The evening before I had seen strong signs of the
dramatic qualities of her nature. She had the gift of imagination,
the epic spirit. Even three years previous I felt how she had seen
every little incident of her daily life in a way which gave it
vividness and distinction. All things touched her with delicate
emphasis--were etched upon her brain--or did not touch her at all.
She would love the picturesque in life, though her own tastes were
so simple and fine. Imagination would beset her path with dangers;
it would be to her, with her beauty, a fatal gift, a danger to
herself and others. She would have power, and feeling it, womanlike,
would use it, dissipating her emotions, paying out the sweetness
of her soul, till one day a dramatic move, a strong picturesque
personality like Doltaire's, would catch her from the moorings of
her truth, and the end must be tragedy to her. Doltaire! Doltaire!
The name burnt into my brain. Some prescient quality in me awaked,
and I saw her the sacrifice of her imagination, of the dramatic
beauty of her nature, my enemy her tyrant and destroyer. He would
leave nothing undone to achieve his end, and do nothing that would
not in the end poison her soul and turn her very glories into
miseries. How could she withstand the charm of his keen knowledge
of the world, the fascination of his temperament, the alluring
eloquence of his frank wickedness? And I should rather a million
times see her in her grave than passed through the atmosphere of
his life.
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