Chapter V: Part 5

A certain English actor, who had been with him two or three seasons, made a curious little mistake night after night, season after season, and no one seemed to heed it. Of course Salvini, not speaking English, could not be expected to detect the error. Where the venomous priest should humbly bow himself out with the veiled threat, "This may yet end in a trial--and--conviction!" the actor invariably said, "This may yet end in a trial of convictions!" Barely three nights had passed when Signor Salvini said to his son, "Why does Miss Morris smile at that man's exit? It is not funny. Ask why she smiles." And he was greatly put out with his actor when he learned the cause of my amusement. A very observant man, you see.

He is a thinking actor; he knows _why_ he does a thing, and he used to be very intolerant of some of the old-school "tricks of the trade." Mind, when I was acting with him, he had come to understand fairly well the English of our ordinary, everyday vocabulary, and if he was quite calm and not on exhibition in any way, he could speak it a little and quite to the point, as you will see. He particularly disliked the old, old trick called "taking the stage," that is, when a good speech has been made, the actor at its end crosses the stage, changing his position for no reason on earth save to add to his own importance. It seemed Salvini had tried through his stage manager to break up the wretched habit; but one morning he saw an actor end his speech at the centre of the stage, and march in front of every one to the extreme right-hand corner. A curl came to the great actor's lip, then he said inquiringly, "What for?" The actor stammered, "I--I--it's my cross, you know--the end of my speech."--"Y-e-es," sweetly acquiesced the star. "Y-e-es, you cross, I see--but what for?" The actor hesitated. "You do _so_," went on Salvini, giving a merciless imitation of the swelling chest and stage stride of the guilty one, as he had crossed from centre down to extreme right. "You do so--but for _why_? A-a-ah!" Suddenly he seemed to catch an idea. "A-a-ah! is it that you have zee business with zee people in zee box? A-a-ah! you come spik to zose people? No? Not for that you come? You have _no_ reason for come here, you say? Then, for God's sake, stay centre till you _have_ a reason!"

It was an awful lesson, but what delicious acting. The simple, earnest inquiry, the delighted catching at an idea, the following disappointment, and the final outburst of indignant authority--he never did anything better for the public.

During the short time we acted together but one cloud, a tiny, tiny one of misunderstanding, rose between us, but according to reports made by lookers-on a good deal of lightning came out of it. Of course not understanding each other's language, we had each to watch the other as a cat would watch a mouse, in order to take our cues correctly. At one point I took for mine his sudden pause in a rapidly delivered speech, and at that pause I was to speak instantly. We got along remarkably well, for his soul was in his work, and I gave every spark of intelligence I had in me to the effort to satisfy him; so by the fifth or sixth performance we both felt less anxiety about the catching of our cues than we had at first. On the night I speak of, some one on Salvini's side of the stage greatly disturbed him by loud whispering in the entrance. He was nervous and excitable, the annoyance (of which I was unconscious) threw him out of his stride, so to speak. He glanced off warningly and snapped his fingers. No use; on went the giggling and whispering. At last, in the very middle of a speech, wrath overcame him. He stopped dead. That sudden stop was my cue. Instantly I spoke. Good heaven! he whirled upon me like a demon. I understood that a mistake had been made, but it was not mine. I knew my cue when I got it. The humble Rosalia was forgotten. With hot resentment my head went up and back with a fling, and I glared savagely back at him. A moment we stood in silent rage. Then his face softened, he laid the fingers of his left hand on his lips, extending his right with that unspeakably deprecating upturning of the palm known only to the foreign-born. An informing glance of the eye toward the right, followed by a faint "_Pardon_!" was enough. I dropped back to meek Rosalia, the scene was resumed, the cloud had passed. But one man who had been looking on said: "By Jove! you know, you two looked like a pair of blue-eyed devils, just ready to rend each other. Talk about black-eyed rage; it's the lightning of the blue eyes that sears every time."

I had been quite wild to see Signor Salvini on his first visit to America, and at last I caught up with him in Chicago, and was so happy as to find my opportunity in an extra matinee. The play was "Othello," and during the first act he looked not only a veritable Moor, but, what was far greater, he seemed to be Shakespeare's own "Moor of Venice." The splendid presence, the bluff, soldierly manner, the open, honest look, as the "round unvarnished tale" was delivered, made one understand, partly at least, how "that maiden never bold, a spirit so still and quiet," had come at last to see "_Othello's_ visage _in his mind_, and to his honour and his valiant parts to consecrate her fortune and her soul!" Through all the noble scene, through all the soldierly dignity and candid speech, there was that tang of roughness that so naturally clung to the man whose life from his seventh year had been passed in the "tented field," and who himself declared, "Rude am I in speech, and little bless'd with the set phrase of peace."

In short, Salvini was a delight to eye and ear, and satisfied both imagination and judgment in that first act. Like many people who are much alone, I have the habit of speaking sometimes to myself--a habit I repented of that day, yes, verily I did; for when, at Cyprus, Othello entered and fiercely swept into his swarthy arms the pale loveliness of Desdemona, 'twas like a tiger's spring upon a lamb. The bluff and honest soldier, the English Shakespeare's Othello, was lost in an Italian Othello. Passion choked, his gloating eyes burned with the mere lust of the "sooty Moor" for that white creature of Venice. It was revolting, and with a shiver I exclaimed aloud, "Ugh, you splendid brute!" Realizing my fault, I drew quickly back into the shadow of the curtain; but a man's rough voice had answered instantly, "Make it a _beast_, ma'am, and I'm with you!" I was cruelly mortified.

But there was worse to happen that day. The leading lady, Signora Piamonti, an admirable actress, was the Desdemona. She played the part remarkably well, and was a fairly attractive figure to the eye, if one excepted her foot. It was exceptionally long and shapeless, and was most vilely shod. Her dresses, too, all tipped up in the front, unduly exposing the faulty members; many were the comments made, and often the query followed, "Why doesn't she get some American shoes?" I am sorry to say that some of our daily papers even were ungracious enough to refer to that physical defect, when only her work should have been considered and criticised.

The actors had reached the last act. The bed stood in the centre of a shallow alcove, heavily curtained. These hangings were looped up at the beginning of the act, and were supposed to fall to the floor, completely concealing the bed and its occupant after the murder. The actor had long before become again Shakespeare's Othello. We had seen him tortured, racked, and played upon by the malignant Iago; seen him, while perplexed in the extreme, irascible, choleric, sullen, morose; but now, as with tense nerves we waited for the catastrophe, he was truly formidable. The great tragedy moved on. Desdemona's piteous entreaties had been choked in her slim throat, the smothering pillow held in place with merciless strength. Then at Emilia's disconcerting knock and demand for admission, Othello had let down and closely drawn the two curtains. But alas and alack a day! though they were thick and rich and wide, they failed to reach the floor by a good foot's breadth--a fact unnoticed by the star. You may not be an actor; but really when you add to that twelve or fourteen-inch space the steep incline of the stage--why, you can readily understand how advisable it was for the dead Desdemona that day to stay dead until the play was over.

Majestically Othello was striding down to the door, where Emilia was knocking for admittance, when there came that long in-drawn breath--that "a-a-h!" that from the auditorium always means mischief--and a sudden bobbing of heads this way and that in the front seats. In an instant the great actor felt the broken spell, knew he had lost his hold upon the people--but why? He went on steadily, and then, just as you have seen a field of wheat surged in one wave by the wind, I saw the closely packed people in that wide parquet sway forward in a great gust of laughter. With quick, experienced eye I scanned first Othello's garb from top to toe, and finding no unseemly rent or flaw of any kind to provoke laughter, I next swept the stage. Coming to the close-drawn curtains, I saw--heavens! No wonder the people laughed. The murdered Desdemona had risen, was evidently sitting on the side of the bed; for beneath the curtains her dangling feet alone were plainly seen, kicking cheerfully back and forth. Such utterly unconscious feet they were that I think the audience would not have laughed again had they kept still; but all at once they began a "heel-and-toe step," and people rocked back and forth, trying to suppress their merriment. And then--oh, Piamonti!--swiftly the toe of the right foot went to the back of the left ankle and scratched vigorously. Restraint was ended, every one let go and laughed and laughed. From the box I saw in the entrance the outspread fingers, the hoisted shoulders, the despairingly shaken heads of the Italian actors, who could find no cause for the uproar. Salvini behaved perfectly in that, disturbed, distressed, he showed no sign of anger, but maintained his dignity through all, even when in withdrawing the curtains and disclosing Desdemona dead once more the incomprehensible laughter again broke out. But late as it was and short the time left him, he got the house in hand again, again wove his charm, and sent the people away sick and shuddering over his too real self-murder.

As I was leaving the box I met one connected with the management of the theatre, who, furious over the _faux pas_, was roughly denouncing the actress, whom he blamed entirely, and I took it upon myself to suggest that he pour a vial or two of his wrath upon the heads of his own property man and the stage manager, who had grossly neglected their duty in failing to provide curtains of the proper length. And I chuckled with satisfaction as I saw him plunge behind the scenes, calling angrily upon some invisible Jim to come forth. I had acted as a sort of lightning-rod for a sister actress.

Salvini's relations with his son were charming, though it sounded a bit odd to hear the stalwart young man calling him "papa." Alessandro had dark eyes and black hair, so naturally admired the opposite colouring, and I never heard him speak of his father's English second wife without some reference to her fairness. It would be "my blond mamma," "my little fair mamma," "my father's pretty English wife," or "before my little blond mamma died." He felt the "mamma" and "papa" jarred on American ears, and often corrected himself; but when Signor Salvini himself once told me a story of his father, he referred to him constantly as "my papa," just as he does in this book of his that makes him seem so egotistical and so determined to find at all costs the vulnerable spot, the weak joint in the armour, of all other actors.

Certainly he could not have been an egotist in the bosom of his family. A friend in London went to call upon his young wife, his "white lily." She was showing the house to her visitor, when, pausing suddenly before a large portrait of her famous husband, she became silent, her uplifted eyes filled, her lips smiled tremulously, she gave a little gasp, and whispered, "Oh, he's almost like God to me!"

The friend, startled, even shocked, was about to reprove her, but a glance into the innocent face showed no sacrilege had been meant, only she had never been honoured, protected, happy, before--and some women worship where they love. Could an egotist win and keep such affection and gratitude as that?

Among those who complain of his opinionated book I am amused to find one who fairly exhausted himself in praise, not to say flattery, of this same Salvini. It is very diverting to the mere looker-on, when the world first proclaims some man a god, bowing down and worshipping him, and then anathematizes him if he ventures to proclaim his own godship. I have my quarrel with the book, I confess it. I am sorry he does not show how he did his tremendous work, show the nature of those sacrifices he made. How one would enjoy a word-picture of the place where he obtained his humble meals in those earliest days of struggle; who shared them, and in what spirit they were discussed, grave or gay! Italian life is apt to be picturesque, and these minor circumstances mean much when one tries to get at the daily life of a man. But Salvini has given us merely splendid results, without showing us _how_ he obtained them. Yet what a lesson the telling would have been for some of our indolent actors! Why, even at the zenith of his career, Salvini attended personally to duties most actors leave to their dressers. He used to be in his dressing-room hours before the overture was on, and in an ancient gown he would polish his armour, his precious weapons or ornaments, arrange his wigs, examine every article of dress he would require that night, and consequently he never had mishaps. He used to say: "The man there? Oh, yes, he can pack and lock and strap and check, but only an actor can understand the care of these artistic things. What I do myself is well done; this work is part of my profession; there is no shame in doing it. And all the time I work, I think--I think of the part--till I have all forgot--_all_ but just that part's self."

And yet, O dear, these are the things he does not put in his book. When he was all dressed and ready for the performance, Salvini would go into a dark place and walk and walk and walk; sometimes droopingly, sometimes with martial tread. Once, I said, "You walk far, signor?"

"_Si, signorina_," he made answer, then eagerly, "_I walk me into him!_" And while the great man was "walking into the character," the actors who supported him smoked cigarettes at the stage door until the dash for dressing room and costume.

Some women scold because he has not given pictures of the great people whom he met. "Why," they ask, "did he not describe Crown Princess Victoria" (the late Empress Frederick) "at least--how she looked, what she wore? Such portraits would be interesting." But Salvini was not painting portraits, not even his own--truly. He was giving a list of his triumphs; and if he has shown self-appreciation, he was at least perfectly honest. There is no hypocrisy about him. If he knew Uriah Heep, he did not imitate him; for in no chapter has he proclaimed himself "'umble." If one will read Signor Salvini's book, remembering that the pæans of a world have been sung in his honour, and that he really had no superior in his artistic life, I think the I's and my's will seem simply natural.

However he may have been admired in other characters, I do truly believe that only those who have seen him in "Othello" and "Morte Civile" can fully appreciate the marvellous art of the actor. I carry in my mind two pictures of him,--Othello, the perfect animal man, in his splendid prime, where, in a very frenzy of conscious strength, he dashes Iago to the earth, man and soldier lost in the ferocity of a jungle male beast, jealously mad--an awful picture of raging passion. The other, Conrad, after the escape from prison; a strong man broken in spirit, wasted with disease, a great shell of a man--one who is legally dead, with the prison pallor, the shambling walk, the cringing manner, the furtive eyes. But oh, that piteous salute at that point when the priest dismisses him, and the wrecked giant, timid as a child, humbly, deprecatingly touches the priest's hand with his finger-tips and then kisses them devoutly! I see that picture yet, through tears, just as I saw for the first time that illustration of supreme humility and veneration.

Oh, never mind a little extravagance with personal pronouns! A beloved father, a very thorough gentleman, but above all else the greatest actor of his day. There is but the one Salvini, and how can he help knowing it? So to book and author--ready! _Viva Salvini!_

_CHAPTER XX

FRANK SEN: A CIRCUS EPISODE_

The circus season was over, the animals had gone into comfortable winter quarters, while the performers, less fortunate than the beasts, were scattered far and near, "some in rags and some in tags, and some" (a very few) "in velvet gowns." But one small group had found midwinter employment, a party of Japanese men and women, who were jugglers, contortionists, and acrobats; and as their work was pretty as well as novel, they found a place on the programme of some of the leading vaudeville theatres.

They were in a large Western city. Behind the curtain their retiring manners, their exquisite cleanliness, their grave and gentle politeness, made them favourites with the working forces of the theatre, while before the curtain the brilliant, graceful precision with which they carried out their difficult, often dangerous, performance won them the high favour of the public.

On that special day the matinee was largely attended, the theatre being filled, even to the upper circles, as at night. Smilingly the audience had watched the movements of the miniature men and women in their handsome native costumes, and with "Ohs!" and "Ahs!" had seen them emerge from those robes, already arrayed for acrobatic work, in suits of black silk tights with trunks and shoulder and wrist trimmings of red velvet fairly stiffened with gold embroideries; and then came the act the people liked best, because it contained the element of danger, because in its performance a young girl and a little lad smilingly risked life and limb to entertain them.

The two young things had climbed like cats up to the swinging bars, high up, where the heat had risen from a thousand gas lights, and the blood thundered in their ears, and the pulses on their temples beat like hammers. So high, that looking down through the quivering, bluish mist, the upturned faces of the people merged together and became like the waters of a pale, wide pool. Their work was well advanced. With clocklike precision they had obeyed, ever-smilingly obeyed, the orders conveyed to them by the sharp tap of the fan their trainer held, though to the audience the two young forms glittering in black and scarlet and gold, poising and fluttering there, were merely playing in midair like a pair of tropical birds.

They were beginning their great feat, in which danger was so evident that women often cried out in terror and some covered their eyes and would not look at all--the music even had sunken to a sort of tremor of fear. They were for the moment hanging head downward from their separate bars, when across the stillness came the ominous sound of cracking, splintering wood; afterward it was known that the rung of a chair in an upper private box had broken, but then,--but _then_! the sound was close to the swaying girl's ear!

Believing it was her bar that was breaking, her strained nerves tore free from all control! Driven by fear, she made a mad leap out into space, reaching frantically for the little brown hands that a half second later would have been ready for her, with life and safety in their tenacious grasp.

To those who do their work in space and from high places, the distance between life and death, between time and eternity, is often measured by half seconds. Little Omassa had leaped too soon, the small brown hands with power to save were not extended. She grasped the empty air, gave a despairing cry, and as she whirled downward, had barely time to realize that the sun had gone black out in the sky, and that the world with its shrieking millions was thundering to its end, when the awful crash came.

There were shouts and shrieks, tears and groans, and here and there helpless fainting. Ushers rushed from place to place, the police appeared suddenly. The Japanese, silent, swift, self-controlled, were moving their paraphernalia that the curtain might be lowered, were stretching a small screen about the inert, fallen figure, were bringing a rug to lift her on, and their faces were like so many old, _old_ ivory masks.

Tom McDermott, in his blue coat, stood by the silent little figure waiting for the rug and for the coming of the doctor, and groaned, "On her face, too--and she a girl child!"

Tom had seen three battle-fields and many worse sights, but none of them had misted his eyes as did this little glittering, broken heap, and he turned his face away and muttered, "If she'd only keep quiet!" for truly it was dreadful to see the long shudders that ran over the silent, huddled thing, to see certain red threads broadening into very rivulets. At last the ambulance, then the all-concealing curtain, the reviving music, a song, a pretty dance, and _presto_, all was forgotten!

When Omassa opened her eyes, her brain took up work just where it had left off; therefore she was astonished to find the sun shining, for had she not seen the sun go out quite black in the sky? Yet here it was so bright, and she was--was, where? The room was small and clean, oh, clean! like a Japanese house, and almost as empty. Could it be? But no, this bed was American, and then why was she so heavy? What great weight was upon her? She could not move one little bit, and oh, my! _what_ was it she could faintly see beyond and below her own nose--was it shadow? Surely she could not see her own _lip_? She smiled at that, and the movement wrung a cry of agony from her--when, like magic, a face was bending over her, so kind and gentle, and then a joyous voice cried to some one in the next room, "This little girl, not content with being alive, sir, has her senses--is she not a marvel?"

And with light, delicate touch the stranger moistened the distended, immovable lip poor Omassa had dimly seen, through which her lower teeth had been driven in her fall, and in answer to her pleading, questioning glances at her own helpless body, told her she was encased in plaster now, but by and by she would be released, and now she was to be very quiet and try to sleep. And then she smoothed a tiny wrinkle out of the white quilt, shut out the sunlight, and, smiling kindly back at her, left Omassa, who obediently fell asleep--partly because her life was one of obedience, and partly because there was nothing else to do.

And then began the acquaintance between Mrs. Helen Holmes, nurse, and Omassa, Japanese acrobat. The other nurses teased Helen Holmes about her pet patient, saying she was only a commonplace, Japanese child woman; but Mrs. Holmes would exclaim, "If you could only see her light up and glow!"

And so they came to calling Omassa "the lantern," and would jestingly ask "when she was going to be lighted up"; but there came a time when Mrs. Holmes knew the magic word that would light the flame and make the lantern glow, like ruby, emerald, and sapphire; like opal and tourmaline.

The child suffered long and terribly; both arms were broken, and in several places, also her little finger, a number of ribs, her collar-bone, and one leg, while cuts were simply not counted. During her fever-haunted nights she babbled Japanese for hours, with one single English name appearing and reappearing almost continually,--the name of Frank; and when she called that name it was like the cooing of a pigeon, and the down-drooping corners of her grave mouth curled upward into smiles. She spoke English surprisingly well, as the other members of the troupe only knew a very little broken English; and had she not placed the emphasis on the wrong syllable, her speech, would have been almost perfect.

Generally she was silent and sad and unsmiling, but grateful, passionately grateful to her "nurse-lady," as she called Mrs. Holmes; yet when, that kind woman stooped to kiss her once, Omassa shrank from the caress with such repugnance as deeply to wound her, until the little Japanese had explained to her the national abhorrence of kissing, assuring her over and over again that even "the Japan ma'ma not kiss little wee baby she love."

Mrs. Holmes ceased to wonder at the girl's sadness when she found she was absolutely alone in the world: no father, no mother; no, no sister, no brother, "no what you call c-cousine?--no nothing, nobody have I got what belong to me," she said.

One morning, as her sick-room toilet was completed, Mrs. Holmes said lightly:--

"Omassa, who is Frank?" and then fairly jumped at the change in the ivory-tinted, expressionless face. Her long, narrow eyes glowed, a pink stain came on either cheek, she raised herself a little on her best arm, eagerly she cried, "You know him--oh, you know Frank?"

Regretfully Mrs. Holmes answered, "No, dear, I don't know him."

"But," persisted Omassa, "you know him, or how could you speak his name?"

"I learned the name from you, child, when you talked in the fever. I am very sorry I have caused you a disappointment. I am to blame for my curiosity--forgive me."

All the light faded from her face and very quietly she lay down upon her pillow, her lips close-pressed, her eyes closed; but she could not hide the shining of the tears that squeezed between her short, thick lashes and clung to them. 'Twas long before his name was mentioned again; but one day something had been said of friends, when Omassa with intense pride had exclaimed:--"I have got my own self one friend--he--my friend Frank."

"What's his other name?" asked the nurse.

"Oh, he very poor, he got only one name."

"But, dear, he must have another name, he is Frank somebody or something."

"No! no!" persisted Omassa with gentle obstinacy, "he tell me always true, he very poor, good man--he got only one name, my Frank Sen."

"There," cried Mrs. Holmes, triumphantly, "you see he _has_ two names after all, you have just called him by them both--Frank Sen."

At which the invalid sent forth a tinkling laugh of amusement, crying: "Oh, that not one man's name, oh, no! That Sen that like your Mr.--Mrs.; you nurse-lady, you Holmes Sen. Ito--big Japan fight man, he Ito Sen, you unnerstand me, nurse-lady?"

"Yes, child, I understand. Sen is a title, a term of respect, and you like to show your friend Frank all the honour you can, so you call him Frank Sen."

And Omassa with unconscious slanginess gravely answered: "You right _on_ to it at first try. My boss" (her manager Kimoto) "find _me_ baby in Japan, with very bad old man. He gamble all time. I not know why he have me, he not my old man, but he sell me for seven year to Kimoto, and Kimoto teach me jump, turn, twist, climb, and he send my money all to old man--_all_. We go Mexico--South America--many Islands--to German land, and long time here in this most big America--and the world so big--and then I so little Japan baby--I no play--I no sing--I know nothing what to do--and just _one_ person in this big lonesome_ness_ make a kindness to me--my Frank Sen--just one man--just one woman in all world make goodness to me--my Frank Sen and my nurse-lady," and she stroked with reverent little fingers the white hand resting on the bed beside her.

"What was he like, your Frank?" asked the nurse.

"Oh, he one big large American man--he not laugh many times loud, but he laugh in he blue eye. He got brown mustache and he hair all short, thick, wavy--like puppy dog's back. He poor--he not perform in circus, oh, no! He work for put up tents, for wagon, for horses. He ver good man for fight too--he smash man that hurt horse--he smash man that kick dog or push me, Japan baby. Oh, he best man in all the world" (the exquisite Madame Butterfly was not known yet, so Omassa was not quoting). "He tell me I shall not say some words, 'damn' and 'hell' and others more long, more bad, and he tell me all about that 'hell' and where is--and how you get in for steal, for lie, for hurt things not so big as you--and how you can't get out again where there is cool place for change--and he smooth my hair and pat my shoulder, for he know Japan people don't ever be kissed--and he call me one word I cannot know."

She shook her head regretfully. "He call me 'poor little wave'--why poor little wave--wave that mean water?" she sighed. "I can't know why Frank Sen call me that."

But quick-witted Mrs. Holmes guessed the word had been "waif"--poor little waif, and she began dimly to comprehend the big-hearted, rough tent-man, who had tried to guard this little foreign maid from the ignorance and evil about her.

"But," resumed Omassa, with perfect conviction, "Frank Sen meaned goodness for me when he called me 'wave'--I know _that_. What you think that big American man do for help me little Japan baby--with no sense? Well, I will tell you. When daylight circus-show over, he take me by hand and lead me to shady place between tents--he sit down--put me at he knee, and in what you call primer-book with he long brown finger he point out and make me know all those big fat letters--yes, he do _that_. Other mens make of him fun--and he only laugh; but when they say he my father and say of me names, he lay down primer and fight. When he lay out the whole deck, he come back and wash he hands and show me some more letters. Oh, I very stupid Japan baby; but at last I know _all_, and _then_ he harness some together and make d-o-g say dog, and n-o say no, and so it come that one day next week was going to be his fête-day,--what you call birsday,--and I make very big large secret."

She lifted herself excitedly in bed, her glowing eyes were on her nurse's face, her lips trembled, the "lantern" was alight and glowing radiantly.

"What you think I do for my Frank Sen's birsday? I have never one penny,--I cannot buy,--but I make one big great try. I go to circus-lady, that ride horse and jump hoops--she read like Frank Sen. I ask her show me some right letters. Oh, I work hard--for I am very stupid Japan child; but when that day come, Frank Sen he lead me to shady place--he open primer--then," her whole face was quivering with fun at the recollection, "then I take he long finger off--I put _my_ finger and I slow spell--not cat--not dog--oh, _what_ you think?--I spell F-r-a-n-k--Frank! He look to me, and then he make a big jump--he catch me--toss me, high up in air, and he shout big glad shout, and then I say--'cause for your birsday.' He stop, he put me down, and he eyes come wet, and he take my hand and he say: 'Thank you, that's the only birsday gift I ever _re_ceived that was not from my mother. Spell it again for me,' he said; and then he was very proud and said, 'there was not any-other birsday gift like that in all the world!' What you think of _that_?

"Then the end to season of circus come--Frank Sen he kneel down by me--he very sad--he say, 'I have nothing to give--I am such a fool--and the green-cloth--oh, the curse of the green-cloth!' He took off my Japan slippers and smiled at them and said, 'Poor little feet'; he stroked my hands and said, 'Poor little hands'; he lifted up my face and said, 'Poor little wave'; then he look up in air and he say, very troubled-like, 'A few home memories--some small knowledge, all I had, I have given her. To read a little is not much, but maybe it may help her some day, and I have nothing more to give!'

"And I feeling something grow very fast, here and here" (touching throat and breast), "and I say, '_You_ have nothing to give me? well'--and then I forget all about I am little Japan girl, and I cry, 'Well, _I_ have something to give you, Frank Sen, and that is one kiss!' And I put my arms about he neck and make one big large kiss right on he kind lips."

Her chin sank upon her night-robed breast. After a moment she smiled deprecatingly at Mrs. Holmes and whispered: "You forgive me, other day? You see I Japan girl--and just once I give big American kiss to my friend, Frank Sen."

_CHAPTER XXI

STAGE FORFEITS AND THEIR HUMOUR_

It was during the rehearsals of "L'Article 47" that I enjoyed one single hearty laugh,--a statement that goes far to show my distressed state of mind,--for generally speaking that is an unusual day which does not bring along with its worry, work, and pain some bubble of healing laughter. It was a joke of Mr. Le Moyne's own special brand that found favour in my eyes and a place in my memory. Any one who has ever served under Mr. Daly can recall the astounding list of rules printed in fine type all over the backs of his contracts. The rules touching on _forfeits_ seemed endless: "For being late," "For a stage wait," "For lack of courtesy," "For gossiping," "For wounding a companion's feelings"--each had its separate forfeiture. "For addressing the manager on business outside of his office," I remember, was considered worth one dollar for a first offence and more for a second. Most of these rules ended with, "Or discharge at the option of the manager." But it was well known that the mortal offence was the breaking that rule whose very first forfeit was five dollars, "Or discharge at the option of," etc., that rule forbidding the giving to outsiders of any stage information whatever; touching the plays in rehearsal, their names, scenes, length, strength, or story; and to all these many rules on the backs of our contracts we assented and subscribed our amused or amazed selves.

When the new French play "L'Article 47" was announced, the title aroused any amount of curiosity. A reporter after a matinee one day followed me up the avenue, trying hard to get me to explain its meaning; but I was anxious not to be "discharged at the option of the manager," and declined to explain. Many of the company received notes asking the meaning of the title. At Mr. Le Moyne's house there boarded a walking interrogation-point of a woman. She wished to know what "L'Article 47" meant; she would know. She tried Mr. Harkins; Mr. Harkins said he didn't know. She tossed her head and tried Mr. Crisp; Mr. Crisp patiently and elaborately explained just why he could not give any information. She implied that he did not know a lady when he saw one, and fell upon Mr. Le Moyne, tired, hungry, suavely sardonic. "_He_ was," she assured him, "a gentleman of the old school. _He_ would know how to receive a lady's request and honour it." And Le Moyne rose to the occasion. A large benevolence sat upon his brow, as assuring her that, though he ran the risk of discharge for her fair sake, yet should she have her will. He asked if she had ever seen a Daly contract. The bridling, simpering idiot replied, "She had seen several, and such numbers of silly rules she had never seen before, and--"

"That's it," blandly broke in Le Moyne, "there's the explanation of the whole thing--see? 'L' Article 47' is a five-act dramatization of the 47th rule of Daly's contract."

"Did you ever?" gasped the woman.

"No," said Le Moyne, reaching for bread, "I never did; but Daly's up to anything, and he'd discharge me like a shot if he should ever hear of this."

It was almost impossible to get Mr. Daly to laugh at an actor's joke; he was too generally at war with them, and he was too often the object of the jest. But he did laugh once at one of the solemn frauds perpetrated on me by this same Le Moyne.

On the one hundred and twenty-fifth performance of "Divorce" I had "stuck dead," as the saying is. Not a word could I find of my speech. I was cold--hot--cold again. I clutched Mrs. Gilbert's hand. I whispered frantically: "What is it? Oh! what is the word?" But horror on horror, in my fall I had dragged her down with me. She, too, was bewildered--lost. "I don't know," she murmured. There we were, all at sea. After an awful wait I walked over and asked Captain Lynde (Louis James) to come on, and the scene continued from that point. I was angry--shamed. I had never stuck in all my life before, not even in my little girl days. Mr. Daly was, of course, in front. He came rushing back to inquire, to scold. Every one joked me about my probable five-dollar forfeit. Well, next night came, and at that exact line I did it again. Of course that was an expression of worn-out nerves; but it was humiliating in the extreme. Mr. Daly, it happened, was attending an opening elsewhere, and did not witness my second fall from grace. Then came Le Moyne to me--big and grave and kind, his plump face with the shiny spots on the cheek-bones fairly exuding sympathetic commiseration. He led me aside, he lowered his voice, he addressed me gently:--

"You stuck again, didn't you, Clara? Too bad! too bad! and of course you apprehend trouble with Daly? I'm awfully sorry. Ten dollars is such a haul on one week's salary. But see here, I've got an idea that will help you out, if you care to listen to it."

I looked hard at him, but the wretch had a front of brass; his benevolence was touching. I said eagerly: "Yes, I do care indeed to listen. What is the idea?"

He beamed with affectionate interest, as he said impressively, "Well, now you know that a bad 'stick' generally costs five dollars in this theatre?"

"Yes," I groaned.

"And you stuck awfully last night?"

"Yes," I admitted.

"Then to-night you go and repeat the offence. But here is where I see hope for you. Daly is not here; he does not know yet what you have done. Watch then for his coming. This play is so long he will be here before it's over. Go to his private office at once. Get ahead of every one else; do you understand? Approach him affably and frankly. Tell him yourself that you have unfortunately stuck again, and then offer him _the two 'sticks' for eight dollars_. If he's a gentleman and not a Jew, he'll accept your proposal."

Just what remarks I made to my sympathetic friend Le Moyne at the end of that speech I cannot now recall. If any one else can, I can only say I was not a church member then, and let it pass at that. But when I opened my envelope next salary day and saw my full week's earnings there, I went to Mr. Daly's office and told him of my two "sticks" and of Le Moyne's proposed offer, and for once he laughed at an actor's joke.

_CHAPTER XXII

POOR SEMANTHA_

It has happened to every one of us, I don't know why, but every mother's son or daughter of us can look back to the time when we habitually referred to some acquaintance or friend as "poor So-and-So"; and the curious part of it is that if one pauses to consider the why or wherefore of such naming, one is almost sure to find that, financially at least, "poor So-and-So" is better off than the person who is doing the "pooring." Nor is "poor So-and-So" always sick or sorrowful, stupid or ugly; and yet, low be it whispered, is there not always a trace of contempt in that word "poor" when applied to an acquaintance? A very slight trace, of course,--we lightly rub the dish with garlic, we do not slice it into our salad. So when we call a friend "poor So-and-So," consciously or unconsciously, there is beneath all our affection the slight garlic touch of contemptuous pity; how else could I, right to her merry, laughing face, have called this girl poor Semantha?

I had at first no cause to notice her especially; she was poor, so was I; she was in the ballet, so was I. True, I had already had heads nodded sagely in my direction, and had heard voices solemnly murmur, "That girl's going to do something yet," and all because I had gone on alone and spoken a few lines loudly and clearly, and had gone off again, without leaving the audience impressed with the idea that they had witnessed the last agonized and dying breath of a girl killed by fright. I had that much advantage, but we both drew the same amount of salary per week,--five very torn and very dirty one-dollar bills. Of course there could have been no rule nor reason for it, but it had so happened that all the young women of the ballet--there were four--received their salary in one-dollar bills. However, I was saying that we, the ballet, dressed together at that time, and poor Semantha first attracted my attention by her almost too great willingness to use my toilet soap, instead of the common brown washing soap she had brought with her. At some past time this soap must have been of the shape and size of a building brick, but now it resembled a small dumb-bell, so worn was its middle, so nobby its ends. Then, too, my pins were, to all intents and purposes, her pins; my hair-pins her hair-pins; while worst of all, my precious, real-for-true French rouge was _her_ rouge.

At that point I came near speaking, because poor Semantha was not artistic in her make-up, and she painted not only her cheeks but her eyes, her temples, her jaws, and quite a good sample of each side of her neck. But just as I would be about to speak, I would bethink me of those nights when, in the interest of art, I had to be hooked up behind, and I would hold my peace.

On the artistic occasions alluded to, I hooked Semantha up the back, and then Semantha hooked up my back. Ah, what a comfort was that girl; as a hooker-up of waists she was perfection. No taking hold of the two sides of the waist, planting the feet firmly, and taking a huge breath, as if the Vendôme column was about to be overthrown. No hooking of two-thirds of the hooks and eyes, and then suddenly unhooking them, remarking that there was a little mistake at the top hook. No putting of thumbs to the mouth to relieve the awful numbness caused by terrible effort and pinching. Ah, no! Semantha smiled,--she generally did that,--turned you swiftly to the light, caught your inside belt on the fly, as it were, fastened that, fluttered to the top, exactly matched the top hook to the top eye, and, high presto! a little pull at the bottom, a swift smooth down beneath the arms, and you were finished, and you knew your back was a joy until the act was over.

That was all I had known of Semantha. Probably it was all I ever should have known had not a sharp attack of sickness kept me away from the theatre for a time, during which absence Semantha made the discovery which was to bring her nearer to me.

Finding my dressing place but a barren waste of pine board, Semantha with smiling readiness turned to the dressing place on her left for a pin or two, and was stricken with amazement when the milder of her two companions remarked in a grudgingly unwilling tone, "You may take a few of my pins and hair-pins if you are sure to pay them back again."

While she was simply stunned for a moment, when the other companion, with that rare, straightforward brutality for which she became so deservedly infamous later on, snorted angrily: "No, you don't! Don't you touch anything of mine! You can't sponge on me as you do on Clara!"

Now Semantha was a German, as we were apt to find out if ever she grew excited over anything; and whenever she had a strange word used to her, she would repeat that word several times, first to make sure she fully understood its meaning, next to impress it upon her memory; so there she stood staring at her dressing mate, and slowly, questioningly repeated, "Spoonge? spoonge? w'at is that spoonge?" And received for answer, "_What is_ it? why, it's stealing." Semantha gave a cry. "Yes," continued the straightforward one, "it's stealing without secrecy; that's what sponging is."

Poor Semantha--astonished, insulted, frightened--turned her quivering face to the other girl and passionately cried, "Und she, my Fräulein Clara, tink she dat I steal of her?"

Then for the first time, and I honestly believe the last time in her life, that other pretty blond, but woolly-brained, young woman rose to the occasion--God bless her--and answered stoutly, "No, Clara never thought you were stealing."

So it happened that when I returned to work, and Semantha's excited and very German welcome had been given, I noticed a change in her. When my eyes met hers, instead of smiling instantly and broadly at me, her eyes sank to the ground and her face flushed painfully. At last we were left alone for a few moments. Quick as a flash, Semantha shut the door and bolted it with the scissors. Then she faced me; but what a strange, new Semantha it was! Her head was down, her eyes were down, her very body seemed to droop. Never had I seen a human look so like a beaten dog. She came quite close, both hands hanging heavily at her sides, and in a low, hurried tone she began: "Clara, now Clara, now see, I've been usen your soap--ach, it smells so goot!--nearly all der time!"--"Why," I broke in, "you were welcome!"

But she stopped me roughly with one word, "Wait," and then she went on. "Und der pins--why, I can't no more count. Und der hair-pins, und der paint," (her voice was rising now), "oh, der lofely soft pink paint! und I used dem, I used 'em all. Und I never t'ought you had to pay for dem all. You see, I be so green, fräulein, I dun know no manners, und I did, I did use dem, I know I did; but, so help me, I didn't mean to spoonge, und by Gott I didn't shteal!"

I caught her hands, they were wildly beating at the air then, and said, "I know it, Semantha, my poor Semantha, I know it."

She looked me brightly in the eyes and answered: "You do? you _truly_ know dat?" gave a great sigh, and added with a fervour I fear I ill-appreciated, "Oh, I hope you vill go to heaven!" then quickly qualified it, "dat is, dat I don't mean right avay, dis minute--only ven you can't keep avay any longer!"

Then she sprang to her dress hanging on the hook, and after struggling among the roots of her pocket, found the opening, and with triumph breathing from every feature of her face, she brought forth a small white cube, and cried out, "Youst you look at dat!"

I did; it seemed of a stony structure, white with a chill thin line of pink wandering forlornly through or on it (I am sure nothing could go through it); but the worst thing about it was the strange and evil smell emanating from it. And this evil, white, hard thing had been purchased from a pedler under the name of soap, fine shaving or toilet soap, and now Semantha was delightedly offering it to me, to use every night, and I with immense fervour promised I would use it, just as soon as my own was gone; and I mentally registered a solemn vow that the shadow of my soap should never grow less.

I soon discovered that poor Semantha was very ambitious; yes, in spite of her faint German accent and the amusing abundance of negatives in her conversation, she was ambitious. One night we had been called on to "go on" as peasants and sing a chorus and do a country dance, and poor Semantha had sung so freely and danced so gracefully and gayly, that it was a pleasure to look at her. She was such a contrast to the two others. One had sung in a thin nasal tone, and the expression of her face was enough to take all the dance out of one's feet. With frowning brows and thin lips tightly compressed, she attacked the figures with such fell determination to do them right or die, that one could hardly help hoping she _would_ make a mistake and take the consequences. The other,--the woolly-brained young person,--having absolutely no ear for music or time, silently but vigorously worked her jaws through the chorus, and affably ambled about, under everybody's feet, through the dance, displaying all the stiff-kneed grace of a young, well-meaning calf.

When we were in our room, I told Semantha how well she had sung and danced, and her face was radiant with delight. Then becoming very grave, she said: "Oh, fräulein, how I vant to be an actor! Not a common van, but" and she laid her hand with a childish gesture on her breast--"I vant to be a big actor. Don' you tink I can ever be von--eh?"

And looking into those bright, intelligent, squirrel-like eyes, I answered, "I think it is very likely," Poor Semantha! we were to recall those simple remarks, later on.

Christmas being near, I was very busy working between acts upon something intended for a present to my mother. This work was greatly admired by all the girls; but never shall I forget the astonishment of poor Semantha when she learned for whom it was intended.

"Your mutter lets you love her yet--you would dare?" And as I only gazed dumbly at her, she went on, while slow tears gathered in her eyes, "My mutter hasn't let me love her since--since I vas big enough to be knocked over."

Through the talkativeness of an extra night-hand or scene-shifter, who knew her family, I learned something of poor Semantha's private life. Poor child! from the very first she had rested her bright brown eyes upon the wrong side of life,--the seamy side,--and her own personal share of the rough patchwork, composed of dismal drabs and sodden browns and greens, had in it just one small patch of rich and brilliant colour,--the theatre. Of the pure tints of sky and field and watery waste and fruit and flower, she knew nothing. But what of that! had she not secured this bit of rosy radiance, and might it not in time be added to, until it should incarnadine the whole fabric of her life?