'Do as Rosalia does with Carlos, divine Marionetta. Let us each open
a vein in the other's arm, mix our blood in a bowl, and drink it as
a sacrament of love. Then we shall see visions of transcendental
illumination, and soar on the wings of ideas into the space of pure
intelligence.'

Marionetta could not reply; she had not so strong a stomach as
Rosalia, and turned sick at the proposition. She disengaged herself
suddenly from Scythrop, sprang through the door of the tower, and fled
with precipitation along the corridors. Scythrop pursued her, crying,
'Stop, stop, Marionetta--my life, my love!' and was gaining rapidly on
her flight, when, at an ill-omened corner, where two corridors ended
in an angle, at the head of a staircase, he came into sudden and
violent contact with Mr Toobad, and they both plunged together to the
foot of the stairs, like two billiard-balls into one pocket. This gave
the young lady time to escape, and enclose herself in her chamber;
while Mr Toobad, rising slowly, and rubbing his knees and shoulders,
said, 'You see, my dear Scythrop, in this little incident, one of the
innumerable proofs of the temporary supremacy of the devil; for what
but a systematic design and concurrent contrivance of evil could have
made the angles of time and place coincide in our unfortunate persons
at the head of this accursed staircase?'

'Nothing else, certainly,' said Scythrop: 'you are perfectly in the
right, Mr Toobad. Evil, and mischief, and misery, and confusion,
and vanity, and vexation of spirit, and death, and disease, and
assassination, and war, and poverty, and pestilence, and famine, and
avarice, and selfishness, and rancour, and jealousy, and spleen,
and malevolence, and the disappointments of philanthropy, and the
faithlessness of friendship, and the crosses of love--all prove the