Читать книгу The Passionate Quest онлайн

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"What have I to do in the chorus?" Rosina enquired.

"Kind of go-as-you-please," Erwen assured her. "Stroll about most of the time in wonderful clothes, and make imaginary conversation with sticky-faced young men."

"I sha'n't like it," Rosina declared firmly.

"I never supposed you would," was the gloomy reply. "All the same, if you want to get on the stage, it's a start."

"It isn't the stage I'm so keen about," she confided. "It's the five pounds a week."

"Honest?"

She nodded.

"I've been earning fifteen shillings a week by typing," she told him. "I couldn't keep myself on it, so I've spent all my savings."

"Haven't you any home or relatives?" he asked curiously.

"None!"

"No friends?"

"One—a young man whom I am by way of being engaged to. He is very clever, but unfortunately he hasn't any money, either."

"Where do you live?"

"At a girls' hostel in Westminster. It costs just twenty-four shillings a week. When one's earnings are fifteen—well, living becomes rather a problem, doesn't it?"

They passed through the swing doors, into the restaurant. The young man wrote his companion's name in a book, handed his stick and hat to an attendant, and led her down the stairs, past the bar, from which he was vociferously greeted by its various patrons, into a quaintly-decorated grillroom, where he ensconced Rosina at a corner table and took a seat beside her.