Actors -- Fiction; Adultery -- Fiction; Married people -- Fiction; Staffordshire (England) -- Fiction
Then followed moments in which she anxiously waited for her cues. She was
nervously afraid of missing her entrance, and she dreaded spoiling her
success by some mistake. But it was not until the end of the act when she
stepped out of the crowd of servant-girls to sing the famous coquetting
song that she reached the summit of her triumph.
Kate was about the medium height, a shade over five feet five. When she
swung her little dress as she strutted on the stage she reminded you
immediately of a pigeon. In her apparent thinness from time to time was
revealed a surprising plumpness.
For instance, her bosom, in a walking dress no more than an indication, in
a low body assumed the roundness of a bird's, and the white lines of her
falling shoulders floated in long undulations into the blue masses of her
hair. The nervous sensibility of her profession had awakened her face, and
now the brown eyes laughed with the spiritual maliciousness with which we
willingly endow the features of a good fairy. The hips were womanly, the
ankle was only a touch of stocking, and the whole house rose to a man and
roared when coquettishly lifting the skirt, she sang:
'"Look at me here! look at me there!
Criticize me everywhere!
From head to feet I am most sweet,
And most perfect and complete."'
The audience, principally composed of sailors--men home from months of
watery weariness, nights of toil and darkness, maddened by the irritating
charm of the music and the delicious modernity of Kate's figure and dress,
looked as if they were going to precipitate themselves from the galleries.
Was she not the living reality of the figures posted over the hammocks in
oil-smelling cabins, the prototype of the short-skirted damsels that
decorated the empty match-boxes which they preserved and gazed at under the
light of the stars?
Her success was enormous, and she was forced to sing
'Look at me here!'
five times before her friends would allow the piece to proceed. At the end
of the act she received an ovation. Two reporters of the local newspapers
obtained permission to come behind to see her. London engagements were
spoken of, and in the general enthusiasm someone talked about grand opera.
Even her fellow artists forgot their jealousies, and in the nervous
excitement of the moment complimented her highly. Beaumont, anxious to kick
down her rival, declared, 'That, to say the least of it, it was a better
rendering of the part than Leslie's.' And on hearing this, Bret, whose
forte was not repartee, moved away; Mortimer, in his least artificial
manner, said that it was not bad for a beginning and that she'd get on if
she worked at it. Dubois strutted and spoke learnedly of how the part had
been played in France, and he was pleased to trace by an analysis which was
difficult to follow a resemblance between Kate and Madame Judic.
The second act went equally well. And after seeing the ghosts she got a
bouquet thrown to her, so cheekily did she sing the refrain:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account