sense of duty and of stern obligation, tore himself from the arms of
the soprano, and calling out upon remorseless fate and upon heaven,
and declaiming about the vanity of glory, and his heart that broke
yet disdained tears, allowed himself to be dragged off the scene by
his friend the basso. For the fifth time during the piece the
soprano fainted into the arms of her long-suffering confidante. The
audience, suddenly remembering hats and wraps, bestirred itself, and
many parties were already upon their feet and filing out at the time
the curtain fell.

The Cresslers and their friends were among the last to regain the
vestibule. But as they came out from the foyer, where the first
draughts of outside air began to make themselves felt, there were
exclamations:

"It's raining."

"Why, it's raining right down."

It was true. Abruptly the weather had moderated, and the fine, dry
snow that had been falling since early evening had changed to a
lugubrious drizzle. A wave of consternation invaded the vestibule
for those who had not come in carriages, or whose carriages had not
arrived. Tempers were lost; women, cloaked to the ears, their heads
protected only by fichus or mantillas, quarrelled with husbands or
cousins or brothers over the question of umbrellas. The vestibules
were crowded to suffocation, and the aigrettes nodded and swayed
again in alternate gusts, now of moist, chill atmosphere from
without, and now of stale, hot air that exhaled in long puffs from
the inside doors of the theatre itself. Here and there in the press,