Memoirs of a Courtesan in Nineteenth-Century Paris (47 page)

So, as I was saying, like all great people, Rachel was criticized, and I rebelled when she was found imperfect.

‘ She is proud, impertinent, and arrogant,’ a pretty little Jewish girl said about her one day. ‘ I knew her when she was poor; I even lent her

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The Variétés Theater

some of my dresses when she was singing in the streets, and today she will not even say hello to me.’

I thought this lack of gratitude was not consistent with Rachel’s personality. I knew she was generous to a fault and carefree about the greatness wrought by her genius. So I contradicted my dear companion. She vehemently swore that she was telling the truth. I believed her less than ever, and I decided to clear up the matter.

Mlle Rachel did not receive people just any time of the day, if she even consented to see you, otherwise the curious and the meddlers would have invaded her little house on Rue Trudon. I had been warned about that, but I went to her house after the theater anyway.

The concierge, who was in a pretty little alcove on the right, motioned for me to sit in a beautiful Voltaire-style armchair and invited me to look at paintings and knickknacks while he went to see if Mlle Rachel was receiving. I regretted coming. What was I going to say? How was I going to present myself ?

I was deep in thought when a liveried servant entered. He told me,

‘ Madame is in her study; she is not receiving today; come back Thursday at two. Madame will see you then. If what you have to say to her is urgent, write her a note.’

That evening I was having dinner with someone whose house had a beautiful garden. I was permitted to pick some flowers for a bouquet. I thought it was so beautiful because of the rare specimens it contained that I sent it to Mlle Rachel with a letter in which I thanked her.

I shall never have a royal audience, but, if I ever had one, I would not be more intimidated than I was when the servant told me, ‘ This way, mademoiselle. Madame is ill, but she will see you anyway.’

When we were on the third floor, I was announced.

The room I had just been brought to was simply furnished. The drapes were Persian, and the carpet was from Smyrna.

Rachel was reclining on a bed, which faced the door. Her torso was partly visible. On top of a peignoir of exquisite batiste, she wore a green velvet jacket trimmed in gold; its sleeves were Greek-style. Her head was intricately wrapped in a brightly colored Algerian scarf. On each side of this sort of Jewish turban, fringes hung down to her shoulders.

Her black and naturally curly hair stuck out here and there in little silky curls.

Immediately I thought of these Israelite beauties described in the holy book so nicely illustrated by Horace Vernet. I had always been told that I looked like Rachel. For the moment the resemblance seemed impossible, even insulting to her.

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The Variétés Theater

‘ Sit down,’ she said. ‘ What can I do for you?’’

‘ Oh, my goodness, madame, I have come here, under pretext, out of a huge desire to express my gratitude for the wonderful emotions your talents have stirred in me. What could possibly seem like curiosity, actually comes from the heart.’

‘‘I must speak low and little because I have a cold and my throat hurts.

You are completely forgiven. I am always happy to hear that someone is fond of me.’

Then her sister came in with a roll of paper in her hand.

‘‘Leave us,’ Mlle Rachel told her as she kissed her forehead. ‘ Come back in half an hour.’

She left, glancing in my direction. Obviously she was looking for the famous resemblance.

After the door was closed, Mlle Rachel asked me with a smile, ‘And may we inquire about your pretext?’

‘ Theater tickets for the benefit of a nice young man who asked me to place some tickets for him.’

‘‘You were right to give a different reason for your visit. From morning until evening, and sometimes from evening until morning, I am besieged with requests. How many tickets do you want to give me?’’

‘ One, since you are willing to grant my wish.’

‘ Send me another one for my mother.’

‘‘I would prefer to bring them to you myself if you will let me.’

  

I returned on Saturday. She was in her living room, on the first floor.

On the left, by the entrance, was a trellis covered with ivy; all around the living room was a damask print Persian sofa; on the right was a glass door credenza filled with thousands of knickknacks. Mlle Rachel was seated in a large armchair with her back to the daylight. Above her head, in an oval frame, was a portrait of her oldest son.

Her attire that day was dark. She was wearing a black dress of antique moire with wide pleats from the waist down; over it, a black cloth jacket trimmed with little black braids; a solid-color collar and smooth cuffs imprisoned her neck and wrists; her hair was in flat bands, and a little ringlet on her forehead was the only evidence of straightened waves.

‘ Forgive me, I am eaten up with worry. I have just turned down a part. They will force me to play it, but I shall leave the theater. Oh! Here, for your friend’s loges.’

The performance was held five days later. Beautiful as a star, she came to the Variétés.

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The Variétés Theater

‘ Come see me,’ she told me.

I thanked her with a look, but I did not want to abuse her generosity, and I did not go back to Rue Trudon until two weeks later. That is when I talked to her about this woman who said she knew her well.

Mlle Rachel assured me she had never seen her. I teased my good friend about it so much that she left the Variétés.

 ?

Most of my day was spent in rehearsal. I rarely saw Richard. One evening I got some very sad news.

‘‘I have come to bid you adieu,’ he told me. ‘‘I misled you about my fate; the fire in San Francisco left me with nothing.’

‘And what are you going to do?’’

‘ It is not a matter of what is to be done; it is done. I enlisted as a mere private in the foreign legion, and I am going to join my regiment in Africa.’

My proceedings were still pending; things were moving distressingly slow.

I was invited to dinners and balls everywhere. I went. I invited people to my home, but less from a desire to have fun than from a desire to escape.

I worked five hours a day at the theater. I had already acted in a play created by the authors of the revue, both handsome young men. One, a real scatterbrain, could mimic Paris’s best actors; he could woo you in the voice of that bewitching Pelletier, the actor from the Funambules, and could continue sounding just like Laurent from l’Ambigu. The other one was very reserved with actresses, but since I was the only exception to that inclination, I was grateful for the friendship he showed me.

This kind of support was doubly needed because the women waged a dogged war against me under the guise of lots of caresses and embraces.

Ozy, with her sweet voice and pretty mouth, was not even nice to her close friends. One day M. C

, the manager, asked her where she

was going.

‘‘Well! I am going where you condemned me to go, to see Mlle Mogador, since you made me her partner.’

‘‘But,’ he said, ‘‘I did not make the obligation to see her part of your engagement!’

M. C

’s cashier was an Armenian Jew whose administrative strategy consisted of paying no one. When we asked for money or for costumes, he would reply in German. If we insisted, he would speak Hebrew. One day the theater concierge handed him a bill.

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The Variétés Theater

‘ Thirty sous for lung meat,’ said the cashier. ‘‘What is that for?’’

‘‘Monsieur, it is to feed the cats.’

‘ Why cats?’

‘‘But, monsieur, to eat the mice, who otherwise would eat the scenery.’

‘‘Well,’ replied the Armenian, ‘‘if the cats eat the mice, they do not need lung meat, and if they do not eat them, then there is no need for cats.’

I wore three different costumes in the revue, and I had to pay for all three.

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My entrance at the Variétés gave me the opportunity to meet Mme Ugalde, one of the stars shining over Paris, and one of its quintessen-tial ornaments.1 She neither needed Camille dresses nor Laura hats. Her only adornment was the voice of a nightingale, and she might not dazzle the eyes, but she enchanted the ears. She left the Opéra-Comique 2 and came to the Variétés to play the part of Roxelane in The Three Sultanas.

Since I was the bad actress, I always went on right after the curtain rise. I had just finished playing in The Queens of the Ball, when Boullé came to tell me, ‘‘Before you leave, you must meet Mme Ugalde; I shall take you to her dressing room.’

Boullé was the stage manager; he stammered, was excitable, and was prone to anger. His son, who acts under the name of Nanteuil, is not better treated than anyone else.

So I went downstairs, since I changed on the second floor, and called on the first floor siren. Boullé announced me, and Mme Ugalde came toward me, a smile on her lips, probably to show off her white teeth.

Not in the habit of formulating my sentences ahead of time and, wishing to make an exception this time so I could properly address the great soprano, I was totally at a loss for words like a child who has forgotten a compliment. She continued putting on her makeup as if I were not there.

Gradually, under the layers of white, red, and black skillfully applied, I could see reappear the beautiful Opéra-Comique enchantress with the roses. That gave me back my voice, and when she let out a practice roulade, my admiration came back.

That day we were opening The Three Sultanas, and the theater was packed. She asked me to go hear her so I could tell her what I thought of her. At first I thought she was joking, but she insisted, so I went.

The declamations and the arias were applauded and encores, requested. The performance lasted twice as long as usual.

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The Variétés Theater

When I returned to Mme Ugalde’s dressing room, she was dressing for the last act, and I heard a discussion between her and her hairdresser.

She was supposed to go on stage in a slave costume wearing her hair down. Her hair was almost five feet long and draped over her like a coat.

But she had made up her mind that she had a hollow spot on the back of her head, and she absolutely insisted that the space, which everyone more or less has, be filled.

Charles (the hairdresser’s name) was at his wits’ end. He could not find anything to fill the supposed cavity, when Mme Ugalde handed him a fistful of stuffing she had pulled out of a chair. Everyone protested, she stomped her feet, and the hair artist categorically refused to cram part of this mop into the soprano’s gorgeous hair!

,   

One night when I was working I was handed a little piece of paper folded like a notice. I walked over to the oil lamp and read: Madame, I must speak to you tonight at ten thirty; meet me at the Galerie Vivienne, Passage des Panoramas.

At first I thought it was a presumptuous admirer, then when I looked again, I recognized a woman’s handwriting.

I left at exactly ten thirty, and I carefully looked everywhere as I went across the passage. I did not glimpse the shadow of a woman, but I saw a short young man who seemed to be walking toward me. I was about to get into a carriage on Rue Vivienne, when he told me as he gracefully removed his hat, ‘‘I am the one who wrote you; I did not take the time to remove my costume.’

His hair was a beautiful shade of black, abundant but curly, slicked down in a way I always dislike in a man.

When he mentioned the costume, I looked at him more attentively.

He told me with a smile, ‘‘You do not recognize Adèle, the little florist who worked on Rue du Temple, the walk-on at the Belleville Theater?’’

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37

o ADeadWomanandaGhost

A Familiar Story—Baptized near Her Dying Mother—

The Good Mother Was Burning the Letters—This Poor Médème

   was a woman, and I do not understand how I could have been fooled even for one minute. I asked her if she wanted to get in my carriage so we could be comfortable to talk. She accepted after telling me that she was coming to take me to a woman who wanted to see me before dying. I asked her the name of the sick woman, and she replied, ‘ To rue d’Angoulême, on the corner of the boulevard.’ 1

And my coachman took off.

Now I asked her to tell me more clearly who she was.

‘‘I am your age,’ she said. ‘‘I was born the same day as you, and we apprenticed in the same house, on Rue du Temple. My mother died on Rue de Bondy, and for a long time the street vendor who is on the boulevard, at the entrance of the Ambigu-Comique, every evening would give me some stale rye bread or some overripe cherries she had not been able to sell during the day.

‘‘I was a walk-on at Belleville when you came to play the part of a grisette in Canal Saint-Martin. For several months I have been living at a hotel on Rue d’Angoulême. Two months ago a young woman moved in the room next to mine. Well, one morning I heard moans and I went in. A doctor was immediately sent for. The poor woman remained in pain until two in the morning. She barely heard, ‘It is a girl.’ She sank into some sort of lethargy.

‘‘I entrusted the little girl to the care of a neighborhood woman. The drawers were empty, and I paid the first month for a nursemaid. Since that time, the poor woman has been getting worse. She told me, after she had written two letters that remained without answers, ‘I had a friend some time back; however, if the one I loved so much has abandoned

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A Dead Woman and a Ghost

me at a time like this, then why would she remember me? But go see her anyway, you will find her at the Variétés Theater.’ ’

  

We had reached Rue d’Angoulême. I sent my coachman away and followed her. The house was not elegant, the stairs were straight up and narrow, and on each landing were eight or ten doors with numbers. The apartments looked like snuff boxes.

Adèle cautiously opened a door. I saw a small room in disarray. I could not make out the sick woman’s features. A candle was burning on a night stand.