“But he won’t receive you.”
Of that I had not thought, either. But I would not hear of any obstacles. Besides, out West I had never been treated that way. I was not yet fully aware that people in the West were simpler and more approachable than in New York.
The objection, therefore, did not appear to me a formidable one, and I started out with my mother, who always went with me and who obeyed me in everything without my having the faintest idea but that I was the obedient one.
Here we were, then, on our way; and, after half an hour’s walking, we reached the theatre. The manager had not yet arrived. We sat down to wait for him. A lot of people came in. Some of them stayed for a while. Others went away at once.
They were all excited, busy and looked worried. What were they after? Were they going to get all the tickets? The crowd kept increasing to such an extent that I saw my poor tickets grow smaller and smaller in perspective and then disappear altogether. And I had counted so much on them!
Would the manager never come?
At last a great commotion was heard. A group of gentlemen rushed by like the wind and, without stopping to see what was going on, disappeared behind a door on which was written “No admission.”
None of us knew what to do after that. Everybody stared at everybody else. Most of those who were cooling their heels in the ante-chamber were men. My exhausted nerves would not let me linger any longer, and I said in a whisper to my mother:
“I am going to knock on the door.”
She turned pale, but I had no choice in the matter. This was the only way to come to something, even if I ran the risk of heart failure from an organ that was beating so loudly that I thought it was on the point of bursting.