He obeys my behest with alacrity, and in a very few moments "the woman" and I are face to face; nay, as she comes slowly forward, and throws back her veil, and fixes upon me her wonderful eyes, I know, with a sinking of the heart, that I am face to face with Bebe's ghost. I am startled and impressed--uncomfortably impressed--as I gaze on the remains of what must once have been an extraordinary beauty. I have risen on her entrance, and we now stand--my strange visitor and I--staring at each other in silence, with only the little work-table between us. She is dressed in deepest black of a good texture; I am in rich brown velvet. She is tall and full--truly, as Tynon had described her, "a woman of a fine presence;" I am small and very slight. Her eyes are large, and dark, and burning--such eyes as belong to the South alone; mine, large too, are gray-blue, and soft and calm. I feel fascinated, and slightly terrified. At last I speak. "Is there anything I can do? I believe you wished to speak to me!" I venture, weakly, and with hesitation. "I do," says my strange visitor, never removing her piercing gaze from my face. "I also wished to _see_ you _close_. So you are _his_ wife, are you? A child, a mere doll!" I am so taken aback I can find no reply to make to this speech: every moment renders me more amazed, more thoroughly frightened. "You are Mrs. Carrington of Strangemore," she goes on, in the purest English, but with an unmistakably foreign accent. "Well, Mrs. Carrington, I have come here to-day to tell you something I fear will be unpalatable to your dainty ears." At this instant it occurs to me that I have admitted to my presence, and am shut up with, an escaped lunatic. At this thought my blood curdles in my veins; I move a step backwards, and cast a lingering, longing glance at the bell handle. Watching my every gesture, she immediately divines my intention. "If you will take my advice," she says, "you will not touch that bell. What I have to say might furnish too much gossip for your servant's hall. No, I am _not_ mad. Pouf! what a fool it is, trembling in every limb! Pray restrain yourself Mrs. Carrington: you will require all your courage to sustain you by and by." She is speaking very insolently, and there is a fiendish triumph in her black eyes; I can hear a subtle mockery in her tone as she utters my married name. "If you will be so kind as to state your business without any further delay," I remark, with as much hauteur as I can summon to my aid, "I shall feel obliged." "Good," says she, with a vicious smile: "you recover. The white mouse has found its squeak. Listen, then." She seats herself before the small table that divides us, leans her elbows upon it, and takes her face between her hands. Her eyes are still riveted upon mine; not for a second does she relax the vigilance of her gaze. "Who do you think I am?" she asks, slowly.