“Many curious people were drawn to the theatre in this way; but the attraction of failure only lasted a few nights. The invitation to turn out and join the mourners strikes one as funny. ‘It helped them to pay expenses,’ said the manager; ‘but it is the most novel effort to “turn diseases to commodities,” as Falstaff says, that ever came under my notice.’”
XII.
“And now,” continued Irving, “to go back to your opening, where we rather discount Raymond’s stories of the wild life of Texas. Have you seen the ‘Herald’s’ latest sensation?”
“No.”
“Not the Texan tragedy?”
“No.”
“Here it is, then; listen to the heads of it: ‘Two Crime-stained Ruffians die with their Boots on—Pistol Shots in a Theatre—Killed in Self-defence by Men whose Lives they sought—The Heroes of many Murders!’”
He handed me the paper, saying, “Read that! And yet we chaffed poor Raymond!”
I read a “special telegram” to the “Herald” (and verified the report at a later day by the records of other journals, local, and of the “Empire city”), reporting that on the 11th of March, between ten and twelve at night, San Antonio, Texas, was “thrown into a state of wild excitement, by the report that Ben Thompson and King Fisher had been shot and killed at the Vaudeville Theatre. An immense crowd thronged around the doors of the theatre, but were denied admission by the officers who had taken possession of the building.