Chapter Twelfth
The Peter Richings’ Engagement brings me my First Taste of Slander—Anent the Splendor of my Wardrobe, also my First Newspaper Notice.
I remember particularly that second season, because it brought to me the first taste of slander, my first newspaper notice, and my first proposal of marriage. The latter being, according to my belief, the natural result of lengthening my skirts and putting up my hair—at all events, it was a part of my education.
Of course the question of wardrobe was a most important one still. I had done very well, so far as peasant dresses of various nationalities were concerned; I had even acquired a page’s dress of my own, but I had no ball-dress, nothing but a plain, skimpy white muslin gown, which I had outgrown; for I had gained surprisingly in height with the passing year. And, lo! the report went about that Mr. Peter Richings and his daughter Caroline were coming in a fortnight, and they would surely do their play “Fashion,” in which everyone was on in a dance; and I knew everyone would bring out her best for that attraction, for you must know that actresses in a stock company grade their costumes by the stars, and only bring out the very treasures of their wardrobes on state occasions. I was in great distress; one of my mates had a genuine silk dress, the other owned a bunch of artificial gold grapes, horribly unbecoming, stiff things, but, mercy, gold grapes! who cared whether they were becoming or not? Were they not gorgeous (a lady star had given them to her)? And I would have to drag about, heavy-footed, in a skimpy muslin!
But in the company there was a lady who had three charming little children. She was the singing soubrette (by name Mrs. James Dickson). One of her babies became sick, and I sometimes did small bits of shopping or other errands for her, thus permitting her to go at once from rehearsal to her beloved babies. Entering her room from one of these errands, I found her much vexed and excited over the destruction of one of a set of fine new lace curtains. The nursemaid had carelessly set it on fire. Of course Mrs. Dickson would have to buy two more curtains to replace them; and now, with the odd one in her hand, she started toward her trunk, paused doubtfully, and finally said to me: “Could you use this curtain for some small window or something, Clara?”
At her very first word a dazzling possibility presented itself to my mind. With burning cheeks, I answered: “Oh, yes, ma’am, I—I can use it, but not at a window, I’m afraid.” Her bonnie face flashed into smiles.
“All right; take it along, then!” she cried, “and do what you like with it. It’s only been up two days, and has not a mark on it.”
I fairly flew from the house. I sang, as I made my way uptown to buy several yards of rose-pink paper cambric and a half garland of American-made artificial roses. Then I sped home and, behind locked doors, measured and cut and snipped, and, regardless of possible accident, held about a gill of pins in my mouth while I hummed over my work. All my fears were gone, they had fled before the waving white curtain, which fortunately for me was of fine meshed net, carrying for design unusually small garlands of roses and daisies. And when the great night came, I appeared as one of the ball guests in a pink under-slip, with white lace overdress, whose low waist was garlanded with wild roses. So, happy at heart and light of foot, I danced with the rest, my pink and white gown ballooning about me in the courtesies with as much rustle and glow of color as though it had been silk.
But, alas! the imitation was too good a one! The pretty, cheap little gown I was so happy over attracted the attention of a woman whose whisper meant scandal, whose lifted brow was an innuendo, whose drooped lid was an accusation. Like a carrion bird she fed best upon corruption. Thank Heaven! this cruel creature, hated by the men, feared by the women, was not an actress, but through mistaken kindness she had been made wardrobe woman, where, as Mr. Ellsler once declared, she spent her time in ripping up and destroying the reputation of his actors instead of making and repairing their wardrobes.
That nothing was too small to catch her pale, cold eye is proved by the fact that even a ballet-girl’s dress received her attention. Next day, after the play “Fashion” had been done, this woman was saying: “That girl’s mother had better be looking after her conduct, I think!”
“Why, what on earth has Clara done?” asked her listener.
“Done!” she cried, “didn’t you see her flaunting herself around the stage last night in silks and laces no honest girl could own? Where did the money come from that paid for such finery?”
A few days later a woman who boarded in the house favored by the mischief-maker happened to meet Mrs. Dickson, happily for me, and said, en passant: “Which one of your ballet-girls is it who has taken to dressing with so much wicked extravagance? I wonder Mrs. Ellsler don’t notice it.”
Now Mrs. Dickson was Scotch, generous, and “unco” quick-tempered, and after she had put the inquiring friend right, she visited her wrath upon the originator of the slander in person, and verily the Scottish burr was on her tongue, and her “r’s” rolled famously while she explained the component parts of that extravagant costume: window curtain—her gift—and paper cambric and artificial flowers to the cost of one dollar and seventy-five cents; “and you’ll admit,” she cried, “that even the purse of a ‘gude lass’ can stand sic a strain as that; and what’s mair, you wicked woman, had the girl been worse dressed than the others, you would ha’ been the first to call attention to her as slovenly and careless.”
This was the first drop of scandal expressed especially for me, and I not only found the taste bitter—very bitter—but learned that it had wonderful powers of expansion, and that the odor it gives off is rather pleasant in the nostrils of everyone save its object.
Mrs. Dickson, who, by the way, is still doing good work professionally, has doubtless forgotten the entire incident, curtain and all, but she never will forget the bonnie baby-girl she lost that summer, and she will remember me because I loved the little one—that’s a mother’s way.
Mr. Peter B. Richings was that joy of the actor’s heart—a character. He had been accounted a very fine actor in his day, but he was a very old man when I saw him, and his powers were much impaired. Six feet tall, high-featured, Roman-nosed, elegantly dressed; a term from bygone days—and not disrespectfully used—describes him perfectly: he was an “old Buck!”
His immeasurable pride made him hide a stiffening of the joints under the forced jauntiness of his step, while a trembling of the head became in him only a sort of debonair senility at worst. Arrogant, short-tempered, and a veritable martinet, he nevertheless possessed an unbending dignity and a certain crabbed courtliness of manner very suggestive of the snuff-box and ruffle period of a hundred years before.
His daughter, by adoption, was the object of his unqualified worship—no other word can possibly express his attitude toward her. No heavenly choir could have charmed him as she did when she sang, while her intellectual head and marble-cold face seemed beautiful beyond compare in his eyes. Really it was worth going far to see him walk through a quadrille with her. His bow was a thing for young actors to dream of, while with trembling head, held high in air, he advanced and retreated, executing antiquated “steps” with a grace that deprived them of comicality, while his air of arrogant superiority changed instantly to profound homage whenever in the movement of the figures he met his daughter.
His pronunciation of her name was as a flourish of trumpets—Car-o-line! Each syllable distinct, the “C” given with great fulness, and the emphasis on the first syllable when pleased, but heavily placed upon the last when he was annoyed.
He was unconscionably vain of his likeness to Washington, and there were few Friday nights, this being considered the fashionable evening of the week, that he failed to present his allegorical picture of Washington receiving the homage of the States, while Miss Richings, as Columbia, sang the “Star-Spangled Banner,” the States joining in the chorus.
In this tableau the circular opening in the flat, backed by a sky-drop and with blue clouds hanging about the opening, represented heaven. And here, at an elevation, Washington stood at the right, with Columbia and her flag on his left, while the States, represented by the ladies of the company, stood in lines up and down the stage, quite outside of heaven.
Now a most ridiculous story anent Mr. Richings and this heaven of his was circulating through the entire profession. Some of our company refused to believe it, declaring it a mere spiteful skit against his well-known exclusiveness; but that gentleman who had wished to send me for an “Ibid,” being an earnest seeker after knowledge, determined to test the truth of the story. Therefore, after we had been carefully rehearsed in the music and had been informed by the star that only Car-O-line and himself were to stand back of that skylike opening, this “inquiring” person gave one of the extra girls fifty cents to go at night before the curtain rose and take her stand on the forbidden spot. She took the money and followed directions exactly, and when Mr. Richings, as Washington, made his pompous way to the stage, he stood a moment in speechless wrath, and then, trembling with anger, he stamped his foot, and waving his arm, cried: “Go a-way! Go a-way! you very presuming young person; this is heaven, and I told you this morning that only my daughter Car-O-line and I could possibly stand in heaven!”
It was enough; the “inquiring one” was rolling about with joy at his work. He had taken a rise out of the old gentleman and proved the truth of the story which had gone abroad in the land as to this claim of all heaven for himself and his Car-O-line.
I naturally remember these stars with great clearness, since it was for a small part in one of their plays that I received my first newspaper notice. Imagine my incredulous joy when I was told of this journalistic feat—unheard of before—of praising the work of a ballet-girl. Suspecting a joke, I did not obtain a paper until late in the day, and after I had several times been told of it. Then I ventured forth, bought a copy of the Herald, and lo, before my dazzled eyes appeared my own name. Ah, few critics, with their best efforts, have thrown as rosy a light upon the world as did Mr. Jake Sage with his trite ten-word statement: “Clara Morris played the small part allotted to her well.”
My heart throbbed hard, I seemed to catch a glimpse, through the rosy light, of a far-away Temple of Fame, and this notice was like a petal blown to me from the roses that wreathed its portals. Could I ever, ever reach them!
“Played the small part allotted to her well.” “Oh,” I cried aloud, “I will try to do everything well—I will, indeed!” and then I cut the notice out and folded it in a sheet of paper, and put both in an envelope and pinned that fast to my pocket, that I might take it to my mother, who was very properly impressed, and was a long time reading its few words, and was more than a trifle misty about the eyes when she gave it back to me. Looking at them now, the words seem rather dry and scant, but then they had all the sweetness, life, and color of a June rose—the most perfect thing of God’s bounteous giving.