The Second Class Passenger: Fifteen Stories. Gibbon Perceval
of impatience.
"You can still do nothing?" she asked
"My powers are where they were, Madame," he answered.
"Then," she said slowly, "it rests with me." She gathered her cloak about her again. "I am tired, as you see," she said wearily—"tired and a little strained. I will beg you to excuse me."
He rose to his feet at once and bowed formally.
"At least," he said, "such a matter is not to interrupt our friendship, Madame."
"It is for you to say," she answered, smiling faintly. He laughed, pressed her hand, and bade her good-night, leaving her with more matter for thought than he could have suspected.
There was real cheering for her that night when she left the theatre. Truda had been cheered before in many cities; but that night she took note of it, looking with attention at the thrusting crowd collected to applaud her. It filled the square, restless as a sea under the tall lamps; rank upon rank of shadow-barred faces showed themselves, vociferous and unanimous—a crowd in a good temper. She bowed in acknowledgment of the shouts, but her face was grave, for she was taking account of what it meant to be alone amid an alien multitude, sharing none of its motives and emotions. The fat coachman edged his horses through the men that blocked the way, till there was space to go ahead, and the cheers, steady and unflagging, followed her out of sight.
The baby was in bed when she arrived at her hotel; Truda paid a brief visit to its side, then ordered that her manager should be summoned, and sat down to write a note. It was to the big young Jew, the baby's uncle; she had a shrewd notion that Monsieur Vaucher would be able to lay hands on him. The note was brief: "I fear there will be more persecutions. The Governor can do nothing. When there is another attack on our people send to me. Send to me without fail, for I have one resource left."
"You can find the man?" she demanded of Vaucher.
The little hardened Frenchman was still under the spell of her acting.
"Madame," he said grandly, "I can do anything you desire. He shall have the note to-night."
Poor Monsieur Vaucher, the charred remains of a man of sentiment, preserving yet a spark or two of the soft fire! Could he have known the contents of that note and their significance, with what fervor of refusal he would have cast it back at her! But he knew nothing, save that Truda's acting restored to him sometimes for an hour or two the emotions of his youth, and he was very much her servant. It was in the spirit of devotion and service that he called a droshky, and fared out to the crooked streets of the Jewish quarter to do his errand. It was a fine soft night, with a clear sky of stars, and Monsieur Vaucher enjoyed the drive. And as he went, jolting over the cobbles of the lesser streets, he suffered himself to recall the great scene of that night's play—a long slow situation of a woman at bay, opposing increasing odds with increasing spirit—and experienced again his thrill.
"Ah," he murmured over his cigar; "the Schottelius, she has the sense of climax!"
And so he duly delivered the note and returned to the hotel and bed, a man content with the conduct of his own world.
Things went well with Truda and Vaucher and all the company for the next two days. Never had she been so amenable to those who charged themselves with her interests, never so generally and mildly amiable to those who had to live at her orders. But none of those who came in contact with her failed to observe a new note in her manner. It was not that she was softer or gentler; rather it seemed that she was more remote, something absent and thoughtful, with a touch of raptness that lent the true air of inspiration to her acting. Her spare time she spent with the baby—she and Marie, her maid, playing with it, making a plaything of it, ministering to it, and obeying it. It had never cried once since Truda had taken it in her arms, but adapted itself with the soundest skill to its surroundings and companions.
"I found it ten years too late," said Truda once.
Her maid looked at her curiously.
"It is surprising that Madame should not have found one before," she said.
Those two days were placid and full of peace, quiet with the lull of emptiness. But in them Truda did not forget. She was realizing herself, and her capacity to deal with a situation that would not be devised to show her talents. She felt that she stood, for the first time, on the threshold of brisk, perilous, actual life, of that life which was burlesqued, exaggerated, in the plays in which she acted. It was expectancy that softened her eyes and lit her face with dreams—expectancy and exhilaration.
She was about to be born into the world.
The summons came suddenly on the evening of the second day. Even as she drove to the theatre, Truda had noted how the streets were uneasy, how men stood about in groups and were in the first stages of drunkenness. The play that night was that harrowing thing La Tosca; she was dressed for her part when the word came, written on a scrap of paper: "It is to-night. I am waiting at the stage door." She pondered for a few moments over it, then reached for her cloak and drew it on over her brilliant stage dress.
"Find Vaucher," she said to her maid. "Tell him I cannot play to- night. He must put on my understudy. Say I am ill."
The maid, startled out of her composure, threw up her hands.
"But, Madame——!" she cried.
Truda waved her aside. "Lose no time," she ordered. "Tell Vaucher I am ill. And then go back to the baby."
She wasted no more words on the woman, but swept forth from the room and down the draughty ill-lit passage to the stage-door. Its guardian, staggered at her appearance, let her out; on the pavement outside, muffled to the eyes like a man that evades observation, was the big young Jew. He was gazing out over the square; her fingers on his arm made him look round with a start.
"I am here," she said. "Now tell me."
With eyes that glanced about warily while he spoke, he told her quickly, in low tones of haste.
"There is a mob gathering again at the market," he said. "Two spirit- shops have been broken open. That is how it begins always. Some Jews who were found in the street were beaten to death; soon they will move down to the Jewish streets, and then"—his breath came harsh through set teeth—"then murder and looting—the old programme. Now I have told you; can you do anything?"
"Let us find a droshky," said Truda, "and go to the Jewish quarter."
"A droshky!" He stared at her. "Do you think any driver will take us there to-night?"
"Then we can walk," said Truda; "show the way. If we stay here any longer, I shall be seen and prevented."
He hesitated an instant; then set off sharply, so that now and again she had to run a few paces to keep up with him. He took her round by the back of the theatre and into a muddle of streets that led thence. The quiet of the night closed about them; Truda was embarked upon her purpose.
"How can you help?" asked the young man again. "Tell me what you will do?"
"Me?" said Truda. "For to-night I can do nothing; I am not an army. But I think that after to-night there will be no more Judenhetze in this city. That is what I think. For, after all, I am the Schottelius; people know me and set a value on me, and if harm comes to me there will be a reckoning."
He was looking down sideways on her as she spoke.
"Is that all?" he asked.
"All!" cried Truda, and braced herself to subdue his doubts. "All! It is enough, and more than enough. Have I come so far without knowing what will rouse my audience?" She slowed her steps, and he slowed to keep by her side. She lifted her clear face proudly. "I tell you," she said, "the part I am to play to-night will move Europe to its core. Paris! Berlin! Vienna! Even cautious prim London! I have them under my hand; even to-morrow they will be asking an account, crying for the heads of the wrongdoers on a charger. And you ask me if that is all!"
"You do not know," he said. "To-night, it is not a play; it is life and death."
"But