Free Slammerkin by Emma Donoghue

priest and get myself absolved.'
    'What's that, then?'
    'Scrubbed clean, soul-wise.'
    Mary considered this image. 'But what about me?' she asked, troubled.
    Doll shrugged. And then, more kindly, added, 'They ever told you about the Magdalen in that school of yours? Mary the Magdalen?'
    The girl thought she remembered the name.
    'Well, she were a whore, and she did all right in the end, didn't she?'

    At Twelfth Night Doll took her to the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, 'to teach you how to cheek the fellows in the grand style,' as she put it. They paid a shilling each to squeeze into the gallery—the price of a fuck, Mary thought, trying out the new word in her head. Doll gazed round critically and guessed there were no more than a thousand and a half in the house this afternoon. The hum of talk rose like bee song.
    Mary felt sick with anticipation. The play was said to be a new one, adapted from the French:
The Game of Love.
Her mother had always kept her away from the theatres, told her that no good would come of folk pretending to be what they weren't. The air was so hot, she felt her shoulders released as if by the touch of the sun. The curtain didn't go up till ten past six, and at first Mary was so dazzled by the set that she could see nothing else. There were great trees that slid on and off the stage, and gilt sofas, and a full moon shining without any visible means of support. The lights stank like burning hair.
    But then Mrs. Abington came on in a white flowered gown with scalloped flounces and a ladder of increasingly tiny bows on her stomacher. Mary forgot everything else. 'Does the manager let her pick out what she wants to wear?' she asked Doll.
    'Pick it? She owns it,' said Doll. 'The actresses all have to furnish their own clothes.'
    Mary watched Mrs. Abington with a sort of tender envy. Imagine owning such dresses and walking out on the stage for thousands of people to stare at you.
    'No wonder they need rich keepers!' said Doll with a dirty laugh.
    Mary looked at her hard, to see if that was a joke. Then she stared even more closely at the woman who was floating across the stage as if she'd never seen a male member in her life. It puzzled Mary, how a girl could wear such a face after entering into the trade. Maybe it was different for an actress; maybe she could reach into a pair of breeches while all the time pretending to be someone else.
    The speeches were hard to follow, above the shrill commentary of the audience, and the swish of fans, and the swell of gossip whenever some viscount or duchess showed themselves in a box. But soon Mary had got the gist of the play. Mrs. Abington was a lady who had switched clothes with her maid, as a sort of joke. It was astonishing, the difference a hat made, or an apron, or a gilt buckle. If you looked like a lady, it seemed, men bowed to you a lot, and if you dressed like a maid, they tried to kiss you behind doors. But what the maid and mistress didn't know was that the gentleman coming to court the lady had done the same swap with his manservant. So they were all liars, and none of them knew who they were flirting with, which made it very funny.
    Doll nudged Mary in the ribs whenever a riposte got a laugh. 'There's the old repartee for you, Mary!'
    'If you shut your mouth for a minute I might be able to hear it,' said Mary, elbowing her back.

    There were folk they were acquainted with—and some they were friendly with, like Mercy Toft and Nan Pullen and Alice Gibbs and the Royle brothers who ran the cider cellar round the corner from Rat's Castle—but when it came right down to it, Mary was coming to the conclusion that she and Doll had no one but each other. Even when they lost themselves in a crowd—they joined in half the peltings and 'rough music' that went on that winter, even helped to burn an effigy of a silk-master who wouldn't raise wages—Mary and Doll always kept one eye out for each other. No one else quite spoke their language, got the