Before she accepted this contract, however, Lambert Thiboust, a well-known playwright, asked her to take the name part in La Bergère d’Ivry, and she accepted—subject, of course, to the approval of the directors of the Ambigu theatre, where the piece was to be played.
These directors were two men named Faille and Chilly. Chilly had a mistress, Laurence Gérard, whom he desired to have the part. To please Thiboust, however, they consented to give Sarah a hearing in the rehearsal room of the Ambigu, and thither she went and recited a part she had learned at the Comédie Française in On ne badine pas avec l’amour. There was complete silence until she had finished, and then Faille rose and shook his head sadly.
“My poor little girl,” he said, with assumed sympathy, “you cannot take this part! You are too thin—and, besides, you are in no way equipped for the theatre! You are not even a good actress!”
Sarah could hardly believe her ears.
“Tenez,” pursued Faille, “here is Chilly, who has heard you from behind that curtain. Ask him what he thinks.”
Sarah turned to Chilly, the little director who was later to be intimately associated with her career.
“Lambert Thiboust is crazy!” said Chilly shortly. “You would be no good in the part, mademoiselle! We cannot give it to you!”
As Sarah went out, more or less in a daze, she passed Laurence Gérard on her way in. Then she realised why she had lost the part.
Later on, Chilly became famous as co-director of the Odéon. Faille never succeeded, and years later, taking pity on him, Sarah Bernhardt acted in a benefit performance to establish a fund for his old age.
Sarah was ever generous in such matters. She never forgave an enemy who remained powerful, but she could always forgive and forget when poverty or misery overtook those who had done her harm.