They turned in at the alley that led to the stage door. This was the same door they had seen Little Eva come out of.
“How surprised we’d have been that day,” said Betsy, “if we’d known how soon we’d be walking in here ourselves.”
“I love to go in doors that say ‘Private, Keep Out,’” said Winona.
Tacy said nothing. She hugged her arm through Betsy’s as they left their own bright snowy world behind, and entered the theatre.
They found themselves in a dusty barnlike space. They knew it was the stage, because they could see the curtain, half-raised, and the dim empty house beyond. There were stacks of canvas scenery about, and piles of ropes, and an assortment of miscellaneous objects including a wash tub.
“Props,” said Tib waving her hand.
Men in overalls were hurrying about.
“Scene shifters,” said Tib.
A worried-looking man in a rumpled checked suit approached Mrs. Poppy.
“Mr. Drew, the stage manager,” whispered Tib.
Mr. Drew leaned toward Mrs. Poppy. He spoke in a lowered voice, as though he were telling a secret, but his words were audible.
“It’s all arranged, Mrs. Poppy,” he said. “Mr. … er … Kee is to show the children their routine. They can dress first.”
“Thank you, Mr. Drew,” said Mrs. Poppy. “I’m very grateful. This way,” she said to the girls and led them down some stairs into a damp-smelling cellar.
They followed a narrow corridor. The walls were covered with show bills. The Old Homestead. The Silver Slipper. Flora Dora. Ben Hur. The names, the half-seen brightly colored pictures flashed past in glamorous parade.
Rows of dressing rooms opened off the hall. Tib went into one of them. Betsy, Tacy, and Winona were ushered into another. It contained a cracked mirror, a bare, scratched dressing table, a wash bowl and pitcher, and three wooden chairs.
A small wrinkled old lady with beadlike eyes came in, carrying a bundle of clothing.
“Hello,” she said. “I’m Mrs. Mulligan, the wardrobe mistress. These are the costumes for village children, and see that they fit you! I think nothing of snipping off an arm here or a leg there.”
Mrs. Mulligan made jokes like that, but she was painstaking about the costumes. Mrs. Poppy came in to help her, and they pinned and fitted energetically.
The dresses were long like Tib’s; and the girls wore quaint Dutch caps. Tacy’s long red ringlets flowed out becomingly, and so did Winona’s straight black locks. Betsy wanted to unbraid her hair, but Mrs. Poppy said “No.” She arranged the pigtails so that they stuck out jauntily and tied ribbons on the ends.
Mrs. Poppy painted round red circles on their cheeks. She painted their lips red too. They looked in the mirror at themselves and looked at one another, anticipation bubbling up in laughter.
They ran in to see Tib. She was sitting in front of a mirror. Her yellow hair curled up babyishly around her cap; her cheeks and lips were red like theirs and her lashes were beaded with black.
She wasn’t excited in the way the others were, but for Tib she was excited. Her eyes were shining. She looked pleased when they praised her, although she said only:
“Thank goodness I’m up in my part!”
She had learned that expression from Mrs. Poppy but she used it naturally. It didn’t sound affected coming from Tib as it would have if one of the others had said it.
With Tacy’s icy hand in hers and Winona prancing behind, Betsy followed Mrs. Poppy up the stairs. Now the front part of the stage was enclosed; the scenery had been run into place, and the curtain was lowered.
Mr. Drew was waiting in the wings with a tall thin young man who wore a brown wig, knee breeches and a long-tailed coat. Lines were painted on his face.
“Mrs. Poppy,” said Mr. Drew. “This is Mr. … er … Kee. He plays the Vedders, first father, then son.”
“And in between,” said the young man lightly, “one of Hendrik Hudson’s men.”
“He understudies Mr. Winter too,” said Mr. Drew.
“You sound like an important person,” Mrs. Poppy smiled. She put out a white-gloved hand. “How do you do?” she said.
“How do you do?” answered Mr. Kee. He had dancing blue eyes that passed now from Mrs. Poppy to Winona, to Tacy, to Betsy.
“Hello, kids,” he said. “Spricht deutsch?”
“They look as though they should … don’t they?” Mrs. Poppy asked.
“They’re perfect.”
“I’d like them to have a very good time.”
“So Mr. Drew explained. I’ll take care of them,” said Mr. Kee. He took Betsy’s hand with a flashing smile. “Come on, Braids,” he said. “And you, Curls, and Locks. I’ll show you the Village of Falling Water before the curtain goes up.”
They went through the wings to the empty stage.
At the back rose the Kaatskill Mountains, brightly purple. To the left stood a country inn with a swinging sign reading George III. To the right was a tumbledown cottage.
“Rip Van Winkle’s palace,” Mr. Kee said. “That’s Dame Van Winkle’s wash tub out in front.”
“And there’s the stool where Tib will be sitting when the curtain goes up,” said Betsy. “You know the play?”
“Yes. Mrs. Poppy told it to us. We don’t know exactly what we’re to do though.”
Mr. Kee explained. They came on in the first act, he said. They would wait in the wings until the words: “Here he comes now, surrounded by all the dogs and children in the district. They cling around him like flies around a lump of sugar.”
When they got that cue, they would come on stage, running behind Rip.
“Two of us carry his coat tails, Mrs. Poppy says.”
“That’s right, Braids. Which two shall it be?”
“She and I,” said Winona. “Tacy doesn’t want to.”
“Braids and Locks at the coat tails then, with Curls bringing up the rear.” Mr. Kee seemed amused with the names he had made up for them.
He explained further.
“Rip will be carrying a small boy pick-a-back, and another boy will be holding his gun. Those two boys, Tom and Jeff, belong to the company. They know exactly what to do, and you must do just as they do.”
“Do we come on and go off when they do?”
“Yes. Stick close to them and you can’t go wrong. Don’t wander down to the front of the stage or get in anyone’s way.”
He gave them a few more instructions, then told them that after the first act they would not appear until the fourth.
“You can sit in the wings and watch the play. I’ll join you whenever I can. Any questions now?”
“No,” said Betsy. “I’m sure we can do it. We give plays ourselves all the time. I’m sure I ought to know how to act,” she added importantly. “My uncle is an actor.”
“He is?” asked the young man. “What’s his name?”
“Keith Warrington.” Betsy pronounced it proudly.
“Keith Warrington?”
Mr. Kee sounded so surprised that Betsy asked quickly, “You don’t happen to know him; do you?”
“Never heard of him.”
The young man settled his wig with long flexible fingers and looked hard at Betsy with his bright blue eyes.
“How do you like that … having an uncle in the profession?”
“Oh, I like it,” Betsy said.
“She has a trunk full of his costumes,” said Winona.
“She uses it for a desk,” Tacy put in shyly.
“Desk, eh?” said the young man. “You do your arithmetic there, I suppose?”
“Arithmetic!” said Betsy scornfully. “I write stories there, and poems, and plays.”
At that moment two boys in Dutch costume came bounding on the stage.
“Hi, Tom and Jeff!” called the young man. “Come here and meet the ‘supes.’” Betsy and Tacy and Winona were “supes,” it appeared; that was short for “supernumeraries.”
“These are the boys,” Mr
. Kee explained, “whom you follow through thick and thin.”
He walked away.
Tom and Jeff took the girls in hand good-naturedly. They took them to the front of the stage and let them look through a peephole in the center of the curtain. It was bad luck, they explained, to peep from any other place. The girls looked out eagerly and saw the audience filing in, laughing and talking.
“There are Julia and Jerry.”
“Katie and Pin are with them.”
“I see my father and mother,” said Winona.
“I see mine too,” said Tacy. “And all the Mullers.”
“Rena and Margaret are in the front row,” cried Betsy. “Rena’s wearing her best hat, with pansies on it.”
Winona took another turn at the peephole.
“I can’t be sure,” she said, “but I think I see Tom and Herbert up in the peanut heaven.”
There were plenty of boys and girls there to judge by the racket going on.
Through all the noise they could hear the violins being tuned. That thin insistent sound increased the turmoil in their breasts. There was a call for the stage to be cleared, and Tom and Jeff hurried the girls past the Inn of George III, around a canvas wall into the wings. They stood where they could look out on the stage, although they were themselves unseen.
Dame Van Winkle strolled out and took her place at the wash tub. Tib passed by with Mrs. Poppy and sat down on the stool. Mrs. Poppy arranged Tib’s cap, the fluffy curls, her skirts. Then Mrs. Poppy rustled off the stage and Tom and Jeff pulled the girls further back in the wings. The orchestra was playing a piece Julia played, Mendelssohn’s Spring Song.
They could not see the stage now, but they knew what had happened from the hush that fell on everything. Winona leaned out and whispered to Betsy:
“The curtain goes up.”
They waited tensely, and after a moment they heard Dame Van Winkle speaking. They heard Tib’s voice, sweet and unafraid. They heard Hendrik Vedder, the boy who was little Meenie’s friend. Mr. Kee, who was playing Hendrik’s father now, would play the grown-up Hendrik later.
Presently Mr. Winter joined the children in the wings. He was dressed in Rip’s old deerskin coat, ragged breeches and torn hat, but he did not look merry as Rip was supposed to look; he looked grave.
He warned the girls in a whisper to stay close to Tom. Unsmiling he hoisted Jeff to his back and handed Tom the gun. They waited together so silently they could almost hear their heart beats. Tacy reached for Betsy’s hand.
They heard a voice. “Here he comes now….They cling around him like flies around a lump of sugar.”
Mr. Winter’s expression changed; he began to laugh. All at once he was Rip, and Betsy and Winona picked up his coat tails, laughing too. Tacy smiled, although her teeth were chattering. With Jeff riding pick-a-back, they all trooped out into a blaze of light.
After a few minutes Betsy got used to the light. She was conscious of the hushed expectant darkness of the house. Intent only on staying close to Tom and Jeff, she scarcely listened as Rip talked and the Dame scolded, as Meenie and Hendrik and Hendrik’s father and themselves went on and off the stage.
Tib did not glance toward her friends. She too was intent … upon saying her lines and doing exactly as she had been told. But in the dance that ended the act, she gave them a cloudless smile.
When the curtain went up after having gone down, and the principals went forward to receive their applause, Tib floated out. She held Rip’s hand with one hand and with the other she lifted her skirt in the daintiest of curtseys. Beyond the footlights her family and friends and half of Deep Valley, it seemed, clapped and cheered approval of the play, and especially of Tib. Modest but pleased, she curtsied again and again. The curtain went down.
Betsy, Tacy, and Winona did not appear in the second act. Mr. Kee placed chairs for them in the wings at a point where they could see the stage, and while they waited for the curtain to go up, he dropped casually down on a barrel.
He stretched his long arms and locked his hands behind his head.
“Tell me,” he said to Betsy, “why you use a trunk for a desk.”
“It’s much nicer than an ordinary desk,” said Betsy. “A real theatrical trunk!”
“How do you happen to have it at your house?”
Betsy, talkative as always, explained.
She told him how Uncle Keith had run away from home, and why; she told how his trunk had come back at the outset of the Spanish War, and had never been called for, and how no one knew where he was.
“But he’ll come back some day,” Betsy said. “He must want to see Mamma, just as she wants to see him.”
“Does she want to see him?” asked the young man. But just then the bell rang as a warning that the act was about to begin. Without waiting for an answer, he jumped up and strode away.
“It’s a good idea, Betsy,” said Tacy, “to tell that actor about your Uncle Keith. Maybe he’ll meet him some day.”
“He seems so interested too,” said Betsy.
“Hush now!” cried Winona. “There’s the music.”
The curtain rose slowly on the dimly lighted kitchen of Rip’s house.
Meenie sat by the window, looking out at a raging storm. It would be interesting, Betsy thought, to run around in back and see how they made that storm … the rain, the frightful wind, the thunder, and the lightning flashes. But she could not bear to take her eyes from Tib.
As the act progressed, however, she forgot that Meenie was Tib. Lost in the drama, she looked and listened, while the boy Hendrik told Meenie tales of the spirits that played at nine pins in the mountains, while Rip and his wife quarreled and Dame Van Winkle turned the hapless fellow out into the torrent. She forgot it was Tib’s treble saying:
“Oh mother, hark at the storm!”
Again Tib curtsied before the big curtain, holding Rip’s hand.
Between the second and third acts, Mr. Kee came to talk with the girls again. He was dressed as one of Hendrik Hudson’s ghostly crew, wearing a high-crowned hat and gray doublet and hose.
He dropped down on his barrel.
“I suppose,” he said to Betsy, “your family is all here to see you act.”
“Papa and Mamma are coming tonight,” said Betsy. “But Rena and Margaret and Jerry and Julia are here.”
“How many brothers and sisters do you have?” he exclaimed, sounding surprised.
“Only two,” said Betsy. “Jerry is a friend of Julia’s. He invited her to come and see the play. And Rena is our hired girl. She brought Margaret.”
“Is Julia old enough to be coming to a play with a young man?” Mr. Kee seemed amazed.
“Of course,” said Betsy. “Why shouldn’t she be?”
“She’s in high school,” said Tacy.
“You ought to hear her sing, Mr. Kee,” Winona said. “She sings and speaks pieces too.”
Betsy explained. “She takes after Uncle Keith.”
“She … what?” The young man jumped up as though he had heard the bell. But he hadn’t. Erect on his long legs, he stood still, staring at Betsy.
“Does she look like him?” he asked abruptly.
“No,” said Betsy. “Julia and Margaret and I all have dark hair like our father’s. Uncle Keith has red hair like our mother’s. But Julia gets her talent for singing and acting from Uncle Keith, and I get my writing from him.”
“You do?”
“That’s what my mother says,” answered Betsy firmly. “And my father says so too.”
The bell really did ring then, and in a few moments they were transported to a wild mountain glen. Rip played at nine pins with an eerie crew; he drank from their flagon.
As soon as the act ended, Mr. Kee appeared.
“Braids,” he said. “Let’s take a look through the curtain. If I were ever to meet this uncle of yours, I’d like to be able to tell him I’d seen his family.”
“Mr. Kee,” said Betsy. “That’s a splendid idea.”
&nbs
p; They went to the peephole in the curtain.
Margaret was acting very ladylike. Every hair of the brown English bob was in place. She was turning her big eyes solemnly about.
Julia was chatting with Jerry, looking very grown-up, with a fluffy bow at the top of her pompadour and another at the back of her neck.
“Father and mother coming tonight, eh?” asked Mr. Kee.
“Yes,” said Betsy. “Papa can’t get away from the store in the afternoon.”
“What about your grandparents?” Mr. Kee asked. “The peppery old gentleman you told me about? I don’t suppose he’d come to see a play.”
“He and Grandma live in California now,” Betsy replied. “He isn’t as peppery as he used to be. Mamma thinks he’s sorry he made Uncle Keith run away.”
“He didn’t actually make him run away,” said the young man.
“Oh, yes he did!” answered Betsy.
“Not in my opinion,” said Mr. Kee. “The young man must have been plenty peppery himself. You told me he had red hair, you know. He certainly gave everyone plenty of worry, and now, probably, he’s ashamed to come back.”
“Ashamed to come back?” Betsy cried. The honest surprise in her voice made Mr. Kee start.
“Why, that’s the silliest thing I ever heard in my life!” she cried. “Everyone is longing for him to come back. It would make my mother happier than anything else in the world. He ought to be ashamed of not coming back.”
“Hmm! You think so? Hmm!” said Mr. Kee.
The last act was in several scenes. Rip woke from his twenty-year nap. Wrinkled and ancient, with his flowing white beard, he returned to the village to find George III replaced by George Washington on the Inn’s swinging sign. Betsy, Tacy, and Winona were part of a crowd hooting cruelly at the old man’s heels.
No one believed the story of his long sleep in the Kaatskills. His old friends were dead, his wife was married to someone else, and Meenie (now a young lady, and played by a young lady actress) was about to be forced into marriage with a villain.
Mr. Kee appeared in the very nick of time, as the dashing sailor, Hendrik Vedder, come home to claim his sweetheart. Rip was recognized; he got his wife back; he came into a fortune, and he gave Meenie to Hendrik.