Charlotte messenger. [volume] (Charlotte, Mecklenburg Co., N.C.) 1882-18??, 1883-05-19

writer that IN case of his death l was
to act as Miss Gabrielle's guardian, and
requesting earnestly that would see
my ward at my earliest convenience,
and this letter was signed Patience
Wyndham.
Fortunately for my curiosity and
the exigencies of the case, 1 could get
away from town Just at that particular
time, and as there really seemed no
way OF decently abandoning the trust
without betraying the dead mans
confidence, l started off at once. s
"It was romantic little country place
at which found them, with noun
tains all around the half-hundred, of
houses ; the church, the store, the
tavern that formed the village, and
near q little waterfall, that was "a
waterfall. not because some fellow
with an eye for picturesque effect had
built dam across its, course, but be-
cause there was an abrupt descent in
the rock at that point, found Miss
Patience Wyndham's house. ~ I y
81 had fetched her letter with me,
and upon sending it in with my name,
l was Immediately admitted 70 the
presence of a stately dame, whose at
tire was copied from some Quaker
ancestress, and whose very counte-
nance and manner bespoke her name
Patience. She asked me great many
questions about Halstead Scot, which
l could but answer with the meager,
unpleasant truths that formed my
stock of knowledge respecting the
man, and then it came her turn to
talk. She told me that years ago,
when she was but eighteen, her
mother died, leaving her at the head
of her fathers household Inone year
after her father married again, and
fifteen months later both he and the
new wife had gone the way of all flesh,
leaving Patience, at twenty, alone in
the world, with an infant sister three
months old to care for, and an income
that only, with the strictest economy,
could be made adequate to their needs.
"Well. for twenty years this woman,
putting her youth and everything that
is natural to it under her feet, was
mother, sister, everything to Gabrielle,
who grew from babyhood into lovely
girl, doing only her duty with uncon-
scious heroism, and giving me the
record as if it were something scarcely
worth the telling. only that it was
necessary to explain.
GAS said before, the child grew up
to be a lovely girl, fair and graceful,
pure and good, and the faithful sister
found all recompense now for what at
first must have been all sacrifice, in
this only thing of kindred blood left
her.
"At length there came young law
yer one summertime to fish and hunt
in that quiet country place, and before
Miss Patience quite came to realize the
danger the heart of her sister-child
was won from her, and the couple
were married.
ITO make a long story short,
this young lawyer was Halstead
Scot. Six months he spent hap
ply with his young wife, then he
went away, and, although he wrote
her occasionally, he forbade her always
to ioin him, and so the fair, frail crea-
ture faded day by day, until the hour
when her baby came struggling into
life. and then shut her weary eyes fol
ever on world wherein she had grown
SO sadly wherein she had learned
the bitterness of untitled graves, and
death that renders not unto dust-ano
Patience Wyndham was once more
left TO fill the mothers office to a worse
than orphaned child.
Fifteen years passed. and, stirred
| by feeling of remorse, by remem
brance of his old romance or what not
scot came once more to the little village
under the mountains. He refused tC
see his daughter. and told Miss Wynd.
ham enough of his own career to satisfy
her that it was wisest so, but the
week following his visit, pure white
monument, N form of broken column,
was erected over his wife's grave. and
every six months during the remainder
of his life there came regularly a
certain sum of money to Miss Wynd'
ham for the support Of the young
Gabrielle.
"This was the whole of the story
az that sweet old saint told it to me
and naturally 1 grew extremely anxious
To see the child of romance. over whom
TX was so singularly appointed
guardian.
"sThe child does not know hel
fathers history said Miss Patience
and / could wish she might remain al
ways in happy ignorance of it,, and
then the child came IN.