He flung out his right arm, pointing toward the entrance. There stood a woman, about Mary’s age, dressed in white. With the rest of the audience, Mary gasped. Even Diana, who was usually unimpressible, whistled under her breath.
She was beautiful. She was, it was no exaggeration to say, the most beautiful woman most of the audience members had ever seen. Her dress was in the Grecian style, leaving her neck and arms bare. Her skin, of a soft olive hue, proclaimed her a daughter of the temperate South, and her cheeks were tinged with red, as though she had spent time under a southern sun. Her features were as clearly cut as those of an ancient statue. Her hair, a lustrous black, hung down to her waist. She stood still for a moment, then walked toward the platform, swaying as gracefully as one of the reeds so admired by the classical god Pan.
JUSTINE: That’s a lovely description, Catherine.
CATHERINE: Thank you! I’m glad someone notices when I write particularly well.
“Let her through, let her through,” said Professor Petronius. “Mothers, nurses, if you please, protect your children. Make certain they do not touch her, not even the hem of her gown. Remember that she is deadly!”
The audience parted before her like the Red Sea, some of the mothers pulling their children back sharply as she passed, although the children strained to see her.
Poor girl, thought Mary. Surely this Petronius is both cruel and a charlatan. She could not possibly harm those children. And indeed, as she moved through the crowd, the woman’s face was so sad that Mary would have liked to comfort her.
BEATRICE: Is that truly what you thought, when you first saw me?
MARY: More or less, although you know how Catherine romanticizes everything. But I was thinking about how sad you looked.
BEATRICE: I was! Oh indeed, I was so sad that you could not imagine the depth of my sadness.
The woman stepped onto the platform and stood beside Professor Petronius. She looked out at the audience, calmly and with an expression of resignation on her face.
“This charming creature,” said Professor Petronius, “was born in the city of Padua, in Italy. No doubt even those of you who have not traveled in Europe have heard of the splendors of Italy—the ruins of an ancient civilization turned up by every farmer’s plough, the perpetual sun that warms the soul and makes it so much more eloquent than here in England. In Italy, the soul becomes poetic, although the body is lethargic. It is the country of Petrarch, of Michelangelo! That is the country in which Signorina Rappaccini was born.”
Looking around at the stolidly English audience, Mary very much doubted that any of them had dreamed of traveling in Europe. A nice trip to Bournemouth would be more in their line.
“Her father was a professor at the University of Padua, a famous doctor specializing in the vegetable poisons. He knew how to draw out their properties and turn the deadliest toxins into the most beneficial pharmacopeia. His daughter tended his garden of poisonous plants. So she could tend them properly, with the attention that the most delicate specimens required, he forbade her from protecting herself with gloves or masks. Slowly, as she assisted her father in his experiments, she herself became poisonous. The essence of the plants seeped into her, and as she grew into splendid womanhood, she also grew deadly to man. And now,” said Professor Petronius, “you shall see how deadly Miss Rappaccini can be.”
From a vase on the table, he lifted a Madonna lily—a long stem of white flowers, no doubt forced in a hothouse, since it was before the season for them. Ceremoniously, he handed it to the woman—to Beatrice. She took it in her hand, held it for a moment, then opened her mouth and breathed on the flowers. Almost at once, they began to turn brown, to shrivel and dry up. Their petals fell to the floor, then the stem itself turned brown and was simply a dry stick. The audience gasped.
In quick succession, as the audience stood spellbound, Professor Petronius handed Beatrice a variety of living objects. An apple on its branch rotted from her breath. Bees in a jar that had been buzzing a moment before fell silent and lay on the glass bottom, their wings twitching and then still. A mouse Professor Petronius handed her—Mary noticed that he donned gloves before doing so—scampered up her arm, stopped on her shoulder, then stood as though transfixed. She lifted it off and kissed it tenderly before laying it back on the table, where it did not move. A small green snake that he lifted out of a box wound itself around her wrist. In a few minutes, she unwound it and returned its limp form. Finally, Professor Petronius held up the canary in its cage. Beatrice touched the cage gently with one hand. There were tears in her eyes as she leaned forward and breathed on the unfortunate bird. A moment before, it had been cheeping. It gave a final querulous cheep, then it too was silent. Beatrice turned away, as though she did not want to see—either the destruction she had caused, or the reactions of the audience.
“Who will volunteer to approach and feel the power of Miss Rappaccini’s breath?” asked Professor Petronius. “We need a robust gentleman who is willing to risk his life for a kiss from the Poisonous Beauty. Gentlemen, if you volunteer, Miss Rappaccini will kiss you on the cheek, and you will feel her power. But do not volunteer if you have a heart condition or your medical advisor has forbade you from taking vigorous exercise!”
Mary was astonished to see that there were indeed volunteers. Professor Petronius chose two: a younger gentleman who was no doubt some sort of clerk, and an older man who proclaimed that he was a builder, and not afraid of a girl. Both were given the opportunity to go up to Beatrice and hold her hands. Then, she leaned over and kissed each of them on the cheek, quickly and with no indication of enjoyment. When they turned back to the audience, the clerk looking dazed and the builder grinning, Mary could see the red mark of her lips on their skin.
“How do you feel, gentlemen?” asked Professor Petronius, according the builder a rank he did not deserve. Both proclaimed that they felt dizzy. “It’s like being drunk, it is,” said the builder. “Don’t know as I could make my way home if I felt like this after leaving the pub on a Friday night!”
“You are brave, gentlemen,” said Professor Petronius. “When you go home tonight, tell your wives or sisters or mothers that today, you were kissed by death and survived! Those marks will fade in a few days, although I would recommend a topical ointment to assist with healing. Now, if anyone in the audience has questions about this marvel of science, I am available to answer them!”