A group of faces showed in the bow-window and for an instant Gordon hesitated, the old perverse spirit tempting him to enter, but he resisted it.
The first act was on when he reached Drury Lane Theater, and the lobby was empty save for the usual loungers and lackeys. The doors of the pit were open and he stood behind the rustling colors of Fops’ Alley. He scanned the house curiously, himself unobserved, noting many a familiar face in the boxes.
Night after night the pit had roused to the veteran actor Kean. Night after night, Fops’ Alley had furnished its quota of applause for a far smaller part, played with grace and sprightliness—by Jane Clermont, the favorite of the greenroom. Her first entrance formed a finish to the act now drawing to a close. To Gordon’s overwrought senses to-night there seemed some strange tenseness in the air. Here and there heads drew together whispering. The boxes were too quiet.
As the final tableau arranged itself, and Jane advanced slowly from the wings, there was none of the usual signs of approval. Instead a disturbed shuffle made itself heard. She began her lines smiling. An ugly murmur overran the pit, and she faltered.
Instantly a man’s form leaned over the edge of a box and hissed. The watcher, staring from the shadow of the lobby, recognized him with a quick stab of significance—it was William Lamb. The action seemed a concerted signal. Some one laughed. An undulate hiss swept over the house like a nest of serpents. Even some of the boxes swelled its volume.
Jane shrank, looking frightenedly about her, bewildered, her hands clutching her gown; for the pit was on its legs now, and epithets were hurled at the stage. “Crede Gordon!” came the derisive shout—a cry taken up with groans and catcalls—and a walking-stick clattered across the footlights. The manager rushed upon the stage and the heavy curtain began to descend.
“The baggage!” said a voice near Gordon with a coarse laugh. “It’s the one they say he had in his house when his wife left him. Serves her right!”
Gordon’s breath caught in his throat. So this had been William Lamb’s way! Not an appeal to the court of ten paces—an assassin in the dark with a bloodless weapon to slay him in the world’s esteem!
He heard the din rising from the whole house, as he crossed the lobby and strode down the passageway leading to the greenroom.