Read "The Tavern Knight" by Rafael Sabatini online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Side by side stepped that oddly assorted pair along - the maiden whose soul was as pure and fresh as the breeze that blew upon them from the sea, and the man whose life years ago had been marred by a sorrow, the quest of whose forgetfulness had led him through the mire of untold sin; the girl upon the threshold of womanhood, her life all before her and seeming to her untainted mind a joyous, wholesome business; the man midway on his ill-starred career, his every hope blighted save the one odious hope of vengeance, which made him cling to a life he had proved worthless and ugly, and that otherwise he had likely enough cast from him. And as they walked: "Sir Crispin," she ventured timidly, "you are unhappy, are you not?"
Startled by her words and the tone of them, Galliard turned his head that he might observe her.