"Camillo!"--it was the Princess's voice, half imperious, half
pleading; and from beyond the angle of the cottage wall came the
noise of a latch shaken. "Open to me, Camillo, or by the Mother of
Christ I will blow the door in! I have a gun, Camillo, and I swear
to you!"
The challenge was not answered. Crouching almost on all fours I
sprang across the ray of light and gained the wall's shadow. There,
as I drew breath, I heard the latch shaken again, more impatiently.
"Camillo!"
The bolt was drawn. Peering around the angle of the wall, I saw the
light fall full on her face as the door opened and she stepped into
the cottage.
CHAPTER XXIII.
ORDEAL AND CHOOSING.
"Thou coward! Yet
Art living? canst not, wilt not find the road
To the great palace of magnificent death?--
Though thousand ways lead to his thousand doors
Which day and night are still unbarr'd for all."
NAT. LEE.--_Oedipus_.
"No man"--I am quoting my father--"can be great, or even wise, or
even, properly speaking, a man at all, until he has burnt his boats";
but I imagine that those who achieve wisdom and greatness burn their
boats deliberately and not--as did I, next moment--upon a sudden wild
impulse.
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