“And what shall we do with the theater?” Brainard asked, in a lucid
interval, early in June. “Shall we sell it to Einstein & Flukeheimer for
vaudeville? Or shall we keep it for a certain American actress when she
wearies of matrimony? Or shall we try to put new life into the great
Idea, and keep on giving the dear Public what bores it, because it’s good
for the dear Public to be bored?”
“I never thought much of your great Idea,” Melody confessed candidly.
“The trouble with it is that it doesn’t do any good to give people what
they aren’t willing to work for. You’ve got to earn your bread, so to
speak, in order to digest it properly. The Public’s got to want good
plays and good acting enough to pay the proper price for ’em. You can’t
get people interested in an art they don’t understand and don’t want
enough to work for. Let ’em give themselves the best they can understand
and like until they kick for better!”
“That even I have begun to comprehend, O Minerva and Melody in one!
Still, there are exceptions to your philosophical principle—for example,
yourself, goddess, and me, who digest with an excellent appetite our
heaven-sent cake.”
“Didn’t you earn it—and me? As few men ever earned the love they take!
And I reckon I earned you, too.”
There followed an unlucid interval.
“But what, then,” Brainard resumed, after the interval, “shall we do with
one large, commodious theater building; also one great Idea with a hole
punched in it, through which the gas has escaped?”
“I’ve been thinking of that problem, too. We might turn it into a
coöperative company, and let the players own it and run it to suit
themselves.”
“Even into the ground?”
“Just that! But there are some good heads in the company, and it will
give them all a chance. Besides, we can afford it, dear!”
“Yes, we can much better afford to give it away than to keep it running,”
Brainard admitted. “As your husband, I can’t countenance all the follies
I put on you as mere guardian!”
So the last night of the season, a warm June night, the People’s players
got together at the close of the performance in the pleasant library of
the theater, and Brainard and Melody made them two little speeches.
First, Brainard explained to the players the plan of a coöperative stock
company, in which all members were to own shares, with a board of
directors, of which Leaventritt was to be chairman and Farson secretary.
Then Melody said:
“You heard the boss on the new plan. You’re in great luck, let me tell
you! And you will be awful chumps if you fight among yourselves, or
otherwise don’t make a go of it.” Melody looked severely at Cissie Pyce,
who was seated obscurely in the rear of the room. “Of course, you’ll all
think yourselves Coquelins and Sarahs. Well, you’re not. Mind what the
manager says. You’ve got the prettiest, nicest theater in the city, a
fair company, and a good start with Mr. Farson’s new play. I shan’t be
with you next season. As you’ve doubtless heard, I’ve taken a new
manager—for life—and we’re going abroad on our first tour. So buck up!
Don’t fight! Good luck!”
And thus was formed the independent Company of Actors, with one Edgar
Brainard as honorary president, and Mrs. Edgar Brainard, _née_ Melody
White, as honorary vice president. All the company came to the wedding,
and later trooped to the dock to see the couple depart for Europe.
A floral offering from the company—an elegant version of the great scene
in Farson’s play, done in roses and carnations—filled their stateroom to
the exclusion of much else. It was labeled, “Their Great Adventure.”
“That’s right,” Melody said when they went to inspect their quarters.
“It’s life, not art!”
“We’ve made a fair start, don’t you think?” Brainard added.
Melody replied by raising her lips for the expected kiss.