"THE TRUTH ABOUT THE RUSSIAN DANCERS."
With that uncanny tuition of his Sir JAMES BARRIE has, of course, hit
on the precise truth. Russian dancers are not born but made--by the
_Maestro_, which I take it is (broadly speaking) Italian for Producer
and Presenter.
When _Karissima_ goes on a visit to the stately home of the _Veres_
the peace of that ancient haunt of the conventionally correct is
queerly broken. Young _Lord Vere_ loses his heart. However, that might
just as easily or more easily have happened if the Gaiety had been
invited. But a dreadful change comes to _Uncle Bill_--he buys his
clothes ready-made (at _La boutique fantasque_, for a guess, or
possibly Mr. MALLABY-DEELEY'S), grows dundrearies and goes hopelessly
off his game at golf.
_Karissima_, poor dear, can't walk or talk or putt, for that matter,
except with her toes. _Bill_ calls this last cheating, but young
_Vere_ thinks it simply adorable--as do we all. _Lady Vere_, his
mother, can't get used to being kissed by _Karissima_, who _will_
stand upon her lightly with one foot, oddly waving the other
meanwhile in the air. Besides it takes too long and _is_ rather too
demonstrative. And couldn't _Karissima_ dear just try to walk with
her soles really flat on the ground in the solid English county way?
Certainly. _Karissima_ will try, to please Madame, and with painful
effort achieves a half-dozen clumsy steps till unconquerable habit and
Mr. ARNOLD BAX'S allusively witty music lift her on tiptoe again. And
really she is such a darling that the once reluctant dowager finally
consents to the marriage; wedding bells forthwith (within); a
white-haired clergyman, surprised at nothing, as becomes the very
best type of padre, appears; follow _corps de ballet_ bridesmaids; and
_Bill_ gives her away.
_Karissima_, says _Vere_ to _Maestro_ later in the evening, is
depressed. Because she hasn't a child. They both tremendously want a
child. _Maestro_, silently showing his watch-dial, would seem to wish
to suggest that they were unreasonably impatient. _Karissima_ also
pleads. Well, he will see what he can do. But there's an awful
penalty. For a new Russian dancer cannot be made unless another
surrenders life. Anyway he fetches his black bag. And _Karissima_
dances down the main staircase with her babe, who grows apace and is
shortly seen prancing in the garden (on his toes--"Thank Heaven!" says
the _Maestro_).
And _Karissima_ dies and is brought in on her bier, and dances (she
_would_!) her own funeral service. _Maestro's_ heart is touched; he
lies down in her stead, and she, dancing on a carpet of thistle-down
shot with stars (I think), and her lord (I am sure), perpetually
exclaiming, "How perfectly topping!"--both achieve an enviable
immortality.
Madame KARSAVINA is exquisite; she is well supported by Mr. C.M.
LOWNE (_Hon. Bill_), Mr. HERMAN DE LANGE (_Maestro_), Miss G.
STERROLL(_Dowager_), and Mr. BASIL FOSTER (_Lord Vere_). And I
thought I detected Mr. DU MAURIER'S appreciation of the bizarre in his
production. But the triumph is the triumph of the whimsical author. I
don't think he has ever done anything better; more ambitious things,
yes, but nothing so free from flaw.
Isn't it more than possible that just three-score years ago, on a May
day (see _Who's Who_), some Maestro of Fantasy slipped into a little
house in Kirriemuir, N.B., with a black bag? Wouldn't that explain the
otherwise inexplicable, the unwearying resourcefulness, the unabashed
playfulness of this impenitent youth?