"The
theater is not large, but we do what we can. Now if His Highness deigns
to follow me--"
Count Muffat was already making for the dressing-room passage. The
really sharp downward slope of the stage had surprised him disagreeably,
and he owed no small part of his present anxiety to a feeling that its
boards were moving under his feet. Through the open sockets gas was
descried burning in the "dock." Human voices and blasts of air, as from
a vault, came up thence, and, looking down into the depths of gloom, one
became aware of a whole subterranean existence. But just as the count
was going up the stage a small incident occurred to stop him. Two little
women, dressed for the third act, were chatting by the peephole in the
curtain. One of them, straining forward and widening the hole with her
fingers in order the better to observe things, was scanning the house
beyond.
"I see him," said she sharply. "Oh, what a mug!"
Horrified, Bordenave had much ado not to give her a kick. But the prince
smiled and looked pleased and excited by the remark. He gazed warmly at
the little woman who did not care a button for His Highness, and she, on
her part, laughed unblushingly. Bordenave, however, persuaded the prince
to follow him.
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