"Excuse me, sir," he said, with an entire disregard of the usual convention which binds his class. "Excuse me, but you seem rather sick of this."
"It's abominable!" Hampson answered, in a sudden burst of anger. "I never go to the theatre, so I suppose I'm behind the times. But I really shouldn't have thought that several hundreds of apparently decent people would have come to see this sort of thing."
"I'm very much of your opinion," the young man replied, "and I don't think I like it any better than you do. I never was fond of filth. But I just strolled in because I'd nothing much better to do."
He sighed, and, turning from Hampson, stood up and began to survey the house.
"Nothing better to do!" The words stung the journalist, and made him shudder when he thought of Whitechapel. This young, kindly, and obviously nice-minded man, had nothing better to do than to "drop in" at the Frivolity!
Dear God! Nothing better to do!
The electric bell whirred. Men began to make their way back to their seats, expectation was alight in most of the faces—faces somewhat flushed now with brandy-and-soda; eyes brighter now in anticipation of the opening scene of Act III!
This was the second night of the play, yet already the opening of Act III was being talked of all over London.
Mimi Addington was surpassing herself.
Mimi was the heroine, par excellence, of all the picture-postcards. Errand-boys whistled her songs, and told each other stories about her in whispers. The front pages of the foul "sporting" papers which depended upon their obscenity for their circulation were never without constant mention of the girl's name.