Luckily Frank forgot my story in a minute, and it never reached my
mother's ears.
I Some years after this an odd incident occurred. The I idea of a
veiled lady had, as I say, fascinated me. One Raxton fair-day I
induced Winnie to be photographed on the sands, wearing a crown of
sea-flowers in imitation of Rhona Boswell's famous wild-flower
coronet, and a necklace of seaweed, with Frank and another boy
lifting from her head a long white veil of my mother's. My father
accidentally saw this photograph, and was so taken with it that he
adorned the title-page of the third edition of _The Veiled Queen_
with a small woodcut of it.
These vagaries of my father's had an influence upon my destiny of the
most tragic, yet of the most fantastic kind.
He had the reputation, I believe, of being one of the most learned
mystics of his time. He was a fair Hebrew scholar, and also had a
knowledge of Sanscrit, Arabic, and Persian. His passion for philology
was deep-rooted. He was a no less ardent numismatist. Moreover, he
was deeply versed in amulet-lore.
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