Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1893-08-24

the last message she should ever send
her darling, the lady wrote a long let
ter to Annie, giving her q full history
of her past, her parents death, her
brief sojourn in the orphan asylum,
her subsequent adoption and every lit
tie incident relating thereto. Then,
having told where all the papers con-
tanning the proofs Of her identity
with most touching and affecsionate
farewell. Before the ink was dry on
the paper the hand that had penned
these loving lines was cold in death.
Had Annie Dupont received this let
ter it would have changed the whole
current Of her life; but she was not des-
tined thus to learn her romantic his
tory. It CHANGED that the first person
who approached the desk where the let
ter lay was this servant, now the
housekeeper and a woman of thirty
years. She read the letter and it in
creased her animosity toward Annie.
castles I have thus represented to you,
Mrs. Maynard, the peculiar attitude OF
this person toward Annie Dupont, that
you may the more readily perceive a
motive for the line of action that she
subsequently pursued.
'sAfter lapse of several years, spent
very happily abroad, the lady's health
began to fail seriously, and she was
warned by her attending physician that
the insidious disease which had been de-
veloping for months, unsupported by
herself, might at any time prove fatal.
The dread of dying in a foreign land
and leaving Annie once more among
strangers, alone and unprotected, In
duced the lady to return at once to her
American home, beautiful little villa
on the Hudson, where for a few months
her health seemed to be materially inn
proved. Encouraged by this favorable
change, she decided to wait little
longer before making known to her
adopted daughter the secret of her true
parentage, seeming to shrink with an
instructive dread from making the dis
closure.
"Annie was now sixteen, and very
finely accomplished, having been since
the age of five years under the care of
governesses and tutors who had taken
great pride in fitting their pupil for the
social position that she was destined to
She determined that her rival, as she
still absurdly considered the girl,
should never be known as Annie Du-
pont, never inherit her aunt's wealth;
and she also determined, if possible,
to prevent her from inheriting the
smaller estate Of her adaptive mother.
In that desk, jealousy guarded for
years, were all the documents on
which Annie Dupont's fortunes de-
pended; the papers that declared her
identity as Hamilton Dupont's daughter
and Mrs. Dunkirl<'s niece; the adop-
ton papers that made her the legal
heir of her kind benefactress; the will
of that lady in which every thing of
which she died possessed was be-
queathed to her adopted daughter-all
these precious papers lay within reach,
and only one living person knew of
their existence. And that one person,
because she hated Annie Dupont and
regarded her good fortune with jeal-
ousy as implacable as it was unreasona-
ble-that one person, unawed by the
presence of death, and too ignorant to
fear the legal consequences should her
deed be discovered, took possession of
those papers, and also the letter to An
ME, and hid them'away, exulting in the
belief that she was thus avenging her
own wrong and disappointment
Tro RE coSr1x1-rn1