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