There, just as _he_ was introduced, the story ended, and fortunate was it for me that it did so, for he declared I should not write another word after I got through with him; and I promised that I wouldn’t, mentally resolving that it should be some time before I reached that point. This then, my reader, is the reason why I said no more of him, when first I presented him to your notice, but left him for a while in mystery. I knew Richard was anxious to hear what _did_ become of himself, and I fancied that if I wrote considerable before I said anything very definite of him, he would be more likely to let me finish the book, as he would not wish me to waste so much paper for nothing! And the sequel proved that I was right. Regularly each day I wrote, Richard always stopping me the moment he thought I was tired, and invariably breaking me off in the wrong place, so if there should be any parts of my story which do not join together smoothly, you may know it was there that Richard took my pen from my hand, or hid the inkstand. Towards the middle of August, invitations came for us to attend a large wedding in Charleston. I was exceedingly anxious to go, having heard much of the bride, who was a distant relative of my husband, and though both he and Mrs. Lansing raised every conceivable objection to my leaving home, I adroitly put aside all their arguments, and ere Richard fully realized that he had been coaxed into doing something he had fully determined not to do, we were rattling along in a dusty Charleston omnibus towards one of the largest hotels, where rooms had been engaged for us. The morning after our arrival, I went into the public parlor, and as I seated myself at the piano I saw just across the room, near an open window, a quiet, intelligent-looking lady, apparently twenty-six or twenty-seven years of age, and near her sporting upon the carpet, was a beautiful little girl, with flowing curls and soft dark eyes, which instantly riveted my attention, they were so like something I had seen before. At the sound of the music she came to my side, listening attentively, and when I had finished, she laid one white, chubby hand on my lap and the other on the keys, saying, “please play again, _Rose_ like to hear you.” “And so your name is Rose?” I answered, “Rose what?” “_Rosa Lee Clayton_, and that’s my new _ma_,” she replied, pointing towards the lady, whose usually pale cheek was for an instant suffused with a blush such as brides only wear. I knew now why I had felt interested in the child. It was the _father_ which I saw looking at me through the eyes of brown, and taking the little creature in my arms, I was about to question her of her sire, when an increasing glow on the lady’s cheek and a footstep in the hall told me he was coming!