Josette waited excitedly for her sister at Figaro Bistrot, she was tap tap tapping her velvet mule against the wrought iron table leg. She held her glass up—another Beaujolais, she signaled to the cute waiter. She had only slept with him just the one time before making her excuses to avoid the next, but he was accepting it quite well. While she sipped the wine and felt her fears quickly melting away, she wound and unwound a lock of her long, dark hair around her index finger. It was getting harder and harder to convince her twin sister, Manon, that she, not Josette, was the true brain behind this operation.
Manon was blonde and though she born just eleven minutes after Josie, her face shone with all that was light and good in this world. Her laugh was like the peal of chandelier’s crystals, her smile akin to the fizz in Champagne. Manon was the understudy to her sister’s burlesque performance at Variété des Artes, but she very rarely had to replace Josette as her sister was a warhorse, going on no matter how hungover she was. Manon didn’t mind, as it left plenty of time for her to sort out her sister’s corsets and stockings and feathers and tat in the dressing room.
Manon didn’t know what the big hurry was, but she took two street cars and virtually ran the rest of the way to Figarot, only to find Josette making small talk with a couple at the next table, flirting with both of them: dipping her bosom a little too low, fist under chin, looking directly into each set of eyes with faux fascination. Manon admired Josette’s lack of propriety as much as she was appalled by it. Josette, just a little tipsy, stood up and shouted “MANON!” Grabbing her reticule purse, she pulled Manon close and lead her by the elbow to a more secluded table. As they sank into their chairs, Josette began—Just hear me out, don’t say anything, don’t ask me questions until I’m done. Promise?
Manon nodded in the affirmative, yes, she promised.
Okay!, Josette continued, I’ve thought of a way we can finally pay our rent AND put some money away to move into a nicer flat. Don’t look at me in that way! No, you said you’d listen. We will get you a brunette wig that looks exactly like my hair, I already found it and it’s not all that much. When the floor manager isn’t at the show, which is every other night, you will perform as me. You already know all the songs and steps and when to drop the feathers, all you need to do is stick out your bosoms and push your rear end out more...
And you will be ? ... Manon wondered, not daring to interrupt her.
I will be entertaining various of my suitors backstage, I know I can charge the Mayor at least one hundred francs because no other girl will ever do that thing that men like. Neither floor manager will suspect a thing! Instead of you sitting around being my handmaiden, pretending to play piano, you will go onstage as me. I too will be working hard, so to speak. I can make double the money offstage that I’m able to make onstage. It is brilliant, no!?
Josette had her nose four inches from Manon’s but she couldn’t get a read, she stared and stared at Manon’s pupils for signs of approval, and light. Manon’s eyes were like saucers, it wasn’t a questioning look so much as it was horror. Horror, unmistakably bound up with intrigue.
THE EULOGY
Not surprising to those who knew her, Josette’s funeral was held at the Mayor’s mansion, in the great hall. There were rows upon rows of upholstered mahogany chairs, nearly 200 people would be in attendance. Even more perhaps, and they would have to stand outside in the street. The men arrived weeping and their women were crying as well, they dabbed their eyes because Josie was dead, handkerchiefs concealing just a bit of white onion to provide authenticity.
Josette knew very well the origin of the professional actress’s funeral rites, and she had set out to keep that grande tradition alive. One mourner said she was the most beautiful woman that he’d ever seen. Another stood up and was nearly too bereft to speak. She was so young, he exclaimed before stopping, his shoulders heaving, so talented, such a loss. Very few women got up to say something but everyone held their breath as her dearest younger sister Manon walked up to the podium, often pausing to steady herself on the aisle chairs. Tears streaming down her cheeks, she told the story of how her sister Josette did all of the hard work so that she could benefit while doing so little, all the while protecting her from the world and all of its evil. She steadied herself at the podium, face upturned to God as she said she would give anything, anything, to have her dear sister back for even one minute.
Kind Pierre, the waiter from the Bistrot, helped Manon walk down the stairs and back to her seat. Instead of sitting down, Manon stood in the back and then briefly exited to the libations table that was being set up in the adjoining parlour. She pulled a small compact from her velvet purse and glanced at her reflection, first powdering her nose and then making sure that her newly colored hair revealed no dark roots. You see, this wasn’t Josette’s little ray of light, her slightly younger twin sister Manon, but Josette herself.
After a recent Saturday night performance, poor Manon, still wearing her dark wig, sipped a well-deserved glass of wine backstage, wholly unaware that a jealous wife had dropped a lethal dose of strychnine therein, thus proving that noone knew that Manon impersonated Josette every other night. Josette returned from an obscene assignation in a dressing room down the hallway, still straightening her garters, only to discover her beloved sister’s heartbreaking final act and the resulting chaos. She felt simply terrible about the fatal mistake that had been intended for her, but at the same time, it gave Josette the perfect opportunity to begin anew. She gave the undertaker her birth certificate and kept Manon’s as her own, assuring him that her twin sister Josette was a natural blonde like herself. She only wore a brunette wig onstage... The following morning the first order of business: Dyeing her hair blonde!
The good, innocent girl was a ruse that Josette had never dreamed of trying before— and judging by the men at her memorial, her lovers or formerly so, they had no inkling that she was channeling her sweet little sister. Josette gave herself a hug for being such a good actress in the truest sense of the word, for this was the role of a lifetime. She was now Manon, all that was pure and good in this world, and the Johns were going to have to pay double—maybe triple—to sully this unsullied girl. She dabbed away at her eyes again, crying real tears because she was so anxious to get started.
a grand twist of fate.