"He was to have come?" he echoed. "To shelter?" he asked.
"Nay," said she quietly, "to death. The papal emissaries had knowledge of
it and would have been here to await him."
"You would have betrayed him?" Fra Gervasio's voice was hoarse, his eyes
were burning sombrely.
"I would have saved my son," said she, with quiet satisfaction, in a tone
that revealed how incontestably right she conceived herself to be.
He stood there, and he seemed taller and more gaunt than usual, for he had
drawn himself erect to the full of his great height--and he was a man who
usually went bowed. His hands were clenched and the knuckles showed
blue-white like marble. His face was very pale and in his temple a little
pulse was throbbing visibly. He swayed slightly upon his feet, and the
sight of him frightened me a little. He seemed so full of terrible
potentialities.
When I think of vengeance, I picture to myself Fra Gervasio as I beheld him
in that hour. Nothing that he could have done would have surprised me.
Had he fallen upon my mother then, and torn her limb from limb, it would
have been no more than from the sight of him I might have expected.
I have said that nothing that he could have done would have surprised me.
Rather should I have said that nothing would have surprised me save the
thing he did.
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