Once, just before his coming South, Miss Bella had appeared before Uncle George in a state of indignation. A young man whom he rather liked had been one of her devotees for a month or more, and then suddenly ceased his attentions. Bella's eyes flashed as she half reluctantly related to Uncle George (in response to his urgent request) the circumstances which led to the sudden break. "He dared to say to me that, if no more attractive subject happened to be available, it was his belief I would flirt with a chimney-sweep!" and then, when Uncle George burst into a fit of uncontrollable merriment, Miss Bella had first flushed with indignation, then her irresistible sense of the humorous began to get the better of her resolution to be deeply offended, and presently she laughed too; laughed till the tears ran down her cheeks; laughed as only Bella could laugh, the most musical, ringing, delightful laugh ever heard; and then, suddenly recollecting herself, she had pronounced Uncle George an unfeeling wretch, and flounced out of the room in high dudgeon. Now, it is contrary to all principles of story-telling to introduce an utterly new character towards the fag end of a narrative, but Mr. Brandon makes no pretensions to being a story-teller. He can only relate things as they happened; and never, until this stage of the game, had his fair niece Bella appeared as a factor in the plot so far as his knowledge went. Nevertheless, it was vividly apparent to Mr. Brandon that now at least she was destined to become a leading lady, a power behind the throne, whether she appeared in person upon the boards or not. He recalled the frequent allusions to her in the letters that used to reach him from the North in the days when he found time to keep up correspondence with the scattered family. There was a tone of almost tragic despair in the letters of one of her aunts whenever Bella was the subject under discussion. Wherever she went--and she went pretty much everywhere--Miss Grayson was the centre of a knot of admirers. Her summers were spent at West Point or on "the Sound;" her winters in New York or Syracuse; and the oddest thing about it all was that, despite her great attractiveness among the beaus of society, she retained an absolute dominion over the hearts of a little coterie of schoolmates,--a sextette of as bright and intelligent and attractive girls as Uncle George had ever seen; two of them undoubted beauties; all of them gracious and winning; yet, as though by common and tacit understanding, when Bella appeared in their midst, and the men concentrated their attentions upon her, the others contentedly, even approvingly, so it seemed, fell into the background. They had their own personal worshippers, to be sure, but they were paraded for Bella's inspection and approval before being decided upon. Two of the sisterhood married within a few years of their graduation after receiving Bella's sanction.