IN THREE WEEKS, CHÈNEVILLOT completed a small and utterly charming stage. Among his workmen, all of whom had demonstrated unflagging zeal, the house painter Toresse and the upholsterer Beaucreau deserved special praise. Toresse, highly dubious of the supplies he’d find in South America, had stocked a provision of barrels filled with various paints, and he covered the entire structure in brilliant red; on the pediment, the words “The Incomparables Club” were haloed by a cluster of rays symbolizing the glory of the brilliant association. And Beaucreau, having brought along a stock of fabrics intended for Ballesteros, employed a supple scarlet damask to hang two wide curtains that met at the middle of the platform or opened into the wings. A white Persian with fine gold arabesques served to mask the wall of planks raised as a backdrop.
Chènevillot’s creation met with great success, and Carmichael was chosen to inaugurate the new stage by singing several romances from his repertoire in his marvelous soprano.
That very day, at around four in the afternoon, Carmichael, having laid out his feminine attire, retired to his hut and reappeared an hour later utterly transformed.
He wore a blue silk gown decorated with an opulent train on which we could read the number 472 in black. A woman’s wig with thick golden curls, perfectly suited to his still beardless face, completed the curious metamorphosis. Asked about the meaning of the strange figure inscribed on his skirt, Carmichael told us the following story:
Toward the end of winter, eager to leave for America where a brilliant engagement awaited him but kept in Marseille until March 14, the date of his military draft lottery, Carmichael had selected from among the available steamers the Lynceus, which lifted anchor on the 15th of that month.
At the time, the young man sang every night to phenomenal acclaim at the Folies Marseillaises. When he appeared at town hall on the morning of March 14, the assembled conscripts easily recognized their famous compatriot and, after the lottery, they all cheered him spontaneously at the exit.
Carmichael, following their example, had to pin a flexible, brightly spangled number to his hat, and for the next hour the streets of the city witnessed a joyous and fraternal parade bursting with songs and merriment.
When the time came for good-byes, Carmichael handed out complimentary tickets to his new friends, who that evening burst drunkenly into the backstage of the Folies Marseillaises, brandishing their hats still decorated with dazzling figures. The most inebriated of the lot, the son of one of the city’s leading tailors, seeing Carmichael in full regalia and about to go onstage, yanked from his pocket a pair of scissors and a threaded needle wrapped in a large swatch of black silk; then, with a drunkard’s insistence, he began sewing onto the elegant blue gown the number 472, which his illustrious comrade had drawn that morning.
Carmichael, laughing, gladly lent himself to this strange whim and, after ten minutes’ work, three artfully cut and sewn figures spread in black over his long train.
Several moments later, the conscripts, seated in the hall, noisily cheered Carmichael, calling for encores of all his romances and shouting out, “Long live number 472!” to the great joy of the spectators, who stared in amazement at the number inscribed on the young singer’s train.
Leaving the next day, Carmichael hadn’t had time to remove the extravagant decoration, which he now wanted to preserve as a precious memento of his native city, from which a simple whim of Talou’s might keep him forever.
His story over, Carmichael climbed onto the Incomparables’ stage and gave a dazzling rendition of Dariccelli’s Aubade. His falsetto, rising with unparalleled elasticity to the extreme heights of the soprano’s range, effortlessly performed the most tortuous vocalizations; chromatic scales shot off like rockets, and the breathtakingly rapid trills stretched to infinity.
A prolonged ovation underscored the final cadence, soon followed by five new romances, each as stupefying as the first. The entire audience, full of emotion and gratitude, warmly greeted Carmichael as he left the stage.
Talou and Sirdah, present since the beginning of the performance, visibly shared our enthusiasm. The stupefied emperor prowled around Carmichael, whose eccentric get-up seemed to fascinate him.
Soon, a few imperious words, promptly translated by Sirdah, told us that Talou, wishing to sing like Carmichael, demanded that the young artist give him a certain number of lessons, the first of which would begin right away.
Sirdah had not yet finished her sentence when the emperor was already mounting the stage, with Carmichael obediently in tow.
There, for half an hour, Talou, emitting a rather pure head-voice, endeavored to copy slavishly the examples furnished by his instructor, who, amazed at the monarch’s unusual skill, brought to the task a tireless and genuine zeal.
At the end of this impromptu session, the tragedienne Adinolfa wanted to try out the acoustics of Trophy Square from a declamatory perspective. Dressed in a magnificent jade gown quickly donned for the occasion, she took the stage and recited some Italian verses accompanied by striking postures and expressions.
Meisdehl, the emperor’s adoptive daughter, had just joined us and appeared mesmerized by the brilliant poses the famous artist adopted.
The next day, Adinolfa was in for a great surprise while strolling beneath the fragrant vaults of the Behuliphruen, whose blazing vegetation daily attracted her vibrant soul, which always sought out natural or artistic splendors.
For a while the tragedienne had been crossing a heavily wooded area carpeted with brilliant flowers. She soon came across a clearing, in the middle of which Meisdehl, improvising words in her jargon full of lyrical eloquence, was reproducing for Kalj the captivating gestures that had drawn everyone’s attention to the Incomparables’ stage the day before, after Talou’s lesson.
The chariot, parked twenty paces away, was guarded by a slave reclining on a bed of moss.
Adinolfa silently watched Meisdehl for some time, astonished by the graceful aptness of her gestures. Wishing to encourage this theatrical instinct, she approached the girl to teach her the fundamentals of stagecraft.
Their first attempts yielded fabulous results. Meisdehl easily understood the subtlest indications and spontaneously devised tragic facial expressions of her own.
Over the following days, several new sessions were devoted to the same subject, and Meisdehl quickly became a veritable artist.
Encouraged by this marvelous progress, Adinolfa thought to teach her pupil an entire scene, to be acted on the day of the gala.
Seeking to give her protégé’s debut a powerful boost, the tragedienne conceived an ingenious idea that required telling us a little of her past.
Adinolfa was celebrated the world over, but the English in particular professed an ardent and fanatical cult for her. The ovations the London public showered upon her were like no other, and it was by the thousands that they sold her photograph in every corner of Great Britain, which had become like her second home.
Wanting a fixed residence for her prolonged stays in the City of Fog, the tragedienne bought a sumptuous and very old castle on the banks of the Thames; the owner, a certain Lord Dewsbury, ruined by unsound investments, sold her in a package deal, and at rock-bottom price, the building and all its contents.
From this residence one could easily reach London, while preserving the advantages of wide-open spaces and fresh air.
Among the various ground-floor rooms used for entertaining, the tragedienne was particularly fond of the huge library, its walls garnished top to bottom with old volumes in precious bindings. A wide shelf filled with theatrical works attracted the great artist’s attention most often, and, well versed in the English language, she spent long hours browsing through the national masterworks of her adoptive country.
One day, Adinolfa had taken down ten volumes of Shakespeare and set them on her desk, looking for a certain scholarly note she recalled, without remembering exactly which drama it referred to.
Having found and transcribed the note, the tragedienne went to return the books to their place; but, back in front of the library, she noticed a thick layer of dust lying on the empty section of shelf. Temporarily setting her burden on an armchair, she dusted off the smooth, powdered surface with her handkerchief, taking care as well to run the improvised dustcloth over the back wall of the cabinet, the vertical portion of which also required some cleaning.
Suddenly, a sharp click was heard, produced by a secret catch that Adinolfa had just activated by inadvertently pressing on a certain spot.
A thin, narrow board snapped back, revealing a secret compartment from which the tragedienne, with pounding heart, carefully withdrew a very old and scarcely legible manuscript.
She immediately brought her discovery to London, to the great expert Creighton, who, after a rapid examination under a loupe, let out a cry of stupefaction.
There could be no doubt that they had before them the original manuscript of Romeo and Juliet, written in Shakespeare’s own hand!
Thunderstruck by this revelation, Adinolfa commissioned Creighton to make her a clean, faithful copy of the precious document, which might contain some unknown scene of incalculable interest. Then, having determined the value of the weighty manuscript, which the expert put at an astronomical sum, she rode back to her new abode, lost in thought.
According to the precise and irrevocable sales contract, the entire contents of the castle belonged by rights to the tragedienne. But Adinolfa was far too principled to take advantage of a fortuitous circumstance that skewed the deal so shamefully in her favor. She therefore wrote to Lord Dewsbury to tell him of her adventure, enclosing a check for the amount at which, in the expert’s opinion, the impressive relic was valued.
Lord Dewsbury expressed his warmest gratitude in a long letter of thanks, in which he furnished the probable explanation for the mysterious discovery. Only one of his ancestors, Albert of Dewsbury, a major collector of autographs and rare books, could have conceived such a hiding place to preserve a manuscript of that magnitude from theft. Now, Albert of Dewsbury, who died suddenly while in excellent health, his skull fractured in a terrible riding accident, had no time to reveal to his son, as he’d no doubt intended to do on his deathbed, the existence of the treasure he’d so carefully cloistered, which since then had remained undisturbed.
Two weeks later, Creighton personally delivered the manuscript to the tragedienne, along with two copies: the first scrupulously faithful to the text, its archaisms and obscurities intact; the second clear and comprehensible, a veritable translation with modernized language and usage. After the expert’s departure, Adinolfa took up the second copy and began reading attentively.
Each page filled her with profound stupefaction.
Many times had she played the part of Juliet, and she knew the entire drama by heart. But in the course of her reading, she continually came across lines of dialogue, stage directions, and details of expression or costuming that were entirely new and unfamiliar.
From start to finish, the play proved to be adorned with a host of enrichments that, without altering the substance, studded it with many picturesque and unexpected scenes.
Certain of having in hand the true version of the celebrated drama of Verona, the tragedienne hastened to announce her discovery in the Times, an entire page of which was devoted to quotations taken from the manuscript itself.
The article had enormous repercussions. Artists and scholars flocked to the former residence of the Dewsburys to see the extraordinary document, which Adinolfa let them browse through while discreetly keeping a careful watch.
Two camps immediately formed, a violent polemic breaking out between the partisans of the famous document and its adversaries who declared it apocryphal. Newspaper columns were filled with heated editorials, their contradictory proofs and other details soon dominating conversations throughout England and the entire world.
Adinolfa thought she’d take advantage of this hubbub to stage the play in its new version, reserving for herself the role of Juliet, the sensational debut of which could crown her name with imperishable brilliance.
But no director would touch the project. The outsized staging costs required by each page of the manuscript dissuaded even the hardiest souls, and it was in vain that the great actress knocked at door after door.
Demoralized, Adinolfa lost interest in the matter and soon the debate subsided, unseated by a sensational crime that captured the public’s attention overnight.
It was the final scene of Shakespeare’s tragedy that Adinolfa wanted Meisdehl to play, in the version from the celebrated autograph. The tragedienne had brought with her the modernized copy, just in case arrangements panned out with some American directors. The delicate and talented Kalj would make a charming Romeo, and the many subtle gestures and expressions could easily replace the dialogue, which was beyond the children’s grasp; besides, words were hardly needed to convey such a popular subject.
Lacking a number of props, they had to come up with some scrap of costume or personal item that would identify the two characters. Hats seemed the simplest and most expedient solution. But according to the manuscript, the two lovers were dressed in fabrics with red decorations and richly embroidered matching headwear.
This latter requisite was weighing on Adinolfa’s mind one day, as she took her usual stroll through the thickets of the Behuliphruen. Suddenly, while walking with eyes on the ground, absorbed in her thoughts, she stopped short at what sounded like a slow, interrupted monologue. She turned and spotted Juillard seated cross-legged on the grass, holding a notebook and drafting his notes, which he then repeated aloud. A large illustrated volume lying open on the ground drew the tragedienne’s attention because of certain reddish hues that happened to match her innermost thoughts perfectly. She approached Juillard, who vaunted the powerful charms of his chosen retreat. It was to this place of meditation and silence that he came each day, since the recent completion of his lecture for the gala, to draft a long article on the Franco-Prussian War. With a sweep of his arm he showed, spread around him, several works that had been published during the terrible conflict of 1870, among them the large volume in which the two pages the actress had spotted depicted with great verve, respectively, the battle of Reichshoffen and an episode from the Commune; the red tones, used at left for the uniforms and plumes, at right for a blazing building, could from a distance give the illusion of embroidery as specified in the Shakespearean manu-script. Hoping to use this ideally colored paper in lieu of fabric, Adinolfa made her request of Juillard, who tore out the coveted pages without having to be asked twice.
With scissors and pins, the tragedienne fashioned for Kalj and Meisdehl the two classic headpieces worn by the lovers from Verona.
That first matter settled, Adinolfa returned to Shakespeare’s text, carefully studying the stage directions in every detail.
Certain episodes of the final portion were explained in a fairly lengthy prologue, comprising two scenes devoted to Romeo and Juliet’s childhoods, before they’d met.
It was this prologue that absorbed Adinolfa’s particular attention.
In the first scene, young Romeo listened to the teachings of his preceptor, Father Valdivieso, a learned monk who inculcated in his pupil the purest and most devout moral principles.
For a number of years, Valdivieso had burned the midnight oil, surrounded by the folios that were his joy and the ancient parchments whose secrets unfailingly yielded to his wisdom. Gifted with phenomenal memory and inspiring elocution, he charmed his disciple with highly imagistic stories, whose meanings nearly always contained some worthy moral. The initial scene was almost entirely composed of his monologues, which were only occasionally interrupted by little Romeo’s naïve interjections.
Bible stories flowed from the monk’s lips. He evoked in minute detail the temptations of Eve, then recounted the adventures of the debauched Thisias, who, in the middle of an orgy in Zion, saw before him the fearsome and livid specter of God the Father.
Then came the following details on the legend of Pheor of Alexandria, a young libertine and Thisias’s contemporary:
Devastated at being left by a beloved mistress, who had let him know of their breakup by not bothering to arrive for a rendezvous, Pheor, renouncing his life of pleasures and seeking consolation in faith, had retreated to the desert to live as an anchorite, sometimes returning to spread the good word in the same places where he had committed his past errors.
Following long privations, Pheor had grown alarmingly thin; his unusually large head seemed immense compared to his frail body, and his salient temples protruded from both sides of his gaunt face.
One day, Pheor appeared in the public square just when the citizens had gathered to discuss matters of state. At the time, two distinct assemblies, one for the young and one for the elderly, met on an appointed day at this forum, the former proposing bold initiatives that the latter tempered with moderation. Each group was arranged in a perfect square that might cover as much as an acre.
The arrival of Pheor, famous for his sudden conversion, momentarily suspended the debates.
Immediately the neophyte, as was his habit, began preaching his fervent disdain of wealth and pleasures, especially aiming his remarks at the younger group, to which he seemed to impute every vice and turpitude.
Incensed by this provocative stance, the targets of his harangue leapt onto him and knocked him down in a rage. Too weak to defend himself, Pheor painfully stood and hobbled away covered in bruises, cursing his attackers. Then, at a bend in the road, he fell to his knees in ecstasy at the sight of his former lover, who passed by without a hint of recognition, richly adorned and trailing a crowd of slaves. For a moment, Pheor felt his old passion well up inside him; but, once the vision had passed, he regained control of himself and returned to the desert, where after years of constant penitence he died free of his obsessions and forgiven of his sins.
After the legend of Pheor, the monk Valdivieso described two famous martyrdoms, that of Jeremiah whom his countrymen stoned with many sharp, pointed flints, then that of Saint Ignatius thrust among wild beasts, which lacerated his body while his soul, in a contrary movement, rose to heaven, fancifully portrayed as an enchanted isle.
As a whole, these lessons had great coherence. Their striking subjects were clearly intended to guide Romeo’s spirit toward good, which also explained how Juliet, the very image of pure, conjugal love, could so easily conquer a young man who had initially given in to frivolous, debasing affairs.
The second scene of the prologue, a touching counterpart to the first, showed little Juliet sitting with her nurse, who kept her spellbound with tales both delightful and terrifying; among other fabulous characters, the storyteller depicted the good fairy Urgela, who shook out her tresses to spread countless gold coins along her path, and the ogress Pergovedula, she of the hideous yellow face and green lips, who wolfed down two heifers for supper when she had no children to sate her.
In the play’s final scene, the one Adinolfa intended to stage, numerous images borrowed from the prologue reappeared before the eyes of the two lovers, who, having downed a lethal potion, were subject to constant hallucinations.
Following the manuscript’s indications, all these phantoms composed a series of tableaux vivants in rapid succession, which would no doubt prove hugely difficult to produce in Ejur.
Adinolfa immediately thought of Fuxier, whose picturesque lozenges might stand in for costumes and stage props.
Acquiescing to the actress’s wishes and promising to perfect all the requested visions, Fuxier, who was quite conversant with the subtleties of the English language, familiarized himself with the prologue and the final scene; these gave him ample material on which to exercise his talents.
One direction in the manuscript called for a greenish hearth next to Juliet’s tomb, which might cast a tragic light over the poignant scene the two lovers played. This brazier, whose flames could be colored with sea salts, seemed the perfect vehicle for burning the evocative lozenges. Adinolfa, made up so she could appear toward the end as the ogress Pergovedula, would lie down behind the tomb and, thus hidden from sight, toss into the coals, at the opportune moment, the lozenge needed to produce a given image.
Even so, they could not dispense entirely with cameo roles. Two apparitions, Capulet dressed in a shining gold robe and Christ seated on the famous donkey, had to be acted by Soreau, who had in his costume chest all the necessary components to fashion what he needed. It would take him only a few seconds to change from one costume to the other offstage, and the docile ass Milenkaya could be pressed into service. Chènevillot agreed to fit into the backdrop two fine grilles, cleverly painted, which the light from a reflector lamp would make transparent at the appropriate moment; behind them, two niches of sufficient size would be installed at the requisite height.
As Romeo’s ghost was supposed to descend from heaven at the end above Romeo’s own corpse, one of Kalj’s brothers, who bore a striking likeness in age and features, was designated as his double. From the rest of the page illustrating the cavalrymen at Reichshoffen they cut a second cap identical to the first, and Chènevillot easily devised a hand-operated suspension system with some rope and a pulley from the Lynceus.
For Urgela, they took from the ship’s hold a certain mannequin head that had remained intact at the bottom of a trunk addressed to a barber in Buenos Aires. A rolling pedestal was quickly fashioned to support the white-and-pink bust with wide blue eyes. Not far from the trunk, a cascade of gilded tokens, like twenty-franc louis, had spilled from a crushed package filled with various games. Using a tiny dab of glue, they attached them tentatively to the bust’s magnificent blonde hair, which fell in loose braids over both shoulders; the slightest jostle would dislodge these dazzling coins, which the generous fairy could thus sow in profusion.
The rest of the staging, including the tomb and the brazier, they left entirely to Chènevillot.
According to a brief indication in the manuscript, Romeo placed on Juliet, who had just awoken from her lethargic slumber, a rich necklace of rubies, which the groom at first thought would adorn only his beloved’s cold corpse.
This detail gave Bex the chance to use a balm of his own devising, with which he’d always had success when handling materials for his experiments.
This was an anesthetic strong enough to make the skin insensitive to burns; by applying this protective coating to his hands, Bex could manipulate at any temperature a certain metal he’d invented called bexium. Had he not discovered this precious element beforehand, the chemist could never have brought forth bexium, whose special properties were triggered by extremes of heat or cold.
To replace the rubies, which were unavailable in Ejur, even in imitation, Bex suggested several glowing coals strung onto asbestos, which he’d supply. Kalj would have only to take from the brazier the strange, sparkling red jewel and put it on Meisdehl, whose chest and shoulders would be immunized in advance with the infallible balm.
The tragedienne accepted Bex’s offer, having first made sure that the trusting, brave Meisdehl would consent.
The entire scene was to be played without dialogue. But, in rehearsing their gestures, Kalj and Meisdehl demonstrated so much intelligence and good will that Adinolfa, encouraged by this success, also tried to teach her pupils a few phrases translated into French, which would help explain the various apparitions. The attempt yielded rapid results, and at that point all that remained was to fine-tune, until the day of the gala, the touching pantomime that the two children had understood so completely.