'A fortune lies beyond that door,' the rum-breathed ogre said,

And I ten shillings in his debt, worth more alive than dead,

Fought hard to keep the bile below and my thoughts within my head.

On, through the door, the curtained stalls revealed the foul straw beds

Upon which and around about were bouncing, bobbing heads

And the flubbering flesh of city gents, evidently well-fed,

Making the most of the working girls earning their daily bread.

To join their ranks was now my fate or debtors' gaol instead;

It could be worse than a job and a home to which fortune's doorway led.