"HIS DIFFICULT DAUGHTER"

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 76, 30 March 1928, Page 14

"HIS DIFFICULT DAUGHTER"

By WINIFRED CARTER

SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS. CARMEN BUCKTON is the beautiful, impetuous daughter of SIR JAMES BUCKTON, K.C., the great criminal lawyer. His wife had run away from him and joined a brother in Italy, where Carmen was born and where she spent the first eighteen years of her life. On her mother's death Carmen is brought to her father's home by MICHAEL ROCHESTER, who is a relative of Sir James, as well as his secretary. Before leaving Italy Michael has to rescue his charge from the attentions of PAUL VARLEY, a dissolute artist. In London, Carmen finds life grey and restrained, and one night her father is astounded at finding her giving an exhibition dance at a cabaret.

CHAPTER VI.. At the theatre Carmen was intrigued with everything she saw. In tones that would easily have reached to other theatre-goers had she been sitting anywhere but in a box, she gave her opinion of the play.

During the acts friends came to exchange greetings with Sir James. Some came because they were interested in the arresting little creature who sat beside him. The news that the famous K.C. had got. a daughter hidden up his sleeve had already gone round like wildfire.

Mrs. Westgate and Ora, having returned directly after Carmen had left St. Divos, were also at the theatre, and they came up. Mrs. Westgate talked in an undertone to Sir James. Carmen took little interest in them, was, indeed, almost rude. Afterwards Betty reproached her.

"Mrs Westgate is going to take you under her wing fo» the season. You should not have shut her up as you did when she was asking you how vou liked England."

"I simply told her that I did not like England," 6aid Carmen uncompromisingly. "And that is, the truth. Neither do I like Mrs. Westgate. Ora Westgate is mean and sly, but as she is not clever, she doesn't count; Her mother is different; she is clever and treacherous. I would not trust her with anything I valued for all the world."

Betty was silent. Once or twice she had felt that Mrs. Westgate did not ring true. Carmen's words made her realise that Carmen had the knack of sizing people up.

Down in the foyer, when it was over, she seemed to be the centre of attraction. To Michael's delight she was quite tractable and made none of her outspoken, candid remarks. She stood there a beautiful, almost insolent figure with the vivid shawl round hei, and her disdainful eyes veiled. Michael was, however, uncomfortably conscious of a feeling that she was laughing at them all. Then as he was closing the door of the car she said something that inaJe him understand.

"T have been good this evening because I was bad to you to-day," she explained. "Now I have paid!"

As Michael turned away Mrs. Westgate caught hold of him.

"Come and have supper with us," she said. "Betty's coming. We're going to the Regal."

Michael accepted. Pretending to be anxious to discuss Carmen, Ora buttonholed him. "You never bt m« know ymi had found her," she said reproachfully. "I was so anxious! I went to Venetia Villa to inquire and discovered you had gone. If we had known, we could have travelled back together. We came iiy the next boat."

Michael could hardly tell her outright that he had clean forgotten hei existence the moment he had left her.

"How kind of you to bother," he said. "Carmen has been a perfect angel tonight," said Be^ty.

"If I were Uncle James I'd jolly well be on my guard when Carmen is particularly docile," said Michael ruefully.

"A most dangerous young women, if you ask me!" said Mrs. Westgate solemnly.

Michael was up in arms instantly. Betty too. And in the very fact of both fighting for the same cause, Betty forgot that look that Carmen had given Mihcael. and was just bappy.

But Ora Westgate bided her time. Perhaps Carmen was wrong when she dismissed her as one who was not clever, and who didn't count —or was it that Carmen didn't realise what a very desirable young man Michael Rochester was?

Tocrc was one accomplishment of Carmen's that she did not talk about, and that was the capacity to dance. They were to know about it soon enough, however.

Carmen had apparently settled down to carrying out Mrs. Westgate's instructions. A long list of classes were arranged in elocution, singing and dancing, and other subjects.

Carmen yawned throughout the whole of the first French lesson, and was distressingly uninterested. The tutor assured Mrs. Westgate that the subject was beyond her. At elocution Carmen shrugged her shoulders, and refused to open her mouth. Singing was of no earthly use to her, it was discovered, for the husky, crooningly attractive voice had no tune when she sang.

"You ought to be very good at dancing," said Ora contemptuously, "because you're not much good at anything else." Carmen glared at Ora, but she said nothing. It a/nazed Betty how Carmen kept herself in, only the occasional flash of her eyes showing how near she was to an explosion. Ora, in her secret heart, hated Carmen, for when she was out with Carmen there were no eyes for anyone else.

When lunching at the Criterion before going to her first dancing lesson, one waiter spoke in Italian to a second waiter. Instantly Carmen was on her feet and addressing him. She spoke to the man excitedly in the liquid language that she loved. Of course, everyone stared. The waiter tactfully got Carmen back into her chair, while Mrs. Westgate's crimson face showed her chagrin.

"Her instincts are not right, that's what is the matter with Carmen," sneered Ora.

"She heard her own tongue and foreverything else," protested Betty indignantly. "She's always gone her own way, and knows no other law. I think she's wonderful!"

Carmen heard both speeches. She had quivered with joy at the sound of the liquid Italian tongue, and she quivered now with hate for Ora and Mrs. Westgate. She knew no half-shades. And when, a little later, Mrs. Westgate invited her to go with them to Carnetti Cabaret that evening, she refused, and took a malicious delight in saying—as Mrs. Westgate* had taught her to say when having to decline an invitation: "So sorry, but Fve got another engagement."

They all knew that it was not true, of course.

During the afternoon she refused to attempt to learn the foxtrot; to Mrs. Westgate's great vexation, Carmen had sat watching the other pupils with a look of concentrated boredom on her face.

Betty's implorings had brought out, in a clear, carrying voice:

"But Betty, that woman doesn't know how to dance. She therefore cannot teach."

Betty had longed to sink through the floor, and the irate Mrs. Westgate had had to use much tact to soothe the upset dancing mistress. But anyhow. Carmen had got surcease. "But if Carmen won't learn to dance," wailed Mrs. Westgate, "she simply can't go anywhere. It's such a hopeless situation."

And she shot a glance of dislike at the unconcerned Carmen, who got up and moved slowly to tne door, giving one more scornful look at the dancing teacher. When Sir James arrived home that evening from the law courts it was with the idea of taking her out. Carmen was delighted, and when he Suggested the Carnetti she never told him that she had already refused Mrs. Westgate's invitation to make one of her party. The Westgate party at the Carnetti Cabaret had, oddly enough, turned out rather dull. Was it that they missed Carmen ? Certainly Betty, conscious that Michael was distrait, restless, wondered wistfully if Carmen was the reason. Then, looking up, she suddenly saw Carmen herself enter with her father. She touched Michael's arm imperatively, and both stared at her spellbound —nor were they the only ones.

Sir James was beginning to be exceedingly proud of his beautiful daughter. To-night it seemed as. if everyone stared at them. Sir James was a familiar, if formidable figure, while Carmen was becoming quite " familiar, photographs of her appearing in all the fashionable weeklies. She was the most blazing comet that had flashed across the sky that season. To-night she was wearing the white frock, with a barbaric chain of carved blue beads dangling round her neck, and of course the übiquitous shawl dropping half off the perfectly-modelled shoulders. She was the most striking as well as the most beautiful girl in the placc.

A little murmur went down the room in tribute to her beauty. A man, sitting half-hidden by a bank of flowers, leaned forward, unable to believe his eyes. Then he beckoned the head waiter.

"Any idea who the girl is?" he said, and his eyes narrowed hatefully as they fixed on Sir James. Then he looked again at the flawless face of the girl he had come back to England to find.

"That, sir, is Sir James Buckton's daughter," said the head waiter deferentially. The artist always tipped well.

Paul Varley's eyes flickered, a strange vengeful smile curved his lips. Sir James Buckton's daughter! Carmen, the wild, untamed beauty he had not forgotten. Truly a quarry worth the chasing! This girl who was the famous K.C.'s daughter! He could not have dreamed of such good fortune as this. Surely, here was a chance to get his own back. As he watched Carmen with her striking, turbulent beauty, his blood was set racing. The dark eyes were curiously menacing. He knew that the famous K.C. would hate the idea of Carmen being his wife. That would give an added zest to the chase.

And now he saw Mrs. Westgate leave her own party and join Carmen, and he smiled to see the disdainful way that Carmen treated her.

How tantalisingly beautiful she was! But for that interfering Michael Rochester she would have been his by now! Anyhow, he told himself that he would not rest, day or night, till he had won her.

Now the band struck up. Those who wanted to began to dance. He saw Michael Rochester dancing with that charming, boyish Betty Martingdale; shallow Ora Westgate had to put up with an insignificant youth who was with them. Varley smiled cynically as he saw Michael Rochester try to catch Carmen's eye as he whizzed Betty past her. So that fool was after Carmen, was he ? . . . He noted that Carmen did not dance. . . . And then that fox-trot ended.

Now a pair of exhibition dancers were announced. The lights above the diners went out, leaving only a tiny shaded light on each table. Over the two dancers, an inverted bowl flung down streams of topaz light. The baud broke out into a crooning, haunting Spanish air. The dancers advanced, a pair of acrobats who did amazing stunts which could not by any stretch of imagination really be called dancing. At the finish, when the clapping had died away, the band played the air again. And then, something happened. Into the centre of that orange "low stepped a girl. She stood there, head flung back, a vivid shawl swathing her. Then—she danced, danced as if inspired —as though it were an impossibility not to^ dance! Danced with the exquisite lightness of some budding Pavlova, with all the verve and abandonment of the South, and as she danced, she smiled a strange little smile that caught oddlv at the heart-strings. And the dancer that distracting, magical dancer—was none other than the daughter of that highly-reputed and highly-respected K C Sir James Buckton. ... It was Carmen!' (To be continued daily.)