And then--the second miracle in
my career, which has been full of miracles--I came across a casual
reference, in the _Staffordshire Recorder_, of all places, to the
_Mademoiselle de Maupin_ of Theophile Gautier. Something in the
reference, I no longer remember what, caused me to guess that the book
was a revelation of matters hidden from me. I bought it. With the
assistance of a dictionary, I read it, nightly, in about a week. Except
_Picciola_, it was the first French novel I had ever read. It held me
throughout; it revealed something on nearly every page. But the climax
dazzled and blinded me. It was exquisite, so high and pure, so
startling, so bold, that it made me ill. When I recovered I had fast in
my heart's keeping the new truth that in the body, and the instincts of
the body, there should be no shame, but rather a frank, joyous pride.
From that moment I ceased to be ashamed of anything that I honestly
liked. But I dared not keep the book. The knowledge of its contents would
have killed my aunt. I read it again; I read the last pages several
times, and then I burnt it and breathed freely.

Such was I, as I forced my will on my aunt in the affair of the concert.
And I say that she who had never suspected the existence of the real me,
suspected it then, when we glanced at each other across the
breakfast-room. Upon these apparent trifles life swings, as upon a pivot,
into new directions.

I sat with my aunt while Lucy went with the note. She returned soon with
the reply, and the reply was:

'So sorry I can't accept your kind invitation. I should have liked to go
awfully. But Fred has got the toothache, and I must not leave him.'

The toothache! And my very life, so it seemed to me, hung in the balance.

I did not hesitate one second.

'Hurrah!' I cried. 'She can go. I am to call for her in the cab.'

And I crushed the note cruelly, and threw it in the fire.

'Tell him to call at Ryleys',' I said to Rebecca as she was putting me
and my dress into the cab.

And she told the cabman with that sharp voice of hers, always arrogant
towards inferiors, to call at Ryleys.'

I put my head out of the cab window as soon as we were in
Oldcastle Street.

'Drive straight to Hanbridge,' I ordered.

The thing was done.

II

He was like his photograph, but the photograph had given me only the most
inadequate idea of him. The photograph could not render his extraordinary
fairness, nor the rich gold of his ha