That settled it and I went, arriving at the great mansion shortly before the dinner hour. I did not, however, take a bag with me. If I had owned one, I would not have had anything to put in it.
I will not attempt to describe Mr. Trenholm's beautiful home. For more than half a century now it has been pointed out to tourists as one of the show places of Charleston, and it has long since passed into the hands of strangers. I must confess that as I opened the iron gate and walked through the well-kept grounds to the front door I was a little awed by the imposing building, with its great columns supporting the portico. I could not but feel some misgivings as to the reception I would get, stranger as I was, from the family whom I had never met. Still, I did not dare run away, and so I timidly rang the bell. A slave, much better dressed than myself, and with the manners of a Chesterfield, appeared and showed me into the parlors; it was all very grand, but very lonely, as there was no one there to receive me. I took a seat and made myself comfortable; it had been a long time since I had sat on a luxurious sofa. In a few minutes two young ladies entered the room. Of course I had never seen either of them before, but the idea instantly flashed through my mind that I was going to marry the taller of the two, who advanced toward me and introduced herself as "Miss Trenholm."
Soon there arrived a Frenchman, a Colonel Le Mat, the inventor of the "grapeshot revolver," a horrible contraption, the cylinder of which revolved around a section of a gun barrel. The cylinder contained ten bullets, and the grapeshot barrel was loaded with buckshot which, when fired, would almost tear the arm off a man with its recoil. Le Mat's English vocabulary was limited, and his only subject of conversation was his invention, so he used me to explain to the young ladies how the infernal machine worked. Now that sounds all very easy, but one must remember that Le Mat was a highly imaginative Gaul and insisted on;
