Theatre people! She had not even dared to confess that she had them in her house. Dolores was a good soul ... but little Dot ... and Alice Niles—who _was_ Alice Niles? A stranger! And Lillian, so frail ... on the road ... with a stranger!!! James Gish’s wife, who had borne up in the face of everything, gave way, wept as if her heart would break. Dolores Lorne comforted her ... later, Alice Niles. She believed them good women, both of them. They promised to take a mother’s care of her little girls. They painted life on the circuit as happy—just a long pleasure trip. If they forgot the broken nights on wretched trains, the scanty, stale food, the dragging weariness of delays ... oh, well, they were human. Lillian and Dorothy became excited. They had never been to a theatre, except to the Christmas-tree performance in Baltimore. That had been beautiful. Especially Maxine Elliot. Now, they were going to be beautiful, like Maxine. Tearfully Mary Gish began to assemble two little wardrobes—scanty little wardrobes, of a size to go into two cheap little telescope bags. Also, there were the rehearsals. Mary Gish taught her children their brief lines, which they rehearsed at the theatre. Lillian went at her task in her obedient, thorough way, and became a favorite. Dorothy, who perhaps had ideas of her own, was invited to repeat, and repeat, until both Mr. William Dean, the kindly manager of her company, and herself, were a trifle worn and critical. Finally, when Mr. Dean became really quite fierce, and peremptory, Dorothy, aged four, whispered, her lips trembling a little: “Please, Mr. Dean, if you let me alone for a few minutes, I _know_ I’ll be able to do it.” Mrs. Gish, meantime, had a new and quite definite plan. She would herself become an actress! Very likely her people would cast her out, but never mind. Acting could not be worse than the long hours in Brooklyn. She would equip herself to be with one or both of her children. Alice Niles introduced her at a theatrical agency, and Mary Gish—determined woman that she was—was rehearsing for a small part at Proctor’s almost as soon as the two real actresses of the family had said their heartbreaking good-byes. V A LITTLE TROUPER Stage children of that day took whatever name was offered them, usually the name of the woman in whose charge they traveled. Dorothy readily learned to say “Aunt Dolores” and accepted the name of Lorne. Alice Niles became “Aunt Alice” to Lillian, and she herself “Florence Niles.” It is not certain where Dorothy’s company opened, but “In Convict Stripes,” with “Little Florence Niles, the loveliest and most gifted child actress on the American stage,” opened at Risingsun, Ohio, in a barn. Barns and upstairs halls were often used by the one-night-stand companies, though a larger town sometimes had an “opera house,” with real seats, not just boards for benches.