The party filed out at the tail end of the audience. Already the lights
were being extinguished and the ushers spreading druggeting over the
upholstered seats.

McTeague and the Sieppes took an uptown car that would bring them near
Polk Street. The car was crowded; McTeague and Owgooste were obliged to
stand. The little boy fretted to be taken in his mother's lap, but Mrs.
Sieppe emphatically refused.

On their way home they discussed the performance.

"I--I like best der yodlers."

"Ah, the soloist was the best--the lady who sang those sad songs."

"Wasn't--wasn't that magic lantern wonderful, where the figures moved?
Wonderful--ah, wonderful! And wasn't that first act funny, where the
fellow fell down all the time? And that musical act, and the fellow with
the burnt-cork face who played 'Nearer, My God, to Thee' on the beer
bottles."

They got off at Polk Street and walked up a block to the flat. The
street was dark and empty; opposite the flat, in the back of the
deserted market, the ducks and geese were calling persistently.

As they were buying their tamales from the half-breed Mexican at the
street corner, McTeague observed:

"Marcus ain't gone to bed yet. See, there's a light in his window.
There!" he exclaimed at once, "I forgot the doorkey. Well, Marcus can