American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1876-03-18
A RECOVERED TREASURE.

A RECOVERED TREASURE
"Must you go out again, dearest?"
Helen Tracy's wistful blue eyes wer'
lifted to her husbands face as he came
into the sitting-room with his overcoa
on. He was tall, stately booking man
with high forehead and clear brown
eyes, and the pleasantest of smiling
mouths; but Helen's face had some
what in its blonde, oval beauty that re-
minded you of the hunted fawn or the
wild bird stricken down by the sports
mans shot. She was fair as lily, with
hair of bright, rippled gold and large,
yiolet-dark eyes-such a one as you
might fancy Saxon Rowena to have been,
in short.
"Yes, but I shall soon be home, Nell,
so don't worry yourself about me. Har-
ry is asleep, see.'
As he spoke he glanced towards a
velvet-cushioned sofa, where a beauti-
full child of scarcely three summers lay
nesting in the flushed, lovely sleep OF
infancy, with his dark curls thrown
back from the dimpled cheeks and one
hand underneath the head.
"Yes; he has been in the garden all
the afternoon, and fell asleep almost the
minute his nurse brought him in''
DIR. Tracy stood a moment looking
down upon the child.
"How pretty he grows. All, Nelly,
we have the most precious treasure
Heaven ever gave to his children in this
boy"
Mrs. Tracy's lip quivered-the dewy
shadow crept into her eyes.
sob, Henry, if 1 only had my little
Bertha, tool"
"Still brooding on your lost one,
Helenp My dear, had hoped that time
was healing up that wound in your
heart. Is it wise, is it discreet, thus 20
forget the bounties Heaven has given
you in the one gift he has withdrawn"
eff could only be certain that she
was indeed lost, Henry" sobbed the
fair-haired woman eff I could have
planted daisies above her grave, and
counted her growing years in heaven
but can not. She may be in want-she
may be ill or suffering, and so power
less to aid her."
"There can be no doubt that she is
dead, Helen," soothed the husband.
"Were it otherwise, your brother-in-
law would long since have communi-
Gated with you.''
"IfI could only believe tiff could
only ease this aching at my heart" re-
iterated Helen. "Do not think me I'M
grateful, Henry, but indeed can not
forget my little lost Bertha.'
At this moment Harry sat up on the
sofa, loudly claiming his mothers at
tention; and DR.. Tracy went away with
the pleasant recollection that Helen was
smiling back to her boys smiles. All!
where was there ever magnetism like
the touch of child's hand to soothe
the aching heart or head?
The flaming crimson belt of the late
sunset glowed suddenly above the leaf
less October woods; the tall trees that
skirted the lonely road on either side
seemed to stand like gaunt sentinels.
DR.. Tracy buttoned his overcoat one or
two buttons higher as he drove along
The solitary highway, and felt the raw
piercing chill of the evening air; and
Ill the time he was thinking of Helen's
words.
She was a widow when he married
her, this fair Saxon beauty widow
whom the death of her handsome
foreign swindler of husband had set
free from a bondage almost worse than
slavery. francesca Petroni died; but
Paolo Petroni, his brother, lived,
lark, designing man. Bertha, their in
FAINT child, had been consigned, by
desire, to his brothers. care,
during the illness that proved fatal to
him. All the widows subsequent eff
forts to gain possession of her little one
we're futile
"My dear sistcr-in-law, said the
Italian to her one day, when her APP
peals and entreaties had been most per-
sistent, ''there is one way, and but qee
way, for you to receive back Bertha"
"And that is
"To receive me also-as your hus-
band!"
Paolo Petroni never forgot nor for
gave the recoiling movement, the look
of horror with which the English wild
ow received his unwelcome proposal.
You will compel him to give my lit
tie one to me, Henry" the poor young
mother had said, on the day that made
her for the second time wife. But
when Henry Tracy, armed with all the
force of the law, went to Milan to de-
mand possession of his little step-daugh-
ter, 10! Paolo Petroni had utterly dis
and Bertha with him.
Search, inquiry, investigation, proved
equally vain; and from that day to this
"a period of full six years-neither DR..
Tracy nor his wife had ever heard one
word of the little Italian infant whose
smile had been the first CLEAN of light
that had fallen across the troubled tide
of poor Helen Petroni's foreign life.