| 494 | 495 | 496 | 497 | 498 |
| 1 | 236 | 472 | 708 | 944 |
|
increased receipts of the Green Box caused a corresponding decrease in
the receipts of the surrounding shows. Those entertainments, popular up
to that time, suddenly collapsed. It was like a low-water mark, showing
inversely, but in perfect concordance, the rise here, the fall there.
Theatres experience the effect of tides: they rise in one only on
condition of falling in another. The swarming foreigners who exhibited
their talents and their trumpetings on the neighbouring platforms,
seeing themselves ruined by the Laughing Man, were despairing, yet
dazzled. All the grimacers, all the clowns, all the merry-andrews envied
Gwynplaine. How happy he must be with the snout of a wild beast! The
buffoon mothers and dancers on the tight-rope, with pretty children,
looked at them in anger, and pointing out Gwynplaine, would say, "What a
pity you have not a face like that!" Some beat their babes savagely for
being pretty. More than one, had she known the secret, would have
fashioned her son's face in the Gwynplaine style. The head of an angel,
which brings no money in, is not as good as that of a lucrative devil.
One day the mother of a little child who was a marvel of beauty, and who
acted a cupid, exclaimed,--
"
Our children are failures! They only succeeded with Gwynplaine." And
shaking her fist at her son, she added, "If I only knew your father,
wouldn't he catch it!"
Gwynplaine was the goose with the golden eggs! What a marvellous
phenomenon! There was an uproar through all the caravans. The
mountebanks, enthusiastic and exasperated, looked at Gwynplaine and
gnashed their teeth. Admiring anger is called envy. Then it howls! They
496
Page
Quick Jump
|