Quickly he left the theater and sought his hotel.
A menacing cloud obscured the wintry moon. A clock sounded the midnight hour.
He threw himself upon the bed and almost sobbed his thoughts, and their burden was:
“I am not great enough for her. I am but a man. I am but a man!”
III
Perkins called in the morning. Perkins was happy—Perkins was positively joyous, and Perkins was self-satisfied. The violinist had made a great hit. But Perkins, confiding in the white-coated dispenser who concocted his matin Martini, very dry, an hour before, said he regarded the success due as much to the management as to the artist. And Perkins believed it. Perkins usually took all the credit for a success, and with charming consistency placed all responsibility for failure on the shoulders of the hapless artist.
When Perkins entered Diotti’s room he found the violinist heavy-eyed and dejected. “My dear Signor,” he began, showing a large envelope bulging with newspaper clippings, “I have brought the notices. They are quite the limit, I assure you. Nothing like them ever heard before—all tuned in the same key, as you musical fellows would say,” and Perkins cocked his eye.
Perkins enjoyed a glorious reputation with himself for bright sayings, which he always accompanied with a cock of the eye. The musician not showing any visible appreciation of the manager’s metaphor, Perkins immediately proceeded to uncock his eye.
“Passed the box-office coming up,” continued this voluble enlightener; “nothing left but a few seats in the top gallery. We’ll stand them on their heads to-morrow night—see if we don’t.” Then he handed the bursting envelope of notices to Diotti, who listlessly put them on the table at his side.