Thirty pound a week--it's
too cheap, Johnson. It's dirt cheap.'
Nicholas replied, that it certainly was; and Mr Vincent Crummles taking
several huge pinches of snuff to compose his feelings, hurried away to
tell Mrs Crummles that he had quite settled the only terms that could be
accepted, and had resolved not to abate one single farthing.
When everybody was dressed and the curtain went up, the excitement
occasioned by the presence of the London manager increased a
thousand-fold. Everybody happened to know that the London manager had
come down specially to witness his or her own performance, and all were
in a flutter of anxiety and expectation. Some of those who were not
on in the first scene, hurried to the wings, and there stretched their
necks to have a peep at him; others stole up into the two little private
boxes over the stage-doors, and from that position reconnoitred the
London manager. Once the London manager was seen to smile--he smiled
at the comic countryman's pretending to catch a blue-bottle, while Mrs
Crummles was making her greatest effect. 'Very good, my fine fellow,'
said Mr Crummles, shaking his fist at the comic countryman when he came
off, 'you leave this company next Saturday night.
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