Paul could not bear it.  He turned away with a sob in his throat and looked into Verdayne’s eyes with such an expression of utter hopelessness that the older man felt his own eyes moisten with the fervor of his sympathy.  That poor, humble ranchman possessed something that was denied the Boy, prince of the blood though he was.

And the two men talked of commonplace subjects that night in subdued tones that were close to tears.  Both hearts were aching with the consciousness of unutterable and irreparable loss.

* * * * *

Through the long nights that followed, out there in the primitive, Paul thought of the hideousness of life as he saw it now, with a loathing that time seemed only to increase.  He pictured Opal—­his love—­as the wife of that old French libertine, till his soul revolted at the very thought.  Such a thing was beyond belief.

Once he said to Verdayne, thinking of the conversation he had had with Opal on the night of the ball at the Plaza,

“Father Paul, who was Lord Hubert Aldringham?  The name sounds so familiar to me—­yet I can’t recall where I heard it.”

“Why, he was my uncle, Boy, my mother’s brother.  A handsome, wicked, devil-may-care sort of fellow to whom nothing was sacred.  You must have heard us speak of him at home, for mother was very fond of him.”

“And you, Father Paul?”

“I—­detested him, Boy!”

And then the Boy told him something that Opal had said to him of the possibility—­nay, the probability—­of Lord Hubert’s being her own grandfather.  Verdayne was pained—­grieved to the heart—­at the terrible significance of this—­if it were true.  And there was little reason, alas, to doubt it!  How closely their lives were woven together—­Paul’s and Opal’s!  How merciless seemed the demands of destiny!

What a juggler of souls Fate was!

* * * * *

And the month of August passed away.  And September found the two men still wandering in an aimless fashion about the prairie country, and yet with no desire for change.  The Boy was growing more and more dissatisfied, less and less resigned to the decrees of destiny.

At last, one dull, gray, moonless night, when neither could woo coveted sleep to his tired eyes, the Boy said to his companion, “Father Paul, I’m going to be a man—­a man, do you hear?  I am going to New Orleans—­you know Mr. Ledoux asked us to come in September—­and I’m going to marry Opal, whatever the consequences!  I will not be bound to a piece of flesh I abhor, for the sake of a mere kingdom—­not for the sake of a world!  I will not sell my manhood!  I will not sacrifice myself, nor allow the girl I love to become a burnt-offering for a mother’s sin.  I will not!  Do you remember away off there,” and he pointed off to the south of them, “the little shack, and the man and the woman and—­the baby?  Father Paul, I want—­that!  And I’m going to have it, too!  Do you blame me?”