forgot your purse,’ she explained, plumping down on a stool next to her friend. ‘May I watch the performance from backstage?’
‘Oh, thank you, Tallie,’ Millie said warmly. ‘Yes, of course, just take care you do not get in anyone’s way—and you won’t have to mind the language.’
Tallie settled down to absorb the atmosphere. Once her ears adjusted to the din and apparent chaos she began to pick out differences in costumes and to make some sense out of what was going on.
What had seemed to her first startled gaze to be Millie’s state of near nudity was revealed as being a set of skin-toned fleshings over which a dress, apparently made of disparate pieces of fabric, was in fact held together by panels of pink net. It still revealed slender ankles and a quantity of Millie’s well-turned calf.
Millie dusted her face with a vast powder puff and searched frantically through her cluttered table. ‘Where’s my lampblack? Jemmie!’
‘Yes, miss?’ A sharp-faced urchin appeared as though by magic.
‘Where’s my lampblack?’
‘Suzy half-inched it,’ the boy reported.
‘Well, go and half-inch it back.’
‘That’s a boy!’ Tallie gasped.
‘Yes, I know. That’s Jemmie. He’s eight.’
‘But you are all … I mean, half of you haven’t got any clothes on and—’
‘He’s used to it,’ Millie said calmly. ‘Doesn’t know any different. Thinks we’re all his sisters in any case.’
A man stuck his head round the door. ‘Overture and beginners! Shift your assets, you load of …’ A chorus of abuse and thrown objects greeted this announcement and he ducked back through he door.
Tallie had a sudden vision of what Nick would say if he saw her now and had to suppress a laugh. He hoped she was being neither indiscreet nor unwise, did he? How would he categorise sitting in the middle of the opera-chorus dressing-room?
Millie was jamming a saucy hat on her head and picking up a beribboned shepherd’s crook. ‘Right. Here we go. I’m in the first scene with the other village girls.’
Tallie spent an exhilarating hour and a half being jostled, sworn at, deafened and shocked as she jammed herself into a corner of the wings and watched the performance. At last the final curtain came down and the cast rushed off, sweaty, exhausted and apparently ready to spend the rest of the night in a continuous party.
‘Come on.’ Millie caught Tallie’s arm and dragged her along. ‘I need to get changed before they let any of them in.’
‘Who?’ Tallie found herself acting as an impromptu dresser, unhooking Millie’s costume and handing her pieces of cotton waste dipped in goose grease to clean off the make-up.
‘We get the lot: the bloods, the peep o’day boys, a few flats, some pinks of the ton,’ Millie said calmly. ‘I don’t encourage them myself, of course, but most of the girls have got followers.’
‘They are going to let them in here?’ Tallie squeaked. ‘Can we go before that happens?’
‘If I really rush.’ Millie stepped into her petticoats and reached for a walking dress hanging on a hook beside her. ‘Normally I’m never finished before they come in. So long as I’m dressed properly I don’t mind. I just get on and do my hair and things.’
Tallie fidgeted with impatience, unable to see anything she could help with to finish Millie’s toilette. The last thing she had expected was to be found in here by a crowd of amorously inclined men—judging from the very half-hearted efforts some of the girls were making to get changed, any man coming here this evening was not going to want to be discussing the finer points of the script.
‘Where are my shoes?’ Millie demanded, dropping to her knees and scrabbling under the table. ‘Oh bother, I’ve kicked one right through …’ She scuttled under the table in pursuit of her missing slipper, leaving Tallie by herself as the door swung open to admit a crowd of men.
They were in a dangerously boisterous mood, already half-drunk, clutching champagne bottles and more than ready to enjoy whatever favours the chorus girls were minded to share with them. Tallie retreated behind a rack of dresses, only to freeze as a very familiar voice reached her from the other side of the wall of mirrors.
‘Why, Miss LeNoir! Charmed to see you. I did so enjoy your performance tonight.’ Hemsley. Tallie pressed herself back against the wall, then realised that she could not abandon Millie, who was obviously responding with flattered delight to his compliments.
‘Your voice goes from strength to strength,’ he was confiding. ‘I think you are wasted in the chorus. I happen to know someone who manages performances at Drury Lane. I know he would hear you as a favour to me. Why don’t you let me drive you home this evening so we can discuss it? You don’t want to be here with this rabble—it is unsuitable for an artiste of your talent.’
‘Oh, thank you, Mr Hemsley, but I cannot drive with you this evening; besides, should you be out when you have so obviously been injured? Whatever happened?’
Tallie tiptoed closer to the end of the makeshift wall of mirrors.
‘Footpads, my dear, six of them at least. I had my cane, of course, and I flatter myself I have a good right hook, but even so, it took me some time to—’ He broke off, his drawling voice choking on the words as Tallie appeared. She glanced around, but the rest of the men were gathered round a giggling group of girls by the door; they would not be overheard.
‘Why, Mr Hemsley, what a dreadful mess those villains made of your face!’ If she had not been present when it happened, she would never have believed that mass of bruises was the work of one man. ‘How heroic of you to beat them off.’
‘Do you know Mr Hemsley, then, Tallie?’ Millie asked innocently, her face lighting up to discover two of her friends were acquainted.
‘Yes, indeed,’ Tallie said earnestly. ‘You have been having a hard time, Mr Hemsley, have you not? Such ill fortune to be attacked by footpads immediately after Lord Arndale beat you so soundly for attempting to ravish me.’
‘What!’ Millie gasped, running to Tallie’s side to put her arm around her. ‘You … you beast!’
It was obvious that Millie trusted her friend’s word absolutely. She stood by Tallie like a fierce little cat defending its kitten against a dog. ‘Take one step nearer and I’ll scratch your eyes out, you libertine!’
‘My dear Miss LeNoir,’ Hemsley was making the mistake of trying to bluster. ‘It was simply a misunderstanding—’
‘On your part,’ a cold voice said. Three pairs of eyes turned to find Nicholas Stangate lounging negligently against a clothes rail. A semi-clad dancer ran over giggling and put her arms around him. ‘Not now, darling,’ he said absently, giving her a pat on her rounded little rump. ‘Off you go like a good girl.’
Tallie made a serious effort to steady her voice, then observed, ‘If you hit him here it will start a brawl.’
‘I
