"Oh, dear Jesus!" His rage quit him like a howling wind, he sagged and shriveled and his hands plucked at his mouth as if to tear out the tongue which had uttered the unutterable. "I didn't mean it, I didn't mean it! 1 didn't mean it!" The moment the words were out Father Ralph let go of Meggie and grabbed Frank. He had Frank's right arm twisted behind him, his own left arm around Frank's neck, throttling him. And he was strong, the grip paralyzing; Frank fought to be free of him, then suddenly his resistance flagged and he shook his head in submission. Meggie had fallen to the floor and knelt there, weeping, her eyes going from her brother to her father in helpless, beseeching agony. She didn't understand what had happened, but she knew it meant she couldn't keep them both.

"You meant it," Frank croaked. "I must always have known it! I must always have known it." He tried to turn his head to Father Ralph. "Let me go, Father. I won't touch him; so help me God I won't."

"So help you God? God rot your souls, both of you! If you've ruined the child I'll kill you!" the priest roared, the only one angry now. "Do you realize I had to keep her here to listen to this, for fear if I took her away you'd kill each other while I was gone? I ought to have let you do it, you miserable, self-centered cretins!"

"It's all right, I'm going," Frank said in a strange, empty voice. "I'm going to join Jimmy Sharman's troupe, and I won't be back."

"You've got to come back!" Paddy whispered. "What can I tell your mother? You mean more to her than the rest of us put together. She'll never forgive me!"

"Tell her I went to join Jimmy Sharman because I want to be someone. It's the truth."

"What I said-it wasn't true, Frank."

Frank's alien black eyes flashed scornfully, the eyes the priest had wondered at the first time he saw them; what were grey-eyed Fee and blue-eyed Paddy doing with a black-eyed son? Father Ralph knew his Mendelian laws, and didn't think even Fee's greyness made it possible. Frank picked up his hat and coat. "Oh, it was true! I must always have known it. The memories of Mum playing her spinet in a room you could never have owned! The feeling you hadn't always been there, that you came after me. That she was mine first." He laughed soundlessly.