mother? There was the crime, Bertuccio—that was where you became really
culpable.”
“True, excellency, that was the crime, the real crime, for in that I
acted like a coward. My first duty, directly I had succeeded in
recalling the babe to life, was to restore it to its mother; but, in
order to do so, I must have made close and careful inquiry, which would,
in all probability, have led to my own apprehension; and I clung to
life, partly on my sister’s account, and partly from that feeling of
pride inborn in our hearts of desiring to come off untouched and
victorious in the execution of our vengeance. Perhaps, too, the natural
and instinctive love of life made me wish to avoid endangering my own.
And then, again, I am not as brave and courageous as was my poor
brother.”
Bertuccio
