Gutter Vestals—The Troglodytes.
"No use. We've got to get rid of that beastly Bizco. Every time I see him hate him more and he disgusts me more."
"Why?"
"Because he's a brute. Let him go off to his old fox, Dolores. You and
I can go to the theatre every night."
"How?"
"With the claque. We don't have to pay. All we have to do is applaud when we get the signal."
This condition seemed to Manuel so easy to fulfil that he asked his cousin:
"But listen. How is it, then, that everybody doesn't go to the theatre like that?"
"Because they don't all know the head of the claque as I do."
And as a matter of fact they went to the Apollo. For the first few days all Manuel could do was think of the plays and the actresses. Vidal, with his superior manner in all things, learned the songs right away; Manuel secretly envied him.