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How a Talented but Fickle
Grand Opera Leader and
a Simple Little Singer Broke Elinor Glyn’s Most
Feverish Record by Just Seven Days.
Mrs. Vanderberg When She Was Simple Little Edna Richardson
A NEW YORK divorce court has re
cently broken Elinor Glyn’s
record. The auburn haired author
of “Three Weeks” sits back breathless
and watches a plump little girl of eighteen
passing under the wire full seven days
ahead of the mysterious and irresistible
queen of Mrs. Glyn’s imagination. Truth
is not only stranger than fiction, but in
this instance is a third swifter.
Miss Edna Richardson met, was wooed,
was won and married her hero and lost
him all in two weeks, and Miss Richardson
is only a little village maid from “up York
State.” Of course, Mrs. Glyn’s hero and
heroine never married—but that’s not the
point. When Mrs. Glyn conceived the
tragedy that ended one life and marred
another, all the events which led to the
unhappy denouement occurring in three
weeks, middle aged, unromantic folks
raised their shoulders and pooh poohed
“Love was never as swift as that,’ they
said.
“It’s quite impossible,” they repeated.
“Why do people write such foolish tales?”
Yet here is a tiny, dark eyed, laughing
maid from “York State” telling a true tale
in a divorce court that makes “Three
Weeks” seem a freight train as compared
with the Twentieth Century Limited.
It happened ih Newark, a town rendered
romantic by the folks who visit it rather
than those who there reside. Edna Rich
ardson paid a visit there, but that is a
fact more or less immaterial, for Edna
was only sixteen. Her mother, chaperon
ing her, called her “little girl.” Edna’s
skirts missed her boot tops by a good
inch or more, revealing a plump, yet
slender pair—well, never mind. The
brevity of her skibts was a small matter,
but her eyes mattered a great deal. They
were large and dark and set far apart,
seemed to dream strange dreams. She
smiled a great deal, revealing two rows
of extremely attractive teeth. Still she
was only a little girl, and her mother told
of the dolls she had left behind in the up
state village.
Quite a different sort of person entered
Newark by way of one of its railway
stations the same week. Some of its citi
zens recalling him say it would have been
more fitting had he swooped down in an
aeroplane. His name was Brahm Vander
berg, and he is the Belgian musical con
ductor of the Aborn Opera Company. He
literally jumped off the train, ran to his
hotel, and told the startled clerk he want
ed a front room, second floor, with bath,
7 o’clock call in the morning, breakfast in
his room, charge to the Aborn Company,
in the time an ordinary individual would
have consumed in saying “Good morning.”
It -was characteristic of Brahm Vander
berg that he walked fast, talked rapidly,
always acted as though fiends were whip
ping him and urging, “Faster, Faster,”
and so quite of course he made love
rapidly when the occasion warranted it.
He had not been in the hotel five minutes
before he started as though catapulted to
tlie theatre for rehearsal. Arriving there
he rapped tne railing with his baton and
shouted “Ready, Begin!”
When the rehearsal was finished a
mfcmbei of the company ?»rne from the
stage and greeted two friends who had
been listening in the shadow's of the audi
torium.
“Let me introduce you to my little
friend, Miss Richardson. Edna, this is
the great Mr. Brahm Vanderberg, our
musical director.”
Miss Richardson saw' a little foreign
looking man with dark hair mixed with
gray and a tiny moustache so tightly
waxed that it seemed to pull his lips up
ward. She thought him “a very funny-
looking little man, with eyes that seemed
to burn a hole through one.” He saw- in
her a half child, half divinity. She told a
friend her impression of him days after
ward. He told her his impressjon within
five minutes after they had met.
“You were sitting back there, ten yards
from me and I did not know-. ‘Mon Dieu.’
‘How cruel,’ ” cried Brahm Vanderberg.
“I—I wasn’t lonely. Mamma was with
me,” w-as the divinity’s answer.
“Mamma! Ah, yes. Permit me the
honor, Madame.” He tried to kiss Mrs.
Richardson’s hand, but she drew it away
and frowned. Mrs. Richardson is not a
cosmopolitan and has no patience with
“such silly foreign antics.”
But the Belgian secured Edna’s hand,
and after he had kissed it, he pressed it
so long that a blush rose to her cheek. “A
blush as lovely as the first flush of rose at
dawm,” he told her.
“The fellow- began making love to Edna
right there under my nose without a ’By
your leave,’ ” Mrs. Richardson said after
ward to condoling neighbors.
That evening the company was invited
to a dinner. The musical conductor escort
ed the little girl from the country and
feasted his eyes upon her beauty with
such amazing concentration that the toast
master had to call his name three times
when he wanted a speech from “the Bel
gian genius.”
The next day he sent her flow-ers and
scrawled on his cards were the words,
“Mia adorata.” He called to take her for
a drive, but her mother, meeting him with
a belligerent air and flashing eyes, said:
“My little girl has a headache. Please go
away.”
Cupid teaches a man invention. He per
suaded the manager of the company to
offer “that beautiful little American who
can sing like an angel,” a small part in the
opera. They were rehearsing “The Chimes
of Normandy.” Little Edna Richardson
carried a bouquet and curtesied. The
manager said she was “well enough.” The
musical director exclaimed:
“My dear sir, she is divine.”
Said the heartless stage manager:
“Brahm, you are old enough to know bet
ter. You are acting like a fool about that
girl. Are you going crazy?”
Vanderberg rolled his eyes toward the
soiled ceiling of the theatre, kissed his
finger tips to the dome, and replied: “Try
being crazy. It is ecstasy. It is to walk
among the stars.”
"Mush!” retorted the stage manager,
who reported to the home office: “That
Belgian fellow is losing his head about a
girl. He comes to rehearsals late or not
at all.”
“What do you think?” complained the
ardent lover to his child inamorata, “that
rude man interrupts me when I am think
ing of you, Edna. When thinking of you!
That is quite as uncouth as though I were
talking with you. I want to remain undis
turbed. My thoughts of you must not be
profaned by a shout from his raucous
voice.”
The home office was as rude as the stage
manager. It “fired” the orchestra leader
for inattention to duty. But it did not
banish him. It couldn’t while little Miss
Richardson remained in “The Chimes of
Normandy.” The theatre being within an
enclosed park, the representative of the
type of “sweet sixteen,” whenever she
neared one of its gates, always saw her
elderly suitor peering through the gate,
his eyes burning, his small talon like hands
tossing her kisses.
On the third day after Vanderberg met
Miss .Edna, he proposed at a restaurant
table, and when she said: “I don’t know.
Maybe some day.” He replied, “Some day?
My cruel angel, do you not see I am dying
for you? Let us go to the City Hall and be
married instantly—at once—now!”
“But why?”
Reading Hall Caine’s Fortune in His Hand
H ALL CAINE, the famous novelist, author
of “The Woman Thou Gavest Me”
and other widely read books, recently
had his palm read by C. W. Childs, a cele
brated English palmist who has made a spe
cial study of the hands of famous men. Mr.
Childs found Mr. Caine’s hand decidedly
square in shape, strongly developed, very pro
portionate and with the finger tips nicely
rounded and the flesh flexible, fresh-colored
and of fine texture. These features, Mr.
Childs says, show that the novelist is
possessed of marked taste for study and in
tellectual pursuits, exceptional refinement and
idealism, good memory, rare versatility and
power of application and an enormous capac
ity for work.
The thumb is strong, shapely, and lies close
close to the hand.
This proclaims strength of character, an in
vincible will, superb reasoning powers, sound
judgment, and excellent self-control. Its atti
tude and placing also signal the born disci
plinarian. and one who would never own de
feat. It is very remarkable to find such a
gigantic thumb in company with such a pow
erful line of head and pronounced develop
ment of the mount of the Moon,
Unfortunately the illustration does not
bring out sufficiently clearly the exceptional
development of the mount of the Moon which
forms quite a heavy pad. The.latter reflects An Autographed Photograph
an extraordinary wvid imagination and great Impression of Hall Caine’s
constructive ability, while the length and
depth of the line of head testifies to abundant
intellectuality and the possession of a very
vigorous brain. The formidable thumb
stands as a sentinel revealing the qualities
which enable the subject to keep in check
any tendencies to excess either of intellect
or imagination.
The perfect line of heart, with its num
erous branchings on the mount of Jupiter, in
conjunction with the full mount of Venus,
reveals a singularly lovable, generous, and
genial nature, and shows one who could not
do other than take a vital interest in human
ity and seek to probe its problems to the core.
This is still further emphasized by the short,
straight shapely first (Jupiter) finger, which
signifies humility and an extremely sensitive
and retiring disposition.
Mr. Caine’s fingers are of medium length
and the knots strongly developed. They are
also placed very evenly on the palm and are
widely separated. This is evidence of tran
quillity, excessive independence, and rare
patience anc( method in work.
The long, stately second (Saturn) finger
bears witness to wisdom and sobriety. The
modest third (Apollo) indicates an entire ab
sence of vanity, while the powerful fourth
(Mercury) bespeaks the matchless writer,
the shrewd observer, the keen student of
human nature, and the diligent worker. The
Of the many fine lines ascending the hand testify
Hand. to an unusually active and successful life.
“At first she thought it
was for her he looked and
she arose and waved her*
little hand with its brand
new wedding ring at him.
But no! It was not for
her he looked!”
<
Mrs. Vanderberg, Who Helped Break the “Three Weeks” Record.
“Why? Because I love you.”
The argument had little weight with the
girl, still less with her mother. The ardent
Belgian tried another.
“If you do not marry me soon 1 shall
die. If not from the fever that is consum
ing me, then I shall cast myself into the
river. I shall jump from the highest build
ing or shall hang myself from the tree
yonder in the park. And my blood will for
ever stain the path of those so dainty feet.”
“The man’s mad. You must go away,”
said Mrs. Richardson, and she sent the girl
“back home,” taking care that the dis
traught suitor should not know where
“back home” was. Mrs. Richardson went
to New York.
“I was put out of two lodging houses be
cause they said they wouldn’t be bothered
with any one who got telegrams, and at 2
in the morning, and telephones at 5,” com
plained the woman who didn’t want to be
a mother-in-law.
Vanderberg would telegraph: “I am tor
tured by thoughts of my loved one. Tell
me where she is or I shall cut my throat.”
No reply coming, he would telephone: “My
brain is on fire. Would you kill me?
Where is she? Is she well? Does she
think of me?”
To the young girl in hiding went reports
of these pleadings. Being a girl of six
teen she smiled and primped before the
mirror and privately thought “Mamma is
hard hearted.”
After a week the torrential lover broke
through the cordon of silence surrounding
his loved one. Somebody relented and
gave him the address of her hiding place.
On the wings of the wind went, or rather
on the telegraph wires went, instantly, the
telegram:
“I am at Worcester with Mine. Marchesi.
Fly to me and we will join her on tour.
Your miserable, yet hoping, Brahm."
Mme. Blanche Marchesi! A tour with
the daughter of the world famed one!
How romantic! How Bohemian! The
village maid burst her bonds. She sped to
Worcester and ten minutes after she had
stepped from the train she was stepping
from a parsonage burdened with the title
of Mme. Vanderberg!
And then? Bliss? Harmony? Joy inex
pressible and immeasurable? No. They
had scarcely started their western tour
when the bride noticed that when her hus
band waved his baton he looked at one
member of the company more closely than
at any other. “And she was not the prettiest
by any means,” she says. When he played
the ’cello, drawing from it the deep sobbing
notes of sorrowing love, his burning eyes
searched the audience as though looking
for some one. At first she thought it was
for her he looked and she waved her little
hand with its brand new wedding ring at
him.
But no! It was not for her he looked!
In truth the fire went out of his burning
eyes when they met her gaze. The fire
in them had already turned to ashes for
her. They burned for some .one else, he
knew not whom, but some one, somewhere
in the world, who was “in harmony” with
him. Love was like music, mysterious,
baffling, maddening, beyond reason and im
possible to be confined. When she re
proached him for these vague thought
wanderings, he shrugged his shoulders and
responded merely, “That I cannot help.
Am I not ze artist?”
The bride became homesick, ner mothe.
came for her and took her home.
“I must go back to Brahm as soon as 1
am better,” said the bride.
“Go back to Brahm? His name should
have been broom. He sweeps one love
affair out of his mind so completely when
he begins another,” said her mother. “You
sijall never go back to him.
“But he will be lonely,” insisted the pen
sive little bride.
Her mother laughed. “Don’t you know, *
Edna dear, that the man already has an
affinity? I tell you two weeks are his
limit.”
The bride refused to believe. The
mother hired a detective. The detective’s
report sounded like the story of Blue
Beard.
There have been several Mrs. Vander-
bergs since you. One of them is living
uptown in New York now.”
“This must be straightened out. It is
awful. I won’t have iny daughter contused
with those terrible persons. It must be
shown that she is the only Mrs. Vander
berg,” declared Edna’s militapt mother.
It was straightened out in the divorce
court. When it was testified that the last
of the many Mrs. Vanderbergs was a tall,
slender blonde, the judge gave one glance
at the plump, dark eyed plaintiff and said:
“Decree granted.”
On Broadway where “Three Weeks”
episodes are frequent, they declare that
Brahm Vanderberg h<ilds the record and
they have invited him to compose an opera
entitled “Two Weeks,” that shall banish
memories of the famous “Three Weeks.”
[ 3 .
i
Copyright, 1913. by the Star Company. Great Britain Rights Reserved.