"That may all be," said the manager almost in a whisper, for he was a man evidently inclined towards peace; "but it does not rest with us to say so. We are French, and I think, therefore, it is better not to express an opinion."
"I'm not French," cried Lemoine. "I'm a native Chilian, and I have a right to abuse my own country if I choose to do so."
"All the more reason, then," said the manager, looking timorously over his shoulder—"all the more reason that you should be careful what you say."
"I suppose," said Dupré, by way of putting an end to the discussion, "it is time for us to get our war-paint on. Come along, Lemoine, and lecture me on our common art, and stop talking politics, if the nonsense you utter about Chili and its president is politics."
The two actors entered the theatre; they occupied the same dressing- room, and the volatile Lemoine talked incessantly.
Although there were but few people in the stalls the gallery was well filled, as was usually the case.
When going on for the last act in the final scene, Dupré whispered a word to the man who controlled the falling of the curtain, and when the actor, as the villain of the piece, received the fatal knife-thrust from the ill-used heroine, he plunged forward on his face and died without a struggle, to the amazement of the manager, who was watching the play from the front of the house, and to the evident bewilderment of the gallery, who had counted on an exciting struggle with death.
Much as they desired the cutting off of the villain, they were not pleased to see him so suddenly shift his worlds without an agonising realisation of the fact that he was quitting an existence in which he had done nothing but evil. The curtain came down upon the climax, but there was no applause, and the audience silently filtered out into the street.
"There," said Dupré, when he returned to his dressing-room; "I hope you are satisfied now, Lemoine, and if you are, you are the only satisfied person in the house. I fell perfectly flat, as you suggested, and you must have seen that the climax of the play fell flat also."
"Nevertheless," persisted Lemoine, stoutly, "it was the true rendering of the part."