"Yes, Boy, some time!"




CHAPTER V


Rebellious thoughts were flitting through the brain of Paul Zalenska as
he rode forth the next morning, tender and fanciful ones, too, as he
watched the sun's kisses fall on leaf and flower and tree, drying with
their soft, insistent warmth the tears left by the dew of night, and
wooing all Nature to awake--to look up with glorious smiles, for the
world, after all, is beautiful and full of love and laughter.

Why should _not_ Paul be happy? Was he not twenty, and handsome, and
rich, and popular, and destined for great things? Was there a want in
the world that he could not easily have satisfied, had he so desired?
And was he not officially betrothed to the Princess Elodie of Austria--

"Damn the Princess Elodie!" he thought, with more emphasis than
reverence, and he rode along silently, slowly, a frown clouding his
fresh, boyish brow, face to face with the prose of the existence he
would fain have had all romance and poetry.

It had all been arranged for him by well-meaning minds--minds that could
never see how the blessing they had intended to bestow might by any
chance become a curse.