Not at Crillick’s Variety Theatre, though. Back in the late forties, if you’d have found yourself sitting in the stalls you would have looked in vain. Doesn’t mean we weren’t there, just that you didn’t see us: red-headed Ellen and right alongside her with the wild black curls? That would be me, Zillah. I know it’s strange to think that we watched you before you watched us, but both of us had our reasons. Each night, Ellen searched the audience for a scout, someone with the power to pluck her from the Crillick’s stage and take her to the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden. She fancied herself a soprano. I was more concerned about seeing what mood the punters were in – if they were at the stage of drink where they would join in a sing-song or so far gone they’d turn violent and throw things at us. Every crowd was different but there was one September night, the year the Queen was delivered of her daughter Louise, when one man in particular caught my eye.

The first thing I noticed was his hat. It stood out a mile among the flat caps and bowlers, and he had the frock coat to match. It’s not often you get a man in a topper at Crillick’s. Don’t mistake me, Marcus Crillick’s show is more than a few rungs up from a penny gaff, but the quality don’t like variety. They prefer to keep things pure. So straight away I was suspicious. Then I clocked the colour of him.

‘Him over there. What do you make of him?’ I said to Ellen.

She squinted in the direction of my pointed finger.

‘The African, you mean? Don’t often get one of yours in.’

He sat on the benches, three rows back, his right leg stretched out on the aisle. Even from here, peeking out behind the curtain, I could see that he was handsome and broad in the shoulders. Around him sat our usual regulars, the shop boys and navvies already half-cut and impatient for the show to start. The sour tang of their sweat was sharp on the air. Beyond them were the tables for the better sort, the clerks with women worth the price of dinner and a show. The ushers weaved around them touting trinkets and sweetmeats, competing for the pennies in their pockets. Up above, the box where our proprietor often sat was in darkness. Crillick liked to keep an eye on what was happening in his theatre but for the time being he was away on business in France.

Ellen, satisfied that she had the measure of the African, delivered her verdict. ‘Selfish bastard, I reckon. Getting above himself. No call to be wearing a hat three minutes before the curtain.’