“Who is the little lady yonder?” Eliphalet asked.
Miss Helen Winter threw a flickering glance in the direction of his gaze.
“I really couldn’t tell you, dear Mr. Cardomay, for I don’t know. A nice little thing, no doubt, but hardly a lady. She gives me the impression of being on the stage for the purpose of earning a living.”
This was too subtle for Eliphalet, and he asked for an explanation.
“I mean she has no people—no money. She acts for a livelihood. Of course that is purely a surmise, but I am sure I am right. The stage is full of young girls who are trying to earn their living. It is very sad, when one comes to think of it.”
Being herself a dweller in Park Street, with no real occasion to act, Miss Winter was one of the rapidly increasing class who make it impossible for the really needy to find employment.
Eliphalet was blissfully ignorant of the methods London managers had begun to use. He did not know that it had become quite de rigueur to engage society ladies to play leading parts, irrespective of talent and merely for the sake of the smart friends they attracted. It is the Box Office that counts, first, last and always. Remember that, some of you clever young ladies, before you abandon the typewriter or the comfortable certainty of the Insurance Office.
“To me,” he said, “that stands to her credit. She strikes me as a most charming little girl.”
“Oh, quite—quite, dear Mr. Cardomay, but provincial—very, very provincial.” And having delivered this two-edged thrust, she sailed away to pastures new.
So Eliphalet asked the same question of Polonius.