THE SUNDAY FICTION MAGAZINE, JANUARY 21, 1917
THE N
ILE ORPHA
OB
N
r .. i i
HE show was work
ing north through
Illinois, hitting the
high spots (or a
night a spot; and
anybody will tell
you that Illinois is
as flat as an Eng
lish wheeze. "
v - Off in th distance was two weeks in
Chicago that is, nearly in Chicago, near
' - enough to "stop" in town while,m.k-
- i ing the suburban theaters. And that
was probably all that kept the troupe to
- gether. The prospect of a sandwich with
real butter on it has kept many a com
pany from disbanding. And real butter
can be had only In the city.
It was a drama a bedraggled success
f of hlnteryears. The big producer had
abandoned it because it had ceased to
pay. So the little one bought the rights
' - on royalty. That he bought that kind of
shows probably accounts for his being
little.
' Affairs were at the stage when the
players were getting what they got
at an in lump sums of one dollar at
a time. Regular salaries hadn't been
paid in so many" weeks that some of
the hams had forgotten what they
were supposed to be getting, and
Just bung on, asking every day for
- - - - large moneys, showing pressing let
. 'ten from insurance companies and
the folks at home, and then thank-
- lng their lucky stars when they
gouged a "one-spot" from the
sides of the frantic manager
was doing the best ha esvEC wMA
. JT wasn't much.
The scenery was going;
. and the properties.
disgruntled per
By JacK ILait
Illuttnted by Ben Cohen
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PJTR. LAIT knows the stage and pictures herewith w'.e
" ambitions of a leading lady, the love of a press'
agent, .and gives an entirely unexpected ending. .
Yights, Julia Marlowe as Juliet, Fanny
Davenport in her prime, lira Leslie Car
ter In her declension, and Evelyn Nesbit
Thaw in her Peter Thompson innocence,
all labeled "Blise de Vaoille as Kitty
Hall In "When the Angelus Is Ringing.' "
Be had no cuU left of Elise, ner had
he money to have any made. But he was
"plugging" Elise because she was the
darling of his heart. He rarely saw her
he was ten days "ahead" of the show.
But each night, inthe lumpy bed of the
stuffy room in the smelly Main street ho
is the last peg that one may cling to and
yet remain in "the business." The under-canvas
companies are the ones that
travel in wagons, camp at crossroads and
play at each stop several nights, switch
ing the bill nightly, every artist doubling
for the ballyhoo at the door and tb
vaudeville between the acts.
A GIRL who has gone through that,
and who is still going through, is not
soft, easily moved or highly enthusiastic.
She has trampled on her optimism and
worn out her faith and starved out her
cheerfulness.
Elise had won the fancy of Walter
Cass, the press agent, when, he had first
seen her play her part. With artificial
curls and knee dresses she had appealed
to him as glorious. Be bad aoet her be
fore and after that in her worm-down
"street" shoes, her flea bitti far boa,
bar nonmatching sai tj sairt and walk
ing Jacket and her m .sanddy-colorsd
hair. But that chre o
from his imagination tltm pic tare he
seen behind the gaslight faetKchts
you will grant me that a press agent to
endowed with imagination If
endowment at all.
Cass, in his flights of ai aluwtii m. al
ways conjured up a vision cf same day
bringing out Elise in that i
Broadway, as a star, surprising the bias
lan ffJW WfI
JlTiw n ft!
u 11 n' II 111 M i'
natives of insular Manhattan with ner
beauty and her genius, proclaiming her
to the world as making Billy Burke look
like a mudhen and acting figure eights
around Nazimova.
Thus far he was starting her by get
ting hyperbola ted "notices' about her In
the Jay papers in advance of the "attrac
tion." These were more or less neutral
tsed by the roasts that the critics thun
dered after her on her departure from
each town. Cass couldn't write the re
views; but he could and did writ tha
"front stuff."
It so hrppened that one of the big
New York managers had been born in
one of the little Illinois towns. Because
he liked to keep cases on Tom, Zeke and
Harry of his boyhood schooldays, he got
the home paper every week. And, as he
glanced through it one week, hunting
"locals," he saw a cut of a beautiful girl,
and under it the name of Elise de Vaoille.
Hi perked up, got his head closer, and
read :
Mile, de Vaoille Is the daughter
of a French nobleman, orphaned by
the war now raging over the Mood
soaked fields of sorrow-stricken Eu
rope. Having studied at home for
the drama as a pastime, and part
of her curriculum in an ultra-fashionable
Parisian- finishing-academy,
she turned to that as a means of
livelihood and a prospect of a ca
reer when she casne to this country.
In leas thaa three months she bad
learned eaeugh English to enable
her t play the part of Kitty Dugan
brRtlantly and tellingly.
What Mile, de Vaoille may lack
ke tkt perfect accent she more than
9 by her exquisite and
f ty. so appealing that
the audience loves her on sight and
is in the hollow of her hand before
the curtain rings down on the first
thrilling act of that terrific and
spectacular drama masterpiece,
"When the Angelus Is Ringing."
The Forty-second street manager read
It twice. He knew the ways of tanktown '
press agents. But you know
how it la when one sees it in
print it seems plausible. Why,
I have known the very men who
write the stuff (and invent tt)
to-ead and believe It! So the
wise New Yorker touched a but
ton. The office boy was sent to
summon one of the stage di
rectors, who in turn was sent to
Illinois to find that show, watch
"My stars"
she gasped.
"fa come."
And come
it hnj.
outfit and two others were "doubling"
.their parts, which means they were each
playing two roles at different times. The
bfflposting "paper" announced It as the
original New York cast." Most of the
cast bad never even seen Pittsburgh.
The press agent had picked up a mis
"ceSaneons collection -of left-over cats at
cms of the theaters and was Ang to
the one-night-stand editors likenesses of
'Eva Tangnay, Annette Kenennaxm tm
tel of the county seat where he tardss
he dreamed of her. .
He always dreamed of her as ELisei e
Vaoille, though he knew that she waa
Fannie McCann, daughter of Jt
Cann. the character woman" of the
show, and of a deceased "heavy." She
a hardened, seasoned, weathered.
grained, warping Ingenue who had done
many -years In stock, "on the road" and
"ander canvas In rep," of which the last
Elise de Vaoille "work,"
in a report.
Two nights later the stranger.
bought a ticket at the box office fax
a hayseed burg, sat down In an