"I do not wish to disparage your attractions when you were a fortnight old.

They may have begun already to be irresistible.

Excuse me; you have led me into the light vein, when speaking of a most sad matter.

You must blame your self-assertion for it.

All I wish to convey to you is my belief that something wholly unknown to us, some dark mystery of which we have no inkling, lies at the bottom of this terrible affair.