After this, needless to say, I did not take much rest. Prowling restlessly round the Opera, I had the good luck to meet Habeneck; I caught him by the arm.
“I hear your musicians are going to play me some tricks. I have my eye on them.”
“Oh, it’s all right,” he answered. “I have talked to them; you need not be afraid.”
“I am not afraid: on the contrary, I am comforting you. You see, if anything happened, it would fall pretty heavily on you. But make your mind easy; they won’t do anything.”
And they did not. My copyist had been all day in the theatre guarding the drum and double-basses, and I myself went round to all the desks to ensure each man having his own part.
Indeed I was made quite ashamed of myself when I got to the Dauverné brothers; one of them looked up and said reproachfully:
“Berlioz, surely you don’t doubt us? Aren’t we decent fellows and your friends?”
I grew quite hot and stopped my investigations, for which, it must be owned, there really was some excuse.
Nothing went wrong and my Requiem produced its due effect, but during the interval, according to rumour, Habeneck’s cabal howled for the Marseillaise. I went to the front of the stage and shouted at the top of my lungs:
“We will not play the Marseillaise; that is not what we are here for,” and peace reigned once more.