Guasconti had not a
deep heart- or at all events, its depths were not sounded now- but
he had a quick fancy, and an ardent southern temperament, which rose
every instant to a higher fever-pitch. Whether or no Beatrice
possessed those terrible attributes- that fatal breath- the affinity
with those so beautiful and deadly flowers- which were indicated by
what Giovanni had witnessed, she had at least instilled a fierce and
subtle poison into his system. It was not love, although her rich
beauty was a madness to him; nor horror, even while he fancied her
spirit to be imbued with the same baneful essence that seemed to
pervade her physical frame; but a wild offspring of both love and
horror that had each parent in it, and burned like one and shivered
like the other. Giovanni knew not what to dread; still less did he
know what to hope; yet hope and dread kept a continual warfare in
his breast, alternately vanquishing one another and starting up afresh
to renew the contest. Blessed are all simple emotions, be they dark or
bright! It is the lurid intermixture of the two that produces the
illuminating blaze of the infernal regions.
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