I started up at a sudden rap at my door.
"Haven't you heard the gong for dinner?" asked Mr. Oke's voice.
I had completely forgotten his existence.
3
I feel that I cannot possibly reconstruct my earliest impressions of Mrs.
Oke. My recollection of them would be entirely coloured by my subsequent
knowledge of her; whence I conclude that I could not at first have
experienced the strange interest and admiration which that extraordinary
woman very soon excited in me. Interest and admiration, be it well
understood, of a very unusual kind, as she was herself a very unusual kind
of woman; and I, if you choose, am a rather unusual kind of man. But I can
explain that better anon.
This much is certain, that I must have been immeasurably surprised at
finding my hostess and future sitter so completely unlike everything I had
anticipated. Or no--now I come to think of it, I scarcely felt surprised at
all; or if I did, that shock of surprise could have lasted but an
infinitesimal part of a minute. The fact is, that, having once seen Alice
Oke in the reality, it was quite impossible to remember that one could have
fancied her at all different: there was something so complete, so
completely unlike every one else, in her personality, that she seemed
always to have been present in one's consciousness, although present,
perhaps, as an enigma.
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