CHAPTER VI
Rehearsals for "The Purple Slipper" had been called positively for September first, and the response became unanimous at about fifteen minutes to eleven at the Barrett Theater on West Forty-sixth Street; that is, it was unanimous except for the presence of the author and the angel—Miss Adair and Mr. Farraday—and Miss Violet Hawtry, the star, who never came to first readings until the whole cast was assembled and could be impressed with the fact that she came and went as she listed.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I take it that you all know one another—and Mr. William Rooney," said Mr. Vandeford, as he took a seat at the left of a table placed in the center of the stage just beyond the footlights. Mr. Rooney marched to a place beside him, and rapped with a large black pencil for attention from the groups into which the dozen members of the cast had fallen after mutual introductions and greetings.
"Everybody grab a seat that is good enough to glue to for five hours while Fido here gives out your parts," commanded Mr. Rooney, without in any way acknowledging Mr. Vandeford's introduction to the company. Mr. Rooney's voice was low and rich, and had the precision and decision of a machine-gun in its utterances. With hurried obedience the entire company looked about the stage for seats.
Miss Bébé Herne, though having fifty pounds the advantage of any of the others in avoirdupois, was the first seated. She merely dropped down upon a stout pine bench, the front of which was stuccoed to represent antique marble, and peremptorily motioned Mr. Wallace Kent to that portion of the seat left after she had wedged herself as far to one side as possible. Mr. Kent obeyed immediately, though he had just placed a rickety, stuffed chair beside the gold one occupied by Miss Blanche Grayson, the glowerer. Miss Lindsey sat on the end of an overturned box hedge before a drop curtain of a twilight night, and Mr. Reginald Leigh sat in a wicker chair under a brilliant canvas flowering shrub of no known variety. The rest of the company were soon seated and receiving the small, blue-backed, manuscript books from the pale young man whom Mr. Rooney always addressed as Fido.
"Everybody here but Miss Hawtry," said Mr. Rooney, and he glared at Mr. Vandeford as though that gentleman must be concealing the star in the pocket of his gray, silk-crash coat.
"And Miss Hawtry is here also," came in a very beautifully modulated voice from left stage, as the tardy star came down center, and stood directly in front of the table at which sat the producer and his stage-manager. Mr. Vandeford rose immediately and said good-morning; Mr. Rooney kept his seat and looked Miss Hawtry through and through with a cold reproof.
"Five minutes late," he said with an edge in the words that cut.
"I really beg your pardon, and it shall not happen—" the star was beginning to say in an apologetic tone, which bent under the cold edge of the assault, as Mr. Vandeford had hoped it would, when Mr. Rooney cut it off with a curt command to pale Fido.
"Give out the Hawtry part."