“I shall lose my licence for this,” muttered the manager hoarsely. “There’s only one way for it—we must pass them through the iron door and out across the stage.” “You fool!” (It was most unusual for Eliphalet to say a thing like that.) “You fool! Pass three hundred people through a two-foot doorway? There’d be a panic—a horrible panic. We must clear those blocked exits, that’s all.” “It’ll take an hour.” “We’ll do it in a quarter.” “But in the meantime?” “In the meantime we will play the play.” “But, my God, don’t you realise that place is full of explosives? Even if we’re not blown up, the row——” “And don’t you realise it is a battle scene we shall be playing?” Then, as fast as his years would carry him, he hurried back to the stage. “What orders, Guv’nor?” said Manning, who, through the open door of the scene entrance, could see the progress of the fire. “Get all your men, Manning, everyone who is not actually playing, and clear the stuff from the emergency exits. The front of the house is impassable. Make a job of it, Manning, while I hold the audience.” “Right!” said Manning. “Now, boys, every one of you.” He was stripping off his coat as Eliphalet heard his cue and walked on to the stage. Even through the make-up, fear was written large on the face of old Kitterson, who played the orderly. “We’re in for a rough time,” said Eliphalet, speaking from the text. There came a sharp, insistent crackle—almost merged into a single report. A shelf of twelve-bore cartridges had gone up next door. Eliphalet took a cigarette from his case and lit it steadily. “Why, man,” he said lightly, between the puffs, “you are not afraid—are you?” He stretched out his hand and gripped old Kitterson’s arm with a warning pressure. “We’ve been through too much together to show the white feather now.” Half his words were lost in the roar and crackle from outside. Captain Raeburn touched his friend’s arm. “Altering the lines, aren’t they?” he queried. “Damn good effect of something burning. You can almost smell the smoke.” Eliphalet had smelt the smoke too. It made him cough, so he impromptued quickly. “The devils have fired the outbuildings. Phew! how the infernal fumes choke one.” He strode over to the window, through which, and beyond the edge of the back cloth, the open scene door gave a view of the factory fire. Great geysers of flame were spouting from the back windows and reaching loving hands toward the gasometer, not sixty feet distant. Old Kitterson had followed and he, too, saw and realised the waiting danger. “God!” he exclaimed. “If that catches!” And there was a note of terror in his voice. “Yes,” said Eliphalet thoughtfully, “if they fire the magazine it would not be pleasant.” Kitterson was plucking his sleeve and beckoning him to come away, but Eliphalet threw the old fellow from him with a fine flash of anger in his voice and eyes. “If we are to die,” he cried, “we will die like soldiers and gentlemen—at our posts.”