The house was fast filling. It held only five hundred persons, and there were but one hundred seats where the élite of the patronage paid so much as a franc; and even these seats were filled. Fortune smiled on the Imperial Theater that night.
Behind the curtain, the agitation was extreme; the Emperor had been remembered and so had Berthier and Duroc. Everybody knew that the Emperor had recognized Cartouche, had walked and talked with him, had pulled his ear, and had come to see the performance as his guest—that is to say, everybody except Fifi. That grand lady, since acquiring the dignity of leading lady, always contrived to be just half a minute behind Julie Campionet, her hated rival; but, also, just in time to escape a wigging from Cartouche. Cartouche himself, dressed as a centurion of the Pretorian Guard, was the coolest person behind the curtain, and was vigorously rearranging the barrels which represented the columns of the Temple of Vesta.
Julie Campionet, a tall, commanding-looking woman with an aggressive nose, sailed in then, arrayed as a Roman matron. After her came Fifi, tripping, and dressed as a Roman maiden. The air was charged with electricity, and both Fifi and the hated Julie knew that something was happening. Julie turned to the leading man, with whom she had an ancient flirtation, to find out what was the impending catastrophe.
Fifi, however, ran straight to the place where there was a hole in the curtain—a hole through which Cartouche had strictly forbidden her to look, as it was bad luck to look at the house before the curtain went up. Fifi was terribly afraid of signs and omens, but curiosity proved stronger than fear. She swept one comprehensive glance through the hole, and then, wildly seizing Cartouche by the arm, screamed at him:
“Cartouche! Cartouche! It is the Emperor! Give me my smelling-salts.”
Instead of running for the smelling-salts, Cartouche shook Fifi’s elbow vigorously.
“Don’t be a goose, Fifi! The Emperor has come here as my guest—do you understand? And it is the chance of your life!”
But Fifi, quite pale under her paint, could only gasp:
“Cartouche, I can never, never act before the Emperor!”
“It isn’t likely you will ever have but this one opportunity,” was Cartouche’s unfeeling reply.