Hyder weekly herald., 1933-08-19
My Dear Annabel"
By H. LOUIS RAYBOLD
@. by Mcclure Newspa per syndicate.
 WNU Service

"MY DEAR Annabel-" AVA Foster Deming paused mo- ment to consider the three lies he had just penned. The girl wasn't his. she was decidedly more annoying than dear, and her name wasn't Annabel. It was Susan Then he resumed his task determinedly.
 My Dear Annabel:
 T am sorry that you are sick of school but 1t would have been your fathers wish, know, that you re- main there until you graduate. And put out of your mind any such thought as running away. You are too old for that sort of thing.
 "As for this boy you frankly say you're infatuated without 1t out. Tn the first place, he Is undoubtedly just amusing himself, and in the second. you are too young for that sort of thing.
 This is rather a brief letter, as I am up to my neck In work. My treas- ure of a stenographer left me to be married and I'm having a hard time trying to replace her.
 "So be a good girl and study so as to be . credit to the memory of your father.
 Sincerely yours.
 FOSTER DEMING."
 Slipping the letter in the envelope, he felt the pleasing sensation that . man knows with a deferred duty performed. By the way, how old was the child, really? It had been four years ago that her father, given but a few weeks to live, had confiGed his daughter to his junior partners inter- est.
 "Her mother will be her guardian, but my wife is busy woman and well, would like to think that Susan. I should say Annabel. would once in awhile get the sort of advice or friend ly letter that father would give her."
 Foster had known intuitively the things his friend would have liked to say That his wife was so involved in this civic duty and that social obli- gation that her daughter would get but a very casual supervision.
 It had been her mother who had en- couraged the chiid's rebellion at her chrstened name of Susan :-"too old fashioned"
 Four years ago Annabel had been we'll, say, thirteen or fourteen-maybe fifteen. That would make her-oh, somewhere between sixteen and twen- ty. But he ought to have known. real ly, before he advised her as to being too young for this and too old for that. He might take a run down some time and see her, he supposed. Hard to picture some one he hadn't seen since she was an infant in bloomers and tam-o-shanter.
 Three days later the telephone rang on MT. Foster Deming's desk. AS he picked up the receiver the agitated voice of a woman struck his ears.
 "Is this Mir. Deming? It is? We'll. Susan, or Annabel Wentworth has sim ply disappeared. She left note say ing she had elOped, but we can't think with whom. I've tried to get her mother, but they tell me she Is at a convention somewhere In St. Louis. I'm so upset about it. In these days"
 He simply had to break in on the flow of words. Don't worry. It's not your fault. I'm sure. I'll see what I can do."
 But after he had hung up he sat for some minutes in irritation. If the girls mother had been dead, he would have resigned himself to the trust. As 1t was, he had no authority in the matter. No right to interfere, other than the right any man has to protect any young and ignorant person.
 "An applicant, Mir. Deming," an as- sistant broke in on his thoughts.
 "Send her in."
 She was the best looking one so far. Slender. of excellent carriage, well- bred in manner and taste for clothes.
 'Please sit down, Miss"
 "I heard you needed a stenograph- er," she said quietly, ignoring the Op- portunity to give her name.
 "Can you-er-spell?" he asked.
 '"Try me-" she said.
 ''Iave you had any experienceT
 '"That is my weak spot" admitted bis caller frankly "Rut yOu might