Birdies loves her mother's shes, but when she is finally granted permission to wear some for a little while, she discovers that her "barefoot shoes" are the best.
The Diamond of Drury Lane Cat Royal series by Julia Golding
Ophan Catherine"Cat" Royal, living at the Drury Lane Theater in 1790s London, tries to find the "diamond" supposedly hidden in the theater, which unmasks a treasonal political cartoonist, and involves her with street gangs and nobility.