"We are plain, sometimes," Madeline admitted. "But what geese antiquarians are! You should always have a girl at your elbow, to tell things. Why, of course, this young person was the Memory he had treasured in his heart!" "I should think it very likely," said Mr. Pelly, "from what follows later. Only, nothing proves it, so far. I should like the arrangement you suggest, my dear Madeline; however, we must get along now, if that clock's right." He nodded at one on the chimneypiece, with Time, made in gold, as a mower of hay; then continued reading: "'Oh, with what joy my fingers closed on that accursed throat! One moment more, and I had sent my old monster whither go the accursed, who shall trouble us no further, yet shall bear for ever the burden of their sins, a debt whereof the capital shall never be repaid, even to the end of all eternity, Amen! But alas!--that one moment was not for me, for the knave who bore the mace, though he missed my head, struck me well and full, half-way betwixt the shoulder and the ear; and though it was a blow that might not easily kill a young man such as I, yet was I stunned by the shock of it, and knew no more till I found myself...'" "What on earth is all this about?" said Madeline. "Surely the wrong page, Uncle Christopher." "Very wrong indeed! But it can't be helped. We must lump it. It may be one folded page missing or it may be half a dozen; we have no clue. We must accept the text as it is." And Mr. Pelly went on reading: "'... Found myself on the back of a horse, going at an easy amble up a hilly road in mountains. I was bound fast behind a strong rider, of whom I could see nothing at first but his steel cap or morion--and I thought I knew him by it, the basnet thereof being dinted, as the man whose sword my beloved had shed her blood to stop, that else had ended my days for me then and there. For in those days, _Eccellenza_, I had such eyes to note all things about me as even youth has rarely. On either side of us rode another man-at-arms, one of whom I could recognise as him who had struck at me with his mace, also missing of slaying me, by the great mercy of God. "'I had little heart to speak to either of them, as you may think, and, indeed, was a mere wreck of myself of two hours ago; for I judged of how time had gone by the last smouldering red of the sundown above the dark, flat, purple of the hills. My thirst was hard to bear, and the great pain of my head and shoulder, shaken as both were by the movement of the horse. But I knew I might ask in vain, though I saw where a wine-flask swung on the saddle-bow of him of the mace. It is wondrous, _Eccellenza_, what youth, and great strength, and pride can endure, rather than ask a _gentilezza_ of an enemy!