The theatre was packed. The throng extended into the lobby where the
ticket scalpers in the faces of the police hawked their coupons each of
which called for "an orchestra chair on the aisle three rows back." The
leader of one group leaned against a convex bulletin board bearing the
lithograph of a gaily garbed soubrette in red, and waving his cane
shouted the first line of a familiar college song. Each man of the group
lent his voice to the clamor and there was at once precipitated a riot
of discord in which the original air was lost in a brazen yell. There
was much rushing; a congestion at the window of the box office at which
hands were thrust between the fingers of which dangled government notes
of various denominations. Beyond the window, his bust framed in the
narrow rim of metal the treasurer of the theatre sat on his high stool
dealing out the tickets with the _sang-froid_ and ease of a judge upon
the bench. Men left their change there on the ledge. The treasurer
always shouted at them once--perhaps it was the voice of his conscience
merely--then with a sweep of his curved palm magically transferred the
money to the till. A solid V of eager youth with its apex at the narrow
door of green, pushed and jostled and shouted.
"Look out there behind, you're squeezing a lady!" some one cried.
"Don't she like it?" called an ungallant if witty youth away at the back
of the crowd. There was a little feminine shriek, then a peal of
laughter in which the throng joined. The police in the lobby were
completely at a loss. No man was to be arrested, their commissioner had
instructed them. But they gripped their clubs nervously; longing to leap
into that seething maelstrom of manhood uncontrolled and wield them to
the best purpose. A policeman is born with a hatred for loud-voiced
youth--particularly if the youth wear good clothes of trim and
fashionable cut. So the policemen there in the lobby, disarmed by the
strict injunction of their chief, were as helpless as babes, and like
babes they drew down their mouths and gripped tighter that which was
within their clutch. Now and again, however, one, bolder than his
fellows, and moved perhaps by a spirit of chivalry would shout
gruffly:--
"Remember there are ladies in this crowd, you fellows."
"Sure," some one in the throng would yell.
Finally the manager appeared and stationing a man at each of the two
other doors flung them back and relieved the pressure at the one. This
stroke of genius resulted in a quick emptying of the brilliant lobby and
an equally sudden congestion at the tops of the aisles where the ushers
in their dark green uniforms were conducting the audience to the seats
below amid the confusion resulting from exchanged coupons, balcony
tickets presented on the lower floor and the presence in the crowd of
"general admissions" who demanded their rights to a seat anywhere in the
house. The manager, a tall young man with a black mustache and black
eyes darted here, there, through the crowd, thrusting aside the men
whose money he had taken, and seeking by every means at his command to
wrest order out of chaos.
It was after eight o'clock before the score of ushers were by
circumstance permitted to emerge from under the burden of their
responsibilities and creep away down-stairs to the smoking room where,
flinging themselves on the long low lounges in sheer fatigue, they
berated the patrons of the house roundly and condemned each and every
one to the hottest depths of a boiling hot perdition.
Ten minutes later the manager himself conducted the men of the
victorious eleven to their adjoining boxes, on the right. The great
audience had had its collective eye upon those boxes and at the
appearance of the men a great shout went up from pit and gallery that
sent the cold shivers up and down the spines of the already nervous
actors behind the gold and scarlet curtain.
"There's the Count," some one shouted.
"Where? Yes!"
And the short heavy person with the baby face who had been thus honored
by selection from among his fellows arose in the box and bowed. The
throng cheered again and after that each man in turn was called for and
each man rose and bowed.
During the clamor attendant upon this official welcome of the victors, a
dozen men, quite as tall, quite as broad and quite as serene of
countenance, were ushered into the corresponding boxes across the house.
Their appearance was not noticed, for the entire audience had turned in
its seats to observe the men of Michigan, proud in the triumph that had
come to them. But, finally, after each man had been given his salvo of
applause some one noted the men on the other side.
"There's Cornell," was cried.
And the audience, to its everlasting credit, and after the fashion of
youth's wild way, repeated for their good cheer the welcome they had
given the fellows of the maize and blue. The vanquished had hardly
expected the ovation they received. A football man is not a modest
creature as a general rule, but in this instance it must in justice be
recorded that several of the brawny giants in the left hand box withdrew
behind the curtains.
Their names, however, were known to the throng below them and were
called.
Finally, unable by modesty to end the uproar, they rose, one by one and
bowed, and the feeling engendered that moment has never died, but lives
in the hearts of Cornell men to-day, who are wont in reminiscent mood to
refer to it as the "finest show of fellowship on record."
A youth with a high tenor voice, who could not be distinguished from the
rear of the theatre started the chorus of "The Yellow and the Blue." The
boys around him took it up and the citizenry of Detroit, in the balcony,
were treated to such a song recital as they had never before heard. In
the midst of it the discovery was suddenly made by some keen youth in
the gallery that one man was missing from the right hand boxes. He
nudged his companion. The word was passed along the rail. Then, with a
suddenness that caused the women in the balcony to start with little
screams, one name was shrieked above the clamor of the lower floor:--
"Adams! Adams! Adams!"
The singing ceased.
The cry was taken up, repeated, screeched.
A commotion was observed in the box and then a tall figure arose. It was
the manager. A silence that was awesome descended upon the house.
He held up his hand.
"I'm sorry," he began.
"Adams!" some one shrieked. Part of the audience laughed. The rest
hissed.
"I am sorry," the manager resumed, "but Mr. Adams is not here to-night."
He sat down.
It was well that at that instant the orchestra commenced a medley of
college airs by way of overture.
Presently the shrill tinkle of a little bell was heard and with a swish
the curtain lifted, disclosing the glittering, golden court of an
Oriental monarch. There was a blare of trumpets and a score of lithe
limbed dancers appeared upon the stage. The crowd cried its huge
delight and the college yell was flung across the footlights to the end
that several of the dancers made missteps, and, covered with a confusion
that brought forth another cheer, rushed into the wings.
After that first catastrophe the audience lent itself to a full
enjoyment of the piece. Occasionally when the chief comedian gave
utterance to a joke of ancient manufacture, the throng gave voice to its
displeasure, by way of criticism, but more often the clamor sprang from
keen appreciation of a song or bit of funny "business."
In all the audience there was, perhaps, but a single spectator whose
face showed him to have no interest either in the audience and its noise
or the action on the stage. He sat at one end of the balcony, back from
the rail, unnoticed by those about him, satisfied, seemingly, to look on
without participation either in the pleasure or the anger of the crowd
around him. When his gallery champion cried out his name he had shrunk
in his seat and almost held his breath, but now he sat up, his arms
folded across his deep, broad breast.
He had entered the theatre late. Indeed there had been no one in the
lobby when he bought his ticket. He was glad when he learned the
location of his seat. He had thus far avoided all contact with the
crowd. He would continue to avoid it. Through the first long act he sat
looking down, apparently seeing nothing, staring blankly as though
dreaming, yet awake.
When the second act was well under way, he glanced at his watch. He drew
out his hat from beneath the chair and inconveniencing no one, left his
seat. He glided up the aisle close to the wall. In the lobby, less
brilliant now, he squared his shoulders and pulled in a long, deep
breath. He lighted a cigarette and for a space stood just outside the
door, in the street, idly watching the passers-by.
At the soldier's monument a group of students--he recognized them as
such in the lighted thoroughfare--had formed a ring around some one who
appeared to be dancing on the asphalt as they shouted, rythmically, and
clapped their hands. As he watched, Adams saw the ring part on the side
nearest him and he glimpsed the dancer. All the blood went out of his
face. He threw away his cigarette and buttoned his coat nervously. With
a cry, the ring resolved itself into two lines and paraded down the
street with the dancer, who was obviously unsteady on his legs,
supported by a twain of students at the front. Adams, at the edge of the
curb, perceived the goal toward which the poor little procession was
making its way--the portal of a huge German restaurant which he knew
well. A picture of its interior as he remembered it flashed upon his
mind--the long room, filled with tables, many white clad waiters, stolid
of face, light of tread. The head of the procession reached the wide
door, bright beneath the great electric sign above. He waited until the
last man had entered, then crossed the street swiftly. In the outer hall
he heard a medley of noises beyond the mahogany and glass partition. He
heard the quick shuffle of feet. Some one was trying to dance on the
sanded floor. In the midst of the jig he flung back the connecting door
and entered the room of riot.