“The old man had not been seen since Sunday. “His landlady had left him in the morning, looking over the ‘parts,’ and when she returned in the evening, he was gone. A letter, addressed to her, had been found in his room, and this she had given the boy to take back with him. “The stage manager took it and hurriedly opened it. At the first glance, he started and uttered an exclamation of horror; and when he had finished it, it dropped from his hand, and he sank down in the nearest chair, dazed and bewildered, like a man who has heard, but cannot yet grasp, some terrible news. “A cold, sickly feeling came over me. The strange, far-away look, and the quiet, sad smile that I had last seen on the old man’s face came back to me with startling vividness, and with a new and awful meaning. He was old and enfeebled. He had not the elastic vigor of youth that can bear up under worry and work. His mind, to all seeming, had never at any time been very powerful. Had the sudden and heavy call upon his energies actually unhinged it? and had the poor old fellow in some mad moment taken up arms against his sea of troubles, and by opposing ended them? Was he now lying in some shady copse, with a gaping wound from ear to ear, or sleeping his last sleep with the deep waters for a coverlet? Was what lay before me a message from the grave? These thoughts flashed like lightning through my brain as I darted forward and picked the letter up. It ran as follows: “Dear Mrs. Hopsam,--I’m off to London by the 3.30, and shan’t come back. I’ll write and let you know where to send my things. I left a pair of boots at Jupp’s to have the toe-caps sewn--please get ‘em; and there was a night-shirt short last week--it’s got a D on it. If they send from the theater, tell them to go to the devil; and if they want sixteen parts studied in a week, they’d better get a cast-iron actor. Yours truly, D------. “This was a great relief to me, but it didn’t seem to have soothed the stage manager much. When he recovered from his amazement, he said what he thought of the old man, which I will not repeat. There was a deuce of a row, I can tell you. Our Leading Man, who had consoled himself for being temporarily ousted from his proper position by the thought of having nothing to do all the time, and being able to go in front each night and sneer at the ‘star,’ had to take the First Old Man’s place, and a pretty temper he’s in about it. It’s as much as one’s life’s worth now, even, to sneak a bit of his color. Another old man joins us after next week, but of course that is just too late for the hard work. ------ will be gone then...” CHAPTER XVI. Views on Acting [Illustration: 9153] QUOTE from two more letters, and then I have done with this stock company. The first was written just after our star had set--or rather gone to the next town--the second about a fortnight later: