The Vaudeville Star Read Free

wife and enveloped her in his arms as tears streamed down her cheeks. “I looked into the school. It’s very good. You’ll learn a lot, and three years will come and go so quickly—”
    “Three years?” Ruby said, looking into his eyes.
    “Come now. What else would you be doing? You’d be stuck here with your Momma and sister and pining away for Ford. That’s not right. You’re young and pretty, and you’ll find a man to love you. That won’t be the problem at all. It will be picking the right one. Now dry your tears. You’ll write to me, and I’ll write to you. I’ll even visit you, Ruby Mae.”
    “Promise?” she said softly.
    “Promise.”

2
    R uby settled into life at Miss Porter’s in Connecticut. Nothing was as bad as she had expected, and she made friends with girls her age and even found much in common with many of them. She had the distinct impression that her mother had told the school outrageous lies because the teachers treated her as if she were a three-eyed monster. She had chores, which she didn’t mind, and as the weeks turned into months, she settled into a routine.
    While at Miss Porter’s School, Ruby took music lessons and began to cultivate a lovely singing voice. She had always sung at home but had often been quieted by her mother or sister. But here in Connecticut, she was encouraged and complimented. The girls often praised her singing voice and made much ado about her looks.
    As the first year passed, she began to blossom. Her blond hair curled becomingly, and her figure filled out. She didn’t realize that when she went into town to look at the latest dress fashions or to choose a new hat, she received male admiration wherever she went. Her friends giggled, but Ruby tended to ignore it.
    At night, alone in her bedroom, she devoured the latest Harper’s Weekly and enjoyed reading about the world around her, delighting in the foreign news, the essays, the illustrations, and the humor.
    In one issue, there was a picture from The Highwayman being performed at the Broadway Theatre in New York, and the thought of being onstage excited Ruby. Music had always surrounded her, whether it was the plantation workers singing as they toiled in the fields or the country dances with the fiddle playing in the summertime.
    She knew she had a fine singing voice and was considered pretty, and so she wondered if both could be used to her advantage. The more Ruby pondered the thought, the more she decided it was what she wanted to do. She didn’t want to go back to Mississippi with her overbearing mother and nasty-tempered sister. Even her sweet father was not reason enough to make her return.
    It was then that one of the girls mentioned the term “vaudeville.” Vaudeville. The name itself sounded odd and foreign on her tongue. Vaudeville. She soon discovered it was a variety of acts grouped together and performed on the same bill. Vaudeville could consist of dancers, comedians, magicians, singers, and acrobatic acts. The idea of going onstage as a vaudeville singer thrilled her.
    With a new goal in mind, Ruby struggled to excel at her music lessons, to learn as much as she could in her time spent at Miss Porter’s. Her music teacher was traditional and detested the “music hall” songs that were so popular onstage and with the common people. But Ruby learned several songs in secret that she had heard from her friends. She also worked on her posture and tried to cultivate elegance in her movements.
    One long weekend, several of the older girls in Ruby’s group, along with two adult chaperones, visited New London in Connecticut and saw a small vaudeville show at Lyric Hall. Ruby was captivated. The show was mesmerizing with three men on bicycles, an acrobat team of dwarves, and a singer who commanded the stage as Ruby hoped to one day do. The singer held the audience in thrall, and Ruby knew then that there was no turning back.
    She was silent the rest of the way back to Farmington while all