I knew something had gone wrong.
Several girls (of course everyone in the audience knew me) began to
titter at my strange appearance, in my apotheosised bathrobe, in my
close Van Dyke beard....
I knew inwardly that in a moment all the house would be laughing ... at
first out of sheer nervousness over the delay in the progress of the
play--then from genuine amusement....
I threw my will, my entire spirit, against the incoming tide of ridicule
which would wreck the play even with the rising of the curtain.
I pictured to myself the beautiful woman who had drowned herself; I
burned with her unhappiness ... I felt her hovering near me ... I
thought of the lovely passion we had known together ... I _was_ Iistral.
I was not on a stage, but in a room, holding actual and rapt communion
with my spirit-bride, Egeria!...
"Egeria! Egeria!" I sobbed ... and tears streamed down my face.
I was miserable, without her, in the flesh ... though she was there,
beside me, in soul!
* * * * *
I was aware of the audience again. I was proud and strong in my
confidence now. The tittering had stopped. The house was filling with
awe. I was pushing something back, back, back--over the footlights. I
did not stop pushing till it had reached the topmost galleries....
I _had_ them....
The applause after the first act was wonderful.
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