Letizia had not been six months in the chorus before she attracted the attention of John Richards by some imitations she gave at a supper party at which, most unusually for him, he was present. If John Richards’s eyes seemed exclusively occupied with the personal appearance of the young women who adorned his theatre, they were not on that account blind to talent. He asked who the good-looking girl was, remembered now that he had engaged her himself, was informed that she came of theatrical stock, and made a note on his cuff that she was to be given an important understudy. Letizia’s luck held. The lady who played the part she was understudying was taken ill at Brighton one Saturday afternoon; and that very night John Richards, who happened to pay one of his periodical visits to the back of a box in order to be sure that his company was not letting the show down by slackness, witnessed Letizia’s performance. He turned to his companion, and asked what he thought of her. “I think she’s a marvel.” “So do I,” said John Richards. Yet he did not mention a word to Letizia about having seen her. In fact, neither she nor any of the company knew that the Guv’nor was in front, for these visits to his theatre were always paid in the strictest secrecy. However, when in July the musical comedy for the autumn production was ready for rehearsal, John Richards offered Letizia a part with three songs that were likely to take London by storm, if the actress knew how to sing them. Nancy was acting in Leicester the week that Letizia’s telegram arrived with its radiant news of the luck her birthday had brought. She went into the church where twenty-one years ago she and Bram were married, and there she lighted every candle she could find to Our Lady of Victories. The pricket blazed with such a prodigality of golden flames in the jewelled sunlight that the old woman who was cleaning out the pews came up to find out if this extravagant stranger was a genuine devotee. “It’s all right,” Nancy told her. “I was married in this church twenty-one years ago, and I am thanking Heaven for happiness after much sorrow.” The old cleaner smiled so benignly that Nancy gave her half a crown and begged for her prayers. Then she sought out the priest, and asked him to say Masses for the soul of Letizia’s great-grandmother and for herself a Mass of thanksgiving, and still another Mass for the intention of the Sisters of the Holy Infancy. She gave him, too, alms for the poor of his parish, and then going home to her lodgings she knelt beside her bed and wept the tears of unutterable thankfulness, those warm tears that flow like outpoured wine, so rich are they with the sunshine of the glad heart.