LEAVES OF DESTINY

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12395, 15 March 1926, Page 4

LEAVES OF DESTINY

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.

By

DOROTHEA CORBOULD.

Author of “A Fatal Friendship-," "His Fair Enemy*" "Held in Bondage," Etc.* Etc.

COPYRIGHT

SYNOPSIS 03 PREVIOUS CHAPTER. CHAPTER I. —Barbara Denning gazes at her last shilling. A well-bred, wellnurtured girl, she has lost both her parents, and is now on the brink of starvation. Her sympathies are divided between her'own necessities and the sufferings of a little boy in the some lodginghouse whoso mother is a drunkard. She goes out singing in the streets that night, and with the money earned she gets a supper for both the child and herself. The next evening two men speak to her, praising her voice, and she decides to sing in the afternoon for tho future. One afternoon she is again addressed by one of the men who spoke to her on a previous night. He gives her his card, advising her to go to a Mr Simpkins, the manager of the Diadem Theatre. Barbara Denning visits the theatre and is interviewed by Mr Simp-

CHAPTER Denning's interview with Mr Simpkins is almost terminated at tho commencement, but he calls' her back. She sings and he is satisfied. He decides she will do for the' Birds’ Chorus, and introduces her to a Mr Beat, the musical director. He thinks she could understudy the Nightingale, Miss MacArtliur’s speciality, as that lady is often absent through illness. The salary is .£3 per week, and .£5 when she takes the Nightingale. ' The following morning Barbara attends a rehearsal. Returning to her lodgings, she finds some excited women chattering. Mrs Brown, the drunken mother of the little boy, Reggie, in whom she is so interested, has been run over and taken to the hospital. A hospital nurse has called to see about the child, as the patient was so anxious about him. Mrs Bloggs, the landlady, has five of her own, and cannot undertake Reggie. Barbara promises to be responsible for the child, goes to him, and takes him to her own quarters. Two days later Barbara is told by Mrs Bloggs that someone has called from the hospital. Reggie's mother has not long to live. She has asked to see Miss Denning. She wants to talk about the child.

CHAPTER lll.—Barbara Denning goes to the hospital and is taken to the bedside of Mrs Brown. The screen has already been drawn round her. She tells Miss Denning that her husband belonys to the upper classes, while she is a blacksmith's daughter; that he has never dared to toll them of his marriage. They would not have recognised hor if he had done so. She places a packet in Barbara's hands, and hide her to give it to Don, her husband, who is a soldier, should he return. Barbara asks her husband’s name, and while trying to tell her married name the woman dies. Tho nurse'appears, hut can give no more - information concerning Mrs Brown's real identity.

Arrived at home, Barbara examines the packet, but discovers nothing helpful. At the-theatre she notes that Miss MacArthur has taken a deep dislike to her, through jealousy. Shortly afterwards Miss MacArthur is ill, and Barbara takes her place, and her singing brings tho house’down. The following day there is a very favourable cuticism on her performance. This notico by the Press of Miss Denning's capabilities throws Miss MacArthur into a transport of rage, aud she plans to discover something unfavourable about her, and to get her out of, the. theatre. Cunning ly she sets to work by inviting Barbara to join herself and Misß James at Romano'S Restaurant for luncheon.

CHAPTER IV. It was a new experience for Barbara Denning to find herself seated at a flower-decked table in a fashionable restaurant, and she felt decidedly out of place, and also out of touch with her companions. She had accepted Miss AlaJcArthur’s invitation against her. better judgment being unwilling to thrust aside the overtures of friendship by the girl who had hitherto ignored her very existence, but she caught herself wishing she had not came. Miss MacArthur. was far too smartly dressed, slio decided, and evidently delighted at the notice bestowed upon her .by their neighbours, chiefly of the opposite sex,* while Laura James, deigning no notice of her surroundings, gave her whole attention to the menu, to all of which items she did ample justice, as though determined to make the most of this chance of a good meal. The conversation turned on topics of the day, chiefly theatrical, and in which Barbara felt herself woefully ignorant, but all at once Miss MacArthur began to question her about herself and her family—eliciting, however, little beyond the fact that Barbara was the daughter of a clergyman in the west of England, that she had been educated abroad, and spoke one or two Languages. Finally Lil said. "You know Teddy Mardaunt very well, don’t you?" "Not very well certainly," was the reply. "I have only spoken to him a few times." "Indeed? But I thought someone said he had introduced you to Simpkins." “That is true. Captain Mardaunt happened to hear me sing once, and he was kind enough to interest himself in getting me an engagement. Barbara was beginning to feel annoyed at tho sort of cross-examina-tion she had' undergone for tho last quarter of an hour, and determined ta reveal nothing of either her past or present circumstances with the two curious pairs of eyes upon her. "And if it isn’t an impertinent question, where did he hear you sing?" asked Lil. "In Crofton square," Barbara replied quietly. "Oh! da you know people there! It’s an awfully swell locality"’ Lil looked impressed. "Are ydu by chance a princess, or duchess in disguise?" Laura James hurst out laughing Barbara laughed, too, as though regarding the remark herself as a joke, and then happily for her longing to ho able to turn the conversation from herself, Lil caught sight of two men who were just then entering the restaurant, and recognition being mutual in the case of one of them, they came straight to tho table at which tho girls were sitting.

“You’re just in tii»s iy zi* us dej part,’’ was Miss MacArthur’s greet-* ing to the younger of the two, with whom she and Laura James shook hands. "Let me introduce Mr Blair, Miss Denning, he is the sub-editor of the ‘Morning Herald,’ and I shouldn't wonder," with a shrill little laugh, "if ho is responsible for that puff about you when you under-studied my part as the Nightingale." “No, I did not have that. pleasure,"* was the reply with a how to Barbara. "I wish I had. Ladies, allow me to present my friend. Sir Lindsay Charter’s —Miss MacArthur, Miss Jame->, Miss Denning." Sir Lindsay bowed. He had 1 een staring at Barbara with a puzzled expression, while she on her part had instantly recognised him as Captain Morduant’s companion on the day she

sang in Crofton Square, and had taken his half-crown. She must rot

run the risk of his recalling the incident, and pleading an engagement, took her departure, -caving the other two girls to bandy repartees with the newcomers, making themselves conspicuous by their loud voices and st'li louder laughter. "That was. Miss Denning, my understudy," Lil told Sir Lindsay. She was in the seventh heaven of delight at meeting this man with a handle to his name, and so handsome and distinguished. Sir Lindsay was about vhirty-fivc, but looked older. His greeny-grey eyes, beneath their overhanging brows had a restless, mistrustful gleam, and his moustache scarcely hid a rhin-Kppcd sneering mouth, but ho possessed an attractive personality, especially for women, and rould make himself very agreeable if it. suited his purpose—it did so row. “Indeed?" he replied to Lil’s announcement. "I have heard of her, but have not yet been able to see the new revue at the Diadem. Her face is familiar to me somehow. I am sine I have met her before.’*

"Teddy Mordaunt got her into the Diadem Theatre," went on Miss MncArthur. "She said he heard her nng in Crofton Square."

“Yes, of course. I remember, she was singing”— But here Sir Lindsay became an me cf the threo pairs of eagerly curious eyes fixed upon him, and decided not to give Miss Denning away—yet. "She told us she was ringing in Crofton Square, at some "At Home," perhaps as a professional.” "Yes, that was *t, of course. Mordaunt. was advising her to try the stage, I remember, but she 'didn’t seem to catch at the idea then. She has a wonderful voice, I must go to- j night, I think, and hear her." "Oh, you won’t hear her as tho I nightingale, that is my part/* Lill said with a coquettish smile, though her eyes gleamed .angrily. "And lam back again at the theatre now. Miss Denning is only in the chorus' " "Then I shall give myself the pleas- i nre of going to hear you," was the reply, and Miss MacArthur told herself that here was the chance of making a. conquest, and for once she scored over her hated rival. For not again if she erndd help it would she over run the risk of letting Barbara# Denning win further laurel's in lied stead on the stage of th© r DiadcJ ! Theatre.

Meanwhile Lindsav’s thoughts wero all with tho latter,” as he won-) rtered to himself how it came about! that Teddy ‘Mordaunt had induced the! girl, who had repulsed him so haughtily, to ehange her mind, and allow him to help hor to her engagement. “Sho is the most beautiful creature 1 have seen for a long time," he said to liimself. "A- lady and evidently ‘stand aloof.’ I must get Teddy to tell me all about her and help me to make her rurther acquaintance." To Barbara herself, the meeting with, .the man who had last seen her under such different circumstances, was a disagreeable experience. She had been a fool, sTio told herself to have accepted the invitation to lunch with those two girls, with whom she had nothing in common, whoso talk and manners disgusted her, and who Rad evidently only asked her in order to try and find out all about her past, ami her present mode of existence. Would that man. Sir Lindsay Charters, tell them and Mr Blair—who might make copy of it —how and when he had last seen her, singing in the streets, and that he had given her money and advice? Barbara shivered at the recollection of his words, ami manner Well, for the future she would avoid Lil MacArthur and Miss Janies, Mr Simpkins’s typist and secretary, wlro never accorded her any hut the most unfriendly star© whenever they met in the manager’s room, and nip in the bud all further advances on their part towards a better acquaintance. But she need) not have feared any such results from their meeting to-day. Both Lil and Laura James had been: greatly disappointed in their endeavour to find out something about Mifcs Denning to use against her, .and her society had been quite as uncongenial to them as, theirs was to her. Barbara found Reggie on her return Tfome, playing happily in Mrs Bloggs’o kitchen, where ho had had his dinner, and where the latter could look after Turn when busy in her own part of the building. ’e’s bin a good hoy," Mr? Bloggs replied in answer to Barbas .-vs inquiry, then lowering her voice, sho added: “I’ve let poor Airs Brown's room to-day—a very nice sort o’ feller, said ’is name was ’Enry Smith, an’ ’c worked at a oaintin’ job. Didn’t make no hones abnht rent, an’ paid in advance." “Oh, well, I’m glad you’ve let it at, last," Barbara said, kindly, “and I hope Re will turn out a satisfactorylodger. Come, Reggie, wo must notget in Airs Bloggs’s way any longer." (To be continued.)