having clapped ten years on to his four score. Like a child, whimpering
and tremulous, he threw his arms around Desnoyers, moistening his neck
with tears.

"He has taken her away! That son of a great flea . . . has taken her
away!"

This time he did not lay all the blame on his China. He wept with her,
and as if trying to console her by a public confession, kept saying over
and over:

"It is my fault. . . . It has all been because of my very, very great
sins."

Now began for Desnoyers a period of difficulties and conflicts. The
fugitives, on one of his visits to the Capital, threw themselves on his
mercy, imploring his protection. The Romantica wept, declaring that only
her brother-in-law, "the most knightly man in the world," could save
her. Karl gazed at him like a faithful hound trusting in his master.
These trying interviews were repeated on all his trips. Then, on
returning to the ranch, he would find the old man ill-humored, moody,
looking fixedly ahead of him as though seeing invisible power and
wailing, "It is my punishment--the punishment for my sins."

The memory of the discreditable circumstances under which he had made
Karl's acquaintance, before bringing him into his home, tormented
the old centaur with remorse. Some afternoons, he would have a horse
saddled, going full gallop toward the neighboring village. But he was
no longer hunting hospitable ranches. He needed to pass some time in
the church, speaking alone with the images that were there only for