Page:The Tragic Muse (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1890), Volume 2.djvu/84

76 "You're always acting," he answered, in English, with a laugh, while Sherringham remained struck with his expressing just what he himself had felt weeks before.

"And when you have shown them your fish-wife, to your public de là-bas, what will you do next?" asked Madame Carré.

"I'll do Juliet—I'll do Cleopatra."

"Rather a big bill, isn't it?" Mr. Dashwood volunteered to Sherringham, in a friendly, discriminating manner.

"Constance and Juliet—take care you don't mix them," said Sherringham.

"I want to be various. You once told me I had a hundred characters," Miriam replied.

"Ah, vous-en-êtes là?" cried the old actress. "You may have a hundred characters, but you have only three plays. I'm told that's all there are in English."

Miriam appealed to Sherringham. "What arrangements have you made? What do the people want?"

"The people at the theatre?"

"I'm afraid they don't want King John, and I don't believe they hunger for Antony and Cleopatra," Basil Dashwood suggested. "Ships and sieges and armies and pyramids, you know: we mustn't be too heavy."

"Oh, I hate scenery!" sighed Miriam.

"Elle est superbe," said Madame Carre. "You must put those pieces on the stage: how will you do it?"

"Oh, we know how to get up a play in London, Madame Carré," Basil Dashwood responded, genially. "They put money on it, you know."