"What, the child?"
"Yes."
"I didn't send him. He was pestering me to come. So at last I gave him leave to do as he liked."
"In order that you might follow and abuse me in front of him!"
"I'll tell no lies," said Musk, sturdily. "I meant to let him hear what I thought of you, and I won't deny it."
Carlton looked a little longer upon the broad face between the steely bristles and the silvery hair; it had aged nothing in these years which had been as twenty to himself; and for the moment there was all the old rugged dignity in its independent purpose and honest unrelenting hate. A bargain had been in Carlton's mind, but at the last he decided to trust his enemy instead.
"It's all right, Georgie," he whispered: "we are not really angry with each other. Run away and play."
"But I don't want to!"
"You must," said Carlton, and rose without taking further notice of the child. "Mr. Musk," he said, in a low voice but firm, "is it to be like this between us to the bitter end?"
"That is."