the mere sight of his Lily, his four stone ten of
flesh and bones fitted to the machine, his Lily, the Lily of his dreams!

"I'll dress you in velvet and satin!" he said, in his enthusiasm. "I'll
cover you with diamonds."

Pa, thanks to his indomitable energy, had made something of his Lily, a
real artiste, at last! And business was moving, too! He had a contract in
his pocket for the States, where Lily would no doubt get permission to do
her "childish tricks," seeing that she was traveling with her Pa and Ma.
As for Trampy, Pa had no use for Trampy, made no bones about sacking him
on some pretext or other:

"Run away and play with your girls, by Jove! Or whatever you please!
Good-by! Ta-ta!"

And off for Denver, whence they were to continue the journey up to
Chicago.

* * * * *

It was the dive for good and all into the stuffy atmosphere behind the
scenes, which Lily was never again to leave, brick walls, where she waited
her turn on the elaborate program of the "continuous performances," amid
the thunder of the orchestra and the lightning of the reflectors. No time
to go out, meals consumed in your dressing-room on the top of the basket
trunk. In the mornings, new tricks to practise on the stage, in the midst
of a herd of girls whom gentlemen in their shirtsleeves were training to
sing in chorus and to keep step to the strum of the piano. And ever and
ever so many new faces, a tumult of tongues which Lily heard on the stage,
in the dressing-room, and even in her room at the hotel, through the thin
partition walls: a lingo made up of coarse remarks and thick stories,
punctuated with spitting and oaths strong enough to carry a tower of
Babel. Lily opened her eyes and ears, heaping it all up, storing it all
away behind her stubborn forehead....

And new people, new people: "families," "brothers," "sisters," troupes,
troupes, troupes! Or else stars by themselves, "bests," "uniques:" a
female-impersonator, a green-eyed boy who wagged his hips like the very
devil and took off the girls; Poland, a Warsaw Jewess, a redheaded,
overscented beauty, who did the "Parisienne," and ever and ever so many
others. And Lily, so slender and frail, was the pet of them all. They
called her their pretty baby, their _petit cheri_, and, with their painted
mugs, kissed her full on the lips.

Pa detested this "rotten lot" and Pa was not always in a good temper. Lily
"under age,"--again! Why,