Shortly after going to New York to live, I had explored the Eden Musée.
One of the most gruesome of the spectacles which I had seen in its
famed Chamber of Horrors was a representation of a gorilla, holding in
its arms the gory body of a woman. It was that impression which now
revived in my mind. But by a process strictly in accordance with
Darwin's theory, the Eden Musée gorilla had become a man--in appearance
not unlike the beast that had inspired my distorted thought. This man
held a bloody dagger which he repeatedly plunged into the woman's
breast. The apparition did not terrify me at all. In fact I found it
interesting, for I looked upon it as a contrivance of the detectives.
Its purpose I could not divine, but this fact did not trouble me, as I
reasoned that no additional criminal charges could make my situation
worse than it already was.

For a month or two, "false voices" continued to annoy me. And if there
is a hell conducted on the principles of my temporary hell, gossippers
will one day wish they had attended strictly to their own business.
This is not a confession. I am no gossipper, though I cannot deny that
I have occasionally gossipped--a little. And this was my punishment:
persons in an adjoining room seemed to be repeating the very same
things which I had said of others on these communicative occasions. I
supposed that those whom I had talked about had in some way found me
out, and intended now to take their revenge.

My sense of smell, too, became normal; but my sense of taste was slow
in recovering. At each meal, poison was still the _pièce de
résistance_, and it was not surprising that I sometimes dallied one,
two, or three hours over a meal, and often ended by not eating it at
all.