Other members of the troupe were given their parts as chamber maids, dishwashers, valets and the like, and for a whole day we ran that hotel. The next day the personnel, having been given free tickets to the theatre, were so impressed by Sarah’s personality that they returned to work in a body, and the manager, declaring that he had never eaten better meals than those prepared by Sarah and myself, refused to accept a franc in payment for our rooms and board.
As soon as it was finished, Sarah had the coffin taken to her flat and placed alongside her Louis XVI. bed. Whenever visitors came to call upon her, she would make a point of showing them this strange piece of furniture.
Her sister Régine, who was tubercular, had been sent to Switzerland, but when her disease became complicated with another malady, all hope was given up, and she returned to Paris, to her sister’s flat.
Sarah had only just moved into this new home and had only one bedroom, so Régine and she at first shared the same bed. Régine’s condition grew so serious, however, that the doctors warned Sarah that she could no longer sleep with her sister without a serious risk of contracting the malady.
Accordingly, Sarah made up a bed in the coffin and slept in that.
When the doctor came he was horrified.
“Take that thing out!” he ordered. “It is not yet time!”
With some difficulty Sarah convinced him that the coffin was not meant for her sister, but was her own bed. A few days later Régine died.
The tragedy had its effect on Sarah’s life for a year or more, and she became a devout worker. Her name gradually ceased to be connected by gossipy writers with the scandals of the day. But after a year of mourning she flung off her mask of grief and “La Grande Sarah,” as she was known, again became a reigning queen of Paris.
She fitted up one of the rooms of her flat as a studio, and here, when she was not at the theatre or resting, she worked at painting and sculpture.