At the little transpontine theatre the effect
of this pecuniary-dramatic arrangement was
tremendous. The first tragic lady, who had
to become the second tragic lady at once,
enacted a little extemporaneous tragedy upon
her own account by going into hysterics. The
second and third tragic ladies were each
proportionally indignant at being unceremoniously
thrust down a peg a-piece in the
dramatic scale. The sentiments of the whole
corps of female artistes can be only paralleled
by those of the military, when the
highest step is not allowed, for some
unexplained reason, to go in the regiment. The
male actors protested in soothing tones that
they would scorn to act with the interloper;
or, if they were obliged to do so, that they
would act exceedingly ill.

Accordingly—for to this universal jealousy
of his sister's position, poor Cecil always
ascribed the catastrophe—when the nameless
tragédienne made Her First Appearance at
the transpontine theatre, no failure had ever
been so complete, on either side of the Thames.
There was pretty general applause when she
made her first majestic appearance; but, from
the moment when she began to speak, until
she closed her eyes in mimic death, the Noes
had it.

The second night was not so completely
unfortunate as the first; only because there
were not so many people in the house to
express disapprobation. On the third night
the deposed first tragic lady of the theatre
resumed her sway.

It would be painful to narrate in detail,
how, at this and that inferior theatre, Nina
Hotham attempted again and again to assert
her fancied pre-eminence, and always in vain;
how hundreds of pounds were spent on
this costly whim of hers, although her brother
never had the heart to tell her the truth;
and how he himself never lost his loving
faith in her; but believed that the world
would welcome her, one day, yet. Peevish
and fretful at the slightest cross, as she had
ever been, she now began to pine under this
great reverse. Her vanity, so far from being
crushed by these repeated disappointments,
grew ranker and wilder than ever; stretching
out its too luxuriant tendrils on all sides, and
finding nothing to support them, anywhere.
It really seemed as if the glare of the foot-
lights and the breath of popular applause
were as light and air to her, and that, both
being denied her, she must perish.

Cecil Hotham, knowing so much better
than she did, in what light estimation her
talents had been held, was yet so blinded
with admiration for her as to determine to
risk his all in one more grand attempt to
get her a public hearing. One of the two
great London theatres being advertised to be
let, for a certain time, this good young man—
sensible enough in ordinary circumstances
wherein his sister was not concerned, but
about as fitted for the part of manager of
such an establishment as the Vicar of
Wakefield—resolved to undertake the management
of it. Matters were the more difficult and
unfavourable for him, insomuch as all things
were made subservient to the interests of
Nina. The stars who chanced just then to
be not fixed, were excluded from his company
lest they should dim his sister's brightness;
but the minor constellations exacted
from him the pay of their superiors. They
were not going to do second business (how
indignantly poor Nina echoed that word!)
to a person without an established name,
unless they were well compensated for that
humiliation.

In spite of the two theatrical agents in his
employment, or, perhaps, because of them,
the young manager paid double the usual
head-money for every recruit in his enormous
corps dramatique.

However, the plan of the campaign was in
the end arranged, and the object of all his
preparations at last placed in a position to
wear the crown of triumph she had so long
desired.

Nina Hotham's name in letters of all the
colours in the rainbow, and bigger than the
poor girl herself, wearied the metropolitan
eye wheresoever it fell. The newspapers
proclaimed to the whole country, including
the little world round Brentfell, how the
ambitious débutante had chosen one of the
first characters in the range of British
drama in which to make her appearance
upon the first stage in Europe, on that day
fortnight. Nina Hotham had selected no
less a part for herself than that of Lady
Macbeth.

The hour to which brother and sister had
looked forward with a secret suspense that
was almost agony, at length arrived. The vast
theatre was densely crowded from floor to
ceiling. Puffing had done its work. Vague
rumours also of failure at other places, and
under a feigned name, had got about, and
excited curiosity to the utmost. A great
number of her private friends, too, were
there; besides at least five hundred hands,
which, if they did not applaud, ought to be
ashamed of themselves, since they had been
admitted by orders, and upon that very
condition.

In the third tier, far back in the darkness
of a private box, sat the Reverend Applepy
Swete, now rector of Brentfell; who, for all
his hasty words and rigid resolves, had an
interest in the fate of the heroine of the
night only second to that felt by one other.
The ocean of murmurous talk in that vast
concourse ebbed and flowed about him, bringing
her beloved name upon its almost every
wave. He had behaved violently to her, he
now thought, and too rigidly. Perhaps her
haughty spirit had been even driven into its
present course by his harsh words. He it was,
not she, who was to blame. He had need to
offer her reparation as well as forgiveness.