Divine Sarah

by Adam Braver

  “Don’t wait for me.”

  “Please. Save it for Paris.”

  Sarah pulled the blanket up over her face.

  She left the covers over her head until she heard the door close. Even though she could barely breathe.

  SHE HEARD MAX’S FOOTSTEPS fall away down the hall. But when they stopped, Sarah pulled the covers back over her head. The footsteps started again, thankfully fading in the distance, instead of returning for one more round of sparring. She stayed in bed. She wondered if her new life would afford her the comforts that she had become accustomed to. Maybe reduced to some level of charming squalor that eschewed the bourgeoisie yet had no true revolutionary or radical convictions—more a matter of gliding through and enjoying her life. Perhaps a quiet retirement, reinvesting herself in the occasional company of her son, Maurice (of course that is its own story altogether). She pictured her future in a modest fourth-floor walk-up apartment. She would be able to add some air of romance to the flat, instead of it being like a traditional actor’s flophouse (although the presence of all her pets—Bizibouzou the parrot, Darwin the monkey, and all the dogs might suggest otherwise).

  She would be all right.

  People would probably still care what she had to say (even though she wouldn’t care anymore). And at least this ongoing war with the Visigoths of morality might end, or at least see a truce that would fade from stagnation. And certainly all thoughts of opium would vanish (as they already did just thinking about it).

  She had had a brilliant career. But, like the members of her company, the real passion had been reserved for her hungry youth. The days when the only serious matters were the moments between the opening curtain and the final bow. When she awoke each morning with gloved fists ready to take on the world, swinging and flailing, but always with a puckish smile. Nobody worried about anything. If she ran into trouble she would just make something up to cause it to go away. She had always been the master of weaving her own reality. She knew that. Most of the people around her thought she was impossible. That she was unable to see the truth in the world around her. She would take adversity and pretend it never happened. She would make up stories to explain away the bad past. She knew they whispered that she would have to open her eyes one day, that life is not an ongoing production with her as its director. And many in her circle treated her as though she were delusional, unable to distinguish between the stage and reality. But wasn’t that right where she wanted them? Keeping them off balance. Never being able to fully read her, and always relying on her to navigate the latest reality. In truth it was power. The unstable are always the most powerful. Unpredictability is a dangerous weapon. And even more so when it is being handled by puppet strings with a nod and a wink. She had used it to rule over everyone—her crew, the newspapers, the promoters. And the audiences loved her for it. Everywhere she went in the world, they gathered around her and waited for her to do something.

  But somewhere along the line the act became routine, and she stopped fully trusting herself and her motive. She questioned her own versions of events. Her attempts at unpredictability seemed contrived and rehearsed. She had started to lose control. And once she lost the ability to control, the outside events that she was trying to deflect began to creep in and overwhelm her. Break her down. And those imbeciles around her who had whispered behind her back would never have once considered that she had only been protecting them. Instead they stripped her of her battle armor and sent her to the Coliseum to face the black-veiled gladiators, still leaving her there today. Even out on that pier, reaching into her arsenal for one last single shot, her interior demons had overwhelmed her capability to ward off the conservative reactionaries. The stunt on the pier may have brought on a wave of nostalgia for some (we have our old Sarah back), but in truth it did nothing other than to reinforce her helplessness. Nothing went away. It just seemed to get worse. Hence the need to escape, medicinally and literally.

  Sarah cinched the covers around her neck. She couldn’t shake the chill that vibrated her bones.

  The hands on the clock faced her at 3:11 P.M., leaning to the right with arms outstretched for an awkward embrace. She wanted to yank the covers over her head and not come out until it was after 4:00 P.M., with the rehearsal well under way without her. And there would be Max, nervously twitching, ready to ingest himself until he could disappear and leave nothing but a small spot of saliva where he had just stood. Kinney’s fury would rage though the theater while the actors paced not too far from their blocking marks, wondering if indeed the show does go on. Maybe a reporter would be there calmly taking notes, never moving from his seat, bowing his pen like Nero while the whole theater burned down. And his story would run the next day, and the bishop would tack it up on the announcements board in the cathedral where it would take on a shrine quality, a memorial to victory and perseverance—the trophy for decency. And then the bishop will go on and fight the next battle, realizing somewhere down the line how little effect executing Sarah Bernhardt had on the wages of morality.

  She looked up at the clock once more. That minute hand wouldn’t move if she hit it with a chisel.

  She rubbed her feet together to warm them. The bones and calluses only added to the discomfort.

  She really had no problem with her career ending. She just couldn’t stand to see it end this way. The more she pictured her absence in the theater, the more she felt a certain cowardice. Maybe that is how Henriette-Rosine would exit, by never taking the stage at all, but Sarah Bernhardt commanded the boards. The theater only came to life when she entered it, and when she exited she sucked out the life in a trailing tornado’s tail. She should be giving a farewell speech to her company, for all the times they had stood behind her. She owed it them, especially to Constant and Edouard. A dramatic recitation that rivaled the best of Shakespeare, and then leave with the footlights in her fists, keeping the power and the victory for herself.

  But getting out of bed felt impossible.

  She expected Max would knock one more time. He didn’t believe her. He never believed her dramatics. He was the one who usually saw through her. That was what made him such a good manager. Only this time he should be seeing her seriousness. Not trying to convince her with some imbecilic speech that this is some kind of pattern. That kind of insulting talk suggested that her fits and starts were unruly, and that perhaps there was some delusion about her realities. She should have told him that it must have been a true miracle that she became the most successful woman in the whole world. A real miracle. Maybe that would buy her a seat in Bishop Conaty’s house.

  She slid off the bed and went into the bathroom. If she submerged her body into the pool, the water would initially burn the skin surface in an almost sensual manner, a thin clear line singeing its way over her stomach and breasts before it settled at her neck. And the heat would relax her muscles, slowing down her heartbeat and draining out a final restless breath until she felt completely relaxed in wombed comfort.

  Sarah turned around with force, almost falling into the tub headfirst (and wouldn’t that make a headline ending). She was not going to get in the bath. Not going to give Max the satisfaction of honoring his routine.

  Nor would she ever drain the bath.

  She went back to her bed, pulling the covers up, while the edges burned across her stomach and breasts, before settling comfortably at her neck.

  The light was growing dim. It could get cold so quickly once the sun considered sinking. And she wished it were tomorrow already. By then there would only be bruises. The blows long ago forgotten and turned to myth.

  WITH WHAT SHE EXPECTED was Max’s knock, Sarah opened the door to see instead the desk clerk. “Pardon me, Madame,” he said. “But I have a message I have been asked to personally deliver.” He handed it to her and stood there as she read it, as was customary in case a reply was warranted (although the reporter had clearly instructed him not to bother). Her face bent into a smile, and tiny fragments of lines burst around her eyes,
showing an age that Dolph had not noticed in her before.

  She glanced up at him, his skin-and-bones frame willing itself not to twitch from nerves. “This Monsieur Baker is a young man, I would guess. He does not yet know the difference between thinking things and sharing them.”

  Dolph shrugged.

  “Another ruffian. A bad boy iconoclast. The world produces a new one every five minutes. And that’s the irony now, isn’t it? They’re spitting out duplicates as fast as it takes to walk out the door and to the pier. The real bad boys are the ones who do everything by the book. Clean-cut and in bed by eight. They take an occasional drink at the proper social moment, with barely a fantasy about bending a lady over with a slapping hand held above their heads. They read one or two books a year, nothing controversial, nothing too thought provoking, and then they blush at the suggestion of any risqué parts. Those are the real bad boys. They are the ones who truly face the world alone.”

  Dolph moved his heels a little closer together. Adopting a more formal posture, as Mr. Kinney had instructed all his staff. “Do you have a reply, Madame?”

  Sarah paused, then drew in a long inhalation. Finally she let it go with an outstretched arm. “Yes,” she said, returning the paper. “Please take the letter back and hold it at the desk. Perhaps he will realize his foolishness, and we can give him the option of retrieving the letter and disposing of it as quickly as he can.”

  Dolph bent the message into an uncommitted fold. He nodded and backed away to leave.

  “Pardon,” she said. “I am sorry but I do not have any money to offer for your services. I will see that Monsieur Klein takes care of that. And what is your name?”

  “Dolph.”

  “Dolph,” she repeated. “I wonder if I know your parents. Dolph. Perhaps I have seen your parents marching through the streets of Paris and shooting little babies. Or maybe those were your father’s bullets lodged into the bodies of all those boys who were laid up in my hospital during the war. It is indeed a small world, isn’t it, Dolph?”

  “Perhaps I should just leave you to your room now.”

  “Perhaps,” she said. “Off with you. And don’t forget to tell your father hello for me. Tell him that Sarah Bernhardt remembers every bullet that shed the skin of every French boy. Now off.” Then she leaned her head through the door frame and yelled down the hallway to Dolph, “There really is no need to worry. Monsieur Klein will see that your efforts are well compensated.”

  3:45 P.M. THE CLOCK ACTUALLY HAD MOVED. She was waiting for Max. She had gone to the closet and buttoned up a white chemisette slightly into perfection, the cambric veiling her cleavage and framing her neck. Then she slipped on a white waist shirt, slowly buttoning it to bring the pirate flounces into form. She stepped into her black peau de soie skirt, the plain tailored silk falling naturally against her form. She didn’t bother to look in the mirror. She was dressed to go to her own funeral. She pushed her hair up, bringing life to her pillow-flattened mane.

  “My lord, you look sensational.” Max looked relieved upon arrival, as if he had expected to find her buried deep in her bed, black rings circling her eyes, and a weak and frail voice fully dehydrated of spirit. “Let’s find your boots, and I will help you lace them up,” he offered hopefully.

  She decided not to fight. Not to toy or tease.

  “Sit down beside me,” she said, patting the bed. “Please, before we go.”

  He looked at her with his head cocked. His suspicion was getting the better of him.

  “You should always trust me.”

  Max dug his hands into his pockets, they bulged and crawled as he scratched his thighs. He nodded. Bit his lip. Looked ridiculously young, as though the situation had drawn him back into the awkwardness of a closeted sixteen-year-old boy, tiptoeing across each day, waiting for the wrath of his father’s disappointment, and the violent form it was likely to take. It was ironic that she had become a father figure to him. Wasn’t that one of the things that these puritans hated her for—how she had sometimes played the opposite gender on the stage? (And it often was Hamlet for God’s sake, not some depraved hermaphroditic child molester.) Her naysayers should take hold of this one—acting as a father to a queer man. That would almost certainly give them license to kill.

  After shuffling his feet and kicking at the floor, Max finally sat down. His weight barely dented the bed.

  Sarah took his hand. “I just want you to know that I love you. You will always be my Molly. In the words of Marguerite: When you saw me spitting blood you took my hand.” And she meant it. She may have despised the way that he puppy-trailed the ass scents of the Kinneys of the world, appearing to straddle the lines of allegiance in some form of arrogant collusion, but still the truth of it was that when the band stopped playing and the last drinks had been served, he came home with her. Night after night.

  Max squeezed her hand. It was sweaty. He didn’t say anything. She knew he was terrified that his words would only come out sounding maudlin.

  “Things have to be different is all.” It was only when the words left her mouth and vanished into the room that she truly understood the impossibility of the statement.

  Max bit down on his bottom lip. “You should just come to the rehearsal. Once you’re there…” He was starting to lecture. He stopped himself. “You should just come.”

  And she thought to say something about the old days. About how they would never have moved another inch without a blast of cocaine or a smoke of opium. And the feeling was nostalgic without the brilliance of sentimentality, a statement only designed for sharing a laugh or common connection. But Max, in his vigilant patrol state, would take that as a sign of weakness. Being lured by a temptress. And he would say it as such, leaving her to feel mortally stupid and pathetically old. Instead she just nodded, and said, “I know. I am planning to come to the theater.”

  “It is only a few minutes from now.”

  She flamboyantly threw her arms around his neck, roping him in closer to her until she held his cheek an inch from her mouth. She smacked her lips in a kiss that deliberately fell short. “Molly, I know that you care for me. Enough so that I can forgive you treating a sixty-one-year-old woman as though she is a wide-eyed girl. But leaving the theater is something that I am going to do.” She then leaned in the extra inch, feeling her spine extend, and touched her lips to his properly smoothed cheek. “Let’s go,” she whispered. “I plan to tell the company myself.”

  “I’m only looking out—”

  “Love me and you’ll trust me.” She kissed his cheek again, and then released him from her hold.

  He turned his back slightly. Not out of shame or irritation, but more in the manner of one who finds himself helplessly helpless. When the power is tripped, and the words that would usually come to mind just seem to form sounds that predate language. His toe ground into the floor, smothering out the last ember of righteousness, and she knew that if he did turn his head around, that she would see his eyes filled by tears. He never liked to disappoint. Even the slightest suggestion sent him back into his shame. Bishop Conaty ought to get hold of him.

  SARAH ASKED TO WALK the long route. She wanted some fresh air. Stretch her legs. Feel the freedom of the setting sun. She wanted to clear her head. Stroll by the canals. Ingest the ocean salts. They walked until they came to the edge of Venice Canal, where they stopped and looked across at Abbot Kinney’s estate. For a moment it was almost tranquil. As though they could have been the sole occupants of this magnificent planet. They might have resigned themselves to an infinite monastic silence if she had not spoken in a sudden voice: “It is okay. You may stare if you like.”

  Max asked what she said.

  “Him.” She pointed over to the thin shadow from an adolescent tree.

  He was a young man, perhaps still a boy. Nothing remarkable in stature. He looked afraid. He pulled at his fingers. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t mean to stare.” He held a notebook and a pen, trembling in the presence of the
woman he had waited for, just for an autograph.

  “Is it that you have never been in the presence of a star, or that you have never been in the presence of a French woman?” she said to the boy, ignoring Max elbowing her side.

  The boy kicked his feet a little. He ran his hands along his chin, one that would not be bristled by a sloppy shave for a few more years to come. “I’m not sure I know how to answer that.”

  “Pardon?” She leaned forward. “You will have to speak louder.”

  “I said, I’m not quite sure how to answer that.”

  “Well, how about either, or.”

  Max tried to intercede by stepping forward to reach for the boy’s book and pen. He tried to place his body between the two of them, hoping to ward her off. Perfectly timed she blocked Max, maintaining her place at the center stage marker.

  “Look at him twisted into a knot,” she said to Max. “His free hands are feeling up his arms each time I make eye contact with him. Like a misfit who wandered onto the stage and just noticed the audience through the footlights.”

  “I only request…,” he sputtered.

  “Is it the mystique of the French woman that is throwing you? You no doubt have heard all the legends of the passion and seduction. And the way they can toy with a man. Or maybe it’s our sophistication. That is always a threat to an American. But it makes you nervous. Right? Nervous. A woman who is your mother’s age awakening you. Is that right, Monsieur Oedipus? You are afraid of the legend of the French seductress?”

  The unfortunate boy could not look away from her. “I just wanted an autograph was all.”

  “A signature? Or is it the thought swirling through your head that you might be able to have this actress if you don’t make any mistakes. This actress who is your mother’s age—although you can’t say that you really think that I look it. Nor would you admit to yourself, either.” She pushed herself upright and shook her hair out. Smiled. Pleased with this scene. She then ripped the book from the boy’s hand and stretched her name along the length of the page. “My name,” she said to him. “And a story to go with it.”