"Well," observed Maggy sententiously, "I should say your father and the rest of your relations must be either dead or dreaming to let you go on the stage." "Nearly all my near relations _are_ dead. I have an aunt and uncle—" "What does he do?" "He’s a retired colonel. He—they wanted me to live with them." Alexandra gave the information with a touch of reluctance. "Why didn’t you?" To give a stranger adequate and convincing reasons why one prefers not to live with uncongenial relations is not always easy. Alexandra put it briefly. "We have nothing in common," she said. "And what do you think you have in common with this life and the people you’ll meet in it?" propounded Maggy. "If I were you I’d go back and say: ’Nunky old dear, I’ve changed my mind. I’ll come and live with you and be your loving niece, amen.’ Fancy! a retired colonel—Anglo-Indian—and you think twice about it!" "Nothing would induce me to change my mind," said Alexandra with decision. "There are three girls, and they find it a tight fit without me. They’re not rich.... When my mother died I had to do something. Besides, I’m really ambitious to get on." Maggy snapped her fingers. "Oh, ambition! Do you know what the ambition of every chorus girl is? It isn’t to become a star-actress. That’s clean beyond her. It’s to find a man who’ll take her away from a room like this and treat her decently." Alexandra found it difficult to reconcile such a statement with one so beaming and joyous-looking as Maggy. "But you—you don’t think like that?" she rejoined. "Sometimes I do. I’ve kept straight so far because I like being on my own. I hate men, with their nasty thoughts and their prowling ways. But I haven’t met any that I liked. If I had, perhaps I shouldn’t be here now. If we get taken on at the Pall Mall it’ll be nothing but men, men, men. We shall get no peace." "You paint everything in such somber colors. There must be light as well as shade."