Please, was it not Fate (because a man must believe in something), was it not Fate that the boy had looked on him in his nakedness in that hidden place known only to George and to himself — and to Bronco Henry? Just so, he had looked on the boy’s nakedness in that eternity when the boy had walked proud and unprotected past the open tents, jeered at, scorned — a pariah. But Phil knew, God knows he knew, what it was to be a pariah, and he had loathed the world, should it loath him first. His voice was husky, ‘That’s damned kind of you, Pete,’ and he slid his long arm about the boy’s shoulders.
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