Part 48

"I hate to leave all my friends," continued Miss Opp.

"Well, I can't take over all your friends," replied Frohman, "but you will have plenty of new admirers in New York."

Miss Opp asked what she thought were unreasonable terms. Frohman said nothing, but sent Charles Dillingham to see her next day. He said Frohman wanted to know if she was joking about her price. "Of course," he said, "if you are not joking he will pay it anyhow, because when he makes up his mind to have anybody he is going to have him."

This shamed Miss Opp. She asked a reasonable fee, went to the United States, and not only became Faversham's leading woman, but his wife. Frohman always took infinite delight in teasing the Favershams about having been their matchmaker.

* * *

Charles, who loved to create a sensation in a big way, was now able to gratify one of his favorite emotions with the production of "The Conquerors." Like many of the Frohman achievements, it began in a picturesque way.

During the summer of 1897, Frohman and Paul Potter, being in Paris, dropped in at that chamber of horrors, the Grand Guignol, in the Rue Chaptal. There they saw "Mademoiselle Fifi," a playlet lasting less than half an hour, adapted by the late Oscar Metenier from Guy de Maupassant's short story. It was the tale of a young Prussian officer who gets into a French country house during the war of 1870, abuses the aristocrats who live there, shoots out the eyes of the family portraits, entertains at supper a number of loose French girls from Rouen, and is shot by one of the girls for vilifying Frenchwomen. Frohman was deeply impressed.

"Why can't you make it into a long play?" said Frohman.

"I can," said Potter.

"How?" queried Frohman.

"By showing what happened to the French aristocrats while the Prussian officer was shooting up the place," answered the author.

"Do it," said Frohman, "and I'll open the season of the Empire Stock Company in this drama, and get George Alexander interested for London."

As "The Conquerors" the play went into rehearsal about Christmas. Mrs. Dazian, wife of Henry Dazian, the costumier, was watching a scene in which William Faversham plans the ruin of Viola Allen, the leading woman.

"Well," said Mrs. Dazian, "if New York will stand for that it will stand for anything."

Frohman jumped up in excitement. "What is wrong with it?" he cried. "The manuscript was shown to a dozen people of the cleanest minds. They found nothing wrong. I've done the scene a dozen times. I have it up-stairs on my shelves at this moment in 'The Sporting Duchess.'"

Mrs. Dazian was obdurate. "It is awful," she said.

The first night approached. Potter was to sail for Europe next day. Frohman had provided him with sumptuous cabin quarters on the New York. After the dress rehearsal, Potter appeared on the Empire stage, where he found Frohman. The latter was worried.

"Paul," said he, "the first three acts are fine; the last is rotten. You must stay and rewrite the last act."

Potter had to postpone his trip. At ten next morning the new act was handed in; the company learned and rehearsed it by three in the afternoon, and that night Frohman and the author stood in the box-office watching the audience file in.

"How's the house, Tommy?" demanded Frohman of Thomas Shea, his house manager.

"Over seventeen hundred dollars already," said Shea.

"You can go to Europe, Paul," said Frohman. "Your last act is all right. We don't want you any more."

The American public agreed with Mrs. Dazian. They thought the play excruciatingly wicked, but they were just as eager to see it on the Fourth of July as they had been six months earlier.

A dozen details combined to make "The Conquerors" a storm-center. First of all it was attacked because of its alleged immorality. In the second place the author was charged with having appropriated some of Sardou's "La Haine." In the third place, this play marked the first stage appearance of Mrs. Clara Bloodgood, wife of "Jack" Bloodgood, one of the best-known men about town in New York. Mr. Bloodgood became desperately ill during rehearsals, and his wife divided her time between watching at his bedside and going to the theater. Of course, the newspapers were filled with the account of the event which was agitating all society, and it added greatly to popular interest in the play.

"The Conquerors" not only brought Paul Potter and Frohman a great success, but it sped William Faversham on to the time when he was to become a star. The cast was one of the most distinguished that Frohman had ever assembled, and it included among its women five future stars--Viola Allen, Blanche Walsh, Ida Conquest, Clara Bloodgood, and May Robson.

* * *

By this time Henry Miller had left the Empire Stock Company and had gone on the road with a play called "Heartsease," by Charles Klein and J. I. C. Clark. It failed in Cincinnati, and Miller wrote Frohman about it. A week later the men met on Broadway. Miller still believed in "Heartsease" and asked Frohman if he could read it to him.

"All right," replied Frohman; "come to-morrow and let me hear it."