"Ned! Ned! Wait! Ned, I want you!"
Blake paused; in the dim light it was not possible to read his face, but something in the outline of his figure, in the rigidity and definiteness of his stopping, chilled the boy with a sense of antagonism.
"Ned! Ned!" He ran to him, caught and clung to his arm, put forth all his wiles.
"Ned, you are angry! Why are you angry?"
"I am not angry; I am disappointed." Some strange wall of coldness, at once intangible and impenetrable, had risen about Blake. In fear the boy beat vain hands against it.
"You are disappointed, Ned—in me?"
"I am."
"And why? Why?"
"Because you have behaved like a little fool."
In themselves, the words were nothing, but Blake's tone was serious.