SENT INTO EXILE.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 6, 9 January 1899, Page 6

SENT INTO EXILE.

By C. E. CHEESEMAN,

(ALL. RIGHTS RESERVED.)

'Author of 'A Rolling Stone,' 'Had He Known,' and 'On a Lee Shore.'

SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS INSTAL-

MENT,

CHAPTER I.—The manager of tho Violet Hyde Dramatic Company, Mr Tomltns, and Mr Dalzell, one of the actors and husband of the star, having discussed the extremely unsatisfactory condition of business, resolve that the one thing to revive the ebbing fortunes of the company is to get Dalzell's little girl to take a part in the performance. The child is a born actress, but very delicate, and Mrs Dalzell, who has lost another little girl through overwork on the boards, has resolved that the one that remains to her shall not be sacrificed in the same way.' The manager easily gains the husband's consent to Hilda's appearing in the next piece. Dalzell is a thriftless dissipated individual, who has squandered his wife's earnings, and is chiefly anxious to get more money for himself.

CHAPTER 11,

HILDA AND HER MOTHER,

In her room at the hotel Mrs Dalzell sat alone, reading a leter. It was from an old schoolmate, whom she had seen but once since the time when they were girls together. For several years they had corresponded, with as much regularity as .the wandering life of the one and tbe household cares of the other had allowed. But the correspondence had been interrupted for nearly four years. When Mrs Dalzell heard again from her friend the occasion was a sad one. The letter had been written to condole with her on the loss of her daughter, and now, before answering it, she was reading it over again. 41 was deeply grieved,' her friend wrote, 'to hear of your loss. I know how you must have felt, for your sorrow is the same as mine. It is less than a year since my little girl died. It was very hard to give her up—how hard God only knows. I miss the dear child terribly. Sometimes even now it is more than I can bear to pass the door of her closed room —to find some toy or little thing of hers lying where she left it months ago. You are happier than I. You have a daughter still. I lost my only one. ' I heard of you from a friend who met you in Melbourne. She tells me that Hilda is delicate, and that you are anxious about her, and would like to send her away for a change. How I wish she were here in this delightful country ! It is a children^ paradise. Sometimes I fancy that if we had come here sooner Ada might have been saved. Do you think you cculd trust Hilda to me ? I should love to have her for as long as you could spare the child. I am sure the change would do wonders.' The letter rambled on with a description of the writer's home and of her remaining children—her two boys. It spoke of the affectionate care she ■would lavish on Hilda, if permitted to have her for a time. There was something pathetic in this —as if the poor woman were pleading for the loan of a daughter. But at the sentence which has just been quoted Mrs Dalzell paused. An idea had occurred to her, and she was pondering over it. Her dislike, of the profession to ■which she had been Drought up, and •which she would follow to the end of her days, had grown so intense and overmastering that it might be called a monomania. Her strongest objections were those which she could not easily put into words. To many people they would have seemed exaggerated, or founded upon prejudice rather than reaeSe. Certainly those •who pride themseferes upon being ' advanced' in their ideas would have laughed her to scam. That an actress should hold such views would seem utterly ridiculous. That one who all her life had courted publicity, whose smallest success, whose daily bread depended upon it, should envy the seconded lives, the settled homes of other might indeed appear strange ; but it was not without reason. She ■was too fastidious, too critical to ensure without shrinking a great many things which are inseparable from the life of one of her class. Use hadhabituated her to most of these things; they had to be taken with the rest. But that her daughter should encounter the same filled her with dismay. This was not the future she desired for her child. She did not care that Hilda should be famous. But she ■wanted her to have that happiness Which she herself had missed, and which, she was persuaded, could seldom be found in the roving, restless life of an actress. And above all, she wanted her to be good, to be unharmed and unspoilt by the world. She did not go so far as to think that this ■was impossible for a stage-player— no, she knew to the contrary. , But she believed that it was difficult, that the temptations of the life were great, the dangers many. In this, it was not easy fo gainsay her; she was taught by her own bitter experience. Besides this, was the important consideration of her daughter's health, Hilda had*never been strong ; she was ailing even now. She was her last, her only one ; she could not bear the thought of losing her as she had lost Isabel. The poor child, delicafe always, and unfortunately precocious in her talents, had died worn-out and exhausted by duties and tasks that should never have been thrust upon Jher. Mrs Dalzell bitterly reproached herself for the neglect that had allowed such a sacrifice. Her husband —she Washed at the thought, and the tears started to her eyes—had been creedv of Isabel's earnings ; he was greedy now of what Hilda might bring to them. When she had yielded so far as to consent to Hilda taking part in their performances it had been on the condition that after this season she should not act again. Dalzell had agreed to this ; but his wife had no faith in his promises. Hilda had done too well. He would be sure to insist on her reappearance. If she stayed with them, she wouljjf be forced into that unhealthy, feverish sort of life Which had been fatal to her, sister, and which—so Mrs Dalzell fearedmight have the same, tragic ending for herself. At any cost' her mother •would save her from that. There, was aio trace of selfishness _ in the love .■which she bore to her child. They must part. The tears that had

been in her eyes a moment before ]. were suddenly dried. She had braced herself to a great sacrifice, and in the exaltation which permitted of this,' she felt able to crush down the most | passionate remonstrances of natural i affection. She wrote - her letter as calmly as if it referred to unimportant matters. After finishing it and j sealing it up, she burnt the one she . | had received from her friend, thinking at the time how fortunate it was that she had never shown it to her husband. Years ago she must have j told him all about her old schoolmate who had married at about the same time as herself, and had gone to In- > dia, whence she had only lately returned to England. But it was long since her name had been mentioned between them ; so long that most probably he bad forgotten it alto- \ gether. I 'Hilda!' she said suddenly. 'The little girl had been near her all this time, sitting on a low chair before the fire, and languidly turning over the pages of an illustrated journal. She had not been watching her mother, j but she had wondered at her silence, iand now when she looked at her face she knew by the expression that some- I thing very serious was under con-' sideration. j 'Hilda,'. Mrs Dalzell said, taking the child on her knee, ' would you be , very sorry if I were to send you away? Would^you miss me very much ?' 'Why would you send me away, mother?' Hilda asked in surprise. | She was a pretty child, delicately fair I in complexion, and with large dark | eyes, black eyebrows and black hair. , j But she was thin and pale, older in 1 manner and appearance than she . j ought to have been. She was oldfashioned altogether. She did not talk like a child, she did not act like one, and but for her small size and • her short frocks, she did not look like one.

T think you ought to have a long holiday,' Mrs Dalzell answered. 'I want you to get strong. If you stay here, and work hard; if you are up late at nights, and worried and excited over your acting, you will not grow up strong and healthy. Other little girls who are well taken care of have only their school lessons to think of. They are outside in the fresh air and sunshine most of the day, and they sleep soundly at nights. They laugh and romp about a great deal, they are not always tired as you are, and they have such round, rosy cheeks, not white ones like yours, darling.'

Her voice trembled over that last word. As she bent her head to kiss the pale cheek of the child, and felt the thin little arms clasped about her neck, a sob rose in her throat. This was not to be taken so calmly after all. This stab of pain at, her heart, this tightening of her breast, this mist before her eyes were a foretaste of the bitterness of the parting that was to come.

'Why are you so sorry, mother?' Hilda asked gravely. T don't want to go away. I'd rather stay with you. And I'm not always tired; only a little now and then. At night, when our turn comes to go on —yours and mine —I never feel tired.'

'That is excitement. You forget yourself then. You don't know when you are tired. It does you harm.' ♦But I like it,' Hilda remonstrated, T like it better than anything else.'

'Isabel liked it,' said Mrs Dalzell, 'Poor Isabel! You have* not forgotten her?'

'No,' said the child, almost in a whisper. 'It made her ill —the doctor told us so. If we had known —your father and I—we should never have allowed her to act. It will always grieve us to think of that, and it makes us all the more anxious about you. We have only you to take care of now.' 'Does papa want me to go away?' Hilda asked suddenly.

'No,' Mrs Dalzell said. 'Papa does not want it.' She paused: it was not easy to explain to the child why there was a difference of opinion between her husband and herself on this question. It was a pity she should know that •it had been disputed between them. But Hilda had already found out that on most subjects her parents held very different views. Naturally enough, the child leaned to her mother's side. What she told her must needs be right.

Besides—and this was keenly felt by Mrs Dalzell—Hilda, already knew her father's failing. Hew indeed could such a thing have been hidden? Before she understood all that involved it, she was aware of it, and it was inevitable that even so early in her life the knowledge should have shaken her trust in him. Instinctively she knew that he was not to be depended on. She was fond of him; but it was her mother that she loved with all the strength of her nature. Probably she was not conscious ot any lack of affection towards her father; she knew only that it was her mother whom she wanted when anything troubled or ailed her, that her mother always knew best, was always 'so good.' Also she had not forgotten what Isabel had told her once: that if it were not for papa, they should have plenty of everything. Papa spent all the money. She felt that this was very wrong of papa. It must be on his account that her mother was often so pale and sad, that she looked ill, or as if she had been crying. Isabel said that papa made her cry dreadfully. How could he—how could he do such things? Once when Isabel had asked the same question and had got quite angry, her mother stopped her. She would not let her say anything against their father. Perhaps then this was something he could not help. Poor papa! The most of us are so forgetful of our early days that we do not realise how keen-sighted little children are, how glaringly our faults and inconsistencies stand out before them, and how accurately they gauge our characters. Hilda was much better acquainted with her parents' affairs, with their differences in character and disposition than even her own mother imagined. She understood very clearly that certain things could be managed much better without her father's intervention, and that it.was very necessary he should be kept in ignorance of some matters. 'You must never repeat what I am saying to you now, Hilda,' Mrs Dalzell said earnestly. 'Do you understand? Never tell anyone.'

yNot papa?' said Hilda, knowing well what the answer would be.

'No, my dear. Your father could never make up his mind to spare you. He couldn't bear to let you go away. So we will not talk about it to him. After you have gone I will, tell him, and then perhaps he will see that it is for the best. Mrs King, the lady I have written to about you, was at school with me. We were great friends. I know she will be very good to you—as kind and careful as if you really belonged to her. She

has lost her little girl, and I think that is why she would like you to | stay with her. It is a long way off— it is in England; but you are such a brave little woman I know that for my salve you'll try not to fret too much.' 'In England! Oh! mother, I couldn't go such a long way.' 'I shall get Mrs Parkes to take you, dear. Hush! don't worry about it now; listen to me for a little longer. Darling-, I haven't enough money of my own to find a nice home for you anywhere else, or to send you to school as I should like. But Mrs King has promised that while you are with her you shall have everything her own daughter had, and I know she will keep her word. And oh, Hilda, she has such a beautiful place! It is near the sea; but there are woods around it too, and green fields and lanes where the wild flowers grow— the flowers I used to gather when 1 was no big-ger than you. There'll be a shaggy little pony for you to ride. Think of that! I fancy I can see you scampering all over the country. Why, it will be delightful. You will have a happy time.' 'No!' cried the child, suddenly bursting into tears. 'No, no! I don't want a pony. • I don't want to go away.' 'Don't cry,' said Mrs Dalzell. Don't, Hilda! it hurts me too. You must go; indeed you must.' T say, what's going on here?' said Dalzell", lounging into the room. 'What's Hilda crying for? Been naughty—it-* well? What is it?' 'She is not naughty,' said Mrs Dalzell, 'only sorry about something. Never mind now, dear.' Hilda slipped off her mother's knee, and went back to her low chair and her,picture book. (To be continued daily.)