The Singer from the Hill

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1078, 16 September 1930, Page 5

The Singer from the Hill

COPVRIGH

Pi nf.ISHF.r) BY SPECIAL arrangement

by

ROWAN GLEN

Author of "Thm Great Anvil.” -The Stronger P-3»ion The Romantic Road.' etc.

SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS CHAPTERS 1.-lII.—-Shelia Stewart is a nurse at St. Cert's Hospital, in Edinburgh, ana Dr. Hew Kennedy is a visit - jag surgeon at St. Cerf’s. They had known each other for long, and outside hospita were very good chums. Lookerson knew how this friendship would end, and there is more than friendship on the man's side. Sheila’s great gift is her voice, but its value is only discovered by Charles Wadeburn, who is connected with the stage, being the author of musical comedies, etc. Sheila and Hew boih hail from the same quarter of Scotland —lnvergarroch. His father was doctor there; lier father is a farmer/ A tolepram comes for Sheila at St. Cerf’s immediately after she has bidden farewell to Hew Kennedy on his departure to take up new duties in London. She travels to Invergarroch.* About a fortnight later she is sitting outside the farmhouse, facing her future. She has lost her father, the farmhouse must go. After all debts are paid there will be little left for her. There is Meg Cameron, her former nurse and her father's housekeeper. What is she to do with Meg? Filled with sadness, she sings a plaintive Highland folk-song. When she lias finished a man standing near the kitchen garden comes forward. It is Charles Wadeburn. He fella her there is a fortune in her voice, *nd suggests a six months’ training in London. He intends to make a paying proposition of her, and will draw up a contract with her local lawyer before he leaves. Sheila decides to close with the offer. CHAPTERS lir. (Continued)—V.—After furies Wadeburn has departed Sheila meditates questioninglv on the step she !y . about to take. Meg Cameron comes they return to the house. * tells her of the proposed change, ! n at s^e » Meg, is to participate '? 1 •• But Meg refuses to say aught till ne morrow. Sheila, signs the contract in j l yer s Presence, says au revoir to ..deburn, an( l sits down to write to Dr. Meg accompanies Sheila to -ondon. They are soon comfortably 'laartered in Kensington. One evening >neila tells Meg she will not be home for kn? per ’ but. * s meeting Charles Wadefriends at an expensive West hotel. Sheila soon lets .Meg see that e^fnce not permitted. Dr. Hew JYenneqy calls, and he and Sheila conr,f rni , hour or so later she is the guest ii am T? r ! M Wadeburn, meeting Sir Wilat ter tin and Dorothy Beamish. The m?r ls allied to the peerage and ala millionaire, and the latter is a fifjj wepsty girl. The weeks piles and ■ ncila makes progress. CHAPTER V. She was, so Wadeburn told her in a* of his few incautious moments, e Quickest-to-learn “find" that had er come his way, and this merited compliment stirred her to even •h f u F e ® or^s - She was determined jaat before what might be called her ah. °* apprenticeship was over, be fitted to appear profesmav? y before the public and so be axing at last what she had referred sh as * <real money.” It was not that * Wished to “crow over” Kennedy, °^ e r her one-time nurse, but she • . to prove to them that she ’hat K° De wisely in taking the chance J 1 “ a( t been given on that never to vh £o l£ o tten night in Invergarroch, ~h en ” afieburn had come to her while n Was singing her sad song, litti weeks she saw but v ,. e °t the man who loved her so and again it happened

that when she was free he was busy, or that he was free when she was busy. They did meet occasionally, but ueither quite understood the other and, as Kennedy felt that the girl was growing away from hint, so did she feel that the doctor was growing away from her. He was seldom far from her thoughts, but the thoughts were of the nebulous order. Others more vital claimed her attention. Toward the end of a dull week during which, so it see.nied to her, she had done nothing but work in the very strenuous way which Charles Wadeburn demanded, without any thought that he was demanding too much, she had a telephone message from him which thrilled her.

“I want you to meet me at the Majestic at nine o’clock to the dot,” he said. “I’m going to put you Into rehearsal for a new show which has been a secret till now. . . . What’s that? Yes, a part, though a minor one. Want to see how you look behind the footlights, and how you sound in a theatre like the ‘Maj.’ It’s up to you. Catterton will be looking at you and listening to you, so for heaven’s sake do your best. What? That’s a good girl'.” So Sheila went to The Majestic to do her best, and. as it happened, her best was very good indeed. “Bill” Catterton himself said so, and, though lie was so near to being a millionaire, and so near to a peerage—it was only a matter of time —he knew more about the stage than many a theatre-owner and manager.

When the trial show was ever and Sheila had been shown the dressingroom which, for the meantime at least, she was to share with another girl, she went to where Wadeburn and Catterton were waiting for her. Now that her first excitement had passed she was conscious of a certain uneasiness, even of something very near to disappointment. There were several reasons for this, and if none of them was very important, when regarded singly, that importance did come when they were regarded in bulk. She had discovered, for instance, that the part which Wadeburn proposed should be assigned to her was not merely of a much lighter type than she had expected, but that, apparently, she was to sing only one solo, though to be sure she was to have what might have been calif# a half-chance in two duets. Again she had discovered that, in at least two scenes, she would he required to wear a costume of so scanty a type that she shivered mentally as she pictured uerself appearing in it before an audience. She would very probably shiver physically as well, she told herself, but somehow that did not seem so important then. There was nothing of the prude about Sheila, hut she had still to become accustomed to the tact that Wadeburn wished her to be seen as well as heard. Shyly, yet with something of firm-

ness, too, she mentioned these points when she had rejoined the impressario, and she was inclined to ruffle her pretty leathers when he first smiled at her and then, though quite good-humouredly, laughed. \ “Can you heat it’.'” he exclaimed. “Just imagine our modest little mouse from the Highland standing up for herself in this way and so soon. And here have J been patting myself on the back at the thought that she might want to embrace me for having given her a tophole chance when 1 might have decided to try her out in the chorus. Oh yes, 1 might, you know*, Sheila. I'll bet that since the day that you signed your contract with me you’ve never read through your copy. Have you, now?” She shook her head and knew that she was flushing. “£n t o,” she admitted and sensed that she would do no more than make herself appear ridiculous if she took exception to his chiff. “1 do feel a bit disappointed, though. I’m not an actress, Mr. i Wadeburn, and I did not think that I was expected to become one. Oh, it is not that I’d mind, if I had the talent. But if I am anything I am a singer.” “Yes,” he agreed, blandly. “ ‘The Singer from the Hills.’ One of these days you’ll be billed as that, but the day has hot come yet. As to not being an actress, why! I’m not so sure about that! I’m not so sure that we shall not have you starring in musical comedy some time, and getting away with it, not on your voice alone, but on that combined with your histrionic powers!” He turned then to Sir William Catterton, who had been looking at the girl through shrewd eyes in which, at the moment, there was an expression of blended amusement and admiration.

“Say something to her, Bill,” Wadeburn urged. “Tell her that, in tRe classic phrase, the folk who are paying the piper must be allowed to call the tune. Say anything you like, so long as you convince her that I’m acting in her interests as well as in my own.” “Charles is dead right, Miss Stewart,” Catterton announced, and nodded his well-shaped head, with an air of much wisdom. “Got to remember that, he’s starting out to make a big career for you, and that it is a case of having to crawl before you can walk. That sort of thing, if you understand me. He knows —so do I —that you have a wonderful voice, a,nd he’s got to go cautiously till he gets the verdict of the critics and the public. See the idea?” “Y—es ” Slieila admitted. “I did not mean to sound silly, but ” “§illy? Don’t worry your pretty head about that. And about that costume. Don’t worry about that either. I remembered how Paula Clarke kicked when she had to come on in ‘Summer-Time,’ looking more or less like a mermaid, but she was an artist, and she soon stopped kicking, didn’t even waggle a toe. You’re going to be gentle with our friend, Charles, are you not?” \ In the end they smoothed away all her protests, and brought the smile back to liar- eyes. Catterton, indeed, succeeded in doing more than that. He persuaded her to have supper with him, and to accept his escorjt back to her rooms. The fact was that, so soon as this, the thirty-seven-year-old baronet was assuring himself tliat in lovely, greatly-gifted Sheila Stewart, he might have found the love of his life. It is to be admitted that he had thought about several other beauties in much the same way, but this time it was different. If not geniuinely in' love with her he was certainly genuinely attracted by her, and, when Catterton felt himself attracted by a woman he prided himself on getting “off the mark quick” as he would have put it. That was what he attempted to do in Sheila’s case, and the further she drew away from him, in a figurative sense, the greater did his interest become. . . During supper, which was lavish, and at which he insisted, in the hale-fellow-well-met way which he could assume so easily, that she should drink success to the new theatrical venture in which they were both interested, he paid her compliments skilfully. She was not averse to these, perhaps because she remained to -x. large extent ingenuous; perhaps because she was ignorant of her companion’s love-making record. But when the taxi which had borne them to Kensington had been dismissed, and when Catterton, who was undoubtedly- wine-lighted, though sober, called her “my dear” in a quite different way from the way in which Charles Wadeburn said it, she began to grow a little afraid. When, standing on the pavement outside her lodgings, he put an arm about her, and strove to kiss Jier, she

struggled against him and did so instinctively. She resented the hal, embrace —but the resentment was faint. She did not intend to let the unlooked-for incident end their friendship. She remembered what Wadeburn had said about the importance of Sir William Catterton. Yet her efforts to push him from her were forceful enough, and they were seen by a man who, after a moment’s hesitation, came forward at a run.

“You damned cadi” the man exclaimed, as he caught at Sir William Catterton’s shoulders and swung him rouud.

The light of a street lamp showed the man’s face to Sheila, and sudden chagrin scared her. “Hew!” she cried. “Hew! What are you doing? Oh stop!” It seemed, though for a mere fingerflick of time, that Kennedy had not heard her. Then his broad shoulders lifted, and his hands fell from the other man’s shoulders.

“I’m sorry, Sheila,” he said jerkily. “It seems that I’ve made a mistake. I thought that this person was insulting you, and I did the obvious thing. But I’d like you to tell me—* —” “I’d like you to tell me something!” Catterton interrupted, the while he wriggled his hurt. shoulders about. “I’d like you to tell me who the devil you are, and what you mean by this infernal interference. Will you explain, Sheila?” So accustomed was he to conquests ■vyhere the other sex was concerned that he counted on her support now; so actively-biting was the chagrin which had come to her that she gave the desired support. “It’s—it’s all right. Sir William,” she said. “You were foolish to do that, but we need not be serious, surely, over what was a joke? You two men must not quarrel. It would be something worse than silly. Listen, Hew, and don’t look so fierce, for there’s nothing to he fierce about. This is Sir William Catterton. He is a friend of Mr. Wadeburn, and he was kind enough to bring me home tonight. I’ll tell you all about that some other time. This is Dr. Kennedy, Sir William. An old friend of mine from Scotland. You have got to be friends. I want it. I hope that that will mean something to you both.”

So well did she handle the situation that, though with nothing of cordiality, the men shook hands, and Catterton said;

“It’s been a queer sort of meeting. Dr. Kennedy. But I’ml glad that we have met. You had the idea that I was trying to embrace Miss Stewart here, but she’ll tell you that I was merely—merely showing her ail over again—and for the fun of the thing, I admit —the one bit in her part at ‘The Majestic’ that she’ll have to learn very thoroughly.” The innate honesty of Sheila almost made her sweep the lie away with a word, but next moment she was marvelling at the cleverness of the man whose guest she had been, and whom, despite the fact that she did not wish for his caresses, she liked. No one could have been more adroit. No one could better have placated the still scowling Hew Kennedy, and charmed the scowl from his handsome face. “That was it, Hew,” she managed. “And now it’s your turn to say something. What are you doing here at this time of night?” “Obvious, is it not?” lie asked, but all trace of curtness had gone.from his voice. “I was coming to call on you.” “But at this- hour?” “Well, I would not have rung the hell if I had not seen a light in your sitting-room. I’ve a patient only halt an hour’s walk away from here, and i had to go to him on a hurry-up call, so I thought I’d take a chance. I’d nothing important to say—just wanted to know how you were getting on.” Ho was uncomfortable, and Sheila knew it, but thought that she was more uncomfortable still. Despite that discomfort, she smiled as she said: “But, Hew, where have all your brains gone to? It’s true that I have, what I might call in a swagger way, a private suite of rooms, but Mrs. Warren —that’s my landlady—will probably have beeii in bed hours ago, and the maid, too. You were not going to do the old-fashioned thing and throw pebbles at my window, were 3 r ou? But perhaps you hadn’t thought about all that?” “I had not,” he answered. “Now that I’ve seen you, Sheila, I’ll be saying a good-night. And good-night to you, sir.”

Ho was gone on that, and for a moment or two after he had disap-

peared round a corner Sheila and Catterton remained in silence. It was Catterton who broke that silence, and he did it with well-simulated lightness.

“And so that’s Dr. Kennedy?” he remarked. “I’ve heard you speak about him. I think that Charles Wadeburn has mentioned him, too. Good sort of chap, I’d be saying, even though he has got a pair of hands that can grip right into your bones. And. by tha way, Sheila —” “Yes?”

“I am sorry that lie blundered along when he did, but I am sorry, too, that I gave him the right, to butt in. You know what I mean. I’m afraid I rather lost my head for a moment. It.’s still lost in that sense,, but I’ve taken hold of myself, much as your friend took hold of me. Are you going to be a real good sport about things? In other words, are you -going to forgive me? Are you going to say goodnight as friends?” Purposely she hesitated. She did not feel that she should let him off too easily, yet felt that it would be both undignified and unwise to refuse his plea. After all, he was not by any means the first hot-headed man who had striven unsuccessfully to embrace her. and she assumed that he would do what the others had done —would take her rebuff in good part, would try to make amends for the indiscretion, would not repeat that indiscretion.

Sincerely sho regretted the whole deplorable incident, but she did not see in what way she personally had been to blame. Despite his suppertime compliments and rather daring speeches, Catterton’s attempted lovemaking had taken her completely by surprise, and had distressed her. She was glad that he had not contrived to get the kiss which he had sought, but, as against that, she was sorry that Hew Kennedy had come along as, and when, he had done. He had gone off in a mood of chilly politeness, but she realised that behind that politeness lay a deep sense of hurt. She was in no w r ay responsible for that hurt, but the thought of it was a maker of worry. “Honestly, Sir William, I don’t know quite what to say,” she managed. “You’ve apologised, and I want to he friends with you, but there’s no sense in pretending that I do not feel annoyed, and a little cheap.” “Cheap? You? Why, what awful nonsense!” he rallied her. “Look here, Miss Stew r art, you don’t w r aut me to grovel at your feet, do you? I will, if I must, but I’d far rather stand on my own and hear you say that you are ready to overlook things. I could put up a very good case for myself, you know', but this is not - the time to attempt that. For one thing you are wanting to get indoors; for another you are understandably upset, lint I do not want to go off feeling that I’m in your black books for ever.” (To be continued tomorrow *