The streets--thank Heaven!--were dark.
He crept to the front gate and peered forth. The roadway was
deserted. Taking his courage in both hands, he stepped out upon the
pavement and walked briskly downhill to the theatre. The distance
was a matter of five or six hundred yards only, and he met nobody.
Coming in sight of the brightly-lit portico, he made a dash for it
and up the steps, where he blundered full tilt into the arms of a
tall doorkeeper at the gallery entrance.
"Hallo!" exclaimed the man, falling back. "Get out of this!"
"One moment, my friend--"
"Damme!" The doorkeeper, blocking the entrance, surveyed him and
whistled. "Hi, Charley!" he called; "come and take a look at this!"
A scrag-necked youth thrust his face forward from the aperture of the
ticket-office.
"Well, I'm jiggered," was his comment. "Drunk, eh? Throw him out!"
"If you'll listen for a moment," pleaded the Major, with dignity, and
began to search in the pockets of his sodden breeches. "I wish a
message taken . . . but dear me, now I remember, I left my money
upstairs!"
"_On_ the gilded dressing-table beside the diamond tiyara," suggested
the doorkeeper. "Or maybe you cast it down, careless, on the moonlit
shore afore taking your dip!"
"My good man, I assure you that I am the victim of an accident.
It so happens that, by a singular chain of mischance, I have not at
this moment a penny about me.
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