Part 85

"Well, then, I may have him?" said Smith.

"Er-m-ah-er-yes--I will let you have him," replied Frohman, at the same time running over a paper before him. The visitor was already at the door.

"By the way, Smith," called out Frohman, "how much do you want me to pay you for taking him off my hands?"

* * *

Frohman was as playful as a child. Once he was riding in a petite voiture in Paris. It was a desperately hot night. The old cocher took his hat off, hung it on the lamp, and wiped his forehead. Frohman took the hat and hid it under his seat. When the driver looked for his hat it was gone. He stopped the horse and ran back two or three blocks before he could be stopped. Then he went on without it, muttering and cursing, and turning around every few moments. Watching his opportunity, Frohman slipped the hat back on the lamp, and there was the expected climax that he thoroughly enjoyed.

On one of his trips to Paris he was accompanied by Dillingham. Knowing Frohman's fondness for rich food, his friend decided to take him to dine at Durand's famous restaurant opposite the Madeleine. He even went to the café in the afternoon and told the proprietor that he was going to bring the great American manager. Great anticipation prevailed in the establishment.

That night when they got to the restaurant Frohman gave Dillingham the shock of his life by saying:

"I want to be a real American to-night. All I want is an oyster stew."

Dillingham instructed the chef how to make the stew. After long delay there was a commotion. In strode the chef, followed by two assistants, bearing aloft a gigantic silver tureen which was placed on the table and opened with great ceremony. Inside was a huge quantity of consommé with two lonely oysters floating on top.

Frohman regarded it as a great joke, and ever afterward when he met anybody in Paris that he did not like, he would say to them:

"If you want the finest oyster stew in the world, go to Durand's."

* * *

Frohman, who was always playing jokes on his friends, was sometimes the victim himself. He was crossing the ocean with Haddon Chambers when the latter was accosted by two enterprising young men who were arranging the ship's concert. Chambers was asked to take part, but declined. Then he had an inspiration.

"We have on board the greatest American singer of coon songs known to the stage."

"Who is that?" asked the men.

"It's Charles Frohman."

The men gasped.

"Of course we knew him as a great manager, but we never knew he could sing."

"Oh yes," said Chambers. "He is a great singer."

He pointed out Frohman and hid behind a lifeboat to await the result. Soon he heard a sputter and a shriek of rage, and the two men came racing down the boat as if pursued by some terror. Up came Frohman, his face livid with rage.

"What do you think?" he said to Chambers, who stood innocently by. "Those men had the nerve to ask me to sing a coon song. I have never been so insulted in all my life."

He was so enraged that he wrote a letter to the steamship line about it and withdrew his patronage from the company for several years in consequence.

* * *

Here is another instance when the joke was on Frohman. No one viewed the manager's immense success with keener pride or pleasure than his father, Henry Frohman. As theater after theater came under the son's direction the parent could gratify his great passion for giving people free passes to its fullest extent. He would appear at the offices at the Empire Theater with his pockets bulging with home-made cigars. The men in the office always accepted the cigars, but never smoked them. But they gave him all the passes he wanted.

One day the father stopped in to see Charles. It was a raw spring day. Charles remarked that the overcoat Henry wore was too thin.

"Go to my tailor and get an overcoat," he said.

"Not much," said the father. "Your tailor is too expensive. He robs you. He wouldn't make one under seventy-five dollars, and I never pay more than twenty dollars."

Charles's eye twinkled. He said, quickly: