The Bill-Toppers

day would come ... when she returned from the continent and, instead of Miss, called herself Mlle., like Adeline Genée and lots of others! Meanwhile, she had found nothing. Still, Lily knew that one sometimes had whole months of enforced idleness, without knowing the reason, and then, suddenly, one’s luck returned. One only has to wait a bit, thought Lily, making herself very short-sighted as she passed before the arcade, the haunt of the out-at-elbow pros and of the piffling little agents, the jackals of the profession, on the lookout for a bone to gnaw. And it was not a little vexing to hear her name pass from mouth to mouth—“Mrs. Trampy, Mrs. Trampy”—and who could be drawing attention to her in that rotten lot? Was Trampy there, by any chance, pointing his finger at her? She felt inclined to go back to them, to tell them in two words what she thought of them. Mrs. Trampy, indeed! It was not for long, in any case. Her divorce was not far off!

In the evening, at the theater, she forgot her bothers, as usual. The day, for that matter, was quite an ordinary one: it was the typical day, the trot, trot, trot, of the star alone, in search of engagements. And, thoroughly tired, in her dressing-room, she related in her own way the adventures which she had had since the morning, the compliments on her beauty; and at the agents’, my! If she had liked, she could have filled up her three years’ book! The architect came in her dressing-room for a moment: so interesting a Lily! so amusing, he thought, as funny, in her way, as Light of Asia, the Chinese girl without arms. Sitting on the big trunk, he admired by turns Lily and the disorderly dressing-table, its cracked looking-glass, scribbled over with names, and, under the glaring light, the grease-paints—red, white, black—the powder-puffs and hare’s feet, the biscuits in the tray among the hair-pins, a bottle and glasses beside the powder-box. From nails on the whitewashed walls, scratched all over with inscriptions, covered with penciled dates, hung rainbow skirts, bodices with metallic flowers. The bike shone in a corner, half-buried under Lily’s outdoor clothes. Tights hung beside it, like pink skins, gold spangles strewed the uncarpeted floor and scent hovered over everything.... Half-open doors admitted gusts of music from the orchestra; and Lily, opposite the glass, fumbled among her pots with the tip of her finger, stained her lips blood-red, fixed the rebellious curl to her forehead with a touch of gum. Outside, in the passage, was the row of doors, with spy-holes and visiting cards, half-sheets of paper, stuck down with wafers and bearing the names of the various occupants:

“Prof. X. The Famous X. Family. Absolutely the best.”

There were others “absolutely the best.”

On Lily’s door, her card—“Miss Lily”—and, under that, modestly:

“And maid.”

Lily revived amid these surroundings; here she forgot her fatigue, blossomed out to her heart’s delight. With her rainbow dress, her feathers and her pearl pendants, combined with her elaborate gestures as she made up her face in front of the gollywog, she resembled the officiating priestess of a strange religion, pacifying some angry-eyed idol to the sound of distant choirs.

While finishing her make-up, Lily continued her stories, talked of her successes in England and here and there and everywhere ... and the lord who wanted to marry her and rained down presents upon her: fifty-pound brooches, diamonds.... Everybody in love with her: to listen to her you could have followed her traces like the passage of a cyclone ... men gone mad ... others blinded through weeping ... millionaires ruined in chocolates and sweets ... and flowers, my!

“You could fill the Colosseum with them, couldn’t you, Glass-Eye? I’ve been spoiled everywhere,” continued Lily, “and I’m known everywhere! Even in Paris, to-day, there were a lot of ladies and gentlemen under an arcade and you heard nothing but ‘Miss Lily, Miss Lily,’ didn’t you, Glass-Eye?”

“Yes, Miss Lily.”

But these social successes did not make Lily forget her business affairs. Harrasford’s new music-hall worried her: if she could only play there, only snatch it from the New Trickers! For they would certainly try to get there; and the architect, of course, knew ...

But Lily was interrupted by the call-boy: time for her to go down to the stage!

A hurricane came up from the orchestra, muffled, with beats of the big drum, like distant cannon. The curtain would go up soon; it was the time when Lily stretched her legs, before giving her performance, and took a breath of air in the painted forest. A click of the padlock and:

“Come along, Glass-Eye, the bike!”

Lily, in spite of her brilliant successes in England, was dead tired of tipping the boys; it ran away with all her money. As she allowed herself the luxury of a maid, by Gollywog, she might as well make use of her; she wasn’t going to feed her to do nothing! And poor Glass-Eye attended to the bike, at the risk of putting out her other eye. Every day the struggle between Glass-Eye and the bike formed the joy and the delight of the passage. There were incredible swervings, scratchings of the wall, barkings of Glass-Eye’s shins. Lily followed behind, bursting with laughter, warning Glass-Eye to take care or she would put the bike out of gear by knocking it about with her legs:

“Oh, where’s my belt?” she cried, patting the back of her hand.

The artistes, attracted by the noise, half-opened the doors; laughing eyes gleamed at the spy-holes; voices cried:

“Go it! 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 Déshabillé gallant, Dessous diaphanes, Le tub, Volupté, 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, as she went through her performance. It was her first revenge! the other’s turn would come next.

“I don’t forgive and I don’t forget,” she muttered to herself. “Every dog has his day.”

Oh, how happy she was! She was magnificent on the stage, under the flashing lights, and the dull sounds in the orchestra were to her as the throbbing of a riotous heart.

“Well, Trampy, you got soaked to-night, to-night,” thought Lily, as she might have said, “One, two!” to mark her times. “To-night, to-night. And, if you don’t like it—one, two—you’ve only got to lump it! Divorce was made for men and women, not for dogs!”

Lily was triumphant, laughed, winked her eye, as she rode past, at the stage-manager, who threw her a kiss and grinned. Immediately after her turn, she ran to her dressing-room, poured water on her steaming skin, while the make-up trickled in pink streaks down her face, and devoted an hour to the dainty care of her person, like a cat licking itself. And then Lily, without paint or powder—awfully ugly, not in the least pretty off the stage, as she said, smiling in her muslin tie with the gold spots—Lily went out by the front, to avoid the pros’ corridor.

The moment she was in the lobby, she assumed the air of a lady accompanied by her maid. She cast an indifferent eye at the string of carriages, like one who changes her mind and prefers to walk, a smile to the gentlemen at the contrôle, a nod to the Roofers going out, two by two, always, a dark one and a fair one. Lily stopped for a second, to look round....

Then: “Let’s go home, Glass-Eye!”

She took a few steps along the street, but a jolly voice behind her cried:

“Gee, what a spanking walk!”

She turned round; it was Trampy again!

“Ah, this time,” thought Lily, “I shall have witnesses!”

She expected blows! She would have given anything to be struck: her divorce, at last, would be hastened on! Cruelty, public insults! But no:

“How’s my dear little wife?” asked Trampy, with outstretched hand.

Lily was so greatly surprised that it took her some seconds to recover her presence of mind; and then, without turning her head:

“Come away, Glass-Eye,” she said. “There are drunkards about.”

“Don’t let us quarrel, little wifie. Aren’t you my dear little wifie? Well, then....”

And Trampy took her by the arm.

“Let me go, or I’ll break your jaw,” muttered Lily, under her breath.

Trampy seemed in a jovial mood, with his cigar in his mouth, his cheeks flushed with insolence, his eyes moist with libations.

“Let’s make peace,” said Trampy. “Peace in the home: that’s my motto!”

“Divorce!” cried Lily.

“Peace in the home for me!” rejoined Trampy, who grew the more radiant as Lily grew more and more incensed.

“Let me tell you,” he continued, puffing luxuriously at his cigar, “that divorce—why, how can you think of it?—means a public scandal, my name dragged in the mud....”

“Footy rotter!” roared Lily.

“Dragged in the mud; and my dear little wife left to her own resources, marrying again, as she feels inclined, marrying some one unworthy of her, perhaps. I won’t have it! I’m responsible for you! I’m your natural protector! You’re not Miss Lily, you’re Mrs. Trampy. You’ve been in the wrong, certainly; you had me turned off the stage, me, your husband; but I forgive you.”

“And I ... take that!” Lily broke in, spitting in his face. “That’s how I forgive you! Take that! And that!”

Trampy reveled with delight:

“You are my dear little wifie, aren’t you? And you’ll remain so ... and you’ll never belong to any one else, do you hear? I am a faithful husband. You’re trying for a divorce, I know, but you won’t get it. The wrong is on your side and I’m not going to law, and you’re Mrs. Trampy and Mrs. Trampy you’ll remain! Will you come and have a drink, Mrs. Trampy?” he continued, lighting a fresh cigar. “Won’t you? Very well. Good night, wifie!”

And Trampy, turning his back to her, disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

Lily came home and went straight to bed, without even waiting for supper, so great was her hurry to forget. It seemed to her that things had happened, things without end; that this day had been as long as a year. She simply could not understand Trampy. She could have imagined anything, except that! She racked her brain to conjecture how, why; and sleep quieted her till the next morning; and she woke up with teeth clenched and eyebrows set and ... why? Why? And again why? Did he still want to keep her?—after realizing in a hundred different ways that she did not love him, that she loathed him, that she had married him only to escape her whippings and that she had but one idea in her head: to divorce him!

Now—only Lily could not know this—it was because of that very reason that Trampy clung to her, like a faithful husband: Jimmy, Jimmy was his bugbear. He believed Jimmy to be in love with his wife. Once Lily was divorced, Jimmy could marry her; and Trampy would see him further first! The greater Jimmy became, the more jealous Trampy grew. He knew the steps Lily had taken to obtain a divorce, the witnesses she had tried to secure. She was very keen on a divorce, was she? All the more reason for not gratifying her; and she wasn’t going to get it. The witnesses, Trampy had just heard, declined to give evidence. They had seen nothing, heard nothing. A bike at her head? Maybe. They didn’t know. A bit of a fuss between artistes, such as you see every day, and none of their damned business. Outside that, Lily had nothing to go upon; on the contrary. She had abandoned the conjugal home; all the wrong, apparently, was on her side. He, Trampy, alone was entitled to file a petition; but that never! He considered that Jimmy and Lily had trifled with him sufficiently. He could not swallow the idea that they were only waiting for the divorce to get married; the idea that Lily would be Mrs. Jimmy, of her own free choice, after marrying him, Trampy, to escape her whippings; no, he couldn’t swallow that! Now it rested entirely with him to prevent that marriage. He had only to keep his dear little wife for himself. In that case, Jimmy, if he wanted her, would be obliged to do without her or else to “live with her” and set a bad example, lavish bestower of good advice that he was, the dirty hypocrite, preaching morality to others! That was what Trampy had determined to do. As for Lily, Trampy, who was incapable, at bottom, of either hatred or love, didn’t care one way or the other. He was always sure to want for nothing, so long as there were girls on the boards and whisky in the bars.

There was another reason still that urged him to let matters rest, without going further. To embark on a divorce-case, to have his name in the papers and his story hawked round the four quarters of the globe—“Trampy, you know. You knew Trampy, didn’t you? The husband of Lily?” and so on—was what he didn’t want at any price, for a reason known to himself. He had made inquiries, quite privately, at the beginning, when he thought of petitioning for a divorce; and what he had learned had made him prudent: his marriage in America was valid beyond a doubt. He was well and duly married, whether he liked it or not. By the common law, two wives meant bigamy; and bigamy meant prison, which was the last thing he wanted, as he himself said. But, so long as there was no scandal, he ran no great risk. He had lived on tenter-hooks at first, in Germany. Chance might have brought him face to face with Ave Maria, on the stage of a music-hall. This danger was not to be feared now, so far as he knew. Ave Maria and her brother Martello were no longer fit stars for Europe, nor for North America. He was too well known to the agencies; his brutality had produced too many complaints, too many denunciations to the police; it discredited any theater employing him. He might have come to Europe—who knew?—to try to get hold of the Bambinis, now that the old man had not much longer to live. But that was not very likely, either. An artiste, come across by accident, had seen the pair at Iquique, in a wretched circus that was doing the coast of Chili. He gave Trampy details: poor Ave Maria had grown very ugly; a body all skin and bone and nerves; no hips, no chest; nothing of the woman about her; in the last stages of consumption; and finished, as an artiste, done for; no spring left in her overworked thighs, no suppleness in her loins: even her brother, that brute, could get nothing out of her now. And Trampy, who knew Chili, followed them, in his mind, on their tour along the coast, from Iquique to Copiapó, to Valdivia: a trying climate, biting winds which would kill her on the spot, unless she went and perished in the fever-stricken plains of the Argentine.... When people had fallen so low as that, they did not rise again: there was nothing to fear from that side. But her presence was not necessary; the danger still existed. There were documents, in black and white. Their names were bracketed on a register somewhere or other: he knew where. It was better, therefore, in every way, not to call attention to himself. Meanwhile, he was playing a nice trick on Lily and her Jimmy. And Lily was Mrs. Trampy and Mrs. Trampy she would remain; and that was all there was about it.

But it was no use for Lily to give herself a headache trying to make out why and how. She did not guess Trampy’s secret thoughts, any more than he suspected the actual nature of her relations with Jimmy. For her, too, one thing was certain: Mrs. Trampy she was and Mrs. Trampy she would remain! She would never be free; she would always be chained to that tramp cyclist! And, if a match should happen to turn up for her among her admirers, the architect, for instance—you can never tell: plenty of others had already proposed for her hand in marriage, in England—she would be obliged to refuse! And, if some gentleman were to pay her his addresses, treat her like a lady, take her to choose a hat or a silk petticoat in a smart shop, there was somebody who would have the right to say to her, as she passed:

“How’s my little wife getting on?”

Oh, those two Jim Crows round her, spoiling her future! Jimmy and Trampy! They would end by being the death of her. Oh, if she had had Thea’s arm, what a blow in the jaw for one or both of them! And Lily, when she thought of it, wore the face which was hers on her bad days, teeth clenched, stubborn forehead. Glass-Eye shook in her boots when she saw it, for sometimes Lily vented her anger upon the poor girl with a smack, considering herself quits if she begged pardon after!

“If it’s one of those footy rotters,” growled Lily, hearing a knock at the door, “smash a bottle over his head!”

But no, it was simply her letters, sent on from the theater. Nothing of importance this morning; prospectuses, mostly: a wig-maker, special theatrical department; a manufacturer of traveling-hampers, for South Africa, Australia....

“No use for them,” thought Lily, with a sigh.

And, on opening The Era, she received that discouraging sensation: always so many names, and so many tricks, and all “the best;” new ideas and troupes, troupes, troupes; another new troupe of fat freaks, a very flood of them; and Roofers, Roofers; “Greater-Greater England Girls,” words and music guaranteed, with scarlet legs and muslin skirts, complete; page upon page of pink tights; and national troupes and colonial troupes; and one had to earn a livelihood and shine among all that! Lily was half crushed; and everybody she knew was triumphing: the Pawnees,—one hundred and thirty music-halls, the whole of the Eastern and Western Trusts, the great two-years’ tour! The Three Graces also were continuing their triumphs. Lily, who felt herself the equal of any of them, held her breath as she read the news. Laurence had won her terrible bet that she would ride straight across Manchester and Salford on her bike, hands tied together, feet fastened to the pedals. At the Art Institute in Chicago, Marjutti had given a lecture on the art of contortion.

“Some josser of a journalist wrote it for her,” thought Lily.

And The Performer Annual had sent Marjutti its set of questions to answer, she had been published in print! And Lily was still waiting! And Tom? Tom was in England now, in the De Frece circuit; had had a triumph at the Portsmouth Hippodrome, as “Topsy Turvy Tommy,” dancing a sailor’s hornpipe on his hands. All, all were successful, including others even who were not so good as she was: one who obtained engagements because she had a nigger in her show; another because of a monkey.

“And I’ve done nothing yet!” grumbled Lily.

Oh, to be talked about in her turn, to achieve something, to become “our Lily!”

“It’s twelve o’clock and I’m still in bed!” she cried. “I ought to be practising!”

It was just a flash of pride, mixed with remorse. She knew it well enough; often and often, she had reproached herself for her idleness, for her habit of sleeping till the middle of the day, of taking her meals before the performance; but she would make up for it to-morrow! It is the usual refrain of stars who have become detached from their troupes, far removed from regimental discipline, so to speak: without a Pa, without a boss, you can do nothing. You must have some one to force you.

“A month on the three years’ book before to-night!” prayed Lily, touching her lucky charm.

And she studied the omens with an expert air, gave an ear to passing sounds, tried to catch the meaning of them, for she had visits to pay, letters to write, business, damn it!

That was what Pa used to say before her. And it was not so easy to turn a letter prettily: that was Trampy’s forte. She knew something about it. Lily, in her night-dress, with her elbows on the table, bit her pen, reflected, in a mental effort that gave her a headache. And that note-paper wasn’t nice, either, without a heading; true, it only rested with herself; every day she was approached with offers of artistic photographs, even of tricks which she did not do: standing with one foot on the saddle, the other in the air and her arms stretched out before her, like a flying genius; or as Cupid, with his dart in his hand: impossible things which neither the Pawnees nor Laurence would have dared to attempt! But it would look well, with her name in red letters: “Miss Lily,” or “La Belle Lily.” Or else a photograph showing her strolling in a great park, with a palace in the background, taken from nature, followed by her maid, or by a footman, hired by the hour, for the occasion.

“I think I shall select the governess,” said Lily to herself, “because of my biography; it will be nicer, truer. Or I might be taken riding on the back-wheel, like a lady just leaving the house and doing that to amuse herself?”

Lily, still undecided, took up the pen again: one foot on the saddle; six pairs of tights; three dresses; the theaters at which she had appeared....

What a pack of jossers! She couldn’t forgive the agents for her present want of success. She was exasperated. She felt inclined to go and see the managers themselves, those who had made love to her on the stage, and to send in her card to them—“Miss Lily”—just to teach those jossers of agents! Her independent ways had already made enemies for her: she knew that; but how could she help being angry? The tricks they played you, down to making you miss a marriage, as had happened in London, the other day, to the Three Graces, to one of them, who had been courted, during Mr. Fuchs’ absence, by the boy-violinist. Their agent had launched into slanders and even insults to prevent the marriage, which would have split up the troupe and broken the contract....

“What a pack of nigger-drivers!” thought Lily. “As long as they get their ten per cent., the rest can go hang, for all they care!”

There was no doubt that Lily had got out of bed on the wrong side, at the thought of having to climb all those staircases again and to dance attendance with the rotten lot in the waiting-rooms. But, by Jove, she could have boxed the ears of the first agent she visited that afternoon! He had the impudence to offer her a magnificent engagement in the Indian show at Earl’s Court, she to stain her skin brown, dye her hair black, with rings in her nose, at the wrists, at her ankles; a costume like Miss Ruth’s, all in gauze; the nautch-girl on the bicycle; six times a day, in the open air, to the sound of tomtoms. Play the negress; that’s what he offered her! She could not help laughing, in spite of her anger. But she became quite intractable and snubbed another agent who suggested a one day’s billet in a tiny music-hall at a ridiculous price.

“I don’t give my performance under five pounds, or on a stage of less than thirty feet!” cried Lily.

At last, luck seemed to turn; she settled for Spain and Portugal, and that same evening, at the Bijou Theater, she was offered another engagement, for three months hence. This contract would procure her others, after her spell of ill luck. Lily at once took courage again:

“Oh, if I had the Astrarium!” she thought.

Everywhere, at the theater, at the agents, people were talking of the new music-hall. It even became a current joke. They said, “So-and-So’s performing at the Astrarium,” as though to say, “He’s not performing! He’s living in a castle in the air!” Every one was talking of the great music-hall which was to open in a few months and which was not to be seen building anywhere. Some said that it was serious; they quoted engagements: Tom; the Three Graces; the impersonator; nothing but turns quite unknown to Paris; novelties, nothing but novelties: Marjutti; Laurence, perhaps; or the New Trickers. Lily shivered when she heard that!... She opened wide eyes, like Alice in Wonderland. Oh, to appear there! But she had performed in Paris. Then she would change her name; bike mixed with dancing; and her whole trick done backward, as Pa had once advised Trampy to do in Mexico! Oh, if she could have that! Lily Godiva, undressed on the bike! She’d show them she was a lady, not a performing dog! The Astrarium, that was certain, would open in Paris in a few months. Harrasford had said so himself. There was no doubt about it. They even told the name of the stage-manager, Joe Brooks, the cleverest of all. Lily felt herself carried away with ambition. Oh! to open there! Oh, if it were true! God grant that it might come true! Oh, if Daisy, their star, could only break a leg! The few days which Lily was still to remain in Paris, before leaving for Spain, she employed in obtaining further information. She learned the most exact particulars. Incredible though it seemed, the Astrarium was to open quite shortly! The blue-chins discussed the thing, amid clouds of tobacco smoke, in the bars, after the show. To allude to it now was not like talking of castles in the air; on the contrary. To tease a pal, one said:

“You’re opening at the Astrarium, aren’t you? I don’t think!”

Which was another way of saying:

“The Astrarium’s no place for you! They’re taking nothing but bill-toppers there!”

The new music-hall, even before it came into existence, was beginning to spread, like the story of the whippings; it would be talked about, all round the world, as something stunning, a more complete show than the Tivoli at Sidney or the New York Hippodrome. Harrasford was credited with designs for a palace in onyx and marble. He had bought or was going to buy a theater with the object of transforming it; names and prices were given. Everybody was interested in it. Just now, especially, when the bioscopes and the gramophones and the singers were taking the bread out of the “artistes’” mouths, it meant twenty turns more to receive princely salaries there; and, every month, that galaxy of stars, which Harrasford would send shooting to Paris, was to disperse toward Brussels, Antwerp, Marseilles, Hamburg: the European Trust, the Moss and Stoll tour of the continent, managed by Harrasford, the great English manager.

To open at the Astrarium meant having work insured and your three years’ book filled for ever so long; meant appearing in public, later, wearing on your chest the medal which they meant to distribute in memory of the opening. Gee, Lily had a pain in her side at the thought of it! The Three Graces, it was said, were on the program. Lily would have consulted them—there was no jealousy about the Graces—but they were not yet in Paris. Oh, Lily was longing and dying to be settled! Who was Harrasford’s agent? If she had to go to London to see him, she would go.

Why, damn it, she would go to Heaven itself to get the Astrarium! Anything, anything to open there! That dream of greatness made her endure her present vexations. Mrs. Trampy ... Mrs. Trampy ... She was addressed as Mrs. Trampy everywhere. Trampy must be telling the story, taking his revenge for the whippings, making little of her in his turn. One night even, the night before her departure for Spain, when the architect was to wait for her at the door of the theater, Lily, who had dressed herself in her best, once more had the humiliation of being accosted by Trampy in front of everybody.

“Hullo, wifie! How are you, darling? All right?”

Lily bristled with rage as she left Paris. Even when she was far away, she still felt that she was dragging a chain which lengthened out endlessly without breaking. Never, oh, nothing could ever get her out of that! Yes, a brilliant triumph. Then, at least, she could crush him from the height of her success, that footy rotter with his red-hot stove! Oh, what a grudge she bore him! Jimmy was different: that was a wound of her own and nobody would ever know; but Trampy, who laughed at her everywhere and called himself her husband! He would make her lose all her friends. To say nothing of the fact that those tales perhaps counted for much in her failure: they were repeated from mouth to mouth. Oh, her profession disgusted her at times! And to think that she, an English girl, was going to earn her bread among the Dagoes, instead of starring in England!

Her wandering life continued; her journeys from town to town, in the Spanish provinces, her arrival in the chill of the morning, her anxiety about her salary, the hustle and bustle of departure and—trot, trot, trot!—lugged about in the railway-carriage, like a performing dog in his box.

And what theaters! It was worse than Germany or even Paris. In England, on the Harrasford tour or the Bill and Boom, they had nice dressing-rooms, with a carpet, water hot and cold, quick attendance, stairs swept every day. Here, old plaster and those idiots who looked as if they understood nothing—it took three of them to shift a scene—Dagoes who asked her straight out, in Pidgin-English, if she was alone:

“No man viz you?”

It touched her on the raw. Lily lost all her cheerfulness: to begin with, that engagement was not a particularly brilliant one; it was not at all calculated to prompt her to do better, to introduce novelties into her turn. Besides, on stages not yet overrun with Roofers or fat freaks, an artiste performing by herself made an impression. Her old tricks sufficed; sometimes she topped the bill:

“Theaters are the same everywhere; artistes the same everywhere, from New York to Bilbao. Topping the bill in one means topping the bill in the others ... doesn’t it, Glass-Eye?”

But she knew quite well that it didn’t; and, besides, that satisfaction of her vanity put no money in her pocket. The amount she owed, my! She thought of the past, of what she had earned for “them” since Mexico. If she had only had half of it, a quarter, a quarter of a quarter, damn it!

Meantime, she had to make herself respected. In those countries, where people used gestures when they spoke to you, a lady could not be too careful. Why, the men treated an English girl just as they treated their own women. She could have flung her bike at their heads! And they kept it up all night, as in Russia, all except the jewels; you had to stay till morning and were expected to accept invitations for supper, so as to keep the customer there and push business! A little more and she would have had to sleep there! She had threatened to tear up her contract, to complain to the consul. And what annoyed her also was being in the same dressing-room with singers who undressed without shame, while receiving their friends, and made eyes at Lily worse than the impersonator.

And she had to have her food at the theater, no dessert, nothing but a biscuit or an apple; and, if she asked for a pear, it caused a terrible to-do. Rather than stand that, Lily went to the hotel, which put her to double expense, for the board at the theater was compulsory. She had to pay in any case; so that she went away without a farthing, thinking herself very lucky if the manager did not try to kiss her in his office. Oh, the things she saw, the things she rubbed shoulders with, the vice, the promiscuity, the rushes of girls in the passages before the onslaughts of footy rotters, direct propositions, with eyes looking straight into eyes, brief wooings on the stairs, behind the properties, between people just about to take the train, one east, the other west, and in a hurry to have done with it; a silent embrace in the dressing-room, a neigh, a kiss; and au revoir, ta-ta!

And the conversations between the stage-girls, who were always surrounded by legends of the white slave-trade; stories of disappearances; of “engagements for Caracas” and finding one’s self over there without resources, stranded in a bad house: like that poor girl, a Roofer, who had received a letter and some sweets in her slipper, which she had sent flying into the audience with a high kick—Lily remembered—well, she had disappeared in South America, somewhere; one or two despairing letters and then silence. And that other one, at Alexandria, who had called out for help, behind her green blinds; and ever and ever so many others, whom she had known slightly. Lily shivered: brrrrrr!

She was sick to death of it. She had had enough of it, was fed up with it. She aspired to better things. Lily had hoped that her engagement in Spain would have marked the end of her bad luck; but no, nothing offered. She was sour, bitter, fierce; a wild bull, a stallion, as Ma used to say. And she became especially terrible now, when her energy was spent in neither work nor love, so much so that there was a cross against her name in the agents’ books.

Oh, she had often felt inclined to send them all to the devil: the made-up eyes, the kiss-me-quick lips, the tow wigs, the low jokes, the monkey-claws! There were some who had merit, no doubt, like that boy who was all over scratches, from head to foot, through training cats; but the rest, almost all of them, were a pack of good-for-nothings who copied their betters: amateurs, jossers all; and they had more work than she, who had taken such pains and who had made a fortune for her Pa. Oh, if that wasn’t enough to make her chuck everything and see life, in her turn. She had only to choose ...

These reflections came to her more particularly when she returned to Paris, after Brussels and Copenhagen, and was again performing at the Bijou Theater, where she had already appeared.

“To make all that money,” thought Lily, when she saw Poland again, “and never to have been through the mill!”

She admired Poland for that, envied her good manners, her grace, the way she slipped on her dressing-wrap in the living picture, The Bath. She turned green with jealousy at the sight of Poland’s motor-car, her thousand-pound ear-rings, her sable furs. It was not that Lily lacked admirers or sympathizers. She even had a little triumph at the Bijou Theater, one day when she passed round the hat for old Martello, who was ill in bed and penniless. Lily topped the bill in her own fashion, by putting her name at the head of the list, and the collection was a success, everybody contributed ... including the architect, who was still prowling round her, in the passages, on the stage, everywhere. Lily was decidedly courted: the rich bookmaker who ran the theater as his private harem, he, too, patted her cheek in a funny way, complimented her on her firm, round hips before the group of dancing-girls packed like poultry, in the shadow of the pillars. Gee, it only rested with herself to have as much of that as Poland! And everything reeked with love, amid the cannonade of the big drums and the clash of the cymbals, while the sudden flashes of the reflectors, moonlight-blue on one side, bright-red on the other, lit up all around her the herd of the languid Hours. But her heart swelled and puffed with pride. No, no, not that! She would succeed by her talent, damn it, not by getting round men! She, an English girl; she, Pa’s daughter; she, who had gone through the mill, to sell herself like cat’s meat! Never! And her Ma should beg her pardon on her knees, on her knees, damn it! The thought infuriated her.

She was quite sincere with herself. It was all her fault. She ought to have worked and practised, practised every day, improved and improved her turn; but she would do so now, to-morrow. It was her last chance. She had hardly any money left; her three years’ book was virgin once again, unsoiled by contracts; but she had a stage to practise on and she was going to practise to-morrow even if she had to pay somebody to run after her, with the belt, if need be! Lily had nothing but that in her head now: to get out of her present life, to get out of the mud, to reach the summit at a bound. Was it possible? She consulted the Zanzigs; she spent a fortune in penny-in-the-slot machines to learn the future, but always received the same reply:

“You will marry the man who loves you. You will be very happy.”

She smiled with pity when she read that nonsense; to prophesy her marriage: how silly! She was only too much married! That was not what she wanted to know; but the Astrarium! the Astrarium! Would she be there or would she not? The New Trickers were plotting to get there, with a turn which she had given them, goose that she was; and Cousin Daisy, that farthing dip, would triumph and not she, a star, a real one! Lily was rather in the position of Pa, when he arrived in London from New York ... with this difference, that Pa had money and Lily had none. But there was the same display of energy, once her pride was aroused. Lily also had run round Paris like a mad thing: not to the agents!—with them it was: “Lily? Lily Clifton? nothing your way to-day!”—but to her friends and acquaintances, to find out about the Astrarium. Lily grew crazy at the idea that she might perform there, be there at the opening, ride over all of them, treat the New Trickers like so many fat freaks!

“Oh, God, if it were true!” she cried, with her hand on her lucky charm. “God above grant that it may come true!”

She was at the end of her tether. Nothing short of the Astrarium could set her on her legs again. She had no choice; it was either that or an absolute come-down: the nautch-girl on the bike, at Earl’s Court, or else nights of dissipation, champagne and diamonds, like Poland; and Lily, like her Pa in the old days, clenched her fists and gnawed her lip as she went off to the Three Graces, who had their engagement and who would be able to give her some hints.

Lily knew their hotel by reputation. Nothing but pros; a rallying-point of troupes, an hotel where nobody’s skin was free from bruises and where, from morning until night, you heard the clatter of the clog-dancers’ heels. It reeked of potatoes, of sleepers three in a bed; chests, strange-shaped packing-cases, ticketed with distant labels, made the yard look like the stage-entrance of a music-hall. Lily did not care for that sort of place: no matter; besides, the Bambinis were there and their mad rushes, their yells of mirth filled the gloomy house with gaiety. And Lily did not mind walking in with her gold-tasseled hat on. All those heads at the windows: it was just like a fine lady visiting the poor. And yet she was not proud now. Formerly, she would have laughed on learning the kind of life led by the Three Graces, those three girls who remained good so as not to break up the troupe and annoy Nunkie and who were said to spend their spare time in sewing and cooking and doing Sandow exercises and measuring one another round the biceps and the chest: simple joys, the only true ones.

“They may be right, after all,” thought Lily, who envied them from the bottom of her heart for having the Astrarium. “If I had only practised too! Practising is certainly better than attaching all that importance to dresses or sending those puff photographs to the agents!”

A surprise awaited Lily when she entered the hotel; pros were talking with a mysterious air. There was muttering in the corners, a piece of news was going round: the Bijou Theater had closed, that very day; the treasury was empty, bankrupt; everything sealed up; just on the eve of pay-day too!

“My! Is it possible?” thought Lily, distracted and forgetting the Astrarium and the Three Graces. “And what am I to do for food to-morrow? Come, quick, Glass-Eye!” she whispered, catching her a thump in the ribs. “To the theater, quick!”

For Lily knew by experience that it was a good thing to be first. Her Pa had saved his salary once, in a similar case, at Perth, in Australia; but one must arrive in time.

There was a crowd in front of the Bijou when she arrived. They were commenting on a notice pasted on the door:

“Fermé.”

What could that mean? Lily had not provided for this in her vocabulary of the French language; but the theater was closed until new arrangements could be made. It meant complete ruin, enforced idleness....

“The rotten lot!” growled Lily. “Money, damn it, money! Pay up, you pack of thieves!”

But Lily soon recovered herself, when she saw that there was nothing to be done. She had been through worse than that, when the iron curtain all but smashed her to a jelly, at Milwaukee, and when she tumbled into the orchestra, at Glasgow! Notwithstanding the anguish that wrung her inside and heralded the coming hunger, Lily put a good face on the matter before all those people, like a lady who is above that sort of thing: a disappointment, that was all.

“But how will those small artistes manage?” she seemed to say. “Those families with babies?”

Lily declared that it was very sad, called Glass-Eye to witness, as usual; but poor Glass-Eye remained dumb, reflected that she would never, never be paid, if this went on. Lily owed her eighteen months’ wages now! True, she got enough to eat, or nearly; she traveled with Lily; and she wore her old hats.

Meanwhile, the door opened; the artistes were allowed to take away the implements of their work, before the final closing. The move began: they fetched out basket trunks, hoisted packing-cases on to cabs. It was a heartrending sight, all those things, made for the glitter of the footlights, now displayed in the street. And everybody made such haste as he could, under the eyes of the inquisitive passers-by, for fear of a general execution, with every door sealed up and days to wait before one could recover one’s property. Fellow-artistes from other theaters came to look on. Some were indignant that the Artistes’ Federation could not take up the matter and hurl the experience of its lawyers at the heads of the proprietor or syndicate responsible, to say nothing of the moral weight of its five thousand members, who had already made the English music-halls come to terms by means of a wholesale strike. Others observed that it was a private theater, one of those theaters run, for the fun of it, by some prosperous gambler or lucky bookmaker; a sort of harem theater, with almost empty houses, but with swells on the stage, among the swarm of half-naked women; and no one responsible, the old boy ruined, the treasury empty, bankruptcy; couldn’t be helped; take in your belt a peg, that’s all!

“What do you think of this, eh, Lily?” asked a voice. “Only yesterday we were passing the hat for others!”

Lily still had the list; and the money was locked up in one of the dressing-rooms. Then it passed from mouth to mouth, like a watchword: they would give back the collection; but not in the street, not before everybody, for the honor of the profession. Lily, quite excited, entered the passage and there, in the dim light, assisted by two one-legged artistes, who called out the amounts and ticked off the names, she handed back the collection of the previous day. Some received their share with an air of furious determination; others looked shy and blushed; others, again, refused, Lily among them; and it was decided to go to the “Pros’ Corner,” or artistes’ bar, near the stage entrance, to drink up what remained: the ups and downs of life, damn it! Your turn to-day, mine to-morrow; jolly lucky not to break a leg, after all! And their gaiety returned, amid the smoke and the glasses, through a need of reaction; and, after the first drink or two, came jokes, after-dinner stories, impromptus which had traveled ten times round the world and brought tears of laughter to the eyes of the audiences in thousands of music-halls, not to speak of the second-class cabins of every ship of every line and the smoking-carriages of every train, from the G. I. P. R. of Bombay to the S. F. of Buenos Ayres.

And they joined in the chorus and they sang, “We all came into this world with nothing!” and the one-legged artistes beat time with their crutches, my! the pink Hour and the scarlet Hour, who were there, got a stitch in their sides. Lily, with her head flung back, full-throated, laughed nervously. Besides, as she said, artistes did as they pleased and didn’t care a hang for anybody! All made plans for the morrow, all had been through that sort of thing before and much worse, too: six stories cleared at a bound, to escape from a theater in flames! Falls of seventy feet on one’s head! And wrecks! And waves miles high! Already they began to talk of going away, of traveling; traced the route with their finger on the table: Cape Town, Australia, the States. To listen to them, those everlasting wanderers seemed to have pretty nearly the whole world under their hands. They spoke of taking a rest at their permanent addresses: good old London; good old Manchester; there was nothing like good old England, after all, eh? They’d had enough of the Dago countries!

But enthusiasm broke out when the great news arrived, brought by some one straight from the agencies: Harrasford—“Guess, boys!”—Harrasford had bought the Bijou Theater! It was all signed and sealed. He was carrying out his program: and he wanted to open at once. For three months, it appeared, there had been a silent struggle between him and the unlucky bookmaker, who did not want to sell; and Harrasford had got it almost for nothing; he had practically won it, yesterday, at the races,—with Dare Devil, his wonderful horse. Dare Devil had beaten Cataplasm, his rival’s colt, and the smash had followed at once: the Bijou closed; a forced sale; Harrasford had bagged it; and that was one, with more to come!

The artistes were carried away by this daring stroke! Harrasford, a son of a gun, who could put them all in his pocket! The one-legged artistes fought a mock duel between France and England, the victor to marry Lily: what did they think of that? Hurrah!

“Say, boys, which is the quickest way of dropping money?”

“Fast women!”

“No, slow horses!”

It was grand. They drank to everybody’s health. They drank to Harrasford; they drank to the Astrarium! They counted the money on the bar-counter; the amount of the collection had been greatly exceeded and somebody suggested that it was a nice thing, upon my word, yes, a very nice thing, what they were doing: having a good time, while the Bambinis, perhaps, were going to bed without any supper! The whiskies and sodas had warmed their hearts: my turn to-day, yours to-morrow, damn it! It might happen to any of them, to hop the twig and leave Bambinis behind him.

“Lily, the hat!”

And Lily handed round the hat again and collected more than on the day before, even among those who had had their money back.

“Take that to the Bambinis,” they said. “We’ve been behaving like Dagoes, damn it! Artistes ought not to act as such!”

“’K you! ’K you!”

And Lily Clifton walked off, very proudly, with her maid, to hand the money to Nunkie, who was acting as treasurer.

“And, meantime, one’s got to live,” said Lily to herself, when she was outside.

After the spurious gaiety of the moment, she seemed to be returning to her distress, with no work, no money, the Bijou closed, Harrasford taking possession of the theater. She revolved all this in her head, without succeeding in connecting the whole: rags of ideas hung in her brain, like the strips of scenery at the back of the stage. She had not even the courage to go and take her bike ... to-morrow ... to-morrow. The Hours, the pink one and the scarlet one, who came out of the bar also, resigned themselves gaily. Their salary mattered so little. As they explained to Lily, you’re always well paid, when you have rich friends, and, if you haven’t, all you have to do is to look out for them:

“Like Poland, what! A fat lot she cares the old boy’s ruined! All she will do is to find another, change her owner!”

Lily had knocked up against everything, seen everything, heard everything, in her adventurous life; but this way of getting out of a difficulty always made her blush to her eyes. No, a triumph at the Astrarium: that was the only solution for her, Lily Clifton! She was eager also to hand the money to Nunkie. The Bambinis’ money was a different matter from Jimmy’s: they were hungry children. Nunkie must be at the theater now, with his Three Graces, quite close, and they were going to perform at the Astrarium. So it was not essential never to have appeared in Paris! That meant one more chance for her!

“Come along, Glass-Eye!”

They now passed into the noisy quarters. The Olympia opened its furnace of light before them. The Three Graces stood displayed in life-size on posters, with others beside them, names which Lily knew vaguely, as she knew them all, from seeing them somewhere,—as she knew the stage-entrance of the Olympia, by instinct, in the dark street, at the side: the mouth by which the monster nightly swallowed and rejected its fill of meat. A courtyard ... three steps up ... turn to the right ... Lily was at home again, amid rainbow lights.

“Hullo, Lily!”

It was Nunkie greeting her on the stage, while his dear girls were dressing in their room. He took the money for the Bambinis, congratulated Lily on the result of her collection, thanked her.

“And what about the Astrarium?” asked Lily. “Do you know...?”

Of course, Nunkie knew. His dear girls were engaged to perform there. And he had seen some one on his way to the theater: the opening would take place in a month ... in six weeks at the latest....

The architect—“You know, Lily?” said Nunkie—the architect who used to hang about on the stage, in the passages, on some pretext or other—to make love to girls, apparently—was minding everything for Harrasford! He was taking measurements, drawing out plans: