When the Company gathered at the railroad station bound for a city of the middle West, it more resembled a family party than a theatrical organization. The manager himself played a part, and his wife was the lady villain. The comedienne and the stage carpenter were man and wife, and the leading lady--a girl not much older than I--was chaperoned by her mother. Will was the leading man and I the ingenue. There was the prospect of a pleasant season ahead. I smiled a little contemptuously when I thought of Miss Burton's terrible arraignment of the stage. She had been unfortunate in her association, that was all, I told myself.
The comedienne and I shared dressing-rooms. She was a beautiful woman with a strain of Latin blood. I loved her from the first moment I met her. I was disappointed in her husband; her superior breeding and education caused me to wonder at her choice. Later, when I better understood the needs of the woman, I grew to like him; he was clean-minded and sincere--virtues I later discovered to be rare ones among actors.
It was about the second week of the season when our family party first showed signs of incompatibility. There had been some gossip connecting the leading lady's name with that of the manager, but as she was protected by her mother it appeared to me ridiculous and unwarranted.
One night, as the curtain fell on the first act, the manager's wife ordered the leading lady's mother out of the wings. Immediately there followed a war of high-pitched voices which penetrated the walls of our aerial dressing-room. The curtain was held and the orchestra played its third overture.
During the wait Margherita, my dressing-room mate, told me the circumstances of the case. The leading lady's mother was the "friend" of the "angel" of the Company; in this capacity she assumed privileges which were galling to the manager's wife. Adding to this the fact that her husband was too obviously interested in the leading lady, the outbreak was not to be wondered at. The manager himself was one of those round, flabby men, suggestive of a fat, spineless worm. Physique is often coindicant of character.
This night the mother had been more obnoxious than usual. It was her habit to stand in the wings while the manager's wife was on the scene, and by petty distractions to goad the actress to expression.
Gradually members of the Company were drawn into the dissension; it was an intolerable situation. Our sympathies were with the manager's wife, but we diplomatically held aloof. Matters finally reached a climax. One night during the performance there was a stage wait. In vain Will and the heavy man filled in the hiatus. The manager's wife had surprised the leading lady in the arms of her husband somewhere behind the scenes, and thereupon slapped the girl's face. A moment later she came upon the stage to play her "big" scene; she was labouring under great emotion, and I thought she had never acted so well. In a speech to me (I played her daughter)--it was part of the stage business that I take her hand in mine; I am not sure that I did not press her hand in silent sympathy.
She drew me towards her; in another moment the lady villain was sobbing in my arms, and there was an emotional storm not indicated in the manuscript of the author. I led her up stage as the house fairly rose to her splendid acting. When the storms of applause had died away we went on with the scene as if nothing had happened.
I wonder why it is that women invariably punish their own sex and exempt the man? Do they instinctively demand a higher code of honour from their kind while meekly acquiescent to the conventional license for men?
Subsequently the "angel" joined the Company, and, to all appearances, an adjustment was reached. For a time peace was restored. The leading lady assumed an air of injured innocence, and left off rouging her cheeks to heighten the effect. Then, suddenly--or gradually, I never realized how it came about--it became obvious to all that the leading lady was "making a play" for Will. Her attentions became so marked that the men of the Company chaffed him about it, declaring the manager would presently challenge him to mortal combat, or--and what was more likely--discharge him from the Company. Will accepted their allusions in good part, but I observed the subject was distasteful to him. To me he called the woman "a little fool," and was irritated with being placed in so ridiculous a position. Indeed I think Will suffered as much as I did.
Without being rude or boorish, there was nothing he could do to check her advances. She was planning her _debut_ as a star the following season, and made Will a proposition to become her leading man; she consulted him concerning the new plays which were being submitted to her, and planned for the current season special matinees of classic plays with which Will was familiar. She called him to preliminary rehearsal and discussions in her rooms at the hotel; sometimes, between the acts of the performance, called him to her dressing-room, where she received him in a state of _neglige_. New bits of stage business were introduced, or the old elaborated; she would run her fingers through his hair, or prolong the kisses which the role demanded; or, in his embrace, she would draw her body close to his and writhe about him to a point of indecency. In countless, intangible ways she brought her blandishments to bear upon him. Will declared she was playing him against the manager, whose relations with her had become strained since his wife had interfered. In all things she was aided and abetted by her mother, who fawned on Will and made his position the more equivocal. My own emotions were confused; it was inconceivable that I should be jealous of the woman. No, the sensation she aroused was nothing more than disgust. To be jealous of my husband connoted a lack of faith, and he had done nothing to betray my trust in him.
Jealousy had always appeared to me a debasing and an undignified emotion.... I resented the position in which my husband was placed; I would not add to his discomfiture by hectoring. I had promised myself when I married that never should I be jealous when I saw my husband making stage-love to another woman--perhaps in the back of my mind was the hope that I should always be the other woman, his leading lady.
Nevertheless, I was determined to stand the test without flinching. It was high time that I began to realize that the conditions which confronted me were but a part of the game--the _game_! The word was reminiscent of Miss Burton. I fought down the suggestion blindly, passionately.... I began to dread going to the theatre; often, while I was making up, I found Margherita's eyes fastened wistfully upon me--they told how she longed to comfort me. Unhappily I could not talk about the thing which was troubling me. What was there to say? There are emotions which never find tangible expression. Then the idea of asking my husband to resign from the Company suggested itself. I endeavoured to look at the question from a material standpoint: it would not be easy to find another engagement in mid-season, besides, there were the expensive railroad fares back to New York--we were then touring California--and probably another separation....
Perhaps it was the strain of hard travel, or it may have been the certainty of my condition which I had heretofore only suspected, or a combination of both, which made me lose my self-control. I had always believed strongly in the influence of suggestion upon the unborn child, and the unclean atmosphere in which I was living preyed upon my mind until it became an obsession. I grew to hate the woman and her witch-like mother. We had had some racking railroad jumps, and the loss of sleep was telling on every member of the Company; the leading lady was stimulating on champagne. Her mother stood in the wings, bottle and glass in hand, and applied the restorative whenever the girl came off the stage. One night, under the influence of the wine, she became more brazen in her advances to Will; she took liberties which made even her mother, watching in the wings, gasp with amusement. Something she said _sotto voce_ to her mother reached my ears. I began to watch her. As the act progressed she elaborated the detail with ever-increasing audacity, and, when the action required her to throw herself in Will's arms, she flung me a look of laughing defiance, coincident with a broad wink to her mother--old Hecate of the wings--then fed upon his lips like a vampire sucking blood.
I am not sure that I responded to the cue which some seconds later brought her into my arms. (We were fellow Nihilists under arrest.) The contact of her hand against mine ... Will told me afterwards he would never have believed me possessed of such physical strength. I choked her.... I drove my nails into her flesh.... I dragged her to the wings and beat her with my fists.... I vented upon her the long pent-up fury.... Oh, the shame, the ignominy of it! I, who resented a vicious influence upon my unborn child--I, its mother, had descended to the level of a fishwife!... It was Margherita who brought me back to consciousness; it was she who restored to me a modicum of my self-respect. I believe she was secretly pleased at what I had done.
That night, as she sat beside my bed, she told me something of herself.
As a young girl she possessed a wonderful singing voice. Her parents--poor Italians--who came to America when she was a babe in arms, could not afford proper masters. She went on the stage to support herself, hoping to earn enough to pay for her musical education. Her beauty attracted a patron "of the arts"; at least, that is the way he was referred to in the newspapers. But it was not Margherita's art that he cared about--it was the woman. He considered his money a fair exchange for her body; Margherita was not willing to pay the price. She struggled on, and one day, after several years of hazardous existence, she found herself stranded in a far Western city without money, without friends. In a state of despondency she had walked to the outskirts of the town, and there in a lonely wood she sat down to fight out a choice between life and death. In a moment of emotion she burst forth into song; her troubled soul found solace in Gounod's _Ave Maria_. At the end her voice broke, and she sobbed. A hand was laid on her shoulder. It was a big hand, strong and sinewy. The man that went with it was big--"big all the way through," Margherita said proudly. They were married not long after; ever since he had remained at her side, helping to fight for a clean career ... making her life's work his.... Dear Margherita! I can see you now, with your glorious black eyes, your coronet of raven hair with the poppies over your pretty ear.... Oh, the pity of it! Weakened by the hardships and privation her life entailed, she died a few years later....
When Will came into the room that night, he held a paper in his hand. It was our resignation. His eyes twinkled with humour when he told Margherita that he was taking the bull by the horns, and sparing us the ignominy of dismissal. I was glad to see he was not angry with me. Then Margherita whispered something into his ear. He came to the bed and took me in his arms, and what he said concerns only a man and wife....
Margherita stole away, but before she went she kissed us both, and there were tears in her eyes.
On the way back to New York, Will and I sat hand in hand looking out at the monotonous stretch of desert-land. "I'm glad to have it over--I'm glad that's out of our life," he reiterated, pressing my hand. "It was rotten!" Suddenly he burst out laughing. He continued long and sonorously. "Do you know, girlie," he said, "do you know that with a little more fullness of figure and a pair of two-inch heels, you'd make a grand Lady Macbeth? Phew!" and he laughed again.
CHAPTER IV
The question of bearing children had given me many a bad hour. My husband felt that the coming of a child, at the outset of his career, would be a burden and a handicap; once he was established and could afford to maintain a home, it would be time enough, he declared. He felt that, at best, children born and reared in the theatrical profession were the victims of unnatural conditions. It was not practicable to carry a young child about the country, and, if left behind, to the care of either relatives or hired attendants, the child was robbed of its natural protection. Obviously I must make up my mind to separate from one or the other--my child or my husband--until the little one was old enough to travel.
Here arose another knotty problem. Children are little human sponges; they absorb the atmosphere of their environment. A stage-child is no more immune to the vicious influences about it than to a scarlet-fever germ. Should I then be willing to expose my child to dangers of more far-reaching consequences than physical ailments, and at a time of life when character is formed? My husband and I discussed these problems at length, and finally concluded that, since the inevitable had happened, the wisest course was to make the best of it. How many children, I wonder, are conceived in the same spirit? How many births the result of accident? How few planned with the wish to bestow the best of one's flesh and spirit upon the little stranger? Can the influence of unwelcome conception upon the child itself ever be computed? May not criminal tendencies and moral delinquencies be traced to such a source?
If, at the beginning, I were guilty of misdirected sentiment, I set myself to right the wrong as the weeks grew into months. I no longer chafed at separation; I lived in a kind of spiritual exaltation. My plans and dreams of the future were now transferred to the coming of my child.
Will was so fortunate as to secure another engagement almost immediately. His success led to the opportunity he most desired, and in the early autumn he played his first engagement as leading man of a New York production. The Company opened out of town; in theatrical parlance this is what they call "trying it on the dog."
Our boy was born during Will's absence. It must have been very hard for Will to have the nervous strain of a first night's performance and the worry of my illness at the same time. I had gone to the hospital alone.
Will had made the arrangements before he left town. He said he would feel better if he knew I was in skilled hands and not at the mercies of a lodginghouse-keeper. It seemed cruel to be alone at such a time. I cried a little when the big, cheery nurse held my boy for me to kiss....
I wanted Will's arms around me as I had never longed for them before--or after.... The little chap had black hair like Will's, and his forehead bulged in the same way. I had always admired Will's forehead....
Baby was six weeks old when his father first saw him. I laughed when he held the boy in his arms--he appeared so awkward. After a successful New York opening, the play settled down for a run. We moved from our furnished room to an apartment. Will found it difficult to sleep with a crying baby in the same room. With the coming of the child, and the "front" Will's new position demanded, it was hard to make both ends meet; for a long time I did the housework except the washing, but when my health began to fail Will made me hire a servant.
Will was very fond of our little boy. Even as a small baby, the child showed his preference for his father; he would stop crying the moment he heard Will's voice. Indeed, I believe that when temptation lured him in her most attractive form it was the child who held him close to me.
Temptation there was plenty; his success had been unqualified. The critics hailed him as a young man with a great future. His pictures began to appear in the magazines and in the pictorial supplements of the Sunday papers. He joined an actors' club, where he dined on matinee days. Will's family developed a pride in him, hitherto carefully suppressed. They had shown decided disapproval of our marriage when it became expedient to announce it to them. My introduction to the family, during the week our late-lamented Company had played Will's home city, was strained and unsatisfactory. Now, however, the sight of the family name in print gave unalloyed joy to Will's father, who collected newspaper clippings for Will's scrap-book with more zeal than did Will himself. Will said this sudden interest reminded him of a story he had heard at the club. It ran like this:
A handsome young Irishman of humble parentage had long yearned for the footlights. Unable longer to restrain himself, he confided his ambitions to his mother. Now, the old lady was an ardent church-goer, and looked upon the stage as a quick chute to perdition.
"Jimmie, Jimmie, me boy! To think you'd want to be an actor! To think you'd want to bring shame on your old mother, this disgrace on your dead father's good name!"
The old lady rocked herself to and fro in her grief. In vain Jimmie endeavoured to soothe her. Finally the idea occurred to him.
"But, mither, mither, darlin'," he caressed, "I'll not bring disgrace on your name--you know actors always change their names when they go on the stage, and no one will ever know who I am."
The old lady stopped her moaning and was silent for a moment.
"But, Jimmie," she protested, "Jimmie, supposin' you became a gr-r-e-at mon, supposin' you became a great lion, with your pictures in all the papers--and adornin' the fences ... then, Jimmie, how'll they know you're me son?" ...
It was at a matinee that I first saw Will in his new part. It was the first time since our marriage that I had not heard his lines or helped him with his costumes. He had told me all about the play, and I knew the cue for his first entrance almost as well as he himself. My heart thumped so hard and fast I feared my neighbour would guess who I was.
His entrance was greeted with a burst of gloved applause, accompanied with such exclamations as, "There he is!" "Isn't he a love!" ... "Just wait until you see how he can make love!" I confess I hardly knew whether to be proud, or indignant. The familiarity with which they discussed him grated on me; I resented the proprietary tone. Then I smiled at my silliness, for I realized that this very interest made for popularity, the most valuable of the actor's assets. I listened to the gush of the matinee girls, and their discussion of the private lives of theatrical people with a good deal of amusement.
Coming out of the theatre, I heard one woman ask another whether Will was married. I wondered what difference that would make in his popularity.
After the matinee I went back to Will's dressing-room. Will had planned what he called a little junket. We were to dine together at a restaurant--a pleasure we could not often afford. While Will washed up I told him the nice things I had overheard. I predicted he would become a veritable matinee idol--a term which he scorned. There were some letters lying on his make-up table. I picked them up idly; Will followed my action.
"Read them," he said. "You'll be amused. They are my first mash-notes."
There was so much roguishness in his smile that I laughed back at him.
Some of the letters were innocent enough, written in girlish hand, with requests for autographs and autographed photographs. One or two asked Will's advice about going on the stage, and there was one from a tooth-powder firm, wanting the right to use Will's picture in which his teeth showed. There was one--a violet-scented note on fine linen, written in the large loose vertical scrawl so much affected by smart women--without signature. It ran as follows:
"If you will pardon this somewhat unconventional method of making your acquaintance, my dear Mr. Hartley, I shall be most happy to have you join me at tea, after the matinee, at Sherry's (other drinkables not excluded). I was present at the opening night of your play, and was quite carried away by your splendid acting.
Where _did_ you learn to make love? I have occupied the right hand proscenium box every Saturday matinee since the opening. Isn't that a proof of my devotion? Do I flatter myself that I have caught your eye once or twice as the curtain falls? I invariably dress in black and wear gardenias. If you are interested, you will have no difficulty in identifying me. For family reasons I withhold my name for the present. Do come, Mr. Hartley."
As I folded the letter and replaced it in its cover, I recalled that Will _had_ glanced towards the right hand proscenium box several times.
"I think I'll put you on a car and send you home," began Will, but something in his voice belied his words, and I made him an impudent _moue_. "How do you like being married to a matinee idol?" Will asked, giving the final touch to his dress.
I did not reply; I was asking myself the same question.
CHAPTER V
Will made friends easily. Perhaps it were better to use the word "acquaintances." At any rate it was not long until he received more invitations than he could accept. He was called on to give his services for charitable purposes, but I noticed these hostesses never received him in their homes. It must be said that Will rarely accepted an invitation which did not include me, though I often realized I was invited as a necessary evil. After supper the guests invariably played poker, and I knew nothing about cards. The late hours sapped my strength, and my boy always wakened early in the morning. Sometimes the suppers were held at a well-known restaurant, like Rector's or Martin's.
I had not the proper clothes for such occasions; it was imperative that Will dressed well, and I did not want it said that his wife was shabby.
The other women wore wonderful gowns and much jewellery.
After a winter's round of these parties, I was able to distinguish one particular set from another. There is a smart set, a fast set and a loose set which, though none of them can be said to be strictly "in society," form a kind of brass-band appendage or fringe to it and differ one from the other only in their gradations--or degradations--of moral laxness. It is the loose set to which the actor is drawn, or inclines.