He gripped the presents in his hands, and treading on air, advanced on to the stage, where Miss Marie Loraine was kissing her hands to the stalls. The stage was very big, and sloped in such a way that he felt his feet impelled towards the footlights; but, being determined that he would accomplish his mission with dignity, Edwin steered a steady, if resilient, course. In front of him he saw a creature before whose elegance and beauty the beauty of the chorus was as nothing. She stood waiting for him and smiled. For a moment Edwin faced the auditorium, a vast and dark abyss in which not a single face was to be seen. It gave him a sudden fright to think that so many thousands of unseen eyes were fixed upon the patch of limelight in which he stood. He pulled himself together. This was the moment, he thought, in which it was for him to make some speech worthy of the bewildering loveliness that stood before him. “Go on,” said the impatient voice of Mephistopheles in the wings. “Buck up.” “Miss Loraine,” said Edwin, with a flourish, “I have the honour of—” The middle of his sentence was broken by a crash and a tremendous peal of laughter from the unseen thousands. The younger Wade, arrayed in the panoply of a Roman legionary and balanced upon the parapet of the stage box, had fallen with a clash of armour into the big drum. Edwin thrust the bouquet and the hair-brushes into the arms of Miss Loraine, herself convulsed with laughter. With a terrific draught the curtain swept down. “Splendid,” said the voice of Mephistopheles.