The First Actress

by C. W. Gortner

  “Is that so?” He gave me a thin smile. “Very well. Seeing as you are in such dire need of rest, you are excused for the season. I will cast another in the part.”

  “Another?” I went still, appalled by the very thought. I knew of no other actress in the company capable of such a demanding role except Madame Nathalie, and she was too old for it. But as I saw his smile turn smug, a cold bolt of shock went through me. Marie. He intended to cast his paramour as Phaedra. She must have been campaigning behind my back this entire time for a leading role to eclipse the success of my Zaïre.

  It almost made me threaten to leave the company permanently, until he said, “I trust you’ll enjoy your time away. Unless you now care to reconsider?”

  I detested him in that moment, for dangling such a prize only to bait it like a snare. But if he meant to fling Marie into a part that she was utterly incapable of performing, it would only result in ridicule, and be the very comeuppance they both deserved. While I would finally have the time I needed to escape Jean and the theater, to turn my much-needed attention to Maurice, my household, and my languishing moi.

  “I do not care to reconsider,” I informed him, and I left to pack up my things. It wasn’t until I was hailing a carriage home that I suddenly wondered if I’d fallen into his trap anyway. What if his intent to cast Marie Colombier as Phaedra wasn’t just his means to satisfy her rivalry with me, but an underhanded attempt to prove I wasn’t indispensable?

  I tried to put the thought out of my mind, even when it gnawed at me as I returned to my neglected sculpture and painting, which had always soothed me. Art demanded as much as love, but once given shape, it never betrayed. It never lost its luster; it remained intact, indifferent to the passage of time even when time or the audience ceased to appreciate it.

  After seeing Maurice to school, where he fared no better with his marks, I went into my studio to work, then paid overdue calls to my friends. Clairin had finished my portrait; while I didn’t think I bore any resemblance to that boneless creature lounging like an odalisque on a cushion-strewn sofa, with a wolfhound at her feet, the rendition had apparently excited titillating interest at its recent exposition.

  “I hear the demoiselles of quality were so taken with it, they now receive their gentleman callers thus,” Clairin told me. “You’ve created a new style: Bernhardt déshabillé.”

  “Thus?” I echoed skeptically. “In a tea dress, peacock fan, and oversized dog?”

  From her easel in the corner, Louise Abbéma remarked, “Perhaps not the dog.”

  I turned to examine her work. She’d changed from the first time I’d met her. Still petite, but now dressed in a male cravat and waistcoat, her dark hair cut short, which surprised me; and she was painting a landscape, which also surprised me—a sun-dappled meadow with a cottage, saccharine as boulevard candy. When I didn’t make a comment on it, she did.

  “I sell these for the shops. It pays the rent on my studio.”

  “I didn’t mean to imply…” My apology faded into a pang as she lifted her dark eyes. All of a sudden, she reminded me of Régine, that same fey quality.

  “Of course you did,” she said. “I am aware this is not distinguished.”

  “Her portraiture, however, is,” interjected Clairin. “You should let her paint yours.”

  I suddenly recalled that I’d once offered as much, so I now felt obliged. “As Georges can testify, I’m not an easy subject.”

  “The best subjects rarely are. Shall we attempt a draft first?”

  I drew up a nearby chair, and was looking about for a prop when she said, “It’s only a sketch.”

  The scratch of her charcoal on the paper tacked to her easel lulled me. I found myself drifting into contemplation of how different her occupation was from mine. The bickering and intrigue at the annual expositions were the same as opening nights; critics would always be critics, and the public prone to fickleness; but the act of creation was entirely apart. Unlike acting, painting was an intimate communion between the artist and his or her subject, without tyrannical directors or zealous rivals to undermine its conception.

  When I came back to attention, Louise was contemplating me with her soulful gaze. “You seem unhappy,” she said. It wasn’t a question.

  I leaned forward to examine her sketch. My profile, with my hawkish nose and upswept chignon unraveling about my angular cheek—a remarkable yet discomfiting likeness, its absence of flattery almost brazen. “Do I also look so forlorn?” I said.

  She gave me a smile that I sensed wasn’t meant to reassure. In her masculine attire, and with her little features overpowered by those huge dark eyes, I thought she was perhaps the most intriguing person I’d ever met, whom I’d neglected to properly know.

  I also wasn’t sure if I liked her depiction of me, which made my decision.

  “When should I sit for you?”

  “Whenever you like.” She took a calling card from her waistcoat. As I nodded awkwardly, wondering how she could exert such an effect on me, she whispered, “We can always add the dog and fancy dress later.”

  * * *

  —

  Louise’s studio was in Montmartre, in one of the tumbledown buildings on a corkscrew alleyway where the sun sent slivered fingers and artists toiled amidst the fumes of pigment and walnut oil. It wasn’t inexpensive to rent space here, despite the decrepit conditions, and when I beheld her garret loft with its drapery crowned by dried flower wreaths, the antique busts, Oriental carpets, and a rosewood pianoforte in a corner, I knew my first impression had been correct.

  No amount of paintings of pastoral scenes could have paid for this.

  She confirmed as much as she offered me tea and prepared for my sitting. “My family is wealthy. I don’t try to hide it, but I don’t care to advertise it, either.”

  “Why not?” The tea was delicious, a jasmine-infused brew. Though she was wearing stovepipe trousers and a waistcoat with a fob chain, reminding me of George Sand, her feminine mannerisms and expertise with a teapot revealed an impeccable, undeniably upper-class upbringing, as if her attire was intended as a mockery. Or a distraction.

  “Wealth isn’t considered an asset for a female artist,” she said. “It reinforces the belief that we paint out of indolence, not from vocation.”

  “Haven’t you exhibited in the Salon?” I regarded the paintings on her studio walls. Clairin hadn’t exaggerated; as insipid as her landscapes were, her portraits were bold, all women in various stages of undress, their bare shoulders and shadowy eyes seeming to gaze from the canvas in apathetic seduction, the brushstrokes evanescent, light refracting on skin as if distilled in water, more impressions of spirit than of mortal flesh.

  “The selection committee rejected my submission last year. Too risqué, they said. Perhaps this coming year will be different.” She slipped on a smock and began to sketch me on a fresh-stretched canvas. Just as I was, sitting on a chair, sipping tea.

  “Ah.” I decided to tease her. “Is this portrait of mine to be your ploy?”

  She paused, regarding me. “Would you mind? The most famous actress in France, painted by another woman: I think they’ll not dare deny my submission then.”

  “I don’t mind.” In fact, I appreciated her honesty. It was refreshing to hear someone state their intent without pretense or evasion.

  “Are you unhappy?” she suddenly said, stepping to me to tilt up my chin. The touch of her fingers was so light, I barely felt it.

  “About helping a woman break into the hallowed Salon des Artistes?” I smiled. “I know all too well what it’s like to be degraded for our sex and our supposed lack of vocation for our chosen craft.”

  “That isn’t what I asked.” She began sketching me with rapid strokes.

  I wanted to lower my gaze, but I couldn’t. She’d managed to hold me captive. “Yes,” I said at length. “I am u
nhappy these days. I can’t say why.”

  “Can’t? Or won’t?” She did not cease to work, but the pause between us turned leaden until she said, “Life is never what we think it will be, is it?”

  “I lost my sister recently.” My voice quavered at the unwitting admission; I hadn’t intended to tell her, but something about her—her pensive tranquility, perhaps—had incited my confidence. “She died of consumption.”

  “How terrible.” Louise paused. “Such a common yet dreadful affliction.”

  I swallowed against the anguish knotting my throat. “I haven’t been able to forgive myself for her death. I keep thinking I should have been there for her, more than I was. My career, all the time in the theater…Then someone recently asked something of me that would have required me to give it all up. For a time, I thought I should.”

  She didn’t reply at once, taking a step back to survey her work. “You can serve yourself more tea if you like,” she said into the silence. “I think I have the pose.”

  I took up the pot, unsure why I should feel disturbed that she hadn’t responded to my confession. Then she said abruptly, “Perhaps that is why I cannot love men. All those expectations…”

  Now it was my turn to be quiet. It didn’t shock me, though such things weren’t spoken of openly, and certainly not between those who’d just begun their acquaintance.

  She added, “Not that it’s any less complicated,” and her sudden smile, with a hint of pearly teeth, transformed her somber face into mischievousness. “As you can imagine.”

  “Women are always expected to sacrifice,” I replied. “Even to other women.”

  She nodded, motioning to me. “What do you think?”

  The sketch was in profile, my collar folded like wilting petals about my throat and my gaze distant, as if I were searching for something elusive.

  “We can add whatever clothing you like,” she said. “I wish to only show your shoulders and head. A portrait of the actress. Is there any particular costume you’d prefer?”

  “Hugo’s Queen of Spain,” I whispered. As I met her eyes, I couldn’t evade the fact that from the moment I’d met her, I had felt an inexplicable attraction toward her. But it also made me ashamed, so that I started to look away when she reached out a charcoal-stained fingertip to trace my cheek. “You needn’t be so afraid, Sarah.”

  “I’ve never…” I felt and sounded utterly inept. “I don’t know how…”

  “You do. You simply haven’t done it yet,” she said.

  * * *

  —

  She was a thread of silk between my fingers; wet paint on smooth canvas, pungent with scent. I’d never known such pleasure. I, who made a living out of grandiose emotions, who’d honed my craft on a trade of erotic enticement, found myself a neophyte in her hands, unable to contain my near-anguished gasp as she brought me to fulfillment.

  I felt as languid as Clairin’s portrait, supine on her studio floor as she went to a cabinet to fetch a cigarette. As she stood there, smoke diffusing about her, rimmed in scarlet while the sun slipped past the window behind her, I had a sudden, unsettling memory of Kératry during our first encounter.

  “You are very beautiful,” she said.

  “I am not.” I inched up the rumpled shawl upon which we’d lain. Her eyes lost some of their luster at my gesture.

  “You needn’t regret this, Sarah. I am not a man. I don’t expect you to be responsible for me. All I expect is honesty.”

  I swallowed. I feared I might ruin our newfound intimacy. I didn’t want to hurt her; I didn’t want to see the same pain and disillusionment on her face as I’d seen on Jean’s.

  She retrieved her shirt. “Shall I brew us more tea? Or must you leave?”

  I sat upright, running a hand through my tangled hair. “I can stay awhile longer.”

  Huddled over her fragrant tea and copious cigarettes, she coaxed everything out of me. As if a crumbling dam had been breached, I told her of my childhood, of never knowing where I belonged, of my fantasy of a father I’d never met and the reality of a mother I couldn’t love. I confessed my struggle to become someone, anyone, other than who I was; I even confided in her about my courtesan past, of my conception of Maurice and my hopes and fears for him, and then, in a halting voice, I finally spoke of Jean.

  She listened without any interruption. When I was done, night had fallen outside and urgency overcame me, that need to escape what I myself had created.

  Her hand touched mine. Lightly, as when she’d positioned my chin for her sketch.

  “Success can bring its own kind of sorrow. As much as you gain, you also lose. You shouldn’t dwell on what cannot be, but on what is. You may not see it, but to many of us, you are more than just an actress. You are an inspiration.”

  I let out a humorless laugh. “If they only knew what I’ve done.”

  “It’s the achievement that matters. Don’t you realize how few of us ever become more than what was intended, how we never question the path set down before us by our mothers and their mothers before them? Women are the most oppressed of beings.”

  I contemplated this. “My mother did teach me that much, I suppose. She, too, refused to settle for what was expected of her. Yet in the end, she still built her own cage.”

  “Is that what you fear? That you’ll end up in a cage of your own making? Is that why you cannot give yourself to this man who says he loves you and wants to marry you?”

  Her words made me flinch. “Is it love? To want to possess someone so completely that they cease to be who they are?”

  “Not to me. But then, I’ve always known I will be alone. My fear isn’t solitude. It’s not being true to myself.”

  “You’re not alone.” I took her hand in mine. “We can be friends, can’t we?” I’d not realized until this moment how much I’d longed for another woman with whom to share myself, not carnally, pleasurable as it was, but in a way that, to me, was more intimate and fragile.

  “I would like that very much.” She lifted my hand to her lips. “Mon amie.”

  X

  “Louise!” I burst into her studio with my hat tumbling off my head, the note crunched in my gloved hand. Pausing to catch my breath, I saw her lift her eyebrow in that ironic manner of hers as she stood by her easel, a cigarette between her fingers.

  “Two hours late. Again.” She sighed. “Sarah, much as I delight in your lack of punctuality, if we wish to see this portrait finished in time for my application—”

  I thrust the crumpled note at her. “Look!”

  She unfolded it under the light filtering through the overhead louver. She went still. “He relented.”

  “He had no choice. He’s desperate. Marie couldn’t do it.” I pulled off my hat, feeling the perspiration of this unseasonably hot September day seeping down my temples. “She fell ill under the strain and left him stranded—eight days before opening night!”

  I wanted to laugh, for it was exactly what Perrin deserved, but I had a stitch in my side from racing to the studio on foot. The upcoming Paris Exposition had filled the city with visitors, and trying to find a public cab was as futile as it had been after the siege.

  “Eight days.” Louise widened her eyes at me. “Impossible.” She put out her cigarette and went to fetch me a glass of water as I collapsed onto a chair.

  “Is it?” I said, when she returned with the glass. “The role of a lifetime. Thousands of visitors here from all over Europe, the first three weeks already sold out. How can I not?”

  “The question shouldn’t be how you cannot, but how can you? Phaedra isn’t something you can prepare for in a week. You said so yourself, it’s the role of a lifetime.”

  “I know the part.” I gulped down the water. “Perhaps not as well as I should, but enough to perfect it by opening night. And you read Perrin’s note; he’s practically beg
ging me to return.” My words tumbled out in the same reassurances I’d been reciting to myself since his missive arrived at my door. “This could be my only chance to play her as I want. He’s in no position to argue. No other actress can do this, as his request proves.”

  She regarded me in silence before she said, “It might also be a trap.”

  Her words gave me pause, reminding me of my own suspicions as I’d departed the Comédie for my leave. “How so?”

  “Well, you told me that you and he had words because you insisted on a reprieve. He cast Marie in your place, an actress he’s been sleeping with and who proved herself not up to the task. Now she’s begged off and left him at your mercy. None of it can be to his liking. He will find himself in your debt. But should you fail…”

  “I won’t fail,” I said at once. “Perrin knows that.”

  “Be that as it may, he’s not your ally.” She made a placating gesture. “I’m only telling you what I think. We did promise to be honest with each other. I could be wrong. He may not intend anything other than to lure you back to work, seeing as you’re the only one whom he can depend on to save the play.”

  I considered the disquieting possibility. Perrin had put Marie’s jealousy of me over the best interests of the company; it wasn’t far-fetched to assume he’d now seek to turn a disaster of his own making to his advantage. If I failed to do Phaedra justice, I could never again reproach him for whatever roles he assigned.

  I flicked my fingers against the glass. “What should I do?”

  “I believe you’ve already decided that,” she said, with a wry smile.

  I gave it another moment of thought. “He wouldn’t dare undermine me if my name is on everyone’s lips by opening night. He’ll want me to succeed if only for the sake of the receipts. But how…?” And then it suddenly occurred to me. “How else? Extraneous publicity: the one thing he detests.”