discovered that I was not there, more trouble ensued.
The Russian manager wired Paris, and I was unable to keep my secret any
longer. This time, taking advantage of my ignorance both of the law and
of the French language, they threatened to arrest me and imprison me if
I did not start for Russia at once. All that was under the pretext
that I had taken money in advance. I was actually accused of being a
thief.
[Illustration: LOIE FULLER AND HER MOTHER
_Photo_ _Falk_]
This whole scene took place in my mother’s presence. We were both
nearly dead with fright. My mother begged me to go. With my heart full
of bitterness, and my eyes sore from crying, I allowed myself to be
dragged away a second time and placed in the train.
After my departure a young Englishwoman, whom I had met only once or
twice, came to call at our _appartement_, and finding my mother very
ill, went, on her own initiative, and summoned an English physician,
Dr. John Chapman, who had attended us before, and whom she had met at
our house. I had not called him because I supposed that the physician
whom I had engaged would be just as competent to cure my mother
sufficiently for her to be able to go with me to St. Petersburg.
Dr. Chapman arrived just at the moment when the French physicians (the
doctor who was attending my mother had called three of his colleagues
into consultation) had decided to give her a soporific on the ground
that she was dying of pneumonia and that nothing could save her. The
English doctor offered to attend my mother, and the Frenchmen retired
when they learned that he was our regular physician.
Dr. Chapman inquired after me, and when he was informed about what had
happened wired me all along the line, at each station where the train
was scheduled to stop. He maintained that they ought never to have let
me go.
Just as I reached the Russian border the telegram was brought to me:
“Return at once. Your mother has very little chance of recovering.”
This was the first news to reach me since my departure, forty-eight
hours before. It was six o’clock in the morning and still dark. I was
in bed in the sleeping car and it was cold, as it can be cold only in
Russia.
The conductor knew no English and I spoke no language but my own. I was
unable to make him understand that I wished to know when I could leave
the train and return to Paris. I dressed myself hastily, packed my
things helter skelter and, when the train arrived at the next station,
I alighted with all my baggage. What a bare and desolate spot! It was a
little station, with hardly a platform. Away the train went rumbling,
leaving me there in that wilderness. What was I to do? I had no idea.
I banged on the door of the wooden hovel that served as a station. It
was closed. For a long time, a very long time, shivering with cold,
grief and anguish, I walked up and down in the darkness like a caged
beast. Finally a man appeared out of the night. He swung a lantern,
which made a little round spot of light in the gloom. He opened the
door and I followed him into the hut. I presented myself at the
ticket office and tried to make him understand that I wanted a ticket
for Berlin. I offered him French currency. He handed it back to me. I
managed to understand that he would take only Russian money and also
that the train that would get me back to Berlin was not due for three
or four hours. Then I waited for day to break, hoping that perhaps some
one would come who could help me. Towards nine o’clock some people
arrived and among them I noticed an old fellow in whom I recognised the
traditional Polish Jew, a money-lender I was sure, with his long black
coat, his big round hat, his beard and his crafty smile.
I went to him and asked if he knew any English.
He did not know a word.
He tried to speak French and then German, but I failed to understand
what he said. I succeeded in making him understand that I wanted to go
to Berlin, and that the railway employee would not accept my French
banknote. This bill of a thousand francs and a little ready money were
all I had with me.
My interpreter took possession of the thousand francs, secured a ticket
for Berlin for me and then disappeared for the purpose of changing
my bill. I did not think of following him, although he bore my whole
fortune away with him.
The man was a thief. He never came back. I realised in an ecstasy of
fright, when the train arrived, that there I was without money enough
to purchase a ticket from Berlin to Paris. At the first station I
telegraphed to some acquaintances whom I had met in Berlin, but on whom
I could hardly count and who very likely were not at the German capital
just then. I begged them, at all hazards, to come to the station and
bring me a little money so that I could continue my journey.
At this point begins the strange part of my adventure. I was alone in
my compartment when we crossed the Russian border. Weighed down with
dejection, I sat on the carpet of the carriage, with my head resting
heavily on the woodwork, crying as if my heart would break. At the
first stop a priest entered. Although I had quickly raised myself
and wiped my face with my handkerchief, he saw at once that I was in
trouble. He came and sat down opposite to me, and I noticed by his
expression that he was disturbed by my suffering. Tears again flooded
my cheeks and I told him that my mother was dying in Paris. He repeated
the words “mother” and “ill” in German. He extended his hand to bid
me not to speak for a minute. He closed his eyes and I looked at him.
Everything subsided within me. I awaited for a miracle. The miracle
took place.
After ten minutes, which seemed to me an age, he opened his eyes and
said to me in German:
“No, no, your mother will not die.”
I understood what he said, catching the words “mother” and “not.” The
frightful sense of oppression that was torturing me disappeared. I
perceived that his words were not in vain, that he spoke the truth and
that my mother was not going to die. I stopped crying, feeling sure
that now everything would come out all right.
Presently he left me, and I understood, from his manner of speaking,
that he was trying to give me courage and hope.
When he was no longer there my fears returned, and I found myself again
as unhappy as before. I seemed to see my mother stretched before me in
death. I saw once more the horrible men who dragged me to the station.
I hated them wildly, and I fell into convulsive tremblings, which shook
me from head to foot.
In this condition I reached Berlin. Luckily my friends were at the
station. Before my arrival they had even telegraphed to Paris to learn
the news. A reply had come to them that my poor mother was hovering
between life and death. I still had twenty-four hours of waiting and
anxiety.
When I arrived in Paris I perceived at once the beautiful white beard,
the pale and weary face of Dr. Chapman, whose tall form rose above the
crowd. He took me in his arms, and said:
“She is still alive. Come.”
In the carriage he gave me this advice:
“Enter the room and speak to your mother just as if you had never gone
away. Your presence will save her.”
And that is what happened. From the moment of my return she began to
improve. But this illness left her very weak. She had a first attack of
paralysis and her trouble gained imperceptibly upon her, leaving each
day less hope of her recovery.
She was destined, without ever being restored to health, to die in
Paris in February, 1908.
In Russia they started a long lawsuit against me for not having kept
my agreement, and before it was ended I lost, including other offers,
which I could not accept without my electrical apparatus and my
costumes that were held as security, fully 250,000 francs. During my
second season at the Folies-Bergère, when, through the solicitude of M.
Marchand, my dressing-room was always filled with flowers by reason of
the distinguished visitors who came to see me and to whom the directors
would offer champagne, an attachment was put upon my receipts and we
often had hardly enough to eat. But for the manager’s wife, who at
times sent us things to eat in a basket, I should often have danced on
an empty stomach, and have sipped champagne in my dressing-room without
having had anything to eat at home.
My work on the stage was so fatiguing that when I had finished
dancing the mechanicians would carry me to my _appartement_, which
was connected with the theatre. I continued this work for a whole
season without being sufficiently well fed to keep up my strength,
and being all the while in an _appartement_ the sanitation of which
was defective. Therein, I am certain, lay one of the reasons for the
progress of my mother’s illness. My health, too, was affected to such
an extent that I am no longer able to endure fatigue as I once endured
it.
However, it all happened as a result of circumstances, and I have no
wish to blame anybody.
The manager of the theatre had given me this _appartement_ and had had
it arranged specially for me in order that I might not be obliged to go
out into the street, heated with dancing.
Since then I have never returned to Russia, for every time that a
journey to that country was mentioned my poor mother trembled with
fright, and there was never any question of my undertaking it.
This adventure at least caused me to believe in one thing--inspiration.
For if the priest in the railway compartment was not inspired, then
what was he?
VIII
SARAH BERNHARDT--THE DREAM AND THE REALITY
I was scarcely sixteen years old. I was then playing _ingenue_ roles
on the road, when on the theatrical horizon there appeared the
announcement that the greatest tragedienne of modern times, Sarah
Bernhardt, the most distinguished of French actresses, was about to
come to America! What an event! We awaited it with feverish curiosity,
for the divine Sarah was not a human being like the rest of us. She was
a spirit endowed with genius.
The circumstance which made my heart throb and caused me to shed tears
copiously was that I was uncertain of being able to see this wonderful
fairy of the stage. I knew beforehand that there would be no seat for
one so insignificant as I was. The newspapers were printing column
upon column about her, and I read everything that I could get hold
of. The papers said that the seats were all bought up, and that not
a hundredth part of those who wanted to see her would achieve their
ambition. The box office was besieged by speculators. All that, alas!
meant that there was scarcely any hope for me. I do not know whether
Sarah had visited America before, for I had all along been on the road
with little travelling companies in the Western States. So far as I was
concerned this was positively her first visit.
At last the famous day arrived. A steamer, with delegations and an
orchestra aboard, went down the bay to meet her. All that impressed me
greatly. I saw in it genuine homage rendered to genius. She had come at
last. She was here. If I could only see her, even from a distance--from
a great distance!
But where and how? I did not know, and I kept on reading the papers,
fairly intoxicating myself with the articles describing her. It seemed
magic, unreality, a fairy tale.
Finally she gave her first performance. The public and critics appeared
to rave over her,--absolutely to rave.
The actors and actresses of New York circulated a petition, begging her
to give a matinee in order that they might honour her and observe her
glorious art.
Wonder of wonders, she accepted! My mind was quickly made up.
Very recently come to New York, my mother and I were strangers in the
big city. But fortunately I had plenty of courage without knowing it.
When I learned that Sarah was going to play for the benefit of her
fellow-artists, I said to my mother: “Well, now, I am going to see her.”
“There are so many famous artists in New York,” my mother replied, “how
do you suppose that you can get seats?”
I had not thought of that, so I jumped up, saying:
“Then I had better hurry up.”
“How will you go about it?” asked my mother.
I paused a moment to think the matter over.
“I don’t know,” I replied, “but in some way or other I must see her. I
am going to her theatrical manager.”
“But he won’t receive you.”
Of that I had not thought, either. But I would not hear of any
obstacles. Besides, out West I had never been treated that way. I was
not yet fully aware that people in the West were simpler and more
approachable than in New York.
The objection, therefore, did not appear to me a formidable one, and I
started out with my mother, who always went with me and who obeyed me
in everything without my having the faintest idea but that I was the
obedient one.
Here we were, then, on our way; and, after half an hour’s walking, we
reached the theatre. The manager had not yet arrived. We sat down to
wait for him. A lot of people came in. Some of them stayed for a while.
Others went away at once.
They were all excited, busy and looked worried. What were they after?
Were they going to get all the tickets? The crowd kept increasing to
such an extent that I saw my poor tickets grow smaller and smaller in
perspective and then disappear altogether. And I had counted so much on
them!
Would the manager never come?
At last a great commotion was heard. A group of gentlemen rushed
by like the wind and, without stopping to see what was going on,
disappeared behind a door on which was written “No admission.”
None of us knew what to do after that. Everybody stared at everybody
else. Most of those who were cooling their heels in the ante-chamber
were men. My exhausted nerves would not let me linger any longer, and I
said in a whisper to my mother:
“I am going to knock on the door.”
She turned pale, but I had no choice in the matter. This was the only
way to come to something, even if I ran the risk of heart failure from
an organ that was beating so loudly that I thought it was on the point
of bursting.
My head was in a whirl and I saw nothing for a moment. Nevertheless I
approached the door and gave a gentle knock.
I felt as if I had committed a crime, this little rap resounded so
loudly in my ears. A command to enter that sounded lugubrious was the
response, and I opened the door.
Mechanically I came forward and found myself in the middle of a group
of gentlemen without knowing which of them to address. Overcome with
embarrassment I stood erect in the centre of the room while everybody
looked me over. Then I summoned all my courage and I said, to the whole
circle:
“Gentlemen, I should like to see the manager of this theatre, if you
please.”
When I stopped speaking my teeth began to chatter so loudly that I bit
my tongue.
A gentleman who looked more important than the others came forward and
said:
“What do you want of him, little girl?”
Good heavens, must I speak again before all these people? To my own
astonishment, I heard, as if it were somebody else’s, my own voice
saying in a firm tone:
“Well, it is this way, sir. I am an artist, and I should like to come
with my mother to the matinee that Sarah Bernhardt is going to give us.”
“Who are you, and where are you playing?”
At this point the tone lost its assurance, while the voice replied:
“You probably don’t know my name, sir. It isn’t well known here. It’s
Loie Fuller. I have come from the West, to try and find an engagement.
I’m not playing anywhere just now, but I think that--it is of no
importance anyway--and that perhaps you will let me just the same--see
her--if I beg it of you.”
“Where is your mother?”
“There, outside,” and I pointed to the door.
“The pale lady, with the sweet expression?”
“Yes, sir. She is pale because she is afraid.”
“And you, are you afraid, too?”
The firm voice reappeared.
“No, sir.”
He looked at me, a slightly ironical smile played on his lips, and he
said:
“Then you think that you are an artist?”
His remark cut me to the quick, but I felt that I must endure
everything. I experienced, nevertheless, a great temptation to cry.
My assurance reasserted itself.
“I have never thought that,” I replied. “But I should like to become an
artist, some day, if I am able.”
“And that is why you are anxious to see the great French tragedienne
play?”
“Yes, I suppose so. But I was thinking only of my longing to see her,
and it was on that account that I came here.”
“Very well, I am going to give you seats for yourself and your mother.”
“Oh, thank you, sir.”
The manager drew a card from his pocket, wrote something on it and
handed it to me. It was a permit for us to see Sarah Bernhardt play!
I looked at the card and looked at the manager. He smiled and I smiled.
He extended his hand. I extended both of mine. While he held my hands
he said to me:
“You have my card. Come and see me. Perhaps I can find you an
engagement, little girl.”
There was a new pleasure, and not a vain pleasure, for this man’s
promise was one that was destined to be fulfilled.
“Thank you, thank you very much, sir.”
I went out blinded with tears of happiness, which I could no longer
restrain, and, rejoining my mother, I left the theatre.
“What’s the matter, my dear Loie? What did they say to make you cry so?
What is it?”
“Mamma, mamma, I have a ticket to see her--to see her!”
“Oh, I am so pleased, my dear.”
“And I have a seat for you, too!”
The great day came. We were seated, my mother and I, in the orchestra
stalls. About us there were American artists. In the boxes were the
managers of all the New York theatres and their wives. The house was
filled to overflowing. The three bangs announced the rising of the
curtain. Silence ensued and the play began, I did not understand a word
and no one around me, I fancy, did, either. But everybody awaited the
culminating moment. _She_ appeared, and there was an almost painful
silence in the great overcrowded hall. Every one held his breath. She
came forward lightly, appearing barely to brush the earth. Then she
stopped in the middle of the stage, and surveyed this audience of
actors.
Suddenly pandemonium was let loose. Madness fell upon the house, and
for a quarter of an hour she stood thus, prevented from playing by the
din of the theatre, as if she were the audience. She looked round,
interested, inspired and moved. This tumultuous crowd was playing with
magnificent sincerity a part of indescribable enthusiasm.
Finally silence was restored. Sarah Bernhardt came forward and began
to read her lines. I believe I understood her soul, her life, her
greatness. She shared her personality with me!
The stage settings were lost on me. I saw and heard only her.
There was frantic applause, encore after encore following each scene.
Then the curtain fell on the final scene, only to be followed by a
great uproar. Then the audience went out slowly, as if regretting to
leave the surroundings.
While I went away a golden voice--_the_ golden voice--seemed still
to resound in my ears, uttering words which I could not understand:
“Je t’aime! je t’aime!” They were like the notes of a crystal bell
resounding in my consciousness.
Who would have thought at that time that the poor little Western girl
would one day come to Paris, would appear there on a stage, in her turn
before an audience trembling with enthusiasm, and that Sarah Bernhardt
would be in the house for the purpose of applauding this little Western
girl, just as the little Western girl had applauded her to-day?
* * * * *
I was dancing at the Folies-Bergère. At a matinee some one came to
say that Sarah Bernhardt was in a box with her little daughter. Did I
dream? My idol was there. And to see me! Could this be possible?
I came on to the stage and looked over the audience, which was filling
the hall above and below. Standing quietly, in my great white robe, I
waited for the end of the applause.
I danced and, although she could not know it, I danced for her. I
forgot everything else. I lived again through the famous day in New
York, and I seemed to see her once more, marvellous as she was at the
matinee. And now here was a matinee to which she had come for the
purpose of seeing me--_my_ idol, to see _me_.
[Illustration: THE DANCE OF THE LILY
_Photo_ _Lafitte_]
I finished.
She rose in her box, she leaned forward toward me to applaud--and to
applaud again. The curtain rose several times. My brain was in a whirl.
Was this real? Was it? Was it she?
It was my turn to become the audience and, as I saw only her,
_her_ audience. And that is how she played to my profound, my perfect
gratification, the part of the whole house.
* * * * *
One day a friend took me to Sarah Bernhardt’s house. It was a real
visit, but it seemed to me nevertheless like a dream. I was scarcely
able to speak or to breathe. I could hardly presume to look at her. I
was in the presence of my divinity.
Later she invited me to have lunch with her, as a result of my begging
her to be photographed by one of the best photographers of San
Francisco, who had crossed the ocean expressly to take Sarah Bernhardt
in her wonderful studio. She had consented. I had taken my compatriot
to her, and she had posed for him very graciously. He was so pleased
with his good luck, so grateful, the dear fellow!
Sarah had asked me to come and lunch with her on the day when he was to
show her the proofs.
Exactly at noon I made my entrance. Very shortly after she appeared in
the great studio, took me in her arms and imprinted a kiss on each of
my cheeks. All that was so simple, so natural and yet so extraordinary.
We had luncheon, Sarah at the end of the table, with her back to the
window, seated in a magnificent chair, as it were in some carved
throne, whose back overtopped her head like a halo of gold. Sarah was
my divinity once more. I was seated on her right. There were several
other invited guests whose names I have forgotten, my mind was so full
of her. Her voice rang in my ears. I understood not a word of what she
was saying, but every syllable made me thrill.
All at once the photographer was announced. Sarah bade him enter. He
was a nice elderly gentleman of about sixty, with pretty white curly
hair. He looked well pleased with himself. He approached Sarah, and
placed in her outstretched hands a packet of proofs of the photographs
he had taken. She looked at them slowly, one by one. Then, her golden
voice broke forth in shrill notes that gave me a sinking feeling. I
did not know what she was saying, but I saw her tear the photographs
into a thousand and one shreds and hurl them at the feet of my
fellow-countryman. He knew no French. Pale and disturbed, he asked me
to translate what Sarah said. But she gave me no time to reply. She
cried, this time in English: “Horrible! Horrible!”
“What does she say?” he asked, making a trumpet of his hand about one
ear.
Thank Heaven, he was deaf! I signalled to him to bend down toward me so
that I might whisper in his ear.
“She says these portraits are unworthy of your work. She has seen some
of your really wonderful photographs. You will have to come again and
make another attempt.”
“Oh, that’s it, is it?” he replied with a joyful smile on his lips.
“She is quite right. The photographs are not good. But the weather was
to blame. It wasn’t bright enough, and these are interiors. We shall
have to make efforts several times in order to succeed. Do you want to
make another appointment?”
I promised, but without hope, and solely because out of kindness I had
to promise.
He grasped my divinity’s hand and mine, and went away.
Sarah was destined on that day to cause me a happy surprise. She
consented, when I asked it of her, to sit again, and I was sorry that
the old man was not there, she was so grieved on account of the pain
for which she was responsible. She really was grieved, and that made
me love her all the more. Her temper, too keen, too glowing, had just
resulted in a ruinous flare-up. And now here was this same fiery
disposition manifesting itself sweet and kind.
One day in London I went to a banquet of fifteen hundred covers given
in honour of Sarah Bernhardt. I attended as one of those who were
personally acquainted with her, and who were to be seated at her table
in the centre of the great hall. She arrived nearly an hour late.
She said how sorry she was to have kept us waiting, and blamed her
coachman for the delay.
At the end of the banquet the president made a long speech. Sarah, in
reply, spoke some harmonious sentences in English. From a distance I
once more surveyed my divinity. I heard her say, in my mother tongue,
that she was happy, and I still loved her.
* * * * *