terms to the manager that he conceived
of him as a brother artist. This led to much bowing and smiling from the
manager when the Marches met him in the street, or in their frequent
visits to the theatre, with which March felt that it might well have
ended, and still been far beyond his desert. He had not thought of going
to the opera on the Emperor's birthnight, but after dinner a box came
from the manager, and Mrs. March agreed with him that they could not in
decency accept so great a favor. At the same time she argued that they
could not in decency refuse it, and that to show their sense of the
pleasure done them, they must adorn their box with all the beauty and
distinction possible; in other words, she said they must ask Miss Triscoe
and her father.

"And why not Major Eltwin and his wife? Or Mrs. Adding and Rose?"

She begged him, simply in his own interest, not to be foolish; and they
went early, so as to be in their box when their guests came. The foyer of
the theatre was banked with flowers, and against a curtain of evergreens
stood a high-pedestalled bust of the paternal Caesar, with whose
side-whiskers a laurel crown comported itself as well as it could. At the
foot of the grand staircase leading to the boxes the manager stood in
evening dress, receiving his friends and their felicitations upon the
honor which the theatre was sure to do itself on an occasion so august.
The Marches were so cordial in their prophecies that the manager yielded
to an artist's impulse and begged his fellow-artist to do him the
pleasure of coming behind the scenes between the acts of the opera; he
bowed a heart-felt regret to Mrs. March that he could not make the
invitation include her, and hoped that she would not be too lonely while
her husband was gone.

She explained that they had asked friends, and she should not be alone,
and then he entreated March to bring any gentleman who was his guest with
him. On the way up to their box, she pressed his arm as she used in their
young married days, and asked him if it was not perfect. "I wish we were
going to have it all to ourselves; no one else can appreciate the whole
situation. Do you think we have made a mistake in having the Triscoes?"

"We!" he retorted. "Oh, that's good! I'm going to shirk him, when it
comes to going behind the scenes."

"No, no, dearest," she entreated. "Snubbing will only make it worse. We
must stand it to the bitter end, now."

The curtain rose upon anot