"I was thinking of going on in the pantomime as one of the hextra ladies, if they'll 'ave me." "Oh, Jenny, you won't do that, will you? A theatre is only sinfulness, as we 'ave always knowed." "You know that I don't 'old with all them preachy-preachy brethren says about the theatre." "I can't argue--I 'aven't the strength, and it interferes with the milk." And then, as if prompted by some association of ideas, Esther said, "I hope, Jenny, that you'll take example by me and will do nothing foolish; you'll always be a good girl." "Yes, if I gets the chance." "I'm sorry to 'ear you speak like that, and poor mother only just dead." The words that rose to Jenny's lips were: "A nice one you are, with a baby at your breast, to come a-lecturing me," but, fearing Esther's temper, she checked the dangerous words and said instead-- "I didn't mean that I was a-going on the streets right away this very evening, only that a girl left alone in London without anyone to look to may go wrong in spite of herself, as it were." "A girl never need go wrong; if she does it is always 'er own fault." Esther spoke mechanically, but suddenly remembering her own circumstances she said: "I'd give you the money if I dared, but for the child's sake I mustn't." "You can afford it well enough--I wouldn't ask you if you couldn't. You'll be earning a pound a week presently." "A pound a week! What do you mean, Jenny?" "Yer can get that as wet-nurse, and yer food too." "How do yer know that, Jenny?" "A friend of mine who was 'ere last year told me she got it, and you can get it too if yer likes. Fancy a pound for the next six months, and everything found. Yer might spare me the money and let me go to Australia with the others." "I'd give yer the money if what you said was true." "Yer can easily find out what I say is the truth by sending for the matron. Shall I go and fetch her? I won't be a minute; you'll see what she says." A few moments after Jenny returned with a good-looking, middle-aged woman. On her face there was that testy and perplexed look that comes of much business and many interruptions. Before she had opened her lips her face had said: "Come, what is it? Be quick about it." "Father and the others is going to Australia. Mother's dead and was buried last week, so father says there's nothing to keep 'im 'ere, for there is better prospects out there. But he says he can't take me, for the agency wants two pounds a 'ead, and it was all he could do to find the money for the others. He is just short of two pounds, and as I'm the eldest barring Esther, who is 'is step-daughter, 'e says that I had better remain, that I'm old enough to get my own living, which is very 'ard on a girl, for I'm only just turned sixteen. So I thought that I would come up 'ere and tell my sister----" "But, my good girl, what has all this got to do with me? I can't give you two pounds to go to Australia. You are only wasting my time for nothing."