GIBSON GIRL'S ROMANCE.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIX, Issue 249, 17 October 1908, Page 15

GIBSON GIRL'S ROMANCE.

RUNAWAY MARRIAGE WITH SON OP WEALTHY SCOT. Mr Seymour Hicks has lost another of his beautiful Gibson girls In the person of Miss Elsie Kay, who was married under romantic circumstances to Mr Ronald McAndrew, the only son of a partner In the shipbuilding firm of Messrs Laird and McAudrew, of Liverpool and Glasgow. The news came as a surprise to Mr Seymour Hicks, who received at Dublin where he was with his "Gay Gordons" company, the following telegram:— "Shall not be back. So sorry. Am married." It was during the company's engagement at Blackpool a fortnight before that Mr McAndrew first met Miss Kay, and it appears to have been a case of love at first sight on his part. His relatives, however, interfered, as he was already engaged to be married to another lady. Miss Kay was also engaged, but the Infatuation apparently was so strong that the previous engagements were broken off. Mr McAndrew had a serious disagreement with his father on the subject, which ended L> a threat to cut him off with a shilling. Then the company went to Dublin. Mt McAndrew travelled over in the same boat with the members, and he sought out Mc Hicks' manager, and got him to reserve a front seat in the paterre of the Theatre Royal for every night of the week. For six successive nights he sat in that seat — the impatient lover longing for the hour to come when he could carry off his bride from the glare of the footlights. In vain Miss Kay urged her theatrical engagement with Mr Seymour Hicks and Miss Ellaline Terriss, and her obliga'tiou? to her profession. But love laughs at such obstacles. Mr McAndrew would have been prepared to tear up all the contracts in the sister kingdom. So Miss Kay consented to be married at once. One evening she approached Mr Hicks manager, and asked to be excused for that night's performance. Consent was given, it being thought that she was merely indisposed. All daj- long she and her lover had been driving round Dublin seeking someone to marry them. But fate was against them. There are forms and formulas, rules and regulations, and the registrar cannot give a dispensation, however ardent and impatient the lovers may be. That nisht Miss Kay packed her boxes, and next day, having said a tearful goodbye to her sister, with whom she lived, and who is also in Mr Hicks' company, she left by- the morning boat for London with her lover, and the marriage duly took place. Mr Hicks, interviewed by a "Lloyd's News" representative, laughingly referred to the number of girls of his company who had left him in recent years to marry men of title and wealth. Miss Elsie Kay was one of the two original Gibson Miss Eva Carrington, now Lady de Clifford. This makes the tenth Gibson girl to marry into the aristocracy of rank or wealth. Mr Kicks is greatly distressed at the lose of his best girls, and he humorously remarked that he thought of substituting "show boys" for show girls in future. "Really," said Mr Hicks, "I don't see how I can come back to Dublin, I'm always losing girls in Dublin. Let mc see. there was Miss Gates. You know, she left mc io Dublin to marry Baron yon Dltton. Then there was Miss Eva Carrington. It was in Dublin she met Lord de Clifford, who promptly robbed us of her. Now there's #»!/;■ and wasn't J3ubjjp,i responsible fdr .Miss Rosle Bootes matrimonial fate?"" Mr McAndrew Is a man of four and twenty—a hi?, good-looking, pleasant fellow, a bronzed athlete, and an outdoor man.