“Don’t knock that pe-des-tal over, you pie face!”
At last they got safely over, and Harvey boldly walked up to the star’s dressing-room.
“We’re all right now,” he said to Butler, with a perceptible quaver in his voice. “Just you wait while I go in and tell her I am here.”
Butler squeezed himself into a narrow place, 61 where he seemed safe from death, mopped his brow, and looked like a lost soul.
Two men, sitting off to the left, saw Harvey try the locked door and then pound rather imperatively.
“Good Lord!” exclaimed one of them, staring. “It’s—it’s—er—What’s-His-Name, Nellie’s husband! Well, of all the infernal––”
“That?” gasped Fairfax.
“What in thunder is he doing here this time o’ night! Great Scott, he’ll spoil everything,” groaned Ripton, the manager.
Harvey pounded again with no response. Nellie was sitting inside, mentally picturing the eagerness that caused Fairfax to come a-pounding like that. She had decided not to answer.
Ripton called a stage hand.