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The Shame of Motley: being the memoir of certain transactions in the life of Lazzaro Biancomonte, of Biancomonte, sometime fool of the court of Pesaro by Rafael Sabatini
page 36 of 290 (12%)
should not find us stubborn. But it were useless. I tell you again,
Madonna, that when I espied them from the hill-top yonder, they were but a
half-league behind. Soon we shall have them over the mountain, and we
shall be seen."

"Fool!" she cried, "a half-league behind, you say; and you forget that we
were on the summit, and they had yet to scale it. If you but press on we
shall treble that distance, at least, ere they begin the descent.
Besides, Giacopo," she added, turning again to the leader, "you may be at
fault; you may be scared by a shadow; you may be wrong in accounting them
our pursuers."

The man shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and grunted.

"Arnaldo, there, made no mistake. He told us what he saw."

"Now Heaven help a poor, deserted maid, who set her trust in curs!" she
exclaimed, between grief and anger.

I had been no better than those hinds of hers had I remained unmoved. I
have said that I hated the very name of Sforza; but what had this tender
child to do with my wrongs that she should be brought within the compass
of that hatred? I had inferred that her pursuers were of the House of
Borgia, and in a flash it came to me that were I so inclined I might
prove, by virtue of the ring I carried, the one man in Italy to serve her
in this extremity. And to be of service to her, her winsome beauty had
already inflamed me. For there was I know not what about this child that
seemed to take me in its toils, and so wrought upon me that there and then
I would have risked my life in her good service. Oh, you may laugh who
read. Indeed, deep down in my heart I laughed myself, I think, at the
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