t at midday, recovered himself from the disappointment he suffered
when Maxwell asked for the manager instead of a seat for the night's
performance. He owned that the manager was in his room, but said he was
very much engaged, and he was hardly moved from this conviction by
Maxwell's urgence that he should send in his card; perhaps something in
Maxwell's tone and face as of authority prevailed with him; perhaps it
was the title of the Boston _Abstract_, which Maxwell wrote under his
name, to recall himself better to the manager's memory. The answer was a
good while getting back; people came in and bought tickets and went
away, while Maxwell hung about the vestibule of the theatre and studied
the bill of the play which formed its present attraction, but at last
the man in the box-office put his face sidewise to the semi-circular
opening above the glass-framed plan of seats and, after he had
identified Maxwell, said, "Mr. Grayson would like to see you." At the
same time the swinging doors of the theatre opened, and a young man came
out, to whom the other added, indicating Maxwell, "This is the
gentleman;" and the young man held the door open for him to pass in, and
then went swiftly before him into the theatre, and led the way around
the orchestra circle to a little door that opened in the wall beside
one of the boxes. There was a rehearsal going on in the glare of some
grouped incandescent bulbs on the stage, and people moving about in top
hats and bonnets and other every-day outside gear, which Maxwell lost
sight of in his progress through the wings and past a rough brick wall
before he arrived at another door down some winding stairs in the depths
of the building. His guide knocked at it, and when an answering voice
said, "Come in!" he left Maxwell to go in alone. The manager had risen
from his chair at his table, and stood, holding out his hand, with a
smile of kindly enough welcome. He said, "I've just made you out, Mr.
Maxwell. Do you come as a friendly interviewer, or as a deadly
dramatist!"

"As both or as neither, whichever you like," said Maxwell, and he gladly
took the manager's hand, and then took the chair which he cleared of
some prompt-books for him to sit down in.

"I hadn't forgotten the pleasant talk I had with you in Boston, you
see," the manager began again, "but I had forgotten whom I had it with."

"I can't say I had even done that," Maxwell answered, and this seemed to
please the manager.

"Well