But, few as the moments were, it seemed to Giovanni when she
was on the point of vanishing beneath the sculptured portal, that
his beautiful bouquet was already beginning to wither in her grasp. It
was an idle thought; there could be no possibility of distinguishing a
faded flower from a fresh one, at so great a distance.
For many days after this incident, the young man avoided the window
that looked into Doctor Rappaccini's garden, as if something ugly
and monstrous would have blasted his eye-sight, had he been betrayed
into a glance. He felt conscious of having put himself, to a certain
extent, within the influence of an unintelligible power, by the
communication which he had opened with Beatrice. The wisest course
would have been, if his heart were in any real danger, to quit his
lodgings and Padua itself, at once; the next wiser, to have accustomed
himself, as far as possible, to the familiar and day-light view of
Beatrice; thus bringing her rigidly and systematically within the
limits of ordinary experience. Least of all, while avoiding her sight,
should Giovanni have remained so near this extraordinary being, that
the proximity and possibility even of intercourse, should give a
kind of substance and reality to the wild vagaries which his
imagination ran riot continually in producing.
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