IV
"You bet I have!" Mr. Seven Sachs cordially agreed, abandoning the endof a cigarette, putting his hands behind his head, and crossing hislegs.
Whereupon there was a brief pause.
"I remember--" Edward Henry began.
"I daresay you've heard--" began Mr. Seven Sachs, simultaneously.
They were like two men who by inadvertence had attempted to passthrough a narrow doorway abreast. Edward Henry, as the host, drewback.
"I beg your pardon!" he apologized.
"Not at all," said Seven Sachs. "I was only going to say you'veprobably heard that I was always up against Archibald Florance."
"Really!" murmured Edward Henry, impressed in spite of himself. Forthe renown of Archibald Florance exceeded that of Seven Sachs as thesun the moon, and was older and more securely established than itas the sun the moon. The renown of Rose Euclid was as naught to it.Doubtful it was whether, in the annals of modern histrionics, thegrandeur and the romance of that American name could be surpassed byany renown save that of the incomparable Henry Irving. The retirementof Archibald Florance from the stage a couple of years earlier hadcaused crimson gleams of sunset splendour to shoot across the Atlanticand irradiate even the Garrick Club, London, so that the membersthereof had to shade their offended eyes. Edward Henry had never seenArchibald Florance, but it was not necessary to have seen him in orderto appreciate the majesty of his glory. No male in the history of theworld was ever more photographed, and few have been the subject ofmore anecdotes.
"I expect he's a wealthy chap in his old age," said Edward Henry.
"Wealthy!" exclaimed Mr. Sachs. "He's the richest actor in America,and that's saying in the world. He had the greatest reputation. He'sstill the handsomest man in the United States--that's admitted--withhis white hair! They used to say he was the cruellest, but it's notso. Though of course he could be a perfect terror with his companies."
"And so you knew Archibald Florance?"
"You bet I did. He never had any friends--never--but I knew him aswell as anybody could. Why, in San Francisco, after the show, I'vewalked with him back to his hotel, and he's walked with me back tomine, and so on and so on till three or four o'clock in the morning.You see, we couldn't stop until it happened that he finished a cigarat the exact moment when we got to his hotel door. If the cigar wasn'tfinished, then he must needs stroll back a bit, and before I knewwhere I was he'd be lighting a fresh one. He smoked the finest cigarsin America. I remember him telling me they cost him three dollarsapiece."
And Edward Henry then perceived another profound truth, his secondcardinal discovery on that notable evening: namely, that no matterhow high you rise, you will always find that others have risen higher.Nay, it is not until you have achieved a considerable peak that youare able to appreciate the loftiness of those mightier summits. Hehimself was high, and so he could judge the greater height of SevenSachs; and it was only through the greater height of Seven Sachs thathe could form an adequate idea of the pinnacle occupied by the uniqueArchibald Florance. Honestly, he had never dreamt that there existed aman who habitually smoked twelve-shilling cigars--and yet he reckonedto know a thing or two about cigars!
"I am nothing!" he thought modestly. Nevertheless, though the savourof the name of Archibald Florance was agreeable, he decided that hehad heard enough for the moment about Archibald Florance, and thathe would relate to Mr. Sachs the famous episode of his own career inwhich the Countess of Chell and a mule had so prominently performed.
"I remember--" he recommenced.
"My first encounter with Archibald Florance was very funny," proceededMr. Seven Sachs, blandly deaf. "I was starving in New York,--trying tosell a new razor on commission--and I was determined to get on to thestage. I had one visiting-card left--just one. I wrote 'Important' onit, and sent it up to Wunch. I don't know whether you've ever heardof Wunch. Wunch was Archibald Florance's stage-manager, and nearly asfamous as Archibald himself. Well, Wunch sent for me upstairs to hisroom, but when he found I was only the usual youngster after the usualjob he just had me thrown out of the theatre. He said I'd no rightto put 'Important' on a visiting-card. 'Well,' I said to myself,'I'm going to get back into that theatre somehow!' So I went up toArchibald's private house--Sixtieth Street I think it was--and askedto see him, and I saw him. When I got into his room he was writing.He kept on writing for some minutes, and then he swung round on hischair.
"'And what can I do for you, sir?' he said.
"'Do you want any actors, Mr. Florance?' I said.
"'Are you an actor?' he said.
"'I want to be one,' I said.
"'Well,' he said, 'there's a school round the corner.'
"'Well,' I said, 'you might give me a card of introduction, Mr.Florance.'
"He gave me the card. I didn't take it to the school. I went straightback to the theatre with it, and had it sent up to Wunch. It justsaid, 'Introducing Mr. Sachs, a young man anxious to get on.' Wunchtook it for a positive order to find me a place. The company was full,so he threw out one poor devil of a super to make room for me. Curiousthing--old Wunchy got it into his head that I was a _protege_ ofArchibald's, and he always looked after me. What d'ye think aboutthat?"
"Brilliant!" said Edward Henry. And it was! The simplicity of thething was what impressed him. Since winning a scholarship at school byaltering the number of marks opposite his name on a paper lying on themaster's desk, Edward Henry had never achieved advancement by a deviceso simple. And he thought: "I am nothing! The Five Towns is nothing!All that one hears about Americans and the United States is true. Asfar as getting on goes, they can make rings round us. Still, I shalltell him about the Countess and the mule--"
"Yes," continued Mr. Seven Sachs, "Wunch was very kind to me. But hewas pretty well down and out, and he left, and Archibald got anew stage-manager, and I was promoted to do a bit of assistantstage-managing. But I got no increase of salary. There were twowomen stars in the play Archibald was doing then--'The Forty-Niners.'Romantic drama, you know! Melodrama you'd call it over here. He neverdid any other sort of play. Well, these two women stars were aboutequal, and when the curtain fell on the first act they'd both make abee line for Archibald to see who'd get to him first and engage himin talk. They were jealous enough of each other to kill. Anybody couldsee that Archibald was frightfully bored, but he couldn't escape. Theygot him on both sides, you see, and he just _had_ to talk to 'em, bothat once. I used to be fussing around fixing the properties for thenext act. Well, one night he comes up to me, Archibald does, and hesays:
"'Mr.--what's your name?'
"'Sachs, sir,' I says.
"'You notice when those two ladies come up to me after the first act.Well, when you see them talking to me, I want you to come right alongand interrupt,' he says.
"'What shall I say, sir?'
"'Tap me on the shoulder and say I'm wanted about something veryurgent. You see?'
"So the next night when those women got hold of him, sure enough Iwent up between them and tapped him on the shoulder. 'Mr. Florance,'I said. 'Something very urgent.' He turned on me and scowled: 'Whatis it?' he said, and he looked very angry. It was a bit of the bestacting the old man ever did in his life. It was so good that at firstI thought it was real. He said again louder, 'What is it?' So I said,'Well, Mr. Florance, the most urgent thing in this theatre is that Ishould have an increase of salary!' I guess I licked the stuffing outof him that time."
Edward Henry gave vent to one of those cordial and violent guffawswhich are a specialty of the humorous side of the Five Towns. And hesaid to himself: "I should never have thought of anything as good asthat."
"And did you get it?" he asked.
"The old man said not a word," Mr. Seven Sachs went on in the sameeven, tranquil, smiling voice. "But next pay-day I found I'd gota rise of ten dollars a week. And not only that, but Mr. Floranceoffered me a singing part in his new drama, if I could play themandolin. I naturally told him I'd played the mandolin all my life. Iwent out and bought a
mandolin and hired a teacher. He wanted toteach me the mandolin, but I only wanted him to teach me that oneaccompaniment. So I fired him, and practised by myself night and dayfor a week. I got through all the rehearsals without ever singingthat song. Cleverest dodging I ever did! On the first night I wasso nervous I could scarcely hold the mandolin. I'd never played theinfernal thing before anybody at all--only up in my bedroom. I struckthe first chord, and found the darned instrument was all out of tunewith the orchestra. So I just pretended to play it, and squawked awaywith my song, and never let my fingers touch the strings at all. OldFlorance was waiting for me in the wings. I knew he was going tofire me. But no! 'Sachs,' he said, 'that accompaniment was the mostdelicate piece of playing I ever heard. I congratulate you.' He wasquite serious. Everybody said the same! Luck, eh?"
"I should say so," said Edward Henry, gradually beginning to beinterested in the odyssey of Mr. Seven Sachs. "I remember a funnything that happened to me--"
"However," Mr. Sachs swept smoothly along, "that piece was afailure. And Archibald arranged to take a company to Europe with'Forty-Niners.' And I was left out! This rattled me, specially afterthe way he liked my mandolin-playing. So I went to see him about it inhis dressing-room one night, and I charged around a bit. He did rattleme! Then I rattled him. I would get an answer out of him. He said:
"'I'm not in the habit of being cross-examined in my owndressing-room.'
"I didn't care what happened then, so I said:
"'And I'm not in the habit of being treated as you're treating me.'
"All of a sudden he became quite quiet, and patted me on the shoulder.'You're getting on very well, Sachs,' he said. 'You've only been at itone year. It's taken me twenty-five years to get where I am.'
"However, I was too angry to stand for that sort of talk. I said tohim:
"'I daresay you're a very great and enviable man, Mr. Florance, butI propose to save fifteen years on your twenty-five. I'll equal orbetter your position in ten years.'
"He shoved me out--just shoved me out of the room.... It was that thatmade me turn to play-writing. Florance wrote his own plays sometimes,but it was only his acting and his face that saved them. And they weretoo American. He never did really well outside America except in oneplay, and that wasn't his own. Now I was out after money. And I stillam. I wanted to please the largest possible public. So I guessed therewas nothing for it but the universal appeal. I never write a play thatwon't appeal to England, Germany, France just as well as to America.America's big, but it isn't big enough for me.... Well, as I wassaying, soon after that I got a one-act play produced at Hannibal,Missouri. And the same week there was a company at another theatrethere playing the old man's 'Forty-Niners.' And the next morning thetheatrical critic's article in the Hannibal _Courier-Post_ was headed:'Rival attractions. Archibald Florance's "Forty-Niners" and new playby Seven Sachs.' I cut that heading out and sent it to the old man inLondon, and I wrote under it, 'See how far I've got in six months.'When he came back he took me into his company again.... What pricethat, eh?"
Edward Henry could only nod his head. The customarily silent SevenSachs had little by little subdued him to an admiration as mute as itwas profound.
"Nearly five years after that I got a Christmas card from oldFlorance. It had the usual printed wishes--'Merriest possibleChristmas and so on'--but, underneath that, Archibald had written inpencil, 'You've still five years to go.' That made me roll my sleevesup, as you may say. Well, a long time after that I was standing at thecorner of Broadway and Forty-fourth Street, and looking at my own namein electric letters on the Criterion Theatre. First time I'd everseen it in electric letters on Broadway. It was the first night of'Overheard.' Florance was playing at the Hudson Theatre, which isa bit higher up Forty-fourth Street, and _his_ name was in electricletters too, but further off Broadway than mine. I strolled up, justout of idle curiosity, and there the old man was standing in the porchof the theatre, all alone! 'Hullo, Sachs,' he said, 'I'm glad I'veseen you. It's saved me twenty-five cents.' I asked how. He said, 'Iwas just going to send you a telegram of congratulations.' He likedme, old Archibald did. He still does. But I hadn't done with him.I went to stay with him at his house on Long Island in the spring.'Excuse me, Mr. Florance,' I says to him. 'How many companies haveyou got on the road?' He said, 'Oh! I haven't got many now. Five, Ithink.' 'Well,' I says, 'I've got six here in the United States, twoin England, three in Austria, and one in Italy.' He said, 'Have acigar, Sachs; you've got the goods on me!' He was living in thatmagnificent house all alone, with a whole regiment of servants!"