Some months after my recovery, while I was out on a camp-hunt, you were brought to Le Bocage, and the sight of you made me more vindictive than ever. I believed you selfishly designing, and I could not bear that you should remain under the same roof with me. I hated children as I hated men and women. But that day when you defied me in the park, and told me I was sinful and cruel, I began to notice you closely. I weighed your words, watched you when you little dreamed that I was present, and often concealed myself in order to listen to your conversation. I saw in your character traits that annoyed me, because they were noble and unlike what I had believed all womanhood or girlhood to be. I was aware that you dreaded and disliked me; I saw that very clearly every time I had occasion to speak to you. How it all came to pass I can not tell--I know not--and it has always been a mystery even to me; but, Edna, after the long lapse of years of sin and reckless dissipation, my heart stirred and turned to you, child though you were, and a strange, strange, invincible love for you sprang from the bitter ashes of a dead affection for Agnes Hunt. I wondered at myself; I sneered at my idiocy; I cursed my mad folly, and tried to believe you as unprincipled as I had found others; but the singular fascination strengthened day by day. Finally I determined to tempt you, hoping that your duplicity and deceit would wake me from the second dream into which I feared there was danger of my falling. Thinking that at your age curiosity was the strongest emotion, I carefully arranged the interior of the Taj Mahal, so that it would be impossible for you to open it without being discovered; and putting the key in your hands, I went abroad. I wanted to satisfy myself that you were unworthy, and believed you would betray the trust. For four years I wandered, restless, impatient, scorning myself more and more because I could not forget your sweet, pure, haunting face; because, despite my jeers, I knew that I loved you. At last I wrote to my mother from Egypt that I should go to Central Persia, and so I intended. But one night as I sat alone, smoking, amid the ruins of the propylon at Philas, a vision of Le Bocage rose before me, and your dear face looked at me from the lotus-crowned columns of the ancient temple. I forgot the hate I bore all mankind; I forgot every thing but you; your pure, calm, magnificent eyes; and the longing to see you, my darling--the yearning to look into your eyes once more, took possession of me. I sat there till the great, golden, dewless dawn of the desert fell upon Egypt, and then came a struggle long and desperate. I laughed and swore at my folly; but far down in the abysses of my distorted nature hope had kindled a little feeble, flickering ray. I tried to smother it, but its flame clung to some crevice in my heart, and would not be crushed. While I debated, a pigeon that dwelt somewhere in the crumbling temple fluttered down at my feet, cooed softly, looked in my face, then perched on a mutilated red granite sphinx immediately in front of me, and after a moment rose, circled above me in the pure, rainless air and flew westward. I accepted it as an omen, and started to America instead of to Persia. On the night of the tenth of December, four years after I bade you good-bye at the park gate, I was again at Le Bocage. Silently and undiscovered I stole into my own house, and secreted myself behind the curtains in the library. I had been there one hour when you and Gordon Leigh came in to examine the Targum. Oh, Edna! how little you dreamed of the eager, hungry eyes that watched you! During that hour that you two sat there bending over the same book, I became thoroughly convinced that while I loved you as I never expected to love any one, Gordon also loved you, and intended if possible to make you his wife. I contrasted my worn, haggard face and grayish locks with his, so full of manly hope and youthful beauty, and I could not doubt that any girl would prefer him to me. Edna, my retribution began then. I felt that my devil was mocking me, as I had long mocked others, and made me love you when it was impossible to win you. Then and there I was tempted to spring upon and throttle you both before he triumphantly called you his. At last Leigh left, and I escaped to my own rooms. I was pacing the floor when I heard you cross the rotunda and saw the glimmer of the light you carried. Hoping to see you open the little Taj, I crawled behind the sarcophagus that holds my two mummies, crouched close to the floor, and peeped at you across the gilded byssus that covered them. My eyes, I have often been told, possess magnetic or mesmeric power. At all events, you felt my eager gaze, you were restless, and searched the room to discover whence that feeling of a human presence came. Darling, were you superstitious, that you avoided looking into the dark corner where the mummies lay? Presently you stopped in front of the little tomb, and swept away the spider-web, and took the key from your pocket, and as you put it into the lock I almost shouted aloud in my savage triumph! I absolutely panted to find Leigh's future wife as unworthy of confidence as I believed the remainder of her sex. But you did not open it. You merely drove away the spider and rubbed the marble clean with your handkerchief, and held the key between your fingers. Then my heart seemed to stand still, as I watched the light streaming over your beautiful, holy face and warm, crimson dress; and when you put the key in your pocket and turned away, my groan almost betrayed me. I had taken out my watch to see the hour, and in my suspense I clutched it so tightly that the gold case and the crystal within all crushed in my hand. You heard the tingling sound and wondered whence it came; and when you had locked the door and gone, I raised one of the windows and swung myself down to the terrace. Do you remember that night?"