Page:The Tragic Muse (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1890), Volume 2.djvu/241

Rh ornament of the profession but as a being of a more fortunate essence. She had had an idea that real ladies were "nasty"; but Miriam was not nasty, and who could gainsay that Miriam was a real lady? The girl justified herself to Sherringham, who had found no fault with her; she knew how much her mother feared that the proper world wouldn't come in if they knew that the improper, in the person of pretty Miss Rover, was on the ground. What did she care who came and who didn't, and what was to be gained by receiving half the snobs in London? People would have to take her exactly as they found her—that they would have to learn; and they would be much mistaken if they thought her capable of becoming a snob too for the sake of their sweet company. She didn't pretend to be anything but what she meant to be, the best general actress of her time; and what had that to do with her seeing or not seeing a poor ignorant girl who had lov— Well, she needn't say what Fanny had. She had met her in the way of business—she didn't say she would have run after her. She had liked her because she wasn't a stick, and when Fanny Rover had asked her quite wistfully if she mightn't come and see her, she hadn't bristled with scandalized virtue. Miss Rover was not a bit more stupid or more ill-natured than any one else: it would be time enough to shut the door when she should become so.

Sherringham commended even to extravagance the liberality of such comradeship; said that of course a woman didn't go into that profession to see how little she could swallow. She was right to live with the others so long as they were at all possible, and it was for her, and only for her, to judge how