“Mornice June, her name is. Something in her, I fancy. Forget who told me she’s been earning her living since she was fourteen. Her people were a bad lot—deserted her—so they say.”
Eliphalet did not need to introduce himself, for the very next day Mornice marched up and gave him a cheery smile.
“Do you mind if I talk?” she said. “You look so homish to me. I can’t get on with these London people a bit.”
He made room for her on the roll of carpet, and she sat beside him.
“Yet, my dear,” he answered, “you seem to be very popular.”
“With those silly boys, yes! But even they are different. I say, I’m sure you know all about playing in Shakespeare. I do wish you’d be an absolute dear, and hear me my lines. I’m certain I shall get a fearful ‘bird’ from his Nibs.” (His Nibs was her name for the eminent producer.) “It’s the blank verse that does me. I’ve never tackled verse before, except ‘I am Lily, called the Flowers’ Queen, the goodest, sweetest fairy ever seen.’ You know—you flip up through a star trap and get it off your chest, where the white limes meet.”
She delivered the cheap couplet with perfect mimicry of pantomime style, then clapped her hands and laughed gaily. Eliphalet caught the infection of her spirit, and laughed too.
“But you will be a dear, and help me, won’t you?” she appealed, picking a speck of fluff from the knee of his trousers. “I say, you didn’t brush yourself very carefully this morning, did you?”
“I stand corrected,” said Eliphalet; “but my dresser is away on his holiday.”
“Aren’t you married, then?”