Los Angeles herald., 1909-09-11
GIRL DISCLAIMS
ALLEGED MOTHER
SAYS WOMAN TOOK HER FROM
HER HOME IN SYRIA
CHILD DECLARES REAL PARENT
is ALIVE
Little One Talks FluentIy, and Police
of Paris, Where Dispute Is
Heard, Are in Guam.
dairy

PARIS, Sept. 10.--A strange lost child
is perplexing the Paris police. An
American mother is claiming the girl
as her daughter, but the latter dis
claims her mother.
The girl is years old, but talks with
astonishing volubility. She happened
to call on a policeman voluntarily one
/ day, but as she could not speak any
apparently known language, he took
| her to the police station, where all the
experts and interpreters at first failed
to understand what the girl wanted.
Finally it turned out that she spoke
some sort of Armenian dialect, and an
interpreter was found.
The child said she had been taken
away from her grandmother home in
Syria by a strange woman, who wanted
to take her to America, and who, in
fact, brought her as far as Paris. The
little girl said she had taken the first
opportunity to run away from the
woman.
The police were astonished at the flu
ency with which the girl talked, and
were about to send her temporarily to
a home when the strange woman of
whom she had spoken appeared and
said the child was her daughter.
"I am not your daughter" retorted
the little one. 'I know my mother.
She Is very different from this person.
The police were seriously embar-
rassed. They put off the inquiry for
the day to obtain a second interpreter
for the mother, or alleged mother, her
self speaks a strange mixture of Eng
lish and French.
DscIams Her Mother
AS soon as the two were again con-
fronted with each other the precocious
r7- oy,l lon1 a Z
the young woman in horror. "She is
not my mother" she exclaimed The
woman said she was born at Marseilles,
but went to New York when very
young. She married an italian in New
York when she was IA years old and
had this child. Her husband died the
day the child was born. She kept the
baby for one year, then sent her to be
taken care of by the child's grand
father in Syria. Having heard that
the grandfather had died, she went TO
Syria to secure the child. On the way
the little girl showed vicious temper
and did all the mischief she could. On
reaching the Lyons railway station IN
Paris she sat down in the waiting room
and fell asleep. During that time, she
alleges, the child took the bag in which
she had all her money, amounting to
some $500, and gave 1t to some strange
woman, who disappeared. When she
woke she slapped the child, VINO tnen
ran away into the street, and did not
know what had become of her child
until she saw her picture in the papers.
Child Sticks to Story
The child, who does not understand
a word of her mothers language, was
then told what she had said, and denied
| II all. For a whole hour the little one
contradicted 1t in every detail. She
insisted the woman was not her moth
er. Until three weeks ago she had
never seen the woman. 1t is not true
her grandfather is dead She knew
her real mother very well, for she left
Syria only a year ago, and was married
again in a town not far from Jerusa-
lem She added:
This woman came one day to my
grandfather's house when l was alone
She told me my grandfather was wait
ing for me in the train. / got in and
he was not there. The train started
away, and I cried, and wanted to go
hack. Then the woman beat me, and
the train went on. At Beyrouth she
took me on board a big steamer and
we went to Port Said, Alexandria and
Marseilles. AS soon as we got to Paris
7 took the first chance and ran away
from her. I do not want to be with
the woman any more. She has beaten
me and made me suffer. l want to go
hack to grandpapa. She says my name
is Annette. 1t is not true. am called
Marianne"
After this both the alleged mother
and the child had a fit of crying, and
between the two contradictory state |
ments the police are unable to make
out the truth Curiously enough, how |
ever the child is wonderfully like the
woman who claims to be her mother.