"Because I don’t know what to say, mother—because I would rather die than go to the theatre again—and he says I must. I cannot go—I cannot go—and there is no one to help me!" The old woman turned her eyes—and they looked large in the shrivelled and weakly face—on her companion. "Annie, you won’t tell me what is the matter. Why should you hate the stage? Hasn’t it been kind to you? Wasn’t it kind to your mother—for many a long year, when she and you depended on it for your lives? The stage is a kind home for many a poor creature whom the world has cast out—and you, Miss Annie, who have been in a theatre all your life, what has taken you now? The newspapers?" The girl only shook her head. "Because the business isn’t good?" No answer. "Has Mr. Melton been saying anything——?" "I tell you, mother," said the girl, passionately, "that I will not go upon the stage, because I hate it! And I hate the people—I hate them for staring at me, and making me ashamed of myself. I hate them because they are rich, and happy, and full of their own concerns—indeed, mother, I can’t tell you—I only know that I will never go on the stage again, let them do what they like. Oh, to feel their eyes on me, and to know that I am only there for their amusement, and to know that I cannot compel them to—to anything but sit and compassionately admire my dress, and my efforts to please them. I can’t bear it, Lady Jane—I can’t bear it." And here she broke out into a fit of hysterical sobbing. "My poor dear, when I should be strong and ready to comfort you, here I am weaker and more helpless than yourself. But don’t go back to the theatre, sweetheart, until your taste for it returns——" "It will never return. I hate the thought of it." "But it may. And in the meantime haven’t we over 40*l.* in the house of good savings?" "That is nothing to what I must undertake to give Mr. Melton if I break my engagement. But I don’t mind that much, Lady Jane—I don’t mind anything except going back there, and you must never ask me to go back. Say that you won’t! We shall get along somehow——" "My darling, how can you imagine I would seek to send you back?" Annie Brunel did not sleep much that night; but by the morning she had recovered all her wonted courage and self-composure. Indeed, it was with a new and singular sense of freedom and cheerfulness that she rose to find the world before her, her own path through it as yet uncertain and full of risks. But she was now mistress of herself; she went to bid Mrs. Christmas good morning with a blithe air, and then, as every Englishwoman does under such circumstances, she sent for the _Times_.