“That,” Francis said coldly, “is a matter of opinion.”
“I know very well,” Trent answered, “what yours is. You are welcome to it. You can blackguard me all round London if you like in a week—but I want a week's grace.”
“Why should I grant it you?”
Trent shrugged his shoulders.
“I won't threaten,” he said, “and I won't offer to bribe you, but I've got to have that week's grace. We're both men, Francis, who've been accustomed to our own way, I think. I want to know on what terms you'll grant it me.”
Francis knocked the ash off his cigarette and rose slowly to his feet.
“You want to know,” he repeated meditatively, “on what terms I'll hold my tongue for a week. Well, here's my answer! On no terms at all!”
“You don't mean that,” Trent said quietly.
“We shall see,” Francis answered grimly. “I'll be frank with you, Trent. When we came in here you called me your enemy. Well, in a sense you were right. I distrusted and disliked you from the moment I first met you in Bekwando village with poor old Monty for a partner, and read the agreement you had drawn up and the clause about the death of either making the survivor sole legatee. In a regular fever swamp Monty was drinking poison like water—and you were watching. That may have seemed all right to you. To me it was very much like murder. It was my mistrust of you which made me send men after you both through the bush, and, sure enough, they found poor Monty abandoned, left to die while you had hastened off to claim your booty. After that I had adventures enough of my own for a bit and I lost sight of you until I came across you and your gang road-making, and I am bound to admit that you saved my life. That's neither here nor there. I asked about Monty and you told me some plausible tale. I went to the place you spoke of—to find him of course spirited away. We have met again in England, Scarlett Trent, and I have asked once more for Monty. Once more I am met with evasions. This morning I granted you a week—now I take back my word. I am going to make public what I know to-morrow morning.”
“Since this morning, then,” Trent said, “your ill-will toward me has increased.”