Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1912-03-01
CHAPTER VI.
A Visit to Box Five.

We left NJ. Firmin Richard and M
Armand Moncharmin at the moment
when they We're deciding ITO look into
that little matter of Rox Five
Leaving behind them the broad
staircase which leads from the lobby
outside the managers offices to the
stage and its dependencies, they
crossed the stage, went out by the
subscribers door and entered the
house through the first little passage
on the left. Then they made their
way through the front rows of stalls
and looked at Box Five on the grand
tier. They could not see it well, be-
cause it was half in darkness and be-
cause great covers We're flung over
the red velvet of the lodges OF all the
boxes.
They We're almost alone in the
huge, gloomy house; and great ST.
lence surrounded them. It was the
time when most of the stage-hands go
out for a drink. The staff had left
the boards for the moment. leaving a
scene half set. A few days OF light,
wan. sinister light. that seemed to
have been stolen from an expiring
luminary. fell through some opening
or other upon an old tower that raised
Its pasteboard battlements on the
stage; everything, in this deceptive
light. adopted fantastic shape. In
the orchestra stalls, the drugget COW
ering them looked like an angry sea,
whose glaucous waves had been sud
denly rendered stationary by secret
order from the storm phantom. who.
as everybody knows, is called Adamas-
ton. NM. Moncharmin and Richard
this motionless turmoil of a calico sea.
They made for the left boxes, plow-
ing their way like sailors who leave
their ship and try to struggle to the
shore. The eight great polished col
umns stood up In the dusk like SO
many huge piles supporting the
threatening, crumbling, big-bellied
cliffs whose layers were represented
by the circular, parallel. waving lines
of the balconies OF the grand. first
and second tiers of boxes. At the top.
right on top of the cliff, lost In NJ.
Lenepveu's copper ceiling, figures
grinned and grimaced laughed and
jeered at NM. Richard and Monchar-
Minis distress. And yet these figures
We're usually very serious. Their
names We're Isis. Amphitrite, Hebe,
Pandora, Psyche. Thetis, Pomona.
Daphne. Clytie. Galatea and Arethusa.
Yes, Arethusa herself and Pandora.
whom We all know by her box. looked
down upon the two new managers OF
the opera who ended by clutching at
some piece of wreckage and from
there stared silently at Box Five on
the grand tier.
| have said that they were dis
tressed. At least. presume so. NJ.
in any case. admits that
he was impressed. To quote his own
words. in his Memoirs:
This moonshine about the opera
ghost in which, since we first took |
over the. duties OF NM. Poligny and /
Debienne, we had been SO nicely |
stepped "-Moncharmins style Is not |
always irreproachable-"h no doubt |
ended by binding my imaginative and
also my visual faculties. 1t may he
that the exceptional surroundings in
which We found ourselves, In the
midst of an incredible silence, i'm
pressed us to an unusual extent. 1t
may be that We were the sport OF a
kind of Authorization brought about
by the semi-darkness OF the theater
and the partial gloom that filled Box
Five. At any rate, saw and Richard
also saw shape in the box. Richard
said nothing. nor | either. But We
spontaneously seized each others
land. We stood like that for some
without moving. with our
Eyes fixed on the same point; but the
igure had disappeared Then We
vent out and, in the lobby, commu.
licated our impressions to each other
md talked about the shape The
Misfortune was that my shape was
,ot in the least like Richards. | had
zen thing like deaths head rest
ng on the ledge OF the box. whereas
Richard saw the shape Of an old
woman who looked like Name CRY.
We soon discovered that We had real