A Pasteboard Crown: A Story of the New York Stage

by Clara Morris

While Jane said to herself: "There's a vain old cockatoo—overbearing, hectoring, using her high and mighty birth as an excuse for wiping her shoes on us as is beneath her. I guess I could add a chapter to her family history that would take the wind out of her sails pretty quick! But my bank book's more important to me than her nasty slurs! 'Stivers,' indeed! It's a wonder it wasn't 'Penny.' The young ladies don't find it beneath them to call me Mrs. Of course in this one it might be policy, but the other one does it, too. It's plain enough to me the daughters get their decent manners from the father. A nice old man that, a gentleman clear through and always welcome here, even by Mr. Thrall; though for appearance sake he does then have to come hat and stick in hand and make a proper fifteen-minute or half-hour call and go. Poor, pale old gentleman; he's an idolator, if ever there was one, just bowing down to and worshipping those girls of his'n. If he knew the secret of that little locked closet upstairs, if he knew of the dinner-jacket, the lounging robe hanging there, he'd die without a word right as he stood. Poor old gentleman! But, Lord! how our boss does hate that old cockatoo! and how she does ko-tow to him and bridle and smirk! Not but what she looks well enough at the supper-table, for with all her rouge she can carry her clothes well. I think Mr. Thrall dislikes her for one thing, because of the likeness he sees in her to Miss Sybil. I overheard her saying in fun to him: 'I shall be just like mamma when I am as old,' and he said: 'Then for God's sake die in your youth!' and, though she tried hard to look angry, she had to laugh, and he looked ashamed of himself, and asked pardon.

"It does beat all, how long this affair lasts. Talk about worshipping the ground she walks on; I believe he's jealous of the air she breathes. Well, my nest is getting a good warm lining, for they are both generous, and she's easy to serve besides, which is more than I can say of the Missus, who is always prowling about the wardrobe room, ready to make a fuss about a quarter of a yard of gold or silver lace, or an inch or two of linen-backed velvet, and weighing the camphor-gum to see if it agrees with the amount mentioned in the bill. These splendid Shaksperian productions deprive her of the delight of dickering with authors for new plays, and so she drives Barney wild by her visits to the box-office, and keeps tab on me in the wardrobe, hoping to prevent the escape of a nickel through someone's hands. That woman's heart—if she has one—bears the dollar-mark, I'll wager!"

In the library, Sybil, being alone, dropped down on an old French tabouret, and with chin in hand fell into a reverie. Her other hand drew from her bosom the little diamond heart, whose centre was a registered ruby, flawless and exquisite. It had been Stewart's first gift to her after she had forgiven him, and he had said, very earnestly: "The real value of this jewel is in a word engraved back of that ruby. No, beloved! you cannot open and read without a jeweler's help, but if the locket will not open for you, why, when you have to remove it in your dressing-room, it will not open for another and betray our secret. No, I will not tell the precious word—only wear it always. If the ornament is not suitable to your gown or the occasion, then wear it inside and out of sight—but wear it, beloved, for my sake!"

And now she wondered still what was the word that to him made the value of this rare gift? Was it love? Was it forgiveness? Was it beloved? She sighed a little. The house was rather lonely since her father and mother had departed. They had come down to see her new great triumph as Beatrice in "Much Ado about Nothing."

Her improvement was wonderful, and Thrall had thrilled with pride when he had heard it commented upon. For Beatrice is a test part that combines comedy the lightest, airiest, and most polished, with both pathos and passion. All actors know that more technical knowledge is required for fine high-comedy acting than for sentiment or even tragedy. And it would have been a bold man who in the first weeks of Juliet had ventured to suggest a future Beatrice in the inexperienced, though immensely tragic, young actress.

Yet here she was, Thrall's ideal Beatrice, well-born, well-bred, beautiful, graceful, but possessed of a young devil of mockery that you saw dancing in her eyes and heard in her bubbling laughter. The stings of her wit seemed healed by the honey of her manner. Full of affectations, airs, and graces toward the courtiers, her "If I were a man!" speech was so full of tender love and sorrow for her injured cousin Hero that its final hot burst of rage and scorn left her with tears wet upon her cheeks.

And consummate artist that he was, Thrall threw such sudden passionate intensity into Benedick's answer, "By this hand I love thee!" that it was no wonder the act brought the people upstanding; and one old playgoer remarked that "it was like watching an exhibition of skilful fencing, where flying sparks made you uncertain whether the bout was friendly or a duel to the death."

Thrall had kept his promise; he had warned her away from so many pitfalls that some of the critics declared she had triumphed through what she had not done almost as much as through what she had. She had avoided the absolute shrewishness with which Beatrice is often invested; also the vindictive ferocity of the "If I were a man!" that catches the gallery, while it "makes the judicious grieve," and wonder, too, why Benedick should have been called upon for assistance by such a man-eating creature. Neither did she fire her best witticisms point-blank at the audience and pause—to make her "point." And better still, she avoided that strained, unnatural merriment that makes the public pity the evident fatigue of an otherwise satisfactory Beatrice. And this last bore strongest witness to the depth of study she had given to the play—yes, the play; for the actress who studies only her own lines gains but the narrowest and baldest view of the character. Sybil had studied the environment of the brilliant, high-born, wilful "she Mercutio," as Jim Roberts in an inspired moment of intoxication had termed Beatrice, in order to know in what manner she should address her impertinences to her uncle—whether with a spoiled-child daring, made pardonable by a respectful bearing; in open insolence, or in veiled dislike. So she studied Leonato carefully, and so she did all the characters she came in contact with, with the result that her manner varied according to her varying companions; and the tension of the bow was not strained to the breaking-point at any time.

Actors and certain critics knew that that swallow-like skimming from laughing badinage to biting satire—that fine restraint, that incredible lightness of touch was backed by certainty, that certainty meant knowledge, and that knowledge meant work. Yet, though Thrall told her again and again that she had in herself the same mocking spirit that informed Beatrice, she would have it that he and he alone had made the performance possible to her. And though he denied it, the assertion was like nectar to the vanity of the artist—like balm to the heart of the man who longed to serve her.

And as it happened the newspapers had, in so many words, hailed her as Queen of the Stage. The term had not been inspired by a suggestion from him. It was extravagant, perhaps, but it was impromptu. And as he read it, the blood swept over his face so redly that the watchful eyes of Mrs. Thrall, sitting behind the tea-urn at the breakfast-table, saw and noted, and when he had left for the theatre, she had studied eagerly that side of the paper, but could not solve the riddle of that deep flush of pleasure. For, though the notice of the play was very flattering to his Benedick, he could not be moved so by the praise of a single newspaper, she thought, even though he triumphed doubly as actor of a part and as managerial producer of nobly correct scenery.