The Shame of Motley

"I shall use the interview to induce his Excellency to submit a tenth beatitude to the approval of our Holy Father: Blessed are the bearers of good tidings. Come on, Messer the seneschal."

I led the way, in my impatience forgetful of his great paunch and little legs, so that he was sorely tried to keep pace with me. Yet who would not have been in haste, urged by such a spur as had I? Here, then, was the end of my shameful travesty. To-morrow a soldier's harness should replace the motley of a jester; the name by which I should be known again to men would be that of Lazzaro Biancomonte, and no longer Boccadoro--the Fool of the golden mouth.

Thus much had Madonna Lucrezia's promises led me to expect, and it was with a soul full of joyous expectation that I entered the great man's closet.

He received me in a manner calculated to set me at my ease, and yet there was about him a something that overa