farthing in her pocket, though she
had made a fortune for her Pa, damn it! Pa living on his income at
Kennington, while she continued her life of slavery! Wasn't it enough to
make her send everybody to the devil, and Nunkie, that old rogue, with the
rest? A pack of nigger drivers, that's what they were, every one of them!
And what an idiot she was, to keep on barking her shins for other people!
Would she go on doing it until she was fifty? And if she didn't begin now
to put money by, who would do it for her later? Not that worthless
husband, surely! He, who, that very morning, had dared, the loafer, to
tell her of a scheme--a sort of a risky trick which she was to perform, a
thing calculated to break your head or make a millionaire of you--for him,
of course, just as for Pa! It had come to this, that her turn wasn't good
enough, that it had to be more sensational; and she was expected to make
it so for a man she didn't love! Oh, she had put him nicely in his place!
Rather! Thank you for nothing: none of that for her! In the evening Lily
was still trembling, with her two elbows on the table, as she sat facing
her glass in her dressing-room; angrily she crushed the grease-paint on to
her cheeks, which were pale with rage.

Ting! Straight on to the stage, turning round and round, fifty rounds from
habit, mechanically, without any "go" in them: an indolent performance,
which would have earned her a good smacking in Pa's time.

"You were shockingly bad!" said Trampy, who was waiting for her in the
bar, after watching her from the front. "What's the matter with you? Are
you ill?"

Lily did not even answer.

"I'm speaking to you," said Trampy crossly. "You did nothing right
to-night."

"Yes, I know; that'll do," said Lily.

"It's not a question of 'Yes, I know,' but of doing better next time,"
said Trampy.

"I'm not taking any orders to-night," said Lily.

"No, darling, but there was an agent in the house. He must have thought
you bad."

"That's none of your business!"

"And, if you don't get engagements, what's to become of us?"

"I don't care a hang," said Lily. "_I_ can always manage."

"You ... you ... and what about me? We're married, aren't we?"

"But the money I earn's mine," said Lily. "I mean to buy dresses and
whatever I want to, with _my_ money. You'll be wanting to come on the
stage next, in evening-dress, to stand over me while I do my turn, and
getting out your belt. Do you take me for your daught