t! Never say die!"

Glass-Eye perspired like anything, pursed her eyebrows above her fat, red
cheeks, grumbled, in her Whitechapel slang:

"Kim up, you lousy moke! Igher up, Jerusalem, you pig-headed bag of
tricks!"

Lily lost patience, snatched the machine from her, ran it down the stairs,
pushed the door of the "meat-tray," and found herself behind the scenes,
the drops rising and falling, the nightly spectacle since she had been
"that high," the land of the unreal lights. And the sudden glare from the
reflectors set clusters of shoulders blazing with a silvery glow, brought
up out of the shade the pale flesh of the dancing-girls, heaped up behind
the pillars. It swarmed from every side, right and left--"Hi, there! Meat,
meat!"--under the rush of the stage-hands shifting the wings. There were
fleecy foams of fair wigs, smiles from kiss-me-quick lips, blinkings of
made-up eyelids, a swarm of arms, thighs and necks, preparatory to a
ballet, _Heures d'amour_, in which Poland, the Parisienne, triumphed with
her costumes _Deshabille gallant, Dessous diaphanes, Le tub, Volupte,
Dodo_, eight pantomimic scenes in a sumptuous setting, with girls to
impersonate the Hours, from pale-pink flirtation to scarlet desire.

Lily watched this familiar sight with a wandering eye; and suddenly she
turned pale: what was that? Who was that? In the midst of it all, smiling
to her from a distance, as though laughing at her, stood Trampy! My!

"Here, hold my bike, Glass-Eye!"

It was close on her turn, but, before going on, she had a word to say to
the stage-manager and, walking up to him:

"Do you see that josser looking at me?" said Lily, pointing to Trampy. "If
he stays here, I ... to begin with, I shan't go on. I won't be humbugged
by any one!"

"Who is it?"

"My husband!"

"All right, darling," said the stage-manager and, suddenly, between the
scene which was being hoisted up and the other let down on the silent,
empty stage: "You there! Get out!"

Trampy could not believe that the words were meant for him. He waited
until the order had been twice repeated. He, an artiste, before those
girls! He made a gesture as though to ask:

"Do you mean me?"

"Yes, you! No jossers here," said the stage-manager. "Sling your hook!"

"Gee!" thought Lily, when he had gone. "This time you've been paid back in
your own coin! So you kicked me out at the Horse Shoe, did you? It's my
turn now, you damned tramp!"

She exulted with delight,