And the result had been a stranger compound than even Everard knew, for all that he knew the lad exceedingly well.

For he had scarcely reckoned sufficiently upon Justin's mixed nationality and the circumstance that in soul and mind he was entirely his mother's child, with nothing--or an imperceptible little--of his father.

As his mother's nature had been, so was Justin's--joyous.

But Everard's training of him had suppressed all inborn vivacity.

The mirth and diablerie that were his birthright had been overlaid with British phlegm, until in their stead, and through the blend, a certain sardonic humor had developed, an ironical attitude toward all things whether sacred or profane.