"Dog of a Christian, die!" he roared, and cut the captive down.
"Infame! infame!" screamed the audience. Settees scraped, shoes pounded, and men sprang to their feet. About us was a hurly-burly of brandished fists, glaring eyes, snarling lips, flashing teeth. Apples, bananas, split peas, and I thought a knife or two, hurtled toward the stage. Deborah uttered a little scream and started up.
The curtain, falling swiftly, shut off the craven monarch from this just indignation, and instantly the raging mob turned into an assemblage of light-hearted citizens, laughing, chaffing, tossing up their heads to drink beer out of bottles or oval tin pails.
Deborah understood, and a smile curved her lips, but her eyes were wide and deep with recent fright.
"Isn't it amazing?" I ventured.
"Infame! Infame!" screamed the audience.
"Yes!" she agreed, faintly. "It's—it's Elizabethan. I wish we Americans could take our theatre as seriously. I don't wonder, though, that they were excited. I was a little under the spell myself. I could easily fancy that those dolls were alive."
"Look at Beatrice," I suggested.
The girl had not yet recovered her composure. Her hands were clinched and her breath came deep and fast. Deborah eyed her sympathetically.