 which I had been treated by Dr. Leete and
his family, and especially the goodness of Edith, had hitherto prevented my
fully realizing that their real sentiment toward me must necessarily be that of
the whole generation to which they belonged. The recognition of this, as
regarded Dr. Leete and his amiable wife, however painful, I might have endured,
but the conviction that Edith must share their feeling was more than I could
bear.
    The crushing effect with which this belated perception of a fact so obvious
came to me opened my eyes fully to something which perhaps the reader has
already suspected, - I loved Edith.
    Was it strange that I did? The affecting occasion on which our intimacy had
begun, when her hands had drawn me out of the whirlpool of madness; the fact
that her sympathy was the vital breath which had set me up in this new life and
enabled me to support it; my habit of looking to her as the mediator between me
and the world around in a sense that even her father was not, - these were
circumstances that had predetermined a result which her remarkable loveliness of
person and disposition would alone have accounted for. It was quite inevitable
that she should have come to seem to me, in a sense quite different from the
usual experience of lovers, the only woman in this world. Now that I had become
suddenly sensible of the fatuity of the hopes I had begun to cherish, I suffered
not merely what another lover might, but in addition a desolate loneliness, an
utter forlornness, such as no other lover, however unhappy, could have felt.
    My hosts evidently saw that I was depressed in spirits, and did their best
to divert me. Edith especially, I could see, was distressed for me, but
according to the usual perversity of lovers, having once been so mad as to dream
of receiving something more from her, there was no longer any virtue for me in a
kindness that I knew was only sympathy.
    Toward nightfall, after secluding myself in my room most of the afternoon, I
went into the garden to walk about. The day was overcast, with an autumnal
flavor in the warm, still air. Finding myself near the excavation, I entered the
subterranean chamber and sat down there. »This,« I muttered to myself, »is the
only home I have. Let me stay here, and not go forth any more.« Seeking aid from
the familiar surroundings, I endeavored to find a sad sort of consolation in
reviving the past and summoning up the forms and faces that were about me in my
former life
