“But no, I can’t see her.”
“Hush! they are beginning.”
The three knocks were given. The amateur with the violin started off and played the overture to Fra Diavolo; the clarinet started a few measures later, and played the overture to Jeune Henri; the two men played thus for some time, seeing who could go the faster, persuaded that they would finally overtake each other and play together. The audience opened their ears in amazement, but the wiser ones stuffed theirs.
“Sapristi! what on earth are they playing?” murmured a native, looking at his neighbor, who answered in an undertone:
“I don’t know, but it’s a terrible mixture.”
At last the violin stopped, but the clarinet went on.
“We are not playing the same thing, that isn’t right!” cried the violinist, waving his bow.
The clarinet refused to listen; he went on with his Jeune Henri. Luckily the curtain rose, the actors came on the stage; but as the clarinet kept on, they were obliged to rush upon him and snatch his instrument away.
The little farce would have gone very well if Madame Dufournelle had laughed less, and if Monsieur Mangeot had looked less often at the prompter, which, by the way, did him no good, because Monsieur Camuzard, who filled that post, having drunk too freely of the champagne, found his mouth so dry that he could hardly speak, and passed his time turning over the play-book, and saying to the actor who was waiting for his lines:
“Wait till I find the place; I can’t find it; we have time enough; they won’t ask for their money back!”