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WILD MARGARET. gh
manage, and the girl—well, she is like the rest, I suppose,
and, Heaven knows, they are easy enough to deceive! Dll
chance it!” a
He sat down and remained: in thought for another
quarter of an hour, then he rose, and putting a Jight
Overcoat over his dress clothes, he took his hat and went
out.’
Passing up one of the small streets, he reached a short
row of houses, quiet, miniature boxes of residences, called
Anglesea Terrace, and knocking at No. 9, inquired if Miss
elvoir were at home. ;
Before the maidservant could reply, a feminine voice
called out through the open door in the narrow passage:
‘“Yes, she is. Is that you, Mr. Ambrose? ‘Come in,”
and Austin Ambrose, passing through the little passage,
which was lined with large photographs of Miss Belvoir
in various costumes, entered the room from which the
voice proceeded.
The room was a very small one—far too small to permit
of that oft-mentioned performance—swinging a cat—and it
was rather shabbily, though gaudily furnished. The fur-
-niture was old and palpably rickety, the carpet was
threadbare, but there was a brilliant wall paper, and a
pair of gay-colored cushions. An opera cloak, lined with
_ &carlet, lay on one of the chairs, and on the sofa were. a-
hat and a pair of sixteen-button kid gloves.
The owner of the hat, opera cloak, and gloves, sat at the
table ‘‘ discussing,” as the old authors say, a lobster and.
a bottle of stout. .
She was a girl of about two-and-twenty, neither pretty
nor plain, but with a sharp, intelligent face—the sort of
face one sees amongst the London street boys—and a pair
of dark and wide-awake eyes, which were by far her best
features. She wore a light-blue dressing grown—rather
frayed at the sleeves, by the way, and trimmed with a
cheap and—by no means slightly—dirty lace. But for all
its sharpness and the vulgarity of its surroundings, it was
not altogether a bad face.
This was Miss Lottie Belvoir. She was an actress. Not,
’ a famous one by any means—only a fifth-rate one at
present; but she was waiting for'a favorable opportunity
to become a first-rate one. Perhaps the opportunity
{ might come, perhaps it mightn’t; ‘meanwhile, Lottie Bel-
| voir was content to work hard and wait. Some day, per-
chance, she would “ fetch ” the town, and then she would
exchange the grimy back room in Anglesea Terrace for a
a costume of Worth, and the lobster and stout for pate de
foie gras and champagne, Until that happy time arrived,
house at St. John’s Wood, the old satin dressing-gown for »