Simon’s voice was almost a whisper. ‘I can’t. She gave me a beating just to teach me what I’d get if she caught me talking to you.’

Margaret tried not to sound impatient. ‘But if I escape you can too. I’ll look after you.’

‘If she was to find you gone she’d know who’d done it, and if I was to have another beating like the last, I’d die. She wouldn’t care.’

‘Can you get to the theatre tonight?’

‘I don’t know,’ Simon explained. ‘She beat me so cruel hard I can’t stand up.’

Margaret heard a sound. ‘Hush! I think she’s coming up the steps.’

Simon began to crawl away. ‘I’m under the stairs,’ he whispered. ‘That’s where she throwed me when she’d done beating me.’

Margaret could hear Matron fumbling to put the key in the lock. She looked round to see that Simon had not disturbed the dirt on the floor. Then she settled back in the exact position in which Matron had left her. Simon’s visit had cheered her immensely. ‘Somehow,’ she told herself, ‘he’s got to get to the theatre. He simply must.’

Chapter Twenty-two

HOPE

It was like being back in the orphanage only worse. There was a living room, Margaret discovered, which was used as a kitchen, for there was a kitchen range, a bucket of coal and some wood chips. On a table there were some bowls with what looked like cold porridge in the bottom of each. Matron, having untied Margaret from the mangle, had pushed her into this room.

‘That’s my orphans’ food,’ she said, pointing to the bowls, ‘but make up a nice fire so you can cook my lunch.’ She undid a greasy parcel and brought out a piece of steak.

‘Where are your orphans?’ Margaret asked.

‘It’s got nothing to do with you, but seeing you’ll have to see them I’ll tell you they’re out working. They gets one good meal a day and that ought to be good enough for anyone. What I say is, what won’t fatten will fill.’

Margaret thought of the miserable bowls of cold porridge waiting for the children and it made her want to cry. It was all so terribly like the orphanage – a house full of hungry children while delicious food was prepared for Matron. To disguise the fact that she had felt like crying she stuck her chin in the air.

‘If you ask me,’ she said, ‘I would think the children needed something hot when they came in.’

Matron smacked Margaret’s face. ‘You always were a saucy child but this theatre has made you worse, so remember how you speak to me. Now get on with cooking my dinner.’

Margaret waited until she heard Matron climb the stairs. Then she took off her shoes and crept out into the passage. Evidently Matron had a room upstairs for she heard a door open and shut. Cautiously Margaret found her way under the stairs. Simon was lying on a pile of rags; he was asleep. Margaret decided to let him sleep, it would do him good, but when she had cooked Matron’s lunch she would keep back some gravy, that would nourish him. She had given Liza some cold meat for him; she wondered if she had found a chance to give it to him, then she remembered that Liza would be at the theatre all day rehearsing her part. Poor Liza! She had always said she hoped she would never have to play Anastasia. Well, even now, maybe she wouldn’t have to. While the fire in the stove was getting going she would see if there was a chance to escape.