IVTHEHerrick theater, Buffalo. A profoundly bored stage-hand was hammering away on a back-drop, regardless of the rehearsing of the orchestra.Prancing along the footlights, up anddown, notes in hand, the stage-manager, intoxicated with his own temporary importance, was grimacing and gesticulating his injunctions to play the music, oh, somuchsofter! Miss Dover’s great love-scene had been ruined by their confounded fiddling at the matinée this afternoon. Now, where was that character-man? “Motzart”—not “Mozart!”—he was profanely cautioned. Two supers were discharged; no use discussing it, gentlemen; they’d walked on the ladies’ trains just once too often. “Be sure to watch those amber lights now, and for Heaven’s sake keep the entrances clear!”Sarah Dover opened the stage-door, and with her gracious “good evening” stilled the bustle. Through a sudden, flattering silence she passed to her dressing-room.Here a slight, serious-looking young woman, with light hair braided into a sedate knot, was spreading a silver-and-chiffon gown over a chair. She looked up.“Well, Vinnie,” Sarah Dover asked anxiously, as she emerged from her sable coat, “what luck did you have with my pet gown?”The maid modestly displayed her skill on a long mended tear in the lace of the star’s second-act costume.“Vinnie!” exclaimed Miss Dover, ecstatically. “Why, it’s wonderful! I can scarcely find the place! Where did you ever learn to sew like that?” She smiled gratefully, and sank down before her triple mirrors.“Why, I could always sew fairly well, Miss Dover,” answered Vinnie. She began deftly to take down her mistress’s hair. “But just before I came to you, I did work a while in a kind of gown shop, and they had all kinds of fine mending to do.”Sarah Dover mumbled as she plastered her face vigorously with rose-scented cold-cream. “Oh, Vinnie, don’t forget about those two new switches. I want to lengthen my braids. Some friends of mine have a box to-night, and I want to look particularly well.”Vinnie, after attaching the switches, gave one shrewd look, then carelessly flung a braid round Miss Dover’s head.“Fine, Vinnie! Leave it that way; it’s just too catchy for anything. Stick in this rose here. Why, Vinnie, I knew you could do nails beautifully, but I had no idea you could dress hair like that. You’re as good as a professional. Lovely!”Sarah Dover inspected her make-up with smiling satisfaction; then automatically giving the final dusting with her powder-puff, she rose. Vinnie hurried her into her costume gown.As the star held out her hand for Vinnie to button the glove, a sudden recollection made her say abstractedly:“I wonder who that was I heard reading those lines last night. Must have been studying some part. Didn’t sound like any voice in the company, though. Here, Vinnie, you’re buttoning that glove all wrong! Don’t be so nervous, my dear; there’s plenty of time. What’s the matter with you to-night?”Several days later Miss Dover entered the dressing-room with a puzzled smile on her face.“Funny!” she exclaimed. “Vinnie, I declare if I didn’t hear that strange voice again just now reciting something. It stopped just before I opened the door. Who in the world—no, notthoseshoes, Vinnie. I’m going to wear the gray ones to-night.” She dropped into her chair with a sigh. “My, but I’m tired! I got so nervous in that cab—oh, that’s nice, Vinnie! Thank you. It is a treat to have some one who knows what to do without being told.”As Vinnie the maid flitted here and there in the dressing-room, handing Miss Dover this and taking off that, busying herself with hat, gown, kimono, shoes, and and hunting for the inevitably lost nail-file, there was a sparkle in her eyes that never had been there before. She trembled, but evidently not from fear. A pink flush was mounting in her cheeks.Miss Dover caught her reflection in the glass. “What in the world are you thinking of, Vinnie?” She studied her maid in the glass as she went on rouging her lips.Pink deepened to red on Vinnie’s face. “Oh, I don’t know that I quite dare to tell you, Miss Dover.”Miss Dover turned squarely round and looked at her.“Why, it was only—” Vinnie was apparently much embarrassed. “Oh, you do look so lovely, Miss Dover! I couldn’t help thinking—oh, I’d justloveto be an actress!”Sarah Dover turned back to the rouge-pot to conceal her amusement, but her shoulders were shaking. In another minute she held up an admonitory finger.“Vinnie,” she said, “I did think that you were the one girl who would never be stage-struck. Oh, dear, nobody’s safe, then!”“Oh, itissort of foolish. I know, but—well, sometimes I feel kind of ambitious.”“Ambitious! Vinnie, for Heaven’s sake, be contented! You’re an admirable maid now. Don’t spoil that with ambition. Why, Vinnie, you’re as much an artist in your line as I am in mine. I give you my word, I’ve envied you more than once!”Vinnie’s face was the perfection of blank ignorance; her voice was a triumph of stupidity as she exclaimed, “Why, Miss Dover, I always thought actresses had such an awfully good time!”Miss Dover smiled.“My poor girl, you have no idea what this theatrical life is. Let me tell you something, Vinnie: you have to pay for your applause on the stage—yes, and a hundred times over. Why, you don’t know when you’re well off. How would you like to stand and wait all day long, month in and month out, for years, in packed, stuffy agencies?” The star shook her head reminiscently. “Wait till you’ve starved and nearly frozen to death in cheap lodging-houses, Miss Vinnie Smith! When I think of the visits to pawnshops! Heavens, I’ve worn clothes like those on a scarecrow! You wouldn’t believe Sarah Dover has patched and borrowed and scrubbed, would you? But, oh, the worst of all was the smiling and smiling, and trying to look prosperous and happy through everything!” She turned and patted Vinnie on the hand. “Just you be thankful, Vinnie Smith, that you’re where you are, and get that stage-struck idea right out of your head.”Miss Dover leaned forward to the mirror and daintily adjusted a piece of court-plaster. At the sound of sobbing, she turned. Vinnie’s face was hidden in her hands.“Why, Vinnie!” cried Sarah Dover. “What’s the matter? Vinnie!” She laid her hand tenderly on her maid’s shoulder.“Oh, I couldn’t bear to think, Miss Dover, that you’d ever had to suffer like that!” Vinnie began to laugh hysterically through her sobs. “It was something in your voice; I kind of forgot where I was, Miss Dover, for a minute, I guess. You made me imagine it all so plain.”What conversation there was after that dwindled down to cold-cream, cosmetic-sticks, and pins, until Sarah Dover was about to leave her dressing-room. “Strange about that voice I heard,” she muttered thoughtfully. “Vinnie, who has this next room right there? D’you know?”Vinnie, queerly enough, didn’t know; so there, for a second time, the subject dropped.During the third week of the popular star’s New York engagement, she arrived at the theater one evening earlier than usual in order to experiment with a new wig. As she stopped to speak to one of the electricians about the spot-light, a voice was heard coming from the direction of her dressing-room. Stealthily, Sarah Dover tiptoed to the door and stopped. For several minutes she leaned against the wall in a spellbound concentration.When the voice ceased, Miss Dover’s eyes were damp, her hands were cold. She was trembling with puzzled excitement.Suddenly she flung open the dressing-room door.Her look searched the room as with a hundred eyes, but no one was there. Only her maid, who, perched on a trunk, smiled as usual and went on flitting the comb through a long-haired golden wig.“Vinnie!” came the amazed exclamation. “You!Why, that wasn’tyou? It couldn’t have—Vinnie!” The excited actress held the maid at arm’s-length and scrutinized her as if she never had seen her before.Vinnie’s expression was a mask of naïve perplexity. But, as she stared, a nervous, sheepish grin crept into her face. “Oh,” she suddenly recollected, with an artfully timorous voice, “I guess I know what you mean, Miss Dover. You heard me talking to myself just now.” Guiltily, she shied away from the star, and flouncing down on the trunk eyed her skittishly, while the apologetic strain ran on:“Why, I was only fooling, Miss Dover. You know you didn’t come as early as you said you would; so I was just trying to see what it would seem like to be a great actress.”Sarah Dover did not appear to be listening. As she moved abstractedly about the room for a few minutes in silence, she scowled faintly and frequently bit her lip. Several times she gave Vinnie a quick, sharp glance. Then, turning abruptly, she pressed a lever on the wall and sat down at her escritoire, where she began to write hurriedly.About fifteen minutes later, while Vinnie was telling her mistress how lovely she looked in the new wig, a series of “beg-pardon” raps came on the door, to the accompaniment of an obsequious voice. “Messenger, Miss Dover,” said the stage-manager. “Did you ring?”Miss Dover hastened to the door and stepped outside. When she returned to the dressing-room to complete her toilet the atmosphere was subtly changed. The former freedom with which she had glibly called for this and that had diminished. The two were outwardly mistress and maid as much as ever; but the whole relation had subconsciously altered.It came to a focus when, just before the star left the dressing-room, Vinnie sprang to brush off a splotch of powder from the black velvet gown. As Miss Dover thanked her, Vinnie restrained a smile. Something in the gracious tone seemed different from that which the mistress had heretofore used to the maid.After the performance that night, as Vinnie was hanging up clothes, awaiting Miss Dover’s unusually delayed return, the assistant stage-manager appeared at the door.“Miss Dover wants you to come out on the stage right away,” he announced.The star was seated by the footlights; her eyes were on a short, stout, authoritative stranger who was haranguing the stage director about a door somewhere, damn it! that had banged all through every act. He turned to Miss Dover with a shaking head and smiled wearily.“Well, where is the little lady?”Miss Dover rose and drew Vinnie forward. “I imagine you’ve seen my maid before,” she said; “but I suppose you’ve never met.” She laughed at the jest. “Vinnie, this is Mr. Littleton; Mr. B. B. Littleton, one of the biggest managers in this country.” She smiled at the magnate. “And this is Miss Vinnie Smith, Mr. Littleton.”Littleton’s shrewd, critical eyes swept Vinnie from top to toe.“Well, Miss Vinnie Smith, what can you do?” His voice was gruffly jocose. “Can you act?”The two successful personages on the bare stage did not realize that at that very moment they were watching what Vinnie Smith could really do—act. They did not dream that the name of B. B. Littleton had swept through her brain and whirled a past before her—a past that a histrionic instinct stronger than her will itself was forcing back to its old place.They did not notice that she had stiffened defiantly. All they saw was a singularly good-looking, phlegmatic maid-servant, coolly unafraid, who seemed quite unimpressed with the possibilities of the situation.“You’d better go over some of those speeches I heard you doing, Vinnie. Mr. Littleton will only want—”“Yes, anything’ll do,” broke in the manager. “Fire away!” He pulled out his watch impatiently. “By George! it’s quarter-past eleven now, and I’m due uptown at twelve. Got to meet that Madame—what the devil’s her name, now?—you know, Sarah, that big French comedienne, Madame—Madame—” Each “Madame” grew more and more remote as he stalked up and down the stage, fumbling in his pockets, chewing a cigar, flipping out letter after letter, grumbling, jamming them back. “Confound it, if there isn’t that door banging again!Wilson!”As the feet of Wilson’s assistant pattered obediently up the iron steps, Vinnie was explaining. “Oh, Miss Dover, I only made those scenes up. I was only—”“Give her some of those lines in the mob scenes,” thundered Littleton. “What are some of them, Wilson?”Wilson repeated a few of the speeches with characteristic stage-manager delivery, while Littleton’s eyes hurried down the page of a letter. After a short silence, he looked up to demand, “Well, what are you waiting for?”“I’m not going to say those lines, Mr. Littleton.” Vinnie was standing erect, with a nonchalantly determined smile on her face.Nonplussed, Littleton glared at her almost as if he were trying to misunderstandher. The star, already on her feet, tactfully intervened.“Oh, Vinnie, you don’t realize what a wonderful opportunity this is, my dear! Why, Mr.—”“It’s just because Idorealize it, Miss Dover, that I’m not—”“What’s the matter with those lines?” Littleton barked it out.Vinnie regarded the manager listlessly. Slowly an ironic smile crept over her face. “Oh, they’re fine,” she finally said, “if all you want is to show intelligence and a good loud voice. ButIhappen to want to show more. And if thisissuch a wonderful opportunity, as Miss Dover says, then why should I waste it on such lines as ‘The ropes! Hand me the ropes!’ and ‘Oh, look at the pretty fool!’ I’m sorry, Mr. Littleton, but—” Vinnie stopped abruptly. Her face changed to a delightfully whimsical, far-away expression. “Those lines are too skimpy. There’s not nearly enough room in them for what I’ve got in me to show you, Mr. Littleton.”Fear, eagerness, and anxiety had vanished in this expression of herself. Littleton! Why, he might have been a scene-shifter, for all she cared, despite the puzzled wonder and growing interest that now lurked behind his cold managerial veil. The amazed, questioning face of Sarah Dover—“Canthisbe Vinnie?”—caused only a secret smile. Vinnie Smith boldly flung reason to the winds, and, calling up every hidden charm she possessed, intuitively scented her way to success.A grunt and a few curt words from the manager urged her on.“That’s very true, Mr. Littleton, but you must remember I did n’t ask you to come and hear me. It was Miss Dover who sent for you, and asked me to come out here on the stage. I’m perfectly satisfied with my position, and I guess I can make good as a maid until—well, some day, somewhere, somebodyisgoing to hear me, Mr. Littleton; but I can tell one thing: I’m not going to ‘fire away’ until I shoot to kill. And when that time comes”—she smiled dreamily—“there won’t be any reading letters or bothering about a banging door somewhere!”Suddenly Vinnie burst into a victorious laugh. “There!” she cried. “That’s the look I want on your face when I act! See? My own words were better than the ones you gave me. I’ve had time to create the ‘spell’; and that’s what tells whether you can act or not.”Littleton was staring at her like a child listening to a fairy-tale. But what was the subtle influence that began to threaten to mar his perfect concentration, neutralizing the attractive magnetism between the sexes? Thewoman’satmosphere! For the first time, Vinnie felt a pang of anxiety for her success. What should she do? lightened through her brain. An answer flashed back: Sarah Dover’s mind must be charged somehow to an equal concentration with his. The same intensity of attention must be compelled. How? Through anger, jealousy, ridicule? Ah! With a triumphant smile of satisfaction, Vinnie, tingling, ran to the center of the stage.“I’m going to do the big speech in Miss Dover’s own love-scene!” she exclaimed; and she jumped audaciously into the part.Shooting a wink at the now intensely interested Sarah, Littleton straddled a chair and, chuckling, rested his arms on the back. The smile gradually faded from his face. He began to scowl, chewing a cigar viciously. He muttered gently under his breath, nervously tapping his foot till the climax came.Then, jumping up with a dash that sent his chair into the footlights, he caught the glowing Vinnie by both hands, and shook them mercilessly.“Sarah Dover,” he shouted, shaking his fist crazily, “this is the discovery of my life! You’re right, by Jupiter! The girl’s got it! Think of finding a talent like that in thegutter!”“That’s right; she certainly surprised me!” So spoke the artist in Sarah Dover. But the woman in her added quickly: “But, Mr. Littleton, you mustn’t forget Madame—that French comedienne, you know. It’s almost twelve o’clock.”“Right out of the gutter! Think of it!” Littleton was repeating. “By Jove, I believe she’d make a perfect—”“But, Mr. Littleton,”—Miss Dover’s voice had risen harshly,—“really, you must n’t miss that appointment! Madame—”“Madame be damned! Let her wait! Why, confound it, Sarah, you don’t realize what this thing means! I’ve been waiting for just something like this. Wait till I tell you something.”In the excited talk that followed, all Vinnie Smith was really aware of was the iteration of that magic word “gutter.” She stood in a kind of trance, clairvoyante, a delicate smile illuminating her.Before her was a little boy. He was polishing a nickel on his trousers. How his eyes were dancing with pride in his discovery! Then he vanished. When she turned to Littleton, there was a look of victory on her face.She left the theater that night, feeling as if, after crawling through a dark, mile-long tunnel, she had miraculously come out into the sunshine, to greet suddenly the half-forgotten figure of—Jean Caspian!HOWfamiliar, yet how strange, the office seemed! She felt like a grandmother revisiting the scenes of her youth. Annie, the red-headed typist, had gone, yet the keys of her machine were still playing the same old tune. A new office-boy, but the same old song: “Mr. Littleton’s not seeing any folks to-day.”How natural it sounded! But Vinnie Smith’s card worked a charm. Two mummies came to life and gaped as she calmly opened the magic door marked “Private.”“Good afternoon. Just be seated, please,” said Littleton. He went on giving orders right and left. A messenger-boy was hurried off. A dozen letters were glanced at and rubber-stamped. Then he swung round in his chair.“Can you keep a secret, young lady?”Vinnie blushed. “That’s what I’ve been doing for the last eight months.”“Good! I guess that’s the record for a woman. Well, then, see here. I’ve had a ‘lemon’ wished on me in this new production of mine. She’s a great friend of the author; acts like a—well, she’s impossible. The show’s going to the devil. Now, I’ve always said I’d rather have the worst professional than the cleverest amateur in any show of mine. You’vegotto have experience; you simply must know how to handle the stage. But I’m so sick of author’s friends and influence and all those gold bricks I’ve stood for, that for just once I’m going to break all my rules and take a chance on you, young lady!“Now, see here; Monday morning you take the train for New Bedford, and travel with the company for two weeks. Rehearse, and watch it from the front every night. Then we’ll see what you can do. Now, young lady, you may not know it, but there’s a chance that doesn’t come once in a stage-lifetime. Excuse me for a moment, please.”As she waited for him to finish a heated telephone conversation, her voyaging eyes stopped suddenly at a large framed photograph on the wall. It was a picture of Guy Norman, and theresheherself was, in the very scene she last played with him in Milwaukee! There she was, too, in this very office she had so many months tried in vain to enter! Guy Norman! A choking came in her throat. His cuffs,—the way he jerked them back; that overcoat, flung over a chair at rehearsal; that fresh, folded handkerchief, never opened. “Très bien, Ma’m’selle.” Tears were gathering in her eyes.Littleton whirled round to her.“Now, about your name. You know, this ‘Vinnie Smith’ sounds to me like a country dressmaker.” He stopped, stared at a tear trickling down her cheek, and added kindly: “Oh, don’t feel hurt, my dear; they all take stage names, you know. Why, Sarah Dover’s real name is McGillicuddy. Now, I’ve been thinking over some names. I’ll tell you—what was that, now? Sher—”“My mother’s name was Caspian.”“Caspian? Bully!”“Oh, I wish I could take my favorite name. It’s Jean.”Littleton poked her with his pencil. “Say, you can kiss Vinnie Smith good-by right now. Jean Caspian, I wish you luck!”INthree weeks Littleton received the following telegram from Springfield:Where did you catch her? Great! You would n’t know the show. Come on immediately.GERRISH.The result of this telegram, and the hurried trip of Littleton’s that followed, was that the production was rushed into New York ahead of the schedule, with thename of Jean Caspian “featured” on the bills.“THE SMILE GRADUALLY FADED FROM HIS FACE”DRAWN BY JAMES MONTGOMERY FLAGG❏LARGER IMAGEOn the opening night, after the second-act drop fell for the last time, Littleton, grinning at the curtain-calls, and with a keen, twinkling eye on the cabal of critics heading for the bar, was suddenly whacked on the back.“Great girl!” a tall man behind him exclaimed cordially. He was beaming as if his own daughter had won.“Hello, Davey! It’s a knock-out, isn’t it? Isn’t she a wonder?”“Well, I guess yes. I came all the way over from Elizabeth to see her.”“And what d’you think, Davey, I picked that girl almost out of the gutter. Never acted before last month.”Davey stared. “Say, how many cocktails have you had to-night, old man?”“Why, that girl was Sarah Dover’s maid!”“Who? Jean Caspian?Haw-haw-haw!” Davey threw back his head and roared. “Good God! Wasn’t I stage-manager for Guy Norman? I always said she’d go to the top. Say, Littleton, you ought to keep track of these outside winners.”Littleton was transfixed. His eyes grew small. “How many cocktails haveyouhad, Davey?”For a moment the two glared at each other in silence. Then Littleton jerked his thumb toward the stage. “Say, come on behind with me.”Jean opened her dressing-room door in answer to the emphatic knock.“Well, Miss Caspian,” said Littleton, “you certainly put it over.” He wrung her hand enthusiastically. “But what’s all this about your being with Norman?”“Oh, yes,” she answered demurely, “I believe Iwashis leading lady. Oh, how d’you do, Mr. Davey?” She extended her hand, and the two exploded in laughter.Littleton, baffled, bewildered, watched them, utterly at a loss, pulling his beard savagely.“Well, I’ll be damned!” he said. Then slowly his face lightened to an indulgent smile. “See here, Miss Caspian, I always thought you were a genius, but now I’m sure of it. Yes, you certainly put it over!Haw-haw-haw!”SOONafter the performance was over that night, Jean and two excited, happy girls hastened from the theater and jumped into a taxicab. Over in Dell’s room they laughed; over in Dell’s room they wept.“Oh, Jean, it’s awful!” said Clara. “I can’t bear to hear it.”“Go on! Go on!” said Della Prance. “I want to hear itall.”“It’s not what she’s telling that affects me. It’s awfully funny, some of it; but it’s something—” Clara slipped down on the floor beside Jean and took her hand. “It’s your voice, Jean—that’s it! It’s something it’sdoneto it.” She gripped Jean hard. “Jean, you’ve won something more than they ever saw to-night. It’s something that you’ll always have now. It’s been worth the whole game!”The clock struck three. The parable of the little boy and the gutter-nickel was finished. Silence fell in the room; the girls communed without words. Then Clara rose, yawned, and gave a broken laugh.“Think of Smiley’s in the morning, Dell!”Tailpiece Page 585
IV
THEHerrick theater, Buffalo. A profoundly bored stage-hand was hammering away on a back-drop, regardless of the rehearsing of the orchestra.
Prancing along the footlights, up anddown, notes in hand, the stage-manager, intoxicated with his own temporary importance, was grimacing and gesticulating his injunctions to play the music, oh, somuchsofter! Miss Dover’s great love-scene had been ruined by their confounded fiddling at the matinée this afternoon. Now, where was that character-man? “Motzart”—not “Mozart!”—he was profanely cautioned. Two supers were discharged; no use discussing it, gentlemen; they’d walked on the ladies’ trains just once too often. “Be sure to watch those amber lights now, and for Heaven’s sake keep the entrances clear!”
Sarah Dover opened the stage-door, and with her gracious “good evening” stilled the bustle. Through a sudden, flattering silence she passed to her dressing-room.
Here a slight, serious-looking young woman, with light hair braided into a sedate knot, was spreading a silver-and-chiffon gown over a chair. She looked up.
“Well, Vinnie,” Sarah Dover asked anxiously, as she emerged from her sable coat, “what luck did you have with my pet gown?”
The maid modestly displayed her skill on a long mended tear in the lace of the star’s second-act costume.
“Vinnie!” exclaimed Miss Dover, ecstatically. “Why, it’s wonderful! I can scarcely find the place! Where did you ever learn to sew like that?” She smiled gratefully, and sank down before her triple mirrors.
“Why, I could always sew fairly well, Miss Dover,” answered Vinnie. She began deftly to take down her mistress’s hair. “But just before I came to you, I did work a while in a kind of gown shop, and they had all kinds of fine mending to do.”
Sarah Dover mumbled as she plastered her face vigorously with rose-scented cold-cream. “Oh, Vinnie, don’t forget about those two new switches. I want to lengthen my braids. Some friends of mine have a box to-night, and I want to look particularly well.”
Vinnie, after attaching the switches, gave one shrewd look, then carelessly flung a braid round Miss Dover’s head.
“Fine, Vinnie! Leave it that way; it’s just too catchy for anything. Stick in this rose here. Why, Vinnie, I knew you could do nails beautifully, but I had no idea you could dress hair like that. You’re as good as a professional. Lovely!”
Sarah Dover inspected her make-up with smiling satisfaction; then automatically giving the final dusting with her powder-puff, she rose. Vinnie hurried her into her costume gown.
As the star held out her hand for Vinnie to button the glove, a sudden recollection made her say abstractedly:
“I wonder who that was I heard reading those lines last night. Must have been studying some part. Didn’t sound like any voice in the company, though. Here, Vinnie, you’re buttoning that glove all wrong! Don’t be so nervous, my dear; there’s plenty of time. What’s the matter with you to-night?”
Several days later Miss Dover entered the dressing-room with a puzzled smile on her face.
“Funny!” she exclaimed. “Vinnie, I declare if I didn’t hear that strange voice again just now reciting something. It stopped just before I opened the door. Who in the world—no, notthoseshoes, Vinnie. I’m going to wear the gray ones to-night.” She dropped into her chair with a sigh. “My, but I’m tired! I got so nervous in that cab—oh, that’s nice, Vinnie! Thank you. It is a treat to have some one who knows what to do without being told.”
As Vinnie the maid flitted here and there in the dressing-room, handing Miss Dover this and taking off that, busying herself with hat, gown, kimono, shoes, and and hunting for the inevitably lost nail-file, there was a sparkle in her eyes that never had been there before. She trembled, but evidently not from fear. A pink flush was mounting in her cheeks.
Miss Dover caught her reflection in the glass. “What in the world are you thinking of, Vinnie?” She studied her maid in the glass as she went on rouging her lips.
Pink deepened to red on Vinnie’s face. “Oh, I don’t know that I quite dare to tell you, Miss Dover.”
Miss Dover turned squarely round and looked at her.
“Why, it was only—” Vinnie was apparently much embarrassed. “Oh, you do look so lovely, Miss Dover! I couldn’t help thinking—oh, I’d justloveto be an actress!”
Sarah Dover turned back to the rouge-pot to conceal her amusement, but her shoulders were shaking. In another minute she held up an admonitory finger.
“Vinnie,” she said, “I did think that you were the one girl who would never be stage-struck. Oh, dear, nobody’s safe, then!”
“Oh, itissort of foolish. I know, but—well, sometimes I feel kind of ambitious.”
“Ambitious! Vinnie, for Heaven’s sake, be contented! You’re an admirable maid now. Don’t spoil that with ambition. Why, Vinnie, you’re as much an artist in your line as I am in mine. I give you my word, I’ve envied you more than once!”
Vinnie’s face was the perfection of blank ignorance; her voice was a triumph of stupidity as she exclaimed, “Why, Miss Dover, I always thought actresses had such an awfully good time!”
Miss Dover smiled.
“My poor girl, you have no idea what this theatrical life is. Let me tell you something, Vinnie: you have to pay for your applause on the stage—yes, and a hundred times over. Why, you don’t know when you’re well off. How would you like to stand and wait all day long, month in and month out, for years, in packed, stuffy agencies?” The star shook her head reminiscently. “Wait till you’ve starved and nearly frozen to death in cheap lodging-houses, Miss Vinnie Smith! When I think of the visits to pawnshops! Heavens, I’ve worn clothes like those on a scarecrow! You wouldn’t believe Sarah Dover has patched and borrowed and scrubbed, would you? But, oh, the worst of all was the smiling and smiling, and trying to look prosperous and happy through everything!” She turned and patted Vinnie on the hand. “Just you be thankful, Vinnie Smith, that you’re where you are, and get that stage-struck idea right out of your head.”
Miss Dover leaned forward to the mirror and daintily adjusted a piece of court-plaster. At the sound of sobbing, she turned. Vinnie’s face was hidden in her hands.
“Why, Vinnie!” cried Sarah Dover. “What’s the matter? Vinnie!” She laid her hand tenderly on her maid’s shoulder.
“Oh, I couldn’t bear to think, Miss Dover, that you’d ever had to suffer like that!” Vinnie began to laugh hysterically through her sobs. “It was something in your voice; I kind of forgot where I was, Miss Dover, for a minute, I guess. You made me imagine it all so plain.”
What conversation there was after that dwindled down to cold-cream, cosmetic-sticks, and pins, until Sarah Dover was about to leave her dressing-room. “Strange about that voice I heard,” she muttered thoughtfully. “Vinnie, who has this next room right there? D’you know?”
Vinnie, queerly enough, didn’t know; so there, for a second time, the subject dropped.
During the third week of the popular star’s New York engagement, she arrived at the theater one evening earlier than usual in order to experiment with a new wig. As she stopped to speak to one of the electricians about the spot-light, a voice was heard coming from the direction of her dressing-room. Stealthily, Sarah Dover tiptoed to the door and stopped. For several minutes she leaned against the wall in a spellbound concentration.
When the voice ceased, Miss Dover’s eyes were damp, her hands were cold. She was trembling with puzzled excitement.
Suddenly she flung open the dressing-room door.
Her look searched the room as with a hundred eyes, but no one was there. Only her maid, who, perched on a trunk, smiled as usual and went on flitting the comb through a long-haired golden wig.
“Vinnie!” came the amazed exclamation. “You!Why, that wasn’tyou? It couldn’t have—Vinnie!” The excited actress held the maid at arm’s-length and scrutinized her as if she never had seen her before.
Vinnie’s expression was a mask of naïve perplexity. But, as she stared, a nervous, sheepish grin crept into her face. “Oh,” she suddenly recollected, with an artfully timorous voice, “I guess I know what you mean, Miss Dover. You heard me talking to myself just now.” Guiltily, she shied away from the star, and flouncing down on the trunk eyed her skittishly, while the apologetic strain ran on:“Why, I was only fooling, Miss Dover. You know you didn’t come as early as you said you would; so I was just trying to see what it would seem like to be a great actress.”
Sarah Dover did not appear to be listening. As she moved abstractedly about the room for a few minutes in silence, she scowled faintly and frequently bit her lip. Several times she gave Vinnie a quick, sharp glance. Then, turning abruptly, she pressed a lever on the wall and sat down at her escritoire, where she began to write hurriedly.
About fifteen minutes later, while Vinnie was telling her mistress how lovely she looked in the new wig, a series of “beg-pardon” raps came on the door, to the accompaniment of an obsequious voice. “Messenger, Miss Dover,” said the stage-manager. “Did you ring?”
Miss Dover hastened to the door and stepped outside. When she returned to the dressing-room to complete her toilet the atmosphere was subtly changed. The former freedom with which she had glibly called for this and that had diminished. The two were outwardly mistress and maid as much as ever; but the whole relation had subconsciously altered.
It came to a focus when, just before the star left the dressing-room, Vinnie sprang to brush off a splotch of powder from the black velvet gown. As Miss Dover thanked her, Vinnie restrained a smile. Something in the gracious tone seemed different from that which the mistress had heretofore used to the maid.
After the performance that night, as Vinnie was hanging up clothes, awaiting Miss Dover’s unusually delayed return, the assistant stage-manager appeared at the door.
“Miss Dover wants you to come out on the stage right away,” he announced.
The star was seated by the footlights; her eyes were on a short, stout, authoritative stranger who was haranguing the stage director about a door somewhere, damn it! that had banged all through every act. He turned to Miss Dover with a shaking head and smiled wearily.
“Well, where is the little lady?”
Miss Dover rose and drew Vinnie forward. “I imagine you’ve seen my maid before,” she said; “but I suppose you’ve never met.” She laughed at the jest. “Vinnie, this is Mr. Littleton; Mr. B. B. Littleton, one of the biggest managers in this country.” She smiled at the magnate. “And this is Miss Vinnie Smith, Mr. Littleton.”
Littleton’s shrewd, critical eyes swept Vinnie from top to toe.
“Well, Miss Vinnie Smith, what can you do?” His voice was gruffly jocose. “Can you act?”
The two successful personages on the bare stage did not realize that at that very moment they were watching what Vinnie Smith could really do—act. They did not dream that the name of B. B. Littleton had swept through her brain and whirled a past before her—a past that a histrionic instinct stronger than her will itself was forcing back to its old place.
They did not notice that she had stiffened defiantly. All they saw was a singularly good-looking, phlegmatic maid-servant, coolly unafraid, who seemed quite unimpressed with the possibilities of the situation.
“You’d better go over some of those speeches I heard you doing, Vinnie. Mr. Littleton will only want—”
“Yes, anything’ll do,” broke in the manager. “Fire away!” He pulled out his watch impatiently. “By George! it’s quarter-past eleven now, and I’m due uptown at twelve. Got to meet that Madame—what the devil’s her name, now?—you know, Sarah, that big French comedienne, Madame—Madame—” Each “Madame” grew more and more remote as he stalked up and down the stage, fumbling in his pockets, chewing a cigar, flipping out letter after letter, grumbling, jamming them back. “Confound it, if there isn’t that door banging again!Wilson!”
As the feet of Wilson’s assistant pattered obediently up the iron steps, Vinnie was explaining. “Oh, Miss Dover, I only made those scenes up. I was only—”
“Give her some of those lines in the mob scenes,” thundered Littleton. “What are some of them, Wilson?”
Wilson repeated a few of the speeches with characteristic stage-manager delivery, while Littleton’s eyes hurried down the page of a letter. After a short silence, he looked up to demand, “Well, what are you waiting for?”
“I’m not going to say those lines, Mr. Littleton.” Vinnie was standing erect, with a nonchalantly determined smile on her face.
Nonplussed, Littleton glared at her almost as if he were trying to misunderstandher. The star, already on her feet, tactfully intervened.
“Oh, Vinnie, you don’t realize what a wonderful opportunity this is, my dear! Why, Mr.—”
“It’s just because Idorealize it, Miss Dover, that I’m not—”
“What’s the matter with those lines?” Littleton barked it out.
Vinnie regarded the manager listlessly. Slowly an ironic smile crept over her face. “Oh, they’re fine,” she finally said, “if all you want is to show intelligence and a good loud voice. ButIhappen to want to show more. And if thisissuch a wonderful opportunity, as Miss Dover says, then why should I waste it on such lines as ‘The ropes! Hand me the ropes!’ and ‘Oh, look at the pretty fool!’ I’m sorry, Mr. Littleton, but—” Vinnie stopped abruptly. Her face changed to a delightfully whimsical, far-away expression. “Those lines are too skimpy. There’s not nearly enough room in them for what I’ve got in me to show you, Mr. Littleton.”
Fear, eagerness, and anxiety had vanished in this expression of herself. Littleton! Why, he might have been a scene-shifter, for all she cared, despite the puzzled wonder and growing interest that now lurked behind his cold managerial veil. The amazed, questioning face of Sarah Dover—“Canthisbe Vinnie?”—caused only a secret smile. Vinnie Smith boldly flung reason to the winds, and, calling up every hidden charm she possessed, intuitively scented her way to success.
A grunt and a few curt words from the manager urged her on.
“That’s very true, Mr. Littleton, but you must remember I did n’t ask you to come and hear me. It was Miss Dover who sent for you, and asked me to come out here on the stage. I’m perfectly satisfied with my position, and I guess I can make good as a maid until—well, some day, somewhere, somebodyisgoing to hear me, Mr. Littleton; but I can tell one thing: I’m not going to ‘fire away’ until I shoot to kill. And when that time comes”—she smiled dreamily—“there won’t be any reading letters or bothering about a banging door somewhere!”
Suddenly Vinnie burst into a victorious laugh. “There!” she cried. “That’s the look I want on your face when I act! See? My own words were better than the ones you gave me. I’ve had time to create the ‘spell’; and that’s what tells whether you can act or not.”
Littleton was staring at her like a child listening to a fairy-tale. But what was the subtle influence that began to threaten to mar his perfect concentration, neutralizing the attractive magnetism between the sexes? Thewoman’satmosphere! For the first time, Vinnie felt a pang of anxiety for her success. What should she do? lightened through her brain. An answer flashed back: Sarah Dover’s mind must be charged somehow to an equal concentration with his. The same intensity of attention must be compelled. How? Through anger, jealousy, ridicule? Ah! With a triumphant smile of satisfaction, Vinnie, tingling, ran to the center of the stage.
“I’m going to do the big speech in Miss Dover’s own love-scene!” she exclaimed; and she jumped audaciously into the part.
Shooting a wink at the now intensely interested Sarah, Littleton straddled a chair and, chuckling, rested his arms on the back. The smile gradually faded from his face. He began to scowl, chewing a cigar viciously. He muttered gently under his breath, nervously tapping his foot till the climax came.
Then, jumping up with a dash that sent his chair into the footlights, he caught the glowing Vinnie by both hands, and shook them mercilessly.
“Sarah Dover,” he shouted, shaking his fist crazily, “this is the discovery of my life! You’re right, by Jupiter! The girl’s got it! Think of finding a talent like that in thegutter!”
“That’s right; she certainly surprised me!” So spoke the artist in Sarah Dover. But the woman in her added quickly: “But, Mr. Littleton, you mustn’t forget Madame—that French comedienne, you know. It’s almost twelve o’clock.”
“Right out of the gutter! Think of it!” Littleton was repeating. “By Jove, I believe she’d make a perfect—”
“But, Mr. Littleton,”—Miss Dover’s voice had risen harshly,—“really, you must n’t miss that appointment! Madame—”
“Madame be damned! Let her wait! Why, confound it, Sarah, you don’t realize what this thing means! I’ve been waiting for just something like this. Wait till I tell you something.”
In the excited talk that followed, all Vinnie Smith was really aware of was the iteration of that magic word “gutter.” She stood in a kind of trance, clairvoyante, a delicate smile illuminating her.
Before her was a little boy. He was polishing a nickel on his trousers. How his eyes were dancing with pride in his discovery! Then he vanished. When she turned to Littleton, there was a look of victory on her face.
She left the theater that night, feeling as if, after crawling through a dark, mile-long tunnel, she had miraculously come out into the sunshine, to greet suddenly the half-forgotten figure of—Jean Caspian!
HOWfamiliar, yet how strange, the office seemed! She felt like a grandmother revisiting the scenes of her youth. Annie, the red-headed typist, had gone, yet the keys of her machine were still playing the same old tune. A new office-boy, but the same old song: “Mr. Littleton’s not seeing any folks to-day.”
How natural it sounded! But Vinnie Smith’s card worked a charm. Two mummies came to life and gaped as she calmly opened the magic door marked “Private.”
“Good afternoon. Just be seated, please,” said Littleton. He went on giving orders right and left. A messenger-boy was hurried off. A dozen letters were glanced at and rubber-stamped. Then he swung round in his chair.
“Can you keep a secret, young lady?”
Vinnie blushed. “That’s what I’ve been doing for the last eight months.”
“Good! I guess that’s the record for a woman. Well, then, see here. I’ve had a ‘lemon’ wished on me in this new production of mine. She’s a great friend of the author; acts like a—well, she’s impossible. The show’s going to the devil. Now, I’ve always said I’d rather have the worst professional than the cleverest amateur in any show of mine. You’vegotto have experience; you simply must know how to handle the stage. But I’m so sick of author’s friends and influence and all those gold bricks I’ve stood for, that for just once I’m going to break all my rules and take a chance on you, young lady!
“Now, see here; Monday morning you take the train for New Bedford, and travel with the company for two weeks. Rehearse, and watch it from the front every night. Then we’ll see what you can do. Now, young lady, you may not know it, but there’s a chance that doesn’t come once in a stage-lifetime. Excuse me for a moment, please.”
As she waited for him to finish a heated telephone conversation, her voyaging eyes stopped suddenly at a large framed photograph on the wall. It was a picture of Guy Norman, and theresheherself was, in the very scene she last played with him in Milwaukee! There she was, too, in this very office she had so many months tried in vain to enter! Guy Norman! A choking came in her throat. His cuffs,—the way he jerked them back; that overcoat, flung over a chair at rehearsal; that fresh, folded handkerchief, never opened. “Très bien, Ma’m’selle.” Tears were gathering in her eyes.
Littleton whirled round to her.
“Now, about your name. You know, this ‘Vinnie Smith’ sounds to me like a country dressmaker.” He stopped, stared at a tear trickling down her cheek, and added kindly: “Oh, don’t feel hurt, my dear; they all take stage names, you know. Why, Sarah Dover’s real name is McGillicuddy. Now, I’ve been thinking over some names. I’ll tell you—what was that, now? Sher—”
“My mother’s name was Caspian.”
“Caspian? Bully!”
“Oh, I wish I could take my favorite name. It’s Jean.”
Littleton poked her with his pencil. “Say, you can kiss Vinnie Smith good-by right now. Jean Caspian, I wish you luck!”
INthree weeks Littleton received the following telegram from Springfield:
Where did you catch her? Great! You would n’t know the show. Come on immediately.GERRISH.
Where did you catch her? Great! You would n’t know the show. Come on immediately.
GERRISH.
The result of this telegram, and the hurried trip of Littleton’s that followed, was that the production was rushed into New York ahead of the schedule, with thename of Jean Caspian “featured” on the bills.
“THE SMILE GRADUALLY FADED FROM HIS FACE”DRAWN BY JAMES MONTGOMERY FLAGG❏LARGER IMAGE
“THE SMILE GRADUALLY FADED FROM HIS FACE”
DRAWN BY JAMES MONTGOMERY FLAGG
❏LARGER IMAGE
On the opening night, after the second-act drop fell for the last time, Littleton, grinning at the curtain-calls, and with a keen, twinkling eye on the cabal of critics heading for the bar, was suddenly whacked on the back.
“Great girl!” a tall man behind him exclaimed cordially. He was beaming as if his own daughter had won.
“Hello, Davey! It’s a knock-out, isn’t it? Isn’t she a wonder?”
“Well, I guess yes. I came all the way over from Elizabeth to see her.”
“And what d’you think, Davey, I picked that girl almost out of the gutter. Never acted before last month.”
Davey stared. “Say, how many cocktails have you had to-night, old man?”
“Why, that girl was Sarah Dover’s maid!”
“Who? Jean Caspian?Haw-haw-haw!” Davey threw back his head and roared. “Good God! Wasn’t I stage-manager for Guy Norman? I always said she’d go to the top. Say, Littleton, you ought to keep track of these outside winners.”
Littleton was transfixed. His eyes grew small. “How many cocktails haveyouhad, Davey?”
For a moment the two glared at each other in silence. Then Littleton jerked his thumb toward the stage. “Say, come on behind with me.”
Jean opened her dressing-room door in answer to the emphatic knock.
“Well, Miss Caspian,” said Littleton, “you certainly put it over.” He wrung her hand enthusiastically. “But what’s all this about your being with Norman?”
“Oh, yes,” she answered demurely, “I believe Iwashis leading lady. Oh, how d’you do, Mr. Davey?” She extended her hand, and the two exploded in laughter.
Littleton, baffled, bewildered, watched them, utterly at a loss, pulling his beard savagely.
“Well, I’ll be damned!” he said. Then slowly his face lightened to an indulgent smile. “See here, Miss Caspian, I always thought you were a genius, but now I’m sure of it. Yes, you certainly put it over!Haw-haw-haw!”
SOONafter the performance was over that night, Jean and two excited, happy girls hastened from the theater and jumped into a taxicab. Over in Dell’s room they laughed; over in Dell’s room they wept.
“Oh, Jean, it’s awful!” said Clara. “I can’t bear to hear it.”
“Go on! Go on!” said Della Prance. “I want to hear itall.”
“It’s not what she’s telling that affects me. It’s awfully funny, some of it; but it’s something—” Clara slipped down on the floor beside Jean and took her hand. “It’s your voice, Jean—that’s it! It’s something it’sdoneto it.” She gripped Jean hard. “Jean, you’ve won something more than they ever saw to-night. It’s something that you’ll always have now. It’s been worth the whole game!”
The clock struck three. The parable of the little boy and the gutter-nickel was finished. Silence fell in the room; the girls communed without words. Then Clara rose, yawned, and gave a broken laugh.
“Think of Smiley’s in the morning, Dell!”
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