"I don't believe he's a child of these people at all," Maisie declared. "He's of a different clay. He's as sensitive as-as a sensitive plant. You ought to keep your eye on him, Mr. Merewether. I believe he's a poor little prince in a fairy tale."
"A freak—a lusus naturae" said the vicar.
Paul did not know what a lusus naturae was, but it sounded mighty grand.
"He's a fairy prince, and one day he'll come into his kingdom."
"My dear, if you saw his mother!"
"But I'm sure no one but a princess could be Paul Kegworthy's mother," laughed Maisie.
"And his father?"
"A prince too!"
And Paul listened and drank in his goddess's words greedily. Truth clear as crystal fell from her lips. A wild wonder racked his little soul. She had said that his mother was not his mother, and that his father was a prince. The tidings capped the glory of an effulgent day.
When he sneaked home late Mrs. Button, who had learned how he had misspent his time, gave him a merciless thrashing. Why should he be trapesing about with Sunday schools, she asked, with impolite embroidery, while his poor little brothers and sisters were crying in the street? She would learn him to Mess about with parsons and Sunday-school teachers. She was in process of "learning" him when Mr. Button entered. He swore in a manner which would have turned our armies in Flanders pallid, and kicked Paul into the scullery. There the boy remained and went supperless to his bed of sacks, aching and tearless. Before he slept he put his cornelian heart in his hiding-hole. What cared he for stripes or kicks or curses with the Vision Splendid glowing before his eyes?