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SHOWMAN
curtain was down, he was out there before the house had a chance to break and behind the curtain the stagehands were breaking their necks to strike and shift those sets in double-quick time.
As soon as Lackaye was primed, I ran back to the lobby. J. J. Shubert, one of the lessees of the Garrick, was already there. We agreed that the only thing to do was mount guard in the lobby and prevent every human being from leaving or entering the place till the performance was over. Lackaye's masterly performance before the curtain took care of half of that. The other half was tough and Shubert certainly stuck by me. Inside ten minutes our problems began to arrive —people whose wives and mothers and brothers and sisters had come down town to see a show, frantic to know whether they'd gone to the Iroquois or not.
The first arrival was a prominent banker— huge man with a silk hat and a heavy stick, storming in like a tornado. I barred his way.
"Get out of my way!" he said. "I want to know if my wife and daughter are in here."
"Look here," I said, grabbing his arm. "How many more people do you want to kill?"
He stopped and thought a moment, breathing hard.
"Very true, young man," he said, and turned away to stand and wait against the wall without saying another word. For a while it was the same with all the others who came— one word of explanation quieted them down, and they stood and waited out the minutes
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