THE COSTUMING OF JULIET
While Dorothy was taking prominent and uncomfortable part in that impromptu "Wild West" show on Broadway, in picturesque and hilly Yonkers, Sybil, in New York, sat in Mrs. Van Camp's old-timey drawing-room and fairly astounded her hostess by confiding to her Mrs. Lawton's evident desire to marry Dorrie to William Henry Bulkley.
"Has Letitia gone stark, staring mad?" she exclaimed. "Why, the man is the merest nobody, who could no more name his grandfather than he could fly! Money he has—yes, of course! But money without family can't balance the public flaunting of all his coarse amours, his bad manners, and worse temper! She must perfectly remember, too, the life he led his poor wife—who was, by the way, a member of the Massachusetts Stone family. Why, her great-uncle was a judge, and her second cousin was lieutenant-governor of the State. How she ever came to accept young Bulkley is a mystery. But she paid for her folly, poor thing. However, I shall take it upon myself to inform Letitia Lawton of some of the atrocities of his recent years, and tell her that as his wife Dorothy would be as dead socially as if she were over in Greenwood."
"Oh, don't!" shivered Sybil, "dear god-mamma! I hope I may go to Greenwood before my little sister Dorrie does!"
And Mrs. Van Camp pushed the girl's dark hair back with a caressing touch and said: "How devoted you two girls are to each other! You might be twins. Even as children I never knew you to squabble or sulk. You, Sybbie, had a furious temper, but your rages were almost always in defence of Dorothy. Do you remember how you kicked the shins of the gardener once because he had kicked her dog?"
"Yes!" laughed Sybil, "and scratched and bit a boy-tramp who attempted to snatch her little locket from her neck. But I can't help loving her, for she's the bravest, sweetest, jolliest, prettiest sister a girl ever had, and she's all the world to me!"
And Mrs. Van Camp, laughing a little at her enthusiasm, held up a finger and said, "Wait!"
And a bit later Sybil was on her way to the theatre, where Mr. Thrall joined her, and together they walked to a house on Fourth Avenue, where Sybil was presented to an ancient couple, who in the profession were recognized as authorities on the subject of correct historic costuming.
Never had the girl received a greater surprise. She had expected a stately and dignified presence, and certainly the sumptuous entourage of a very fashionable dressmaker. But here there was no reception-room, no parlor, no fitting-room, no boy in buttons. Here the thing that first commanded attention and longest held it was the almost overpowering odor of garlic. It led them through the little drab hallway, up the stairs, and to the door of the stuffy and crowded living room, where an old woman in a false front and a black alpaca dress and a snuffy old man in carpet slippers received them.
And, as they heartily greeted the manager, Sybil wondered what on earth there could be in common between the rich and splendid dresses she had seen at the theatre and these frumpish old people, while she shuddered at the thought of their stumpy, uncared-for hands, pulling about beautiful satins and velvets. "But of course," she thought, "they have people under them who do the real work." Afterward she knew that it was the cunning of these same fingers that produced all the wonderful embroideries in bullion and spangles that are so difficult to obtain in this country.
Now, however, she saw that Mr. Thrall treated the couple most deferentially. Indeed, he was secretly anxious to see what impression his "Princess," as he mentally called Sybil, would make upon the old pair, who had dressed every famous Juliet of the past twenty years, and who were in their own way veritable artists.
He had come there with one or two fixed ideas on the subject in hand, and he hoped there might not be a struggle with the old pair, whose obstinacy he well knew. But he had a vision of Sybil with cloudy, dark hair, all netted over with pearls, after the Venetian fashion, with pearl-encircled neck and arms, and pearl-engirdled waist; and he was determined that she should not wear glittering ornaments of any kind—which he rather fancied they would favor—or much gold and general splendor, after the style in which they had clothed the Juliet of his previous season. For he forgot how well these old people knew their business, or perhaps he did not know the passionate love of beauty that produced in them an almost poetic power of expression, through color, fabrics, draperies. They were like artists, who got their "darks" from heavy velvets, "middle tints" from cloths and satins, and their "highest lights" from laces and jewels.
Sybil, hatted and veiled and jacketted, had remained in the background, a position that gave her a glimpse of another room, shelved about from floor to ceiling, with every shelf quite crowded with green boxes. She had been so interested in her surroundings that she had not heeded the conversation going on until the strong disapproval on both old faces drew her attention to the words "society" and "débutante"; and when, to a question, Mr. Thrall answered, "Juliet," they gazed at him with incredulous wonder for a moment. Then, exchanging glances of contemptuous derision that made poor Sybil's cheeks burn, with innumerable shrugs and much sniffing they scuffled back and forth, bringing out and throwing open boxes, until the room was presently a confusion of such splendid materials as velvets, satins, crêpes, of silver tissues and cloth of gold; while camphor gum and cedar wood sent odors from the boxes holding rare furs, cut into strips of trimming width, correct for king or prince, for judge or queen. For in this cramped and shabby place one could be provided with everything, from the rough woolens and leathers of Macbeth, the black and purple satins, the jet and sable of Hamlet, the crimson velvets and ermine of queens, the embroideries and laced fripperies of white-wigged courtiers, down to the floating gauze of a Titania and the silvered wings of a cupid.
In the splendor of the display Sybil forgot her recent mortification, and thrilled with delight at the thought that some portion of it was to be placed at her service—for her adornment!
As the old man came lumbering in with two great volumes, bearing the title "Modes et Costumes Historique—Étranger," and, slamming them down on the table, began ostentatiously turning over the colored plates, Thrall, laughing good-naturedly, closed the book, saying: "Now, now, Lefebvre! You and Nonna Angelique here need no plates to dress Shakspere's people by, and you won't be so cross when you see your new Juliet! Come now, Madame, no one knows better than you do how important is the setting of a jewel! Oh, I know what that shrug means and that 'la, la, la!' But as a just woman you must at least see my young Capulet before you condemn her. Miss Lawton," he continued, "please remove your jacket. Thanks! And now take off your veil and hat, please!"
The autumn wind had somewhat roughened Sybil's hair, and she raised her hands to smooth it, but he stopped her: "Not for the world!" he said, laughingly. Then he took her by the hand and led her to the centre of the room, saying:
"Monsieur et Madame, you will kindly costume this young girl for me, but only if you can see in her a Juliet. If not, why—" he stopped.
Flushed, excited, embarrassed under deliberate inspection, Sybil stood with downcast eyes and red, half-sullen lip, already quivering to a smile.
The old pair stood at gaze. Then mutely the woman's hand went out and was caught in his.
The girl saw, and with her sudden flashing smile, she raised imploring, dark eyes and looked at them.
"Par Dieu!" cried old Lefebvre, "'tis Juliet's self!"
"And oh, mon Dieu! mon Dieu!" the old woman exclaimed, "if you can act as you can look the part! Oh, Mr. Thrall, I crave your pardon! Will I costume her?—will I? We shall make of her that last blossom of the House of Capulet—the very Juliet herself!" She turned and half whispered to the old man, "Slight and dark!"
He took snuff furiously, and added: "Rich colored, quick tempered, hot!"
And then, together: "Let's see! let's see!" and they turned excitedly toward their boxes.
"No velvet, I think?" suggested Thrall, who was highly elated that his judgment, so far, had been so heartily seconded by this experienced old couple.
"Velvet? Bah!" responded Nonna Angelique, with a condemnatory wave of the hand that swept velvet entirely out of consideration. "Too old! too heavy! but—but—" She tossed things right and left in hurried, nervous search.—"Where's that blond lace scarf?" she fretted, "where?—where? And why don't you open the cabinet, and not stand there wasting time, mon mari?"
As they stood waiting, Stewart Thrall said, laughingly: "Patience, patience! We are in the hands of the powers that be. These are the people who 'paint the lily' and—er—er—touch up refined gold! And, Miss Lawton, haven't you been about a theatre long enough to learn how indiscreet it is to laugh at your manager's imperfect quotations? You should reserve your merriment for those occasions when he tells a supposedly funny story. Ah! ah! the lost is found!"
For Nonna Angelique came trotting up with a long scarf of silky old blond lace trailing from her hands, and Sybil, turning toward her, gave a cry of rapture. Drawer, too, after drawer had been drawn out from the chiffonier, and from their velvet-lined depths there came a blaze and glow and gleam and such dancing prismatic colors of violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, red, from jewels in such good and careful setting that, imitation though they were, they commanded admiration even in broad daylight.
Among these crowns and crosses, stomachers and necklaces, there were minutely exact copies of some famous originals treasured in the museums of Europe. Nor were these ornaments cheap; the price of many of them was told in hundreds of dollars, not tens. And Sybil, while missing their real value, which lay in their historical accuracy, might well be forgiven for her childish delight in their meretricious splendor.
"Oh, how I wish Dorrie could see, too!" she exclaimed, and the snuffy old man nudged his rumpled old wife with his elbow, and, looking at Sybil's flushed and happy young face, they wagged their heads knowingly.
And Stewart Thrall said to himself: "To watch her countenance is like watching the surface of a land-locked lake—one moment glass-smooth beneath the sun, then reflecting a slow white cloud, then breaking into ripples, fretting into waves and blackening to sudden storm! Ah, surely you are the headlong Capulet in love with love!" and his meditation broke off short.
Lefebvre was advancing, diamond coronet in hand, and he anxiously waited results. Nonna Angelique, with stumpy brown fingers, had still further loosened Sybil's black hair and fluffed it out, crooning to herself the while, and had turned her head this way and that, bent it down, lifted it, then put her hand out for the coronet her husband brought, placed it, drew back a step, then tore it off to a chorus of, "o! no!"
"Too old!" said Lefebvre.
"C'est cela! too old!" nodded Nonna Angelique.
"Too old!" acquiesced Thrall.
Then was handed over a golden net, studded with jewels; and oh, Sybil did hope they would let her wear that!
Old Angelique put it on with deft hands. "Mais comme elle est belle!" she exclaimed; "but——"
Thrall shook his head and repeated: "Beautiful, but——"
And the old man explained the "buts" fully with the remark: "Too Zingary, n'est ce pas?"
"Yes! yes!" cried Nonna, throwing her arms over her head and snapping her fingers to imitate castanets. "Oui! oui! too Zingary—too gypsy-like!" and off came the golden net.
A head-piece of colored stones barely touched her brow when, with a contemptuous "Bah! too Egyptian" it was returned to the drawer.
The costumers stood looking at each other, silently. Thrall waited; he wanted them to propose pearls themselves, and thus avoid a wrangle, for they did not accept suggestions willingly. Then, suddenly, Nonna Angelique said: "Let me hear the voice, Mr. Thrall. Give her a cue; let me know whether her voice matches the mobilité of her face. That may give me my idée!"
Sybil gave a frightened, deprecating, "Oh, Mr. Thrall!"
But he answered with: "Steady! steady!" then added: "Give her 'Wherefore art thou Romeo?'"
She looked at him with dilating eyes, then clasped her hands, and gazing into space, obediently began:
"Oh, Romeo! Romeo! wherefore art thou, Romeo?
Deny thy father and refuse thy name—
Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn—my—love!
And [with a rush] I'll no longer be a Capulet!"
Nonna Angelique caught the girl's face between her hands and kissed her soundingly. It had been an unexpected test, and Thrall, pleased at her courage and obedience, was simply delighted with the effect she got from that pause, as if at her own temerity in using the words:
and then the reckless dash of the declaration:
"... I'll no longer be a Capulet!"
And Sybil, glancing up, noted for the very first time the extreme beauty of the man's eyes, and if the open admiration beaming from their sapphire depths gave her a thrill of gratification, it was the approval of the manager that moved her, not the man, she told herself; and since there is no one in this world so easy to deceive as one's self, she undoubtedly believed her own statement.
"Ah! ah! monsieur, you have a find in this young girl!" said old Lefebvre to Thrall. "She should be a big card—and in your hands, eh?" he poked the managerial ribs and winked his round black eye knowingly. "The wires will be pulled, eh? And the public, it will dance! And the dollars they will rattle, eh? A-a-ah! Qu'est-ce, cherie? Les perles? mais oui—certainement! In a moment I shall bring them! My key? Ah, the devil flies away with everything this day! Where is my key? Ah, here in my vest-pocket all the time!"
And at last Thrall's patience was rewarded as pearls came to the front, and "Oh!" exclaimed Sybil, in amazed delight. For her idea of imitation pearls had been founded upon the cheap bluish-white glass beads with just a skim of wax for lining. Now she stood astonished by the weight and lustre of these lovely things from Paris, where by some clever artifice the scales of fish are used to produce upon the forms of almost solid wax the wonderful "nacre" of the true gem of the sea. So artistic was the work that small imperfections in shape and flaws in tinting had been carefully reproduced, the monotony of a mechanical perfection being thus avoided. Really they were very beautiful, and among those selected strands intended for the throat it was as if color, having life and breath, a rosy pink, had gently breathed across their milky lustre, faintly flushing the swelling round of each great pearl. Nor were they too frail for service; weight and solidity made them almost as durable as the true jewel's self. And here was bunch after bunch of seed pearls, so small, for embroidery on lace or satin; long strands for plaiting in the hair, for the suspension from the waist of feather fan or tiny mirrors à la Marie Stuart, when dauphine of France; great girdles for the waist, whose pendant tassels fell almost to the wearer's feet. And at last—at last, the heavy net which he so much wished to see upon that waywardly waving dark cloud of hair!
Old Angelique, having raised a sternly instructing index finger to close proximity with Sybil's glowing face, proceeded to strike off with it upon the air these verbal commands: "You will do exact now as I tell you, if you wish to look the little Juliet—so high-bred, so headstrong, yet so young! Mais, so young—mon Dieu! mon Dieu! comme—like a bébé! Now make the mark of my words, Miss—Miss—er? Lawsons! oui! oui! merci! For I have in the mind that Juliet—me—I know! So you must make no height on the top of the head, no cross braid, no pile up curl, no coronet! No—no! that make very handsome, mais—but not the Juliet! Tumble the hair to the shoulders, half curl! No curl, all regular! Wat is call 'em, 'em ring-a-let? No! no! half-curl, half-wave—oui! all natural! And for the front, the hair all fluff—so! [puffing out her breath]—low to the brows, that the big eyes look from under it, like from a cloud. Then turn all back from the cheeks, after the manner of the angels in the old masters' pictures! Obey me, and you shall see! The city shall see! Why, even now!" She flung the net upon Sybil's head, drawing a pear-shaped pendant pearl forward to rest upon her brow, rapidly twisted the white lace scarf about her shoulders to hide the street gown, threw a rope of pearls about her neck, and with triumphant eyes turned to Thrall, saying: "Is not the Italian angel's the coiffure correct for this, Miss Lawsons?"
Thrall answered, briefly, "Quite correct!"
And Sybil, with an ecstatic sigh, said again: "How I do wish Dorothy were here!"
And Thrall commented: "Your lovers have cause for jealousy of that young sister, I fancy, Miss Lawton?"
But, with careless frankness, Sybil answered: "I never had a lover in my life! So Dorrie can have caused no jealousy, you see!" and turned her whole attention back to Nonna Angelique, who was checking off costumes on her fingers.
And she would have been an astonished girl had she been told that her brusquely spoken words had made this man's heart leap in his breast, as no seductive wile of most tactful coquetry could have done; and the fact that he had no right to heed the words of any maid, however sweet or fair, did nothing to check that hurried thumping at his ribs. For, like many other men, he had something of the explorer's spirit about him—something that responded eagerly to the charm of the strange, the vague, the new,—something that makes the would-be explorer of the terra incognita ignore all thought of danger, and dream only of the beauty of virgin forests, strange flowers, and fabled fountains of youth and love eternal! No one could have guessed that the calm-faced, stately gentleman, looking on at the selection of Juliet's finery, was mentally repeating those candid, girlish words: "I never had a lover in my life!"
"Ah, no!" he thought; "no more had Juliet ever had a lover in her life, up to an hour before that 'trifling, foolish banquet,' given by old Capulet. Yet, ere its end, swift love had grown so great that she had declared already for the grave, if 'twere a passion unrequited!"
Then old Angelique broke in upon his thought, and claimed attention with: "The cloak, now, Mr. Thrall—the cloak for the visit to old Laurence's cell? Shall it be black or brown or gray?"
"Gray!" he answered, readily. "Dark gray, I think, gives a hint of mystery. Though, 'tis true, Juliet seeks the Friar with her parents' knowledge, still it is with secret purpose. So gray and very large and full and hooded, Nonna Angelique, so that a young maid might slip like a shadow by high walls and through Verona's streets to the cloisters of the convent without revealing a trace of beauty or of rich attire."
"C'est bon! c'est bon!" nodded Lefebvre, taking a prodigious pinch of snuff, and entering in a greasy little note-book "One large, gray, circle cloak, hooded"—"c'est bon!"
On Angelique's four fingers her grimy thumb checked off "Cloak for Friar's cell—gray. Chamber scene—white, of course, but flowing, loose, long, light as air. For tomb—white also, but heavy, rich, eh? The satin gown for County Paris bride, and only one spot of color, eh? The jewelled sheath of the dagger, at the waist. Oh, yes! oh, yes! all that is clear, but—but, my Mr. Manager, how shall it be for the ball—for that first time to meet the Romeo—eh?"
She pursed her lips, she scratched her forehead thoughtfully, and so pushed her false front over to a most rakish angle. But the old man shuffled across the room, and with a: "Permettez that I correct the coiffure, my Angelique! It have slide, and it make a little of what you call the—the 'jaky' look! That way—so!" And with the palms of both hands he calmly replaced the foxy-red front, and the search for a color suitable for the first act went on.
Thrall, drawing his hand lightly across the loosened folds of many webs, over purples, mauves, ambers, with a snapping accompaniment of "No! no! no!" paused, by merest chance, at a delicate blue brocade, at which Angelique almost shrieked: "No! no!—I say no! Pretty? Yes, mais too calm—cool—collected—obedient! Ah, bah! A fool color! What, that amber would become her? Hear you that, old man?" She appealed to Lefebvre with up-cast hands: "Y-es, and it would be Spanish in effect! Oh, what is it that we want?"
The old man squinted up his eyes, and, studying Sybil, answered: "Something happy, v-e-r-y happy! Something like a flower, a-a very early flower—but what?"
And Thrall, who had caught the old snuff-taker's idea, asked, quickly: "Why not the blossom of the peach? That's early!"
"God bless the man!" cried Nonna Angelique, throwing her arms about him in frantic demonstration of delight. "It is the coup-de-grâce! The pinks, mon mari! vite! vite done! Vraiment you have the head still! A happy color, said you!"
She threw out a fold of satin her husband offered: "Non! non! it is too deep—too common!" Another: "Bah! too pale, but mere flesh color!" A beautiful bright pink brocade next was tried. "Oh, non! non!" she almost cried from disappointment; "too-'er, too-'er!" In despair she resorted to pantomime to help make her meaning clear, and, catching up her skimpy alpaca skirt, she danced a wild step or two, saying: "Too comme-ça! too what you call 'frisky,' eh? You feel me, what I mean? But that sweet, first flowering thing—that soft promise of the spring, that peach-blossom pink, that would make this dark girl beautiful—can I not find it, then?" She beat her breast with Gallic despair. Lefebvre clutched his few hairs, and apparently pulled up a memory, and cried: "One chance more! The old chest with Eastern things! India, China, Japan!" He disappeared—he lost a shoe, but left it lying till he came back, and slid into it in passing. Some rolls were cast down, soft, non-crackling paper removed, and, with cries of joy and gurgles of delight, Nonna Angelique flung out, fold upon fold, a silky crêpe of so pure and true a peach-blossom pink that the petals of the flower itself scattered over it could hardly have been perceived.
Pearls with this color would be perfection. Then the round white fan, dagger,—everything ordered, the measures were taken in the inner room of shelves, a day fixed for fitting, and, quivering with excitement and delight, Sybil was descending the house-steps, when Jim Roberts came up to Thrall, and looking rather oddly at him—the girl thought—said: "The property-man says that cloisonné-jar you made such a fuss about was cared for by the Missus. So, if you want it used, give me her key!"
There was a sort of half-frightened daring in the pale face of Roberts, and the look of sardonic comprehension burning in Thrall's eyes might well have shaken the nerves of such a poor wreck as he answered: "We won't trouble about the cloisonné, just now; but I understand your good intention in following me here to tell me about it. And—I—shall—remember—it! Oh, here's your car, Miss Lawton; good-by!"