What about Miss Dickce? I read on.

Essie Mae and I are going to North Carolina for the next six months. Dick is telling everyone that I am “in an interesting condition,” and that I need time in the clear mountain air to be sure to deliver a healthy child. No one besides the three of us knows the truth, and we will leave before Essie Mae grows large enough with child to reveal the shameful secret. When we return, the child will be considered my own. Essie Mae has agreed to this. She is terrified, of course, that she will be sent away once the baby is born, but I will reserve judgment on that.

The next entry came six months later.

Essie Mae was delivered of a girl this morning. One glimpse of that angelic little face, and I was lost. The child is the innocent in all this, and I will not visit the sins of her father and mother upon her. She is so like a little angel that I have decided that shall be her name. It should have a French sound, however, so her name will be An’gel. An’gel Ducote. Dick will not dare argue with me over this. He of course will be disappointed that my An’gel is not a boy, but perhaps the Lord has decided to repay him in this way for his perfidy.

I was so absorbed in my reading that I completely forgot my napping cat. Diesel took care of that by butting the back of my head several times to get my attention. I took a minute to reassure him that he was still wonderful and that I adored him, and he purred in satisfaction. When he’d had enough he went back to napping, and I returned to the journal.

From that point on I skimmed even more rapidly, searching for mention of a second child. Cecilia grew reconciled to the presence of Essie Mae in the household, and everyone within the house and without apparently accepted An’gel without question as the child of Cecilia and Richard. At first Dick had little to do with his daughter, severely disappointed that she wasn’t a son. Eventually the child won him over, however.

I was rather glad to read that. I would have hated to think that Miss An’gel wasn’t cherished by her father.

When An’gel was a year old, Cecilia began to long for another child. Richard continued to refuse to risk her health and at last confided in her that the doctor had said another pregnancy might kill her. She battled with her emotions in the pages of her journal, but she finally resolved to ask Dick to father another child with Essie Mae.

That shocked me, but I could understand Cecilia’s longing for another baby. At least, as she reasoned to herself, a second child would be a full sibling to little An’gel. Richard readily agreed to the scheme, but Essie Mae took more persuading. She soon consented, however, and within two months was with child again.