I showed it to Gabriel; but he scarce seemed to heed. His eyes and mind were fixed on the woman who stood looking at us, the candle held above her head. To tell the truth, I never saw a stranger creature. She wore a long gown of amber cloth, padded voluminously, but unbuttoned at the bosom and showing her brown, wrinkled throat. Her feet were shoeless, and were covered with grey stockings. Her face was profoundly unhallowed. There were remains of marvellous beauty; unparalleled eyes, pure and light blue and unfathomably deep, under white, knotted, bushy brows. No other feature did I note, save loose, prehensile lips and rippling flaxen hair that fell, like a young girl’s, in great locks over her shoulders. In truth, she had sinned monstrously; and in punishment thereof Nature had gifted the most alluring of her sweetnesses with a perenneity of youth: so making her a frightful anomaly--a terrifying Death-and-Life. She stood bowed; her mouth twisting, her eyes falling with inquiry on me. Gabriel she scarce observed; and I know not what in myself attracted her. I was excited, and could scarce repress my mirth. Yet, when I think of it, how oddly laughter would have rung along that mildewed passage! How Sara in the painting of the Angel’s Visit would have smiled a grimmer smile! After a while, sighing heavily, she turned and led the way to a great room. Here she lighted two candles on the central table and, bidding us wait for a little, disappeared. We could hear her movements grow more and more distant. I sat on a tiny settee--(bah, how cold it was!)--whilst Gabriel wandered about, lifting the candle at times to the Italian landscapes painted on the panelling. ‘The Colosseum!’ he cried suddenly--‘and not ruined, but in its full pride. See, I can’t understand this!’ He drew me towards the picture (poor Gabriel was always a lover of art),--I looked, and was amazed to see the building I had so often dreamed of glistening in the moonlight. But my gaze was not so deeply interested as his, and, leaving the picture, it fell upon the miniature of a young girl above the mantelpiece. A host of memories came, my eyes grew dim, my chin trembled. Surely--surely--the likeness was familiar? Yet it could not be. The woman with the web of flaxen hair, Lenore whom I had lost, but never loved, Lenore whom I had forgotten years ago. Lenore with a rose--a lust-flower--a flower of volupty--warming the iciness of the breasts it glowed between! _Lenore! Lenore! Lenore!_ I could not show it to Gabriel. It was not Lenore. How should the portrait of the holy witch, who slept so peacefully, encounter me here of all places? Fie! An instant, and I had fallen to speculating as the jack-o’-lanthorn of my folly bade, when the hostess came back. She bore a pan of live coals and a bundle of fagots; these she threw on the hearth, so that a bright flame was soon leaping giddily up the chimney. ‘Gentlemen,’ she said, ‘your chamber is making ready. Supper shall be laid anon.’