"Well, it's a scene in a foundling asylum. Here's a pass. Go up now and see it. If you hurry you'll get there just in time for that act. Then if you come to me at the office in the morning at ten, I'll give you a chance as one of the Charity girls. Do you want it?"
God, Mag! Do I want it!
V.
Do you remember Lady Patronesses' Day at the Cruelty, Mag? Remember how the place smelt of cleaning ammonia on the bare floors? Remember the black dresses we all wore, and the white aprons with the little bibs, and the oily sweetness of the matron, and how our faces shone and tingled from the soap and the rubbing? Remember it all?
Well, who'd 'a' thought then that Nance Olden ever would make use of it—on the level, too!
Drop the Cruelty, and tell you about the stage? Why, it's bare boards back there, bare as the Cruelty, but oh, there's something that you don't see, but you feel it—something magic that makes you want to pinch yourself to be sure you're awake. I go round there just doped with it; my face, if you could see it, must look like Molly's kid's when she is telling him fairy stories.
I love it, Mag! I love it!
And what do I do? That's what I was trying to tell you about the Cruelty for. It's in a little act that was made for Lady Gray, that there are four Charity girls on the stage, and I'm one of 'em.
Lady Gray? Why, Mag, how can you ever hope to get on if you don't know who's who? How can you expect me to associate with you if you're so ignorant? Yes—a real Lady, as real as the wife of a Lord can be. Lord Harold Gray's a sure enough Lord, and she's his wife but—but a chippy, just the same; that's what she is, in spite of the Gray emeralds and that great Gray rose diamond she wears on the tiniest chain around her scraggy neck. Do you know, Mag Monahan, that this Lady Harold Gray was just a chorus girl—and a sweet chorus it must have been if she sang there!—when she nabbed Lord Harold?