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 Melicent, his mind went wildly aberrant and it was the Royle girl whom he married. It was the Royle girl—companion of Ketlar, the wife-slayer, daughter of Dads, the dizzy, and of mamma, the doped, in the flat in Chicago—it was she whom he would take to wife.

At the idea, which he could not deny, with his desire of it thrilling and trembling in him, he thought of his mother learning that he would bring such a one to his home, make her his wife and the mother of the children to succeed him; and he swung toward the old house, clenching his hands and swearing within himself against such defilement of his blood and the blood of the others—of his mother and father, of the man of his own name who had died with Knox, and of Timothy, who, two hundred and fifty years ago, had fallen here.

Then, dully and slowly, Calvin Clarke returned to his home.