Mrs. Caesar’s Champion.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLI, Issue 9, 26 August 1908, Page 53

Mrs. Caesar’s Champion.

By

JOHN BARTON OXFORD.

Recounting Several Improvements on Shakespeare and The Famous Roman Statesman.

HE sat on the end of the pier, dangling his long legs above the water while he watched the afternoon shadows play hide-and-seek among the spars of the fishing-fleet at the next wharf. His bullet-shaped head was crowned with an aureole of fiery red hair; his protruding jaw gave the impression of dogged determination; but, to offset this, his watery blue eyes, one of which had a decided cast, roved restlessly here and there with an air of melancholy indecision. His name began valiantly with Daniel Webster, and ended—with something of a shock to the senses —in O’Reilly. Beside him on the pier-stringer lounged a smaller aud meeker man —a satellite, evidently, if one were to judge him by the manner in which his eyes sought almost reverently O’Reilly’s ugly features and the way he hung attentively on O’Reilly’s every word. “ ’Tis bein’ too intellectual that begun it,” quoth O’Reilly, borrowing the satellite’s newly-lighted pipe and puffing away .with contented inhalations. “If I hadn’t been thinkin’ too much of my intellect I wouldn’t have been perusin’ borrowed literature behind a pile of packin’-cases, an’ if I hadn’t been perusin’ the literature, the head shipper wouldn’t ’a’ found me there an’ fired me incontinent for doin’ the same. As it was, I stuffed the literature into my pocket, said good day to the shipper an’ jvished him luck, sarcastic, an’ havin’ drawn the pay that was due me, departed into outer darkness. “Three weeks I was jobless, an’ at the end of that time, what with toilin’ not nor spinnin’, I found myself facin’ the terrible possibility of a personal famine in the midst of plenty. “ ’Twas at that stage of the proceedin’s that I run across Andy McConachy —success to the white soul of him! He took me down the street to a place an’ listened to my troubles most sympathetic. “ ‘I happen to know,’ says he, when 1 had finished, ‘where you can land a job most suitable to your peculiar talents. This feller, Hagan, who is playin’ Julius Caesar at the Grand Opera House, is shy a couple of centurions. “ ‘Nature has east you in the mould of a centurion,’ he goes on, runnin’ a critical eye over my contour. ‘You’ve the build* an’ the air of one. Why don’t you go up an’ make a try for it?’ “ ‘Who do 1 want to see up there?’ says I, brightenin’ up with hope. “ ‘The stage-door keeper is a good friend of mine,’ says Andy. ‘l’ll give you a note to him. Go up an’ see him an’ he’ll put you wise.’ “An’ that is how it came about that on the same evenin’ I trod the boards in ‘Julius Caesar,’ with an undeeent pair of tights encasin’ my legs, a dinky little skirt danglin’ from my waist, a bit of tin armour on my chest, an’ a brass helmet, which sported a plume of rooster-feath-ers, for a lid. “ ’Twas little enough I had to do — nothin’ but inarch on to the stage now an’ then with a crowd of supes an’, occasionally, at a signal from the stagemanager in the wings, to let out a boiler or mayhap a bit of a groan, as circumstances demanded. I seemed to get the spirit of the thing from the start. “Maybe the Shakespeare I’d read on the sly behind the packin’-cases accounted for it. At any rate, the stagemanager told me I done it all right, except the hellers, which he Baid was a little too strident. “For two weeks I led a care-free life, disportin’ my immodest tights every night, doin’ my groans an’ my bellers an’ drawin’ my pay regular every Monday. 1 might have been doin’ the same yet if my heart hadn’t got away with my ■ense an* I hadn’t give Julius Caesar a much-needed chastisement one night when the house was packed. “Thia feller, Hagan, who was doin’ the title role of the show, was a pompous,

orderin’ every one about an’ makin’ a crabbed sort of a chap. He was always most amazin’ fuss if everything didn’t go just as he wanted it to. He had a wife —nice little clingin’ sort of a creature that thought the sun rose an’ set by him. He was forever findin’ fault with her an’ abusin’ her something fierce, but she used to stand for it all with never a murmur. She’d pass it off by sayin’ he had the artistic temperament, which I took to be something that relieved him of all responsibility of actin’ like a civilised man. “To make things worse, Hagan would drink sometimes, an’ when he was tanked up a bit the shameful way he’d treat that meek little bunch of skirts was enough to make the hair of any halfways respectable man rise on his head. There was a good deal of talk about the way he treated her, even among the supes, for she was one of the kind of women that was always doin’ some one a good turn, an’ every one connected with the show liked her as much as they hated Hagan. “She was east for a small part, an’ if she didn’t do it just to suit his lordship’s taste —which was frequent—the way he’d run on an’ the names he’d call her was enough to make your blood run cold. But I never saw him abuse her except with his tongue, till this night I’m tellin’ you about, when I resigned from the company sorter sudden. "Hagan must ’a’ been drinkin’ pretty hard all day, an’ when it came time for the evenin’ performance he was in his crankiest frame of mind. He cussed everybody an’ everything, free an’ impartial. We all noticed, too, that when he got his first cue his legs were wobblin’ a good deal as he stumbled through the wings. “Mrs. Hagan was watchin’ him anxiously, but, once he got goin’, he seemed to sober up all right, an’ the show run on smooth as clockwork, with Julius Caesar gettin’ the glad hand every time he stuck his nose out of the wings, for, somehow, he was outdoin’ himself. “After this first scene of his he come niarchin’ off the stage most majestic, but the minute he hit the wings he seemed to lose his grip on himself an’ to go all to pieces. He stood there for a minute, shakin’ an’ sort of confusedlike; then he went staggerin’ toward his dressin’-room, with his wife, white an’ anxious, trailin’ after. “A minute later a door banged viciously, an’ even in the wings we could hear Hagan’s voice howlin’ an’ cussin’. The members of the company, waitin’ for their cues, begun droppin’ their eyelids at one another an’ bobbin’ their heads very knowin’. “ Twas shortly afterward that I caught my tights on a nail in a piece of scenery an’ tore ’em something scandalous. It bein’ almost time for the centurions to show up again, I rushed down the passageway between the dressin’rooms to the property-room, meanin’ either to get the tear sewed up or to get a fresh pair of tights. “When I come back the door of Hagan’s dressin’-room was wide open an’ I eould hear two voices—his wife’s, sort of low an’ pleadin’, an’ Hagan’s roarin’ back at her as if she was the inmate of a deaf asylum. I come along more cautious till I got to where I could see through the open doorway. “Hagan was standin’ back to me. In one hand he held a bottle an’ in the other a glass. ’Twas plain as the nose on your face that Julius Caesar intended to take a little refreshment. His wife had hold with both hands of the arm that held the bottle. Her eyes were big an’ frightened an’ she was talkin' fast in a low, scared voice. “‘You sha’n’t,’ she was sayin’,’‘you sha’n’t!’ “An’ then Hagan wrenched himself free. He put the bottle on a chair an’, turnin’ round, struck her with his fist. “She gave a little sigh an’ sort of crumpled up an* went down in a heap on a trunk just back of her. “Something seemed to give way in-

eide of me. For a minute I couldn't seem to move, an’ I guess it was lucky 1 couldn’t, for there was murder in my soul, an’ I guess if I’d got hold of Hiv gan then I’d have wrung the neck of him. “But before I could get my wits back sufficient there was a fortunate interruption in the shape of Brutus, who come hurryin’ down the passageway to the dressin'-room, an’ ]>ulied Hagan through the door. “‘Come, come, Hagan! Where the devil are you?’ says he, apparently noC noticin’ the huddled heap on the trunk. ‘Do you want to queer the scene? Come on, now, an’ get a grip on yourself.’ "An’ off he goes, pushin’ Hagan on in front of him. “I went down the passageway, an’ got some water in a dipper; then I come back to the dressin’-room, an’ liftin’ il* the woman on the trunk, I bathed her temples till she opened her eyes an’ said ‘Thank you,’ very weak. “Then I propped her up comfortable with some costumes an’ went out to the wings. "My head was swimmin’, an’ red sparks was floatin’ in front of my eyes, but I walked into the wings very steadily an’ stopped there for a minute to listen. Julius Caesar stood alone near the footlights, swayin’ uncertainly while he delivered a soliloquy. “Only a moment I waited there before I stalked out on the stage, my tin breavtplate clankin’ an’ the roosterfeathers in the plume of my helmet streamin’ out most virtuous. “Hagan heard me cornin’ an’ turned round. When his eyes lit on me he fair turned yellow with anger. “ ‘ Get out of here!” says he under his breath. ‘What do you mean, you crazy fool ! Get out of here!’ “An’ with that he swings round an’ goes on with his soliloquy, thinkin’, of course, that I’d dive crestfallen into the wings; but he was takin’ a chance on uncertainties, for on’ I stalked an’ caught him by the back of the neck with my right hand. The soliloquy stopped sudden; he let out a yell an’ begun to cuss so violent that I had to hug him up to me an’ clap my other hand over his mouth to choke him off. “Then I turned to the audience, which was starin’ in open-mouth wonder. “ ‘ Ladies and gentlemen,’ says I, bowin’ my lowest an’ smilin’ my sweetest, • I’m sorry to interrupt Julius’s soliloquy, but there’s a few things that ought to be said, out of fairness to you, before he goes any farther. “ ‘ Julius, here, ain’t just what he seems to be. He’s been deceivin’ you an’ ’tis now my intention to show him up for what he is. When he struts these boards every night an’ gets the glad

hand from you all you good but misguided folks think of him as an upright an’ honourable man, which lie ain’t by no means. He’s a low-down undcservin’ hound. “ ‘ But, like a good many people of his kind, he’s got as good a wife as the Lord ever made. Julius ain’t appreciative of this fact. He seems to think she’s only something to cuss at an’ wipe his feet on. This is his usual course with her, but to-night he went a step farther an’ struck her a dirty- cowardly blow in the mouth. All of which makes me think that our friend, Julius, here, is badly in need of chastisin’ in public. An’ this, if you will kindly give me your undivided attention for a minute, I will proceed to do.’ “All this time Hagan had been buttin’ his head into my ribs, an’ kickin’ me in the shins something cruel, but by dint of exertin’ all of my strength I’d managed to hold on to him an’ keep him quiet. “At the left of the scene was a flight of steps, an’, when I’d dragged him up, down on these I sat, an’ after considerable of a struggle I managed to get him across my knee. Then I laid on some good, honest welts with my bare hands, the while he howled an’ kicked an’ bit most vicious. “I’d only got in a half-dozen or so when a bell tinkled an’ the curtain come down with a rush. People come swarmin’ from every direction. I let go Hagan, gave him a push an’ a kick, an* jumped up to defend myself. I was makin’ a pretty creditable job of it when Brutus got a strangle-hold around my neck an* Cassius tripped me up, an’ then Mark Antony give me a jolt in the short - , ribs that took the wind clean out of me an’ put me down an’ out. “When I come to I was layin’ in the alley that runs back of the stage entrance, still toggl'd out in mjfccentunbn rig, but with my civilised clothes piled up beside me. “Say, I’m out of a job, nil right, an’ I’m on my uppers for fair, but it’s worth it. “I hear Hagan is treatin’ her better 1 now.” . «' ' II