is
just as big lies as ours: you don't tell what you really done no
more than us; but you men can tell your lies right out at the
meetins and be made much of for it; while the sort o confessions
we az to make az to be wispered to one lady at a time. It ain't
right, spite of all their piety.

PRICE. Right! Do you spose the Army'd be allowed if it went and
did right? Not much. It combs our air and makes us good little
blokes to be robbed and put upon. But I'll play the game as good
as any of em. I'll see somebody struck by lightnin, or hear a
voice sayin "Snobby Price: where will you spend eternity?" I'll
ave a time of it, I tell you.

RUMMY. You won't be let drink, though.

PRICE. I'll take it out in gorspellin, then. I don't want to
drink if I can get fun enough any other way.

Jenny Hill, a pale, overwrought, pretty Salvation lass of 18,
comes in through the yard gate, leading Peter Shirley, a half
hardened, half worn-out elderly man, weak with hunger.

JENNY [supporting him] Come! pluck up. I'll get you something to
eat. You'll be all right then.

PRICE [rising and hurrying officiously to take the old man off
Jenny's hands] Poor old man! Cheer up, brother: you'll find rest
and peace and appiness ere. Hurry up with the food, miss: e's
fair done. [Jenny hurries into the shelter]. Ere, buck up, daddy!
She's fetchin y'a thick slice o breadn treacle, an a mug o
skyblue. [He seats him at the corner of the table].

RUMMY [gaily] Keep up your old art! Never say die!

SHIRLEY. I'm not an old man. I'm ony 46. I'm as good as ever I
was. The grey patch come in my hair before I was thirty. All it
wants is three pennorth o hair dye: am I to be turned on the
streets to starve for it? Holy God! I've worked ten to twelve
hours a day since I was thirteen, and paid my way all through;
and now am I to be thrown into the gutter and my job given to a
young man that can do it no better than me because I've black
hair that goes white at the first change?

PRICE [cheerfully] No good jawrin about it. You're ony a
jumped-up, jerked-off, orspittle-turned-out incurable of an ole
workin man: who cares about you? Eh? Make the thievin swine give
you a meal: they've stole many a one from you. Get a bit o your
own back. [Jenny returns with the usual meal]. There you are,
brother. Awsk a blessin an tuck that into you.

SHIRLEY [looking at it ravenously but not touching it, and crying
like a child] I never took anything before.

JENNY [