CHAPTER XI
MARGOT woke next morning to a premonition of disaster. She had foreseen that she might lose her job last night; but this morning she realized it, which is quite a different affair. The evening before, life had seemed very large and golden, with plenty of opportunity for heroism on a grand scale, and without the practical peril of misfortune. She had felt the keen thrill of danger before it had lasted long enough to attack the nerves. But the hour of sleep had robbed her of her gaiety of heart. Even the treasures of which it was her wont to take stock every morning ceased to-day to give her any moral reassurance.
The little room which Margot shared with her mother always filled her with a sense of pride and protection. It held all the substantial remnants of Madame Selba’s country furniture. It contained an immense bureau, four looking-glasses, and three gilt clocks. None of the clocks would go, to be sure, but one on a handsome blue mat on the mantelpiecewas surmounted by a dome of glass and flanked with terra cotta vases filled with artificial flowers. It was a magnificent affair and had been presented to Monsieur Selba on his having passed ten years in one particular firm. The other two clocks had been gifts to Madame Selba on her marriage, but the mere fact of the ceremony had appeared to startle them to such an extent that they had never given a tick since. Still they were undoubtedly extremely handsome, and there was room for one on the window-sill, and for the other upon a bracket above the washstand.
There was a crucifix and a prie-Dieu, given to Margot by her school friends at the Convent which in her luxurious youth she had attended for two unforgettable years, and she herself had bought the holy-water stoup which hung above it, upheld by two slightly irrelevant angels a little loose of wing, out of her first earnings. There was a linnet’s cage in the window, built in the shape of a palace, a present to Margot from a young ironmonger, a man in a social position so inferior to her own that she had had to discourage him; he had such nice curly hair, too! But she had prayed for him, and she always took peculiar care of the birdcage. The bird had died and she had not been able to afford another one. She looked at it with some impatience this morning: “Moi, je trouve que c’est déplacé,” she said to herself as she got up.
She cast an eye almost depreciatingly upon theheirloom of Madame Selba’s heart; this was a superb bedstead with brass knobs and a spring mattress, a bed which had struck the concierge’s wife with envy and was by no means the secret pride of Madame Selba’s existence.
“You can figure to yourself,” she used to say, “when you look at that bedstead, that there was a time in my life when I wanted for nothing.”
Margot had to keep the room very tidy, or else there would not have been much room to move about; the bureau and the bed between them having rather the air of two prize-fighters getting ready to be at each other’s throat and only prevented from carrying out this intention by a small strip of rag carpet and a cane chair. Mother and daughter could not by any possible means have dressed at the same time, but that hardly mattered, as Margot got up early to make her mother’s coffee and went to bed late because of the theatre.
You could see twenty-seven chimney-pots out of the window, and by sticking your neck at an uncomfortable angle you could catch a distant view of some green trees not half a mile away. It was, as Margot used to say, when she felt homesick for open fields and a wide sky, almost like the country. Madame Selba preferred a view of the street, but that she could get from the window of the living-room. There was a handsome public house opposite.
Madame Selba united two passions with equalardour, a passion for Margot’s success, and a passion for brandy; that the two passions might occasionally conflict did not appear to occur to her; but she found it was more practical to work for the second and to dream of the first. In her way, Madame Selba was an idealist.
Margot loved her mother deeply, because she was her mother, and it never occurred to Margot not to love her, because she had always taken care of her, and because it was Margot’s nature to love.
“What I should do without Mother!” she had often said to herself; sometimes people said this for her, but with a different meaning.
Madame Selba was a stout woman, who ate heartily; she had never been able to work. She referred vaguely sometimes to internal troubles. Margot said, “Mother must be very careful not to overdo herself,” but no one except Margot ever felt it necessary to urge this caution upon her.
This morning everything had a most dreary and unreal air (for Margot felt it extremely unusual not to be cheerful); even Madame Selba, sleeping heavily upon the pillow with at least three-fourths of the blanket wrapped about her substantial form, appeared slightly unattractive. A dreadful idea occurred to Margot—suppose that Jean should not admire her mother! She reproached herself for thinking it possible, but she did think it possible.
“I wonder if I should have made that arrangement with him,” thought Margot as she prepared the coffee. “In the long run I shall make more, of course, but meanwhile we shall be hard up. I must be more careful, that is all. It is an extravagance this taking of trams; from henceforth I will walk to the theatre, and I will not buy a new hat.” Margot sighed; to buy the new hat would have been flying in the face of Providence, but not to buy it was to fly even more relentlessly in the face of pleasure; and Providence might not have minded as much as Margot.
She tried to sing over the coffee, and she kissed her mother’s very large and rather unappetizing cheek with the heartiness of inveterate affection; and then, with sheer terror in her heart struggling against the dauntless courage of youth, Margot set off to the theatre.
It was an icy winter morning, and it is doubtful what would have happened to her courage if she had not fortified it by an imprudence. On her way she passed a flower-seller and bought a bunch of violets. It was an imprudence, as she confessed to herself, but like many other imprudences it really looked very well, and it gave her a sense of defiance. If she was to have her head cut off, she would at least appear at her best for the execution.
There was a sense of quickened suspense in the very atmosphere of the Odéon. The great emptytheatre resounded to the angry explosions of Monsieur Picot, the Stage Manager; the retreating charwomen with dirty buckets almost hurried to get out of his way. The gathered artists in the wings or on the stage seemed dipped in whispering gloom. They were all waiting, it appeared, for Liane, and Liane was late.
Monsieur Picot looked at Margot morosely—she had really done well the night before, several people had congratulated him about it. It did not occur to him to repeat the congratulations; he merely remarked that he supposed she thought he liked wasting his time, for the pleasure of seeing how late feather-headed nincompoops cared to be! She was mistaken if she thought so, because he held everybody to witness that he did not! Everybody had been witnessing it for half an hour and knew in addition that Margot was not wanted till the fourth act, which was not timed to take place for another hour but there was a general assent, and everyone cast looks of scandalized indignation upon Margot.
Then Liane arrived. It at once became obvious that the morning’s work, if it took place at all, would hardly be pleasant.
Liane had a peculiar strained and nervous look in her face, like that of a horse laying back its ears preparatory to kicking the trap to pieces. The manager rubbed his hands together and his back cringed with precautionary amiability. He didnot dare reproach Liane for being late, so he scolded the whole of the rest of the company, who had been early.
“Now, perhaps, since you are at last ready, you set of wooden-heads!” he observed with bitter scorn, “you will no longer trespass upon the patience of Madame!”
Liane raised her head and drew back her lips as if she were smiling.
“First I must ask permission for a few words with Monsieur le Régisseur,” she said, with terrible humility. Monsieur Picot shook in his shoes; he begged hischèreMadame to do him the great kindness of waiting until after the rehearsal.
“Until we have those few words there can be no rehearsal, Monsieur,” she replied, still in the deadly undertone of controlled rage.
The Manager gave himself up for lost.
“Madame!” he said, and bowed the way into his office. The rest of the company looked at each other and at Margot. They had never liked Margot, her manner of life disgusted them. Afille de théâtreshould behave like afille de théâtreand not like afille du monde; surely the profession was hard enough without that clumsy addition!
Within the Manager’s small office, Liane addressed herself to the mirror and put an ostrich feather straight; she was never more terrible than when she was arranging her appearance.
“Bon!” she said. “You will have the kindness,Monsieur Picot, to instantly dismiss the little one who sang last night! her song is not necessary to the play that is now on, and her taking any part in the new piece is quite out of the question. I don’t know her name; her voice is execrable, she puts me out.”
Monsieur Picot shook his head.
“But, Madame,” he said persuasively, “I am simply desolated if she has displeased you, this little Selba; to tell the truth, I do not find that she sings so badly. We cannot all have the charm of a De Brances. But you are fatigued this morning. Sit down for a few moments, try this armchair, a cigaretteNon? Ah! I find them such a rest for the nerves! Your triumph last night, now that was a sensation! In all probability you suffer this morning from a reaction. Ah! you geniuses! All alike, all alike! You conquer the world, but that is not enough for you, if you fail to find yourself amused next morning!”
Liane sat down, but she kept tapping her foot and playing with her muff during the manager’s speech; at the end of it she breathed quickly.
“A thousand thanks, Monsieur,” she said. “I repeat, I cannot continue to play a part subject to such interruptions from a cat that squalls, a toneless vegetable, a dreadfulgauche, clumsy little insect!”
“Ah, we must arrange something,” said the manager soothingly. “Yes, yes, we must make alittle alteration. I think you only come in together during the fourth act, before you wind up that magnificent scene of yours under the pyramid. The voice is that of the little Circassian slave, which reminds the princess of her youth. Ah, yes! I thought it went very well last night. I might tell Selba to sing just a little more slowly, perhaps. You find the tune too light, too gay? A suggestion of the Princess’s tragedy,hein? Madame has always such talent forles nuances. One cannot expect a young girl like Selba to make the most of her part. They are as ignorant as fleas, these young girls, all of them! It must often appal the creative genius of Madame!”
“Mon Dieu!” said Liane, with a brusque movement of her whole body. “It is useless that you should try to put me off! You enrage me with your stale compliments! Make them to this season’singénue, not to Liane de Brances! You have heard what I have to say; nor am I alone in saying it. I do not come before you with personal complaints, I speak always for the good of the theatre.”
“The consideration of Madame touches me to the heart,” murmured Monsieur Picot, who detested her. Liane gave him a baleful look and swept on with her speech.
“It is possible that you have some respect for the opinions of Manet of theComœdia, and Danton from theJournal; they took supperwith me last night, they were trembling with rage. ‘Madame,’ they said, ‘that little one distracts the part. The song is an intrusion—it is a thing behind the age, totally unworthy of the Odéon and of you! It is an atrocious blunder, an infamy!’ I have only this to ask you, Monsieur Picot, am I to be exposed to the blunders of underlings in this theatre? If so, let me know it at once. I suppose there are possibly other theatres in Paris where the name of Liane de Brances is not utterly unknown, nor her capacities entirely despised.”
Monsieur Picot turned sulky; no man likes to hear his flattery taken for what it is worth, especially if it is worth nothing, and no Parisian manager will bear to be spoken of as old-fashioned.
“Voyons, De Brances,” he snarled viciously, entirely dropping his voice of oil and honey. “There are such things as contracts, I would have you remember!”
Liane rose from her seat with a magnificent gesture of scorn.
“You appear to forget,” she said, “that for the new play I amen représentation, and that the present one runs, I think I am not wrong in saying, for ten nights longer. I have not as yet signed the contract for this fresh play. I wish you all success in it! No doubt Marguérite la Vaillance will make her name and yours in the principal part. She will render you famous,parbleu, that fine, fat, forty-year-old hack! It remainsonly that I felicitate you, Monsieur. I take pleasure in doing so before the public, who will, without doubt, be swift to follow my example.”
Monsieur Picot wrung his hands in a confusion of rage and terror. How he would have loved it to have been the neck of the brutally indispensable woman before him! He had never dealt with any actress so insolent, so jealous, so terrifically shrewd about business! She had none of the pleasant failings of the real artist; only success, a success that reduced him, cowering and malignant, to any terms, even her own.
“Madame!” he cried, as Liane swept past him towards the door, “pray do not let us part like this. You know well that Marguérite la Vaillance is incapable, or any other actress in Paris, of undertaking a part written especially for you! As to this affair of little Selba’s song, it is true I should regret greatly having to dismiss her. I tell you frankly she will get a better place elsewhere if I do. She has a voice like a little country bird, and in Paris just now they have a rage for simplicity. Of course, if it is your wish to push her into notice, I say no more. But you know, De Brances, as well as I do that it is just these little things—a dismissal on the heels of a success, a story of jealousy and revenge, that send the public wild about an actress. If Selba succeeds after I send her away, she will owe her success to you!Voilà tout!” And the diplomaticManager, certain of his triumph, shrugged his shoulders. Liane hesitated.
“No one who knows me could suppose me capable of jealousy,” she said, in a disturbed voice.
The manager’s eyelids fluttered; he bowed.
“Still,” she continued, with more determination,—then the door opened, and Margot herself appeared. Monsieur Moncet, thejeune premier, had sent her to ask Monsieur Picot to begin the rehearsal, as he had an urgent appointment to keep and had waited an hour already.
It is a curious thing that the more depraved and cold-hearted human beings are, the more passionately sentimental they become. Liane was incorrigibly sentimental, and Margot owed her dismissal entirely to the bunch of violets. It had been Jean’s custom to present Liane with violets every day, and for Jean’s sake Liane had temporarily thrust aside all the more expensive tributes which besieged her door. She drew back for a moment like a creature about to spring, then she rushed forward on to the middle of the stage.
“Dismiss that girl!” she shrieked to the Manager over her shoulder. “What!” she cried, turning on the company. “Am I to be badgered and interrupted in private conversations by the off-scourings of the theatre? Has it come to this, that not a rehearsal can be conducted in a decent manner so as to suit the convenience ofthe leading lady, only too patient, only too submissive to the whims of a troupe of dancing marionettes? Monsieur Moncet, you have a very important engagement to keep, I hear? Do not let us detain you! Pleasure before duty is the rule of this company! It would be perhaps a trifle moreconvenable, Monsieur, if you refrained from sending one of your young women to interrupt private interviews, with which your affairs—however pressing—have nothing whatever to do! What, Marie Hauteville, you are amused!”
“Madame! Madame!je vous en prie!” wailed the manager. Liane waved him contemptuously aside.
“Mademoiselle Hauteville is amused!” she went on, with terrific irony. “Let the whole theatre wait, then, until she has digested her joke. What is the rehearsal of a new play compared to the inimitable humour of Mademoiselle? Cat! Daughter of the devil! Spot of infamy! It is a joke, then, that I am bullied, betrayed, infuriated by thiscanailleof a company! Oh, yes!” shrieked Liane, her irony breaking into wild invective, “it is very amusing, very!” And she collapsed with a scream of rage into the nearest chair.
“I should like to know what I have done to justify Madame’s attack,” said Marie Hauteville wrathfully. “I have not taken away any of her admirers! Thank Heaven, I have no need to adoptenfantsfrom the country.”
“Mademoiselle,taisez-vous!” shrieked the Manager, shaking his fist in her face.
Liane sprang to her feet.
“What does she say?” she cried. “Is she about to give us a list of her admirers? I beseech you, let us listen. It will not take long!”
“Malheur!” moaned the manager, burying his face in his hands.
“Is this a rehearsal?” shouted thejeune premier“or is it Pandemonium?”
“It is what you make it,” flashed Liane, turning swiftly upon him, “with yourcabotinemessengers and your littleaffaires de cœur, which you cannot keep to yourself, it seems, but desire to intrude upon women of reputation!”
“Et quelle réputation!” murmured Marie Hauteville, who had found her voice.
“I will not stay here to be insulted,” said Moncet, who had been burning to get away for the last half hour. “Mademoiselle Hauteville, allow me to suggest that you follow my example. Madame de Brances is suffering from losses; she is not herself this morning.”
“Go, both of you!” said Liane, with a superb gesture of dismissal. “You are not wasted upon each other.”
The manager raised his head from his hands.
“There will be no rehearsal this morning,” he announced coldly. “To-night at half-past eleven, please, without fail.”
Then Liane turned to Margot; she felt all the resistless hunger of the vulgar and violent to wreak their spite visibly upon their victim.
“It appears,” said Liane, regarding her slowly from head to foot, “that you are to go. It will be a lesson for you, perhaps; a girl like you, with her way to make, should at least study to appear respectable.”
“From Madame such a warning has special significance,” said Margot quietly. She had been sick with fright through the loud scene which had followed her unfortunate message, but when she saw she was herself to bear the brunt of Liane’s fury, all fear left her.
Liane drew her lips back from her shining white teeth; they looked long and savage like a wolf’s.
“It is not you alone who will find the significance,ma fille,” she hissed. “Run and tell your silly little Baron that he shall not forget he has lost a friend and found an enemy.”
Margot put out her hands suddenly, as if something precious which she held near her heart had been assailed. Had she then brought trouble upon Jean? Liane laughed. It was a horrible laugh; it made several people who had not particularly kind hearts feel quite uncomfortable.
As for the Manager, he was so uncomfortable, that when he dismissed Margot he gave her a hundred francs more than was due to her. Jean scolded her seriously for taking it. He said sheshould have had more pride; he had such an heroic way of looking at things. He did not know that when Margot had taken the money she had been thinking that she could feed him up very nicely on that without depriving her mother of anything. If he had known, he would have been more angry still.
Margot was very unhappy, because she was afraid that Jean despised her, but she did not return the hundred francs as he suggested. She preferred that Jean should despise her, than that he should go without extras for his meals. There was nothing at all heroic about Margot!