What a place to talk of suicide, there, in the midst of that oriental
garden, voluptuous with a thousand unspoken suggestions, laden with the
perfume of flowers, glowing with the many colored lights that illumined
it, rustling as with the sound of hidden insects as the gowns of
gorgeously bedecked women brushed against the growing things! Over our
heads, beyond the glass roof, the storm still howled, although with
less violence, and the contrast seemed strangely in keeping with the
condition of my own mind, outwardly so calm and composed, yet torn by
the thousand conflicting emotions that were induced by the proximity of
this entrancing creature, and the knowledge of what her fate, and
therefore mine, must inevitably be.