Another star now swam into the Frohman ken. This was the way of it:
Paul Potter was making a periodical visit to New York in 1901. David Belasco came to see him at the Holland House.
"Paul," said he, "C. F. and I want you to make us a version of Ouida's 'Under Two Flags' for Blanche Bates."
"I never read the novel," said Potter.
"You can dramatize it without reading it," remarked Belasco, and in a month he was sitting in Frohman's rooms at Sherry's and Potter was reading to them his dramatization of "Under Two Flags," throwing in, for good measure, a ride from "Mazeppa" and a snow-storm from "The Queen of Sheba."
"I like all but the last scene," said Frohman. "When Cigarette rides up those mountains with her lover's pardon, the pardon is, to all intents and purposes, delivered. The actual delivery is an anti-climax. What the audience want to see is a return to the garret where the lovers lived and were happy."
As they walked home that night Belasco said to Potter:
"That was a great point which C. F. made. What remarkable intuition he has!"
Frohman and Potter used to watch Belasco at work, teaching the actors to act, the singers to sing, the dancers to dance.
Then came a hitch.