The Duke gazed after it petrified: "Velasco!" he said, "And I all but twisted his wrist!—Ye gods!
"Go on, Pierre, go on!"
The Theatre was superbly lighted, crowded from the pit to the gallery, from the orchestra chairs to the Bel-Etage with the cream of St. Petersburg aristocracy.
It was like a vast garden of colour.
The brilliant uniforms of the officers mingled with the more delicate hues of ecru and rose, sky-blue and palest heliotrope of the loggias. Fans waved here and there over the house, fluttering, flashing like myriads of butterfly wings. The stage was filled with the black and white of the orchestra and the musicians sat waiting, the conductor gnawing his long mustache in an agony of doubt and bewilderment.
Gradually a hush stole over the House. The fans waved less regularly; the uniforms and the more delicate hues whispered together, glancing first at a box on the first tier, which was still empty, and then at the stage door and back again.
Where was the Grand-Duke Stepan, and where was the star, the idol, the young god, who was to charm their hearts with his four strings?—for whom they had paid fifteen roubles, twenty—twenty-five until there wasn't a seat left, not even standing room; only the crimson-curtained Imperial Loggia in the centre, solitary, significant.
The time passed; the minutes dragged slowly.
Suddenly the curtains moved. An usher appeared and placed a chair. Another moment of silence; then a tall, grey-haired, military figure stepped to the front of the loggia and bowed to right and to left; his eyes, small and black and crossed, glancing haughtily over the throng. "At last!"—The applause was mechanical, in strict accordance with etiquette, but there was a relieved note in it and the thousands of straining eyes leaped back to the stage, eager and watchful.
All at once a small door in the wings opened slightly and a slim boyish figure strode across the boards, a mane of dark hair falling over his brows.