"Put the boy down," said Jasper Musk, with sinister self-control. Instinctively the child slipped to the ground; but there his courage failed him, so that he turned his back upon the terrible old man, and hid his face in the lap that he had left. "Come here, George!" But Carlton held him firmly with both hands. Musk bore down on them in a series of little shuffling steps, his great face wincing with the pain of each. His voice had already risen; now it was so terrible to hear, so hoarse and high with passion, that in an instant Carlton had his thumbs in the small boy's ears. "Snivelling hypocrite! Whited sepulchre! Do you hand the child over to me, or I'll break this stick across your back. So I've caught ye, temptun him here to make up to him behind my back! But you don't--no, you don't--not while I'm alive to stop that. He's nothun to you and you're nothun to him, and do you meddle with him again at your peril. I've taken the trouble to learn the law of it, so I know. God damn ye! will you take your hands off him, or am I to break your blasted head?" "You can do what you like," said Carlton; "but the boy shall not hear you using that language to me. So you will never get a better opportunity than you have." And his nostrils curled as he bent his defenceless head over that of the boy, and pressed a little harder with his thumbs. The other gnashed his teeth, and his great hand tightened on his stick. But he could not strike like that. And his enemy knew it; trust him to know when he was safe! "I'm not going to prison for ye," said Musk, "if that's what you want. I daresay you'd think that worth a crack on the head to get me locked up for a bit; well, then, you shan't. Do you leave go o' the kid, and I won't swear no more." The effort at self-control was plain enough, as Carlton looked up, without complying all at once. "One moment," he said. "You sent him here yourself, I think?" "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." "I do not ask your forgiveness----" "Glad to hear it."