Does the task daunt you ?" His glance and voice were alike harsh.
In very truth it did, and I told him so, but in the terms which the shrewd wit he said was mine dictated.
"I hesitate, my lord, indeed; but more because I fear the frustration of your own ends--whatever they may be--than because I dread to earn a broken neck by again adventuring into Pesaro.

Would not some other messenger--unknown at the Court of Giovanni Sforza--be in better case to acquit himself of such a task?
"Yes, if I had one I could trust," he answered frankly.
"I will be open with you, Biancomonte.

There are such grave matters at issue, there are such secrets confided to that paper, that I would not for a kingdom, not for our Holy Father's triple crown, that they should fall into alien hands." He approached me again, and his slender hand, upon which the sacred amethyst was glowing, fell lightly on my shoulder.

He lowered his voice "You are the man, the one man in Italy, whose interests are bound up with mine in this; therefore are you the one man to whom I can entrust that package." "I ?" I gasped in amazement--as well I might, for what interests had Boccadoro, the Fool, in common with Cesare Borgia, Cardinal of Valencia?
"You," he answered vehemently, "you, Lazzaro Biancomonte of Biancomonte, whose father Costanzo of Pesaro stripped of his domains.

The matters in those papers mean the ruin of the Lord of Pesaro.