er, no dessert, nothing but a
biscuit or an apple; and, if she asked for a pear, it caused a terrible
to-do. Rather than stand that, Lily went to the hotel, which put her to
double expense, for the board at the theater was compulsory. She had to
pay in any case; so that she went away without a farthing, thinking
herself very lucky if the manager did not try to kiss her in his office.
Oh, the things she saw, the things she rubbed shoulders with, the vice,
the promiscuity, the rushes of girls in the passages before the onslaughts
of footy rotters, direct propositions, with eyes looking straight into
eyes, brief wooings on the stairs, behind the properties, between people
just about to take the train, one east, the other west, and in a hurry to
have done with it; a silent embrace in the dressing-room, a neigh, a kiss;
and _au revoir_, ta-ta!

And the conversations between the stage-girls, who were always surrounded
by legends of the white slave-trade; stories of disappearances; of
"engagements for Caracas" and finding one's self over there without
resources, stranded in a bad house: like that poor girl, a Roofer, who had
received a letter and some sweets in her slipper, which she had sent
flying into the audience with a high kick--Lily remembered--well, she had
disappeared in South America, somewhere; one or two despairing letters and
then silence. And that other one, at Alexandria, who had called out for
help, behind her green blinds; and ever and ever so many others, whom she
had known slightly. Lily shivered: brrrrrr!

She was sick to death of it. She had had enough of it, was fed up with it.
She aspired to better things. Lily had hoped that her engagement in Spain
would have marked the end of her bad luck; but no, nothing offered. She
was sour, bitter, fierce; a wild bull, a stallion, as Ma used to say. And
she became especially terrible now, when her energy was spent in neither
work nor love, so much so that there was a cross against her name in the
agents' books.

Oh, she had often felt inclined to send them all to the devil: the made-up
eyes, the kiss-me-quick lips, the tow wigs, the low jokes, the
monkey-claws! There were some who had merit, no doubt, like that boy who
was all over scratches, from head to foot, through training cats; but the
rest, almost all of them, were a pack of good-for-nothings who copied
their betters: amateurs, jossers all; and they had more work than she, who
had taken such pains and who