The spectators of the strange entertainment have at last departed, and the long e’s, ungrateful to the ear of the Attic scholar, are heard no more. In the far centre of the theatre a man is taking apart a mechanism—that from which the deus sprang in this evening’s play. Two other men remain. One walks musing and absorbed, looking toward that entrance whereby Orestes was wont to make his way to the stage. The other walks slowly round about the theatre, marking its aspects, and thinking of practical things. Presently they meet at the spot where once the choragus stood. They salute each other.
Mr Griffith
I am sorry that you should have been here to-night. To you, I suppose, this has been only a sacrilege. I am sorry that you should feel that I am gloating over my success. But perhaps I am mistaken. Are you, or are you not, Walter Pritchard Eaton?
Mr Eaton
I am. And you are David Wark Griffith, are you not? [D. G. nods.] We are well met, then—if I may make use of a phrase which the drama, and not your métier has made famous. By the way, ought I to “register” pleasure in any conventional way?
D. G.
Score one for you. I have sinned. But since you say we are well met, can’t we chat for a moment about things? You see, I am not altogether unaffected by this scene—the light, and the ancient theatre, and the memories of it all.
W. P. E.
They would all do admirably for a picture—for one of those extraordinary scenic effects which you create as no other man can create them. But the memories—those at least are mine. Surely you are not thinking of—
D. G.