The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1895-03-04
HER REVENGE


talked.
"A strange woman" you will say, and
SO she was. We led strange life, too, in
little cottage outside of Paris. She
earned her living by broidery-thst
wonderful embroidery on undergsrments
for which rich women pay so much. q
My earliest recollections are of slen-
der, pale girl. with great dark eyes and
mass of dusky brown hair, which turned
red in the sunlight The white, slim
hands were always plying a needle, and
now and then the great eyes uplifted to
regard me with look never understood.
I called this girl who watched over me
Louise. - Until was quite old did not
understand that she was my mother. No
one save the priest ever came to see us
and all our work was done by Louise I'M
til grew old enough to help her.
was of blithe spirit and 1 sang as
went about the little garden hanging out
the clothes. Coming in, would always
find my mother weeping.
why do you cry sof'' would say, put
ting my arms about her, and abe would
hold me to her, sobbing.
The devil will surely have thee" she
answered, eff you love SO to sing and
make merry. The devil always loves mer-
ry company. I was merry once"
One morning, when was n my fifteenth
year, = 0WOA0 c1iQ 4OuA0 AlJ 44Ob0oI
cheeks flushed for the first time in my
memory. She was i'll with fever. Her
breath burnt my hand like fire. She did
not recover. When she lay dying, she IN
clasped from her neck chain upon which
hung key and a locket.
''Open the little chest You will find
letters. Read them and take them and
this locket to old Nine. Roman" she
whispered. Tell her you are Adelaide
0T1fS. hot have hco 4 oid 10
Roman. but for herr
listened to her words as in dream.
was too full of grief to comprehend them
clearly until the frail, fair young body
was laid away.
When she had been buried three days,
opened the locket whose chain she had
placed about my neck. The picture there
in is that of a smooth faced boy, coun-
tenance as much like mine as mans can
be like a woman's. 1t is face very ex-
pressiye rather than handsome. The lips
are full and laughing, the eyes are blue as
a Breton fisher maiden's, and the hair
waving back from a low, broad, white
brow is black.
''This is my fatherl'' I say to myself
under my breath. Then remember my
mothers dying words, go to Nine. Ro-
man with the locket and letters.
Can it be the Nine. Roman whose villa
lies only three miles away; the rich,
wrinkled, parsimoniOus old Nine. Roman
whom we had passed on our way to Paris
as she walked in her garden with her dull,
cold old eyes bent upon the ground, as if
in search of lost penniesS
There was one being for whom she pre-
tended to care-the son of her dead
daughter, now some 20 years old. 1t was
said she had reared the boy to follow out
her own beautiful example.
Ny father, Victor Roman, was the son
Of Nine. Roman; my mother, a peasant
girl upon their estates. They loved each
other. My father pleaded with his mother
for marriage. The reply was letter Of
contemptuous scorn. I was born when my
father was in Paris, and the announce
ment of my birth brings letter of pas
sionate reproach and tenderness. He is
coming to marry my mother Immediately.
|. In this letter is a newspaper paragraph
telling of the death of Victor Louis Ro-
man from fever. That is the whole pitiful
story.
go with it all to the gates of the villa
of Nine. Roman on a bright June morn
ing gay with sunshine and redolent with
flowers. An old woman, hobbling and
leaning on her stick, enters The stick
falls from her hands as her piercing black
eyes meet my own. The face, which was
yellow and hard as the gold she loves,
turns suddenly pale.
'Who are your she cries in half fright
ened peevishness.
IT am the child of this man. reply,
holding the opened locket before her eyes
and thrusting the letters into her hands.
She sinks into a chair and opens letter
after letter in nervous, passionate haste.
The face grows scarlet with rage, and she
heaps terrible curses upon me.
Co. she cries. giving me a blow across
my arm with her stick-a blow whose
scar carry at this moment
I need no second invitation to leave her
gates an outcast and beggar.
Two years later find myself in Paris,
the favorite singer and dancer in comic
opera. I have lover, a young fellow,
mean and avaricious to everybody save
me. He showers his wealth upon me. His
foolish old grandmother has placed all her
property in his hands.
I marry him, hating his Misunderstanding
the hand that guided and influenced it.
In year l have made Victor Roman
Soule bankrupt. Nine. Roman had no
place to lay her head until provided her,
by my large earnings, with pleasant cot
tage and comfortable annuity. l give
her grandson a goodly sum yearly to live
anywhere save in Paris.
AS for myself, I am happy enough.
am free, am successful, am adored.
What more could Parisienne ask Of
fortune?-Atlanta Constitution.