The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1871-05-11
NObOdy'S Daughter.


A correspondent of the Cincinnati
Chronicle assures the verify of the fol-
lowing highly romantic story, which,
while in the full flavor of the choicest
old-style fiction, has still to find its solu-
ton in modern fact:
In the dusk of an evening of last win
ter, when they were just lighting the
gas in the stores of city supposed to be
st. Louis, there entered certain fashion,
able jewellers establishment pale, slen-
der, very shabbily dressed girl, appar-
emily about Is years old, who timidly
asked clerk in charge if he would not
buy from her much tarnisled small
bracelet, which she rather stealthily ex-
hibited. Carelessly noting the soiled
general look OF the article, the clerk at
first gave sharp refusal; but, happen
ing to have his attention incidentally
attracted more closely by the antique
setting of some ornament in the brace
let, and next discovering that said orna-
ment was valuable ruby, with mono
gram inside, he sternly refused to let
either the would-be seller or her ware
leave the store until his employer should
have arrived. Consequently, when the
jeweller came in from his dinner he
found the girl, crying with terror, await
ing him in his private Office, and the
clerk holding her in custody for sus-
pected theft. Examining the bracelet
closely, he became convinced that it was
foreign both in manufacture and owner
ship; and this conviction, added to the
pleading manner and innocent look of
the terrified girl, induced him to credit
the latter's fearful protestations of hon
esty. By skillful admixture of pater-
nal kindness of tone with admonitions
to full explanation for her own good,
the golden merchant presently persuaded
the alarmed young creature into such
disclosure of her history as he had little
anticipated.
The girl described herself as the
daughter of ga great lady" in Europe,
from whom, some four years ago, she
was removed by her uncle, who placed
her on board ship at night, in care of
man never seen by her before. She
knew not why this was done. 1t came
upon her without a moments warning,
and to all her protests and questions d
command for silence was the only re-
sponse. On the ship she came to this
country, vigilantly guarded by her
strange, wholly incommunicative custo-
dian, who, after their landing in New
York, hurried her to the Western city,
delivered her there to the charge of an
obscure and poor family, evidently ad-
vised of her arrival beforehand, and
then disappeared, to be seen of her no
more.
Upon her arm when she left home was
Tho hro lot E.
to sell it was that the people having the
care OF her were too poor to provide her
with decent clothing, and had not OBJ
jected to her sale of the bracelet in the
interest of her wardrobe.
While scarcely inclined to credit this
curious and unsatisfactory story, the
jeweller felt sufficiently interested in the
girl to make inquiries about her of the
people with whom she lived. They
verifying all that she had told him,
though stubbornly refusing to add an
explanatory word thereto he took the
mysterious young exile into his own
home as nursemaid for his children,
and placed her bracelet in one of the
showcases of his store as d curiosity.
80 the affair rested until few days
age, when the bracelet produced new
scene. A priest, lately despatched by
his ghostly superiors in Europe to some
duty in America. had left his watch at
the jewellers for the usual rectification
after sea voyage, and when calling to
receive it again, noticed the bracelet in
the showcase, and asked the privilege of
inspecting it more closely. His request
being granted, and the bauble placed in
his hand, he was seized with an agitation
too powerful to be repressed, and, after
moments pause, solicited an immediate
private interview with the ieweller.
What passed during that interview can
be only vaguely inferred, for one of its
effects, it appears, was to commit the
jeweller also to the secresy heretofore
involving all others concerned with the
bracelet. At the close of the interview
the priest accompanied the merchant to
his private residence from whence, after
an hours pause, priest and girl came
forth together, to enter a private car
riage, and drive--it is not known whittier.
So ends all of the story that can be
known at present; the general readers
ingenuity and powers of imagination
being conveniently left at liberty to de-
wise the solution most agreeable to his,
or her, sense of the logic of romance
and poetic justice, and the most obvious
induction from the facts revealed.