Le

nothing worth drinking gains flavour when one is alone. voilà! She was discontented, this poor old Mère Fradeau, despite all that touching affection could lavish on her.

So, until the night of the famous dinner given by La Poupée to M. Corneille, Director of the Comédie, his friends, and the friends of his friends. The occasion celebrated the last of a hundred nights through which a noted play had pleased fickle Paris. It was also to feast a celebrated author whose latest effort was soon to be produced.

our

How he has genius, that gross César Corneille! Cécé of the Comédie ! Genius disguised as a corpulent little Jew who seems sleepy and stupid until one looks at the eyes and sees, mon Dieu, what lively intelligence, quelle joie d'esprit; a tub of a man with the soul of a great artist striving through the burden of hindering flesh. It was he who found Michette entertaining the patrons of a café-chantant and made her the idol of Paris in a night and a day. He discovered a thoroughly miserable little Michette Fradeau, whom he rechristened to create from nothing the fame of La Jolie Poupée. Many another has he thus raised from obscurity, but La Poupée is his triumph, for which the little Michette is not too ungrateful. An eye for talent is the greatest gift that he brings to his trade.

The dinner was a triumph

In her youth she had been a mistress of saucepans with unusual ability. At the Villa des Enchantées she at last found her level in the kitchen, the only apartment where she could feel at home. The upstairs servants, so she considered, were insolent hussies no better than they should be, but almost at once she found a friend in the cook. They had much in common, and were thus able to talk to each other without restraint.

Alors, throughout all the course of the dinner it was noted that Mère Fradeau frequently disappeared, at first with a muttered word of apology; later, with no word at all. La Poupée, who was seated beside the famous author with Cécé of the Comédie opposite, thought only that the old woman displayed an embarrassing interest in the cuisine. During all the early part of the evening Mère Fradeau was respectably grave, stiff with concern lest the least faux pas should mar this distinguished occasion. Finally, however, the crooked smile which she wore on each return from the kitchen stretched itself to become jocular grin; demanded utterance in cackling throaty chuckles for which no adequate reason could be assigned.

One guesses the secret! Hélas, mes amis, truth could not very long continue to wear that mask of imposed restraint. All simply, for one of the courses there had been pre

pared a marvellous sauce which demanded the flavour of Martell '71. For flavour one does not require all of the bottle. What? Should the remainder be wasted? Impossible to think so! Hence the visits to the kitchen; therefore the hilarity of thirsty old Mère Fradeau.

Does it become clear how presently, for the first time in that house, she was amusing herself? There was a story which she told to a famous actor on her right, embellishing the tale with appropriate gesture.

"Was I to listen to that? I ask it, monsieur? Bon Dieu ! That I gave her a great kick of the foot, bif-bouf, like an enraged ass. Understand me, that raised her . . .'

Consider, alors, that there was much more of this, all related in the most terrible slang, poured forth with an accompaniment of hoarse chuckles as if the imp of all jests struggled for escape from the throat of this Mère Fradeau. Certainly the guests at the table gave her all their attention.

Cécé of the Comédie, that gross César Corneille, leaned over the table to speak to the famous author of the piece he was about to produce.

"You see?" he questioned. "But yes! It is droll, is it not?

do

"Sufficiently droll! What you think after that? "It is curious that she should be the mother of our Poupée."

"What else, mon ami? Her speech, at times, is a little uncommon, perhaps?"

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"All authors are stupid, as I have often said," remarked César Corneille. Now, to a man like myself For another moment he observed the merry old woman through half-closed eyes. "I see, par exemple, a beggar crouching at our cathedral door. Le vrai type-could we cast the part better? Listen, mon ami, how it is that she writes her own lines! One has only to listen, then, with a little refinement, it goes! You see it? She is our beggar! That is certain, my old! "

The author, seeing all that had been pointed out to him, granted the tribute of profound admiration.

"You look through the eyes of genius, my friend! Who but Cécé could have such an inspiration?"

"It is decided," whispered M. Corneille. "Remains but to persuade her, and that we may leave to Michette. Consider also that the man of affairs in me does not ignore the value of the advertisement."

Messieurs, thus was the redemption of Madame Fradeau arranged. What Cécé wanted, that he would have; the word "no" is a locution he does not understand. Mère Fradeau required but little persuasion. She was to appear at the Comédie? Well, and why not, mon Dieu ? Was she not as

good as these others? With a little encouragement, there was nothing she would not attempt to do.

Her part demanded but little effort to learn, and this was excellent, for her memory was traitorous. Her mere appearance was sufficient to fill the part, and this, indeed, was what Cécé had in his eye. Nevertheless, it required much argument before the old woman could be persuaded to make her appearance consistent with the rôle. She owned silkswhy not wear them? There was a gold chain to hang at her wrinkled neck, an ornament of which she was extremely proud. What! To clothe herself in the discarded rags of the vendor of apples, before all the people who would be looking at her? Jamais! She would not be the usual foul beggar, be that understood! She would beg like a lady, or she would not be a beggar at all.

Never, perhaps, had Cécé laboured with any young ingénue as he laboured in training this type of a Mère Fradeau. With that, a word at a time, he perfected her in the part until, becoming familiar with the strange environment, she forgot to act, and became wholly herself, which was the end that Cécé meant to achieve. Already in his leaping imagination, the producer could see the articles fall from the Press: "Once Again a Corneille Discovery! Great Character Actress Wins Success in

New Part! What a furore when he also permitted it to be admitted by him that his most recent discovery was the mother of lovely Poupéefamous in the past, but since twenty years retired from the stage. Yes; it was a story. We were ourselves prepared to give the matter two columns in that excellent journal, 'Le Grand Bavard.' There would be a clatter of talk on the boulevards. The Parisian public would rush in crowds to look at the mother of Michette, and afterwards gossip about her supreme talent, hidden so long, while the salons gabbled intelligently about laws of heredity.

You see, mes amis, how it was intended that Mère Fradeau should make a success, even distracting the attention of critics from the work of the author, which was of a nature to justify reasonable doubts in the mind of M. Corneille.

César

Alors, all being prepared, there arrives the first night, an event of importance, as must be any première at the Comédie. The piece was that new classic 'L'Allumeuse," by Max Delacroix ; producer, Corneille. Oh, clever Cécé! There had been but certain vague paragraphs sent to the Press when, only three days before the actual production, the programme was published. Flaming posters by Mugère proclaimed La Poupée in the leading part. Then, scarcely less important: "The Beggar - Woman, created by

Félice Fradeau, mother of La Belle Poupée."

Was this not enough to entrap all the gulls of Paris? And then how cleverly the old woman had been fitted into the play! You will, perhaps, remember the touching scene where L'Allumeuse, cold heroine of a thousand amorous triumphs, given up at last to a burning love, broken, betrayed, abandoned, seeks peace in the sacred cathedral, only to meet her forgotten, deserted mother, a ragged beggar, crouched at the cathedral door? It was a scene to bring tears to the eyes of a mule. Even a moneylender with a bosom of brass has been known to weep loudly and unashamed while looking at it.

Hélas! that even the gods of this earth are not omniscient! Cécé had planned as well as a man may do. He had secured his actress, his comedy, a triumph of publicity, and a house so packed there was not even space for one other pair of eyes. More than sixty million francs' worth of dazzling jewels gleamed from the boxes. The fauteuils were serried rows of starched shirt-fronts and powdered shoulders. In the galleries the riff-raff had packed themselves in layers on the benches, prepared without prejudice to voice raucous approval or ferine condemnation.

and the slightest hint that she was not doing well threatened to remove her permanently from the stage.

She walked on stiff as a wooden puppet with a painted grimace. Immediately she was frightened by that sea of upturned faces. She felt like a criminal on the scaffold, with every eye malignantly fixed on her. For all that, let them look! She was determined to maintain her dignity. She sat down as though every joint was a rusty hinge, and gathered her skirts modestly over her ankles. She spoke, and the words, base argot in context but in diction really genteel, were scarcely audible beyond the footlights. Her lines came from her throat with all the expression attained by a welltrained parrot endowed with the voice of a ventriloquist's doll. Then, very decently, all in due order, the old woman walked off again, with such mincing gait, so sedately, that the grinning galleries were dumb with astonishment. The poor Cécé ruined his beard in the wings, even that sacred ornament not being safe from his writhing fingers, which could only fail to express the torture that racked his artist's soul. At the first exit he transferred those fingers from his beard to the shoulders of Mère Fradeau.

"Name of a pipe ! he cried through white teeth closeclenched. "What is this that

VOL. CCXVI.—NO. MCCCX.

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Never before had one spoken so to Cécé. He had, without doubt, met his equal in repartee. At last, a situation with which he was unable to deal at an instant's notice. A terrible resignation succeeded his burst of rage. The première was ruined. Even his reputation might be destroyed. That he had fallen thus between his eye for talent and need for advertisement! Luckily, in the second act she had but one line to speak and the most brief appearance. Dame! At least she should not ruin the great scene in the final act. In thirty-five minutes another could take the part-any one! Even the old property-woman, who had once been an actress. Cécé issued an order that she should scan the lines and make up for the rôle.

Gloomily he looked from the wings at the second act. Mère Fradeau, if possible even worse than before, was ignored in the triumph accorded to La Poupée. The idol of Paris,

smiling, took nine curtain calls, but even that burst of enthusiasm could not siasm could not console M. Corneille for his first great failure.

And then messieurs, you have been told that César Corneille has genius of an uncommon kind. What is genius if not the ability to twist a triumph from the rags of defeat? The kind of desperate courage that dares to stake the work of years on a theorem? That, mes amis, is the type of genius that belongs to César Corneille.

Mère Fradeau, in the wings, insulted, avoided him. He approached the haughty Mère Fradeau. He smiled. bowed graciously.

He

"I beg you to forgive me. Acknowledged that I spoke hastily, is it not so! One regrets to have such a terrible temper, now, indeed, more especially so. Madame has in this act done so very much better. Accept, then, my gincere apology. And now, for the big scene coming, there is just a hint or two. if Madame will permit?

With excessive courtesy he drew her arm into his own, and led the way into the little box of an office, a transformed dressing-room, to which Cécé always retired when planning a stroke.

One may not record the facts of that interview. It is sufficient that Mère Fradeau came forth, her black eyes shining with pleasure, a certain animation marked in her