'I see a golden opportunity rising in the distance,' said Trombin. 'It illuminates my imagination and lights up my understanding.'
'It will probably dazzle mine, so that I shall see nothing at all,' observed Gambardella with his usual sourness.
'Possibly,' Trombin answered pleasantly. 'I shall therefore hide my light under a bushel, as it were, and thus spare your mental eyes a shock that might be fatal to them. For my present inspiration is of such a tremendous nature that an ordinary intelligence might be unsettled by it.'
'Could you not communicate the nature of it in small doses, as it were?' asked Gambardella, mimicking him a little. 'One can get accustomed even to poisons in that way, as Mithridates did.'
'To oblige you, I will attempt it, my friend, but I shall endeavour to lead you to guess the truth yourself by asking questions, instead of presenting it to you in disjointed fragments. Now consider that youth whom I ran through the arm the other night, and answer me. Do you suppose that he was serenading Pina, the serving-woman, or Ortensia her mistress?'
'What a question! It was Ortensia, of course.'
'But was he serenading the Lady Ortensia out of ill-feeling towards her, or out of good-feeling?'
'Out of good-feeling.'
'What is the good-feeling of a handsome young man towards a beautiful young woman usually called, my friend?'
'Love, I suppose. What nonsense is this?'