broke in impatiently, and turning to her a pair of reproachful,
tear-filled eyes, "yes, but why? because I'm really crying, with the
worry and the disappointment, and, oh, Hattie, the fright!"
And the landlady, a person who always lost one shoe when coming
up-stairs, announced dinner, and I shuddered and turned my face away.
Hattie went down, however, and bringing all her blandishments to bear
upon the head of the establishment, secured for me a cup of coffee--that
being my staff in all times of trouble or of need, and then we were off
to the theatre, Hattie kindly keeping at my side for companionship or
help, as need might be.
I did not appear in the first act, so I had plenty of time to receive my
borrowed finery--to try it on, and then to dress in my own white muslin,
ready for my first attempt at a crying part. It was a moonlit scene. Miss
St. Clair, tall, slender, elegant, looked the young French gallant to the
life in her black velvet court dress. I had to enter down some steps from
a great stone doorway. I stood, ready to go on. I wore a mantilla with my
muslin. I held a closed fan in my hand. My heart seemed to suffocate
me--I thought, stupidly, "Why don't I pray?" but I could not think of a
single word. I heard the faint music that preceded my entrance--a mad
panic seized me. I turned and dashed toward the street-door. Mr. Ellsler,
who had just made his exit, caught me by the skirts. "Are you mad, girl?"
he cried; "go back--quick--quick! I tell you--there's your cue!"
Next moment, tremulous but smiling, I was descending the steps to meet
the counterfeit lover awaiting me. My head was on his breast and my arm
stealing slowly about his neck before I knew that the closed fan in my
hand was crushed into fragments and marks of blood showing between my
clinched fingers. My first lines were simply recited, without meaning,
then the tender words and courtly manners aroused my imagination. The
glamour of the stage was upon me. The frightened actress ceased to
exist--I was the Spanish girl whose long-mourned lover had returned to
her; and there was something lacking in the greeting, some tone of the
voice, some glance of the eye seemed strange, alien. There was more of
ardor, less of tenderness than before. My lips trembled; suddenly I heard
the veiled, pathetic tone I had all day striven for in vain, and
curiously enough it never struck me that it was my voice--no! it was the
Spanish girl who spoke. My heart leaped up in my throat with a great
pity, tears rushed to my eyes, fell upon my cheeks. There was
applause--of course, was not Miss St. Clair there? Suspicion arose in my
mind--grew. I bethought me of the saving of my life on that stolen day
passed in the forest long ago. I took my lover's hand and with pretty
wiles drew him into the moonlight. Then swiftly stripping up the lace
ruffles, showed his arm smooth and unblemished by any scar, and with the
cry: "You are not Pascal de la Garde!" stood horror-stricken.
The moment the curtain fell Miss St. Clair sprang to me, and taking my
face between her hands, she cried: "You would move a heart of stone!" She
wiped her eyes, and turning to her husband, said: "Good God! she's a
marvel!"
"No, no!" he snuffled, "not yet, Sallie; but she's a marvel in embryo!"
He patted me on the shoulder. "You have a fortune somewhere between your
throat and your eyes, my girl--you have, indeed!"
And then I rushed to don my borrowed robes for the next act, and stared
stupidly when Hattie said: "What lovely applause you got, Clara, and you
so frightened; you shook all over when you went on, we could see you."
But I was too excited over what was yet to be done really to comprehend
her words. When I saw myself in the glass I was delighted. The open robe
of pale blue satin, brocaded with silver, was lifted at the sides with
big bunches of blush and deep-pink roses over a white satin petticoat. I
wore a high Spanish comb, a white mantilla, a pink rose over the ear,
after the national fashion, and a great cluster of roses at my breast,
and for the first time I felt the subtle joy that emanates from beautiful
and becoming garments. The fine softness of the rich fabric was pleasant
to my touch--its silken rustle was music to my ear. Miss St. Clair had
lent me of her best, and as I saw it all reflected there, I thought how
easy it must be for the rich to be good and happy, never dreaming that
the wealthy, who to escape _ennui_ and absolute idleness sometimes did
wrong simply because there was nothing else to do, might think in turn,
ah! how easy it must be for the poor to be good and happy.
But the overture ended abruptly. I gathered up my precious draperies and
ran to the entrance to be ready for my cue. The first speeches were cold,
haughty, and satirical. The gypsy who was personating my dead lover had
deceived everyone else, even the half-blind old mother had accepted him
as her son, though declaring him greatly changed in temper and in manner.
But I, the sweetheart, was not convinced, and ignoring the advice of the
highest at the court, was fighting the adventurer with the courage of
despair.
As the scene went on, the stage hands (carpenters, gas-men,
scene-shifters, etc.) began to gather in the entrances, always a sign of
something unusual going on. I saw them--an ugly thought sprang up in my
mind. Ah, yes, they are there waiting to see the ballet-girl fail in a
leading part! An unworthy suspicion, I am sure, but it acted as a spur
would have done upon an already excited horse, and with the same result,
loss of self-control.
In the denunciation of the adventurer as a murderer and a personator of
his own victim my passion rose to a perfect fury. I swept the stage,
storming, raging, fearing nothing under heaven but the possible escape of
the wretch I hated! Vaguely I noted the manager reaching far over a
balcony to see me--I didn't care even for the manager. The audience burst
into tremendous applause; I didn't care for that either, I only wanted
to see a rapier through the heart of the pale, sneering man before me. It
was momentary madness. People were startled--the star twice forgot her
lines. It was not correct, it was not artistic work. She, the part, was a
great lady, and even her passion should have been partially restrained;
but I, who played her, a ballet-girl, earning $5 a week, what could you
expect, pray, for the price? Certainly not polish or refinement. But the
genuine feeling, the absolute sincerity, and the crude power lavished
upon the scene delighted the audience and created a very real sensation.
The curtain fell. Miss St. Clair took me into her kind arms and, without
a word, kissed me heartily. The applause went on and on. She caught my
hand and said, "Come!" As she led me to the curtain, I suddenly realized
her intention, and a very agony of bashfulness seized upon me. I
struggled frantically. "Oh, don't!" I begged. "Oh, please, I'm nobody,
they won't like it, Miss St. Clair."
She motioned the men to pull back the curtain, and she dragged me out
before it with her. The applause redoubled. Shamed and stupid, I stood
there, my chin on my breast. Then I heard the laugh I so admired (Miss
St. Clair had a laugh that the word merry describes perfectly), her arm
went about my neck, while her fingers beneath my chin lifted my face till
I met her smiling glance and smiled back at her. Then the audience burst
into a great laugh, and bowing awkwardly to them and to her, I backed
off, out of sight, as quickly as I could; she, bowing like a young
prince, followed me. But again they called, and again the generous woman
took me with her.
And that was the first time I ever experienced the honor of going before
the curtain with a star. I supposed I had received the highest possible
reward for my night's work; I forgot there were such things as newspapers
in the town, but I was reminded of their existence the next day.
Never, never was I so astonished. Such notices as were given of the
performance, and what was particularly dwelt upon, think you? Why, the
tears. "Real tears--tears that left streaks on the girl's cheeks!" said
one paper. "Who is she--have you seen her--the wonderful Columbus
ballet-girl, who wins tears with tears, real ones, too?" asked another.
I was ashamed. I was afraid people would make fun of me at the theatre.
At the box-office window that day many people were asking: "That girl
that made the hit last night, is she really one of the ballet, or is it
just a story, for effect?"