Julie had gone to London, and it was Aunt Rosine who went to the school to fetch the child.
Sarah delighted to tell of this departure from the school.
“I hated to leave,” she told me, “and it was two hours before they could succeed in dressing me. Once this was accomplished, I flew at Tante Rosine like a young fury, and spoiled all her elaborate coiffure.
“She was furious and, bundling me into her coach, commanded me to keep silent. But I would not, and throughout the journey in the jolting carriage from Auteuil to 6, rue de la Chaussée d’Antin, where my aunt and my mother owned a joint flat, I tore at her hair and kicked at her legs, and otherwise performed like the disgraceful young ragamuffin I really was.
“I was no better on our arrival at the flat, and kept the whole household in an uproar until I heard the sudden announcement that my father had arrived! Then I collapsed and had to be carried to bed, where I lost consciousness for three hours. When I awoke, it was to find a doctor and nurse installed and an array of medicine bottles on the table. I felt utterly exhausted and I heard Doctor Monod, the great physician who had been called by the Duc de Morny, tell my father that I was in an extremely delicate condition and that my recovery depended upon my being kept absolutely quiet. ‘Above all,’ said he, ‘she is not to be “crossed.”’”
Sarah’s father often visited her during her three days’ convalescence from the fever brought on by a fit of temper, and on two occasions he brought with him Rossini, who lived in the same street and was an intimate friend.
Julie had been informed of Sarah’s illness, but was herself ill at Haarlem, in Holland, where she had just arrived from London. It was a fortnight before she reached Paris, and in the meantime Sarah stayed at Neuilly, in the home of another and married aunt whose husband afterwards became a monk.
When Julie finally arrived, a dinner was arranged to take place the night before Sarah was taken to the Convent. Edouard Bernhardt was present. This was the last time Sarah saw her father, for he died shortly afterwards in Italy.
Sarah’s life at the Convent has been more or less faithfully described in her own Memoirs, and I shall not dilate on it here. She was expelled three times—the last time for good. She was baptised at the age of twelve under the name of Rosine, and from then on dated her determination to become a nun. For two years she was fanatical on the subject of religion, but this did not prevent her fits of temper from breaking out and disturbing the whole school.
“All my time at the Convent I was haunted by the desire to be a nun,” she said to me once. “The beautiful life of the sisters who taught us at Grandchamps, their almost unearthly purity, their tranquil tempers, all made a tremendous impression on me. I dearly desired to take the vows and, had it been left to me, Sarah Bernhardt would have become Sister Rosine. But I doubt whether I would have remained a nun for life!