Little Bornier looked at big Emile Augier. There was in this beseeching and piteous glance an expression of sorrow at having to cut out a scene which he prized, and of fear at vexing an Academician just at the time when he was hoping to become a member of the Academy.
“Cut it out, cut it out—or you are done for!” brutally replied Augier, and he turned his back. Then poor Bornier, who resembled a Breton gnome, came up to me. He scratched himself desperately, for the unfortunate man suffered from a distressing skin disease. He did not speak. He looked at us searchingly. Poignant anxiety was expressed on his face. Perrin, who had come up to me, guessed the private little drama which was taking place in the heart of the mild Bornier.
“Refuse energetically,” murmured Perrin to me.
I understood, and declared firmly to Bornier that if this scene were cut out I should refuse the part. Then Bornier seized both my hands, which he kissed ardently, and running up to Augier he exclaimed, with comic emphasis:
“But I cannot cut it out—I cannot cut it out! She will not play! And the day after to-morrow the play is to be performed.” Then, as Emile Augier made a gesture and would have spoken: “No! No! To put back my play eight days would be to kill it! I cannot cut it out! Oh, mon Dieu!” And he cried and gesticulated with his two long arms, and he stamped with his short legs. His large hairy head went from right to left. He was at the same time funny and pitiable. Emile Augier was irritated, and turned on me like a hunted boar on a pursuing dog:
“Will you take the responsibility, Mademoiselle, of the absurd window scene on the first performance?”
“Certainly, Monsieur; and I even promise to make of this scene, which I find very beautiful, an enormous success!”
He shrugged his shoulders rudely, muttering something very disagreeable between his teeth.
When I left the theatre I found poor Bornier quite transfigured. He thanked me a thousand times, for he thought very highly of this scene, and he dared not thwart Emile Augier. Both Perrin and myself had divined the legitimate emotions of this poor poet, so gentle and so well bred, but a trifle Jesuitical.
The play was an immense success. But the window scene on the first night was a veritable triumph.