Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1885-10-09
AUNT BETSY'S PRESENT.

horribly mean of your Aunt Betsy,
Estella. After making such fav-
orite of you all your life, and hav
ing you with her ever since you
we're a mere baby, she might have
sent you something worth having
on your twenty.frst birthday, es-
pecially as she knows how poor we
are since your fathers DEATH said
my mother, sharply.
you had better take it as a hint
for the future, and not build any
more castles on what Aunt Betsy is
likely to do for YOU remarked my
sister Lena.
Walter, my brother, added with
a provoking grimace:
Here endeth my sister Stella's
great expectations
you need not make such un-
pleasant remarks | answered, pet.
tishly. Tn sending me the portrait
of her old swea theart, poor auntie
has given me her greatest treasure,
and she, no doubt, thinks | shall
value it as much as she does
'Well, it may come in useful, al
ter all, for if, as expect, you never
get a sweetheart, you can imagine
he was yours, when you are sour
old maid like Aunt Betsy said Le-
ma, who prided herself not q little
on being engaged at eighteen, while
! |, at twenty one, had never had an
offer, not even the ghost of low
er.
| had lived with Aunt Betsy
down in her quiet country home in
the south OF Cornwall until my
fathers death two years before,
when coming up to London for his
funeral, l found my mother left in
such Strengthened circumstances
that I felt it my duty to stay and
earn what money could to help
her; thereby, however, l incurred
Aunt Betsy's anger.
Surely she wrote, your brother
and sister can help your mother;
you have no need to leave me lonely
in my old age, after have had all
the trouble of you as child etc.
l would willingly have returned,
for close London lodging was not
at all to my taste after my aunts
large, airy country house, but my
mother seemed to lean on me, and
so dreaded my leaving her, that |
had not the heart to go.
Aunt Betsy neither came nor
wrote, and l had quite resigned
myself to the idea that l was hope
lessly on her black books when the
above related event took place.
Now l knew that l was fOrgiv.
en-.
In her early youth, Aunt Betsy,
then the beautiful Elizabeth Mars
ton, my fathers only sister, had
been engaged to the son and heir
of a wealthy London banker.
He had been sent abroad, on bus
mess for his father, j9stbefore they
were to have been married, and
through the jealous treachery
of another man who madly loved
her, and wished to supplant his ri.
val, the engagement had been sud
denly broken of by him
He then remained abroad, and
Aunt Betsy never heard from him
again. Just before he left England
he had presented her with beau
tiful little miniature of himself set
in gold and diamonds, and this she
had kept, together with her maid
en- name no other lover ever in
duced her to change it.
As a glrl,I had often seen and
reverently admired the pretty
souvenir, and l had taken all a
girls keen interest in the loye-stOry
attached to it. Aunt had always
told me it was to be mine, and now
| felt certain, with this treasure in
my possession, that had not quite
lost my old place in her favor,
though l heard in the same letter
| in which she solemnly commended
the portrait to my care, that she
had adopted an orphan girl in my
place as her companion and prob
able heiress.
| put the letter and portrait away
with a sigh of regret for my old
happy home, with its quiet and
| freedom from the daily toll and
worry that were now my portion.
Things went on from bad to worse
with us, and my twenty'second
birthday found me in despair.
Waite. in despair, had gone to
New Zealand; Lena had married on
| a very slender income, and gone to
live in the North. | could not
bend TO ask help from Aunt Betsy,
aud my mother was ill, and my
work so scarce that | could barely
| find us in the necessaries of life.
| At last, l too, became i'll, and we
had not a penny in the house every
thing we had, even poor mama's en-
gagement ring had gone for food.
Stella, you must go and get some
money. Mrs. Burton says she will
have the rent by tomorrow, or we
shall have to turn out into the
street. There is-would you mind