# "A Modern Hercules," The Tale of a Sculptress/Chapter 16

CHAPTER XVI.
PAUL COMPLETES A STORY.
Despite the difference in their dispositions, something usually brought Doane, Wayland and Connors together. So about midnight, at the grand ball, this trio found themselves together in one of the apartments of the great mansion.
Connors, the politician, started to talk. "If Sarah Bernhardt were here," he said, "she'd take a bath in the wine we have wasted tonight."
"The frail Sarah has much faith in this method of preserving health, as did old Ponce de Leon, in the long-sought-for fountain of immortal youth."
"By the way," said Doane, "did you hear the story they tell on the actress, while on her late Western tour?"
"No," they exclaimed, "let us have it."
​"Well," said Doane, in great relish, for he did love to tell a story, "when she played at Seattle, she expressed a desire to have a vivid, real live hunt. An old trapper near by had some tame bears, and the newspaper boys put up a job on the fair French woman. She dressed herself up in a male attire, went out into the woods, a perfect nimrod. She was hauled over logs and creeks, and finally, in a moment of ecstacy, she was permitted to kill a bear. She was the happiest woman, for a day, upon whom the sun ever shone."
They had a hearty laugh.
"I saw in your paper the other day, that some fool out West had attempted to dramatize Victor Hugo's 'Les Miserables.'"
"If you saw it in my paper," said Doane, "be careful. I missed a train a few days ago by depending on the accuracy of my own journal."
"But what do you think of the idea?" queried Connors.
"In these days," said Wayland, "when managers are crazy for a new idea, it seems to me that a clever stage story of Jean Valjean would make a certain hit."
"You might as well try to dramatize the clouds, the great rugged mountain peaks," said Doane, scornfully, "as anything Victor Hugo wrote. No man under forty can grasp the real philosophy of Hugo. How, then, can the unintelligent masses hope to comprehend him? Connors, you are a great politician, but you are not overburdened with dramatic knowledge."
"I wrote a play once," said Connors.
"Was it produced?" asked Wayland.
"Yes, for three consecutive nights."
​"And what became of it then?" laughed Doane.
"The fourth night," said Connors, sorrowfully, "the leading man did not appear. He afterward explained that he could not stand the forcible appreciation of the admiring gallery."
The trio talked, smoked and sipped champagne for quite a while. Suddenly it occurred to the editor that it was about time for him to fill an engagement in the ball room.
"By the way, I promised, after considerable persuasion, to dance with Ouida," said Doane, "and even my gout shall not deprive her of that pleasure."
"The conceited wretch," said Connors. "He talks as though he conferred a favor."
"I do," said Doane, as he went off in search of his partner, "there are but few women in this world I would really dance with."
He returned in a moment, mad as a March hare. He had been too late, and fifty had pleaded for his place upon her programme of dances.
"A most remarkable woman," said Connors.
"Peculiar, isn't it, how a person like her could so have mastered the world?" observed Wayland. "I have heard that but a comparatively few years ago she was the most common and obtainable creature on the streets of New York."
"I care not what may have been her past," said Connors, with comparative warmth, "today she is verily a mistress of her art."
"She is now putting the finishing touches," said Doane, "on 'A Modern Hercules,' a work which, in my judgment, compares favorably with that of the ancient Italian artists."
​"By the way," said Wayland, "did you hear of her scrape with Cardinal Beppo, at Rome?"
"Yes," said Doane, "but tell it for the benefit of Connors."
"You see," said Wayland, "Ouida spent some time in study at Rome. For a few months she worked hard, and behaved herself quite well, but one sunny day she captivated the Cardinal, and so complete was his adoration, that he lost all discretion, and Rome rung with the open story of his mad infatuation. Finally the officers of the Vatican made known to her, that the sacred city could exist without her. She suddenly left her dear prelate, who, since that time, has been beyond consolation."
"A capital bit of romance," said Connors, somewhat skeptical, "but who vouches for its truth?"
"I had it almost direct," said Doane, "from the Secretary of the American Legation, who was home last year from Rome on a visit to his people. But that story is tame, compared to what she did to Demas of the Comedie Francaise."
"Let's hear it," said Wayland, eagerly, "you never mar a poor tale in the telling of it."
Wayland was about to go, having heard all that he desired, but Doane restrained him, and he reluctantly was almost forced to listen to a style of gossip which, in his opinion, was good enough for the sewing circle, but little fitted for intelligent men.
"Ouida," said Doane, "was more than intimate with Demas, known to you all by reputation. But she fooled him, as she has every man who has thus far been lured into the magic circle of her regard. One night Demas ​was playing Falstaff in 'The Merry Wives of Windsor.' He was of ordinary size, but made himself up as the 'huge hell of flesh,' by a rubber apparatus, which was nightly filled with air. This night the cork came out which held the air in the rubber affair, and almost in the twinkling of an eye, he dwindled to his normal size, while his clothing hung about him like the folds of a collapsed balloon. The audience broke into a roar. The curtain was rung down, and it was fully fifteen minutes before order was sufficiently restored to allow the performance to proceed. Next day Demas was found dead in his apartments, a bullet wound in the temple. The press said it was chagrin. The real truth was that Ouida had led him on and on, until he thought she loved him. That night the fatal knowledge came to him that she was a heartless jilt, and he simply took the pistol route, with which to end his misery."
"Gentlemen," said Connors, "you astonish me. I have heard of such creatures as you paint this woman, but never before had the distinguished honor of a personal acquaintance. I do believe that a grain or two of discount on such stuff would be wise and just to her."
"And yet," said Wayland, "what a following she has, despite all this. Go into the ball room, and see New York at her feet."
"New York is the greatest city in the world," said Doane, "yet it is the must easily duped."
"People, in their wild desire to be entertained," said Connors, "pick and choose queer idols for worship."
At this juncture, unobserved, Ouida, accompanied by Paul, enter at the rear, but are partially concealed by large and rich portieres. Ouida had been searching for ​Doane, in order to soothe his wounded feelings, although not at fault herself. She heard herself as the subject of Doane's conversation, but hardly thought it would take the shape it did. She intended, in the midst of it, to burst in and turn it into something amusing at Doane's expense.
"The most astonishing part of it all," said Doane, "is her well-known life here in New York. At twelve, Ouida, who was the natural daughter of a woman of the town and Albert Angelo, was a child of the street. How she lived, she hardly knew herself. Lovers she had by the score. She became a model. She would just as willingly sit nude, as attired in silks and satins. One day Warde discovered that she possessed talent, nay, genius, of a high order. She was inspired to uplift herself out of base conditions. She was sent abroad, where, between her scrapes and love affairs, she studied. The power of art dowered her with wondrous victories. One or two conceptions a year brought her a fortune. She became rich enough to gratify every whim. She came here three years ago, having lost none of her Bohemian characteristics. Society has opened its arms; as you see, it worships her."
Paul breaks away from Ouida, and confronts Doane, anger and contempt leaping from his eyes.
"A wonderful story! Is it fully told?" said Paul. "Do these gentlemen know all?"
"All!" said Doane, "all, man? Why, could more possibly be crowded into the life of one woman?"
"Yes, slanderous cur," thundered Paul, as he slapped Doane's face with his glove. "Give them the finish. She marries me tomorrow night."