The mingling of emotions, like that of two waters, may produce a volume whose direction cannot be calculated by any previous knowledge of the separate streams. In my case, just described, the reader has seen that while my heart was still palpitating at the news of the recovery of a mistress, it was to be shaken anew by the sight of a dear friend. Two sorts of joy met and blended their forces within me; their issue in one turbulent flood, which I should have thought to see heading to Aurelia at the convent, instead of that poured themselves upon the bosom of Virginia. I raised her from my knees where, upon her own, she was clinging, and clasped her in my arms. I was, indeed, happy to see her again, and so much so that I forgot entirely that I had only myself to blame for our long separation. For the first time in our lives our lips met. But if I was moved, what is to be said of her? I can hardly express the painful scene which followed. She lost all control of her senses; she clung to me as if I had been a spar in some stormy sea wherein she drowned; she uttered incoherent cries, she gasped, sobbed, was clean distraught. When I held her, when I kissed her, she struggled like a caught bird, fought furiously, used her teeth, her nails. And yet all the time she was caressing me with every diminutive, every sweet term of love which the most passionate people in the world can find as expression of their love-thoughts. She stroked my cheeks, hair and shoulders, crooned over me like a brooding dove, held me so straitly that I was near choking; or with tragic mouth and eyes of sombre fire she adjured me to kill her there and then, lest any subsequent moment of her life might be less full of bliss than the present. I know that my fancy was inflamed, and suspect that my senses--from whose occasional dominion I was no more free than most men--must have sprung into flame from this dangerous contact, had it not been that her excessive joy induced an attack of hysterics. For a time she was like a madwoman, beyond all human power; and she ended by fainting in my arms, and had to be carried by myself and Scipione, my servant, to a bed. There she lay moaning and muttering to herself for an hour or more. It may be imagined whether all this tended to calm my own agitation or to turn my thoughts towards that road whereby alone honour and salvation could be reached. I could not go out to see Aurelia; I could hardly even think of Aurelia while Virginia lay in my house with closed eyes, clenched hands and shuddering breath. I left Scipione in charge of her, and returned to my saloon, to pace the floor until he brought me word that she could be spoken with. This he did not do for some hours. He came in at last, shaking his head. "That is a bad case, sir--porca miseria!" says he. I hoped that she was better. "She's ashamed of herself, sir," he said, "as well she may be. What a scandal, my word! But these baggages have no modesty."