“Yes, I know,” said Lily. “Mine’s full for months ahead!”
They showed her, on theirs, the last pages containing portrait advertisements of famous artistes: the Pawnees, Marjutti, Laurence.
“Oh, if I could get there one day!” thought Lily. “I’d post it to Pa; it would be the death of him!”
And then followed the thousand and one details of the wandering life: your name on the red list, the list handed in at the station; the journeys at reduced fares; the music for twelve instruments, forty executants, sent on to the theater a fortnight in advance.
“And matinées are paid for now. And you know, Lily, in the Federation you can get a solicitor free.”
“That’s a good thing to know,” thought Lily, “for my divorce from that rusty biker!”
Oh, how she hated pros, now! The sight of them in the corridor, looking at her with glistening eyes, made her want to put out her tongue at them! But she preferred not to see:
“I don’t like to seem stuck-up with them, it’s not polite,” she observed.
Nevertheless, she shrugged her shoulders when one of them who, no doubt, had known her when she was “that high,” blew kisses to her from the tips of his fingers, with a gesture straight at her heart, through the window.
And the train rushed on, rushed on. They were nearing Warrington. The slopes, on either side, bristled with chimneys and houses, houses, endless roofs ... a Lancashire rid of its black smoke, like an extinct and silent crater ... Warrington!