ne. I want you to go to the Madawaska
River."

"No, I won't go to the Madawaska," replied Carnac after a long pause,
"but"--with sudden resolution--"if it's any good to you, I'll stay here
in the business, and you can go to the Madawaska. Show me what to do
here; tell me how to do it, and I'll try to help you out for a while--if
it can be done," he added hastily. "You go, but I'll stay. Let's talk it
over at supper."

He sighed, and turned and gazed warmly at the sunset on the roofs of the
city; then turned to his father's face, but it was not the same look in
his eyes.

CHAPTER V. CARNAC AS MANAGER

Carnac was installed in the office, and John Grier went to the
Madawaska. Before he left, however, he was with Carnac for near a week,
showing the procedure and the main questions that might arise to be
solved.

"It's like this," said Grier in their last talk, "you've got to keep
a stiff hand over the foremen and overseers, and have strict watch of
Belloc & Co. Perhaps there will be trouble when I've gone, but, if it
does, keep a stiff upper lip, and don't let the gang do you. You've got
a quick mind and you know how to act sudden. Act at once, and damn the
consequences! Remember, John Grier's firm has a reputation, and deal
justly, but firmly, with opposition. The way it's organized, the
business almost runs itself. But that's only when the man at the head
keeps his finger on the piston-rod. You savvy, don't you?"

"I savvy all right. If the Belloc firm cuts up rusty, I'll think of what
you'd do and try to do it in the same way."

The old man smiled. He liked the spirit in Carnac. It was the right kind
for his business. "I predict this: if you have one fight with the Belloc
lot, you'll hate them too. Keep the flag flying. Don't get rattled. It's
a big job, and it's worth doing in a big way.

"Yes, it's a big job," said Carnac. "I hope I'll pull it off."

"You'll pull it off, if you bend your mind to it. But there won't be any
time for your little pictures and statues. You'll have to deal with
the real men, and they'll lose their glamour. That's the thing about
business--it's death to sentimentality."

Carnac flushed with indignation. "So you think Titian and Velasquez and
Goyot and El Greco and Watteau and Van Dyck and Rembrandt and all the
rest were sentimentalists, do you? The biggest men in the world worship
them. You aren't just to the greatest intellects. I suppose Shakespeare
was a sentimentalist!"