{"id":"01KG8AMYEVAJ07P2PC05X3R2Q2","cid":"bafkreia743hdhf5xlqms5ph3za4zrw7jli77uo6juz2yqh4pli5mgm5cty","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":6634,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:52.921Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 3","source_file":"01KG89J1JSYKSGCE149MH9HF6A","start_line":6564,"text":"still fadedly gilded upon a part of one side of the interior, where it\r\nmade a projecting curve.\r\n\r\n\"A very curious place thou hast chosen, Isabel, wherein to have the\r\nownership of the guitar engraved. How did ever any person get in there\r\nto do it, I should like to know?\"\r\n\r\nThe girl looked surprisedly at him a moment; then took the instrument\r\nfrom him, and looked into it herself. She put it down, and continued.\r\n\r\n\"I see, my brother, thou dost not comprehend. When one knows every thing\r\nabout any object, one is too apt to suppose that the slightest hint\r\nwill suffice to throw it quite as open to any other person. _I_ did not\r\nhave the name gilded there, my brother.\"\r\n\r\n\"How?\" cried Pierre.\r\n\r\n\"The name was gilded there when I first got the guitar, though then I\r\ndid not know it. The guitar must have been expressly made for some one\r\nby the name of Isabel; because the lettering could only have been put\r\nthere before the guitar was put together.\"\r\n\r\n\"Go on--hurry,\" said Pierre.\r\n\r\n\"Yes, one day, after I had owned it a long time, a strange whim came\r\ninto me. Thou know'st that it is not at all uncommon for children to\r\nbreak their dearest playthings in order to gratify a half-crazy\r\ncuriosity to find out what is in the hidden heart of them. So it is with\r\nchildren, sometimes. And, Pierre, I have always been, and feel that I\r\nmust always continue to be a child, though I should grow to three score\r\nyears and ten. Seized with this sudden whim, I unscrewed the part I\r\nshowed thee, and peeped in, and saw 'Isabel.' Now I have not yet told\r\nthee, that from as early a time as I can remember, I have nearly always\r\ngone by the name of Bell. And at the particular time I now speak of, my\r\nknowledge of general and trivial matters was sufficiently advanced to\r\nmake it quite a familiar thing to me, that Bell was often a diminutive\r\nfor Isabella, or Isabel. It was therefore no very strange affair, that\r\nconsidering my age, and other connected circumstances at the time, I\r\nshould have instinctively associated the word Isabel, found in the\r\nguitar, with my own abbreviated name, and so be led into all sorts of\r\nfancyings. They return upon me now. Do not speak to me.\"\r\n\r\nShe leaned away from him, toward the occasionally illuminated casement,\r\nin the same manner as on the previous night, and for a few moments\r\nseemed struggling with some wild bewilderment But now she suddenly\r\nturned, and fully confronted Pierre with all the wonderfulness of her\r\nmost surprising face.\r\n\r\n\"I am called woman, and thou, man, Pierre; but there is neither man nor\r\nwoman about it. Why should I not speak out to thee? There is no sex in\r\nour immaculateness. Pierre, the secret name in the guitar even now\r\nthrills me through and through. Pierre, think! think! Oh, canst thou not\r\ncomprehend? see it?--what I mean, Pierre? The secret name in the guitar\r\nthrills me, thrills me, whirls me, whirls me; so secret, wholly hidden,\r\nyet constantly carried about in it; unseen, unsuspected, always\r\nvibrating to the hidden heart-strings--broken heart-strings; oh, my\r\nmother, my mother, my mother!\"\r\n\r\nAs the wild plaints of Isabel pierced into his bosom's core, they\r\ncarried with them the first inkling of the extraordinary conceit, so\r\nvaguely and shrinkingly hinted at in her till now entirely\r\nunintelligible words.\r\n\r\nShe lifted her dry burning eyes of long-fringed fire to him.\r\n\r\n\"Pierre--I have no slightest proof--but the guitar was _hers_, I know, I\r\nfeel it was. Say, did I not last night tell thee, how it first sung to\r\nme upon the bed, and answered me, without my once touching it? and how\r\nit always sung to me and answered me, and soothed and loved me,--Hark\r\nnow; thou shalt hear my mother's spirit.\"\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 3"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AKJAEQ00QR124VM7H290W","peer_type":"subsection","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1JSYKSGCE149MH9HF6A","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AMYEJ98K45TCGV42X12VD","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AMYEVHYX3VMS8WJFS590S","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:53.723Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:49:19.512Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}