"Put it out! Put it out!" shouted McMullen.
"I am! I am!" said the other, clapping the flimsy stuff between his hands.
Some of the stage hands at this moment noticed the fire.
"Look at that fire!" these called out. "Can't you see that you're on fire up there! Put it out!"
"D—— it, I am trying to," said the man who was clapping away at the burning paint impregnated muslin.
Then a flame a foot high shot up and caught the draperies above those on fire.
"Look at that other one. It's on fire," some one on the stage yelled.
"Put it out!" shouted another.
"All right," said the man on the perch. But he did not clap hard enough or fast enough, and in ten seconds the flames were beyond his reach.
It was after these hand clapping attempts to extinguish the fire had proved futile that McMullen shouted a call for the asbestos curtain to be put down.