The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
Vicente Blasco Ibanez

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
(Los Cuatro Jinettes del Apocalipsis)

by Vicente Blasco Ibanez


Translated by Charlotte Brewster Jordan




CONTENTS

PART I

I. THE TRYST--IN THE GARDEN OF THE EXPIATORY CHAPEL
II. MADARIAGA, THE CENTAUR
III. THE DESNOYERS FAMILY
IV. THE COUSIN FROM BERLIN
V. IN WHICH APPEAR THE FOUR HORSEMEN


PART II

I. WHAT DON MARCELO ENVIED
II. NEW LIFE
III. THE RETREAT
IV. NEAR THE SACRED GROTTO
V. THE INVASION
VI. THE BANNER OF THE RED CROSS


PART III

I. AFTER THE MARNE
II. IN THE STUDIO
IV. "NO ONE WILL KILL HIM"
V. THE BURIAL FIELDS




PART I



CHAPTER I

THE TRYST


(In the Garden of the Chapelle Expiatoire)


They were to have met in the garden of the Chapelle Expiatoire at
five o'clock in the afternoon, but Julio Desnoyers with the
impatience of a lover who hopes to advance the moment of meeting by
presenting himself before the appointed time, arrived an half hour
earlier.  The change of the seasons was at this time greatly
confused in his mind, and evidently demanded some readjustment.

Five months had passed since their last interview in this square had
afforded the wandering lovers the refuge of a damp, depressing
calmness near a boulevard of continual movement close to a great
railroad station.  The hour of the appointment was always five and
Julio was accustomed to see his beloved approaching by the
reflection of the recently lit street lamps, her figure enveloped in
furs, and holding her muff before her face as if it were a half-
mask.  Her sweet voice, greeting him, had breathed forth a cloud of
vapor, white and tenuous, congealed by the cold.  After various
hesitating interviews, they had abandoned the garden.  Their love
had acquired the majestic importance of acknowledged fact, and from
five to seven had taken refuge in the fifth floor of the rue de la
Pompe where Julio had an artist's studio.  The curtains well drawn
over the double glass windows, the cosy hearth-fire sending forth
its ruddy flame as the only light of the room, the monotonous song
of the samovar bubbling near the cups of tea--all the seclusion of
life isolated by an idolizing love--had dulled their perceptions to
the fact that the afternoons were growing longer, that outside the
sun was shining later and later into the pearl-covered depths of the
clouds, and that a timid and pallid Spring was beginning to show its
green finger tips in the buds of the branches suffering the last
nips of Winter--that wild, black boar who so often turned on his
tracks.

Then Julio had made his trip to Buenos Aires, encountering in the
other hemisphere the last smile of Autumn and the first icy winds
from the pampas.  And just as his mind was becoming reconciled to
the fact that for him Winter was an eternal season--since it always
came to meet him in his change of domicile from one extreme of the
planet to the other--lo, Summer was unexpectedly confronting him in
this dreary garden!

A swarm of children was racing and screaming through the short
avenues around the monument.  On entering the place, the first thing
that Julio encountered was a hoop which came rolling toward his
legs, trundled by a childish hand.  Then he stumbled over a ball.
Around the chestnut trees was gathering the usual warm-weather
crowd, seeking the blue shade perforated with points of light.  Many
nurse-maids from the neighboring houses were working and chattering
here, following with indifferent glances the rough games of the
children confided to their care.  Near them were the men who had
brought their papers down into the garden under the impression that
they could read them in the midst of peaceful groves.  All of the
benches were full.  A few women were occupying camp stools with that
feeling of superiority which ownership always confers.  The iron
chairs, "pay-seats," were serving as resting places for various
suburban dames, loaded down with packages, who were waiting for
straggling members of their families in order to take the train in
the Gare Saint Lazare. . . .

And Julio, in his special delivery letter, had proposed meeting in
this place, supposing that it would be as little frequented as in
former times.  She, too, with the same thoughtlessness, had in her
reply, set the usual hour of five o'clock, believing that after
passing a few minutes in the Printemps or the Galeries on the
unfrequented garden without risk of being seen by any of her
numerous acquaintances.

Desnoyers was enjoying an almost forgotten sensation, that of
strolling through vast spaces, crushing as he walked the grains of
sand under his feet.  For the past twenty days his rovings had been
upon planks, following with the automatic precision of a riding
school the oval promenade on the deck of a ship.  His feet
accustomed to insecure ground, still were keeping on terra firma a
certain sensation of elastic unsteadiness.  His goings and comings
were not awakening the curiosity of the people seated in the open,
for a common preoccupation seemed to be monopolizing all the men and
women.  The groups were exchanging impressions.  Those who happened
to have a paper in their hands, saw their neighbors approaching them
with a smile of interrogation.  There had suddenly disappeared that
distrust and suspicion which impels the inhabitants of large cities
mutually to ignore one another, taking each other's measure at a
glance as though they were enemies.

"They are talking about the war," said Desnoyers to himself.  "At
this time, all Paris speaks of nothing but the possibility of war."

Outside of the garden he could see also the same anxiety which was
making those around him so fraternal and sociable.  The venders of
newspapers were passing through the boulevard crying the evening
editions, their furious speed repeatedly slackened by the eager
hands of the passers-by contending for the papers.  Every reader was
instantly surrounded by a group begging for news or trying to
decipher over his shoulder the great headlines at the top of the
sheet.  In the rue des Mathurins, on the other side of the square, a
circle of workmen under the awning of a tavern were listening to the
comments of a friend who accompanied his words with oratorical
gestures and wavings of the paper.  The traffic in the streets, the
general bustle of the city was the same as in other days, but it
seemed to Julio that the vehicles were whirling past more rapidly,
that there was a feverish agitation in the air and that people were
speaking and smiling in a different way.  The women of the garden
were looking even at him as if they had seen him in former days.  He
was able to approach them and begin a conversation without
experiencing the slightest strangeness.

"They are talking of the war," he said again but with the
commiseration of a superior intelligence which foresees the future
and feels above the impressions of the vulgar crowd.

He knew exactly what course he was going to follow.  He had
disembarked at ten o'clock the night before, and as it was not yet
twenty-four hours since he had touched land, his mentality was still
that of a man who comes from afar, across oceanic immensities, from
boundless horizons, and is surprised at finding himself in touch
with the preoccupations which govern human communities.  After
disembarking he had spent two hours in a cafe in Boulogne,
listlessly watching the middle-class families who passed their time
in the monotonous placidity of a life without dangers.  Then the
special train for the passengers from South America had brought him
to Paris, leaving him at four in the morning on a platform of the
Gare du Nord in the embrace of Pepe Argensola, the young Spaniard
whom he sometimes called "my secretary" or "my valet" because it was
difficult to define exactly the relationship between them.  In
reality, he was a mixture of friend and parasite, the poor comrade,
complacent and capable in his companionship with a rich youth on bad
terms with his family, sharing with him the ups and downs of
fortune, picking up the crumbs of prosperous days, or inventing
expedients to keep up appearances in the hours of poverty.

"What about the war?" Argensola had asked him before inquiring about
the result of his trip.  "You have come a long ways and should know
much."

Soon he was sound asleep in his dear old bed while his "secretary"
was pacing up and down the studio talking of Servia, Russia and the
Kaiser.  This youth, too, skeptical as he generally was about
everything not connected with his own interests, appeared infected
by the general excitement.

When Desnoyers awoke he found her note awaiting him, setting their
meeting at five that afternoon and also containing a few words about
the threatened danger which was claiming the attention of all Paris.
welcoming him back, had asked him the war news.  And in the
restaurant, the cafe and the street, always war . . . the
possibility of war with Germany. . . .

Julio was an optimist.  What did all this restlessness signify to a
man who had just been living more than twenty days among Germans,
crossing the Atlantic under the flag of the Empire?

He had sailed from Buenos Aires in a steamer of the Hamburg line,
the Koenig Frederic August.  The world was in blessed tranquillity
when the boat left port.  Only the whites and half-breeds of Mexico
were exterminating each other in conflicts in order that nobody
might believe that man is an animal degenerated by peace.  On the
rest of the planet, the people were displaying unusual prudence.
Even aboard the transatlantic liner, the little world of passengers
of most diverse nationalities appeared a fragment of future society
implanted by way of experiment in modern times--a sketch of the
hereafter, without frontiers or race antagonisms.

One morning the ship band which every Sunday had sounded the Choral
of Luther, awoke those sleeping in the first-class cabins with the
most unheard-of serenade.  Desnoyers rubbed his eyes believing
himself under the hallucinations of a dream.  The German horns were
playing the Marseillaise through the corridors and decks.  The
steward, smiling at his astonishment, said, "The fourteenth of
July!"  On the German steamers they celebrate as their own the great
festivals of all the nations represented by their cargo and
passengers.  Their captains are careful to observe scrupulously the
rites of this religion of the flag and its historic commemoration.
The most insignificant republic saw the ship decked in its honor,
affording one more diversion to help combat the monotony of the
voyage and further the lofty ends of the Germanic propaganda.  For
the first time the great festival of France was being celebrated on
a German vessel, and whilst the musicians continued escorting a racy
Marseillaise in double quick time through the different floors, the
morning groups were commenting on the event.

"What finesse!" exclaimed the South American ladies.  "These Germans
are not so phlegmatic as they seem.  It is an attention . . .
something very distinguished. . . .  And is it possible that some
still believe that they and the French might come to blows?"

The very few Frenchmen who were travelling on the steamer found
themselves admired as though they had increased immeasurably in
public esteem.  There were only three;--an old jeweller who had been
visiting his branch shops in America, and two demi-mondaines from
the rue de la Paix, the most timid and well-behaved persons aboard,
vestals with bright eyes and disdainful noses who held themselves
stiffly aloof in this uncongenial atmosphere.

At night there was a gala banquet in the dining room at the end of
which the French flag and that of the Empire formed a flaunting,
conspicuous drapery.  All the German passengers were in dress suits,
and their wives were wearing low-necked gowns.  The uniforms of the
attendants were as resplendent as on a day of a grand review.

During dessert the tapping of a knife upon a glass reduced the table
to sudden silence.  The Commandant was going to speak.  And this
brave mariner who united to his nautical functions the obligation of
making harangues at banquets and opening the dance with the lady of
most importance, began unrolling a string of words like the noise of
clappers between long intervals of silence.  Desnoyers knew a little
German as a souvenir of a visit to some relatives in Berlin, and so
was able to catch a few words.  The Commandant was repeating every
few minutes "peace" and "friends."  A table neighbor, a commercial
commissioner, offered his services as interpreter to Julio, with
that obsequiousness which lives on advertisement.

"The Commandant asks God to maintain peace between Germany and
France and hopes that the two peoples will become increasingly
friendly."

Another orator arose at the same table.  He was the most influential
of the German passengers, a rich manufacturer from Dusseldorf who
had just been visiting his agents in America.  He was never
mentioned by name.  He bore the title of Commercial Counsellor, and
among his countrymen was always Herr Comerzienrath and his wife was
entitled Frau Rath.  The Counsellor's Lady, much younger than her
important husband, had from the first attracted the attention of
Desnoyers.  She, too, had made an exception in favor of this young
Argentinian, abdicating her title from their first conversation.
"Call me Bertha," she said as condescendingly as a duchess of
Versailles might have spoken to a handsome abbot seated at her feet.
Her husband, also protested upon hearing Desnoyers call him
"Counsellor," like his compatriots.

"My friends," he said, "call me 'Captain.'  I command a company of
the Landsturm."  And the air with which the manufacturer accompanied
these words, revealed the melancholy of an unappreciated man
scorning the honors he has in order to think only of those he does
not possess.

While he was delivering his discourse, Julio was examining his small
head and thick neck which gave him a certain resemblance to a bull
dog.  In imagination he saw the high and oppressive collar of a
uniform making a double roll of fat above its stiff edge.  The
waxed, upright moustaches were bristling aggressively.  His voice
was sharp and dry as though he were shaking out his words. . . .
Thus the Emperor would utter his harangues, so the martial burgher,
with instinctive imitation, was contracting his left arm, supporting
his hand upon the hilt of an invisible sword.

In spite of his fierce and oratorical gesture of command, all the
listening Germans laughed uproariously at his first words, like men
who knew how to appreciate the sacrifice of a Herr Comerzienrath
when he deigns to divert a festivity.

"He is saying very witty things about the French," volunteered the
interpreter in a low voice, "but they are not offensive."

Julio had guessed as much upon hearing repeatedly the word
Franzosen.  He almost understood what the orator was saying--
"Franzosen--great children, light-hearted, amusing, improvident.
The things that they might do together if they would only forget
past grudges!"  The attentive Germans were no longer laughing.  The
Counsellor was laying aside his irony, that grandiloquent, crushing
irony, weighing many tons, as enormous as a ship.  Then he began
unrolling the serious part of his harangue, so that he himself, was
also greatly affected.

"He says, sir," reported Julio's neighbor, "that he wishes France to
become a very great nation so that some day we may march together
against other enemies . . . against OTHERS!"

And he winked one eye, smiling maliciously with that smile of common
intelligence which this allusion to the mysterious enemy always
awakened.

Finally the Captain-Counsellor raised his glass in a toast to
France.  "Hoch!" he yelled as though he were commanding an evolution
of his soldierly Reserves.  Three times he sounded the cry and all
the German contingent springing to their feet, responded with a
lusty Hoch while the band in the corridor blared forth the
Marseillaise.

Desnoyers was greatly moved.  Thrills of enthusiasm were coursing up
and down his spine.  His eyes became so moist that, when drinking
his champagne, he almost believed that he had swallowed some tears.
He bore a French name.  He had French blood in his veins, and this
that the gringoes were doing--although generally they seemed to him
ridiculous and ordinary--was really worth acknowledging.  The
subjects of the Kaiser celebrating the great date of the Revolution!
He believed that he was witnessing a great historic event.

"Very well done!" he said to the other South Americans at the near
tables.  "We must admit that they have done the handsome thing."

Then with the vehemence of his twenty-seven years, he accosted the
jeweller in the passage way, reproaching him for his silence.  He
was the only French citizen aboard.  He should have made a few words
of acknowledgment.  The fiesta was ending awkwardly through his
fault.

"And why have you not spoken as a son of France?" retorted the
jeweller.

"I am an Argentinian citizen," replied Julio.

And he left the older man believing that he ought to have spoken and
making explanations to those around him.  It was a very dangerous
thing, he protested, to meddle in diplomatic affairs.  Furthermore,
he had not instructions from his government.  And for a few hours he
believed that he had been on the point of playing a great role in
history.

Desnoyers passed the rest of the evening in the smoking room
attracted thither by the presence of the Counsellor's Lady.  The
Captain of the Landsturm, sticking a preposterous cigar between his
moustachios, was playing poker with his countrymen ranking next to
him in dignity and riches.  His wife stayed beside him most of the
time, watching the goings and comings of the stewards carrying great
bocks, without daring to share in this tremendous consumption of
beer.  Her special preoccupation was to keep vacant near her a seat
which Desnoyers might occupy.  She considered him the most
distinguished man on board because he was accustomed to taking
champagne with all his meals.  He was of medium height, a decided
brunette, with a small foot, which obliged her to tuck hers under
her skirts, and a triangular face under two masses of hair,
straight, black and glossy as lacquer, the very opposite of the type
of men about her.  Besides, he was living in Paris, in the city
which she had never seen after numerous trips in both hemispheres.

"Oh, Paris!  Paris!" she sighed, opening her eyes and pursing her
lips in order to express her admiration when she was speaking alone
to the Argentinian.  "How I should love to go there!"

And in order that he might feel free to tell her things about Paris,
she permitted herself certain confidences about the pleasures of
Berlin, but with a blushing modesty, admitting in advance that in
the world there was more--much more--that she wished to become
acquainted with.

While pacing around the Chapelle Expiatoire, Julio recalled with a
certain remorse the wife of Counsellor Erckmann.  He who had made
the trip to America for a woman's sake, in order to collect money
and marry her!  Then he immediately began making excuses for his
conduct.  Nobody was going to know.  Furthermore he did not pretend
to be an ascetic, and Bertha Erckmann was certainly a tempting
adventure in mid ocean.  Upon recalling her, his imagination always
saw a race horse--large, spare, roan colored, and with a long
stride.  She was an up-to-date German who admitted no defect in her
country except the excessive weight of its women, combating in her
person this national menace with every known system of dieting.  For
her every meal was a species of torment, and the procession of bocks
in the smoking room a tantalizing agony.  The slenderness achieved
and maintained by will power only made more prominent the size of
her frame, the powerful skeleton with heavy jaws and large teeth,
strong and dazzling, which perhaps suggested Desnoyers'
disrespectful comparison.  "She is thin, but enormous,
nevertheless!" was always his conclusion.

But then, he considered her, notwithstanding, the most distinguished
woman on board--distinguished for the sea--elegant in the style of
Munich, with clothes of indescribable colors that suggested Persian
art and the vignettes of mediaeval manuscripts.  The husband admired
Bertha's elegance, lamenting her childlessness in secret, almost as
though it were a crime of high treason.  Germany was magnificent
because of the fertility of its women.  The Kaiser, with his
artistic hyperbole, had proclaimed that the true German beauty
should have a waist measure of at least a yard and a half.

When Desnoyers entered into the smoking room in order to take the
seat which Bertha had reserved for him, her husband and his wealthy
hangers-on had their pack of cards lying idle upon the green felt.
Herr Rath was continuing his discourse and his listeners, taking
their cigars from their mouths, were emitting grunts of approbation.
The arrival of Julio provoked a general smile of amiability.  Here
was France coming to fraternize with them.  They knew that his
father was French, and that fact made him as welcome as though he
came in direct line from the palace of the Quai d'Orsay,
representing the highest diplomacy of the Republic.  The craze for
proselyting made them all promptly concede to him unlimited
importance.

"We," continued the Counsellor looking fixedly at Desnoyers as if he
were expecting a solemn declaration from him, "we wish to live on
good terms with France."

The youth nodded his head so as not to appear inattentive.  It
appeared to him a very good thing that these peoples should not be
enemies, and as far as he was concerned, they might affirm this
relationship as often as they wished: the only thing that was
interesting him just at that time was a certain knee that was
seeking his under the table, transmitting its gentle warmth through
a double curtain of silk.

"But France," complained the manufacturer, "is most unresponsive
towards us.  For many years past, our Emperor has been holding out
his hand with noble loyalty, but she pretends not to see it. . . .
That, you must admit, is not as it should be."

Just here Desnoyers believed that he ought to say something in order
that the spokesman might not divine his more engrossing occupation.

"Perhaps you are not doing enough.  If, first of all, you would
return that which you took away from France!" . . .

Stupefied silence followed this remark, as if the alarm signal had
sounded through the boat.  Some of those who were about putting
their cigars in their mouths, remained with hands immovable within
two inches of their lips, their eyes almost popping out of their
heads.  But the Captain of the Landsturm was there to formulate
their mute protest.

"Return!" he said in a voice almost extinguished by the sudden
swelling of his neck.  "We have nothing to return, for we have taken
nothing.  That which we possess, we acquire by our heroism."

The hidden knee with its agreeable friction made itself more
insinuating, as though counselling the youth to greater prudence.

"Do not say such things," breathed Bertha, "thus only the
republicans, corrupted by Paris, talk.  A youth so distinguished who
has been in Berlin, and has relatives in Germany!" . . .

But Desnoyers felt a hereditary impulse of aggressiveness before
each of her husband's statements, enunciated in haughty tones, and
responded coldly:--

"It is as if I should take your watch and then propose that we
should be friends, forgetting the occurrence.  Although you might
forget, the first thing for me to do would be to return the watch."

Counsellor Erckmann wished to retort with so many things at once
that he stuttered horribly, leaping from one idea to the other.  To
compare the reconquest of Alsace to a robbery.  A German country!
The race . . . the language . . . the history! . . .

"But when did they announce their wish to be German?" asked the
youth without losing his calmness.  "When have you consulted their
opinion?"

The Counsellor hesitated, not knowing whether to argue with this
insolent fellow or crush him with his scorn.

"Young man, you do not know what you are talking about," he finally
blustered with withering contempt.  "You are an Argentinian and do
not understand the affairs of Europe."

And the others agreed, suddenly repudiating the citizenship which
they had attributed to him a little while before.  The Counsellor,
with military rudeness, brusquely turned his back upon him, and
taking up the pack, distributed the cards.  The game was renewed.
Desnoyers, seeing himself isolated by the scornful silence, felt
greatly tempted to break up the playing by violence; but the hidden
knee continued counselling self-control, and an invisible hand had
sought his right, pressing it sweetly.  That was enough to make him
recover his serenity.  The Counsellor's Lady seemed to be absorbed
in the progress of the game.  He also looked on, a malignant smile
contracting slightly the lines of his mouth as he was mentally
ejaculating by way of consolation, "Captain, Captain! . . .  You
little know what is awaiting you!"

On terra firma, he would never again have approached these men; but
life on a transatlantic liner, with its inevitable promiscuousness,
obliges forgetfulness.  The following day the Counsellor and his
friends came in search of him, flattering his sensibilities by
erasing every irritating memory.  He was a distinguished youth
belonging to a wealthy family, and all of them had shops and
business in his country.  The only thing was that he should be
careful not to mention his French origin.  He was an Argentinian;
and thereupon, the entire chorus interested itself in the grandeur
of his country and all the nations of South America where they had
agencies or investments--exaggerating its importance as though its
petty republics were great powers, commenting with gravity upon the
deeds and words of its political leaders and giving him to
understand that in Germany there was no one who was not concerned
about the future of South America, predicting for all its divisions
most glorious prosperity--a reflex of the Empire, always, provided,
of course, that they kept under Germanic influence.

In spite of these flatteries, Desnoyers was no longer presenting
himself with his former assiduity at the hour of poker.  The
Counsellor's wife was retiring to her stateroom earlier than usual--
their approach to the Equator inducing such an irresistible desire
for sleep, that she had to abandon her husband to his card playing.
Julio also had mysterious occupations which prevented his appearance
on deck until after midnight.  With the precipitation of a man who
desires to be seen in order to avoid suspicion, he was accustomed to
enter the smoking room talking loudly as he seated himself near the
husband and his boon companions.

The game had ended, and an orgy of beer and fat cigars from Hamburg
was celebrating the success of the winners.  It was the hour of
Teutonic expansion, of intimacy among men, of heavy, sluggish jokes,
of off-color stories.  The Counsellor was presiding with much
majesty over the diableries of his chums, prudent business men from
the Hanseatic ports who had big accounts in the Deutsche Bank or
were shopkeepers installed in the republic of the La Plata, with an
innumerable family.  He was a warrior, a captain, and on applauding
every heavy jest with a laugh that distended his fat neck, he
fancied that he was among his comrades at arms.

In honor of the South Americans who, tired of pacing the deck, had
dropped in to hear what the gringoes were saying, they were turning
into Spanish the witticisms and licentious anecdotes awakened in the
memory by a superabundance of beer.  Julio was marvelling at the
ready laugh of all these men.  While the foreigners were remaining
unmoved, they would break forth into loud horse-laughs throwing
themselves back in their seats.  And when the German audience was
growing cold, the story-teller would resort to an infallible
expedient to remedy his lack of success:--

"They told this yarn to the Kaiser, and when the Kaiser heard it he
laughed heartily."

It was not necessary to say more.  They all laughed then.  Ha, ha,
ha! with a spontaneous roar but a short one, a laugh in three blows,
since to prolong it, might be interpreted as a lack of respect to
His Majesty.

As they neared Europe, a batch of news came to meet the boat.  The
employees in the wireless telegraphy office were working
incessantly.  One night, on entering the smoking room, Desnoyers saw
the German notables gesticulating with animated countenances.  They
were no longer drinking beer.  They had had bottles of champagne
uncorked, and the Counsellor's Lady, much impressed, had not retired
to her stateroom.  Captain Erckmann, spying the young Argentinian,
offered him a glass.

"It is war," he shouted with enthusiasm.  "War at last. . . .  The
hour has come!"

Desnoyers made a gesture of astonishment.  War! . . .  What war? . . .
Like all the others, he had read on the news bulletin outside a
radiogram stating that the Austrian government had just sent an
ultimatum to Servia; but it made not the slightest impression on
him, for he was not at all interested in the Balkan affairs.  Those
were but the quarrels of a miserable little nation monopolizing the
attention of the world, distracting it from more worthwhile matters.
How could this event concern the martial Counsellor?  The two
nations would soon come to an understanding.  Diplomacy sometimes
amounted to something.

"No," insisted the German ferociously.  "It is war, blessed war.
Russia will sustain Servia, and we will support our ally. . . .
What will France do?  Do you know what France will do?" . . .

Julio shrugged his shoulders testily as though asking to be left out
of all international discussions.

"It is war," asserted the Counsellor, "the preventive war that we
need.  Russia is growing too fast, and is preparing to fight us.
Four years more of peace and she will have finished her strategic
railroads, and her military power, united to that of her allies,
will be worth as much as ours.  It is better to strike a powerful
blow now.  It is necessary to take advantage of this opportunity. . . .
War.  Preventive war!"

All his clan were listening in silence.  Some did not appear to feel
the contagion of his enthusiasm.  War! . . .  In imagination they
saw their business paralyzed, their agencies bankrupt, the banks
cutting down credit . . . a catastrophe more frightful to them than
the slaughters of battles.  But they applauded with nods and grunts
all of Erckmann's ferocious demonstrations.  He was a Herr Rath, and
an officer besides.  He must be in the secrets of the destiny of his
country, and that was enough to make them drink silently to the
success of the war.

Julio thought that the Counsellor and his admirers must be drunk.
"Look here, Captain," he said in a conciliatory tone, "what you say
lacks logic.  How could war possibly be acceptable to industrial
Germany?  Every moment its business is increasing, every month it
conquers a new market and every year its commercial balance soars
upward in unheard of proportions.  Sixty years ago, it had to man
its boats with Berlin hack drivers arrested by the police.  Now its
commercial fleets and war vessels cross all oceans, and there is no
port where the German merchant marine does not occupy the greatest
part of the docks.  It would only be necessary to continue living in
this way, to put yourselves beyond the exigencies of war!  Twenty
years more of peace, and the Germans would be lords of the world's
commerce, conquering England, the former mistress of the seas, in a
bloodless struggle.  And are they going to risk all this--like a
gambler who stakes his entire fortune on a single card--in a
struggle that might result unfavorably?" . . .

"No, war," insisted the Counsellor furiously, "preventive war.  We
live surrounded by our enemies, and this state of things cannot go
on.  It is best to end it at once.  Either they or we!  Germany
feels herself strong enough to challenge the world.  We've got to
put an end to this Russian menace!  And if France doesn't keep
herself quiet, so much the worse for her! . . .  And if anyone
else . . . ANYONE dares to come in against us, so much the worse
for him!  When I set up a new machine in my shops, it is to make
it produce unceasingly.  We possess the finest army in the world,
and it is necessary to give it exercise that it may not rust out."

He then continued with heavy emphasis, "They have put a band of iron
around us in order to throttle us.  But Germany has a strong chest
and has only to expand in order to burst its bands.  We must awake
before they manacle us in our sleep.  Woe to those who then oppose
us! . . ."

Desnoyers felt obliged to reply to this arrogance.  He had never
seen the iron circle of which the Germans were complaining.  The
nations were merely unwilling to continue living, unsuspecting and
inactive, before boundless German ambition.  They were simply
preparing to defend themselves against an almost certain attack.
They wished to maintain their dignity, repeatedly violated under

"I wonder if it is not the others," he concluded, "who are obliged
to defend themselves because you represent a menace to the world!"

An invisible hand sought his under the table, as it had some nights
before, to recommend prudence; but now he clasped it forcibly with
the authority of a right acquired.

"Oh, sir!" sighed the sweet Bertha, "to talk like that, a youth so
distinguished who has . . ."

She was not able to finish, for her husband interrupted.  They were
no longer in American waters, and the Counsellor expressed himself
with the rudeness of a master of his house.

"I have the honor to inform you, young man," he said, imitating the
cutting coldness of the diplomats, "that you are merely a South
American and know nothing of the affairs of Europe."

He did not call him an "Indian," but Julio heard the implication as
though he had used the word itself.  Ah, if that hidden handclasp
had not held him with its sentimental thrills! . . .  But this
contact kept him calm and even made him smile.  "Thanks, Captain,"
he said to himself.  "It is the least you can do to get even with
me!"

Here his relations with the German and his clientele came to an end.
The merchants, as they approached nearer and nearer to their native
land, began casting off that servile desire of ingratiating
themselves which they had assumed in all their trips to the new
world.  They now had more important things to occupy them.  The
telegraphic service was working without cessation.  The Commandant
of the vessel was conferring in his apartment with the Counsellor as
his compatriot of most importance.  His friends were hunting out the
most obscure places in order to talk confidentially with one
another.  Even Bertha commenced to avoid Desnoyers.  She was still
smiling distantly at him, but that smile was more of a souvenir than
a reality.

Between Lisbon and the coast of England, Julio spoke with her
husband for the last time.  Every morning was appearing on the
bulletin board the alarming news transmitted by radiograph.  The
Empire was arming itself against its enemies.  God would punish
them, making all manner of troubles fall upon them.  Desnoyers was
motionless with astonishment before the last piece of news--"Three
hundred thousand revolutionists are now besieging Paris.  The
suburbs are beginning to burn.  The horrors of the Commune have
broken out again."

"My, but these Germans have gone mad!" exclaimed the disgusted youth
to the curious group surrounding the radio-sheet.  "We are going to
lose the little sense that we have left! . . .  What revolutionists
are they talking about?  How could a revolution break out in Paris
if the men of the government are not reactionary?"

A gruff voice sounded behind him, rude, authoritative, as if trying
to banish the doubts of the audience.  It was the Herr Comerzienrath
who was speaking.

"Young man, these notices are sent us by the first agencies of
Germany . . . and Germany never lies."

After this affirmation, he turned his back upon them and they saw
him no more.

On the following morning, the last day of the voyage.  Desnoyers'
steward awoke him in great excitement.  "Herr, come up on deck! a
most beautiful spectacle!"

The sea was veiled by the fog, but behind its hazy curtains could be
distinguished some silhouettes like islands with great towers and
sharp, pointed minarets.  The islands were advancing over the oily
waters slowly and majestically, with impressive dignity.  Julio
counted eighteen.  They appeared to fill the ocean.  It was the
Channel Fleet which had just left the English coast by Government
order, sailing around simply to show its strength.  Seeing this
procession of dreadnoughts for the first time, Desnoyers was
reminded of a flock of marine monsters, and gained a better idea of
the British power.  The German ship passed among them, shrinking,
humiliated, quickening its speed.  "One might suppose," mused the
youth, "that she had an uneasy conscience and wished to scud to
safety."  A South American passenger near him was jesting with one
of the Germans, "What if they have already declared war! . . .  What
if they should make us prisoners!"

After midday, they entered Southampton roads.  The Frederic August
hurried to get away as soon as possible, and transacted business
with dizzying celerity.  The cargo of passengers and baggage was
enormous.  Two launches approached the transatlantic and discharged
an avalanche of Germans residents in England who invaded the decks
with the joy of those who tread friendly soil, desiring to see
Hamburg as soon as possible.  Then the boat sailed through the
Channel with a speed most unusual in these places.

The people, leaning on the railing, were commenting on the
extraordinary encounters in this marine boulevard, usually
frequented by ships of peace.  Certain smoke lines on the horizon
were from the French squadron carrying President Poincare who was
returning from Russia.  The European alarm had interrupted his trip.
Then they saw more English vessels patrolling the coast line like
aggressive and vigilant dogs.  Two North American battleships could
be distinguished by their mast-heads in the form of baskets.  Then a
Russian battleship, white and glistening, passed at full steam on
its way to the Baltic.  "Bad!" said the South American passengers
regretfully.  "Very bad!  It looks this time as if it were going to
be serious!" and they glanced uneasily at the neighboring coasts on
both sides.  Although they presented the usual appearance, behind
them, perhaps, a new period of history was in the making.

The transatlantic was due at Boulogne at midnight where it was
supposed to wait until daybreak to discharge its passengers
comfortably.  It arrived, nevertheless, at ten, dropped anchor
outside the harbor, and the Commandant gave orders that the
disembarkation should take place in less than an hour.  For this
reason they had quickened their speed, consuming a vast amount of
extra coal.  It was necessary to get away as soon as possible,
seeking the refuge of Hamburg.  The radiographic apparatus had
evidently been working to some purpose.

By the glare of the bluish searchlights which were spreading a livid
clearness over the sea, began the unloading of passengers and
baggage for Paris, from the transatlantic into the tenders.  "Hurry!
Hurry!"  The seamen were pushing forward the ladies of slow step who
were recounting their valises, believing that they had lost some.
The stewards loaded themselves up with babies as though they were
bundles.  The general precipitation dissipated the usual exaggerated
and oily Teutonic amiability.  "They are regular bootlickers,"
thought Desnoyers.  "They believe that their hour of triumph has
come, and do not think it necessary to pretend any longer." . . .

He was soon in a launch that was bobbing up and down on the waves
near the black and immovable hulk of the great liner, dotted with
many circles of light and filled with people waving handkerchiefs.
Julio recognized Bertha who was waving her hand without seeing him,
without knowing in which tender he was, but feeling obliged to show
her gratefulness for the sweet memories that now were being lost in
the mystery of the sea and the night.  "Adieu, Frau Rath!"

The distance between the departing transatlantic and the lighters
was widening.  As though it had been awaiting this moment with
impunity, a stentorian voice on the upper deck shouted with a noisy
guffaw, "See you later!  Soon we shall meet you in Paris!"  And the
marine band, the very same band that three days before had
astonished Desnoyers with its unexpected Marseillaise, burst forth
into a military march of the time of Frederick the Great--a march of
grenadiers with an accompaniment of trumpets.

That had been the night before.  Although twenty-four hours had not
yet passed by, Desnoyers was already considering it as a distant
event of shadowy reality.  His thoughts, always disposed to take the
opposite side, did not share in the general alarm.  The insolence of
the Counsellor now appeared to him but the boastings of a burgher
turned into a soldier.  The disquietude of the people of Paris, was
but the nervous agitation of a city which lived placidly and became
alarmed at the first hint of danger to its comfort.  So many times
they had spoken of an immediate war, always settling things
peacefully at the last moment! . . .  Furthermore he did not want
war to come because it would upset all his plans for the future; and
the man accepted as logical and reasonable everything that suited
his selfishness, placing it above reality.

"No, there will not be war," he repeated as he continued pacing up
and down the garden.  "These people are beside themselves.  How
could a war possibly break out in these days?" . . .

And after disposing of his doubts, which certainly would in a short
time come up again, he thought of the joy of the moment, consulting
his watch.  Five o'clock!  She might come now at any minute!  He
thought that he recognized her afar off in a lady who was passing
through the grating by the rue Pasquier.  She seemed to him a little
different, but it occurred to him that possibly the Summer fashions
might have altered her appearance.  But soon he saw that he had made
a mistake.  She was not alone, another lady was with her.  They were
perhaps English or North American women who worshipped the memory of
Marie Antoinette and wished to visit the Chapelle Expiatoire, the
old tomb of the executed queen.  Julio watched them as they climbed
the flights of steps and crossed the interior patio in which were
interred the eight hundred Swiss soldiers killed in the attack of
the Tenth of August, with other victims of revolutionary fury.

Disgusted at his error, he continued his tramp.  His ill humor made
the monument with which the Bourbon restoration had adorned the old
cemetery of the Madeleine, appear uglier than ever to him.  Time was
passing, but she did not come.  Every time that he turned, he looked
hungrily at the entrances of the garden.  And then it happened as in
all their meetings.  She suddenly appeared as if she had fallen from
the sky or risen up from the ground, like an apparition.  A cough, a
slight rustling of footsteps, and as he turned, Julio almost
collided with her.

"Marguerite!  Oh, Marguerite!" . . .

It was she, and yet he was slow to recognize her.  He felt a certain
strangeness in seeing in full reality the countenance which had
occupied his imagination for three months, each time more
spirituelle and shadowy with the idealism of absence.  But his
doubts were of short duration.  Then it seemed as though time and
space were eliminated, that he had not made any voyage, and but a
few hours had intervened since their last interview.

Marguerite divined the expansion which might follow Julio's
exclamations, the vehement hand-clasp, perhaps something more, so
she kept herself calm and serene.

"No; not here," she said with a grimace of repugnance.  "What a
ridiculous idea for us to have met here!"

They were about to seat themselves on the iron chairs, in the shadow
of some shrubbery, when she rose suddenly.  Those who were passing
along the boulevard might see them by merely casting their eyes
toward the garden.  At this time, many of her friends might be
passing through the neighborhood because of its proximity to the big
shops. . . .  They, therefore, sought refuge at a corner of the
monument, placing themselves between it and the rue des Mathurins.
Desnoyers brought two chairs near the hedge, so that when seated
they were invisible to those passing on the other side of the
railing.  But this was not solitude.  A few steps away, a fat,
nearsighted man was reading his paper, and a group of women were
chatting and embroidering.  A woman with a red wig and two dogs--
some housekeeper who had come down into the garden in order to give
her pets an airing--passed several times near the amorous pair,
smiling discreetly.

"How annoying!" groaned Marguerite.  "Why did we ever come to this
place!"

The two scrutinized each other carefully, wishing to see exactly
what transformation Time had wrought.

"You are darker than ever," she said.  "You look like a man of the
sea."

Julio was finding her even lovelier than before, and felt sure that
possessing her was well worth all the contrarieties which had
brought about his trip to South America.  She was taller than he,
with an elegantly proportioned slenderness.  "She has the musical
step," Desnoyers had told himself, when seeing her in his
imagination; and now, on beholding her again, the first thing that
he admired was her rhythmic tread, light and graceful as she passed
through the garden seeking another seat.  Her features were not
regular but they had a piquant fascination--a true Parisian face.
Everything that had been invented for the embellishment of feminine
charm was used about her person with the most exquisite
fastidiousness.  She had always lived for herself.  Only a few
months before had she abdicated a part of this sweet selfishness,
sacrificing reunions, teas, and calls in order to give Desnoyers
some of the afternoon hours.

Stylish and painted like a priceless doll, with no loftier ambition
than to be a model, interpreting with personal elegance the latest
confections of the modistes, she was at last experiencing the same
preoccupations and joys as other women, creating for herself an
inner life.  The nucleus of this new life, hidden under her former
frivolity, was Desnoyers.  Just as she was imagining that she had
reorganized her existence--adjusting the satisfactions of worldly
elegance to the delights of love in intimate secrecy--a fulminating
catastrophe (the intervention of her husband whose possible
appearance she seemed to have overlooked) had disturbed her
thoughtless happiness.  She who was accustomed to think herself the
centre of the universe, imagining that events ought to revolve
around her desires and tastes, had suffered this cruel surprise with
more astonishment than grief.

"And you, how do you think I look?" Marguerite queried.

"I must tell you that the fashion has changed.  The sheath skirt has
passed away.  Now it is worn short and with more fullness."

Desnoyers had to interest himself in her apparel with the same
devotion, mixing his appreciation of the latest freak of the
fashion-monger with his eulogies of Marguerite's beauty.

"Have you thought much about me?" she continued.  "You have not been
unfaithful to me a single time?  Not even once? . . .  Tell me the
truth; you know I can always tell when you are lying."

"I have always thought of you," he said putting his hand on his
heart, as if he were swearing before a judge.

And he said it roundly, with an accent of truth, since in his
infidelities--now completely forgotten--the memory of Marguerite had
always been present.

"But let us talk about you!" added Julio.  "What have you been doing
all the time?"

He had brought his chair nearer to hers, and their knees touched.
He took one of her hands, patting it and putting his finger in the
glove opening.  Oh, that accursed garden which would not permit
greater intimacy and obliged them to speak in a low tone, after
three months' absence! . . .  In spite of his discretion, the man
who was reading his paper raised his head and looked irritably at
them over his spectacles as though a fly were distracting him with
its buzzing. . . .  The very idea of talking love-nonsense in a
public garden when all Europe was threatened with calamity!

Repelling the audacious hand, Marguerite spoke tranquilly of her
existence during the last months.

"I have passed my life the best I could, but I have been greatly
bored.  You know that I am now living with mama, and mama is a lady
of the old regime who does not understand our tastes.  I have been
to the theatres with my brother.  I have made many calls on the
lawyer in order to learn the progress of my divorce and hurry it
along . . . and nothing else."

"And your husband?"

"Don't let's talk about him.  Do you want to?  I pity the poor man!
So good . . . so correct.  The lawyer assures me that he agrees to
everything and will not impose any obstacles.  They tell me that he
does not come to Paris, that he lives in his factory.  Our old home
is closed.  There are times when I feel remorseful over the way I
have treated him."

"And I?" queried Julio, withdrawing his hand.

"You are right," she returned smiling.  "You are Life.  It is cruel
but it is human.  We have to live our lives without taking others
into consideration.  It is necessary to be selfish in order to be
happy."

The two remained silent.  The remembrance of the husband had swept
across them like a glacial blast.  Julio was the first to brighten
up.

"And you have not danced in all this time?"

"No, how could I?  The very idea, a woman in divorce proceedings! . . .
I have not been to a single chic party since you went away.  I
wanted to preserve a certain decorous mourning fiesta.  How horrible
it was! . . .  It needed you, the Master!"

They had again clasped hands and were smiling.  Memories of the
previous months were passing before their eyes, visions of their
life from five to seven in the afternoon, dancing in the hotels of
the Champs Elysees where the tango had been inexorably associated
with a cup of tea.

She appeared to tear herself away from these recollections, impelled
by a tenacious obsession which had slipped from her mind in the
first moments of their meeting.

"Do you know much about what's happening?  Tell me all.  People talk
so much. . . .  Do you really believe that there will be war?  Don't
you think that it will all end in some kind of settlement?"

Desnoyers comforted her with his optimism.  He did not believe in
the possibility of a war.  That was ridiculous.

"I say so, too!  Ours is not the epoch of savages.  I have known
some Germans, chic and well-educated persons who surely must think
exactly as we do.  An old professor who comes to the house was
explaining yesterday to mama that wars are no longer possible in
these progressive times.  In two months' time, there would scarcely
be any men left, in three, the world would find itself without money
to continue the struggle.  I do not recall exactly how it was, but
he explained it all very clearly, in a manner most delightful to
hear."

She reflected in silence, trying to co-ordinate her confused
recollections, but dismayed by the effort required, added on her own
account.

"Just imagine what war would mean--how horrible!  Society life
paralyzed.  No more parties, nor clothes, nor theatres!  Why, it is
even possible that they might not design any more fashions!  All the
women in mourning.  Can you imagine it? . . .  And Paris deserted. . . .
How beautiful it seemed as I came to meet you this afternoon! . . .
No, no, it cannot be!  Next month, you know, we go to Vichy.
Mama needs the waters.  Then to Biarritz.  After that, I shall go to
a castle on the Loire.  And besides there are our affairs, my
divorce, our marriage which may take place the next year. . . .  And
is war to hinder and cut short all this!  No, no, it is not
possible.  My brother and others like him are foolish enough to
dream of danger from Germany.  I am sure that my husband, too, who
is only interested in serious and bothersome matters, is among those
who believe that war is imminent and prepare to take part in it.
What nonsense!  Tell me that it is all nonsense.  I need to hear you
say it."

Tranquilized by the affirmations of her lover, she then changed the
trend of the conversation.  The possibility of their approaching
marriage brought to mind the object of the voyage which Desnoyers
had just made.  There had not been time for them to write to each
other during their brief separation.

"Did you succeed in getting the money?  The joy of seeing you made
me forget all about such things. . . ."

Adopting the air of a business expert, he replied that he had
brought back less than he expected, for he had found the country in
the throes of one of its periodical panics; but still he had managed
to get together about four hundred thousand francs.  In his purse he
had a check for that amount.  Later on, they would send him further
remittances.  A ranchman in Argentina, a sort of relative, was
looking after his affairs.  Marguerite appeared satisfied, and in
spite of her frivolity, adopted the air of a serious woman.

"Money, money!" she exclaimed sententiously.  "And yet there is no
happiness without it!  With your four hundred thousand and what I
have, we shall be able to get along. . . .  I told you that my
husband wishes to give me back my dowry.  He has told my brother so.
But the state of his business, and the increased size of his factory
do not permit him to return it as quickly as he would like.  I can't
help but feel sorry for the poor man . . . so honorable and so
upright in every way.  If he only were not so commonplace! . . ."

Again Marguerite seemed to regret these tardy spontaneous eulogies
which were chilling their interview.  So again she changed the trend
of her chatter.

"And your family?  Have you seen them?" . . .

Desnoyers had been to his father's home before starting for the
Chapelle Expiatoire.  A stealthy entrance into the great house on
the avenue Victor Hugo, and then up to the first floor like a
tradesman.  Then he had slipt into the kitchen like a soldier
sweetheart of the maids.  His mother had come there to embrace him,
poor Dona Luisa, weeping and kissing him frantically as though she
had feared to lose him forever.  Close behind her mother had come
Luisita, nicknamed Chichi, who always surveyed him with sympathetic
curiosity as if she wished to know better a brother so bad and
adorable who had led decent women from the paths of virtue, and
committed all kinds of follies.  Then Desnoyers had been greatly
surprised to see entering the kitchen with the air of a tragedy
queen, a noble mother of the drama, his Aunt Elena, the one who had
married a German and was living in Berlin surrounded with
innumerable children.

"She has been in Paris a month.  She is going to make a little visit
to our castle.  And it appears that her eldest son--my cousin, 'The
Sage,' whom I have not seen for years--is also coming here."

The home interview had several times been interrupted by fear.
"Your father is at home, be careful," his mother had said to him
each time that he had spoken above a whisper.  And his Aunt Elena
had stationed herself at the door with a dramatic air, like a stage
heroine resolved to plunge a dagger into the tyrant who should dare
to cross the threshold.  The entire family was accustomed to submit
to the rigid authority of Don Marcelo Desnoyers.  "Oh, that old
man!" exclaimed Julio, referring to his father.  "He may live many
years yet, but how he weighs upon us all!"

His mother, who had never wearied of looking at him, finally had to
bring the interview to an end, frightened by certain approaching
sounds.  "Go, he might surprise us, and he would be furious."  So
Julio had fled the paternal home, caressed by the tears of the two
ladies and the admiring glances of Chichi, by turns ashamed and
proud of a brother who had caused such enthusiasm and scandal among
her friends.

Marguerite also spoke of Senor Desnoyers.  A terrible tyrant of the
old school with whom they could never come to an understanding.

The two remained silent, looking fixedly at each other.  Now that
they had said the things of greatest urgency, present interests
became more absorbing.  More immediate things, unspoken, seemed to
well up in their timid and vacillating eyes, before escaping in the
form of words.  They did not dare to talk like lovers here.  Every
minute the cloud of witnesses seemed increasing around them.  The
woman with the dogs and the red wig was passing with greater
frequency, shortening her turns through the square in order to greet
them with a smile of complicity.  The reader of the daily paper was
now exchanging views with a friend on a neighboring bench regarding
the possibilities of war.  The garden had become a thoroughfare.
The modistes upon going out from their establishments, and the
ladies returning from shopping, were crossing through the square in
order to shorten their walk.  The little avenue was a popular short-
cut.  All the pedestrians were casting curious glances at the
elegant lady and her companion seated in the shadow of the shrubbery
with the timid yet would-be natural look of those who desire to hide
themselves, yet at the same time feign a casual air.

"How exasperating!" sighed Marguerite.  "They are going to find us
out!"

A girl looked at her so searchingly that she thought she recognized
in her an employee of a celebrated modiste.  Besides, some of her
personal friends who had met her in the crowded shops but an hour
ago might be returning home by way of the garden.

"Let us go," she said rising hurriedly.  "If they should spy us here
together, just think what they might say! . . . and just when they
are becoming a little forgetful!"

Desnoyers protested crossly.  Go away? . . .  Paris had become a
shrunken place for them nowadays because Marguerite refused to go to
a single place where there was a possibility of their being
surprised.  In another square, in a restaurant, wherever they might
go--they would run the same risk of being recognized.  She would
only consider meetings in public places, and yet at the same time,
dreaded the curiosity of the people.  If Marguerite would like to go
to his studio of such sweet memories! . . .

"To your home?  No! no indeed!" she replied emphatically "I cannot
forget the last time I was there."

But Julio insisted, foreseeing a break in that firm negative.  Where
could they be more comfortable?  Besides, weren't they going to
marry as soon as possible? . . .

"I tell you no," she repeated.  "Who knows but my husband may be
watching me!  What a complication for my divorce if he should
surprise us in your house!"

Now it was he who eulogized the husband, insisting that such
watchfulness was incompatible with his character.  The engineer had
accepted the facts, considering them irreparable and was now
thinking only of reconstructing his life.

"No, it is better for us to separate," she continued.  "Tomorrow we
shall see each other again.  You will hunt a more favorable place.
Think it over, and you will find a solution for it all."

But he wished an immediate solution.  They had abandoned their
seats, going slowly toward the rue des Mathurins.  Julio was
speaking with a trembling and persuasive eloquence.  To-morrow?  No,
now.  They had only to call a taxicab.  It would be only a matter of
a few minutes, and then the isolation, the mystery, the return to a
sweet past--to that intimacy in the studio where they had passed
their happiest hours.  They would believe that no time had elapsed
since their first meetings.

"No," she faltered with a weakening accent, seeking a last
resistance.  "Besides, your secretary might be there, that Spaniard
who lives with you.  How ashamed I would be to meet him again!"

Julio laughed. . . .  Argensola!  How could that comrade who knew
all about their past be an obstacle?  If they should happen to meet
him in the house, he would be sure to leave immediately.  More than
once, he had had to go out so as not to be in the way.  His
discretion was such that he had foreseen events.  Probably he had
already left, conjecturing that a near visit would be the most
logical thing.  His chum would simply go wandering through the
streets in search of news.

exhausted.  Desnoyers was silent, too, construing her stillness as
assent.  They had left the garden and she was looking around
uneasily, terrified to find herself in the open street beside her
lover, and seeking a hiding-place.  Suddenly she saw before her the
little red door of an automobile, opened by the hand of her adorer.

"Get in," ordered Julio.

And she climbed in hastily, anxious to hide herself as soon as
possible.  The vehicle started at great speed.  Marguerite
immediately pulled down the shade of the window on her side, but,
before she had finished and could turn her head, she felt a hungry
mouth kissing the nape of her neck.

"No, not here," she said in a pleading tone.  "Let us be sensible!"

And while he, rebellious at these exhortations, persisted in his
advances, the voice of Marguerite again sounded above the noise of
the rattling machinery of the automobile as it bounded over the
pavement.

"Do you really believe that there will be no war?  Do you believe
that we will be able to marry? . . .  Tell me again.  I want you to
encourage me . . . I need to hear it from your lips."



CHAPTER II

MADARIAGA, THE CENTAUR


In 1870 Marcelo Desnoyers was nineteen years old.  He was born in
the suburbs of Paris, an only child; his father, interested in
little building speculations, maintained his family in modest
comfort.  The mason wished to make an architect of his son, and
Marcelo was in the midst of his preparatory studies when his father
suddenly died, leaving his affairs greatly involved.  In a few
months, he and his mother descended the slopes of ruin, and were
obliged to give up their snug, middle-class quarters and live like
laborers.

When the fourteen-year-old boy had to choose a trade, he learned
wood carving.  This craft was an art related to the tastes awakened
in Marcelo by his abandoned studies.  His mother retired to the
country, living with some relatives while the lad advanced rapidly
in the shops, aiding his master in all the important orders which he
received from the provinces.  The first news of the war with Prussia
surprised him in Marseilles, working on the decorations of a
theatre.

Marcelo was opposed to the Empire like all the youths of his
generation.  He was also much influenced by the older workmen who
had taken part in the Republic of '48, and who still retained vivid
recollections of the Coup d'Etat of the second of December.

One day he saw in the streets of Marseilles a popular manifestation
in favor of peace which was practically a protest against the
government.  The old republicans in their implacable struggle with
the Emperor, the companies of the International which had just been
organized, and a great number of Italians and Spaniards who had fled
their countries on account of recent insurrections, composed the
procession.  A long-haired, consumptive student was carrying the
flag.  "It is peace that we want--a peace which may unite all
mankind," chanted the paraders.  But on this earth, the noblest
propositions are seldom heard, since Destiny amuses herself in
perverting them and turning them aside.

Scarcely had the friends of peace entered the rue Cannebiere with
their hymn and standard, when war came to meet them, obliging them
to resort to fist and club.  The day before, some battalions of
Zouaves from Algiers had disembarked in order to reinforce the army
on the frontier, and these veterans, accustomed to colonial
existence and undiscriminating as to the cause of disturbances,
seized the opportunity to intervene in this manifestation, some with
bayonets and others with ungirded belts.  "Hurrah for War!" and a
rain of lashes and blows fell upon the unarmed singers.  Marcelo saw
the innocent student, the standard-bearer of peace, knocked down
wrapped in his flag, by the merry kicks of the Zouaves.  Then he
knew no more, since he had received various blows with a leather
strap, and a knife thrust in his shoulder; he had to run the same as
the others.

That day developed for the first time, his fiery, stubborn
character, irritable before contradiction, even to the point of
adopting the most extreme resolution.  "Down with War!"  Since it
was not possible for him to protest in any other way, he would leave
the country.  The Emperor might arrange his affairs as best he
could.  The struggle was going to be long and disastrous, according
to the enemies of the Empire.  If he stayed, he would in a few
months be drawn for the soldiery.  Desnoyers renounced the honor of
serving the Emperor.  He hesitated a little when he thought of his
mother.  But his country relatives would not turn her out, and he
planned to work very hard and send her money.  Who knew what riches
might be waiting for him, on the other side of the sea! . . .  Good-
bye, France!

Thanks to his savings, a harbor official found it to his interest to
offer him the choice of three boats.  One was sailing to Egypt,
another to Australia, another to Montevideo and Buenos Aires, which
made the strongest appeal to him? . . .  Desnoyers, remembering his
readings, wished to consult the wind and follow the course that it
indicated, as he had seen various heroes of novels do.  But that day
the wind blew from the sea toward France.  He also wished to toss up
a coin in order to test his fate.  Finally he decided upon the
vessel sailing first.  Not until, with his scanty baggage, he was
actually on the deck of the next boat to anchor, did he take any
interest in its course--"For the Rio de la Plata." . . .  And he
accepted these words with a fatalistic shrug.  "Very well, let it be
South America!"  The country was not distasteful to him, since he
knew it by certain travel publications whose illustrations
represented herds of cattle at liberty, half-naked, plumed Indians,
and hairy cowboys whirling over their heads serpentine lassos tipped
with balls.

The millionaire Desnoyers never forgot that trip to America--forty-
three days navigating in a little worn-out steamer that rattled like
a heap of old iron, groaned in all its joints at the slightest
roughness of the sea, and had to stop four times for repairs, at the
mercy of the winds and waves.

In Montevideo, he learned of the reverses suffered by his country
and that the French Empire no longer existed.  He felt a little
ashamed when he heard that the nation was now self-governing,
defending itself gallantly behind the walls of Paris.  And he had
fled! . . .  Months afterwards, the events of the Commune consoled
him for his flight.  If he had remained, wrath at the national
downfall, his relations with his co-laborers, the air in which he
lived--everything would surely have dragged him along to revolt.  In
that case, he would have been shot or consigned to a colonial prison
like so many of his former comrades.

So his determination crystallized, and he stopped thinking about the
affairs of his mother-country.  The necessities of existence in a
foreign land whose language he was beginning to pick up made him
think only of himself.  The turbulent and adventurous life of these
new nations compelled him to most absurd expedients and varied
occupations.  Yet he felt himself strong with an audacity and self-
reliance which he never had in the old world.  "I am equal to
everything," he said, "if they only give me time to prove it!"
Although he had fled from his country in order not to take up arms,
he even led a soldier's life for a brief period in his adopted land,
receiving a wound in one of the many hostilities between the whites
and reds in the unsettled districts.

In Buenos Aires, he again worked as a woodcarver.  The city was
beginning to expand, breaking its shell as a large village.
Desnoyers spent many years ornamenting salons and facades.  It was a
laborious existence, sedentary and remunerative.  But one day he
became tired of this slow saving which could only bring him a
mediocre fortune after a long time.  He had gone to the new world to
become rich like so many others.  And at twenty-seven, he started
forth again, a full-fledged adventurer, avoiding the cities, wishing
to snatch money from untapped, natural sources.  He worked farms in
the forests of the North, but the locusts obliterated his crops in a
few hours.  He was a cattle-driver, with the aid of only two peons,
driving a herd of oxen and mules over the snowy solitudes of the
Andes to Bolivia and Chile.  In this life, making journeys of many
months' duration, across interminable plains, he lost exact account
of time and space.  Just as he thought himself on the verge of
winning a fortune, he lost it all by an unfortunate speculation.
And in a moment of failure and despair, being now thirty years old,
he became an employee of Julio Madariaga.

He knew of this rustic millionaire through his purchases of flocks--
a Spaniard who had come to the country when very young, adapting
himself very easily to its customs, and living like a cowboy after
he had acquired enormous properties.  The country folk, wishing to
put a title of respect before his name, called him Don Madariaga.

"Comrade," he said to Desnoyers one day when he happened to be in a
good humor--a very rare thing for him--"you must have passed through
many ups and downs.  Your lack of silver may be smelled a long ways
off.  Why lead such a dog's life?  Trust in me, Frenchy, and remain
here!  I am growing old, and I need a man."

After the Frenchman had arranged to stay with Madariaga, every
landed proprietor living within fifteen or twenty leagues of the
ranch, stopped the new employee on the road to prophesy all sorts of
misfortune.

"You will not stay long.  Nobody can get along with Don Madariaga.
We have lost count of his overseers.  He is a man who must be killed
or deserted.  Soon you will go, too!"

Desnoyers did not doubt but that there was some truth in all this.
Madariaga was an impossible character, but feeling a certain
sympathy with the Frenchman, had tried not to annoy him with his
irritability.

"He's a regular pearl, this Frenchy," said the plainsman as though
trying to excuse himself for his considerate treatment of his latest
acquisition.  "I like him because he is very serious. . . .  That is
the way I like a man."

Desnoyers did not know exactly what this much-admired seriousness
could be, but he felt a secret pride in seeing him aggressive with
everybody else, even his family, whilst he took with him a tone of
paternal bluffness.

The family consisted of his wife Misia Petrona (whom he always
called the China) and two grown daughters who had gone to school in
Buenos Aires, but on returning to the ranch had reverted somewhat to
their original rusticity.

Madariaga's fortune was enormous.  He had lived in the field since
his arrival in America, when the white race had not dared to settle
outside the towns for fear of the Indians.  He had gained his first
money as a fearless trader, taking merchandise in a cart from fort
to fort.  He had killed Indians, was twice wounded by them, and for
a while had lived as a captive with an Indian chief whom he finally
succeeded in making his staunch friend.  With his earnings, he had
bought land, much land, almost worthless because of its insecurity,
devoting it to the raising of cattle that he had to defend, gun in
hand, from the pirates of the plains.

Then he had married his China, a young half-breed who was running
around barefoot, but owned many of her forefathers' fields.  They
had lived in an almost savage poverty on their property which would
have taken many a day's journey to go around.  Afterwards, when the
government was pushing the Indians towards the frontiers, and
offering the abandoned lands for sale, considering it a patriotic
sacrifice on the part of any one wishing to acquire them, Madariaga
bought and bought at the lowest figure and longest terms.  To get
possession of vast tracts and populate it with blooded stock became
the mission of his life.  At times, galloping with Desnoyers through
his boundless fields, he was not able to repress his pride.

"Tell me something, Frenchy!  They say that further up the country,
there are some nations about the size of my ranches.  Is that so?" . . .

The Frenchman agreed. . . .  The lands of Madariaga were indeed
greater than many principalities.  This put the old plainsman in
rare good humor and he exclaimed in the cowboy vernacular which had
become second nature to him--"Then it wouldn't be absurd to proclaim
myself king some day?  Just imagine it, Frenchy;--Don Madariaga, the
First. . . .  The worst of it all is that I would also be the last,
for the China will not give me a son. . . .  She is a weak cow!"

The fame of his vast territories and his wealth in stock reached
even to Buenos Aires.  Every one knew of Madariaga by name, although
very few had seen him.  When he went to the Capital, he passed
unnoticed because of his country aspect--the same leggings that he
was used to wearing in the fields, his poncho wrapped around him
like a muffler above which rose the aggressive points of a necktie,
a tormenting ornament imposed by his daughters, who in vain arranged
it with loving hands that he might look a little more respectable.

One day he entered the office of the richest merchant of the
capital.

"Sir, I know that you need some young bulls for the European market,
and I have come to sell you a few."

The man of affairs looked haughtily at the poor cowboy.  He might
explain his errand to one of the employees, he could not waste his
time on such small matters.  But the malicious grin on the rustic's
face awoke his curiosity.

"And how many are you able to sell, my good man?"

"About thirty thousand, sir."

It was not necessary to hear more.  The supercilious merchant sprang
from his desk, and obsequiously offered him a seat.

"You can be no other than Don Madariaga."

"At the service of God and yourself, sir," he responded in the
manner of a Spanish countryman.

That was the most glorious moment of his existence.

In the outer office of the Directors of the Bank, the clerks offered
him a seat until the personage the other side of the door should
deign to receive him.  But scarcely was his name announced than that
same director ran to admit him, and the employee was stupefied to
hear the ranchman say, by way of greeting, "I have come to draw out
three hundred thousand dollars.  I have abundant pasturage, and I
wish to buy a ranch or two in order to stock them."

His arbitrary and contradictory character weighed upon the
inhabitants of his lands with both cruel and good-natured tyranny.
No vagabond ever passed by the ranch without being rudely assailed
by its owner from the outset.

"Don't tell me any of your hard-luck stories, friend," he would yell
as if he were going to beat him.  "Under the shed is a skinned
beast; cut and eat as much as you wish and so help yourself to
continue your journey. . . .  But no more of your yarns!"

And he would turn his back upon the tramp, after giving him a few
dollars.

One day he became infuriated because a peon was nailing the wire
fencing too deliberately on the posts.  Everybody was robbing him!
The following day he spoke of a large sum of money that he would
have to pay for having endorsed the note of an acquaintance,
completely bankrupt.  "Poor fellow!  His luck is worse than mine!"

Upon finding in the road the skeleton of a recently killed sheep, he
was beside himself with indignation.  It was not because of the loss
of the meat.  "Hunger knows no law, and God has made meat for
mankind to eat.  But they might at least have left the skin!" . . .
And he would rage against such wickedness, always repeating, "Lack
of religion and good habits!"  The next time, the bandits stripped
the flesh off of three cows, leaving the skins in full view, and the
ranchman said, smiling, "That is the way I like people, honorable
and doing no wrong."

His vigor as a tireless centaur had helped him powerfully in his
task of populating his lands.  He was capricious, despotic and with
the same paternal instincts as his compatriots who, centuries before
when conquering the new world, had clarified its native blood.  Like
the Castilian conquistadors, he had a fancy for copper-colored
beauty with oblique eyes and straight hair.  When Desnoyers saw him
toward a neighboring ranch, he would say to himself, smilingly, "He
is going in search of a new peon who will help work his land fifteen
years from now."

The personnel of the ranch often used to comment on the resemblance
of certain youths laboring here the same as the others, galloping
from the first streak of dawn over the fields, attending to the
various duties of pasturing.  The overseer, Celedonio, a half-breed
thirty years old, generally detested for his hard and avaricious
character, also bore a distant resemblance to the patron.

Almost every year, some woman from a great distance, dirty and bad-
faced, presented herself at the ranch, leading by the hand a little
mongrel with eyes like live coals.  She would ask to speak with the
proprietor alone, and upon being confronted with her, he usually
recalled a trip made ten or twelve years before in order to buy a
herd of cattle.

"You remember, Patron, that you passed the night on my ranch because
the river had risen?"

The Patron did not remember anything about it.  But a vague instinct
warned him that the woman was probably telling the truth.  "Well,
what of it?"

"Patron, here he is. . . .  It is better for him to grow to manhood
by your side than in any other place."

And she presented him with the little hybrid.  One more, and offered
with such simplicity! . . .  "Lack of religion and good habits!"
Then with sudden modesty, he doubted the woman's veracity.  Why must
it necessarily be his? . . .  But his wavering was generally short-
lived.

"If it's mine, put it with the others."

The mother went away tranquilly, seeing the youngster's future
assured, because this man so lavish in violence was equally so in
generosity.  In time there would be a bit of land and a good flock
of sheep for the urchin.

These adoptions at first aroused in Misia Petrona a little
rebellion--the only ones of her life; but the centaur soon reduced
her to terrified silence.

"And you dare to complain of me, you weak cow! . . .  A woman who
has only given me daughters.  You ought to be ashamed of yourself."

The same hand that negligently extracted from his pocket a wad of
bills rolled into a ball, giving them away capriciously without
knowing just how much, also wore a lash hanging from the wrist.  It
was supposed to be for his horse, but it was used with equal
facility when any of his peons incurred his wrath.

"I strike because I can," he would say to pacify himself.

One day, the man receiving the blow, took a step backward, hunting
for the knife in his belt.

"You are not going to beat me, Patron.  I was not born in these
parts. . . .  I come from Corrientes."

The Patron remained with upraised thong.  "Is it true that you were
not born here? . . .  Then you are right; I cannot beat you.  Here
are five dollars for you."

When Desnoyers came on the place, Madariaga was beginning to lose
count of those who were under his dominion in the old Latin sense,
and could take his blows.  There were so many that confusion often
reigned.

The Frenchman admired the Patron's expert eye for his business.  It
was enough for him to contemplate for a few moments a herd of
cattle, to know its exact number.  He would go galloping along with
an indifferent air, around an immense group of horned and stamping
beasts, and then would suddenly begin to separate the different
animals.  He had discovered that they were sick.  With a buyer like
Madariaga, all the tricks and sharp practice of the drovers came to
naught.

His serenity before trouble was also admirable.  A drought suddenly
strewed his plains with dead cattle, making the land seem like an
abandoned battlefield.  Everywhere great black hulks.  In the air,
great spirals of crows coming from leagues away.  At other times, it
was the cold; an unexpected drop in the thermometer would cover the
ground with dead bodies.  Ten thousand animals, fifteen thousand,
perhaps more, all perished!

"WHAT a knock-out!" Madariaga would exclaim with resignation.
"Without such troubles, this earth would be a paradise. . . .  Now,
the thing to do is to save the skins!"

And he would rail against the false pride of the emigrants, against
the new customs among the poor which prevented his securing enough
hands to strip the victims quickly, so that thousands of hides had
to be lost.  Their bones whitened the earth like heaps of snow.  The
peoncitos (little peons) went around putting the skulls of cows with
crumpled horns on the posts of the wire fences--a rustic decoration
which suggested a procession of Grecian lyres.

"It is lucky that the land is left, anyway!" added the ranchman.

He loved to race around his immense fields when they were beginning
to turn green in the late rains.  He had been among the first to
convert these virgin wastes into rich meadow-lands, supplementing
the natural pasturage with alfalfa.  Where one beast had found
sustenance before, he now had three.  "The table is set," he would
chuckle, "we must now go in search of the guests."  And he kept on
buying, at ridiculous prices, herds dying of hunger in others'
uncultivated fields, constantly increasing his opulent lands and
stock.

One morning Desnoyers saved his life.  The old ranchman had raised
his lash against a recently arrived peon who returned the attack,
knife in hand.  Madariaga was defending himself as best he could,
convinced from one minute to another that he was going to receive
the deadly knife-thrust--when Desnoyers arrived and, drawing his
revolver, overcame and disarmed the adversary.

"Thanks, Frenchy," said the ranchman, much touched.  "You are an
all-round man, and I am going to reward you.  From this day I shall
speak to you as I do to my family."

Desnoyers did not know just what this familiar talk might amount to,
for his employer was so peculiar.  Certain personal favors,
nevertheless, immediately began to improve his position.  He was no
longer allowed to eat in the administration building, the proprietor
insisting imperiously that henceforth Desnoyers should sit at his
own table, and thus he was admitted into the intimate life of the
Madariaga family.

The wife was always silent when her husband was present.  She was
used to rising in the middle of the night in order to oversee the
breakfasts of the peons, the distribution of biscuit, and the
boiling of the great black kettles of coffee or shrub tea.  She
looked after the chattering and lazy maids who so easily managed to
get lost in the nearby groves.  In the kitchen, too, she made her
authority felt like a regular house-mistress, but the minute that
she heard her husband's voice she shrank into a respectful and
timorous silence.  Upon sitting down at table, the China would look
at him with devoted submission, her great, round eyes fixed on him,
like an owl's.  Desnoyers felt that in this mute admiration was
mingled great astonishment at the energy with which the ranchman,
already over seventy, was continuing to bring new occupants to live
on his demesne.

The two daughters, Luisa and Elena, accepted with enthusiasm the new
arrival who came to enliven the monotonous conversations in the
dining room, so often cut short by their father's wrathful
outbursts.  Besides, he was from Paris.  "Paris!" sighed Elena, the
younger one, rolling her eyes.  And Desnoyers was henceforth
consulted in all matters of style every time they ordered any
"confections" from the shops of Buenos Aires.

The interior of the house reflected the different tastes of the two
generations.  The girls had a parlor with a few handsome pieces of
furniture placed against the cracked walls, and some showy lamps
that were never lighted.  The father, with his boorishness, often
invaded this room so cherished and admired by the two sisters,
making the carpets look shabby and faded under his muddy boot-
tracks.  Upon the gilt centre-table, he loved to lay his lash.
Samples of maize scattered its grains over a silk sofa which the
young ladies tried to keep very choice, as though they feared it
might break.

Near the entrance to the dining room was a weighing machine, and
Madariaga became furious when his daughters asked him to remove it
to the offices.  He was not going to trouble himself to go outside
every time that he wanted to know the weight of a leather skin! . . .
A piano came into the ranch, and Elena passed the hours
practising exercises with desperate good will.  "Heavens and earth!
She might at least play the Jota or the Perican, or some other
lively Spanish dance!"  And the irate father, at the hour of siesta,
betook himself to the nearby eucalyptus trees, to sleep upon his
poncho.

This younger daughter whom he dubbed La Romantica, was the special
victim of his wrath and ridicule.  Where had she picked up so many
tastes which he and his good China never had had?  Music books were
piled on the piano.  In a corner of the absurd parlor were some
wooden boxes that had held preserves, which the ranch carpenter had
been made to press into service as a bookcase.

"Look here, Frenchy," scoffed Madariaga.  "All these are novels and
poems!  Pure lies! . . .  Hot air!"

He had his private library, vastly more important and glorious, and
occupying less space.  In his desk, adorned with guns, thongs, and
chaps studded with silver, was a little compartment containing deeds
and various legal documents which the ranchman surveyed with great
pride.

"Pay attention, now and hear marvellous things," announced the
master to Desnoyers, as he took out one of his memorandum books.

This volume contained the pedigree of the famous animals which had
improved his breeds of stock, the genealogical trees, the patents of
nobility of his aristocratic beasts.  He would have to read its
contents to him since he did not permit even his family to touch
these records.  And with his spectacles on the end of his nose, he
would spell out the credentials of each animal celebrity.  "Diamond
III, grandson of Diamond I, owned by the King of England, son of
Diamond II, winner in the races."  His Diamond had cost him many
thousands, but the finest horses on the ranch, those which brought
the most marvellous prices, were his descendants.

"That horse had more sense than most people.  He only lacked the
power to talk.  He's the one that's stuffed, near the door of the
parlor.  The girls wanted him thrown out. . . .  Just let them dare
to touch him!  I'd chuck them out first!"

Then he would continue reading the history of a dynasty of bulls
with distinctive names and a succession of Roman numbers, the same
as kings--animals acquired by the stubborn ranchman in the great
cattle fairs of England.  He had never been there, but he had used
the cable in order to compete in pounds sterling with the British
owners who wished to keep such valuable stock in their own country.
Thanks to these blue-blooded sires that had crossed the ocean with
all the luxury of millionaire passengers, he had been able to
exhibit in the concourses of Buenos Aires animals which were
veritable towers of meat, edible elephants with their sides as fit
and sleek as a table.

"That book amounts to something!  Don't you think so, Frenchy?  It
is worth more than all those pictures of moons, lakes, lovers and
other gewgaws that my Romantica puts on the walls to catch the
dust."

And he would point out, in contrast, the precious diplomas which
were adorning his desk, the metal vases and other trophies won in
the fairs by the descendants of his blooded stock.

Luisa, the elder daughter, called Chicha, in the South American
fashion, was much more respected by her father.  "She is my poor
China right over again," he said, "the same good nature, and the
same faculty for work, but more of a lady."  Desnoyers entirely
agreed with him, and yet the father's description seemed to him weak
and incomplete.  He could not admit that the pale, modest girl with
the great black eyes and smile of childish mischief bore the
slightest resemblance to the respectable matron who had brought her
into existence.

The great fiesta for Chicha was the Sunday mass.  It represented a
journey of three leagues to the nearest village, a weekly contact
with people unlike those of the ranch.  A carriage drawn by four
horses took the senora and the two senoritas in the latest suits and
hats arrived, via Buenos Aires, from Europe.  At the suggestion of
Chicha, Desnoyers accompanied them in the capacity of driver.

The father remained at home, taking advantage of this opportunity to
survey his fields in their Sunday solitude, thus keeping a closer
oversight on the shiftlessness of his hands.  He was very religious--
"Religion and good manners, you know."  But had he not given
thousands of dollars toward building the neighboring church?  A man
of his fortune should not be submitted to the same obligations as
ragamuffins!

During the Sunday lunch the young ladies were apt to make comments
upon the persons and merits of the young men of the village and
neighboring ranches, who had lingered at the church door in order to
chat with them.

"Don't fool yourselves, girls!" observed the father shrewdly.  "You
believe that they want you for your elegance, don't you? . . .  What
those shameless fellows really want are the dollars of old
Madariaga, and once they had them, they would probably give you a
daily beating."

For a while the ranch received numerous visitors.  Some were young
men of the neighborhood who arrived on spirited steeds, performing
all kinds of tricks of fancy horsemanship.  They wanted to see Don
opportunity to chat with Chicha and Luisa.  At other times they were
youths from Buenos Aires asking for a lodging at the ranch, as they
were just passing by.  Don Madariaga would growl--

"Another good-for-nothing scamp who comes in search of the Spanish
ranchman!  If he doesn't move on soon . . . I'll kick him out!"

But the suitor did not stand long on the order of his going,
intimidated by the ominous silence of the Patron.  This silence, of
late, had persisted in an alarming manner, in spite of the fact that
the ranch was no longer receiving visitors.  Madariaga appeared
abstracted, and all the family, including Desnoyers, respected and
feared this taciturnity.  He ate, scowling, with lowered head.
Suddenly he would raise his eyes, looking at Chicha, then at
Desnoyers, finally fixing them upon his wife as though asking her to
give an account of things.

His Romantica simply did not exist for him.  The only notice that he
ever took of her was to give an ironical snort when he happened to
see her leaning at sunset against the doorway, looking at the
reddening glow--one elbow on the door frame and her cheek in her
hand, in imitation of the posture of a certain white lady that she
had seen in a chromo, awaiting the knight of her dreams.

Desnoyers had been five years in the house when one day he entered
his master's private office with the brusque air of a timid person
who has suddenly reached a decision.

"Don Julio, I am going to leave and I would like our accounts
settled."

Madariaga looked at him slyly.  "Going to leave, eh? . . .  What
for?"  But in vain he repeated his questions.  The Frenchman was
floundering through a series of incoherent explanations--"I'm going;
I've got to go."

"Ah, you thief, you false prophet!" shouted the ranchman in
stentorian tones.

But Desnoyers did not quail before the insults.  He had often heard
his Patron use these same words when holding somebody up to
ridicule, or haggling with certain cattle drovers.

"Ah, you thief, you false prophet!  Do you suppose that I do not
know why you are going?  Do you suppose old Madariaga has not seen
your languishing looks and those of my dead fly of a daughter,
clasping each others' hands in the presence of poor China who is
blinded in her judgment? . . .  It's not such a bad stroke, Frenchy.
By it, you would be able to get possession of half of the old
Spaniard's dollars, and then say that you had made it in America.

And while he was storming, or rather howling, all this, he had
grasped his lash and with the butt end kept poking his manager in
the stomach with such insistence that it might be construed in an
affectionate or hostile way.

"For this reason I have come to bid you good-bye," said Desnoyers
haughtily.  "I know that my love is absurd, and I wish to leave."

"The gentleman would go away," the ranchman continued spluttering.
"The gentleman believes that here one can do what one pleases!  No,
siree!  Here nobody commands but old Madariaga, and I order you to
stay. . . .  Ah, these women!  They only serve to antagonize men.
And yet we can't live without them!" . . .

He took several turns up and down the room, as though his last words
were making him think of something very different from what he had
just been saying.  Desnoyers looked uneasily at the thong which was
still hanging from his wrist.  Suppose he should attempt to whip him
as he did the peons? . . .  He was still undecided whether to hold
his own against a man who had always treated him with benevolence
or, while his back was turned, to take refuge in discreet flight,
when the ranchman planted himself before him.

"You really love her, really?" he asked.  "Are you sure that she
loves you?  Be careful what you say, for love is blind and
deceitful.  I, too, when I married my China was crazy about her.  Do
you love her, honestly and truly? . . .  Well then, take her, you
devilish Frenchy.  Somebody has to take her, and may she not turn
out a weak cow like her mother! . . .  Let us have the ranch full of
grandchildren!"

In voicing this stock-raiser's wish, again appeared the great
breeder of beasts and men.  And as though he considered it necessary
to explain his concession, he added--"I do all this because I like
you; and I like you because you are serious."

Again the Frenchman was plunged in doubt, not knowing in just what
this greatly appreciated seriousness consisted.

At his wedding, Desnoyers thought much of his mother.  If only the
poor old woman could witness this extraordinary stroke of good
fortune!  But she had died the year before, believing her son
enormously rich because he had been sending her sixty dollars every
month, taken from the wages that he had earned on the ranch.

Desnoyers' entrance into the family made his father-in-law pay less
attention to business.

City life, with all its untried enchantments and snares, now
attracted Madariaga, and he began to speak with contempt of country
women, poorly groomed and inspiring him with disgust.  He had given
up his cowboy attire, and was displaying with childish satisfaction,
the new suits in which a tailor of the Capital was trying to
disguise him.  When Elena wished to accompany him to Buenos Aires,
he would wriggle out of it, trumping up some absorbing business.
"No; you go with your mother."

The fate of his fields and flocks gave him no uneasiness.  His
fortune, managed by Desnoyers, was in good hands.

"He is very serious," again affirmed the old Spaniard to his family
assembled in the dining roam--"as serious as I am. . . .  Nobody can
make a fool of him!"

And finally the Frenchman concluded that when his father-in-law
spoke of seriousness he was referring to his strength of character.
According to the spontaneous declaration of Madariaga, he had, from
the very first day that he had dealings with Desnoyers, perceived in
him a nature like his own, more hard and firm perhaps, but without
splurges of eccentricities.  On this account he had treated him with
such extraordinary circumspection, foreseeing that a clash between
the two could never be adjusted.  Their only disagreements were
about the expenses established by Madariaga during his regime.
Since the son-in-law was managing the ranches, the work was costing
less, and the people working more diligently;--and that, too,
without yells, and without strong words and deeds, with only his
presence and brief orders.

The old man was the only one defending the capricious system of a
blow followed by a gift.  He revolted against a minute and
mechanical administration, always the same, without any arbitrary
extravagance or good-natured tyranny.  Very frequently some of the
half-breed peons whom a malicious public supposed to be closely
related to the ranchman, would present themselves before Desnoyers
with, "Senor Manager, the old Patron say that you are to give me
five dollars."  The Senor Manager would refuse, and soon after
Madariaga would rush in in a furious temper, but measuring his
words, nevertheless, remembering that his son-in-law's disposition
was as serious as his own.

"I like you very much, my son, but here no one overrules me. . . .
Ah, Frenchy, you are like all the rest of your countrymen!  Once you
get your claws on a penny, it goes into your stocking, and nevermore
sees the light of day, even though they crucify you. . . !  Did I
say five dollars?  Give him ten.  I command it and that is enough."

The Frenchman paid, shrugging his shoulders, whilst his father-in-
law, satisfied with his triumph, fled to Buenos Aires.  It was a
good thing to have it well understood that the ranch still belonged
to Madariaga, the Spaniard.

From one of these trips, he returned with a companion, a young
German who, according to him, knew everything and could do
everything.  His son-in-law was working too hard.  This Karl
Hartrott would assist him in the bookkeeping.  Desnoyers accepted
the situation, and in a few days felt increasing esteem for the new
incumbent.

Although they belonged to two unfriendly nations, it didn't matter.
There are good people everywhere, and this Karl was a subordinate
worth considering.  He kept his distance from his equals, and was
hard and inflexible toward his inferiors.  All his faculties seemed
concentrated in service and admiration for those above him.
Scarcely would Madariaga open his lips before the German's head
began nodding in agreement, anticipating his words.  If he said
anything funny, his clerk's laugh would break forth in scandalous
roars.  With Desnoyers he appeared more taciturn, working without
stopping for hours at a time.  As soon as he saw the manager
entering the office he would leap from his seat, holding himself
erect with military precision.  He was always ready to do anything
whatever.  Unasked, he spied on the workmen, reporting their
carelessness and mistakes.  This last service did not especially
please his superior officer, but he appreciated it as a sign of
interest in the establishment.

The old man bragged triumphantly of the new acquisition, urging his
son-in-law also to rejoice.

"A very useful fellow, isn't he? . . .  These gringoes from Germany
work well, know a good many things and cost little.  Then, too, so
disciplined! so servile! . . .  I am sorry to praise him so to you
because you are a Frenchy, and your nation has in them a very
powerful enemy.  His people are a hard-shelled race."

Desnoyers replied with a shrug of indifference.  His country was far
away, and so was Germany.  Who knew if they would ever return! . . .
They were both Argentinians now, and ought to interest themselves in
present affairs and not bother about the past.

"And how little pride they have!" sneered Madariaga in an ironical
tone.  "Every one of these gringoes when he is a clerk at the
Capital sweeps the shop, prepares the meals, keeps the books, sells
to the customers, works the typewriter, translates four or five
languages, and dances attendance on the proprietor's lady friend, as
though she were a grand senora . . . all for twenty-five dollars a
month.  Who can compete with such people!  You, Frenchy, you are
like me, very serious, and would die of hunger before passing
through certain things.  But, mark my words, on this very account
they are going to become a terrible people!"

After brief reflection, the ranchman added:

"Perhaps they are not so good as they seem.  Just see how they treat
those under them!  It may be that they affect this simplicity
without having it, and when they grin at receiving a kick, they are
saying inside, "Just wait till my turn comes, and I'll give you
three!"

Then he suddenly seemed to repent of his suspicions.

"At any rate, this Karl is a poor fellow, a mealy-mouthed simpleton
who the minute I say anything opens his jaws like a fly-catcher.  He
insists that he comes of a great family, but who knows anything
about these gringoes? . . .  All of us, dead with hunger when we
reach America, claim to be sons of princes."

Madariaga had placed himself on a familiar footing with his Teutonic
treasure, not through gratitude as with Desnoyers, but in order to
make him feel his inferiority.  He had also introduced him on an
equal footing in his home, but only that he might give piano lessons
to his younger daughter.  The Romantica was no longer framing
herself in the doorway--in the gloaming watching the sunset
reflections.  When Karl had finished his work in the office, he was
now coming to the house and seating himself beside Elena, who was
tinkling away with a persistence worthy of a better fate.  At the
end of the hour the German, accompanying himself on the piano, would
sing fragments from Wagner in such a way that it put Madariaga to
sleep in his armchair with his great Paraguay cigar sticking out of
his mouth.

Elena meanwhile was contemplating with increasing interest the
singing gringo.  He was not the knight of her dreams awaited by the
fair lady.  He was almost a servant, a blond immigrant with reddish
hair, fat, heavy, and with bovine eyes that reflected an eternal
fear of disagreeing with his chiefs.  But day by day, she was
finding in him something which rather modified these impressions--
his feminine fairness, except where he was burned by the sun, the
increasingly martial aspect of his moustachios, the agility with
which he mounted his horse, his air of a troubadour, intoning with a
rather weak tenor voluptuous romances whose words she did not
understand.

One night, just before supper, the impressionable girl announced
with a feverish excitement which she could no longer repress that
she had made a grand discovery.

"Papa, Karl is of noble birth!  He belongs to a great family."

The plainsman made a gesture of indifference.  Other things were
vexing him in those days.  But during the evening, feeling the
necessity of venting on somebody the wrath which had been gnawing at
his vitals since his last trip to Buenos Aires, he interrupted the
singer.

"See here, gringo, what is all this nonsense about nobility which
you have been telling my girl?"

Karl left the piano that he might draw himself up to the approved
military position before responding.  Under the influence of his
recent song, his pose suggested Lohengrin about to reveal the secret
of his life.  His father had been General von Hartrott, one of the
commanders in the war of '70.  The Emperor had rewarded his services
by giving him a title.  One of his uncles was an intimate councillor
of the King of Prussia.  His older brothers were conspicuous in the
most select regiments.  He had carried a sword as a lieutenant.

Bored with all this grandeur, Madariaga interrupted him.  "Lies . . .
nonsense . . . hot air!"  The very idea of a gringo talking to him
about nobility! . . .  He had left Europe when very young in order
to cast in his lot with the revolting democracies of America, and
although nobility now seemed to him something out-of-date and
incomprehensible, still he stoutly maintained that the only true
nobility was that of his own country.  He would yield first place to
the gringoes for the invention of machinery and ships, and for
breeding priceless animals, but all the Counts and Marquises of
Gringo-land appeared to him to be fictitious characters.

"All tomfoolery!" he blustered.  "There isn't any nobility in your
country, nor have you five dollars all told to rub against each
other.  If you had, you wouldn't come over here to play the gallant
to women who are . . . you know what they are as well as I do."

To the astonishment of Desnoyers, the German received this onslaught
with much humility, nodding his head in agreement with the Patron's
last words.

"If there's any truth in all this twaddle about titles," continued
Madariaga implacably, "swords and uniforms, what did you come here
for?  What in the devil did you do in your own country that you had
to leave it?"

Now Karl hung his head, confused and stuttering.

"Papa, papa," pleaded Elena.  "The poor little fellow!  How can you
humiliate him so just because he is poor?"

And she felt a deep gratitude toward her brother-in-law when he
broke through his usual reserve in order to come to the rescue of
the German.

"Oh, yes, of course, he's a good-enough fellow," said Madariaga,
excusing himself.  "But he comes from a land that I detest."

When Desnoyers made a trip to Buenos Aires a few days afterward, the
cause of the old man's wrath was explained.  It appeared that for
some months past Madariaga had been the financial guarantor and
devoted swain of a German prima donna stranded in South America with
an Italian opera company.  It was she who had recommended Karl--an
unfortunate countryman, who after wandering through many parts of
the continent, was now living with her as a sort of gentlemanly
singer.  Madariaga had joyously expended upon this courtesan many
thousands of dollars.  A childish enthusiasm had accompanied him in
this novel existence midst urban dissipations until he happened to
discover that his Fraulein was leading another life during his
absence, laughing at him with the parasites of her retinue;
whereupon he arose in his wrath and bade her farewell to the
accompaniment of blows and broken furniture.

The last adventure of his life! . . .  Desnoyers suspected his
abdication upon hearing him admit his age, for the first time.  He
did not intend to return to the capital.  It was all false glitter.
Existence in the country, surrounded by all his family and doing
good to the poor was the only sure thing.  And the terrible centaur
expressed himself with the idyllic tenderness and firm virtue of
seventy-five years, already insensible to temptation.

After his scene with Karl, he had increased the German's salary,
trying as usual, to counteract the effects of his violent outbreaks
with generosity.  That which he could not forget was his dependent's
nobility, constantly making it the subject of new jests.  That
glorious boast had brought to his mind the genealogical trees of the
illustrious ancestry of his prize cattle.  The German was a
pedigreed fellow, and thenceforth he called him by that nickname.

Seated on summer nights under the awning, he surveyed his family
around him with a sort of patriarchal ecstasy.  In the evening hush
could be heard the buzzing of insects and the croaking of the frogs.
From the distant ranches floated the songs of the peons as they
prepared their suppers.  It was harvest time, and great bands of
immigrants were encamped in the fields for the extra work.

Madariaga had known many of the hard old days of wars and violence.
Upon his arrival in South America, he had witnessed the last years
of the tyranny of Rosas.  He loved to enumerate the different
provincial and national revolutions in which he had taken part.  But
all this had disappeared and would never return.  These were the
times of peace, work and abundance.

"Just think of it, Frenchy," he said, driving away the mosquitoes
with the puffs of his cigar.  "I am Spanish, you French, Karl
German, my daughters Argentinians, the cook Russian, his assistant
Greek, the stable boy English, the kitchen servants Chinas
(natives), Galicians or Italians, and among the peons there are many
castes and laws. . . .  And yet we all live in peace.  In Europe, we
would have probably been in a grand fight by this time, but here we
are all friends."

He took much pleasure in listening to the music of the laborers--
laments from Italian songs to the accompaniment of the accordion,
Spanish guitars and Creole choruses, wild voices chanting of love
and death.

"This is a regular Noah's ark," exulted the vainglorious patriarch.

"He means the tower of Babel," thought Desnoyers to himself, "but
it's all the same thing to the old man."

"I believe," he rambled on, "that we live thus because in this part
of the world there are no kings and a very small army--and mankind
is thinking only of enjoying itself as much as possible, thanks to
its work.  But I also believe that we live so peacefully because
there is such abundance that everyone gets his share. . . .  How
quickly we would spring to arms if the rations were less than the
people!"

Again he fell into reflective silence, shortly after announcing the
result of his meditations.

"Be that as it may be, we must recognize that here life is more
tranquil than in the other world.  Men are taken for what they are
worth, and mingle together without thinking whether they came from
one country or another.  Over here, fellows do not come in droves to
kill other fellows whom they do not know and whose only crime is
that they were born in an unfriendly country. . . .  Man is a bad
beast everywhere, I know that; but here he eats, owns more land than
he needs so that he can stretch himself, and he is good with the
goodness of a well-fed dog.  Over there, there are too many; they
live in heaps getting in each other's way, and easily run amuck.
Hurrah for Peace, Frenchy, and the simple life!  Where a man can
live comfortably and runs no danger of being killed for things he
doesn't understand--there is his real homeland!"

And as though an echo of the rustic's reflections, Karl seated at
the piano, began chanting in a low voice one of Beethoven's hymns--


   "We sing the joy of life,
     We sing of liberty,
    We'll ne'er betray our fellow-man,
     Though great the guerdon be."


Peace! . . .  A few days afterward Desnoyers recalled bitterly the
old man's illusion, for war--domestic war--broke loose in this
idyllic stage-setting of ranch life.

"Run, Senor Manager, the old Patron has unsheathed his knife and is
going to kill the German!"  And Desnoyers had hurried from his
office, warned by the peon's summons.  Madariaga was chasing Karl,
knife in hand, stumbling over everything that blocked his way.  Only
his son-in-law dared to stop him and disarm him.

"That shameless pedigreed fellow!" bellowed the livid old man as he
writhed in Desnoyers' firm clutch.  "Half famished, all he thinks he
has to do is to come to my house and take away my daughters and
dollars. . . .  Let me go, I tell you!  Let me loose that I may kill
him."

And in order to free himself from Desnoyers, he tried further to
explain the difficulty.  He had accepted the Frenchman as a husband
for his daughter because he was to his liking, modest, honest . . .
and serious.  But this singing Pedigreed Fellow, with all his
airs! . . .  He was a man that he had gotten from . . . well, he
didn't wish to say just where!  And the Frenchman, though knowing
perfectly well what his introduction to Karl had been, pretended
not to understand him.

As the German had, by this time, made good his escape, the ranchman
consented to being pushed toward his house, talking all the time
about giving a beating to the Romantica and another to the China for
not having informed him of the courtship.  He had surprised his
daughter and the Gringo holding hands and exchanging kisses in a
grove near the house.

"He's after my dollars," howled the irate father.  "He wants America
to enrich him quickly at the expense of the old Spaniard, and that
is the reason for so much truckling, so much psalm-singing and so
much nobility!  Imposter! . . . Musician!"

And he repeated the word "musician" with contempt, as though it were
the sum and substance of everything vile.

Very firmly and with few words, Desnoyers brought the wrangling to
an end.  While her brother-in-law protected her retreat, the
Romantica, clinging to her mother, had taken refuge in the top of
the house, sobbing and moaning, "Oh, the poor little fellow!
Everybody against him!"  Her sister meanwhile was exerting all the
powers of a discreet daughter with the rampageous old man in the
office, and Desnoyers had gone in search of Karl.  Finding that he
had not yet recovered from the shock of his terrible surprise, he
gave him a horse, advising him to betake himself as quickly as
possible to the nearest railway station.

Although the German was soon far from the ranch, he did not long
remain alone.  In a few days, the Romantica followed him. . . .
Iseult of the white hands went in search of Tristan, the knight.

This event did not cause Madariaga's desperation to break out as
violently as his son-in-law had expected.  For the first time, he
saw him weep.  His gay and robust old age had suddenly fallen from
him, the news having clapped ten years on to his four score.  Like a
child, whimpering and tremulous, he threw his arms around Desnoyers,
moistening his neck with tears.

"He has taken her away!  That son of a great flea . . . has taken
her away!"

This time he did not lay all the blame on his China.  He wept with
her, and as if trying to console her by a public confession, kept
saying over and over:

"It is my fault. . . .  It has all been because of my very, very
great sins."

Now began for Desnoyers a period of difficulties and conflicts.  The
fugitives, on one of his visits to the Capital, threw themselves on
his mercy, imploring his protection.  The Romantica wept, declaring
that only her brother-in-law, "the most knightly man in the world,"
could save her.  Karl gazed at him like a faithful hound trusting in
his master.  These trying interviews were repeated on all his trips.
Then, on returning to the ranch, he would find the old man ill-
humored, moody, looking fixedly ahead of him as though seeing
invisible power and wailing, "It is my punishment--the punishment
for my sins."

The memory of the discreditable circumstances under which he had
made Karl's acquaintance, before bringing him into his home,
tormented the old centaur with remorse.  Some afternoons, he would
have a horse saddled, going full gallop toward the neighboring
village.  But he was no longer hunting hospitable ranches.  He
needed to pass some time in the church, speaking alone with the
images that were there only for him--since he had footed the bills
for them. . . .  "Through my sin, through my very great sin!"

But in spite of his self-reproach, Desnoyers had to work very hard
to get any kind of a settlement out of the old penitent.  Whenever
he suggested legalizing the situation and making the necessary
arrangements for their marriage, the old tyrant would not let him go
on.  "Do what you think best, but don't say anything to me about
it."

Several months passed by.  One day the Frenchman approached him with
a certain air of mystery.  "Elena has a son and has named him
'Julio' after you."

"And you, you great useless hulk," stormed the ranchman, "and that
weak cow of a wife of yours, you dare to live tranquilly on without
giving me a grandson! . . .  Ah, Frenchy, that is why the Germans
will finally overwhelm you.  You see it, right here.  That bandit
has a son, while you, after four years of marriage . . . nothing.  I
want a grandson!--do you understand THAT?"

And in order to console himself for this lack of little ones around
his own hearth, he betook himself to the ranch of his overseer,
Celedonio, where a band of little half-breeds gathered tremblingly
and hopefully about him.

Suddenly China died.  The poor Misia Petrona passed away as
discreetly as she had lived, trying even in her last hours to avoid
all annoyance for her husband, asking his pardon with an imploring
look for any trouble which her death might cause him.  Elena came to
the ranch in order to see her mother's body for the last time, and
Desnoyers who for more than a year had been supporting them behind
his father-in-law's back, took advantage of this occasion to
overcome the old man's resentment.

"Well, I'll forgive her," said the ranchman finally.  "I'll do it
for the sake of my poor wife and for you.  She may remain on the
ranch, and that shameless gringo may come with her."

But he would have nothing to do with him.  The German was to be an
employee under Desnoyers, and they could live in the office building
as though they did not belong to the family.  He would never say a
word to Karl.

But scarcely had the German returned before he began giving him
orders rudely as though he were a perfect stranger.  At other times
he would pass by him as though he did not know him.  Upon finding
Elena in the house with his older daughter, he would go on without
speaking to her.

In vain his Romantica transfigured by maternity, improved all
opportunities for putting her child in his way, calling him loudly
by name: "Julio . . . Julio!"

"They want that brat of a singing gringo, that carrot top with a
face like a skinned kid to be my grandson? . . .  I prefer
Celedonio's."

And by way of emphasizing his protest, he entered the dwelling of
his overseer, scattering among his dusky brood handfuls of dollars.

After seven years of marriage, the wife of Desnoyers found that she,
too, was going to become a mother.  Her sister already had three
sons.  But what were they worth to Madariaga compared to the
grandson that was going to come?  "It will be a boy," he announced
positively, "because I need one so.  It shall be named Julio, and I
hope that it will look like my poor dead wife."

Since the death of his wife he no longer called her the China,
feeling something of a posthumous love for the poor woman who in her
lifetime had endured so much, so timidly and silently.  Now "my poor
dead wife" cropped out every other instant in the conversation of
the remorseful ranchman.

His desires were fulfilled.  Luisa gave birth to a boy who bore the
name of Julio, and although he did not show in his somewhat sketchy
features any striking resemblance to his grandmother, still he had
the black hair and eyes and olive skin of a brunette.  Welcome! . . .
This WAS a grandson!

In the generosity of his joy, he even permitted the German to enter
the house for the baptismal ceremony.

When Julio Desnoyers was two years old, his grandfather made the
rounds of his estates, holding him on the saddle in front of him.
He went from ranch to ranch in order to show him to the copper-
colored populace, like an ancient monarch presenting his heir.
Later on, when the child was able to say a few words, he entertained
himself for hours at a time talking with the tot under the shade of
the eucalyptus tree.  A certain mental failing was beginning to be
noticed in the old man.  Although not exactly in his dotage, his
aggressiveness was becoming very childish.  Even in his most
affectionate moments, he used to contradict everybody, and hunt up
ways of annoying his relatives.

"Come here, you false prophet," he would say to Julio.  "You are a
Frenchy."

The grandchild protested as though he had been insulted.  His mother
had taught him that he was an Argentinian, and his father had
suggested that she also add Spanish, in order to please the
grandfather.

"Very well, then; if you are not a Frenchy, shout, 'Down with
Napoleon!'"

And he looked around him to see if Desnoyers might be near,
believing that this would displease him greatly.  But his son-in-law
pursued the even tenor of his way, shrugging his shoulders.

"Down with Napoleon!" repeated Julio.

And he instantly held out his hand while his grandfather went
through his pockets.

Karl's sons, now four in number, used to circle around their
grandparent like a humble chorus kept at a distance, and stare
enviously at these gifts.  In order to win his favor, they one day
when they saw him alone, came boldly up to him, shouting in unison,
"Down with Napoleon!"

"You insolent gringoes!" ranted the old man.  "That's what that
shameless father has taught you!  If you say that again, I'll chase
you with a cat-o-nine-tails. . . .  The very idea of insulting a
great man in that way!"

While he tolerated this blond brood, he never would permit the
slightest intimacy.  Desnoyers and his wife often had to come to
their rescue, accusing the grandfather of injustice.  And in order
to pour the vials of his wrath out on someone, the old plainsman
would hunt up Celedonio, the best of his listeners, who invariably
replied, "Yes, Patron.  That's so, Patron."

"They're not to blame," agreed the old man, "but I can't abide them!
Besides, they are so like their father, so fair, with hair like a
shredded carrot, and the two oldest wearing specs as if they were
court clerks! . . .  They don't seem like folks with those glasses;
they look like sharks."

Madariaga had never seen any sharks, but he imagined them, without
knowing why, with round, glassy eyes, like the bottoms of bottles.

By the time he was eight years old, Julio was a famous little
equestrian.  "To horse, peoncito," his grandfather would cry, and
away they would race, streaking like lightning across the fields,
midst thousands and thousands of horned herds.  The "peoncito,"
proud of his title, obeyed the master in everything, and so learned
to whirl the lasso over the steers, leaving them bound and
conquered.  Upon making his pony take a deep ditch or creep along
the edge of the cliffs, he sometimes fell under his mount, but
clambered up gamely.

"Ah, fine cowboy!" exclaimed the grandfather bursting with pride in
his exploits.  "Here are five dollars for you to give a handkerchief
to some china."

The old man, in his increasing mental confusion, did not gauge his
gifts exactly with the lad's years; and the infantile horseman,
while keeping the money, was wondering what china was referred to,
and why he should make her a present.

Desnoyers finally had to drag his son away from the baleful
teachings of his grandfather.  It was simply useless to have masters
come to the house, or to send Julio to the country school.
Madariaga would always steal his grandson away, and then they would
scour the plains together.  So when the boy was eleven years old,
his father placed him in a big school in the Capital.

The grandfather then turned his attention to Julio's three-year-old
sister, exhibiting her before him as he had her brother, as he took
her from ranch to ranch.  Everybody called Chicha's little girl
Chichi, but the grandfather bestowed on her the same nickname that
he had given her brother, the "peoncito."  And Chichi, who was
growing up wild, vigorous and wilful, breakfasting on meat and
talking in her sleep of roast beef, readily fell in with the old
man's tastes.  She was dressed like a boy, rode astride like a man,
and in order to win her grandfather's praises as "fine cowboy,"
carried a knife in the back of her belt.  The two raced the fields
from sun to sun, Madariaga following the flying pigtail of the
little Amazon as though it were a flag.  When nine years old she,
too, could lasso the cattle with much dexterity.

What most irritated the ranchman was that his family would remember
his age.  He received as insults his son-in-law's counsels to remain
quietly at home, becoming more aggressive and reckless as he
advanced in years, exaggerating his activity, as if he wished to
drive Death away.  He accepted no help except from his harum-scarum
"Peoncito."  When Karl's children, great hulking youngsters,
hastened to his assistance and offered to hold his stirrup, he would
repel them with snorts of indignation.

"So you think I am no longer able to help myself, eh! . . .  There's
still enough life in me to make those who are waiting for me to die,
so as to grab my dollars, chew their disappointment a long while
yet!"

Since the German and his wife were kept pointedly apart from the
family life, they had to put up with these allusions in silence.
Karl, needing protection, constantly shadowed the Frenchman,
improving every opportunity to overwhelm him with his eulogies.  He
never could thank him enough for all that he had done for him.  He
was his only champion.  He longed for a chance to prove his
gratitude, to die for him if necessary.  His wife admired him with
enthusiasm as "the most gifted knight in the world."  And Desnoyers
received their devotion in gratified silence, accepting the German
as an excellent comrade.  As he controlled absolutely the family
fortune, he aided Karl very generously without arousing the
resentment of the old man.  He also took the initiative in bringing
about the realization of Karl's pet ambition--a visit to the
Fatherland.  So many years in America! . . .  For the very reason
that Desnoyers himself had no desire to return to Europe, he wished
to facilitate Karl's trip, and gave him the means to make the
journey with his entire family.  The father-in-law had no curiosity
as to who paid the expenses.  "Let them go!" he said gleefully, "and
may they never return!"

Their absence was not a very long one, for they spent their year's
allowance in three months.  Karl, who had apprised his parents of
the great fortune which his marriage had brought him, wished to make
an impression as a millionaire, in full enjoyment of his riches.
Elena returned radiant, speaking with pride of her relatives--of the
baron, Colonel of Hussars, of the Captain of the Guard, of the
Councillor at Court--asserting that all countries were most
insignificant when compared with her husband's.  She even affected a
certain condescension toward Desnoyers, praising him as "a very
worthy man, but without ancient lineage or distinguished family--and
French, besides."

Karl, on the other hand, showed the same devotion as before, keeping
himself submissively in the background when with his brother-in-law
who had the keys of the cash box and was his only defense against
the browbeating old Patron. . . .  He had left his two older sons in
a school in Germany.  Years afterwards they reached an equal footing
with the other grandchildren of the Spaniard who always begrudged
them their existence, "perfect frights, with carroty hair, and eyes
like a shark."

Suddenly the old man became very lonely, for they had also carried
off his second "Peoncito."  The good Chicha could not tolerate her
daughter's growing up like a boy, parading 'round on horseback all
the time, and glibly repeating her grandfather's vulgarities.  So
she was now in a convent in the Capital, where the Sisters had to
battle valiantly in order to tame the mischievous rebellion of their
wild little pupil.

When Julio and Chichi returned to the ranch for their vacations, the
grandfather again concentrated his fondness on the first, as though
the girl had merely been a substitute.  Desnoyers was becoming
indignant at his son's dissipated life.  He was no longer at
college, and his existence was that of a student in a rich family
who makes up for parental parsimony with all sorts of imprudent
borrowings.

But Madariaga came to the defense of his grandson.  "Ah, the fine
cowboy!" . . .  Seeing him again on the ranch, he admired the dash
of the good looking youth, testing his muscles in order to convince
himself of their strength, and making him to recount his nightly
escapades as ringleader of a band of toughs in the Capital.  He
longed to go to Buenos Aires himself, just to see the youngster in
the midst of this gay, wild life.  But alas! he was not seventeen
like his grandson; he had already passed eighty.

"Come here, you false prophet!  Tell me how many children you
have. . . .  You must have a great many children, you know!"

"Father!" protested Chicha who was always hanging around, fearing
her parent's bad teachings.

"Stop nagging at me!" yelled the irate old fellow in a towering
temper.  "I know what I'm saying."

Paternity figured largely in all his amorous fancies.  He was almost
blind, and the loss of his sight was accompanied by an increasing
mental upset.  His crazy senility took on a lewd character,
expressing itself in language which scandalized or amused the
community.

"Oh, you rascal, what a pretty fellow you are!" he said, leering at
Julio with eyes which could no longer distinguish things except in a
shadowy way.  "You are the living image of my poor dead wife. . . .
Have a good time, for Grandpa is always here with his money!  If you
could only count on what your father gives you, you would live like
a hermit.  These Frenchies are a close-fisted lot!  But I am looking
out for you.  Peoncito!  Spend and enjoy yourself--that's what your
Granddaddy has piled up the silver for!"

When the Desnoyers children returned to the Capital, he spent his
lonesome hours in going from ranch to ranch.  A young half-breed
would set the water for his shrub-tea to boiling on the hearth, and
the old man would wonder confusedly if she were his daughter.
Another, fifteen years old, would offer him a gourd filled with the
bitter liquid and a silver pipe with which to sip it. . . .  A
grandchild, perhaps--he wasn't sure.  And so he passed the
afternoons, silent and sluggish, drinking gourd after gourd of shrub
tea, surrounded by families who stared at him with admiration and
fear.

Every time he mounted his horse for these excursions, his older
daughter would protest.  "At eighty-four years!  Would it not be
better for him to remain quietly at home. . . .  Some day something
terrible would happen. . . .  And the terrible thing did happen.
One evening the Patron's horse came slowly home without its rider.
The old man had fallen on the sloping highway, and when they found
him, he was dead.  Thus died the centaur as he had lived, with the
lash hanging from his wrist, with his legs bowed by the saddle.

A Spanish notary, almost as old as he, produced the will.  The
family was somewhat alarmed at seeing what a voluminous document it
was.  What terrible bequests had Madariaga dictated?  The reading of
the first part tranquilized Karl and Elena.  The old father had left
considerable more to the wife of Desnoyers, but there still remained
an enormous share for the Romantica and her children.  "I do this,"
he said, "in memory of my poor dead wife, and so that people won't
talk."

After this, came eighty-six legacies.  Eighty-five dark-hued
individuals (women and men), who had lived on the ranch for many
years as tenants and retainers, were to receive the last paternal
munificence of the old patriarch.  At the head of these was
Celedonio whom Madariaga had greatly enriched in his lifetime for no
heavier work than listening to him and repeating, "That's so,
Patron, that's true!"  More than a million dollars were represented
by these bequests in lands and herds.  The one who completed the
list of beneficiaries was Julio Desnoyers.  The grandfather had made
special mention of this namesake, leaving him a plantation "to meet
his private expenses, making up for that which his father would not
give him."

"But that represents hundreds of thousands of dollars!" protested
Karl, who had been making himself almost obnoxious in his efforts to
assure himself that his wife had not been overlooked in the will.

The days following the reading of this will were very trying ones
for the family.  Elena and her children kept looking at the other
group as though they had just waked up, contemplating them in an
entirely new light.  They seemed to forget what they were going to
receive in their envy of the much larger share of their relatives.

Desnoyers, benevolent and conciliatory, had a plan.  An expert in
administrative affairs, he realized that the distribution among the
heirs was going to double the expenses without increasing the
income.  He was calculating, besides, the complications and
disbursements necessary for a judicial division of nine immense
ranches, hundreds of thousands of cattle, deposits in the banks,
houses in the city, and debts to collect.  Would it not be better
for them all to continue living as before? . . .  Had they not lived
most peaceably as a united family? . . .

The German received this suggestion by drawing himself up haughtily.
No; to each one should be given what was his.  Let each live in his
own sphere.  He wished to establish himself in Europe, spending his
wealth freely there.  It was necessary for him to return to "his
world."

As they looked squarely at each other, Desnoyers saw an unknown
Karl, a Karl whose existence he had never suspected when he was
under his protection, timid and servile.  The Frenchman, too, was
beginning to see things in a new light.

"Very well," he assented.  "Let each take his own.  That seems fair
to me."



CHAPTER III

THE DESNOYERS FAMILY


The "Madariagan succession," as it was called in the language of the
legal men interested in prolonging it in order to augment their
fees--was divided into two groups, separated by the ocean.  The
Desnoyers moved to Buenos Aires.  The Hartrotts moved to Berlin as
soon as Karl could sell all the legacy, to re-invest it in lands and
industrial enterprises in his own country.

Desnoyers no longer cared to live in the country.  For twenty years,
now, he had been the head of an enormous agricultural and stock
raising business, overseeing hundreds of men in the various ranches.
The parcelling out of the old man's fortune among Elena and the
other legatees had considerably constricted the radius of his
authority, and it angered him to see established on the neighboring
lands so many foreigners, almost all Germans, who had bought of
Karl.  Furthermore, he was getting old, his wife's inheritance
amounted to about twenty millions of dollars, and perhaps his
brother-in-law was showing the better judgment in returning to
Europe.

So he leased some of the plantations, handed over the
superintendence of others to those mentioned in the will who
considered themselves left-handed members of the family--of which
Desnoyers as the Patron received their submissive allegiance--and
moved to Buenos Aires.

By this move, he was able to keep an eye on his son who continued
living a dissipated life without making any headway in his
engineering studies.  Then, too, Chichi was now almost a woman--her
robust development making her look older than she was--and it was
not expedient to keep her on the estate to become a rustic senorita
like her mother.

Dona Luisa had also tired of ranch life, the social triumphs of her
sister making her a little restless.  She was incapable of feeling
jealous, but material ambitions made her anxious that her children
should not bring up the rear of the procession in which the other
grandchildren were cutting such a dashing figure.

During the year, most wonderful reports from Germany were finding
their way to the Desnoyers home in the Capital.  "The aunt from
Berlin," as the children called her, kept sending long letters
filled with accounts of dances, dinners, hunting parties and titles--
many high-sounding and military titles;--"our brother, the
Colonel," "our cousin, the Baron," "our uncle, the Intimate
Councillor," "our great-uncle, the Truly Intimate."  All the
extravagances of the German social ladder, which incessantly
manufactures new titles in order to satisfy the thirst for honors of
a people divided into castes, were enumerated with delight by the
old Romantica.  She even mentioned her husband's secretary (a
nobody) who, through working in the public offices, had acquired the
title of Rechnungarath, Councillor of Calculations.  She also
referred with much pride to the retired Oberpedell which she had in
her house, explaining that that meant "Superior Porter."

The news about her children was no less glorious.  The oldest was
the wise one of the family.  He was devoted to philology and the
historical sciences, but his sight was growing weaker all the time
because of his omnivorous reading.  Soon he would be a Doctor, and
before he was thirty, a Herr Professor.  The mother lamented that he
had not military aspirations, considering that his tastes had
somewhat distorted the lofty destinies of the family.
Professorships, sciences and literature were more properly the
perquisites of the Jews, unable, because of their race, to obtain
preferment in the army; but she was trying to console herself by
keeping in mind that a celebrated professor could, in time, acquire
a social rank almost equal to that of a colonel.

Her other four sons would become officers.  Their father was
preparing the ground so that they might enter the Guard or some
aristocratic regiment without any of the members being able to vote
against their admission.  The two daughters would surely marry, when
they had reached a suitable age with officers of the Hussars whose
names bore the magic "von" of petty nobility, haughty and charming
gentlemen about whom the daughter of Misia Petrona waxed most
enthusiastic.

The establishment of the Hartrotts was in keeping with these new
relationships.  In the home in Berlin, the servants wore knee-
breeches and white wigs on the nights of great banquets.  Karl had
bought an old castle with pointed towers, ghosts in the cellars, and
various legends of assassinations, assaults and abductions which
enlivened its history in an interesting way.  An architect,
decorated with many foreign orders, and bearing the title of
"Councillor of Construction," was engaged to modernize the mediaeval
edifice without sacrificing its terrifying aspect.  The Romantica
described in anticipation the receptions in the gloomy salon, the
light diffused by electricity, simulating torches, the crackling of
the emblazoned hearth with its imitation logs bristling with flames
of gas, all the splendor of modern luxury combined with the
souvenirs of an epoch of omnipotent nobility--the best, according to
her, in history.  And the hunting parties, the future hunting
parties! . . . in an annex of sandy and loose soil with pine woods--
in no way comparable to the rich ground of their native ranch, but
which had the honor of being trodden centuries ago by the Princes of
Brandenburg, founders of the reigning house of Prussia.  And all
this advancement in a single year! . . .

They had, of course, to compete with other oversea families who had
amassed enormous fortunes in the United States, Brazil or the
Pacific coast; but these were Germans "without lineage," coarse
plebeians who were struggling in vain to force themselves into the
great world by making donations to the imperial works.  With all
their millions, the very most that they could ever hope to attain
would be to marry their daughters with ordinary soldiers.  Whilst
Karl! . . .  The relatives of Karl! . . . and the Romantica let her
pen run on, glorifying a family in whose bosom she fancied she had
been born.

From time to time were enclosed with Elena's effusions brief, crisp
notes directed to Desnoyers.  The brother-in-law continued giving an
account of his operations the same as when living on the ranch under
his protection.  But with this deference was now mixed a badly
concealed pride, an evident desire to retaliate for his times of
voluntary humiliation.  Everything that he was doing was grand and
glorious.  He had invested his millions in the industrial
enterprises of modern Germany.  He was stockholder of munition
factories as big as towns, and of navigation companies launching a
ship every half year.  The Emperor was interesting himself in these
works, looking benevolently on all those who wished to aid him.
Besides this, Karl was buying land.  At first sight, it seemed
foolish to have sold the fertile fields of their inheritance in
order to acquire sandy Prussian wastes that yielded only to much
artificial fertilizing; but by becoming a land owner, he now
belonged to the "Agrarian Party," the aristocratic and conservative
group par excellence, and thus he was living in two different but
equally distinguished worlds--that of the great industrial friends
of the Emperor, and that of the Junkers, knights of the countryside,
guardians of the old traditions and the supply-source of the
officials of the King of Prussia.

On hearing of these social strides, Desnoyers could not but think of
the pecuniary sacrifices which they must represent.  He knew Karl's
past, for on the ranch, under an impulse of gratitude, the German
had one day revealed to the Frenchman the cause of his coming to
America.  He was a former officer in the German army, but the desire
of living ostentatiously without other resources than his salary,
had dragged him into committing such reprehensible acts as
abstracting funds belonging to the regiment, incurring debts of
honor and paying for them with forged signatures.  These crimes had
not been officially prosecuted through consideration of his father's
memory, but the members of his division had submitted him to a
tribunal of honor.  His brothers and friends had advised him to
shoot himself as the only remedy; but he loved life and had fled to
South America where, in spite of humiliations, he had finally
triumphed.

Wealth effaces the spots of the past even more rapidly than Time.
The news of his fortune on the other side of the ocean made his
family give him a warm reception on his first voyage home;
introducing him again into their world.  Nobody could remember
shameful stories about a few hundred marks concerning a man who was
talking about his father-in-law's lands, more extensive than many
German principalities.  Now, upon installing himself definitely in
his country, all was forgotten.  But, oh, the contributions levied
upon his vanity . . .  Desnoyers shrewdly guessed at the thousands
of marks poured with both hands into the charitable works of the
Empress, into the imperialistic propagandas, into the societies of
veterans, into the clubs of aggression and expansion organized by
German ambition.

The frugal Frenchman, thrifty in his expenditures and free from
social ambitions, smiled at the grandeurs of his brother-in-law.  He
considered Karl an excellent companion although of a childish pride.
He recalled with satisfaction the years that they had passed
together in the country.  He could not forget the German who was
always hovering around him, affectionate and submissive as a younger
brother.  When his family commented with a somewhat envious vivacity
upon the glories of their Berlin relatives, Desnoyers would say
smilingly, "Leave them in peace; they are paying very dear for their
whistle."

But the enthusiasm which the letters from Germany breathed finally
created an atmosphere of disquietude and rebellion.  Chichi led the
attack.  Why were they not going to Europe like other folks?  all
their friends had been there.  Even the Italian and Spanish
shopkeepers were making the voyage, while she, the daughter of a
Frenchman, had never seen Paris! . . . Oh, Paris.  The doctors in
attendance on melancholy ladies were announcing the existence of a
new and terrible disease, "the mania for Paris."  Dona Luisa
supported her daughter.  Why had she not gone to live in Europe like
her sister, since she was the richer of the two?  Even Julio gravely
declared that in the old world he could study to better advantage.
America is not the land of the learned.

Infected by the general unrest, the father finally began to wonder
why the idea of going to Europe had not occurred to him long before.
Thirty-four years without going to that country which was not
his! . . .  It was high time to start!  He was living too near to
his business.  In vain the retired ranchman had tried to keep himself
indifferent to the money market.  Everybody was coining money around
him.  In the club, in the theatre, wherever he went, the people were
talking about purchases of lands, of sales of stock, of quick
negotiations with a triple profit, of portentous balances.  The
amount of money that he was keeping idle in the banks was beginning
to weigh upon him.  He finally ended by involving himself in some
speculation; like a gambler who cannot see the roulette wheel
without putting his hand in his pocket.

His family was right.  "To Paris!"  For in the Desnoyers' mind, to
go to Europe meant, of course, to go to Paris.  Let the "aunt from
Berlin" keep on chanting the glories of her husband's country!
"It's sheer nonsense!" exclaimed Julio who had made grave
geographical and ethnic comparisons in his nightly forays.  "There
is no place but Paris!"  Chichi saluted with an ironical smile the
slightest doubt of it--"Perhaps they make as elegant fashions in
Germany as in Paris? . . . Bah!"  Dona Luisa took up her children's
cry.  "Paris!" . . .  Never had it even occurred to her to go to a
Lutheran land to be protected by her sister.

"Let it be Paris, then!" said the Frenchman, as though he were
speaking of an unknown city.

He had accustomed himself to believe that he would never return to
it.  During the first years of his life in America, the trip would
have been an impossibility because of the military service which he
had evaded.  Then he had vague news of different amnesties.  After
the time for conscription had long since passed, an inertness of
will had made him consider a return to his country as somewhat
absurd and useless.  On the other side, nothing remained to attract
him.  He had even lost track of those country relatives with whom
his mother had lived.  In his heaviest hours he had tried to occupy
his activity by planning an enormous mausoleum, all of marble, in La
Recoleta, the cemetery of the rich, in order to move thither the
remains of Madariaga as founder of the dynasty, following him with
all his own when their hour should come.  He was beginning to feel
the weight of age.  He was nearly seventy years old, and the rude
life of the country, the horseback rides in the rain, the rivers
forded upon his swimming horse, the nights passed in the open air,
had brought on a rheumatism that was torturing his best days.

His family, however, reawakened his enthusiasm.  "To Paris!" . . .
He began to fancy that he was twenty again, and forgetting his
habitual parsimony, wished his household to travel like royalty, in
the most luxurious staterooms, and with personal servants.  Two
copper-hued country girls, born on the ranch and elevated to the
rank of maids to the senora and her daughter, accompanied them on
the voyage, their oblique eyes betraying not the slightest
astonishment before the greatest novelties.

Once in Paris, Desnoyers found himself quite bewildered.  He
confused the names of streets, proposed visits to buildings which
had long since disappeared, and all his attempts to prove himself an
expert authority on Paris were attended with disappointment.  His
children, guided by recent reading up, knew Paris better than he.
He was considered a foreigner in his own country.  At first, he even
felt a certain strangeness in using his native tongue, for he had
remained on the ranch without speaking a word of his language for
years at a time.  He was used to thinking in Spanish, and
translating his ideas into the speech of his ancestors spattered his
French with all kinds of Creole dialect.

"Where a man makes his fortune and raises his family, there is his
true country," he said sententiously, remembering Madariaga.

The image of that distant country dominated him with insistent
obsession as soon as the impressions of the voyage had worn off.  He
had no French friends, and upon going into the street, his feet
instinctively took him to the places where the Argentinians gathered
together.  It was the same with them.  They had left their country
only to feel, with increasing intensity, the desire to talk about it
all the time.  There he read the papers, commenting on the rising
prices in the fields, on the prospects for the next harvests and on
the sales of cattle.  Returning home, his thoughts were still in
America, and he chuckled with delight as he recalled the way in
which the two chinas had defied the professional dignity of the
French cook, preparing their native stews and other dishes in Creole
style.

He had settled the family in an ostentatious house in the avenida
Victor Hugo, for which he paid a rental of twenty-eight thousand
francs.  Dona Luisa had to go and come many times before she could
accustom herself to the imposing aspect of the concierges--he,
decorated with gold trimmings on his black uniform and wearing white
whiskers like a notary in a comedy, she with a chain of gold upon
her exuberant bosom, and receiving the tenants in a red and gold
salon.  In the rooms above was ultra-modern luxury, gilded and
glacial, with white walls and glass doors with tiny panes which
exasperated Desnoyers, who longed for the complicated carvings and
rich furniture in vogue during his youth.  He himself directed the
arrangement and furnishings of the various rooms which always seemed
empty.

Chichi protested against her father's avarice when she saw him
buying slowly and with much calculation and hesitation.  "Avarice,
no!" he retorted, "it is because I know the worth of things."

Nothing pleased him that he had not acquired at one-third of its
value.  Beating down those who overcharged but proved the
superiority of the buyer.  Paris offered him one delightful spot
which he could not find anywhere else in the world--the Hotel
Drouot.  He would go there every afternoon that he did not find
other important auctions advertised in the papers.  For many years,
there was no famous failure in Parisian life, with its consequent
liquidation, from which he did not carry something away.  The use
and need of these prizes were matters of secondary interest, the
great thing was to get them for ridiculous prices.  So the trophies
from the auction-rooms now began to inundate the apartment which, at
the beginning, he had been furnishing with such desperate slowness.

His daughter now complained that the home was getting overcrowded.
The furnishings and ornaments were handsome, but too many . . . far
too many!  The white walls seemed to scowl at the magnificent sets
of chairs and the overflowing glass cabinets.  Rich and velvety
carpets over which had passed many generations, covered all the
compartments.  Showy curtains, not finding a vacant frame in the
salons, adorned the doors leading into the kitchen.  The wall
mouldings gradually disappeared under an overlay of pictures, placed
close together like the scales of a cuirass.  Who now could accuse
Desnoyers of avarice? . . .  He was investing far more than a
fashionable contractor would have dreamed of spending.

The underlying idea still was to acquire all this for a fourth of
its price--an exciting bait which lured the economical man into
continuous dissipation.  He could sleep well only when he had driven
a good bargain during the day.  He bought at auction thousands of
bottles of wine consigned by bankrupt firms, and he who scarcely
ever drank, packed his wine cellars to overflowing, advising his
family to use the champagne as freely as ordinary wine.  The failure
of a furrier induced him to buy for fourteen thousand francs pelts
worth ninety thousand.  In consequence, the entire Desnoyers family
seemed suddenly to be suffering as frightfully from cold as though a
polar iceberg had invaded the avenida Victor Hugo.  The father kept
only one fur coat for himself but ordered three for his son.  Chichi
and Dona Luisa appeared arrayed in all kinds of silky and luxurious
skins--one day chinchilla, other days blue fox, marten or seal.

The enraptured buyer would permit no one but himself to adorn the
walls with his new acquisitions, using the hammer from the top of a
step-ladder in order to save the expense of a professional picture
hanger.  He wished to set his children the example of economy.  In
his idle hours, he would change the position of the heaviest pieces
of furniture, trying every kind of combination.  This employment
reminded him of those happy days when he handled great sacks of
wheat and bundles of hides on the ranch.  Whenever his son noticed
that he was looking thoughtfully at a monumental sideboard or heavy
piece, he prudently betook himself to other haunts.

Desnoyers stood a little in awe of the two house-men, very solemn,
correct creatures always in dress suit, who could not hide their
astonishment at seeing a man with an income of more than a million
francs engaged in such work.  Finally it was the two coppery maids
who aided their Patron, the three working contentedly together like
companions in exile.

Four automobiles completed the luxuriousness of the family.  The
children would have been more content with one--small and dashing,
in the very latest style.  But Desnoyers was not the man to let a
bargain slip past him, so one after the other, he had picked up the
four, tempted by the price.  They were as enormous and majestic as
coaches of state.  Their entrance into a street made the passers-by
turn and stare.  The chauffeur needed two assistants to help him
keep this flock of mastodons in order, but the proud owner thought
only of the skill with which he had gotten the best of the salesmen,
anxious to get such monuments out of their sight.

To his children he was always recommending simplicity and economy.
"We are not as rich as you suppose.  We own a good deal of property,
but it produces a scanty income."

And then, after refusing a domestic expenditure of two hundred
francs, he would put five thousand into an unnecessary purchase just
because it would mean a great loss to the seller.  Julio and his
sister kept protesting to their mother, Dona Luisa--Chichi even
going so far as to announce that she would never marry a man like
her father.

"Hush, hush!" exclaimed the scandalized Creole.  "He has his little
peculiarities, but he is very good.  Never has he given me any cause
for complaint.  I only hope that you may be lucky enough to find his
equal."

Her husband's quarrelsomeness, his irritable character and his
masterful will all sank into insignificance when she thought of his
unvarying fidelity.  In so many years of married life . . . nothing!
His faithfulness had been unexceptional even in the country where
many, surrounded by beasts, and intent on increasing their flocks,
had seemed to become contaminated by the general animalism.  She
remembered her father only too well! . . .  Even her sister was
obliged to live in apparent calmness with the vainglorious Karl,
quite capable of disloyalty not because of any special lust, but
just to imitate the doings of his superiors.

Desnoyers and his wife were plodding through life in a routine
affection, reminding Dona Luisa, in her limited imagination, of the
yokes of oxen on the ranch who refused to budge whenever another
animal was substituted for the regular companion.  Her husband
certainly was quick tempered, holding her responsible for all the
whims with which he exasperated his children, yet he could never
bear to have her out of his sight.  The afternoons at the hotel
Drouot would be most insipid for him unless she was at his side, the
confidante of his plans and wrathful outbursts.

"To-day there is to be a sale of jewels; shall we go?"

He would make this proposition in such a gentle and coaxing voice--
the voice that Dona Luisa remembered in their first talks around the
old home.  And so they would go together, but by different routes;--
she in one of the monumental vehicles because, accustomed to the
leisurely carriage rides of the ranch, she no longer cared to walk;
and Desnoyers--although owner of the four automobiles, heartily
abominating them because he was conservative and uneasy with the
through lack of work, his body needed the exercise.  When they met
in the crowded salesrooms, they proceeded to examine the jewels
together, fixing beforehand, the price they would offer.  But he,
quick to become exasperated by opposition, always went further,
hurling numbers at his competitors as though they were blows.  After
such excursions, the senora would appear as majestic and dazzling as
a basilica of Byzantium--ears and neck decorated with great pearls,
her bosom a constellation of brilliants, her hands radiating points
of light of all colors of the rainbow.

"Too much, mama," Chichi would protest.  "They will take you for a
pawnbroker's lady!"  But the Creole, satisfied with her splendor,
the crowning glory of a humble life, attributed her daughter's
faultfinding to envy.  Chichi was only a girl now, but later on she
would thank her for having collected all these gems for her.

Already the home was unable to accommodate so many purchases.  In
the cellars were piled up enough paintings, furniture, statues, and
draperies to equip several other dwellings.  Don Marcelo began to
complain of the cramped space in an apartment costing twenty-eight
thousand francs a year--in reality large enough for a family four
times the size of his.  He was beginning to deplore being obliged to
renounce some very tempting furniture bargains when a real estate
agent smelled out the foreigner and relieved him of his
embarrassment.  Why not buy a castle? . . .

The entire family was delighted with the idea.  An historic castle,
the most historic that could be found, would supplement their
luxurious establishment.  Chichi paled with pride.  Some of her
friends had castles.  Others, of old colonial family, who were
accustomed to look down upon her for her country bringing up, would
now cry with envy upon learning of this acquisition which was almost
a patent of nobility.  The mother smiled in the hope of months in
the country which would recall the simple and happy life of her
youth.  Julio was less enthusiastic.  The "old man" would expect him
to spend much time away from Paris, but he consoled himself by
reflecting that the suburban place would provide excuse for frequent
automobile trips.

Desnoyers thought of the relatives in Berlin.  Why should he not
have his castle like the others? . . .  The bargains were alluring.
Historic mansions by the dozen were offered him.  Their owners,
exhausted by the expense of maintaining them, were more than anxious
to sell.  So he bought the castle of Villeblanche-sur-Marne, built
in the time of the religious wars--a mixture of palace and fortress
with an Italian Renaissance facade, gloomy towers with pointed
hoods, and moats in which swans were swimming.

He could now live with some tracts of land over which to exercise
his authority, struggling again with the resistance of men and
things.  Besides, the vast proportions of the rooms of the castle
were very tempting and bare of furniture.  This opportunity for
placing the overflow from his cellars plunged him again into buying.
With this atmosphere of lordly gloom, the antiques would harmonize
beautifully, without that cry of protest which they always seemed to
make when placed in contact with the glaring white walls of modern
habitations.  The historic residence required an endless outlay; on
that account it had changed owners so many times.

But he and the land understood each other beautifully. . . .  So at
the same time that he was filling the salons, he was going to begin
farming and stock-raising in the extensive parks--a reproduction in
miniature of his enterprises in South America.  The property ought
to be made self-supporting.  Not that he had any fear of the
expenses, but he did not intend to lose money on the proposition.

The acquisition of the castle brought Desnoyers a true friendship--
the chief advantage in the transaction.  He became acquainted with a
neighbor, Senator Lacour, who twice had been Minister of State, and
was now vegetating in the senate, silent during its sessions, but
restless and voluble in the corridors in order to maintain his
influence.  He was a prominent figure of the republican nobility, an
aristocrat of the new regime that had sprung from the agitations of
the Revolution, just as the titled nobility had won their spurs in
the Crusades.  His great-grandfather had belonged to the Convention.
His father had figured in the Republic of 1848.  He, as the son of
an exile who had died in banishment, had when very young marched
behind the grandiloquent figure of Gambetta, and always spoke in
glowing terms of the Master, in the hope that some of his rays might
be reflected on his disciple.  His son Rene, a pupil of the Ecole
Centrale regarded his father as "a rare old sport," laughing a
little at his romantic and humanitarian republicanism.  He,
nevertheless, was counting much on that same official protection
treasured by four generations of Lacours dedicated to the service of
the Republic, to assist him when he became an engineer.

Don Marcelo who used to look uneasily upon any new friendship,
fearing a demand for a loan, gave himself up with enthusiasm to
intimacy with this "grand man."  The personage admired riches and
recognized, besides, a certain genius in this millionaire from the
other side of the sea accustomed to speaking of limitless pastures
and immense herds.  Their intercourse was more than the mere
friendliness of a country neighborhood, and continued on after their
return to Paris.  Finally Rene visited the home on the avenida
Victor Hugo as though it were his own.

The only disappointments in Desnoyers' new life came from his
children.  Chichi irritated him because of the independence of her
tastes.  She did not like antiques, no matter how substantial and
magnificent they might be, much preferring the frivolities of the
latest fashion.  She accepted all her father's gifts with great
indifference.  Before an exquisite blonde piece of lace, centuries
old, picked up at auction, she made a wry face, saying, "I would
much rather have had a new dress costing three hundred francs."  She
and her brother were solidly opposed to everything old.

Now that his daughter was already a woman, he had confided her
absolutely to the care of Dona Luisa.  But the former "Peoncito" was
not showing much respect for the advice and commands of the good
natured Creole.  She had taken up roller-skating with enthusiasm,
regarding it as the most elegant of diversions.  She would go every
afternoon to the Ice Palace, Dona Luisa chaperoning her, although to
do this she was obliged to give up accompanying her husband to his
sales.  Oh, the hours of deadly weariness before that frozen oval
ring, watching the white circle of balancing human monkeys gliding
by on runners to the sound of an organ! . . .  Her daughter would
pass and repass before her tired eyes, rosy from the exercise,
spirals of hair escaped from her hat, streaming out behind, the
folds of her skirt swinging above her skates--handsome, athletic and
Amazonian, with the rude health of a child who, according to her
father, "had been weaned on beefsteaks."

Finally Dona Luisa rebelled against this troublesome vigilance,
preferring to accompany her husband on his hunt for underpriced
riches.  Chichi went to the skating rink with one of the dark-
skinned maids, passing the afternoons with her sporty friends of the
new world.  Together they ventilated their ideas under the glare of
the easy life of Paris, freed from the scruples and conventions of
their native land.  They all thought themselves older than they
were, delighting to discover in each other unsuspected charms.  The
change from the other hemisphere had altered their sense of values.
Some were even writing verses in French.  And Desnoyers became
alarmed, giving free rein to his bad humor, when Chichi of evenings,
would bring forth as aphorisms that which she and her friends had
been discussing, as a summary of their readings and observations.--
"Life is life, and one must live! . . . I will marry the man I love,
no matter who he may be. . . ."

But the daughter's independence was as nothing compared to the worry
which the other child gave the Desnoyers.  Ay, that other one! . . .
Julio, upon arriving in Paris, had changed the bent of his
aspirations.  He no longer thought of becoming an engineer; he
wished to become an artist.  Don Marcelo objected in great
consternation, but finally yielded.  Let it be painting!  The
important thing was to have some regular profession.  The father,
while he considered property and wealth as sacred rights, felt that
no one should enjoy them who had not worked to acquire them.

Recalling his apprenticeship as a wood carver, he began to hope that
the artistic instincts which poverty had extinguished in him were,
perhaps, reappearing in his son.  What if this lazy boy, this lively
genius, hesitating before taking up his walk in life, should turn
out to be a famous painter, after all! . . .  So he agreed to all of
Julio's caprices, the budding artist insisting that for his first
efforts in drawing and coloring, he needed a separate apartment
where he could work with more freedom.  His father, therefore,
established him near his home, in the rue de la Pompe in the former
studio of a well-known foreign painter.  The workroom and its
annexes were far too large for an amateur, but the owner had died,
and Desnoyers improved the opportunity offered by the heirs, and
bought at a remarkable bargain, the entire plant, pictures and
furnishings.

Dona Luisa at first visited the studio daily like a good mother,
caring for the well-being of her son that he may work to better
advantage.  Taking off her gloves, she emptied the brass trays
filled with cigar stubs and dusted the furniture powdered with the
ashes fallen from the pipes.  Julio's visitors, long-haired young
men who spoke of things that she could not understand, seemed to her
rather careless in their manners. . . .  Later on she also met there
women, very lightly clad, and was received with scowls by her son.
Wasn't his mother ever going to let him work in peace? . . .  So the
poor lady, starting out in the morning toward the rue de la Pompe,
stopped midway and went instead to the church of Saint Honore
d'Eylau.

The father displayed more prudence.  A man of his years could not
expect to mingle with the chums of a young artist.  In a few months'
time, Julio passed entire weeks without going to sleep under the
paternal roof.  Finally he installed himself permanently in his
studio, occasionally making a flying trip home that his family might
know that he was still in existence. . . .  Some mornings, Desnoyers
would arrive at the rue de la Pompe in order to ask a few questions
of the concierge.  It was ten o'clock; the artist was sleeping.
Upon returning at midday, he learned that the heavy sleep still
continued.  Soon after lunch, another visit to get better news.  It
was two o'clock, the young gentleman was just arising.  So the
father would retire, muttering stormily--"But when does this painter
ever paint?" . . .

At first Julio had tried to win renown with his brush, believing
that it would prove an easy task.  In true artist fashion, he
collected his friends around him, South American boys with nothing
to do but enjoy life, scattering money ostentatiously so that
everybody might know of their generosity.  With serene audacity, the
young canvas-dauber undertook to paint portraits.  He loved good
painting, "distinctive" painting, with the cloying sweetness of a
romance, that copied only the forms of women.  He had money, a good
studio, his father was standing behind him ready to help--why
shouldn't he accomplish as much as many others who lacked his
opportunities? . . .

So he began his work by coloring a canvas entitled, "The Dance of
buxom models.  These he would sketch at a mad speed, filling in the
outlines with blobs of multi-colored paint, and up to this point all
went well.  Then he would begin to vacillate, remaining idle before
the picture only to put it in the corner in hope of later
inspiration.  It was the same way with his various studies of
feminine heads.  Finding that he was never able to finish anything,
he soon became resigned, like one who pants with fatigue before an
obstacle waiting for a providential interposition to save him.  The
important thing was to be a painter . . . even though he might not
paint anything.  This afforded him the opportunity, on the plea of
lofty aestheticism, of sending out cards of invitation and asking
light women to his studio.  He lived during the night.  Don Marcelo,
upon investigating the artist's work, could not contain his
indignation.  Every morning the two Desnoyers were accustomed to
greet the first hours of dawn--the father leaping from his bed, the
son, on his way home to his studio to throw himself upon his couch
not to wake till midday.

The credulous Dona Luisa would invent the most absurd explanations
to defend her son.  Who could tell?  Perhaps he had the habit of
painting during the night, utilizing it for original work.  Men
resort to so many devilish things! . . .

Desnoyers knew very well what these nocturnal gusts of genius were
amounting to--scandals in the restaurants of Montmartre, and
scrimmages, many scrimmages.  He and his gang, who believed that at
seven a full dress or Tuxedo was indispensable, were like a band of
Indians, bringing to Paris the wild customs of the plains.
Champagne always made them quarrelsome.  So they broke and paid, but
their generosities were almost invariably followed by a scuffle.  No
one could surpass Julio in the quick slap and the ready card.  His
father heard with a heavy heart the news brought him by some friends
thinking to flatter his vanity--his son was always victorious in
these gentlemanly encounters; he it was who always scratched the
enemy's skin.  The painter knew more about fencing than art.  He was
a champion with various weapons; he could box, and was even skilled
in the favorite blows of the prize fighters of the slums.  "Useless
as a drone, and as dangerous, too," fretted his father.  And yet in
the back of his troubled mind fluttered an irresistible
satisfaction--an animal pride in the thought that this hare-brained
terror was his own.

For a while, he thought that he had hit upon a way of withdrawing
his son from such an existence.  The relatives in Berlin had visited
the Desnoyers in their castle of Villeblanche.  With good-natured
superiority, Karl von Hartrott had appreciated the rich and rather
absurd accumulations of his brother-in-law.  They were not bad; he
admitted that they gave a certain cachet to the home in Paris and to
the castle.  They smacked of the possessions of titled nobility.
But Germany! . . .  The comforts and luxuries in his country! . . .
He just wished his brother-in-law to admire the way he lived and the
noble friendships that embellished his opulence.  And so he insisted
in his letters that the Desnoyers family should return their visit.
This change of environment might tone Julio down a little.  Perhaps
his ambition might waken on seeing the diligence of his cousins,
each with a career.  The Frenchman had, besides, an underlying
belief in the more corrupt influence of Paris as compared with the
purity of the customs in Patriarchal Germany.

They were there four months.  In a little while Desnoyers felt ready
to retreat.  Each to his own kind; he would never be able to
understand such people.  Exceedingly amiable, with an abject
amiability and evident desire to please, but constantly blundering
through a tactless desire to make their grandeur felt.  The high-
toned friends of Hartrott emphasized their love for France, but it
was the pious love that a weak and mischievous child inspires,
needing protection.  And they would accompany their affability with
all manner of inopportune memories of the wars in which France had
been conquered.  Everything in Germany--a monument, a railroad
station, a simple dining-room device, instantly gave rise to
glorious comparisons.  "In France, you do not have this," "Of
course, you never saw anything like this in America."

Don Marcelo came away fatigued by so much condescension, and his
wife and daughter refused to be convinced that the elegance of
Berlin could be superior to Paris.  Chichi, with audacious
sacrilege, scandalized her cousins by declaring that she could not
abide the corseted officers with immovable monocle, who bowed to the
women with such automatic rigidity, blending their gallantries with
an air of superiority.

Julio, guided by his cousins, was saturated in the virtuous
atmosphere of Berlin.  With the oldest, "The Sage," he had nothing
to do.  He was a poor creature devoted to his books who patronized
all the family with a protecting air.  It was the others, the sub-
lieutenants or military students, who proudly showed him the rounds
of German joy.

Julio was accordingly introduced to all the night restaurants--
imitations of those in Paris, but on a much larger scale.  The women
who in Paris might be counted by the dozens appeared here in
hundreds.  The scandalous drunkenness here never came by chance, but
always by design as an indispensable part of the gaiety.  All was
grandiose, glittering, colossal.  The libertines diverted themselves
in platoons, the public got drunk in companies, the harlots
presented themselves in regiments.  He felt a sensation of disgust
before these timid and servile females, accustomed to blows, who
were so eagerly trying to reimburse themselves for the losses and
exposures of their business.  For him, it was impossible to
celebrate with hoarse ha-has, like his cousins, the discomfiture of
these women when they realized that they had wasted so many hours
without accomplishing more than abundant drinking.  The gross
obscenity, so public and noisy, like a parade of riches, was
loathsome to Julio.  "There is nothing like this in Paris," his
cousins repeatedly exulted as they admired the stupendous salons,
the hundreds of men and women in pairs, the thousands of tipplers.
"No, there certainly was nothing like that in Paris."  He was sick
of such boundless pretension.  He seemed to be attending a fiesta of
hungry mariners anxious at one swoop to make amends for all former
privations.  Like his father, he longed to get away.  It offended
his aesthetic sense.

Don Marcelo returned from this visit with melancholy resignation.
Those people had undoubtedly made great strides.  He was not such a
blind patriot that he could not admit what was so evident.  Within a
few years they had transformed their country, and their industry was
astonishing . . . but, well . . . it was simply impossible to have
anything to do with them.  Each to his own, but may they never take
a notion to envy their neighbor! . . .  Then he immediately repelled
this last suspicion with the optimism of a business man.

"They are going to be very rich," he thought.  "Their affairs are
prospering, and he that is rich does not hunt quarrels.  That war of
which some crazy fools are always dreaming would be an impossible
thing."

Young Desnoyers renewed his Parisian existence, living entirely in
the studio and going less and less to his father's home.  Dona Luisa
began to speak of a certain Argensola, a very learned young
Spaniard, believing that his counsels might prove most helpful to
Julio.  She did not know exactly whether this new companion was
friend, master or servant.  The studio habitues also had their
doubts.  The literary ones always spoke of Argensola as a painter.
The painters recognized only his ability as a man of letters.  He
was among those who used to come up to the studio of winter
afternoons, attracted by the ruddy glow of the stove and the wines
secretly provided by the mother, holding forth authoritatively
before the often-renewed bottle and the box of cigars lying open on
the table.  One night, he slept on the divan, as he had no regular
quarters.  After that first night, he lived entirely in the studio.

Julio soon discovered in him an admirable reflex of his own
personality.  He knew that Argensola had come third-class from
Madrid with twenty francs in his pocket, in order to "capture
glory," to use his own words.  Upon observing that the Spaniard was
painting with as much difficulty as himself, with the same wooden
and childish strokes, which are so characteristic of the make-
believe artists and pot-boilers, the routine workers concerned
themselves with color and other rank fads.  Argensola was a
psychological artist, a painter of souls.  And his disciple, felt
astonished and almost displeased on learning what a comparatively
simple thing it was to paint a soul.  Upon a bloodless countenance,
with a chin as sharp as a dagger, the gifted Spaniard would trace a
pair of nearly round eyes, and at the centre of each pupil he would
aim a white brush stroke, a point of light . . . the soul.  Then,
planting himself before the canvas, he would proceed to classify
this soul with his inexhaustible imagination, attributing to it
almost every kind of stress and extremity.  So great was the sway of
his rapture that Julio, too, was able to see all that the artist
flattered himself into believing that he had put into the owlish
eyes.  He, also, would paint souls . . . souls of women.

In spite of the ease with which he developed his psychological
creations, Argensola preferred to talk, stretched on a divan, or to
read, hugging the fire while his friend and protector was outside.
Another advantage this fondness for reading gave young Desnoyers was
that he was no longer obliged to open a volume, scanning the index
and last pages "just to get the idea."  Formerly when frequenting
society functions, he had been guilty of coolly asking an author
which was his best book--his smile of a clever man--giving the
writer to understand that he merely enquired so as not to waste time
on the other volumes.  Now it was no longer necessary to do this;
Argensola would read for him.  As soon as Julio would see him
absorbed in a book, he would demand an immediate share: "Tell me the
story."  So the "secretary," not only gave him the plots of comedies
and novels, but also detailed the argument of Schopenhauer or of
Nietzsche . . .  Dona Luisa almost wept on hearing her visitors--
with that benevolence which wealth always inspires--speak of her son
as "a rather gay young man, but wonderfully well read!"

In exchange for his lessons, Argensola received, much the same
treatment as did the Greek slaves who taught rhetoric to the young
patricians of decadent Rome.  In the midst of a dissertation, his
lord and friend would interrupt him with--"Get my dress suit ready.
I am invited out this evening."

At other times, when the instructor was luxuriating in bodily
comfort, with a book in one hand near the roaring stove, seeing
through the windows the gray and rainy afternoon, his disciple would
suddenly appear saying, "Quick, get out! . . . There's a woman
coming!"

And Argensola, like a dog who gets up and shakes himself, would
disappear to continue his reading in some miserable little coffee
house in the neighborhood.

In his official capacity, this widely gifted man often descended
from the peaks of intellectuality to the vulgarities of everyday
life.  He was the steward of the lord of the manor, the intermediary
between the pocketbook and those who appeared bill in hand.
"Money!" he would say laconically at the end of the month, and
Desnoyers would break out into complaints and curses.  Where on
earth was he to get it, he would like to know.  His father was as
regular as a machine, and would never allow the slightest advance
upon the following month.  He had to submit to a rule of misery.
Three thousand francs a month!--what could any decent person do with
that? . . .  He was even trying to cut THAT down, to tighten the
band, interfering in the running of his house, so that Dona Luisa
could not make presents to her son.  In vain he had appealed to the
various usurers of Paris, telling them of his property beyond the
ocean.  These gentlemen had the youth of their own country in the
hollow of their hand and were not obliged to risk their capital in
other lands.  The same hard luck pursued him when, with sudden
demonstrations of affection, he had tried to convince Don Marcelo
that three thousand francs a month was but a niggardly trifle.

The millionaire fairly snorted with indignation.  "Three thousand
francs a trifle!"  And the debts besides, that he often had to pay
for his son! . . .

"Why, when I was your age," . . . he would begin saying--but Julio
would suddenly bring the dialogue to a close.  He had heard his
father's story too many times.  Ah, the stingy old miser!  What he
had been giving him all these months was no more than the interest
on his grandfather's legacy. . . .  And by the advice of Argensola
he ventured to get control of the field.  He was planning to hand
over the management of his land to Celedonio, the old overseer, who
was now such a grandee in his country that Julio ironically called
him "my uncle."

Desnoyers accepted this rebellion coldly.  "It appears just to me.
You are now of age!"  Then he promptly reduced to extremes his
oversight of his home, forbidding Dona Luisa to handle any money.
Henceforth he regarded his son as an adversary, treating him during
his lightning apparitions at the avenue Victor Hugo with glacial
courtesy as though he were a stranger.

For a while a transitory opulence enlivened the studio.  Julio had
increased his expenses, considering himself rich.  But the letters
from his uncle in America soon dissipated these illusions.  At first
the remittances exceeded very slightly the monthly allowance that
his father had made him.  Then it began to diminish in an alarming
manner.  According to Celedonio, all the calamities on earth seemed
to he falling upon his plantation.  The pasture land was yielding
scantily, sometimes for lack of rain, sometimes because of floods,
and the herds were perishing by hundreds.  Julio required more
income, and the crafty half-breed sent him what he asked for, but
simply as a loan, reserving the return until they should adjust
their accounts.

In spite of such aid, young Desnoyers was suffering great want.  He
was gambling now in an elegant circle, thinking thus to compensate
for his periodical scrimpings; but this resort was only making the
remittances from America disappear with greater rapidity. . . .
That such a man as he was should be tormented so for the lack of a
few thousand francs!  What else was a millionaire father for?

If the creditors began threatening, the poor youth had to bring the
secretary into play, ordering him to see the mother immediately; he
himself wished to avoid her tears and reproaches.  So Argensola
would slip like a pickpocket up the service stairway of the great
house on the avenue Victor Hugo.  The place in which he transacted
his ambassadorial business was the kitchen, with great danger that
the terrible Desnoyers might happen in there, on one of his
perambulations as a laboring man, and surprise the intruder.

Dona Luisa would weep, touched by the heartrending tales of the
messenger.  What could she do!  She was as poor as her maids; she
had jewels, many jewels, but not a franc.  Then Argensola came to
the rescue with a solution worthy of his experience.  He would
smooth the way for the good mother, leaving some of her jewels at
the Mont-de-Piete.  He knew the way to raise money on them.  So the
lady accepted his advice, giving him, however, only jewels of medium
value as she suspected that she might never see them again.  Later
scruples made her at times refuse flatly.  Suppose Don Marcelo
should ever find it out, what a scene! . . .  But the Spaniard
deemed it unseemly to return empty-handed, and always bore away a
basket of bottles from the well-stocked wine-cellar of the
Desnoyers.

Every morning Dona Luisa went to Saint-Honore-d'Eylau to pray for
her son.  She felt that this was her own church.  It was a
hospitable and familiar island in the unexplored ocean of Paris.
Here she could exchange discreet salutations with her neighbors from
the different republics of the new world.  She felt nearer to God
and the saints when she could hear in the vestibule conversations in
her language.

It was, moreover, a sort of salon in which took place the great
events of the South American colony.  One day was a wedding with
flowers, orchestra and chanting chorals.  With Chichi beside her,
she greeted those she knew, congratulating the bride and groom.
Another day it was the funeral of an ex-president of some republic,
or some other foreign dignitary ending in Paris his turbulent
existence.  Poor President!  Poor General! . . .

Dona Luisa remembered the dead man.  She had seen him many times in
that church devoutly attending mass and she was indignant at the
evil tongues which, under the cover of a funeral oration, recalled
the shootings and bank failures in his country.  Such a good and
religious gentleman!  May God receive his soul in glory! . . .  And
upon going out into the square, she would look with tender eyes upon
the young men and women on horseback going to the Bois de Boulogne,
the luxurious automobiles, the morning radiant in the sunshine, all
the primeval freshness of the early hours--realizing what a
beautiful thing it is to live.

Her devout expression of gratitude for mere existence usually
included the monument in the centre of the square, all bristling
with wings as if about to fly away from the ground.  Victor Hugo! . . .
It was enough for her to have heard this name on the lips of
her son to make her contemplate the statue with a family interest.
The only thing that she knew about the poet was that he had died.
Of this she was almost sure, and she imagined that in life, he was a
great friend of Julio's because she had so often heard her son
repeat his name.

Ay, her son! . . .  All her thoughts, her conjectures, her desires,
converged on him and her strong-willed husband.  She longed for the
men to come to an understanding and put an end to a struggle in
which she was the principal victim.  Would not God work this
miracle? . . .  Like an invalid who goes from one sanitarium to
another in pursuit of health, she gave up the church on her street
to attend the Spanish chapel on the avenue Friedland.  Here she
considered herself even more among her own.

In the midst of the fine and elegant South American ladies who
looked as if they had just escaped from a fashion sheet, her eyes
sought other women, not so well dressed, fat, with theatrical ermine
and antique jewelry.  When these high-born dames met each other in
the vestibule, they spoke with heavy voices and expressive gestures,
emphasizing their words energetically.  The daughter of the ranch
ventured to salute them because she had subscribed to all their pet
charities, and upon seeing her greeting returned, she felt a
satisfaction which made her momentarily forget her woes.  They
belonged to those families which her father had so greatly admired
without knowing why.  They came from the "mother country," and to
the good Chicha were all Excelentisimas or Altisimas, related to
kings.  She did not know whether to give them her hand or bend the
knee, as she had vaguely heard was the custom at court.  But soon
she recalled her preoccupation and went forward to wrestle in prayer
with God.  Ay, that he would mercifully remember her!  That he would
not long forget her son! . . .

It was Glory that remembered Julio, stretching out to him her arms
of light, so that he suddenly awoke to find himself surrounded by
all the honors and advantages of celebrity.  Fame cunningly
surprises mankind on the most crooked and unexpected of roads.
Neither the painting of souls nor a fitful existence full of
extravagant love affairs and complicated duels had brought Desnoyers
this renown.  It was Glory that put him on his feet.

A new pleasure for the delight of humanity had come from the other
side of the seas.  People were asking one another in the mysterious
tones of the initiated who wish to recognize a familiar spirit, "Do
you know how to tango? . . ."  The tango had taken possession of the
world.  It was the heroic hymn of a humanity that was suddenly
concentrating its aspirations on the harmonious rhythm of the thigh
joints, measuring its intelligence by the agility of its feet.  An
incoherent and monotonous music of African inspiration was
satisfying the artistic ideals of a society that required nothing
better.  The world was dancing . . . dancing . . . dancing.

A negro dance from Cuba introduced into South America by mariners
who shipped jerked beef to the Antilles, conquered the entire earth
in a few months, completely encircling it, bounding victoriously
from nation to nation . . . like the Marseillaise.  It was even
penetrating into the most ceremonious courts, overturning all
traditions of conservation and etiquette like a song of the
Revolution--the revolution of frivolity.  The Pope even had to
become a master of the dance, recommending the "Furlana" instead of
the "Tango," since all the Christian world, regardless of sects, was
united in the common desire to agitate its feet with the tireless
frenzy of the "possessed" of the Middle Ages.

Julio Desnoyers, upon meeting this dance of his childhood in full
swing in Paris, devoted himself to it with the confidence that an
old love inspires.  Who could have foretold that when as a student,
he was frequenting the lowest dance halls in Buenos Aires, watched
by the police, that he was really serving an apprenticeship to
Glory? . . .

From five to seven, in the salons of the Champs d'Elysees where it
cost five francs for a cup of tea and the privilege of joining in
the sacred dance, hundreds of eyes followed him with admiration.
"He has the key," said the women, appraising his slender elegance,
medium stature, and muscular springs.  And he, in abbreviated jacket
and expansive shirt bosom, with his small, girlish feet encased in
high-heeled patent leathers with white tops, danced gravely,
thoughtfully, silently, like a mathematician working out a problem,
under the lights that shed bluish tones upon his plastered, glossy
locks.  Ladies asked to be presented to him in the sweet hope that
their friends might envy them when they beheld them in the arms of
the master.  Invitations simply rained upon Julio.  The most
exclusive salons were thrown open to him so that every afternoon he
made a dozen new acquaintances.  The fashion had brought over
professors from the other side of the sea, compatriots from the
slums of Buenos Aires, haughty and confused at being applauded like
famous lecturers or tenors; but Julio triumphed over these
vulgarians who danced for money, and the incidents of his former
life were considered by the women as deeds of romantic gallantry.

"You are killing yourself," Argensola would say.  "You are dancing
too much."

The glory of his friend and master was only making more trouble for
him.  His placid readings before the fire were now subject to daily
interruptions.  It was impossible to read more than a chapter.  The
celebrated man was continually ordering him to betake himself to the
street.  "A new lesson," sighed the parasite.  And when he was alone
in the studio numerous callers--all women, some inquisitive and
aggressive, others sad, with a deserted air--were constantly
interrupting his thoughtful pursuits.

One of them terrified the occupants of the studio with her
insistence.  She was a North American of uncertain age, somewhere
between thirty-two and fifty-nine, with short skirts that whenever
she sat down, seemed to fly up as if moved by a spring.  Various
dances with Desnoyers and a visit to the rue de la Pompe she seemed
to consider as her sacred rights, and she pursued the master with
the desperation of an abandoned zealot.  Julio had made good his
escape upon learning that this beauty of youthful elegance--when
seen from the back--had two grandchildren.  "MASTER Desnoyers has
gone out," Argensola would invariably say upon receiving her.  And,
thereupon she would burst into tears and threats, longing to kill
herself then and there that her corpse might frighten away those
other women who would come to rob her of what she considered her
special privilege.  Now it was Argensola who sped his companion to
the street when he wished to be alone.  He had only to remark
casually, "I believe that Yankee is coming," and the great man would
beat a hasty retreat, oftentimes in his desperate flight availing
himself of the back stairs.

At this time began to develop the most important event in Julio's
existence.  The Desnoyers family was to be united with that of
Senator Lacour.  Rene, his only son, had succeeded in awakening in
Chichi a certain interest that was almost love.  The dignitary
enjoyed thinking of his son allied to the boundless plains and
immense herds whose description always affected him like a
marvellous tale.  He was a widower, but he enjoyed giving at his
home famous banquets and parties.  Every new celebrity immediately
suggested to him the idea of giving a dinner.  No illustrious person
passing through Paris, polar explorer or famous singer, could escape
being exhibited in the dining room of Lacour.  The son of Desnoyers-
-at whom he had scarcely glanced before--now inspired him with
sudden interest.  The senator was a thoroughly up-to-date man who
did not classify glory nor distinguish reputations.  It was enough
for him that a name should be on everybody's lips for him to accept
it with enthusiasm.  When Julio responded to his invitation, he
presented him with pride to his friends, and came very near to
calling him "dear master."  The tango was monopolizing all
conversation nowadays.  Even in the Academy they were taking it up
in order to demonstrate that the youth of ancient Athens had
diverted itself in a somewhat similar way. . . .  And Lacour had
dreamed all his life of an Athenian republic.

At these reunions, Desnoyers became acquainted with the Lauriers.
He was an engineer who owned a motor-factory for automobiles in the
outskirts of Paris--a man about thirty-five, tall, rather heavy and
silent, with a deliberate air as though he wished to see deeply into
men and things.  She was of a light, frivolous character, loving
life for the satisfactions and pleasures which it brought her,
appearing to accept with smiling conformity the silent and grave
adoration of her husband.  She could not well do less with a man of
his merits.  Besides, she had brought to the marriage a dowry of
three hundred thousand francs, a capital which had enabled the
engineer to enlarge his business.  The senator had been instrumental
in arranging this marriage.  He was interested in Laurier because he
was the son of an old friend.

Upon Marguerite Laurier the presence of Julio flashed like a ray of
sunlight in the tiresome salon of Lacour.  She was dancing the fad
of the hour and frequenting the tango teas where reigned the adored
Desnoyers.  And to think that she was being entertained with this
celebrated and interesting man that the other women were raving
about! . . .  In order that he might not take her for a mere middle-
class woman like the other guests at the senator's party, she spoke
of her modistes, all from the rue de la Paix, declaring gravely that
no woman who had any self-respect could possibly walk through the
streets wearing a gown costing less than eight hundred francs, and
that the hat of a thousand francs--but a few years ago, an
astonishing novelty--was nowadays a very ordinary affair.

This acquaintanceship made the "little Laurier," as her friends
called her notwithstanding her tallness, much sought by the master
of the dance, in spite of the looks of wrath and envy hurled at her
by the others.  What a triumph for the wife of a simple engineer who
was used to going everywhere in her mother's automobile! . . .
Julio at first had supposed her like all the others who were
languishing in his arms, following the rhythmic complications of the
dance, but he soon found that she was very different.  Her coquetry
after the first confidential words, but increased his admiration.
He really had never before been thrown with a woman of her class.
Those of his first social period were the habituees of the night
restaurants paid for their witchery.  Now Glory was tossing into his
arms ladies of high position but with an unconfessable past, anxious
for novelties although exceedingly mature.  This middle class woman
who would advance so confidently toward him and then retreat with
such capricious outbursts of modesty, was a new type for him.

The tango salons soon began to suffer a great loss.  Desnoyers was
permitting himself to be seen there with less frequency, handing
Glory over to the professionals.  Sometimes entire weeks slipped by
without the five-to-seven devotees being able to admire his black
locks and his tiny patent leathers twinkling under the lights in
time with his graceful movements.

Marguerite was also avoiding these places.  The meetings of the two
were taking place in accordance with what she had read in the love
stories of Paris.  She was going in search of Julio, fearing to be
recognized, tremulous with emotion, selecting her most inconspicuous
suit, and covering her face with a close veil--"the veil of
adultery," as her friends called it.  They had their trysts in the
least-frequented squares of the district, frequently changing the
places, like timid birds that at the slightest disturbance fly to
perch a little further away.  Sometimes they would meet in the
Buttes Chaumont, at others they preferred the gardens on the left
bank of the Seine, the Luxembourg, and even the distant Parc de
Montsouris.  She was always in tremors of terror lest her husband
might surprise them, although she well knew that the industrious
engineer was in his factory a great distance away.  Her agitated
aspect, her excessive precautions in order to slip by unseen, only
served to attract the attention of the passers-by.  Although Julio
was waxing impatient with the annoyance of this wandering love
affair which only amounted to a few fugitive kisses, he finally held
his peace, dominated by Marguerite's pleadings.

She did not wish merely to be one in the procession of his
sweethearts; it was necessary to convince herself first that this
love was going to last forever.  It was her first slip and she
wanted it to be the last.  Ay, her former spotless reputation! . . .
What would people say! . . .  The two returned to their adolescent
period, loving each other as they had never loved before, with the
confident and childish passion of fifteen-year-olds.

Julio had leaped from childhood to libertinism, taking his
initiation into life at a single bound.  She had desired marriage in
order to acquire the respect and liberty of a married woman, but
feeling towards her husband only a vague gratitude.  "We end where
others begin," she had said to Desnoyers.

Their passion took the form of an intense, reciprocal and vulgar
love.  They felt a romantic sentimentality in clasping hands or
exchanging kisses on a garden bench in the twilight.  He was
treasuring a ringlet of Marguerite's--although he doubted its
genuineness, with a vague suspicion that it might be one of the
latest wisps of fashion.  She would cuddle down with her head on his
shoulder, as though imploring his protection, although always in the
open air.  If Julio ever attempted greater intimacy in a carriage,
madame would repel him most vigorously.  A contradictory duality
appeared to inspire her actions.  Every morning, on awaking, she
would decide to yield, but then when near him, her middle-class
respectability, jealous of its reputation, kept her faithful to her
mother's teachings.

One day she agreed to visit his studio with the interest that the
haunts of the loved one always inspires.  "Promise that you will not
take advantage of me."  He readily promised, swearing that
everything should be as Marguerite wished. . . .  But from that day
they were no longer seen in the gardens, nor wandering around
persecuted by the winter winds.  They preferred the studio, and
Argensola had to rearrange his existence, seeking the stove of
another artist friend, in order to continue his reading.

This state of things lasted two months.  They never knew what secret
force suddenly disturbed their tranquility.  Perhaps one of her
friends, guessing at the truth, had told the husband anonymously.
Perhaps it was she herself unconsciously, with her inexpressible
happiness, her tardy returns home when dinner was already served,
and the sudden aversion which she showed toward the engineer in
their hours alone, trying to keep her heart faithful to her lover.
To divide her interest between her legal companion and the man she
loved was a torment that her simple and vehement enthusiasm could
not tolerate.

While she was hurrying one night through the rue de la Pompe,
looking at her watch and trembling with impatience at not finding an
automobile or even a cab, a man stood in front of her. . . .
Etienne Laurier!  She always shuddered with fear on recalling that
hour.  For a moment she believed that he was going to kill her.
Serious men, quiet and diffident, are most terrible in their
explosions of wrath.  Her husband knew everything.  With the same
patience that he employed in solving his industrial problems, he had
been studying her day by day, without her ever suspecting the
watchfulness behind that impassive countenance.  Then he had
followed her in order to complete the evidence of his misfortune.

Marguerite had never supposed that he could be so common and noisy
in his anger.  She had expected that he would accept the facts
coldly with that slight tinge of philosophical irony usually shown
by distinguished men, as the husbands of her friends had done.  But
the poor engineer who, outside of his work, saw only his wife,
loving her as a woman, and adoring her as a dainty and superior
being, a model of grace and elegance, could not endure the thought
of her downfall, and cried and threatened without reserve, so that
the scandal became known throughout their entire circle of friends.
The senator felt greatly annoyed in remembering that it was in his
exclusive home that the guilty ones had become acquainted; but his
displeasure was visited upon the husband.  What lack of good
taste! . . .  Women will be women, and everything is capable of
adjustment.  But before the imprudent outbursts of this frantic
devil no elegant solution was possible, and there was now nothing
to do but to begin divorce proceedings.

Desnoyers, senior, was very indignant upon learning of this last
escapade of his son.  He had always had a great liking for Laurier.
That instinctive bond which exists between men of industry, patient
and silent, had made them very congenial.  At the senator's
receptions he had always talked with the engineer about the progress
of his business, interesting himself in the development of that
factory of which he always spoke with the affection of a father.
The millionaire, in spite of his reputation for miserliness, had
even volunteered his disinterested support if at any time it should
become necessary to enlarge the plant.  And it was this good man's
happiness that his son, a frivolous and useless dancer, was going to
steal! . . .

At first Laurier spoke of a duel.  His wrath was that of a work
horse who breaks the tight reins of his laboring outfit, tosses his
mane, neighs wildly and bites.  The father was greatly distressed at
the possibility of such an outcome. . . .  One scandal more!  Julio
had dedicated the greater part of his existence to the handling of
arms.

"He will kill the poor man!" he said to the senator.  "I am sure
that he will kill him.  It is the logic of life; the good-for-
nothing always kill those who amount to anything."

But there was no killing.  The Father of the Republic knew how to
handle the clashing parties, with the same skill that he always
employed in the corridors of the Senate during a ministerial crisis.
The scandal was hushed up.  Marguerite went to live with her mother
and took the first steps for a divorce.

Some evenings, when the studio clock was striking seven, she would
yawn and say sadly: "I must go. . . .  I have to go, although this
is my true home. . . .  Ah, what a pity that we are not married!"

And he, feeling a whole garden of bourgeois virtues, hitherto
ignored, bursting into bloom, repeated in a tone of conviction:

"That's so; why are we not married!"

Their wishes could be realized.  The husband was facilitating the
step by his unexpected intervention.  So young Desnoyers set forth
for South America in order to raise the money and marry Marguerite.



CHAPTER IV

THE COUSIN FROM BERLIN


The studio of Julio Desnoyers was on the top floor, both the
stairway and the elevator stopping before his door.  The two tiny
apartments at the back were lighted by an interior court, their only
means of communication being the service stairway which went on up
to the garrets.

While his comrade was away, Argensola had made the acquaintance of
those in the neighboring lodgings.  The largest of the apartments
was empty during the day, its occupants not returning till after
they had taken their evening meal in a restaurant.  As both husband
and wife were employed outside, they could not remain at home except
on holidays.  The man, vigorous and of a martial aspect, was
superintendent in a big department store. . . .  He had been a
soldier in Africa, wore a military decoration, and had the rank of
sub-lieutenant in the Reserves.  She was a blonde, heavy and rather
anaemic, with bright eyes and a sentimental expression.  On holidays
she spent long hours at the piano, playing musical reveries, always
the same.  At other times Argensola saw her through the interior
window working in the kitchen aided by her companion, the two
laughing over their clumsiness and inexperience in preparing the
Sunday dinner.

The concierge thought that this woman was a German, but she herself
said that she was Swiss.  She was a cashier in a shop--not the one
in which her husband was employed.  In the mornings they left home
together, separating in the Place d'Etoile.  At seven in the evening
they met here, greeting each other with a kiss, like lovers who meet
for the first time; and then after supper, they returned to their
nest in the rue de la Pompe.  All Argensola's attempts at
friendliness with these neighbors were repulsed because of their
self-centredness.  They responded with freezing courtesy; they lived
only for themselves.

The other apartment of two rooms was occupied by a single man.  He
was a Russian or Pole who almost always returned with a package of
books, and passed many hours writing near the patio window.  From
the very first the Spaniard took him to be a mysterious man,
probably a very distinguished one--a true hero of a novel.  The
foreign appearance of this Tchernoff made a great impression upon
him--his dishevelled beard, and oily locks, his spectacles upon a
large nose that seemed deformed by a dagger-thrust.  There emanated
from him, like an invisible nimbus, an odor of cheap wine and soiled
clothing.

When Argensola caught a glimpse of him through the service door he
would say to himself, "Ah, Friend Tchernoff is returning," and
thereupon he would saunter out to the stairway in order to have a
chat with his neighbor.  For a long time the stranger discouraged
all approach to his quarters, which fact led the Spaniard to infer
that he devoted himself to alchemy and kindred mysteries.  When he
finally was allowed to enter he saw only books, many books, books
everywhere--scattered on the floor, heaped upon benches, piled in
corners, overflowing on to broken-down chairs, old tables, and a bed
that was only made up now and then when the owner, alarmed by the
increasing invasion of dust and cobwebs, was obliged to call in the
aid of his friend, the concierge.

Argensola finally realized, not without a certain disenchantment,
that there was nothing mysterious in the life of the man.  What he
was writing near the window were merely translations, some of them
ordered, others volunteer work for the socialist periodicals.  The
only marvellous thing about him was the quantity of languages that
he knew.

"He knows them all," said the Spaniard, when describing their
neighbor to Desnoyers.  "He has only to hear of a new one to master
it.  He holds the key, the secret of all languages, living or dead.
He speaks Castilian as well as we do, and yet he has never been in a
Spanish-speaking country."

Argensola again felt a thrill of mystery upon reading the titles of
many of the volumes.  The majority were old books, many of them in
languages that he was not able to decipher, picked up for a song at
second-hand shops or on the book stands installed upon the parapets
of the Seine.  Only a man holding the key of tongues could get
together such volumes.  An atmosphere of mysticism, of superhuman
insight, of secrets intact for many centuries appeared to emanate
from these heaps of dusty volumes with worm-eaten leaves.  And mixed
with these ancient tomes were others red and conspicuous, pamphlets
of socialistic propaganda, leaflets in all the languages of Europe
and periodicals--many periodicals, with revolutionary titles.

Tchernoff did not appear to enjoy visits and conversation.  He would
smile enigmatically into his black beard, and was very sparing with
his words so as to shorten the interview.  But Argensola possessed
the means of winning over this sullen personage.  It was only
necessary for him to wink one eye with the expressive invitation,
"Do we go?" and the two would soon be settled on a bench in the
kitchen of Desnoyers' studio, opposite a bottle which had come from
the avenue Victor Hugo.  The costly wines of Don Marcelo made the
Russian more communicative, although, in spite of this aid, the
Spaniard learned little of his neighbor's real existence.  Sometimes
he would mention Jaures and other socialistic orators.  His surest
means of existence was the translation of periodicals or party
papers.  On various occasions the name of Siberia escaped from his
lips, and he admitted that he had been there a long time; but he did
not care to talk about a country visited against his will.  He would
merely smile modestly, showing plainly that he did not wish to make
any further revelations.

The morning after the return of Julio Desnoyers, while Argensola was
talking on the stairway with Tchernoff, the bell rang.  How
annoying!  The Russian, who was well up in advanced politics, was
just explaining the plans advanced by Jaures.  There were still many
who hoped that war might be averted.  He had his motives for
doubting it. . . .  He, Tchernoff, was commenting on these illusions
with the smile of a flat-nosed sphinx when the bell rang for a
second time, so that Argensola was obliged to break away from his
interesting friend, and run to open the main door.

A gentleman wished to see Julio.  He spoke very correct French,
though his accent was a revelation for Argensola.  Upon going into
the bedroom in search of his master, who was just arising, he said
confidently, "It's the cousin from Berlin who has come to say good-
bye.  It could not be anyone else."

When the three came together in the studio, Desnoyers presented his
comrade, in order that the visitor might not make any mistake in
regard to his social status.

"I have heard him spoken of.  The gentleman is Argensola, a very
deserving youth."

Doctor Julius von Hartrott said this with the self-sufficiency of a
man who knows everything and wishes to be agreeable to an inferior,
conceding him the alms of his attention.

The two cousins confronted each other with a curiosity not
altogether free from distrust.  Although closely related, they knew
each other very slightly, tacitly admitting complete divergence in
opinions and tastes.

After slowly examining the Sage, Argensola came to the conclusion
that he looked like an officer dressed as a civilian.  He noticed in
his person an effort to imitate the soldierly when occasionally
discarding uniform--the ambition of every German burgher wishing to
be taken for the superior class.  His trousers were narrow, as
though intended to be tucked into cavalry boots.  His coat with two
rows of buttons had the contracted waist with very full skirt and
upstanding lapels, suggesting vaguely a military great coat.  The
reddish moustachios, strong jaw and shaved head completed his would-
be martial appearance; but his eyes, large, dark-circled and near-
sighted, were the eyes of a student taking refuge behind great thick
glasses which gave him the aspect of a man of peace.

Desnoyers knew that he was an assistant professor of the University,
that he had published a few volumes, fat and heavy as bricks, and
that he was a member of an academic society collaborating in
documentary research directed by a famous historian.  In his lapel
he was wearing the badge of a foreign order.

Julio's respect for the learned member of the family was not unmixed
with contempt.  He and his sister Chichi had from childhood felt an
instinctive hostility toward the cousins from Berlin.  It annoyed
him, too, to have his family everlastingly holding up as a model
this pedant who only knew life as it is in books, and passed his
existence investigating what men had done in other epochs, in order
to draw conclusions in harmony with Germany's views.  While young
Desnoyers had great facility for admiration, and reverenced all
those whose "arguments" Argensola had doled out to him, he drew the
line at accepting the intellectual grandeur of this illustrious
relative.

During his stay in Berlin, a German word of vulgar invention had
enabled him to classify this prig.  Heavy books of minute
investigation were every month being published by the dozens in the
Fatherland.  There was not a professor who could resist the
temptation of constructing from the simplest detail an enormous
volume written in a dull, involved style.  The people, therefore,
appreciating that these near-sighted authors were incapable of any
genial vision of comradeship, called them Sitzfleisch haben, because
of the very long sittings which their works represented.  That was
what this cousin was for him, a mere Sitzfleisch haben.

Doctor von Hartrott, on explaining his visit, spoke in Spanish.  He
availed himself of this language used by the family during his
childhood, as a precaution, looking around repeatedly as if he
feared to be heard.  He had come to bid his cousin farewell.  His
mother had told him of his return, and he had not wished to leave
Paris without seeing him.  He was leaving in a few hours, since
matters were growing more strained.

"But do you really believe that there will be war?" asked Desnoyers.

"War will be declared to-morrow or the day after.  Nothing can
prevent it now.  It is necessary for the welfare of humanity."

Silence followed this speech, Julio and Argensola looking with
astonishment at this peaceable-looking man who had just spoken with
such martial arrogance.  The two suspected that the professor was
making this visit in order to give vent to his opinions and
enthusiasms.  At the same time, perhaps, he was trying to find out
what they might think and know, as one of the many viewpoints of the
people in Paris.

"You are not French," he added looking at his cousin.  "You were
born in Argentina, so before you I may speak the truth."

"And were you not born there?" asked Julio smiling.

The Doctor made a gesture of protest, as though he had just heard
something insulting.  "No, I am a German.  No matter where a German
may be born, he always belongs to his mother country."  Then turning
to Argensola--"This gentleman, too, is a foreigner.  He comes from
noble Spain, which owes to us the best that it has--the worship of
honor, the knightly spirit."

The Spaniard wished to remonstrate, but the Sage would not permit,
adding in an oracular tone:

"You were miserable Celts, sunk in the vileness of an inferior and
mongrel race whose domination by Rome but made your situation worse.
Fortunately you were conquered by the Goths and others of our race
who implanted in you a sense of personal dignity.  Do not forget,
young man, that the Vandals were the ancestors of the Prussians of
to-day."

Again Argensola tried to speak, but his friend signed to him not to
interrupt the professor who appeared to have forgotten his former
reserve and was working up to an enthusiastic pitch with his own
words.

"We are going to witness great events," he continued.  "Fortunate
are those born in this epoch, the most interesting in history!  At
this very moment, humanity is changing its course.  Now the true
civilization begins."

The war, according to him, was going to be of a brevity hitherto
unseen.  Germany had been preparing herself to bring about this
event without any long, economic world-disturbance.  A single month
would be enough to crush France, the most to be feared of their
adversaries.  Then they would march against Russia, who with her
slow, clumsy movements could not oppose an immediate defense.
Finally they would attack haughty England, so isolated in its
archipelago that it could not obstruct the sweep of German progress.
This would make a series of rapid blows and overwhelming victories,
requiring only a summer in which to play this magnificent role.  The
fall of the leaves in the following autumn would greet the definite
triumph of Germany.

With the assurance of a professor who does not expect his dictum to
be refuted by his hearers, he explained the superiority of the
German race.  All mankind was divided into two groups--dolicephalous
and the brachicephalous, according to the shape of the skull.
Another scientific classification divided men into the light-haired
and dark-haired.  The dolicephalous (arched heads) represented
purity of race and superior mentality.  The brachicephalous (flat
heads) were mongrels with all the stigma of degeneration.  The
German, dolicephalous par excellence, was the only descendant of the
primitive Aryans.  All the other nations, especially those of the
south of Europe called "latins," belonged to a degenerate humanity.

The Spaniard could not contain himself any longer.  "But no person
with any intelligence believes any more in those antique theories of
race!  What if there no longer existed a people of absolutely pure
blood, owing to thousands of admixtures due to historical
conquests!" . . .  Many Germans bore the identical ethnic marks
which the professor was attributing to the inferior races.

"There is something in that," admitted Hartrott, "but although the
German race may not be perfectly pure, it is the least impure of all
races and, therefore, should have dominion over the world."

His voice took on an ironic and cutting edge when speaking of the
Celts, inhabitants of the lands of the South.  They had retarded the
progress of Humanity, deflecting it in the wrong direction.  The
Celt is individualistic and consequently an ungovernable
revolutionary who tends to socialism.  Furthermore, he is a
humanitarian and makes a virtue of mercy, defending the existence of
the weak who do not amount to anything.

The illustrious German places above everything else, Method and
Power.  Elected by Nature to command the impotent races, he
possesses all the qualifications that distinguish the superior
leader.  The French Revolution was merely a clash between Teutons
and Celts.  The nobility of France were descended from Germanic
warriors established in the country after the so-called invasion of
the barbarians.  The middle and lower classes were the Gallic-Celtic
element.  The inferior race had conquered the superior,
disorganizing the country and perturbing the world.  Celtism was the
inventor of Democracy, of the doctrines of Socialism and Anarchy.
Now the hour of Germanic retaliation was about to strike, and the
Northern race would re-establish order, since God had favored it by
demonstrating its indisputable superiority.

"A nation," he added, "can aspire to great destinies only when it is
fundamentally Teutonic.  The less German it is, the less its
civilization amounts to.  We represent 'the aristocracy of
humanity,' 'the salt of the earth,' as our William said."

Argensola was listening with astonishment to this outpouring of
conceit.  All the great nations had passed through the fever of
Imperialism.  The Greeks aspired to world-rule because they were the
most civilized and believed themselves the most fit to give
civilization to the rest of mankind.  The Romans, upon conquering
countries, implanted law and the rule of justice.  The French of the
Revolution and the Empire justified their invasions on the plea that
they wished to liberate mankind and spread abroad new ideas.  Even
the Spaniards of the sixteenth century, when battling with half of
Europe for religious unity and the extermination of heresy, were
working toward their ideals obscure and perhaps erroneous, but
disinterested.

All the nations of history had been struggling for something which
they had considered generous and above their own interests.  Germany
alone, according to this professor, was trying to impose itself upon
the world in the name of racial superiority--a superiority that
nobody had recognized, that she was arrogating to herself, coating
her affirmations with a varnish of false science.

"Until now wars have been carried on by the soldiery," continued
Hartrott.  "That which is now going to begin will be waged by a
combination of soldiers and professors.  In its preparation the
University has taken as much part as the military staff.  German
science, leader of all sciences, is united forever with what the
Latin revolutionists disdainfully term militarism.  Force, mistress
of the world, is what creates right, that which our truly unique
civilization imposes.  Our armies are the representatives of our
culture, and in a few weeks we shall free the world from its
decadence, completely rejuvenating it."

The vision of the immense future of his race was leading him on to
expose himself with lyrical enthusiasm.  William I, Bismarck, all
the heroes of past victories, inspired his veneration, but he spoke
of them as dying gods whose hour had passed.  They were glorious
ancestors of modest pretensions who had confined their activities to
enlarging the frontiers, and to establishing the unity of the
Empire, afterwards opposing themselves with the prudence of
valetudinarians to the daring of the new generation.  Their
ambitions went no further than a continental hegemony . . . but now
William II had leaped into the arena, the complex hero that the
country required.

"Lamprecht, my master, has pictured his greatness.  It is tradition
and the future, method and audacity.  Like his grandfather, the
Emperor holds the conviction of what monarchy by the grace of God
represents, but his vivid and modern intelligence recognizes and
accepts modern conditions.  At the same time that he is romantic,
feudal and a supporter of the agrarian conservatives, he is also an
up-to-date man who seeks practical solutions and shows a utilitarian
spirit.  In him are correctly balanced instinct and reason."

Germany, guided by this hero, had, according to Hartrott, been
concentrating its strength, and recognizing its true path.  The
Universities supported him even more unanimously than the army.  Why
store up so much power and maintain it without employment? . . .
The empire of the world belongs to the German people.  The
historians and philosophers, disciples of Treitschke, were taking it
upon themselves to frame the rights that would justify this
universal domination.  And Lamprecht, the psychological historian,
like the other professors, was launching the belief in the absolute
superiority of the Germanic race.  It was just that it should rule
the world, since it only had the power to do so.  This "telurian
germanization" was to be of immense benefit to mankind.  The earth
was going to be happy under the dictatorship of a people born for
mastery.  The German state, "tentacular potency," would eclipse with
its glory the most imposing empire of the past and present.  Gott
mit uns!

"Who will be able to deny, as my master says, that there exists a
Christian, German God, the 'Great Ally,' who is showing himself to
our enemies, the foreigners, as a strong and jealous divinity?" . . .

Desnoyers was listening to his cousin with astonishment and at the
same time looking at Argensola who, with a flutter of his eyes,
seemed to be saying to him, "He is mad!  These Germans are simply
mad with pride."

Meanwhile, the professor, unable to curb his enthusiasm, continued
expounding the grandeur of his race.  From his viewpoint, the
providential Kaiser had shown inexplicable weakenings.  He was too
good and too kind.  "Deliciae generis humani," as had said Professor
Lasson, another of Hartrott's masters.  Able to overthrow everything
with his annihilating power, the Emperor was limiting himself merely
to maintaining peace.  But the nation did not wish to stop there,
and was pushing its leader until it had him started.  It was useless
now to put on the brakes.  "He who does not advance recedes";--that
was the cry of PanGermanism to the Emperor.  He must press on in
order to conquer the entire world.

"And now war comes," continued the pedant.  "We need the colonies of
the others, even though Bismarck, through an error of his stubborn
old age, exacted nothing at the time of universal distribution,
letting England and France get possession of the best lands.  We
must control all countries that have Germanic blood and have been
civilized by our forbears."

Hartrott enumerated these countries.  Holland and Belgium were
German.  France, through the Franks, was one-third Teutonic blood.
Italy. . . .  Here the professor hesitated, recalling the fact that
this nation was still an ally, certainly a little insecure, but
still united by diplomatic bonds.  He mentioned, nevertheless, the
Longobards and other races coming from the North.  Spain and
Portugal had been populated by the ruddy Goth and also belonged to
the dominant race.  And since the majority of the nations of America
were of Spanish and Portuguese origin, they should also be included
in this recovery.

"It is a little premature to think of these last nations just yet,"
added the Doctor modestly, "but some day the hour of justice will
sound.  After our continental triumph, we shall have time to think
of their fate. . . .  North America also should receive our
civilizing influence, for there are living millions of Germans who
have created its greatness."

He was talking of the future conquests as though they were marks of
distinction with which his country was going to favor other
countries.  These were to continue living politically the same as
before with their individual governments, but subject to the
Teutons, like minors requiring the strong hand of a master.  They
would form the Universal United States, with an hereditary and all-
powerful president--the Emperor of Germany--receiving all the
benefits of Germanic culture, working disciplined under his
industrial direction. . . .  But the world is ungrateful, and human
badness always opposes itself to progress.

"We have no illusions," sighed the professor, with lofty sadness.
"We have no friends.  All look upon us with jealousy, as dangerous
beings, because we are the most intelligent, the most active, and
have proved ourselves superior to all others. . . .  But since they
no longer love us, let them fear us!  As my friend Mann says,
although Kultur is the spiritual organization of the world, it does
not exclude bloody savagery when that becomes necessary.  Kultur
sanctifies the demon within us, and is above morality, reason and
science.  We are going to impose Kultur by force of the cannon."

Argensola continued, saying with his eyes, "They are crazy, crazy
with pride! . . .  What can the world expect of such people!"

Desnoyers here intervened in order to brighten this gloomy monologue
with a little optimism.  War had not yet been positively declared.
The diplomats were still trying to arrange matters.  Perhaps it
might all turn out peaceably at the last minute, as had so often
happened before.  His cousin was seeing things entirely distorted by
an aggressive enthusiasm.

Oh, the ironical, ferocious and cutting smile of the Doctor!
Argensola had never known old Madariaga, but it, nevertheless,
occurred to him that in this fashion sharks must smile, although he,
too, had never seen a shark.

"It is war," boomed Hartrott.  "When I left Germany, fifteen days
ago, I knew that war was inevitable."

The certainty with which he said this dissipated all Julio's hope.
disquieted him. . . .  On what mission had Doctor Julius von
Hartrott come to Paris? . . .

"Well, then," asked Desnoyers, "why so many diplomatic interviews?
Why does the German government intervene at all--although in such a
lukewarm way--in the struggle between Austria and Servia. . . .
Would it not be better to declare war right out?"

The professor replied with simplicity: "Our government undoubtedly
wishes that the others should declare the war.  The role of outraged
dignity is always the most pleasing one and justifies all ulterior
resolutions, however extreme they may seem.  There are some of our
people who are living comfortably and do not desire war.  It is
expedient to make them believe that those who impose it upon us are
our enemies so that they may feel the necessity of defending
themselves.  Only superior minds reach the conviction of the great
advancement that can be accomplished by the sword alone, and that
war, as our grand Treitschke says, is the highest form of progress."

Again he smiled with a ferocious expression.  Morality, from his
point of view, should exist among individuals only to make them more
obedient and disciplined, for morality per se impedes governments
and should be suppressed as a useless obstacle.  For the State there
exists neither truth nor falsehood; it only recognizes the utility
of things.  The glorious Bismarck, in order to consummate the war
with France, the base of German grandeur, had not hesitated to
falsify a telegraphic despatch.

"And remember, that he is the most glorious hero of our time!
History looks leniently upon his heroic feat.  Who would accuse the
one who triumphs? . . .  Professor Hans Delbruck has written with
reason, 'Blessed be the hand that falsified the telegram of Ems!'"

It was convenient to have the war break out immediately, in order
that events might result favorably for Germany, whose enemies are
totally unprepared.  Preventive war was recommended by General
Bernhardi and other illustrious patriots.  It would be dangerous
indeed to defer the declaration of war until the enemies had
fortified themselves so that they should be the ones to make war.
Besides, to the Germans what kind of deterrents could law and other
fictions invented by weak nations possibly be? . . .  No; they had
the Power, and Power creates new laws.  If they proved to be the
victors, History would not investigate too closely the means by
which they had conquered.  It was Germany that was going to win, and
the priests of all cults would finally sanctify with their chants
the blessed war--if it led to triumph.

"We are not making war in order to punish the Servian regicides, nor
to free the Poles, nor the others oppressed by Russia, stopping
there in admiration of our disinterested magnanimity.  We wish to
wage it because we are the first people of the earth and should
extend our activity over the entire planet.  Germany's hour has
sounded.  We are going to take our place as the powerful Mistress of
the World, the place which Spain occupied in former centuries,
afterwards France, and England to-day.  What those people
accomplished in a struggle of many years we are going to bring about
in four months.  The storm-flag of the Empire is now going to wave
over nations and oceans; the sun is going to shine on a great
slaughter. . . .

"Old Rome, sick unto death, called 'barbarians' the Germans who
opened the grave.  The world to-day also smells death and will
surely call us barbarians. . .  .  So be it!  When Tangiers and
Toulouse, Amberes and Calais have become submissive to German
barbarism . . . then we will speak further of this matter.  We have
the power, and who has that needs neither to hesitate nor to
argue. . . .  Power! . . .  That is the beautiful word--the only
word that rings true and clear. . . .  Power!  One sure stab and
all argument is answered forever!"

"But are you so sure of victory?" asked Desnoyers.  "Sometimes
Destiny gives us great surprises.  There are hidden forces that we
must take into consideration or they may overturn the best-laid
plans."

The smile of the Doctor became increasingly scornful and arrogant.
Everything had been foreseen and studied out long ago with the most
minute Germanic method.  What had they to fear? . . .  The enemy
most to be reckoned with was France, incapable of resisting the
enervating moral influences, the sufferings, the strain and the
privations of war;--a nation physically debilitated and so poisoned
by revolutionary spirit that it had laid aside the use of arms
through an exaggerated love of comfort.

"Our generals," he announced, "are going to leave her in such a
state that she will never again cross our path."

There was Russia, too, to consider, but her amorphous masses were
slow to assemble and unwieldy to move.  The Executive Staff of
Berlin had timed everything by measure for crushing France in four
weeks, and would then lead its enormous forces against the Russian
empire before it could begin action.

"We shall finish with the bear after killing the cock," affirmed the
professor triumphantly.

But guessing at some objection from his cousin, he hastened on--"I
know what you are going to tell me.  There remains another enemy,
one that has not yet leaped into the lists but which all the Germans
are waiting for.  That one inspires more hatred than all the others
put together, because it is of our blood, because it is a traitor to
the race. . . .  Ah, how we loathe it!"

And in the tone in which these words were uttered throbbed an
expression of hatred and a thirst for vengeance which astonished
both listeners.

"Even though England attack us," continued Hartrott, "we shall
conquer, notwithstanding.  This adversary is not more terrible than
the others.  For the past century she has ruled the world.  Upon the
fall of Napoleon she seized the continental hegemony, and will fight
to keep it.  But what does her energy amount to? . . .  As our
Bernhardi says, the English people are merely a nation of renters
and sportsmen.  Their army is formed from the dregs of the nation.
The country lacks military spirit.  We are a people of warriors, and
it will be an easy thing for us to conquer the English, debilitated
by a false conception of life."

The Doctor paused and then added: "We are counting on the internal
corruption of our enemies, on their lack of unity.  God will aid us
by sowing confusion among these detested people.  In a few days you
will see His hand.  Revolution is going to break out in France at
the same time as war.  The people of Paris will build barricades in
the streets and the scenes of the Commune will repeat themselves.
Tunis, Algiers and all their other possessions are about to rise
against the metropolis."

Argensola seized the opportunity to smile with an aggressive
incredulity.

"I repeat it," insisted Hartrott, "that this country is going to
have internal revolution and colonial insurrection.  I know
perfectly well what I am talking about. . . .  Russia also will
break out into revolution with a red flag that will force the Czar
to beg for mercy on his knees.  You have only to read in the papers
of the recent strikes in Saint Petersburg, and the manifestations of
England will see her appeals to her colonies completely ignored.
India is going to rise against her, and Egypt, too, will seize this
opportunity for her emancipation."

Julio was beginning to be impressed by these affirmations enunciated
with such oracular certainty, and he felt almost irritated at the
incredulous Argensola, who continued looking insolently at the seer,
repeating with his winking eyes, "He is insane--insane with pride."
The man certainly must have strong reasons for making such awful
prophecies.  His presence in Paris just at this time was difficult
for Desnoyers to understand, and gave to his words a mysterious
authority.

"But the nations will defend themselves," he protested to his
cousin.  "Victory will not be such a very simple thing as you
imagine."

"Yes, they will defend themselves, and the struggle will be fiercely
contested.  It appears that, of late years, France has been paying
some attention to her army.  We shall undoubtedly encounter some
resistance; triumph may be somewhat difficult, but we are going to
prevail. . . .  You have no idea to what extent the offensive power
of Germany has attained.  Nobody knows with certainty beyond the
frontiers.  If our foes should comprehend it in all its immensity,
they would fall on their knees beforehand to beg for mercy, thus
obviating the necessity for useless sacrifices."

There was a long silence.  Julius von Hartrott appeared lost in
reverie.  The very thought of the accumulated strength of his race
submerged him in a species of mystic adoration.

"The preliminary victory," he suddenly exclaimed, "we gained some
time ago.  Our enemies, therefore, hate us, and yet they imitate us.
All that bears the stamp of Germany is in demand throughout the
world.  The very countries that are trying to resist our arms copy
our methods in their universities and admire our theories, even
those which do not attain success in Germany.  Oftentimes we laugh
among ourselves, like the Roman augurs, upon seeing the servility
with which they follow us! . . .  And yet they will not admit our
superiority!"

For the first time, Argensola's eyes and general expression approved
the words of Hartrott.  What he had just said was only too true--the
world was a victim of "the German superstition."  An intellectual
cowardice, the fear of Force had made it admire en masse and
indiscriminately, everything of Teutonic origin, just because of the
intensity of its glitter--gold mixed with talcum.  The so-called
Latins, dazed with admiration, were, with unreasonable pessimism,
becoming doubtful of their ability, and thus were the first to
decree their own death.  And the conceited Germans merely had to
repeat the words of these pessimists in order to strengthen their
belief in their own superiority.

With that Southern temperament, which leaps rapidly from one extreme
to another, many Latins had proclaimed that in the world of the
future, there would be no place for the Latin peoples, now in their
death-agony--adding that Germany alone preserved the latent forces
of civilization.  The French who declaimed among themselves, with
the greatest exaggeration, unconscious that folks were listening the
other side of the door, had proclaimed repeatedly for many years
past, that France was degenerating rapidly and would soon vanish
from the earth. . . .  Then why should they resent the scorn of
their enemies. . . .  Why shouldn't the Germans share in their
beliefs?

The professor, misinterpreting the silent agreement of the Spaniard
who until then had been listening with such a hostile smile, added:

"Now is the time to try out in France the German culture, implanting
it there as conquerors."

Here Argensola interrupted, "And what if there is no such thing as
German culture, as a celebrated Teuton says?"  It had become
necessary to contradict this pedant who had become insufferable with
his egotism.  Hartrott almost jumped from his chair on hearing such
a doubt.

"What German is that?"

"Nietzsche."

The professor looked at him pityingly.  Nietzsche had said to
mankind, "Be harsh!" affirming that "a righteous war sanctifies
every cause."  He had exalted Bismarck; he had taken part in the war
of '70; he was glorifying Germany when he spoke of "the smiling
lion," and "the blond beast."  But Argensola listened with the
tranquillity of one sure of his ground.  Oh, hours of placid reading
near the studio chimney, listening to the rain beating against the
pane! . . .

"The philosopher did say that," he admitted, "and he said many other
very different things, like all great thinkers.  His doctrine is one
of pride, but of individual pride, not that of a nation or race.  He
always spoke against 'the insidious fallacy of race.'"

Argensola recalled his philosophy word for word.  Culture, according
to Nietzsche, was "unity of style in all the manifestations of
life."  Science did not necessarily include culture.  Great
knowledge might be accompanied with great barbarity, by the absence
of style or by the chaotic confusion of all styles.  Germany,
according to the philosopher, had no genuine culture owing to its
lack of style.  "The French," he had said, "were at the head of an
authentic and fruitful culture, whatever their valor might be, and
until now everybody had drawn upon it."  Their hatreds were
concentrated within their own country.  "I cannot endure Germany.
The spirit of servility and pettiness penetrates everywhere. . . .
I believe only in French culture, and what the rest of Europe calls
culture appears to me to be a mistake.  The few individual cases of
lofty culture that I met in Germany were of French origin."

"You know," continued Argensola, "that in quarrelling with Wagner
about the excess of Germanism in his art, Nietzsche proclaimed the
necessity of mediterraneanizing music.  His ideal was a culture for
all Europe, but with a Latin base."

Julius von Hartrott replied most disdainfully to this, repeating the
Spaniard's very words.  Men who thought much said many things.
Besides, Nietzsche was a poet, completely demented at his death, and
was no authority among the University sages.  His fame had only been
recognized in foreign lands. . . .  And he paid no further attention
to the youth, ignoring him as though he had evaporated into thin air
after his presumption.  All the professor's attention was now
concentrated on Desnoyers.

"This country," he resumed, "is dying from within.  How can you
doubt that revolution will break out the minute war is declared? . . .
Have you not noticed the agitation of the boulevard on account of
the Caillaux trial?  Reactionaries and revolutionists have been
assaulting each other for the past three days.  I have seen them
challenging one another with shouts and songs as if they were going
to come to blows right in the middle of the street.  This division
of opinion will become accentuated when our troops cross the
frontier.  It will then be civil war.  The anti-militarists are
clamoring mournfully, believing that it is in the power of the
government to prevent the clash. . . .  A country degenerated by
democracy and by the inferiority of the triumphant Celt, greedy for
full liberty! . . .  We are the only free people on earth because we
know how to obey."

This paradox made Julio smile.  Germany the only free people! . . .

"It is so," persisted Hartrott energetically.  "We have the liberty
best suited to a great people--economical and intellectual liberty."

"And political liberty?"

The professor received this question with a scornful shrug.

"Political liberty! . . .  Only decadent and ungovernable people,
inferior races anxious for equality and democratic confusion, talk
about political liberty.  We Germans do not need it.  We are a
nation of masters who recognize the sacredness of government, and we
wish to be commanded by those of superior birth.  We possess the
genius of organization."

That, according to the Doctor, was the grand German secret, and the
Teutonic race upon taking possession of the world, would share its
discovery with all.  The nations would then be so organized that
each individual would give the maximum of service to society.
Humanity, banded in regiments for every class of production, obeying
a superior officer, like machines contributing the greatest possible
output of labor--there you have the perfect state!  Liberty was a
purely negative idea if not accompanied with a positive concept
which would make it useful.

The two friends listened with astonishment to this description of
the future which Teutonic superiority was offering to the world.
Every individual submitted to intensive production, the same as a
bit of land from which its owner wishes to get the greatest number
of vegetables. . . .  Mankind reduced to mechanics. . . .  No
useless operations that would not produce immediate results. . .  .
And the people who heralded this awful idea were the very
philosophers and idealists who had once given contemplation and
reflection the first place in their existence! . . .

Hartrott again harked back to the inferiority of their racial
enemies.  In order to combat successfully, it required self-
assurance, an unquenchable confidence in the superiority of their
own powers.

"At this very hour in Berlin, everyone is accepting war, everyone is
believing that victory is sure, while HERE! . . .  I do not say that
the French are afraid; they have a brave past that galvanizes them
at certain times--but they are so depressed that it is easy to guess
that they will make almost any sacrifices in order to evade what is
coming upon them.  The people first will shout with enthusiasm, as
it always cheers that which carries it to perdition.  The upper
classes have no faith in the future; they are keeping quiet, but the
presentiment of disaster may easily be conjectured.  Yesterday I was
talking with your father.  He is French, and he is rich.  He was
indignant against the government of his country for involving the
nation in the European conflict in order to defend a distant and
uninteresting people.  He complains of the exalted patriots who have
opened the abyss between Germany and France, preventing a
reconciliation.  He says that Alsace and Lorraine are not worth what
a war would cost in men and money. . . .  He recognizes our
greatness and is convinced that we have progressed so rapidly that
the other countries cannot come up to us. . . .  And as your father
thinks, so do many others--all those who are wrapped in creature
comfort, and fear to lose it.  Believe me, a country that hesitates
and fears war is conquered before the first battle."

Julio evinced a certain disquietude, as though he would like to cut
short the conversation.

"Just leave my father out of it!  He speaks that way to-day because
war is not yet an accomplished fact, and he has to contradict and
vent his indignation on whoever comes near him.  To-morrow he will
say just the opposite. . . .  My father is a Latin."

The professor looked at his watch.  He must go; there were still
many things which he had to do before going to the station.  The
Germans living in Paris had fled in great bands as though a secret
order had been circulating among them.  That afternoon the last of
those who had been living ostensibly in the Capital would depart.

"I have come to see you because of our family interest, because it
was my duty to give you fair warning.  You are a foreigner, and
nothing holds you here.  If you are desirous of witnessing a great
historic event, remain--but it will be better for you to go.  The
war is going to be ruthless, very ruthless, and if Paris attempts
resistance, as formerly, we shall see terrible things.  Modes of
offense have greatly changed."

Desnoyers made a gesture of indifference.

"The same as your father," observed the professor.  "Last night he
and all your family responded in the same way.  Even my mother
prefers to remain with her sister, saying that the Germans are very
good, very civilized and there is nothing to apprehend in their
triumph."

This good opinion seemed to be troubling the Doctor.

"They don't understand what modern warfare means.  They ignore the
fact that our generals have studied the art of overcoming the enemy
and they will apply it mercilessly.  Ruthlessness is the only means,
since it perturbs the intelligence of the enemy, paralyzes his
action and pulverizes his resistance.  The more ferocious the war,
the more quickly it is concluded.  To punish with cruelty is to
proceed humanely.  Therefore, Germany is going to be cruel with a
cruelty hitherto unseen, in order that the conflict may not be
prolonged."

He had risen and was standing, cane and straw hat in hand.
Argensola was looking at him with frank hostility.  The professor,
obliged to pass near him, did so with a stiff and disdainful nod.

Then he started toward the door, accompanied by his cousin.  The
farewell was brief.

"I repeat my counsel.  If you do not like danger, go!  It may be
that I am mistaken, and that this nation, convinced of the
uselessness of defense, may give itself up voluntarily. . . .  At
any rate, we shall soon see.  I shall take great pleasure in
returning to Paris when the flag of the Empire is floating over the
Eiffel Tower, a mere matter of three or four weeks, certainly by the
beginning of September."

France was going to disappear from the map.  To the Doctor, her
death was a foregone conclusion.

"Paris will remain," he admitted benevolently, "the French will
remain, because a nation is not easily suppressed; but they will not
retain their former place.  We shall govern the world; they will
continue to occupy themselves in inventing fashions, in making life
agreeable for visiting foreigners; and in the intellectual world, we
shall encourage them to educate good actresses, to produce
entertaining novels and to write witty comedies. . . .  Nothing
more."

Desnoyers laughed as he shook his cousin's hand, pretending to take
his words as a paradox.

"I mean it," insisted Hartrott.  "The last hour of the French
Republic as an important nation has sounded.  I have studied it at
close range, and it deserves no better fate.  License and lack of
confidence above--sterile enthusiasm below."

Upon turning his head, he again caught Argensola's malicious smile.

"We know all about that kind of study," he added aggressively.  "We
are accustomed to examine the nations of the past, to dissect them
fibre by fibre, so that we recognize at a glance the psychology of
the living."

The Bohemian fancied that he saw a surgeon talking self-sufficiently
about the mysteries of the will before a corpse.  What did this
pedantic interpreter of dead documents know about life? . . .

When the door closed, he approached his friend who was returning
somewhat dismayed.  Argensola no longer considered Doctor Julius von
Hartrott crazy.

"What a brute!" he exclaimed, throwing up his hands.  "And to think
that they are at large, these originators of gloomy errors! . . .
Who would ever believe that they belong to the same land that
produced Kant, the pacifist, the serene Goethe and Beethoven! . . .
To think that for so many years, we have believed that they were
forming a nation of dreamers and philosophers occupied in working
disinterestedly for all mankind! . . ."

The sentence of a German geographer recurred to him: "The German is
bicephalous; with one head he dreams and poetizes while with the
other he thinks and executes."

Desnoyers was now beginning to feel depressed at the certainty of
war.  This professor seemed to him even worse than the Herr
Counsellor and the other Germans that he had met on the steamer.
His distress was not only because of his selfish thought as to how
the catastrophe was going to affect his plans with Marguerite.  He
was suddenly discovering that in this hour of uncertainty he loved
France.  He recognized it as his father's native land and the scene
of the great Revolution. . . .  Although he had never mixed in
political campaigns, he was a republican at heart, and had often
ridiculed certain of his friends who adored kings and emperors,
thinking it a great sign of distinction.

Argensola tried to cheer him up.

"Who knows? . . .  This is a country of surprises.  One must see the
Frenchman when he tries to remedy his want of foresight.  Let that
barbarian of a cousin of yours say what he will--there is order,
there is enthusiasm. . . .  Worse off than we were those who lived
in the days before Valmy.  Entirely disorganized, their only defense
battalions of laborers and countrymen handling a gun for the first
time. . . .  But, nevertheless, the Europe of the old monarchies
could not for twenty years free themselves from these improvised
warriors!"



CHAPTER V

IN WHICH APPEAR THE FOUR HORSEMEN


The two friends now lived a feverish life, considerably accelerated
by the rapidity with which events succeeded each other.  Every hour
brought forth an astonishing bit of news--generally false--which
changed opinions very suddenly.  As soon as the danger of war seemed
arrested, the report would spread that mobilization was going to be
ordered within a few minutes.

Within each twenty-four hours were compressed the disquietude,
anxiety and nervous waste of a normal year.  And that which was
aggravating the situation still more was the uncertainty, the
expectation of the event, feared but still invisible, the distress
on account of a danger continually threatening but never arriving.

History in the making was like a stream overflowing its banks,
events overlapping each other like the waves of an inundation.
Austria was declaring war with Servia while the diplomats of the
great powers were continuing their efforts to stem the tide.  The
electric web girdling the planet was vibrating incessantly in the
depths of the ocean and on the peaks of the continents, transmitting
alternate hopes and fears.

Russia was mobilizing a part of its army.  Germany, with its troops
state of "threatened war."  The Austrians, regardless of the efforts
of diplomacy, were beginning the bombardment of Belgrade.  William
II, fearing that the intervention of the Powers might settle the
differences between the Czar and the Emperor of Austria, was forcing
the course of events by declaring war upon Russia.  Then Germany
began isolating herself, cutting off railroad and telegraphic
communications in order to shroud in mystery her invading forces.

France was watching this avalanche of events, temperate in its words
and enthusiasm.  A cool and grave resolution was noticeable
everywhere.  Two generations had come into the world, informed as
soon as they reached a reasonable age, that some day there would
undoubtedly be war.  Nobody wanted it; the adversary imposed
it. . . .  But all were accepting it with the firm intention of
fulfilling their duty.

During the daytime Paris was very quiet, concentrating the mind on
the work in hand.  Only a few groups of exalted patriots, following
the tricolored flag, were passing through the place de la Concorde,
in order to salute the statue of Strasbourg.  The people were
accosting each other in a friendly way in the streets.  Everybody
seemed to know everybody else, although they might not have met
before.  Eye attracted eye, and smiles appeared to broaden mutually
with the sympathy of a common interest.  The women were sad but
speaking cheerily in order to hide their emotions.  In the long
summer twilight, the boulevards were filling with crowds.  Those
from the outlying districts were converging toward the centre of the
city, as in the remote revolutionary days, banding together in
groups, forming an endless multitude from which came shouts and
songs.  These manifestations were passing through the centre under
the electric lights that were just being turned on, the processions
generally lasting until midnight, with the national banner floating
above the walking crowds, escorted by the flags of other nations.

It was on one of these nights of sincere enthusiasm that the two
friends heard an unexpected, astonishing piece of news.  "They have
killed Jaures!"  The groups were repeating it from one to another
with an amazement which seemed to overpower their grief.  "Jaures
assassinated!  And what for?"  The best popular element, which
instinctively seeks an explanation of every proceeding, remained in
suspense, not knowing which way to turn.  The tribune dead, at the
very moment that his word as welder of the people was most
needed! . . .

Argensola thought immediately of Tchernoff.  "What will our
neighbors say?" . . .  The quiet, orderly people of Paris were
fearing a revolution, and for a few moments Desnoyers believed that
his cousin's auguries were about to be fulfilled.  This
assassination, with its retaliations, might be the signal for civil
war.  But the masses of the people, worn out with grief at the death
of their hero, were waiting in tragic silence.  All were seeing,
beyond his dead body, the image of the country.

By the following morning, the danger had vanished.  The laboring
classes were talking of generals and war, showing each other their
little military memorandums, announcing the date of their departure
as soon as the order of mobilization should be published.  "I go the
second day."  "I the first."  Those of the standing army who were on
leave were recalled individually to the barracks.  All these events
were tending in the same direction--war.

The Germans were invading Luxembourg; the Germans were ordering
their armies to invade the French frontier when their ambassador was
still in Paris making promises of peace.  On the day after the death
of Jaures, the first of August, the people were crowding around some
pieces of paper, written by hand and in evident haste.  These papers
were copies of other larger printed sheets, headed by two crossed
flags.  "It has come; it is now a fact!". . .  It was the order for
general mobilization.  All France was about to take up arms, and
chests seemed to expand with a sigh of relief.  Eyes were sparkling
with excitement.  The nightmare was at last over! . . .  Cruel
reality was preferable to the uncertainty of days and days, each as
long as a week.

In vain President Poincare, animated by a last hope, was explaining
to the French that "mobilization is not necessarily war, that a call
to arms may be simply a preventive measure."  "It is war, inevitable
war," said the populace with a fatalistic expression.  And those who
were going to start that very night or the following day were the
most eager and enthusiastic.--"Now those who seek us are going to
find us!  Vive la France!"  The Chant du Depart, the martial hymn of
the volunteers of the first Republic, had been exhumed by the
instinct of a people which seek the voice of Art in its most
critical moments.  The stanzas of the conservative Chenier, adapted
to a music of warlike solemnity, were resounding through the
streets, at the same time as the Marseillaise:


     La Republique nous appelle.
     Sachons vaincre ou sachons perir;
     Un francais doit vivre pour elle.
     Pour elle un francais doit mourir.


The mobilization began at midnight to the minute.  At dusk, groups
of men began moving through the streets towards the stations.  Their
families were walking beside them, carrying the valise or bundle of
clothes.  They were escorted by the friends of their district, the
tricolored flag borne aloft at the head of these platoons.  The
Reserves were donning their old uniforms which presented all the
difficulties of suits long ago forgotten.  With new leather belts
and their revolvers at their sides, they were betaking themselves to
the railway which was to carry them to the point of concentration.
One of their children was carrying the old sword in its cloth
sheath.  The wife was hanging on his arm, sad and proud at the same
time, giving her last counsels in a loving whisper.

Street cars, automobiles and cabs rolled by with crazy velocity.
Nobody had ever seen so many vehicles in the Paris streets, yet if
anybody needed one, he called in vain to the conductors, for none
wished to serve mere civilians.  All means of transportation were
for military men, all roads ended at the railroad stations.  The
heavy trucks of the administration, filled with sacks, were saluted
with general enthusiasm.  "Hurrah for the army!"  The soldiers in
mechanic's garb, on top of the swaying pyramid, replied to the
cheers, waving their arms and uttering shouts that nobody pretended
to understand.

Fraternity had created a tolerance hitherto unknown.  The crowds
were pressing forward, but in their encounters, invariably preserved
good order.  Vehicles were running into each other, and when the
conductors resorted to the customary threats, the crowds would
intervene and make them shake hands.  "Three cheers for France!"
The pedestrians, escaping between the wheels of the automobiles were
laughing and good-naturedly reproaching the chauffeur with, "Would
you kill a Frenchman on his way to his regiment?" and the conductor
would reply, "I, too, am going in a few hours.  This is my last
trip."  As night approached, cars and cabs were running with
increasing irregularity, many of the employees having abandoned
their posts to take leave of their families and make the train.  All
the life of Paris was concentrating itself in a half-dozen human
rivers emptying in the stations.

Desnoyers and Argensola met in a boulevard cafe toward midnight.
Both were exhausted by the day's emotions and under that nervous
depression which follows noisy and violent spectacles.  They needed
to rest.  War was a fact, and now that it was a certainty, they felt
no anxiety to get further news.  Remaining in the cafe proved
impossible.  In the hot and smoky atmosphere, the occupants were
singing and shouting and waving tiny flags.  All the battle hymns of
the past and present were here intoned in chorus, to an
accompaniment of glasses and plates.  The rather cosmopolitan
clientele was reviewing the European nations.  All, absolutely all,
were going to enroll themselves on the side of France.  "Hurrah! . . .
Hurrah!" . . .  An old man and his wife were seated at a table
near the two friends.  They were tenants, of an orderly, humdrum
walk in life, who perhaps in all their existence had never been
awake at such an hour.  In the general enthusiasm they had come to
the boulevards "in order to see war a little closer."  The foreign
tongue used by his neighbors gave the husband a lofty idea of their
importance.

"Do you believe that England is going to join us?" . . .

Argensola knew as much about it as he, but he replied
authoritatively, "Of course she will.  That's a sure thing!"  The
old man rose to his feet: "Hurrah for England!" and he began
chanting a forgotten patriotic song, marking time with his arms in a
spirited way, to the great admiration of his old wife, and urging
all to join in the chorus that very few were able to follow.

The two friends had to take themselves home on foot.  They could not
find a vehicle that would stop for them; all were hurrying in the
opposite direction toward the stations.  They were both in a bad
humor, but Argensola couldn't keep his to himself.

"Ah, these women!"  Desnoyers knew all about his relations (so far
honorable) with a midinette from the rue Taitbout.  Sunday strolls
in the suburbs of Paris, various trips to the moving picture shows,
comments upon the fine points of the latest novel published in the
sheets of a popular paper, kisses of farewell when she took the
night train from Bois Colombes in order to sleep at home--that was
all.  But Argensola was wickedly counting on Father Time to mellow
the sharpest virtues.  That evening they had taken some refreshment
with a French friend who was going the next morning to join his
regiment.  The girl had sometimes seen him with Argensola without
noticing him particularly, but now she suddenly began admiring him
as though he were another person.  She had given up the idea of
returning home that night; she wanted to see how a war begins.  The
three had dined together, and all her interest had centred upon the
one who was going away.  She even took offense, with sudden modesty,
when Argensola tried as he had often done before, to squeeze her
hand under the table.  Meanwhile she was almost leaning her head on
the shoulder of the future hero, enveloping him with admiring gaze.

"And they have gone. . . .  They have gone away together!" said the
Spaniard bitterly.  "I had to leave them in order not to make my
hard luck any worse.  To have worked so long . . . for another!"

He was silent for a few minutes, then changing the trend of his
ideas, he added: "I recognize, nevertheless, that her behavior is
beautiful.  The generosity of these women when they believe that the
moment for sacrifice has come!  She is terribly afraid of her
father, and yet she stays away from home all night with a person
whom she hardly knows, and whom she was not even thinking of in the
middle of the afternoon! . . .  The entire nation feels gratitude
toward those who are going to imperil their lives, and she, poor
child, wishing to do something, too, for those destined for death,
to give them a little pleasure in their last hour . . . is giving
the best she has, that which she can never recover.  I have sketched
her role poorly, perhaps. . . .  Laugh at me if you want to, but
admit that it is beautiful."

Desnoyers laughed heartily at his friend's discomfiture, in spite of
the fact that he, too, was suffering a good deal of secret
annoyance.  He had seen Marguerite but once since the day of his
return.  The only news of her that he had received was by letter. . . .
This cursed war!  What an upset for happy people!  Marguerite's
mother was ill.  She was brooding over the departure of her son, an
officer, on the first day of the mobilization.  Marguerite, too, was
uneasy about her brother and did not think it expedient to come to
the studio while her mother was grieving at home.  When was this
situation ever to end? . . .

That check for four hundred thousand francs which he had brought
from America was also worrying him.  The day before, the bank had
declined to pay it for lack of the customary official advice.
Afterward they said that they had received the advice, but did not
give him the money.  That very afternoon, when the trust companies
had closed their doors, the government had already declared a
moratorium, in order to prevent a general bankruptcy due to the
general panic.  When would they pay him? . . .  Perhaps when the war
which had not yet begun was ended--perhaps never.  He had no other
money available except the two thousand francs left over from his
travelling expenses.  All of his friends were in the same
distressing situation, unable to draw on the sums which they had in
the banks.  Those who had any money were obliged to go from shop to
shop, or form in line at the bank doors, in order to get a bill
changed.  Oh, this war!  This stupid war!

In the Champs Elysees, they saw a man with a broad-brimmed hat who
was walking slowly ahead of them and talking to himself.  Argensola
recognized him as he passed near the street lamp, "Friend
Tchernoff."  Upon returning their greeting, the Russian betrayed a
slight odor of wine.  Uninvited, he had adjusted his steps to
theirs, accompanying them toward the Arc de Triomphe.

Julio had merely exchanged silent nods with Argensola's new
acquaintance when encountering him in the vestibule; but sadness
softens the heart and makes us seek the friendship of the humble as
a refreshing shelter.  Tchernoff, on the contrary, looked at
Desnoyers as though he had known him all his life.

The man had interrupted his monologue, heard only by the black
masses of vegetation, the blue shadows perforated by the reddish
tremors of the street lights, the summer night with its cupola of
warm breezes and twinkling stars.  He took a few steps without
saying anything, as a mark of consideration to his companions, and
then renewed his arguments, taking them up where he had broken off,
without offering any explanation, as though he were still talking to
himself. . . .

"And at this very minute, they are shouting with enthusiasm the same
as they are doing here, honestly believing that they are going to
defend their outraged country, wishing to die for their families and
firesides that nobody has threatened."

"Who are 'they,' Tchernoff?" asked Argensola.

The Russian stared at him as though surprised at such a question.

"They," he said laconically.

The two understood. . . .  THEY!  It could not be anyone else.

"I have lived ten years in Germany," he continued, connecting up his
words, now that he found himself listened to.  "I was daily
correspondent for a paper in Berlin and I know these people.
Passing along these thronged boulevards, I have been seeing in my
imagination what must be happening there at this hour.  They, too,
are singing and shouting with enthusiasm as they wave their flags.
On the outside, they seem just alike--but oh, what a difference
within! . . .  Last night the people beset a few babblers in the
boulevard who were yelling, 'To Berlin!'--a slogan of bad memories
and worse taste.  France does not wish conquests; her only desire is
to be respected, to live in peace without humiliations or
disturbances.  To-night two of the mobilized men said on leaving,
'When we enter Germany we are going to make it a republic!' . . .  A
republic is not a perfect thing, but it is better than living under
an irresponsible monarchy by the grace of God.  It at least
presupposes tranquillity and absence of the personal ambitions that
disturb life.  I was impressed by the generous thought of these
laboring men who, instead of wishing to exterminate their enemies,
were planning to give them something better."

Tchernoff remained silent a few minutes, smiling ironically at the
picture which his imagination was calling forth.

"In Berlin, the masses are expressing their enthusiasm in the lofty
phraseology befitting a superior people.  Those in the lowest
classes, accustomed to console themselves for humiliations with a
gross materialism, are now crying 'Nach Paris!  We are going to
drink champagne gratis!'  The pietistic burgher, ready to do
anything to attain a new honor, and the aristocracy which has given
the world the greatest scandals of recent years, are also shouting,
'Nach Paris!'  To them Paris is the Babylon of the deadly sin, the
city of the Moulin Rouge and the restaurants of Montmartre, the only
places that they know. . . .  And my comrades of the Social-
Democracy, they are also cheering, but to another tune.--'To-morrow!
To St. Petersburg!  Russian ascendency, the menace of civilization,
must be obliterated!'  The Kaiser waving the tyranny of another
country as a scarecrow to his people! . . .  What a joke!"

And the loud laugh of the Russian sounded through the night like the
noise of wooden clappers.

"We are more civilized than the Germans," he said, regaining his
self-control.

Desnoyers, who had been listening with great interest, now gave a
start of surprise, saying to himself, "This Tchernoff has been
drinking."

"Civilization," continued the Socialist, "does not consist merely in
great industry, in many ships, armies and numerous universities that
only teach science.  That is material civilization.  There is
another, a superior one, that elevates the soul and does not permit
human dignity to suffer without protesting against continual
humiliations.  A Swiss living in his wooden chalet and considering
himself the equal of the other men of his country, is more civilized
than the Herr Professor who gives precedence to a lieutenant, or to
a Hamburg millionaire who, in turn, bends his neck like a lackey
before those whose names are prefixed by a von."

Here the Spaniard assented as though he could guess what Tchernoff
was going to say.

"We Russians endure great tyranny.  I know something about that.  I
know the hunger and cold of Siberia. . . .  But opposed to our
tyranny has always existed a revolutionary protest.  Part of the
nation is half-barbarian, but the rest has a superior mentality, a
lofty moral spirit which faces danger and sacrifice because of
liberty and truth. . . .  And Germany?  Who there has ever raised a
protest in order to defend human rights?  What revolutions have ever
broken out in Prussia, the land of the great despots?

Frederick William, the founder of militarism, when he was tired of
beating his wife and spitting in his children's plates, used to
sally forth, thong in hand, in order to cowhide those subjects who
did not get out of his way in time.  His son, Frederick the Great,
declared that he died, bored to death with governing a nation of
slaves.  In two centuries of Prussian history, one single
revolution--the barricades of 1848--a bad Berlinish copy of the
Paris revolution, and without any result.  Bismarck corrected with a
heavy hand so as to crush completely the last attempts at protest--
if such ever really existed.  And when his friends were threatening
him with revolution, the ferocious Junker, merely put his hands on
his hips and roared with the most insolent of horse laughs.  A
revolution in Prussia! . . .  Nothing at all, as he knew his
people!"

Tchernoff was not a patriot.  Many a time Argensola had heard him
railing against his country, but now he was indignant in view of the
contempt with which Teutonic haughtiness was treating the Russian
nation.  Where, in the last forty years of imperial grandeur, was
that universal supremacy of which the Germans were everlastingly
boasting? . . .

Excellent workers in science; tenacious and short-sighted
academicians, each wrapped in his specialty!--Benedictines of the
laboratory who experimented painstakingly and occasionally hit upon
something, in spite of enormous blunders given out as truths,
because they were their own . . . that was all!  And side by side
with such patient laboriosity, really worthy of respect--what
charlatanism!  What great names exploited as a shop sample!  How
many sages turned into proprietors of sanatoriums! . . .  A Herr
Professor discovers the cure of tuberculosis, and the tubercular
keep on dying as before.  Another labels with a number the
invincible remedy for the most unconfessable of diseases, and the
genital scourge continues afflicting the world.  And all these
errors were representing great fortunes, each saving panacea
bringing into existence an industrial corporation selling its
products at high prices--as though suffering were a privilege of the
rich.  How different from the bluff Pasteur and other clever men of
the inferior races who have given their discoveries to the world
without stooping to form monopolies!

"German science," continued Tchernoff, "has given much to humanity,
I admit that; but the science of other nations has done as much.
Only a nation puffed up with conceit could imagine that it has done
everything for civilization, and the others nothing. . . .  Apart
from their learned specialists, what genius has been produced in our
day by this Germany which believes itself so transcendent?  Wagner,
the last of the romanticists, closes an epoch and belongs to the
past.  Nietzsche took pains to proclaim his Polish origin and
abominated Germany, a country, according to him, of middle-class
pedants.  His Slavism was so pronounced that he even prophesied the
overthrow of the Prussians by the Slavs. . . .  And there are
others.  We, although a savage people, have given the world of
modern times an admirable moral grandeur.  Tolstoi and Dostoievsky
are world-geniuses.  What names can the Germany of William II put
ahead of these? . . .  His country was the country of music, but the
Russian musicians of to-day are more original than the mere
followers of Wagner, the copyists who take refuge in orchestral
exasperations in order to hide their mediocrity. . . .  In its time
of stress the German nation had men of genius, before Pan-Germanism
had been born, when the Empire did not exist.  Goethe, Schiller,
Beethoven were subjects of little principalities.  They received
influence from other countries and contributed their share to the
universal civilization like citizens of the world, without insisting
that the world should, therefore, become Germanized."

Czarism had committed atrocities.  Tchernoff knew that by
experience, and did not need the Germans to assure him of it.  But
all the illustrious classes of Russia were enemies of that tyranny
and were protesting against it.  Where in Germany were the
intellectual enemies of Prussian Czarism?  They were either holding
their peace, or breaking forth into adulation of the anointed of the
Lord--a musician and comedian like Nero, of a sharp and superficial
intelligence, who believed that by merely skimming through anything
he knew it all.  Eager to strike a spectacular pose in history, he
had finally afflicted the world with the greatest of calamities.

"Why must the tyranny that weighs upon my country necessarily be
Russian?  The worst Czars were imitators of Prussia.  Every time
that the Russian people of our day have attempted to revindicate
their rights, the reactionaries have used the Kaiser as a threat,
proclaiming that he would come to their aid.  One-half of the
Russian aristocracy is German; the functionaries who advise and
support despotism are Germans; German, too, are the generals who
have distinguished themselves by massacring the people; German are
the officials who undertake to punish the laborers' strikes and the
rebellion of their allies.  The reactionary Slav is brutal, but he
has the fine sensibility of a race in which many princes have become
Nihilists.  He raises the lash with facility, but then he repents
and oftentimes weeps.  I have seen Russian officials kill themselves
rather than march against the people, or through remorse for
slaughter committed.  The German in the service of the Czar feels no
scruples, nor laments his conduct.  He kills coldly, with the
minuteness and exactitude with which he does everything.  The
Russian is a barbarian who strikes and regrets; German civilization
shoots without hesitation.  Our Slav Czar, in a humanitarian dream,
favored the Utopian idea of universal peace, organizing the
Conference of The Hague.  The Kaiser of culture, meanwhile, has been
working years and years in the erection and establishment of a
destructive organ of an immensity heretofore unknown, in order to
crush all Europe.  The Russian is a humble Christian, socialistic,
democratic, thirsting for justice; the German prides himself upon
his Christianity, but is an idolator like the German of other
centuries.  His religion loves blood and maintains castes; his true
worship is that of Odin;--only that nowadays, the god of slaughter
has changed his name and calls himself, 'The State'!"

Tchernoff paused an instant--perhaps in order to increase the wonder
of his companions--and then said with simplicity:

"I am a Christian."

Argensola, who already knew the ideas and history of the Russian,
started with astonishment, and Julio persisted in his suspicion,
"Surely Tchernoff is drunk."

"It is true," declared the Russian earnestly, "that I do not worry
about God, nor do I believe in dogmas, but my soul is Christian as
is that of all revolutionists.  The philosophy of modern democracy
is lay Christianity.  We Socialists love the humble, the needy, the
weak.  We defend their right to life and well-being, as did the
greatest lights of the religious world who saw a brother in every
unfortunate.  We exact respect for the poor in the name of justice;
the others ask for it in the name of charity.  That only separates
us.  But we strive that mankind may, by common consent, lead a
better life, that the strong may sacrifice for the weak, the lofty
for the lowly, and the world be ruled by brotherliness, seeking the
greatest equality possible."

The Slav reviewed the history of human aspirations.  Greek thought
had brought comfort, a sense of well-being on the earth--but only
for the few, for the citizens of the little democracies, for the
free men, leaving the slaves and barbarians who constituted the
majority, in their misery.  Christianity, the religion of the lowly,
had recognized the right of happiness for all mankind, but this
happiness was placed in heaven, far from this world, this "vale of
tears."  The Revolution and its heirs, the Socialists, were trying
to place happiness in the immediate realities of earth, like the
ancients, but making all humanity participants in it like the
Christians.

"Where is the 'Christianity of modern Germany? . . .  There is far
more genuine Christian spirit in the fraternal laity of the French
Republic, defender of the weak, than in the religiosity of the
conservative Junkers.  Germany has made a god in her own image,
believing that she adores it, but in reality adoring her own image.
The German God is a reflex of the German State which considers war
as the first activity of a nation and the noblest of occupations.
Other Christian peoples, when they have to go to war, feel the
contradiction that exists between their conduct and the teachings of
the Gospel, and excuse themselves by showing the cruel necessity
which impels them.  Germany declares that war is acceptable to God.
I have heard German sermons proving that Jesus was in favor of
Militarism.

"Teutonic pride, the conviction that its race is providentially
destined to dominate the world, brings into working unity their
Protestants, Catholics and Jews.

"Far above their differences of dogma is that God of the State which
is German--the Warrior God to whom William is probably referring as
'my worthy Ally.'  Religions always tend toward universality.  Their
aim is to place humanity in relationship with God, and to sustain
these relations among mankind.  Prussia has retrograded to
barbarism, creating for its personal use a second Jehovah, a
divinity hostile to the greater part of the human race who makes his
own the grudges and ambitions of the German people."

Tchernoff then explained in his own way the creation of this
Teutonic God, ambitious, cruel and vengeful.  The Germans were
comparatively recent Christians.  Their Christianity was not more
than six centuries old.  When the Crusades were drawing to a close,
the Prussians were still living in paganism.  Pride of race,
impelling them to war, had revived these dead divinities.  The God
of the Gospel was now adorned by the Germans with lance and shield
like the old Teutonic god who was a military chief.

"Christianity in Berlin wears helmet and riding boots.  God at this
moment is seeing Himself mobilized the same as Otto, Fritz and
Franz, in order to punish the enemies of His chosen people.  That
the Lord has commanded, 'Thou shalt not kill,' and His Son has said
to the world, 'Blessed are the peacemakers,' no longer matters.
Christianity, according to its German priests of all creeds, can
only influence the individual betterment of mankind, and should not
mix itself in affairs of state.  The Prussian God of the State is
'the old German God,' the lineal descendant of the ferocious
Germanic mythology, a mixture of divinities hungry for war."

In the silence of the avenue, the Russian evoked the ruddy figures
of the implacable gods, that were going to awake that night upon
hearing the hum of arms and smelling the acrid odor of blood.  Thor,
the brutal god with the little head, was stretching his biceps and
clutching the hammer that crushed cities.  Wotan was sharpening his
lance which had the lightning for its handle, the thunder for its
blade.  Odin, the one-eyed, was gaping with gluttony on the
mountain-tops, awaiting the dead warriors that would crowd around
his throne.  The dishevelled Valkyries, fat and perspiring, were
beginning to gallop from cloud to cloud, hallooing to humanity that
they might carry off the corpses doubled like saddle bags, over the
haunches of their flying nags.

"German religiosity," continued the Russian, "is the disavowal of
Christianity.  In its eyes, men are no longer equal before God.
Their God is interested only in the strong, and favors them with his
support so that they may dare anything.  Those born weak must either
submit or disappear.  Neither are nations equal, but are divided
into leaders and inferior races whose destiny is to be sifted out
and absorbed by their superiors.  Since God has thus ordained, it is
unnecessary to state that the grand world-leader is Germany."

Argensola here interrupted to observe that German pride believed
itself championed not only by God but by science, too.

"I know that," interposed the Russian without letting him finish--
"generalization, inequality, selection, the struggle for life, and
all that. . . .  The Germans, so conceited about their special
worth, erect upon distant ground their intellectual monuments,
borrowing of the foreigner their foundation material whenever they
undertake a new line of work.  A Frenchman and an Englishman,
Gobineau and Chamberlain, have given them the arguments with which
to defend the superiority of their race.  With the rubbish left over
from Darwin and Spencer, their old Haeckel has built up his doctrine
of 'Monism' which, applied to politics, scientifically consecrates
Prussian pride and recognizes its right to rule the world by force."

"No, a thousand times no!" he exclaimed after a brief silence.  "The
struggle for existence with its procession of cruelties may be true
among the lower species, but it should not be true among human
creatures.  We are rational beings and ought to free ourselves from
the fatality of environment, moulding it to our convenience.  The
animal does not know law, justice or compassion; he lives enslaved
in the obscurity of his instincts.  We think, and thought signifies
liberty.  Force does not necessarily have to be cruel; it is
strongest when it does not take advantage of its power, and is
kindly.  All have a right to the life into which they are born, and
since among individuals there exist the haughty and the humble, the
mighty and the weak, so should exist nations, large and small, old
and young.  The end of our existence is not combat nor killing in
order that others may afterwards kill us, and, perhaps, be killed
themselves.  Civilized peoples ought unanimously to adopt the idea
of southern Europe, striving for the most peaceful and sweetest form
of life possible."

A cruel smile played over the Russian's beard.

"But there exists that Kultur, diametrically opposed to
civilization, which the Germans wish to palm off upon us.
Civilization is refinement of spirit, respect of one's neighbor,
tolerance of foreign opinion, courtesy of manner.  Kultur is the
action of a State that organizes and assimilates individuals and
communities in order to utilize them for its own ends; and these
ends consist mainly in placing 'The State' above other states,
overwhelming them with their grandeur--or what is the same thing--
with their haughty and violent pride."

By this time, the three had reached the place de l'Etoile.  The dark
outline of the Arc de Triomphe stood forth clearly in the starry
expanse.  The avenues extended in all directions, a double file of
lights.  Those around the monument illuminated its gigantic bases
and the feet of the sculptured groups.  Further up, the vaulted
spaces were so locked in shadow that they had the black density of
ebony.

Upon passing under the Arch, which greatly intensified the echo of
their footsteps, they came to a standstill.  The night breeze had a
wintry chill as it whistled past, and the curved masses seemed
melting into the diffused blue of space.  Instinctively the three
turned to glance back at the Champs Elysees.  They saw only a river
of shadow on which were floating rosaries of red stars among the two
long, black scarfs formed by the buildings.  But they were so well
acquainted with this panorama that in imagination they mentally saw
the majestic sweep of the avenue, the double row of palaces, the
place de la Concorde in the background with the Egyptian obelisk,
and the trees of the Tuileries.

"How beautiful it is!" exclaimed Tchernoff who was seeing something
beyond the shadows.  "An entire civilization, loving peace and
pleasure, has passed through here."

A memory greatly affected the Russian.  Many an afternoon, after
lunch, he had met in this very spot a robust man, stocky, with
reddish beard and kindly eyes--a man who looked like a giant who had
just stopped growing.  He was always accompanied by a dog.  It was
Jaures, his friend Jaures, who before going to the senate was
accustomed to taking a walk toward the Arch from his home in Passy.

"He liked to come just where we are now!  He loved to look at the
avenues, the distant gardens, all of Paris which can be seen from
this height; and filled with admiration, he would often say to me,
'This is magnificent--one of the most beautiful perspectives that
can be found in the entire world.' . . .  Poor Jaures!"

Through association of ideas, the Russian evoked the image of his
compatriot, Michael Bakounine, another revolutionist, the father of
anarchy, weeping with emotion at a concert after hearing the
symphony with Beethoven chorals directed by a young friend of his,
named Richard Wagner.  "When our revolution comes," he cried,
clasping the hand of the master, "whatever else may perish, this
must be saved at any cost!"

Tchernoff roused himself from his reveries to look around him and
say with sadness:

"THEY have passed through here!"

Every time that he walked through the Arch, the same vision would
spring up in his mind.  THEY were thousands of helmets glistening in
the sun, thousands of heavy boots lifted with mechanical rigidity at
the same time; horns, fifes, drums large and small, clashing against
the majestic silence of these stones--the warlike march from
Lohengrin sounding in the deserted avenues before the closed houses.

He, who was a foreigner, always felt attracted by the spell exerted
by venerable buildings guarding the glory of a bygone day.  He did
not wish to know who had erected it.  As soon as its pride is
flattered, mankind tries immediately to solidify it.  Then Humanity
intervenes with a broader vision that changes the original
significance of the work, enlarges it and strips it of its first
egotistical import.  The Greek statues, models of the highest
beauty, had been originally mere images of the temple, donated by
the piety of the devotees of those times.  Upon evoking Roman
grandeur, everybody sees in imagination the enormous Coliseum,
circle of butcheries, or the arches erected to the glory of the
inept Caesars.  The representative works of nations have two
significations--the interior or immediate one which their creators
gave them, and the exterior or universal interest, the symbolic
value which the centuries have given them.

"This Arch," continued Tchernoff, "is French within, with its names
of battles and generals open to criticism.  On the outside, it is
the monument of the people who carried through the greatest
revolution for liberty ever known.  The glorification of man is
there below in the column of the place Vendome.  Here there is
nothing individual.  Its builders erected it to the memory of la
Grande Armee and that Grand Army was the people in arms who spread
revolution throughout Europe.  The artists, great inventors, foresaw
the true significance of this work.  The warriors of Rude who are
chanting the Marseillaise in the group at the left are not
professional soldiers, they are armed citizens, marching to work out
their sublime and violent mission.  Their nudity makes them appear
to me like sans-culottes in Grecian helmets. . . .  Here there is
more than the glory and egoism of a great nation.  All Europe is
awake to new life, thanks to these Crusaders of Liberty. . . .  The
nations call to mind certain images.  If I think of Greece, I see
the columns of the Parthenon; Rome, Mistress of the World, is the
Coliseum and the Arch of Trajan; and revolutionary France is the Arc
de Triomphe."

The Arch was even more, according to the Russian.  It represented a
great historical retaliation; the nations of the South, called the
Latin races, replying, after many centuries, to the invasion which
had destroyed the Roman jurisdiction--the Mediterranean peoples
spreading themselves as conquerors through the lands of the ancient
barbarians.  Retreating immediately, they had swept away the past
like a tidal wave--the great surf depositing all that it contained.
Like the waters of certain rivers which fructify by overflowing,
this recession of the human tide had left the soil enriched with new
and generous ideas.

"If THEY should return!" added Tchernoff with a look of uneasiness.
"If they again should tread these stones! . . .  Before, they were
simple-minded folk, stunned by their rapid good-fortune, who passed
through here like a farmer through a salon.  They were content with
money for the pocket and two provinces which should perpetuate the
memory of their victory. . . .  But now they will not be the
soldiers only who march against Paris.  At the tail of the armies
come the maddened canteen-keepers, the Herr Professors, carrying at
the side the little keg of wine with the powder which crazes the
barbarian, the wine of Kultur.  And in the vans come also an
enormous load of scientific savagery, a new philosophy which
glorifies Force as a principle and sanctifier of everything, denies
liberty, suppresses the weak and places the entire world under the
charge of a minority chosen by God, just because it possesses the
surest and most rapid methods of slaughter.  Humanity may well
tremble for the future if again resounds under this archway the
tramp of boots following a march of Wagner or any other
Kapellmeister."

They left the Arch, following the avenue Victor Hugo.  Tchernoff
walking along in dogged silence as though the vision of this
imaginary procession had overwhelmed him.  Suddenly he continued
aloud the course of his reflections.

"And if they should enter, what does it matter? . . .  On that
account, the cause of Right will not die.  It suffers eclipses, but
is born again; it may be ignored and trampled under foot, but it
does not, therefore, cease to exist, and all good souls recognize it
as the only rule of life.  A nation of madmen wishes to place might
upon the pedestal that others have raised to Right.  Useless
endeavor!  The eternal hope of mankind will ever be the increasing
power of more liberty, more brotherliness, more justice."

The Russian appeared to calm himself with this statement.  He and
his friends spoke of the spectacle which Paris was presenting in its
preparation for war.  Tchernoff bemoaned the great suffering
produced by the catastrophe, the thousands and thousands of domestic
tragedies that were unrolling at that moment.  Apparently nothing
had changed.  In the centre of the city and around the stations,
there was unusual agitation, but the rest of the immense city did
not appear affected by the great overthrow of its existence.  The
solitary street was presenting its usual aspect, the breeze was
gently moving the leaves.  A solemn peace seemed to be spreading
itself through space.  The houses appeared wrapped in slumber, but
behind the closed windows might be surmised the insomnia of the
reddened eyes, the sighs from hearts anguished by the threatened
danger, the tremulous agility of the hands preparing the war outfit,
perhaps the last loving greetings exchanged without pleasure, with
kisses ending in sobs.

Tchernoff thought of his neighbors, the husband and wife who
occupied the other interior apartment behind the studio.  She was no
longer playing the piano.  The Russian had overheard disputes, the
banging of doors locked with violence, and the footsteps of a man in
the middle of the night, fleeing from a woman's cries.  There had
begun to develop on the other side of the wall a regulation drama--a
repetition of hundreds of others, all taking place at the same time.

"She is a German," volunteered the Russian.  "Our concierge has
ferreted out her nationality.  He must have gone by this time to
join his regiment.  Last night I could hardly sleep.  I heard the
lamentations through the thin wall partition, the steady, desperate
weeping of an abandoned child, and the voice of a man who was vainly
trying to quiet her! . . .  Ah, what a rain of sorrows is now
falling upon the world!"

That same evening, on leaving the house, he had met her by her door.
She appeared like another woman, with an old look as though in these
agonizing hours she had been suffering for fifteen years.  In vain
the kindly Tchernoff had tried to cheer her up, urging her to accept
quietly her husband's absence so as not to harm the little one who
was coming.

"For the unhappy creature is going to be a mother," he said sadly.
"She hides her condition with a certain modesty, but from my window,
I have often seen her making the dainty layette."

The woman had listened to him as though she did not understand.
Words were useless before her desperation.  She could only sob as
though talking to herself, "I am a German. . . .  He has gone; he
has to go away. . . .  Alone! . . .  Alone forever!" . . .

"She is thinking all the time of her nationality which is separating
her from her husband; she is thinking of the concentration camp to
which they will take her with her compatriots.  She is fearful of
being abandoned in the enemy's country obliged to defend itself
against the attack of her own country. . . .  And all this when she
is about to become a mother.  What miseries!  What agonies!"

The three reached the rue de la Pompe and on entering the house,
Tchernoff began to take leave of his companions in order to climb
the service stairs; but Desnoyers wished to prolong the
conversation.  He dreaded being alone with his friend, still
chagrined over the evening's events.  The conversation with the
Russian interested him, so they all went up in the elevator
together.  Argensola suggested that this would be a good opportunity
to uncork one of the many bottles which he was keeping in the
kitchen.  Tchernoff could go home through the studio door that
opened on the stairway.

The great window had its glass doors wide open; the transoms on the
patio side were also open; a breeze kept the curtains swaying,
moving, too, the old lanterns, moth-eaten flags and other adornments
of the romantic studio.  They seated themselves around the table,
near a window some distance from the light which was illuminating
the other end of the big room.  They were in the shadow, with their
backs to the interior court.  Opposite them were tiled roofs and an
enormous rectangle of blue shadow, perforated by the sharp-pointed
stars.  The city lights were coloring the shadowy space with a
bloody reflection.

Tchernoff drank two glasses, testifying to the excellence of the
liquid by smacking his lips.  The three were silent with the
wondering and thoughtful silence which the grandeur of the night
imposes.  Their eyes were glancing from star to star, grouping them
in fanciful lines, forming them into triangles or squares of varying
irregularity.  At times, the twinkling radiance of a heavenly body
appeared to broaden the rays of light, almost hypnotizing them.

The Russian, without coming out of his revery, availed himself of
another glass.  Then he smiled with cruel irony, his bearded face
taking on the semblance of a tragic mask peeping between the
curtains of the night.

"I wonder what those men up there are thinking!" he muttered.  "I
wonder if any star knows that Bismarck ever existed! . . .  I wonder
if the planets are aware of the divine mission of the German
nation!"

And he continued laughing.

Some far-away and uncertain noise disturbed the stillness of the
night, slipping through some of the chinks that cut the immense
plain of roofs.  The three turned their heads so as to hear
better. . . .  The sound of voices cut through the thick silence
of night--a masculine chorus chanting a hymn, simple, monotonous
and solemn.  They guessed at what it must be, although they could
not hear very well.  Various single notes floating with greater
intensity on the night wind, enabled Argensola to piece together
the short song, ending in a melodious, triumphant yell--a true
war song:


     C'est l'Alsace et la Lorraine,
     C'est l'Alsace qu'il nous faut,
     Oh, oh, oh, oh.


A new band of men was going away through the streets below, toward
the railway station, the gateway of the war.  They must be from the
outlying districts, perhaps from the country, and passing through
silence-wrapped Paris, they felt like singing of the great national
hope, that those who were watching behind the dark facades might
feel comforted, knowing that they were not alone.

"Just as it is in the opera," said Julio listening to the last notes
of the invisible chorus dying away into the night.

Tchernoff continued drinking, but with a distracted air, his eyes
fixed on the red cloud that floated over the roofs.

The two friends conjectured his mental labor from his concentrated
look, and the low exclamations which were escaping him like the
echoes of an interior monologue.  Suddenly he leaped from thought to
word without any forewarning, continuing aloud the course of his
reasoning.

"And when the sun arises in a few hours, the world will see coursing
through its fields the four horsemen, enemies of mankind. . . .
Already their wild steeds are pawing the ground with impatience;
already the ill-omened riders have come together and are exchanging
the last words before leaping into the saddle."

"What horsemen are these?" asked Argensola.

"Those which go before the Beast."

The two friends thought this reply as unintelligible as the
preceding words.  Desnoyers again said mentally, "He is drunk," but
his curiosity forced him to ask, "What beast is that?"

"That of the Apocalypse."

There was a brief silence, but the Russian's terseness of speech did
not last long.  He felt the necessity of expressing his enthusiasm
for the dreamer on the island rock of Patmos.  The poet of great and
mystic vision was exerting, across two thousand years, his influence
over this mysterious revolutionary, tucked away on the top floor of
a house in Paris.  John had foreseen it all.  His visions,
unintelligible to the masses, nevertheless held within them the
mystery of great human events.

Tchernoff described the Apocalyptic beast rising from the depths of
the sea.  He was like a leopard, his feet like those of a bear, his
mouth like the snout of a lion.  He had seven heads and ten horns.
And upon the horns were ten crowns, and upon each of his heads the
name of a blasphemy.  The evangelist did not say just what these
blasphemies were, perhaps they differed according to the epochs,
modified every thousand years when the beast made a new apparition.
The Russian seemed to be reading those that were flaming on the
heads of the monster--blasphemies against humanity, against justice,
against all that makes life sweet and bearable.  "Might is superior
to Right!" . . .  "The weak should not exist." . . .  "Be harsh in
order to be great." . . .  And the Beast in all its hideousness was
attempting to govern the world and make mankind render him homage!

"But the four horsemen?" persisted Desnoyers.

The four horsemen were preceding the appearance of the monster in
John's vision.

The seven seals of the book of mystery were broken by the Lamb in
the presence of the great throne where was seated one who shone like
jasper.  The rainbow round about the throne was in sight like unto
an emerald.  Twenty-four thrones were in a semicircle around the
great throne, and upon them twenty-four elders with white robes and
crowns of gold.  Four enormous animals, covered with eyes and each
having six wings, seemed to be guarding the throne.  The sounding of
trumpets was greeting the breaking of the first seal.

"Come and see," cried one of the beasts in a stentorian tone to the
vision-seeing poet. . . .  And the first horseman appeared on a
white horse.  In his hand he carried a bow, and a crown was given
unto him.  He was Conquest, according to some, the Plague according
to others.  He might be both things at the same time.  He wore a
crown, and that was enough for Tchernoff.

"Come forth," shouted the second animal, removing his thousand eyes.
And from the broken seal leaped a flame-colored steed.  His rider
brandished over his head an enormous sword.  He was War.  Peace fled
from the world before his furious gallop; humanity was going to be
exterminated.

And when the third seal was broken, another of the winged animals
bellowed like a thunder clap, "Come and see!"  And John saw a black
horse.  He who mounted it held in his hand a scale in order to weigh
the maintenance of mankind.  He was Famine.

The fourth animal saluted the breaking of the fourth seal with a
great roaring--"Come and see!"  And there appeared a pale-colored
horse.  His rider was called Death, and power was given him to
destroy with the sword and with hunger and with death, and with the
beasts of the earth.

The four horsemen were beginning their mad, desolating course over
the heads of terrified humanity.

Tchernoff was describing the four scourges of the earth exactly as
though he were seeing them.  The horseman on the white horse was
clad in a showy and barbarous attire.  His Oriental countenance was
contracted with hatred as if smelling out his victims.  While his
horse continued galloping, he was bending his bow in order to spread
pestilence abroad.  At his back swung the brass quiver filled with
poisoned arrows, containing the germs of all diseases--those of
private life as well as those which envenom the wounded soldier on
the battlefield.

The second horseman on the red steed was waving the enormous, two-
edged sword over his hair bristling with the swiftness of his
course.  He was young, but the fierce scowl and the scornful mouth
gave him a look of implacable ferocity.  His garments, blown open by
the motion of his wild race, disclosed the form of a muscular
athlete.

Bald, old and horribly skinny was the third horseman bouncing up and
down on the rawboned back of his black steed.  His shrunken legs
clanked against the thin flanks of the lean beast.  In one withered
hand he was holding the scales, symbol of the scarcity of food that
was going to become as valuable as gold.

The knees of the fourth horseman, sharp as spurs, were pricking the
ribs of the pale horse.  His parchment-like skin betrayed the lines
and hollows of his skeleton.  The front of his skull-like face was
twisted with the sardonic laugh of destruction.  His cane-like arms
were whirling aloft a gigantic sickle.  From his angular shoulders
was hanging a ragged, filthy shroud.

And the furious cavalcade was passing like a hurricane over the
immense assemblage of human beings.  The heavens showed above their
heads, a livid, dark-edged cloud from the west.  Horrible monsters
and deformities were swarming in spirals above the furious horde,
like a repulsive escort.  Poor Humanity, crazed with fear, was
fleeing in all directions on hearing the thundering pace of the
Plague, War, Hunger and Death.  Men and women, young and old, were
knocking each other down and falling to the ground overwhelmed by
terror, astonishment and desperation.  And the white horse, the red,
the black and the pale, were crushing all with their relentless,
iron tread--the athletic man was hearing the crashing of his broken
ribs, the nursing babe was writhing at its mother's breast, and the
aged and feeble were closing their eyes forever with a childlike
sob.

"God is asleep, forgetting the world," continued the Russian.  "It
will be a long time before he awakes, and while he sleeps the four
feudal horsemen of the Beast will course through the land as its
only lords."

Tchernoff was overpowered by the intensity of his dramatic vision.
Springing from his seat, he paced up and down with great strides;
but his picture of the fourfold catastrophe revealed by the gloomy
poet's trance, seemed to him very weak indeed.  A great painter had
given corporeal form to these terrible dreams.

"I have a book," he murmured, "a rare book." . . .

And suddenly he left the studio and went to his own quarters.  He
wanted to bring the book to show to his friends.  Argensola
accompanied him, and they returned in a few minutes with the volume,
leaving the doors open behind them, so as to make a stronger current
of air among the hollows of the facades and the interior patio.

Tchernoff placed his precious book under the light.  It was a volume
printed in 1511, with Latin text and engravings.  Desnoyers read the
title, "The Apocalypse Illustrated."  The engravings were by Albert
Durer, a youthful effort, when the master was only twenty-seven
years old.  The three were fascinated by the picture portraying the
wild career of the Apocalyptic horsemen.  The quadruple scourge, on
fantastic mounts, seemed to be precipitating itself with a realistic
sweep, crushing panic-stricken humanity.

Suddenly something happened which startled the three men from their
contemplative admiration--something unusual, indefinable, a dreadful
sound which seemed to enter directly into their brains without
passing through their ears--a clutch at the heart.  Instinctively
they knew that something very grave had just happened.

They stared at each other silently for a few interminable seconds.

Through the open door, a cry of alarm came up from the patio.

With a common impulse, the three ran to the interior window, but
before reaching them, the Russian had a presentiment.

"My neighbor! . . .  It must be my neighbor.  Perhaps she has killed
herself!"

Looking down, they could see lights below, people moving around a
form stretched out on the tiled floor.  The alarm had instantly
filled all the court windows, for it was a sleepless night--a night
of nervous apprehension when everyone was keeping a sad vigil.

"She has killed herself," said a voice which seemed to come up from
a well.  "The German woman has committed suicide."

The explanation of the concierge leaped from window to window up to
the top floor.

The Russian was shaking his head with a fatalistic expression.  The
unhappy woman had not taken the death-leap of her own accord.
Someone had intensified her desperation, someone had pushed her. . . .
The horsemen!  The four horsemen of the Apocalypse! . . .
Already they were in the saddle!  Already they were beginning their
merciless gallop of destruction!

The blind forces of evil were about to be let loose throughout the
world.

The agony of humanity, under the brutal sweep of the four horsemen,
was already begun!



PART II


CHAPTER I

WHAT DON MARCELO ENVIED


Upon being convinced that war really was inevitable, the elder
Desnoyers was filled with amazement.  Humanity had gone crazy.  Was
it possible that war could happen in these days of so many
railroads, so many merchant marines, so many inventions, so much
activity developed above and below the earth? . . .  The nations
would ruin themselves forever.  They were now accustomed to luxuries
and necessities unknown a century ago.  Capital was master of the
world, and war was going to wipe it out.  In its turn, war would be
wiped out in a few months' time through lack of funds to sustain it.
His soul of a business man revolted before the hundreds of thousands
of millions that this foolhardy event was going to convert into
smoke and slaughter.

As his indignation had to fix upon something close at hand, he made
his own countrymen responsible for this insanity.  Too much talk
about la revanche!  The very idea of worrying for forty-four years
over the two lost provinces when the nation was mistress of enormous
and undeveloped lands in other countries! . . .  Now they were going
to pay the penalty for such exasperating and clamorous foolishness.

For him war meant disaster writ large.  He had no faith in his
country.  France's day had passed.  Now the victors were of the
Northern peoples, and especially that Germany which he had seen so
close, admiring with a certain terror its discipline and its
rigorous organization.  The former working-man felt the conservative
and selfish instinct of all those who have amassed millions.  He
scorned political ideals, but through class interest he had of late
years accepted the declarations against the scandals of the
government.  What could a corrupt and disorganized Republic do
against the solidest and strongest empire in the world? . . .

"We are going to our deaths," he said to himself.  "Worse than
'70! . . .  We are going to see horrible things!"

The good order and enthusiasm with which the French responded to
their country's call and transformed themselves into soldiers were
most astonishing to him.  This moral shock made his national faith
begin to revive.  The great majority of Frenchmen were good after
all; the nation was as valiant as in former times.  Forty-four years
of suffering and alarm had developed their old bravery.  But the
leaders?  Where were they going to get leaders to march to
victory? . . .

Many others were asking themselves the same question.  The silence
of the democratic government was keeping the country in complete
ignorance of their future commanders.  Everybody saw the army
increasing from hour to hour: very few knew the generals.  One name
was beginning to be repeated from mouth to mouth, "Joffre . . .
Joffre."  His first pictures made the curious crowds struggle to get
a glimpse of them.  Desnoyers studied them very carefully.  "He
looks like a very capable person."  His methodical instincts were
gratified by the grave and confident look of the general of the
Republic.  Suddenly he felt the great confidence that efficient-
looking bank directors always inspired in him.  He could entrust his
interests to this gentleman, sure that he would not act impulsively.

Finally, against his will, Desnoyers was drawn into the whirlpool of
enthusiasm and emotion.  Like everyone around him, he lived minutes
that were hours, and hours that were years.  Events kept on
overlapping each other; within a week the world seemed to have made
up for its long period of peace.

The old man fairly lived in the street, attracted by the spectacle
of the multitude of civilians saluting the multitude of uniformed
men departing for the seat of war.

At night he saw the processions passing through the boulevards.  The
tricolored flag was fluttering its colors under the electric lights.
The cafes were overflowing with people, sending forth from doors and
windows the excited, musical notes of patriotic songs.  Suddenly,
amidst applause and cheers, the crowd would make an opening in the
street.  All Europe was passing here; all Europe--less the arrogant
enemy--and was saluting France in her hour of danger with hearty
spontaneity.  Flags of different nations were filing by, of all
tints of the rainbow, and behind them were the Russians with bright
and mystical eyes; the English, with heads uncovered, intoning songs
of religious gravity; the Greeks and Roumanians of aquiline profile;
the Scandinavians, white and red; the North Americans, with the
noisiness of a somewhat puerile enthusiasm; the Hebrews without a
country, friends of the nation of socialistic revolutions; the
Italians, as spirited as a choir of heroic tenors; the Spanish and
South Americans, tireless in their huzzas.  They were students and
apprentices who were completing their courses in the schools and
workshops, and refugees who, like shipwrecked mariners, had sought
shelter on the hospitable strand of Paris.  Their cheers had no
special significance, but they were all moved by their desire to
show their love for the Republic.  And Desnoyers, touched by the
sight, felt that France was still of some account in the world, that
she yet exercised a moral force among the nations, and that her joys
and sorrows were still of interest to humanity.

"In Berlin and Vienna, too," he said to himself, "they must also be
cheering enthusiastically at this moment . . . but Germans only, no
others.  Assuredly no foreigner is joining in their demonstrations."

The nation of the Revolution, legislator of the rights of mankind,
was harvesting the gratitude of the throngs, but was beginning to
feel a certain remorse before the enthusiasm of the foreigners who
were offering their blood for France.  Many were lamenting that the
government should delay twenty days, until after they had finished
the operations of mobilization, in admitting the volunteers.  And
he, a Frenchman born, a few hours before, had been mistrusting his
country! . . .

In the daytime the popular current was running toward the Gare de
l'Est.  Crowded against the gratings was a surging mass of humanity
stretching its tentacles through the nearby streets.  The station
that was acquiring the importance of a historic spot appeared like a
narrow tunnel through which a great human river was trying to flow
with many rippling encounters and much heavy pressure against its
banks.  A large part of France in arms was coursing through this
exit from Paris toward the battlefields at the frontier.

Desnoyers had been in the station only twice, when going and coming
from Germany.  Others were now taking the same road.  The crowds
were swarming in from the environs of the city in order to see the
masses of human beings in geometric bodies, uniformly clad,
disappearing within the entrance with flash of steel and the rhythm
of clanking metal.  The crystal archways that were glistening in the
sun like fiery mouths were swallowing and swallowing people.  When
night fell the processions were still coming on, by light of the
electric lamps.  Through the iron grills were passing thousands and
thousands of draught horses; men with their breasts crossed with
metal and bunches of horsehair hanging from their helmets, like
paladins of bygone centuries; enormous cases that were serving as
cages for the aeronautic condors; strings of cannon, long and
narrow, painted grey and protected, by metal screens, more like
astronomical instruments than mouths of death; masses and masses of
red kepis (military caps) moving in marching rhythm, rows and rows
of muskets, some black and stark like reed plantations, others
ending in bayonets like shining spikes.  And over all these restless
fields of seething throngs, the flags of the regiments were
fluttering in the air like colored birds; a white body, a blue wing,
or a red one, a cravat of gold on the neck, and above, the metal tip
pointing toward the clouds.

Don Marcelo would return home from these send-offs vibrating with
nervous fatigue, as one who had just participated in a scene of
racking emotion.  In spite of his tenacious character which always
stood out against admitting a mistake, the old man began to feel
ashamed of his former doubts.  The nation was quivering with life;
France was a grand nation; appearances had deceived him as well as
many others.  Perhaps the most of his countrymen were of a light and
flippant character, given to excessive interest in the sensuous side
of life; but when danger came they were fulfilling their duty
simply, without the necessity of the harsh force to which the iron-
clad organizations were submitting their people.

On leaving home on the morning of the fourth day of the mobilization
Desnoyers, instead of betaking himself to the centre of the city,
went in the opposite direction toward the rue de la Pompe.  Some
imprudent words dropped by Chichi, and the uneasy looks of his wife
and sister-in-law made him suspect that Julio had returned from his
trip.  He felt the necessity of seeing at least the outside of the
studio windows, as if they might give him news.  And in order to
justify a trip so at variance with his policy of ignoring his son,
he remembered that the carpenter lived in the same street.

"I must hunt up Robert.  He promised a week ago that he would come
here."

This Robert was a husky young fellow who, to use his own words, was
"emancipated from boss tyranny," and was working independently in
his own home.  A tiny, almost subterranean room was serving him for
dwelling and workshop.  A woman he called "my affinity" was looking
carefully after his hearth and home, with a baby boy clinging to her
skirts.  Desnoyers was accustomed to humor Robert's tirades against
his fellow citizens because the man had always humored his whimseys
about the incessant rearrangement of his furniture.  In the
luxurious apartment in the avenue Victor Hugo the carpenter would
sing La Internacional while using hammer and saw, and his employer
would overlook his audacity of speech because of the cheapness of
his work.

Upon arriving at the shop he found the man with cap over one ear,
broad trousers like a mameluke's, hobnailed boots and various
pennants and rosettes fastened to the lapels of his jacket.

"You've come too late, Boss," he said cheerily.  "I am just going to
close the factory.  The Proprietor has been mobilized, and in a few
hours will join his regiment."

And he pointed to a written paper posted on the door of his dwelling
like the printed cards on all establishments, signifying that
employer and employees had obeyed the order of mobilization.

It had never occurred to Desnoyers that his carpenter might become a
soldier, since he was so opposed to all kinds of authority.  He
hated the flics, the Paris police, with whom he had, more than once,
exchanged fisticuffs and clubbings.  Militarism was his special
aversion.  In the meetings against the despotism of the barracks he
had always been one of the noisiest participants.  And was this
revolutionary fellow going to war naturally and voluntarily? . . .

Robert spoke enthusiastically of his regiment, of life among
comrades with Death but four steps away.

"I believe in my ideas, Boss, the same as before," he explained as
though guessing the other's thought.  "But war is war and teaches
many things--among others that Liberty must be accompanied with
order and authority.  It is necessary that someone direct that the
rest may follow--willingly, by common consent . . . but they must
follow.  When war actually comes one sees things very differently
from when living at home doing as one pleases."

The night that they assassinated Jaures he howled with rage,
announcing that the following morning the murder would be avenged.
He had hunted up his associates in the district in order to inform
them what retaliation was being planned against the malefactors.
But war was about to break out.  There was something in the air that
was opposing civil strife, that was placing private grievances in
momentary abeyance, concentrating all minds on the common weal.

"A week ago," he exclaimed, "I was an anti-militarist!  How far away
that seems now--as if a year had gone by!  I keep thinking as
before!  I love peace and hate war like all my comrades.  But the
French have not offended anybody, and yet they threaten us, wishing
to enslave us. . . .  But we French can be fierce, since they oblige
us to be, and in order to defend ourselves it is just that nobody
should shirk, that all should obey.  Discipline does not quarrel
with Revolution.  Remember the armies of the first Republic--all
citizens, Generals as well as soldiers, but Hoche, Kleber and the
others were rough-hewn, unpolished benefactors who knew how to
command and exact obedience."

The carpenter was well read.  Besides the papers and pamphlets of
"the Idea," he had also read on stray sheets the views of Michelet
and other liberal actors on the stage of history.

"We are going to make war on War," he added.  "We are going to fight
so that this war will be the last."

This statement did not seem to be expressed with sufficient
clearness, so he recast his thought.

"We are going to fight for the future; we are going to die in order
that our grandchildren may not have to endure a similar calamity.
If the enemy triumphs, the war-habit will triumph, and conquest will
be the only means of growth.  First they will overcome Europe, then
the rest of the world.  Later on, those who have been pillaged will
rise up in their wrath.  More wars! . . .  We do not want conquests.
We desire to regain Alsace and Lorraine, for their inhabitants wish
to return to us . . . and nothing more.  We shall not imitate the
enemy, appropriating territory and jeopardizing the peace of the
world.  We had enough of that with Napoleon; we must not repeat that
experience.  We are going to fight for our immediate security, and
at the same time for the security of the world--for the life of the
weaker nations.  If this were a war of aggression, of mere vanity,
of conquest, then we Socialists would bethink ourselves of our anti-
militarism.  But this is self-defense, and the government has not
been at fault.  Since we are attacked, we must be united in our
defensive."

The carpenter, who was also anti-clerical, was now showing a more
generous tolerance, an amplitude of ideas that embraced all mankind.
The day before he had met at the administration office a Reservist
who was just leaving to join his regiment.  At a glance he saw that
this man was a priest.

"I am a carpenter," he had said to him, by way of introduction, "and
you, comrade, are working in the churches?"

He employed this figure of speech in order that the priest might not
suspect him of anything offensive.  The two had clasped hands.

"I do not take much stock in the clerical cowl," Robert explained to
Desnoyers.  "For some time I have not been on friendly terms with
religion.  But in every walk of life there must be good people, and
the good people ought to understand each other in a crisis like
this.  Don't you think so, Boss?"

The war coincided with his socialistic tendencies.  Before this,
when speaking of future revolution, he had felt a malign pleasure in
imagining all the rich deprived of their fortunes and having to work
in order to exist.  Now he was equally enthusiastic at the thought
that all Frenchmen would share the same fate without class
distinction.

"All with knapsacks on their backs and eating at mess."

And he was even extending this military sobriety to those who
remained behind the army.  War was going to cause great scarcity of
provisions, and all would have to come down to very plain fare.

"You, too, Boss, who are too old to go to war--you, with all your
millions, will have to eat the same as I. . . .  Admit that it is a
beautiful thing."

Desnoyers was not offended by the malicious satisfaction that his
future privations seemed to inspire in the carpenter.  He was very
thoughtful.  A man of his stamp, an enemy of existing conditions,
who had no property to defend, was going to war--to death, perhaps--
because of a generous and distant ideal, in order that future
generations might never know the actual horrors of war!  To do this,
he was not hesitating at the sacrifice of his former cherished
beliefs, all that he had held sacred till now. . . .  And he who
belonged to the privileged class, who possessed so many tempting
things, requiring defense, had given himself up to doubt and
criticism! . . .

Hours after, he again saw the carpenter, near the Arc de Triomphe.
He was one of a group of workmen looking much as he did, and this
group was joining others and still others that represented every
social class--well-dressed citizens, stylish and anaemic young men,
graduate students with worn jackets, pale faces and thick glasses,
and youthful priests who were smiling rather shamefacedly as though
they had been caught at some ridiculous escapade.  At the head of
this human herd was a sergeant, and as a rear guard, various
soldiers with guns on their shoulders.  Forward march,
Reservists! . . .

And a musical cry, a solemn harmony like a Greek chant, menacing and
monotonous, surged up from this mass with open mouths, swinging
arms, and legs that were opening and shutting like compasses.

Robert was singing the martial chorus with such great

energy that his eyes and Gallic moustachios were fairly trembling.
In spite of his corduroy suit and his bulging linen hand bag, he had
the same grand and heroic aspect as the figures by Rude in the Arc
de Triomphe.  The "affinity" and the boy were trudging along the
sidewalk so as to accompany him to the station.  For a moment he
took his eyes from them to speak with a companion in the line,
shaven and serious-looking, undoubtedly the priest whom he had met
the day before.  Now they were talking confidentially, intimately,
with that brotherliness which contact with death inspires in
mankind.

The millionaire followed the carpenter with a look of respect,
immeasurably increased since he had taken his part in this human
avalanche.  And this respect had in it something of envy, the envy
that springs from an uneasy conscience.

Whenever Don Marcelo passed a bad night, suffering from nightmare, a
certain terrible thing--always the same--would torment his
imagination.  Rarely did he dream of mortal peril to his family or
self.  The frightful vision was always that certain notes bearing
his signature were presented for collection which he, Marcelo
Desnoyers, the man always faithful to his bond, with a past of
immaculate probity, was not able to pay.  Such a possibility made
him tremble, and long after waking his heart would be oppressed with
terror.  To his imagination this was the greatest disgrace that a
man could suffer.

Now that war was overturning his existence with its agitations, the
same agonies were reappearing.  Completely awake, with full powers
of reasoning, he was suffering exactly the same distress as when in
his horrible dreams he saw his dishonored signature on a protested
document.

All his past was looming up before his eyes with such extraordinary
clearness that it seemed as though until then his mind must have
been in hopeless confusion.  The threatened land of France was his
native country.  Fifteen centuries of history had been working for
him, in order that his opening eyes might survey progress and
comforts that his ancestors did not even know.  Many generations of
Desnoyers had prepared for his advent into life by struggling with
the land and defending it that he might be born into a free family
and fireside. . . .  And when his turn had come for continuing this
effort, when his time had arrived in the rosary of generations--he
had fled like a debtor evading payment! . . .  On coming into his
fatherland he had contracted obligations with the human group to
whom he owed his existence.  This obligation should be paid with his
arms, with any sacrifice that would repel danger . . . and he had
eluded the acknowledgment of his signature, fleeing his country and
betraying his trust to his forefathers!  Ah, miserable coward!  The
material success of his life, the riches acquired in a remote
country, were comparatively of no importance.  There are failures
that millions cannot blot out.  The uneasiness of his conscience was
proving it now.  Proof, too, was in the envy and respect inspired by
this poor mechanic marching to meet his death with others equally
humble, all kindled with the satisfaction of duty fulfilled, of
sacrifice accepted.

The memory of Madariaga came to his memory.

"Where we make our riches, and found a family--there is our
country."

No, the statement of the centaur was not correct.  In normal times,
perhaps.  Far from one's native land when it is not exposed to
danger, one may forget it for a few years.  But he was living now in
France, and France was being obliged to defend herself against
enemies wishing to overpower her.  The sight of all her people
rising en masse was becoming an increasingly shameful torture for
Desnoyers, making him think all the time of what he should have done
in his youth, of what he had dodged.

The veterans of '70 were passing through the streets, with the green
and black ribbon in their lapel, souvenirs of the privations of the
Siege of Paris, and of heroic and disastrous campaigns.  The sight
of these men, satisfied with their past, made him turn pale.  Nobody
was recalling his, but he knew it, and that was enough.  In vain his
reason would try to lull this interior tempest. . . .  Those times
were different; then there was none of the present unanimity; the
Empire was unpopular . . . everything was lost. . . .  But the
recollection of a celebrated sentence was fixing itself in his mind
as an obsession--"France still remained!"  Many had thought as he
did in his youth, but they had not, therefore, evaded military
service.  They had stood by their country in a last and desperate
resistance.

Useless was his excuse-making reasoning.  Nobler thoughts showed him
the fallacy of this beating around the bush.  Explanations and
demonstrations are unnecessary to the understanding of patriotic and
religious ideals; true patriotism does not need them.  One's
country . . . is one's country.  And the laboring man, skeptical and
jesting, the self-centred farmer, the solitary pastor, all had
sprung to action at the sound of this conjuring word, comprehending
it instantly, without previous instruction.

"It is necessary to pay," Don Marcelo kept repeating mentally.  "I
ought to pay my debt."

As in his dreams, he was constantly feeling the anguish of an
upright and desperate man who wishes to meet his obligations.

Pay! . . . and how?  It was now very late.  For a moment the heroic
resolution came into his head of offering himself as a volunteer, of
marching with his bag at his side in some one of the groups of
future combatants, the same as the carpenter.  But the uselessness
of the sacrifice came immediately into his mind.  Of what use would
it be? . . .  He looked robust and was well-preserved for his age,
but he was over seventy, and only the young make good soldiers.
Combat is but one incident in the struggle.  Equally necessary are
the hardship and self-denial in the form of interminable marches,
extremes of temperature, nights in the open air, shoveling earth,
digging trenches, loading carts, suffering hunger. . . .  No; it was
too late.  He could not even leave an illustrious name that might
serve as an example.

Instinctively he glanced behind.  He was not alone in the world; he
had a son who could assume his father's debt . . . but that hope
only lasted a minute.  His son was not French; he belonged to
another people; half of his blood was from another source.  Besides,
how could the boy be expected to feel as he did?  Would he even
understand if his father should explain it to him? . . .  It was
useless to expect anything from this lady-killing, dancing clown,
from this fellow of senseless bravado, who was constantly exposing
his life in duels in order to satisfy a silly sense of honor.

Oh, the meekness of the bluff Senor Desnoyers after these
reflections! . . .  His family felt alarmed at seeing the humility
and gentleness with which he moved around the house.  The two men-
servants had gone to join their regiments, and to them the most
surprising result of the declaration of war was the sudden kindness
of their master, the lavishness of his farewell gifts, the paternal
care with which he supervised their preparations for departure.  The
terrible Don Marcelo embraced them with moist eyes, and the two had
to exert themselves to prevent his accompanying them to the station.

Outside of his home he was slipping about humbly as though mutely
asking pardon of the many people around him.  To him they all
appeared his superiors.  It was a period of economic crisis; for the
time being, the rich also were experiencing what it was to be poor
and worried; the banks had suspended operations and were paying only
a small part of their deposits.  For some weeks the millionaire was
deprived of his wealth, and felt restless before the uncertain
future.  How long would it be before they could send him money from
South America?  Was war going to take away fortunes as well as
lives? . . .  And yet Desnoyers had never appreciated money less,
nor disposed of it with greater generosity.

Numberless mobilized men of the lower classes who were going alone
toward the station met a gentleman who would timidly stop them, put
his hand in his pocket and leave in their right hand a bill of
twenty francs, fleeing immediately before their astonished eyes.
The working-women who were returning weeping from saying good-bye to
their husbands saw this same gentleman smiling at the children who
were with them, patting their cheeks and hastening away, leaving a
five-franc piece in their hands.

Don Marcelo, who had never smoked, was now frequenting the tobacco
shops, coming out with hands and pockets filled in order that he
might, with lavish generosity, press the packages upon the first
soldier he met.  At times the recipient, smiling courteously, would
thank him with a few words, revealing his superior breeding--
afterwards passing the gift on to others clad in cloaks as coarse
and badly cut as his own.  The mobilization, universally obligatory,
often caused him to make these mistakes.

The rough hands pressing his with a grateful clasp, left him
satisfied for a few moments.  Ah, if he could only do more! . . .
The Government in mobilizing its vehicles had appropriated three of
his monumental automobiles, and Desnoyers felt very sorry that they
were not also taking the fourth mastodon.  Of what use were they to
him?  The shepherds of this monstrous herd, the chauffeur and his
assistants, were now in the army.  Everybody was marching away.
Finally he and his son would be the only ones left--two useless
creatures.

He roared with wrath on learning of the enemy's entrance into
Belgium, considering this the most unheard-of treason in history.
He suffered agonies of shame at remembering that at first he had
held the exalted patriots of his country responsible for the
war. . . .  What perfidy, methodically carried out after long years
of preparation!  The accounts of the sackings, fires and butcheries
made him turn pale and gnash his teeth.  To him, to Marcelo
Desnoyers, might happen the very same thing that Belgium was
enduring, if the barbarians should invade France.  He had a home in
the city, a castle in the country, and a family.  Through
association of ideas, the women assaulted by the soldiery, made him
think of Chichi and the dear Dona Luisa.  The mansions in flames
called to his mind the rare and costly furnishings accumulated in
his expensive dwellings--the armorial bearings of his social
elevation.  The old folk that were shot, the women foully mutilated,
the children with their hands cut off, all the horrors of a war of
terror, aroused the violence of his character.

And such things could happen with impunity in this day and
generation! . . .

In order to convince himself that punishment was near, that
vengeance was overtaking the guilty ones, he felt the necessity of
mingling daily with the people crowding around the Gare de l'Est.

Although the greater part of the troops were operating on the
frontiers, that was not diminishing the activity in Paris.  Entire
battalions were no longer going off, but day and night soldiers were
coming to the station singly or in groups.  These were Reserves
without uniform on their way to enroll themselves with their
companies, officials who until then had been busy with the work of
the mobilization, platoons in arms destined to fill the great gaps
opened by death.

The multitude, pressed against the railing, was greeting those who
were going off, following them with their eyes while they were
crossing the large square.  The latest editions of the daily papers
were announced with hoarse yells, and instantly the dark throng
would be spotted with white, all reading with avidity the printed
sheets.  Good news: "Vive la France!"  A doubtful despatch,
foreshadowing calamity: "No matter!  We must press on at all costs!
The Russians will close in behind them!"  And while these dialogues,
inspired by the latest news were taking place, many young girls were
going among the groups offering little flags and tricolored
cockades--and passing through the patio, men and still more men were
disappearing behind the glass doors, on their way to the war.

A sub-lieutenant of the Reserves, with his bag on his shoulder, was
accompanied by his father toward the file of policemen keeping the
crowds back.  Desnoyers saw in the young officer a certain
resemblance to his son.  The father was wearing in his lapel the
black and green ribbon of 1870--a decoration which always filled
Desnoyers with remorse.  He was tall and gaunt, but was still trying
to hold himself erect, with a heavy frown.  He wanted to show
himself fierce, inhuman, in order to hide his emotion.

"Good-bye, my boy!  Do your best."

"Good-bye, father."

They did not clasp hands, and each was avoiding looking at the
other.  The official was smiling like an automaton.  The father
turned his back brusquely, and threading his way through the throng,
entered a cafe, where for some time he needed the most retired seat
in the darkest earner to hide his emotion.

AND DON MARCELO ENVIED HIS GRIEF.

Some of the Reservists came along singing, preceded by a flag.  They
were joking and jostling each other, betraying in excited actions,
long halts at all the taverns along the way.  One of them, without
interrupting his song, was pressing the hand of an old woman
marching beside him, cheerful and dry-eyed.  The mother was
concentrating all her strength in order, with feigned happiness, to
accompany this strapping lad to the last minute.

Others were coming along singly, separated from their companies, but
not on that account alone.  The gun was hanging from the shoulder,
the back overlaid by the hump of the knapsack, the red legs shooting
in and out of the turned-back folds of the blue cloak, and the smoke
of a pipe under the visor of the kepis.  In front of one of these
men, four children were walking along, lined up according to size.
They kept turning their heads to admire their father, suddenly
glorified by his military trappings.  At his side was marching his
wife, affable and resigned, feeling in her simple soul a revival of
love, an ephemeral Spring, born of the contact with danger.  The
man, a laborer of Paris, who a few months before was singing La
Internacional, demanding the abolishment of armies and the
brotherhood of all mankind, was now going in quest of death.  His
wife, choking back her sobs, was admiring him greatly.  Affection
and commiseration made her insist upon giving him a few last
counsels.  In his knapsack she had put his best handkerchiefs, the
few provisions in the house and all the money.  Her man was not to
be uneasy about her and the children; they would get along all
right.  The government and kind neighbors would look after them.

The soldier in reply was jesting over the somewhat misshapen figure
of his wife, saluting the coming citizen, and prophesying that he
would be born in a time of great victory.  A kiss to the wife, an
affectionate hair-pull for his offspring, and then he had joined his
comrades. . . .  No tears.  Courage!. . .  Vive la France!

The final injunctions of the departing were now heard.  Nobody was
crying.  But as the last red pantaloons disappeared, many hands
grasped the iron railing convulsively, many handkerchiefs were
bitten with gnashing teeth, many faces were hidden in the arms with
sobs of anguish.

AND DON MARCELO ENVIED THESE TEARS.

The old woman, on losing the warm contact of her son's hand from her
withered one, turned in the direction which she believed to be that
of the hostile country, waving her arms with threatening fury.

"Ah, the assassin! . . . the bandit!"

In her wrathful imagination she was again seeing the countenance so
often displayed in the illustrated pages of the periodicals--
moustaches insolently aggressive, a mouth with the jaw and teeth of
a wolf, that laughed . . . and laughed as men must have laughed in
the time of the cave-men.

AND DON MARCELO ENVIED THIS WRATH!



CHAPTER II

NEW LIFE


When Marguerite was able to return to the studio in the rue de la
Pompe, Julio, who had been living in a perpetual bad humor, seeing
everything in the blackest colors, suddenly felt a return of his old
optimism.

The war was not going to be so cruel as they all had at first
imagined.  The days had passed by, and the movements of the troops
were beginning to be less noticeable.  As the number of men
diminished in the streets, the feminine population seemed to have
increased.  Although there was great scarcity of money, the banks
still remaining closed, the necessity for it was increasingly great,
in order to secure provisions.  Memories of the famine of the siege
of '70 tormented the imagination.  Since war had broken out with the
same enemy, it seemed but logical to everybody to expect a
repetition of the same happenings.  The storehouses were besieged by
women who were securing stale food at exorbitant prices in order to
store it in their homes.  Future hunger was producing more terror
than immediate dangers.

For young Desnoyers these were about all the transformations that
war was creating around him.  People would finally become accustomed
to the new existence.  Humanity has a certain reserve force of
adaptation which enables it to mould itself to circumstances and
continue existing.  He was hoping to continue his life as though
nothing had happened.  It was enough for him that Marguerite should
continue faithful to their past.  Together they would see events
slipping by them with the cruel luxuriousness of those who, from an
inaccessible height, contemplate a flood without the slightest risk
to themselves.

This selfish attitude had also become habitual to Argensola.

"Let us be neutral," the Bohemian would say.  "Neutrality does not
necessarily mean indifference.  Let us enjoy the great spectacle,
since nothing like it will ever happen again in our lifetime."

It was unfortunate that war should happen to come when they had so
little money.  Argensola was hating the banks even more than the
Central Powers, distinguishing with special antipathy the trust
company which was delaying payment of Julio's check.  How lovely it
would have been with this sum available, to have forestalled events
by laying in every class of commodity!  In order to supplement the
domestic scrimping, he again had to solicit the aid of Dona Luisa.
War had lessened Don Marcelo's precautions, and the family was now
living in generous unconcern.  The mother, like other house
mistresses, had stored up provisions for months and months to come,
buying whatever eatables she was able to lay hands on.  Argensola
took advantage of this abundance, repeating his visits to the home
in the avenue Victor Hugo, descending its service stairway with
great packages which were swelling the supplies in the studio.

He felt all the joys of a good housekeeper in surveying the
treasures piled up in the kitchen--great tins of canned meat,
pyramids of butter crocks, and bags of dried vegetables.  He had
accumulated enough there to maintain a large family.  The war had
vaults.

"Let them come!" he would say with a heroic gesture as he took stock
of his treasure trove.  "Let them come when they will!  We are ready
for them!"

The care and increase of his provisions, and the investigation of
news were the two functions of his existence.  It seemed necessary
to procure ten, twelve, fifteen papers a day; some because they were
reactionary, and the novelty of seeing all the French united filled
him with enthusiasm; others because they were radical and must be
better informed of the news received from the government.  They
generally appeared at midday, at three, at four and at five in the
afternoon.  An half hour's delay in the publication of the sheet
raised great hopes in the public, on the qui vive for stupendous
news.  All the last supplements were snatched up; everybody had his
pockets stuffed with papers, waiting anxiously the issue of extras
in order to buy them, too.  Yet all the sheets were saying
approximately the same thing.

Argensola was developing a credulous, enthusiastic soul, capable of
admitting many improbable things.  He presumed that this same spirit
was probably animating everybody around him.  At times, his old
critical attitude would threaten to rebel, but doubt was repulsed as
something dishonorable.  He was living in a new world, and it was
but natural that extraordinary things should occur that could be
neither measured nor explained by the old processes of reasoning.
So he commented with infantile joy on the marvellous accounts in the
daily papers--of combats between a single Belgian platoon and entire
regiments of enemies, putting them to disorderly flight; of the
German fear of the bayonet that made them run like hares the instant
that the charge sounded; of the inefficiency of the German artillery
whose projectiles always missed fire.

It was logical and natural that little Belgium should conquer
gigantic Germany--a repetition of David and Goliath--with all the
metaphors and images that this unequal contest had inspired across
so many centuries.  Like the greater part of the nation, he had the
mentality of a reader of tales of chivalry who feels himself
defrauded if the hero, single-handed, fails to cleave a thousand
enemies with one fell stroke.  He purposely chose the most
sensational papers, those which published many stories of single
encounters, of individual deeds about which nobody could know with
any degree of certainty.

The intervention of England on the seas made him imagine a frightful
famine, coming providentially like a thunder-clap to torture the
enemy.  He honestly believed that ten days of this maritime blockade
would convert Germany into a group of shipwrecked sailors floating
on a raft.  This vision made him repeat his visits to the kitchen to
gloat over his packages of provisions.

"Ah, what they would give in Berlin for my treasures!" . . .

Never had Argensola eaten with greater avidity.  Consideration of
the great privations suffered by the adversary was sharpening his
appetite to a monstrous capacity.  White bread, golden brown and
crusty, was stimulating him to an almost religious ecstasy.

"If friend William could only get his claws on this!" he would
chuckle to his companion.

So he chewed and swallowed with increasing relish; solids and
liquids on passing through his mouth seemed to be acquiring a new
flavor, rare and divine.  Distant hunger for him was a stimulant, a
sauce of endless delight.

While France was inspiring his enthusiasm, he was conceding greater
credit to Russia.  "Ah, those Cossacks!" . . .  He was accustomed to
speak of them as intimate friends.  He loved to describe the
unbridled gallop of the wild horsemen, impalpable as phantoms, and
so terrible in their wrath that the enemy could not look them in the
face.  The concierge and the stay-at-homes used to listen to him
with all the respect due to a foreign gentleman, knowing much of the
great outside world with which they were not familiar.

"The Cossacks will adjust the accounts of these bandits!" he would
conclude with absolute assurance.  "Within a month they will have
entered Berlin."

And his public composed of women--wives and mothers of those who had
gone to war--would modestly agree with him, with that irresistible
desire which we all feel of placing our hopes on something distant
and mysterious.  The French would defend the country, reconquering,
besides the lost territories, but the Cossacks--of whom so many were
speaking but so few had seen--were going to give the death blow.
The only person who knew them at first hand was Tchernoff, and to
Argensola's astonishment, he listened to his words without showing
any enthusiasm.  The Cossacks were for him simply one body of the
Russian army--good enough soldiers, but incapable of working the
miracles that everybody was expecting from them.

"That Tchernoff!" exclaimed Argensola.  "Since he hates the Czar, he
thinks the entire country mad.  He is a revolutionary fanatic. . . .
And I am opposed to all fanaticisms."

Julio was listening absent-mindedly to the news brought by his
companion, the vibrating statements recited in declamatory tones,
the plans of the campaign traced out on an enormous map fastened to
the wall of the studio and bristling with tiny flags that marked the
camps of the belligerent armies.  Every issue of the papers obliged
the Spaniard to arrange a new dance of the pins on the map, followed
by his comments of bomb-proof optimism.

"We have entered into Alsace; very good! . . .  It appears now that
we abandon Alsace.  Splendid!  I suspect the cause.  It is in order
to enter again in a better place, getting at the enemy from
behind. . . .  They say that Liege has fallen.  What a lie! . . .
And if it does fall, it doesn't matter.  Just an incident, nothing
more!  The others remain . . . the others! . . . that are advancing
on the Eastern side, and are going to enter Berlin."

The news from the Russian front was his favorite, but obliged him to
remain in suspense every time that he tried to find on the map the
obscure names of the places where the admired Cossacks were
exhibiting their wonderful exploits.

Meanwhile Julio was continuing the course of his own reflections.
Marguerite! . . .  She had come back at last, and yet each time
seemed to be drifting further away from him. . . .

In the first days of the mobilization, he had haunted her
neighborhood, trying to appease his longing by this illusory
proximity.  Marguerite had written to him, urging patience.  How
fortunate it was that he was a foreigner and would not have to
endure the hardship of war!  Her brother, an officer in the
artillery Reserves, was going at almost any minute.  Her mother, who
made her home with this bachelor son, had kept an astonishing
serenity up to the last minute, although she had wept much while the
war was still but a possibility.  She herself had prepared the
soldier's outfit so that the small valise might contain all that was
indispensable for campaign life.  But Marguerite had divined her
poor mother's secret struggles not to reveal her despair, in moist
eyes and trembling hands.  It was impossible to leave her alone at
such a time. . . .  Then had come the farewell.  "God be with you,
my son!  Do your duty, but be prudent."  Not a tear nor a sign of
weakness.  All her family had advised her not to accompany her son
to the railway station, so his sister had gone with him.  And upon
returning home, Marguerite had found her mother rigid in her arm
chair, with a set face, avoiding all mention of her son, speaking of
the friends who also had sent their boys to the war, as if they only
could comprehend her torture.  "Poor Mama!  I ought to be with her
now more than ever. . . .  To-morrow, if I can, I shall come to see
you."

When at last she returned to the rue de la Pompe, her first care was
to explain to Julio the conservatism of her tailored suit, the
absence of jewels in the adornment of her person.  "The war, my
dear!  Now it is the chic thing to adapt oneself to the depressing
conditions, to be frugal and inconspicuous like soldiers.  Who knows
what we may expect!"  Her infatuation with dress still accompanied
her in every moment of her life.

Julio noticed a persistent absent-mindedness about her.  It seemed
as though her spirit, abandoning her body, was wandering to far-away
places.  Her eyes were looking at him, but she seldom saw him.  She
would speak very slowly, as though wishing to weigh every word,
fearful of betraying some secret.  This spiritual alienation did
not, however, prevent her slipping bodily along the smooth path of
custom, although afterwards she would seem to feel a vague remorse.
"I wonder if it is right to do this! . . .  Is it not wrong to live
like this when so many sorrows are falling on the world?"  Julio
hushed her scruples with:

"But if we are going to marry as soon as possible! . . .  If we are
already the same as husband and wife!"

She replied with a gesture of strangeness and dismay.  To
marry! . . .  Ten days ago she had had no other wish.  Now the
possibility of marriage was recurring less and less in her thoughts.
Why think about such remote and uncertain events?  More immediate
things were occupying her mind.

The farewell to her brother in the station was a scene which had
fixed itself ineradicably in her memory.  Upon going to the studio
she had planned not to speak about it, foreseeing that she might
annoy her lover with this account; but alas, she had only to vow not
to mention a thing, to feel an irresistible impulse to talk about
it.

She had never suspected that she could love her brother so dearly.
Her former affection for him had been mingled with a silent
sentiment of jealousy because her mother had preferred the older
child.  Besides, he was the one who had introduced Laurier to his
home; the two held diplomas as industrial engineers and had been
close friends from their school days. . . .  But upon seeing the boy
ready to depart, Marguerite suddenly discovered that this brother,
who had always been of secondary interest to her, was now occupying
a pre-eminent place in her affections.

"He was so handsome, so interesting in his lieutenant's uniform! . . .
He looked like another person.  I will admit to you that I was
very proud to walk beside him, leaning on his arm.  People thought
that we were married.  Seeing me weep, some poor women tried to
console me saying, 'Courage, Madame. . . .  Your man will come
back.'  He just laughed at hearing these mistakes.  The only thing
that was really saddening him was thinking about our mother."

They had separated at the door of the station.  The sentries would
not let her go any further, so she had handed over his sword that
she had wished to carry till the last moment.

"It is lovely to be a man!" she exclaimed enthusiastically.  "I
would love to wear a uniform, to go to war, to be of some real use!"

She tried not to say more about it, as though she suddenly realized
the inopportuneness of her last words.  Perhaps she noticed the
scowl on Julio's face.

She was, however, so wrought up by the memory of that farewell that,
after a long pause, she was unable to resist the temptation of again
putting her thought into words.

At the station entrance, while she was kissing her brother for the
last time, she had an encounter, a great surprise.  "He" had
approached, also clad as an artillery officer, but alone, having to
entrust his valise to a good-natured man from the crowd.

Julio shot her a questioning look.  Who was "he"?  He suspected, but
feigned ignorance, as though fearing to learn the truth.

"Laurier," she replied laconically, "my former husband."

The lover displayed a cruel irony.  It was a cowardly thing to
ridicule this man who had responded to the call of duty.  He
recognized his vileness, but a malign and irresistible instinct made
him keep on with his sneers in order to discredit the man before
Marguerite.  Laurier a soldier!--He must cut a pretty figure dressed
in uniform!

"Laurier, the warrior!" he continued in a voice so sarcastic and
strange that it seemed to be coming from somebody else. . . .  "Poor
creature!"

She hesitated in her response, not wishing to exasperate Desnoyers
any further.  But the truth was uppermost in her mind, and she said
simply:

"No . . . no, he didn't look so bad.  Quite the contrary.  Perhaps
it was the uniform, perhaps it was his sadness at going away alone,
completely alone, without a single hand to clasp his.  I didn't
recognize him at first.  Seeing my brother, he started toward us;
but then when he saw me, he went his own way . . .  Poor man!  I
feel sorry for him!"

Her feminine instinct must have told her that she was talking too
much, and she cut her chatter suddenly short.  The same instinct
warned her that Julio's countenance was growing more and more
saturnine, and his mouth taking a very bitter curve.  She wanted to
console him and added:

"What luck that you are a foreigner and will not have to go to the
war!  How horrible it would be for me to lose you!" . . .

She said it sincerely. . . .  A few moments before she had been
envying men, admiring the gallantry with which they were exposing
their lives, and now she was trembling before the idea that her
lover might have been one of these.

This did not please his amorous egoism--to be placed apart from the
rest as a delicate and fragile being only fit for feminine
adoration.  He preferred to inspire the envy that she had felt on
beholding her brother decked out in his warlike accoutrement.  It
seemed to him that something was coming between him and Marguerite
that would never disappear, that would go on expanding, repelling
them in contrary directions . . . far . . . very far, even to the
point of not recognizing each other when their glances met.

He continued to be conscious of this impalpable obstacle in their
following interviews.  Marguerite was extremely affectionate in her
speech, and would look at him with moist and loving eyes.  But her
caressing hands appeared more like those of a mother than a lover,
and her tenderness was accompanied with a certain disinterestedness
and extraordinary modesty.  She seemed to prefer remaining
obstinately in the studio, declining to go into the other rooms.

"We are so comfortable here. . . .  I would rather not. . . .  It is
not worth while.  I should feel remorse afterwards. . . .  Why think
of such things in these anxious times!"

The world around her seemed saturated with love, but it was a new
love--a love for the man who is suffering, desire for abnegation,
for sacrifice.  This love called forth visions of white caps, of
tremulous hands healing shell-riddled and bleeding flesh.

Every advance on Julio's part but aroused in Marguerite a vehement
and modest protest as though they were meeting for the first time.

"It is impossible," she protested.  "I keep thinking of my brother,
and of so many that I know that may be dying at this very minute."

News of battles were beginning to arrive, and blood was beginning to
flow in great quantities.

"No, no, I cannot," she kept repeating.

And when Julio finally triumphed, he found that her thoughts were
still following independently the same line of mental stress.

One afternoon, Marguerite announced that henceforth she would see
him less frequently.  She was attending classes now, and had only
two free days.

Desnoyers listened, dumbfounded.  Classes? . . .  What were her
studies? . . .

She seemed a little irritated at his mocking expression. . . .  Yes,
she was studying; for the past week she had been attending classes.
Now the lessons were going to be more regular; the course of
instruction had been fully organized, and there were many more
instructors.

"I wish to be a trained nurse.  I am distressed over my
uselessness. . . .  Of what good have I ever been till now?" . . .

She was silent for a few moments as though reviewing her past.

"At times I almost think," she mused, "that war, with all its
horrors, still has some good in it.  It helps to make us useful to
our fellowmen.  We look at life more seriously; trouble makes us
realize that we have come into the world for some purpose. . . .  I
believe that we must not love life only for the pleasures that it
brings us.  We ought to find satisfaction in sacrifice, in
dedicating ourselves to others, and this satisfaction--I don't know
just why, perhaps because it is new--appears to me superior to all
other things."

Julio looked at her in surprise, trying to imagine what was going on
in that idolized and frivolous head.  What ideas were forming back
of that thoughtful forehead which until then had merely reflected
the slightest shadow of thoughts as swift and flitting as birds? . . .

But the former Marguerite was still alive.  He saw her constantly
reappearing in a funny way among the sombre preoccupations with
which war was overshadowing all lives.

"We have to study very hard in order to earn our diplomas as nurses.
Have you noticed our uniform? . . .  It is most distinctive, and the
white is so becoming both to blondes and brunettes.  Then the cap
which allows little curls over the ears--the fashionable coiffure--
and the blue cape over the white suit, make a splendid contrast.
With this outfit, a woman well shod, and with few jewels, may
present a truly chic appearance.  It is a mixture of nun and great
lady which is vastly becoming."

She was going to study with a regular fury in order to become really
useful . . . and sooner to wear the admired uniform.

Poor Desnoyers! . . .  The longing to see her, and the lack of
occupation in these interminable afternoons which hitherto had been
employed so delightfully, compelled him to haunt the neighborhood of
the unoccupied palace where the government had just established the
training school for nurses.  Stationing himself at the corner,
watching the fluttering skirts and quick steps of the feminine feet
on the sidewalk, he imagined that the course of time must have
turned backward, and that he was still but eighteen--the same as
when he used to hang around the establishments of some celebrated
modiste.  The groups of women that at certain hours came out of the
palace suggested these former days.  They were dressed extremely
quietly, the aspect of many of them as humble as that of the
seamstresses.  But they were ladies of the well-to-do class, some
even coming in automobiles driven by chauffeurs in military uniform,
because they were ministerial vehicles.

These long waits often brought him unexpected encounters with the
elegant students who were going and coming.

"Desnoyers!" some feminine voices would exclaim behind him.  "Isn't
it Desnoyers?"

And he would find himself obliged to relieve their doubts, saluting
the ladies who were looking at him as though he were a ghost.  They
were friends of a remote epoch, of six months ago--ladies who had
admired and pursued him, trusting sweetly to his masterly wisdom to
guide them through the seven circles of the science of the tango.
They were now scrutinizing him as if between their last encounter
and the present moment had occurred a great cataclysm, transforming
all the laws of existence--as if he were the sole survivor of a
vanished race.

Eventually they all asked the same questions--"Are you not going to
the war? . . .  How is it that you are not wearing a uniform?"

He would attempt to explain, but at his first words, they would
interrupt him:

"That's so. . . .  You are a foreigner."

They would say it with a certain envy, doubtless thinking of their
loved ones now suffering the privations and dangers of war. . . .
But the fact that he was a foreigner would instantly create a vague
atmosphere of spiritual aloofness, an alienation that Julio had not
known in the good old days when people sought each other without
considering nationality, without feeling that disavowal of danger
which isolates and concentrates human groups.

The ladies generally bade him adieu with malicious suspicion.  What
was he doing hanging around there?  In search of his usual lucky
adventure? . . .  And their smiles were rather grave, the smiles of
older folk who know the true significance of life and commiserate
the deluded ones still seeking diversion in frivolities.

This attitude was as annoying to Julio as though it were a
manifestation of pity.  They were supposing him still exercising the
only function of which he was capable; he wasn't good for anything
else.  On the other hand, these empty heads, still keeping something
of their old appearance, now appeared animated by the grand
sentiment of maternity--an abstract maternity which seemed to be
extending to all the men of the nation--a desire for self-sacrifice,
of knowing first-hand the privations of the lowly, and aiding all
the ills that flesh is heir to.

This same yearning was inspiring Marguerite when she came away from
her lessons.  She was advancing from one overpowering dread to
another, accepting the first rudiments of surgery as the greatest of
scientific marvels.  At the same time, she was astonished at the
avidity with which she was assimilating these hitherto unsuspected
mysteries.  Sometimes with a funny assumption of assurance, she
would even believe she had mistaken her vocation.

"Who knows but what I was born to be a famous doctor?" she would
exclaim.

Her great fear was that she might lose her self-control when the
time came to put her newly acquired knowledge into practice.  To see
herself before the foul odors of decomposing flesh, to contemplate
the flow of blood--a horrible thing for her who had always felt an
invincible repugnance toward all the unpleasant conditions of
ordinary life!  But these hesitations were short, and she was
suddenly animated by a dashing energy.  These were times of
sacrifice.  Were not the men snatched every day from the comforts of
sensuous existence to endure the rude life of a soldier? . . .  She
would be, a soldier in petticoats, facing pain, battling with it,
plunging her hands into putrefaction, flashing like a ray of
sunlight into the places where soldiers were expecting the approach
of death.

She proudly narrated to Desnoyers all the progress that she was
making in the training school, the complicated bandages that she was
learning to adjust, sometimes over a mannikin, at others over the
flesh of an employee, trying to play the part of a sorely wounded
patient.  She, so dainty, so incapable in her own home of the
slightest physical effort, was learning the most skilful ways of
lifting a human body from the ground and carrying it on her back.
Who knew but that she might render this very service some day on the
battlefield!  She was ready for the greatest risks, with the
ignorant audacity of women impelled by flashes of heroism.  All her
admiration was for the English army nurses, slender women of nervous
vigor whose photographs were appearing in the papers, wearing
pantaloons, riding boots and white helmets.

Julio listened to her with astonishment.  Was this woman really
Marguerite? . . .  War was obliterating all her winning vanities.
She was no longer fluttering about in bird-like fashion.  Her feet
were treading the earth with resolute firmness, calm and secure in
the new strength which was developing within.  When one of his
caresses would remind her that she was a woman, she would always say
the same thing,

"What luck that you are a foreigner! . . .  What happiness to know
that you do not have to go to war!"

In her anxiety for sacrifice, she wanted to go to the battlefields,
and yet at the same time, she was rejoicing to see her lover exempt
from military duty.  This preposterous lack of logic was not
gratefully received by Julio but irritated him as an unconscious
offense.

"One might suppose that she was protecting me!" he thought.  "She is
the man and rejoices that I, the weak comrade, should be protected
from danger. . . .  What a grotesque situation!" . . .

Fortunately, at times when Marguerite presented herself at the
studio, she was again her old self, making him temporarily forget
his annoyance.  She would arrive with the same joy in a vacation
that the college student or the employee feels on a holiday.
Responsibility was teaching her to know the value of time.

"No classes to-day!" she would call out on entering; and tossing her
hat on a divan, she would begin a dance-step, retreating with
infantile coquetry from the arms of her lover.

But in a few minutes she would recover her customary gravity, the
serious look that had become habitual with her since the outbreak of
hostilities.  She spoke often of her mother, always sad, but
striving to hide her grief and keeping herself up in the hope of a
letter from her son; she spoke, too, of the war, commenting on the
latest events with the rhetorical optimism of the official
dispatches.  She could describe the first flag taken from the enemy
as minutely as though it were a garment of unparalleled elegance.
From a window, she had seen the Minister of War.  She was very much
affected when repeating the story of some fugitive Belgians recently
arrived at the hospital.  They were the only patients that she had
been able to assist until now.  Paris was not receiving the soldiers
wounded in battle; by order of the Government, they were being sent
from the front to the hospitals in the South.

She no longer evinced toward Julio the resistance of the first few
days.  Her training as a nurse was giving her a certain passivity.
She seemed to be ignoring material attractions, stripping them of
the spiritual importance which she had hitherto attributed to them.
She wanted to make Julio happy, although her mind was concentrated
on other matters.

One afternoon, she felt the necessity of communicating certain news
which had been filling her mind since the day before.  Springing up
from the couch, she hunted for her handbag which contained a letter.
She wanted to read it again to tell its contents to somebody with
that irresistible impulse which forestalls confession.

It was a letter which her brother had sent her from the Vosges.  In
it he spoke of Laurier more than of himself.  They belonged to
different batteries, but were in the same division and had taken
part in the same combats.  The officer was filled with admiration
for his former brother-in-law.  Who could have guessed that a future
hero was hidden within that silent and tranquil engineer! . . .  But
he was a genuine hero, just the same!  All the officials had agreed
with Marguerite's brother on seeing how calmly he fulfilled his
duty, facing death with the same coolness as though he were in his
factory near Paris.

He had asked for the dangerous post of lookout, slipping as near as
possible to the enemy's lines in order to verify the exactitude of
the artillery discharge, rectifying it by telephone.  A German shell
had demolished the house on the roof of which he was concealed, and
Laurier, on crawling out unhurt from the ruins, had readjusted his
telephone and gone tranquilly on, continuing the same work in the
shelter of a nearby grove.  His battery, picked out by the enemy's
aeroplanes, had received the concentrated fire of the artillery
opposite.  In a few minutes all the force were rolling on the
ground--the captain and many soldiers dead, officers wounded and
almost all the gunners.  There only remained as chief, Laurier, the
Impassive (as his comrades nicknamed him), and aided by the few
artillerymen still on their feet, he continued firing under a rain
of iron and fire, so as to cover the retreat of a battalion.

"He has been mentioned twice in dispatches," Marguerite continued
reading.  "I do not believe that it will be long before they give
him the cross.  He is valiant in every way.  Who would have supposed
all this a few weeks ago?" . . .

She did not share the general astonishment.  Living with Laurier had
many times shown her the intrepidity of his character, the
fearlessness concealed under that placid exterior.  On that account,
her instincts had warned her against rousing her husband's wrath in
the first days of her infidelity.  She still remembered the way he
looked the night he surprised her leaving Julio's home.  His was the
passion that kills, and, nevertheless, he had not attempted the
least violence with her. . . .  The memory of his consideration was
awakening in Marguerite a sentiment of gratitude.  Perhaps he had
loved her as no other man had.

Her eyes, with an irresistible desire for comparison, sought
Julio's, admiring his youthful grace and distinction.  The image of
Laurier, heavy and ordinary, came into her mind as a consolation.
Certainly the officer whom she had seen at the station when saying
good-bye to her brother, did not seem to her like her old husband.
But Marguerite wished to forget the pallid lieutenant with the sad
countenance who had passed before her eyes, preferring to remember
him only as the manufacturer preoccupied with profits and incapable
of comprehending what she was accustomed to call "the delicate
refinements of a chic woman."  Decidedly Julio was the more
fascinating.  She did not repent of her past.  She did not wish to
repent of it.

And her loving selfishness made her repeat once more the same old
exclamation--"How fortunate that you are a foreigner! . . .  What a
relief to know that you are safe from the dangers of war!"

Julio felt the usual exasperation at hearing this.  He came very
near to closing his beloved's mouth with his hand.  Was she trying
to make fun of him? . . .  It was fairly insulting to place him
apart from other men.

Meanwhile, with blind irrelevance, she persisted in talking about
Laurier, commenting upon his achievements.

"I do not love him, I never have loved him.  Do not look so cross!
How could the poor man ever be compared with you?  You must admit,
though, that his new existence is rather interesting.  I rejoice in
his brave deeds as though an old friend had done them, a family
visitor whom I had not seen for a long time. . . .  The poor man
deserved a better fate.  He ought to have married some other woman,
some companion more on a level with his ideals. . . .  I tell you
that I really pity him!"

And this pity was so intense that her eyes filled with tears,
awakening the tortures of jealousy in her lover.  After these
interviews, Desnoyers was more ill-tempered and despondent than
ever.

"I am beginning to realize that we are in a false position," he said
one morning to Argensola.  "Life is going to become increasingly
painful.  It is difficult to remain tranquil, continuing the same
old existence in the midst of a people at war."

His companion had about come to the same conclusion.  He, too, was
beginning to feel that the life of a young foreigner in Paris was
insufferable, now that it was so upset by war.

"One has to keep showing passports all the time in order that the
police may be sure that they have not discovered a deserter.  In the
street car, the other afternoon, I had to explain that I was a
Spaniard to some girls who were wondering why I was not at the
front. . . .  One of them, as soon as she learned my nationality,
asked me with great simplicity why I did not offer myself as a
volunteer. . . .  Now they have invented a word for the stay-at-
homes, calling them Les Embusques, the hidden ones. . . .  I am sick
and tired of the ironical looks shot at me wherever I go; it makes
me wild to be taken for an Embusque."

A flash of heroism was galvanizing the impressionable Bohemian.  Now
that everybody was going to the war, he was wishing to do the same
thing.  He was not afraid of death; the only thing that was
disturbing him was the military service, the uniform, the mechanical
obedience to bugle-call, the blind subservience to the chiefs.
Fighting was not offering any difficulties for him but his nature
capriciously resented everything in the form of discipline.  The
foreign groups in Paris were trying to organize each its own legion
of volunteers and he, too, was planning his--a battalion of
Spaniards and South Americans, reserving naturally the presidency of
the organizing committee for himself, and later the command of the
body.

He had inserted notices in the papers, making the studio in the rue
de la Pompe the recruiting office.  In ten days, two volunteers had
presented themselves; a clerk, shivering in midsummer, who
stipulated that he should be an officer because he was wearing a
suitable jacket, and a Spanish tavern-keeper who at the very outset
that he was a soldier in his youth while the Bohemian was only an
artist.  Twenty Spanish battalions were attempted with the same
result in different parts of Paris.  Each enthusiast wished to be
commander of the others, with the individual haughtiness and
aversion to discipline so characteristic of the race.  Finally the
future generalissimos, decided to enlist as simple volunteers . . .
but in a French regiment.

"I am waiting to see what the Garibaldis do," said Argensola
modestly.  "Perhaps I may go with them."

This glorious name made military service conceivable to him.  But
then he vacillated; he would certainly have to obey somebody in this
body of volunteers, and he did not believe in an obedience that was
not preceded by long discussions. . . .  What next!

"Life has changed in a fortnight," he continued.  "It seems as if we
were living in another planet; our former achievements are not
appreciated.  Others, most obscure and poor, those who formerly had
the least consideration, are now promoted to the first ranks.  The
refined man of complex spirituality has disappeared for who knows
how many years! . . .  Now the simple-minded man climbs triumphantly
to the top, because, though his ideas are limited, they are sure and
he knows how to obey.  We are no longer the style."

Desnoyers assented.  It was so; they were no longer fashionable.
None knew that better than he, for he who was once the sensation of
the day, was now passing as a stranger among the very people who a
few months before had raved over him.

"Your reign is over," laughed Argensola.  "The fact that you are a
handsome fellow doesn't help you one bit nowadays.  In a uniform and
with a cross on my breast, I could soon get the best of you in a
rival love affair.  In times of peace, the officers only set the
girls of the provinces to dreaming; but now that we are at war,
there has awakened in every woman the ancestral enthusiasm that her
remote grandmothers used to feel for the strong and aggressive
beast. . . .  The high-born dames who a few months ago were
complicating their desires with psychological subtleties, are now
admiring the military man with the same simplicity that the maid has
for the common soldier.  Before a uniform, they feel the humble and
servile enthusiasm of the female of the lower animals before the
crests, foretops and gay plumes of the fighting males.  Look out,
master! . . .  We shall have to follow the new course of events or
resign ourselves to everlasting obscurity.  The tango is dead."

And Desnoyers agreed that truly they were two beings on the other
side of the river of life which at one bound had changed its course.
There was no longer any place in the new existence for that poor
painter of souls, nor for that hero of a frivolous life who, from
five to seven every afternoon, had attained the triumphs most envied
by mankind.



CHAPTER III

THE RETREAT


War had extended one of its antennae even to the avenue Victor Hugo.
It was a silent war in which the enemy, bland, shapeless and
gelatinous, seemed constantly to be escaping from the hands only to
renew hostilities a little later on.

"I have Germany in my own house," growled Marcelo Desnoyers.

"Germany" was Dona Elena, the wife of von Hartrott.  Why had not her
son--that professor of inexhaustible sufficiency whom he now
believed to have been a spy--taken her home with him?  For what
sentimental caprice had she wished to stay with her sister, losing
the opportunity of returning to Berlin before the frontiers were
closed?

The presence of this woman in his home was the cause of many
compunctions and alarms.  Fortunately, the chauffeur and all the
men-servants were in the army.  The two chinas received an order in
a threatening tone.  They must be very careful when talking to the
French maids--not the slightest allusion to the nationality of Dona
Elena's husband nor to the residence of her family.  Dona Elena was
an Argentinian.  But in spite of the silence of the maids, Don
Marcelo was always in fear of some outburst of exalted patriotism,
and that his wife's sister might suddenly find herself confined in a
concentration camp under suspicion of having dealings with the
enemy.

Frau von Hartrott made his uneasiness worse.  Instead of keeping a
discreet silence, she was constantly introducing discord into the
home with her opinions.

During the first days of the war, she kept herself locked in her
room, joining the family only when summoned to the dining room.
With tightly puckered mouth and an absent-minded air, she would then
seat herself at the table, pretending not to hear Don Marcelo's
verbal outpourings of enthusiasm.  He enjoyed describing the
departure of the troops, the moving scenes in the streets and at the
stations, commenting on events with an optimism sure of the first
news of the war.  Two things were beyond all discussion.  The
bayonet was the secret of the French, and the Germans were
shuddering with terror before its fatal, glistening point. . . .
The '75 cannon had proved itself a unique jewel, its shots being
absolutely sure.  He was really feeling sorry for the enemy's
artillery since its projectiles so seldom exploded even when well
aimed. . . .  Furthermore, the French troops had entered
victoriously into Alsace; many little towns were already theirs.

"Now it is as it was in the '70's," he would exult, brandishing his
fork and waving his napkin.  "We are going to kick them back to the
other side of the Rhine--kick them! . . .  That's the word."

Chichi always agreed gleefully while Dona Elena was raising her eyes
to heaven, as though silently calling upon somebody hidden in the
ceiling to bear witness to such errors and blasphemies.

The kind Dona Luisa always sought her out afterwards in the
retirement of her room, believing it necessary to give sisterly
counsel to one living so far from home.  The Romantica did not
maintain her austere silence before the sister who had always
venerated her superior instruction; so now the poor lady was
overwhelmed with accounts of the stupendous forces of Germany,
enunciated with all the authority of a wife of a great Teutonic
patriot, and a mother of an almost celebrated professor.  According
to her graphic picture, millions of men were now surging forth in
enormous streams, thousands of cannons were filing by, and
tremendous mortars like monstrous turrets.  And towering above all
this vast machinery of destruction was a man who alone was worth an
army, a being who knew everything and could do everything, handsome,
intelligent, and infallible as a god--the Emperor.

"The French just don't know what's ahead of them," declared Dona
Elena.  "We are going to annihilate them.  It is merely a matter of
two weeks.  Before August is ended, the Emperor will have entered
Paris."

Senora Desnoyers was so greatly impressed by these dire prophecies
that she could not hide them from her family.  Chichi waxed
indignant at her mother's credulity and her aunt's Germanism.
Martial fervor was flaming up in the former Peoncito.  Ay, if the
women could only go to war! . . .  She enjoyed picturing herself on
horseback in command of a regiment of dragoons, charging the enemy
with other Amazons as dashing and buxom as she.  Then her fondness
for skating would predominate over her tastes for the cavalry, and
she would long to be an Alpine hunter, a diable bleu among those who
slid on long runners, with musket slung across the back and
alpenstock in hand, over the snowy slopes of the Vosges.

But the government did not appreciate the valorous women, and she
could obtain no other part in the war but to admire the uniform of
her true-love, Rene Lacour, converted into a soldier.  The senator's
son certainly looked beautiful.  He was tall and fair, of a rather
feminine type recalling his dead mother.  In his fiancee's opinion,
Rene was just "a little sugar soldier."  At first she had been very
proud to walk the streets by the side of this warrior, believing
that his uniform had greatly augmented his personal charm, but
little by little a revulsion of feeling was clouding her joy.  The
senatorial prince was nothing but a common soldier.  His illustrious
father, fearful that the war might cut off forever the dynasty of
the Lacours, indispensable to the welfare of the State, had had his
son mustered into the auxiliary service of the army.  By this
arrangement, his heir need not leave Paris, ranking about as high as
those who were kneading the bread or mending the soldiers' cloaks.
Only by going to the front could he claim--as a student of the Ecole
Centrale--his title of sub-lieutenant in the Artillery Reserves.

"What happiness for me that you have to stay in Paris!  How
delighted I am that you are just a private! . . ."

And yet, at the same time, Chichi was thinking enviously of her
friends whose lovers and brothers were officers.  They could parade
the streets, escorted by a gold-trimmed kepis that attracted the
notice of the passers-by and the respectful salute of the lower
ranks.

Each time that Dona Luisa, terrified by the forecasts of her sister,
undertook to communicate her dismay to her daughter, the girl would
rage up and down, exclaiming:--

"What lies my aunt tells you! . . .  Since her husband is a German,
she sees everything as he wishes it to be.  Papa knows more; Rene's
father is better informed about these things.  We are going to give
them a thorough hiding!  What fun it will be when they hit my uncle
and all my snippy cousins in Berlin! . . ."

"Hush," groaned her mother.  "Do not talk such nonsense.  The war
has turned you as crazy as your father."

The good lady was scandalized at hearing the outburst of savage
desires that the mere mention of the Kaiser always aroused in her
daughter.  In times of peace, Chichi had rather admired this
personage.  "He's not so bad-looking," she had commented, "but with
a very ordinary smile."  Now all her wrath was concentrated upon
him.  The thousands of women that were weeping through his fault!
The mothers without sons, the wives without husbands, the poor
children left in the burning towns! . . .  Ah, the vile wretch! . . .
And she would brandish her knife of the old Peoncito days--a
dagger with silver handle and sheath richly chased, a gift that her
grandfather had exhumed from some forgotten souvenirs of his
childhood in an old valise.  The very first German that she came
across was doomed to death.  Dona Luisa was terrified to find her
flourishing this weapon before her dressing mirror.  She was no
longer yearning to be a cavalryman nor a diable bleu.  She would be
entirely content if they would leave her, alone in some closed space
with the detested monster.  In just five minutes she would settle
the universal conflict.

"Defend yourself, Boche," she would shriek, standing at guard as in
her childhood she had seen the peons doing on the ranch.

And with a knife-thrust above and below, she would pierce his
imperial vitals.  Immediately there resounded in her imagination,
shouts of joy, the gigantic sigh of millions of women freed at last
from the bloody nightmare--thanks to her playing the role of Judith
or Charlotte Corday, or a blend of all the heroic women who had
killed for the common weal.  Her savage fury made her continue her
imaginary slaughter, dagger in hand.  Second stroke!--the Crown
Prince rolling to one side and his head to the other.  A rain of
dagger thrusts!--all the invincible generals of whom her aunt had
been boasting fleeing with their insides in their hands--and
bringing up the rear, that fawning lackey who wished to receive the
same things as those of highest rank--the uncle from Berlin. . . .
Ay, if she could only get the chance to make these longings a
reality!

"You are mad," protested her mother.  "Completely mad!  How can a
ladylike girl talk in such a way?" . . .

Surprising her niece in the ecstasy of these delirious ravings, Dona
Elena would raise her eyes to heaven, abstaining thenceforth from
communicating her opinions, reserving them wholly for the mother.

Don Marcelo's indignation took another bound when his wife repeated
to him the news from her sister.  All a lie! . . .  The war was
progressing finely.  On the Eastern frontier the French troops had
advanced through the interior of Alsace and Lorraine.

"But--Belgium is invaded, isn't it?" asked Dona Luisa.  "And those
poor Belgians?"

Desnoyers retorted indignantly.

"That invasion of Belgium is treason. . . .  And a treason never
amounts to anything among decent people."

He said it in all good faith as though war were a duel in which the
traitor was henceforth ruled out and unable to continue his
outrages.  Besides, the heroic resistance of Belgium was nourishing
the most absurd illusions in his heart.  The Belgians were certainly
supernatural men destined to the most stupendous achievements. . . .
And to think that heretofore he had never taken this plucky little
nation into account! . . .  For several days, he considered Liege a
holy city before whose walls the Teutonic power would be completely
confounded.  Upon the fall of Liege, his unquenchable faith sought
another handle.  There were still remaining many other Lieges in the
interior.  The Germans might force their way further in; then we
would see how many of them ever succeeded in getting out.  The entry
into Brussels did not disquiet him.  An unprotected city! . . .  Its
surrender was a foregone conclusion.  Now the Belgians would be
better able to defend Antwerp.  Neither did the advance of the
Germans toward the French frontier alarm him at all.  In vain his
sister-in-law, with malicious brevity, mentioned in the dining-room
the progress of the invasion, so confusedly outlined in the daily
papers.  The Germans were already at the frontier.

"And what of that?" yelled Don Marcelo.  "Soon they will meet
someone to talk to!  Joffre is going to meet them.  Our armies are
in the East, in the very place where they ought to be, on the true
frontier, at the door of their home.  But they have to deal with a
treacherous and cowardly opponent that instead of marching face to
face, leaps the walls of the corral like sheep-stealers. . . .
Their underhand tricks won't do them any good, though!  The French
are already in Belgium and adjusting the accounts of the Germans.
We shall smash them so effectually that never again will they be
able to disturb the peace of the world.  And that accursed
individual with the rampant moustache we are going to put in a cage,
and exhibit in the place de la Concorde!"

Inspired by the paternal braggadocio, Chichi also launched forth
exultingly an imaginary series of avenging torments and insults as a
complement to this Imperial Exhibition.

These allusions to the Emperor aggravated Frau von Hartrott more
than anything else.  In the first days of the war, her sister had
surprised her weeping before the newspaper caricatures and leaflets
sold in the streets.

"Such an excellent man.  . . so knightly . . . such a good father to
his family!  He wasn't to blame for anything.  It was his enemies
who forced him to assume the offensive."

Her veneration for exalted personages was making her take the
attacks upon this admired grandee as though they were directed
against her own family.

One night in the dining room, she abandoned her tragic silence.
Certain sarcasms, shot by Desnoyers at her hero, brought the tears
to her eyes, and this sentimental indulgence turned her thoughts
upon her sons who were undoubtedly taking part in the invasion.

Her brother-in-law was longing for the extermination of all the
enemy.  "May every barbarian be exterminated! . . . every one of the
bandits in pointed helmets who have just burned Louvain and other
towns, shooting defenceless peasants, old men, women and children! "

"You forget that I am a mother," sobbed Frau von Hartrott.  "You
forget that among those whose extermination you are imploring, are
my sons."

Her violent weeping made Desnoyers realize more than ever the abyss
yawning between him and this woman lodged in his own house.  His
resentment, however, overleapt family considerations. . . .  She
might weep for her sons all she wanted to; that was her right.  But
these sons were aggressors and wantonly doing evil.  It was the
other mothers who were inspiring his pity--those who were living
tranquilly in their smiling little Belgian towns when their sons
were suddenly shot down, their daughters violated and their houses
burned to the ground.

As though this description of the horrors of war were a fresh insult
to her, Dona Elena wept harder than ever.  What falsehoods!  The
Kaiser was an excellent man.  His soldiers were gentlemen, the
German army was a model of civilization and goodness.  Her husband
had belonged to this army, her sons were marching in its ranks.  And
she knew her sons--well-bred and incapable of wrong-doing.  These
Belgian calumnies she could no longer listen to . . . and, with
dramatic abandon, she flung herself into the arms of her sister.

Senor Desnoyers raged against the fate that condemned him to live
under the same roof with this woman.  What an unfortunate
complication for the family! . . . and the frontiers were closed,
making it impossible to get rid of her!

"Very well, then," he thundered.  "Let us talk no more about it.  We
shall never reach an understanding, for we belong to two different
worlds.  It's a great pity that you can't go back to your own
people."

After that, he refrained from mentioning the war in his sister-in-
law's presence.  Chichi was the only one keeping up her aggressive
and noisy enthusiasm.  Upon reading in the papers the news of the
shootings, sackings, burning of cities, and the dolorous flight of
those who had seen their all reduced to ashes, she again felt the
necessity of assuming the role of lady-assassin.  Ay, if she could
only once get her hands on one of those bandits! . . .  What did the
men amount to anyway if they couldn't exterminate the whole lot? . . .

Then she would look at Rene in his exquisitely fresh uniform, sweet-
mannered and smiling as though all war meant to him was a mere
change of attire, and she would exclaim enigmatically:

"What luck that you will never have to go to the front! . . .  How
fine that you don't run any risks!"

And her lover would accept these words as but another proof of her
affectionate interest.

One day Don Marcelo was able to appreciate the horrors of the war
without leaving Paris.  Three thousand Belgian refugees were
quartered provisionally in the circus before being distributed among
the provinces.  When Desnoyers entered this place, he saw in the
vestibule the same posters which had been flaunting their
spectacular gayeties when he had visited it a few months before with
his family.

Now he noticed the odor from a sick and miserable multitude crowded
together--like the exhalation from a prison or poorhouse infirmary.
He saw a throng that seemed crazy or stupefied with grief.  They did
not know exactly where they were; they had come thither, they didn't
know how.  The terrible spectacle of the invasion was still so
persistent in their minds that it left room for no other impression.
They were still seeing the helmeted men in their peaceful hamlets,
their homes in flames, the soldiery firing upon those who were
fleeing, the mutilated women done to death by incessant adulterous
assault, the old men burned alive, the children stabbed in their
cradles by human beasts inflamed by alcohol and license. . . .  Some
of the octogenarians were weeping as they told how the soldiers of a
civilized nation were cutting off the breasts from the women in
order to nail them to the doors, how they had passed around as a
trophy a new-born babe spiked on a bayonet, how they had shot aged
men in the very armchair in which they were huddled in their
sorrowful weakness, torturing them first with their jests and
taunts.

They had fled blindly, pursued by fire and shot, as crazed with
terror as the people of the middle ages trying not to be ridden down
by the hordes of galloping Huns and Mongols.  And this flight had
been across the country in its loveliest festal array, in the most
productive of months, when the earth was bristling with ears of
grain, when the August sky was most brilliant, and when the birds
were greeting the opulent harvest with their glad songs!

In that circus, filled with the wandering crowds, the immense crime
was living again.  The children were crying with a sound like the
bleating of lambs; the men were looking wildly around with terrified
eyes; the frenzied women were howling like the insane.  Families had
become separated in the terror of flight.  A mother of five little
ones now had but one.  The parents, as they realized the number
missing, were thinking with anguish of those who had disappeared.
Would they ever find them again? . . .  Or were they already
dead? . . .

Don Marcelo returned home, grinding his teeth and waving his cane in
an alarming manner.  Ah, the bandits! . . .  If only his sister-in-
law could change her sex!  Why wasn't she a man? . . .  It would be
better still if she could suddenly assume the form of her husband,
von Hartrott.  What an interesting interview the two brothers-in-law
would have! . . .

The war was awakening religious sentiment in the men and increasing
the devotion of the women.  The churches were filled.  Dona Luisa
was no longer confining herself to those of her neighborhood.  With
the courage induced by extraordinary events, she was traversing
Paris afoot and going from the Madeleine to Notre Dame, or to the
Sacre Coeur on the heights of Montmartre.  Religious festivals were
now thronged like popular assemblies.  The preachers were tribunes.
Patriotic enthusiasm interrupted many sermon with applause.

Each morning on opening the papers, before reading the war news,
Senora Desnoyers would hunt other notices.  "Where was Father Amette
going to be to-day?"  Then, under the arched vaultings of that
temple, would she unite her voice with the devout chorus imploring
supernatural intervention.  "Lord, save France!"  Patriotic
religiosity was putting Sainte Genevieve at the head of the favored
ones, so from all these fiestas, Dona Luisa, tremulous with faith,
would return in expectation of a miracle similar to that which the
patron saint of Paris had worked before the invading hordes of
Attila.

Dona Elena was also visiting the churches, but those nearest the
house.  Her brother-in-law saw her one afternoon entering Saint-
Honoree d'Eylau.  The building was filled with the faithful, and on
the altar was a sheaf of flags--France and the allied nations.  The
imploring crowd was not composed entirely of women.  Desnoyers saw
men of his age, pompous and grave, moving their lips and fixing
steadfast eyes on the altar on which were reflected like lost stars,
the flames of the candles.  And again he felt envy.  They were
fathers who were recalling their childhood prayers, thinking of
their sons in battle.  Don Marcelo, who had always considered
religion with indifference, suddenly recognized the necessity of
faith.  He wanted to pray like the others, with a vague, indefinite
supplication, including all beings who were struggling and dying for
a land that he had not tried to defend.

He was scandalized to see von Hartrott's wife kneeling among these
people raising her eyes to the cross in a look of anguished
entreaty.  She was begging heaven to protect her husband, the German
who perhaps at this moment was concentrating all his devilish
faculties on the best organization for crushing the weak; she was
praying for her sons, officers of the King of Prussia, who revolver
in hand were entering villages and farmlands, driving before them a
horror-stricken crowd, leaving behind them fire and death.  And
these orisons were going to mingle with those of the mothers who
were praying for the youth trying to check the onslaught of the
barbarians--with the petitions of these earnest men, rigid in their
tragic grief! . . .

He had to make a great effort not to protest aloud, and he left the
church.  His sister-in-law had no right to kneel there among those
people.

"They ought to put her out!" he growled indignantly.  "She is
compromising God with her absurd entreaties."

But in spite of his annoyance, he had to endure her living in his
household, and at the same time had taken great pains to prevent her
nationality being known outside.

It was a severe trial for Don Marcelo to be obliged to keep silent
when at table with his family.  He had to avoid the hysterics of his
sister-in-law who promptly burst into sighs and sobs at the
slightest allusion to her hero; and he feared equally the complaints
of his wife, always ready to defend her sister, as though she were
the victim. . . .  That a man in his own home should have to curb
his tongue and speak tactfully! . . .

The only satisfaction permitted him was to announce the military
moves.  The French had entered Belgium.  "It appears that the Boches
have had a good set-back."  The slightest clash of cavalry, a simple
encounter with the advance troops, he would glorify as a decisive
victory.  "In Lorraine, too, we are making great headway!" . . .
But suddenly the fountain of his bubbling optimism seemed to become
choked up.  To judge from the periodicals, nothing extraordinary was
occurring.  They continued publishing war-stories so as to keep
enthusiasm at fever-heat, but nothing definite.  The Government,
too, was issuing communications of vague and rhetorical verbosity.
Desnoyers became alarmed, his instinct warning him of danger.
"There is something wrong," he thought.  "There's a spring broken
somewhere!"

This lack of encouraging news coincided exactly with the sudden rise
in Dona Elena's spirits.  With whom had that woman been talking?
Whom did she meet when she was on the street? . . .  Without
dropping her pose as a martyr, with the same woebegone look and
drooping mouth, she was talking, and talking treacherously.  The
torment of Don Marcelo in being obliged to listen to the enemy
harbored within his gates! . . .  The French had been vanquished in
Lorraine and in Belgium at the same time.  A body of the army had
deserted the colors; many prisoners, many cannon were captured.
"Lies!  German exaggerations!" howled Desnoyers.  And Chichi with
the derisive ha-ha's of an insolent girl, drowned out the triumphant
communications of the aunt from Berlin.  "I don't know, of course,"
said the unwelcome lodger with mock humility.  "Perhaps it is not
authentic.  I have heard it said."  Her host was furious.  Where had
she heard it said?  Who was giving her such news? . . .

And in order to ventilate his wrath, he broke forth into tirades
against the enemy's espionage, against the carelessness of the
police force in permitting so many Germans to remain hidden in
Paris.  Then he suddenly became quiet, thinking of his own behavior
in this line.  He, too, was involuntarily contributing toward the
maintenance and support of the foe.

The fall of the ministry and the constitution of a government of
national defense made it apparent that something very important must
have taken place.  The alarms and tears of Dona Luisa increased his
nervousness.  The good lady was no longer returning from the
churches, cheered and strengthened.  Her confidential talks with her
sister were filling her with a terror that she tried in vain to
communicate to her husband.  "All is lost. . . .  Elena is the only
one that knows the truth."

Desnoyers went in search of Senator Lacour.  He would know all the
ministers; no one could be better informed.  "Yes, my friend," said
the important man sadly.  "Two great losses at Morhange and
Charleroi, at the East and the North.  The enemy is going to invade
French soil! . . .  But our army is intact, and will retreat in good
order.  Good fortune may still be ours.  A great calamity, but all
is not lost."

Preparations for the defense of Paris were being pushed forward . . .
rather late.  The forts were supplying themselves with new cannon.
Houses, built in the danger zone in the piping times of peace, were
now disappearing under the blows of the official demolition.  The
trees on the outer avenues were being felled in order to enlarge the
horizon.  Barricades of sacks of earth and tree trunks were heaped
at the doors of the old walls.  The curious were skirting the
suburbs in order to gaze at the recently dug trenches and the barbed
wire fences.  The Bois de Boulogne was filled with herds of cattle.
Near heaps of dry alfalfa steers and sheep were grouped in the green
meadows.  Protection against famine was uppermost in the minds of a
people still remembering the suffering of 1870.  Every night, the
street lighting was less and less.  The sky, on the other hand, was
streaked incessantly by the shafts from the searchlights.  Fear of
aerial invasion was increasing the public uneasiness.  Timid people
were speaking of Zeppelins, attributing to them irresistible powers,
with all the exaggeration that accompanies mysterious dangers.

In her panic, Dona Luisa greatly distressed her husband, who was
passing the days in continual alarm, yet trying to put heart into
his trembling and anxious wife.  "They are going to come, Marcelo;
my heart tells me so.  The girl! . . . the girl!"  She was accepting
blindly all the statements made by her sister, the only thing that
comforted her being the chivalry and discipline of those troops to
which her nephews belonged.  The news of the atrocities committed
against the women of Belgium were received with the same credulity
as the enemy's advances announced by Elena.  "Our girl, Marcelo. . . .
Our girl!"  And the girl, object of so much solicitude, would
laugh with the assurance of vigorous youth on hearing of her
mother's anxiety.  "Just let the shameless fellows come!  I shall
take great pleasure in seeing them face to face!"  And she clenched
her right hand as though it already clutched the avenging knife.

The father became tired of this situation.  He still had one of his
monumental automobiles that an outside chauffeur could manage.
Senator Lacour obtained the necessary passports and Desnoyers gave
his wife her orders in a tone that admitted of no remonstrance.
They must go to Biarritz or to some of the summer resorts in the
north of Spain.  Almost all the South American families had already
gone in the same direction.  Dona Luisa tried to object.  It was
impossible for her to separate herself from her husband.  Never
before, in their many years of married life, had they once been
separated.  But a harsh negative from Don Marcelo cut her pleadings
short.  He would remain.  Then the poor senora ran to the rue de la
Pompe.  Her son! . . .  Julio scarcely listened to his mother.  Ay!
he, too, would stay.  So finally the imposing automobile lumbered
toward the South carrying Dona Luisa, her sister who hailed with
delight this withdrawal before the admired troops of the Emperor,
and Chichi, pleased that the war was necessitating an excursion to
the fashionable beaches frequented by her friends.

Don Marcelo was at last alone.  The two coppery maids had followed
by rail the flight of their mistresses.  At first the old man felt a
little bewildered by this solitude, which obliged him to eat
uncomfortable meals in a restaurant and pass the nights in enormous
and deserted rooms still bearing traces of their former occupants.
The other apartments in the building had also been vacated.  All the
tenants were foreigners, who had discreetly decamped, or French
families surprised by the war when summering at their country seats.

Instinctively he turned his steps toward the rue de la Pompe gazing
from afar at the studio windows.  What was his son doing? . . .
Undoubtedly continuing his gay and useless life.  Such men only
existed for their own selfish folly.

Desnoyers felt satisfied with the stand he had taken.  To follow the
family would be sheer cowardice.  The memory of his youthful flight
to South America was sufficient martyrdom; he would finish his life
with all the compensating bravery that he could muster.  "No, they
will not come," he said repeatedly, with the optimism of enthusiasm.
I have a presentiment that they will never reach Paris.  And even if
they DO come!" . . .  The absence of his family brought him a joyous
valor and a sense of bold youthfulness.  Although his age might
prevent his going to war in the open air, he could still fire a gun,
immovable in a trench, without fear of death.  Let them come! . . .
He was longing for the struggle with the anxiety of a punctilious
business man wishing to cancel a former debt as soon as possible.

In the streets of Paris he met many groups of fugitives.  They were
from the North and East of France, and had escaped before the German
advance.  Of all the tales told by this despondent crowd--not
knowing where to go and dependent upon the charity of the people--he
was most impressed with those dealing with the disregard of
property.  Shootings and assassinations made him clench his fists,
with threats of vengeance; but the robberies authorized by the
heads, the wholesale sackings by superior order, followed by fire,
appeared to him so unheard-of that he was silent with stupefaction,
his speech seeming to be temporarily paralyzed.  And a people with
laws could wage war in this fashion, like a tribe of Indians going
to combat in order to rob! . . .  His adoration of property rights
made him beside himself with wrath at these sacrileges.

He began to worry about his castle at Villeblanche.  All that he
owned in Paris suddenly seemed to him of slight importance to what
he had in his historic mansion.  His best paintings were there,
adorning the gloomy salons; there, too, the furnishings captured
from the antiquarians after an auctioneering battle, and the crystal
cabinets, the tapestries, the silver services.

He mentally reviewed all of these objects, not letting a single one
escape his inventory.  Things that he had forgotten came surging up
in his memory, and the fear of losing them seemed to give them
greater lustre, increasing their size, and intensifying their value.
All the riches of Villeblanche were concentrated in one certain
acquisition which Desnoyers admired most of all; for, to his mind,
it stood for all the glory of his immense fortune--in fact, the most
luxurious appointment that even a millionaire could possess.

"My golden bath," he thought.  "I have there my tub of gold."

This bath of priceless metal he had procured, after much financial
wrestling, from an auction, and he considered the purchase the
culminating achievement of his wealth.  No one knew exactly its
origin; perhaps it had been the property of luxurious princes;
perhaps it owed its existence to the caprice of a demi-mondaine fond
of display.  He and his had woven a legend around this golden cavity
adorned with lions' claws, dolphins and busts of naiads.
Undoubtedly it was once a king's!  Chichi gravely affirmed that it
had been Marie Antoinette's, and the entire family thought that the
home on the avenue Victor Hugo was altogether too modest and
plebeian to enshrine such a jewel.  They therefore agreed to put it
in the castle, where it was greatly venerated, although it was
useless and solemn as a museum piece. . . .  And was he to permit
the enemy in their advance toward the Marne to carry off this
priceless treasure, as well as the other gorgeous things which he
had accumulated with such patience  Ah, no!  His soul of a collector
would be capable of the greatest heroism before he would let that go.

Each day was bringing a fresh sheaf of bad news.  The papers were
saying little, and the Government was so veiling its communications
that the mind was left in great perplexity.  Nevertheless, the truth
was mysteriously forcing its way, impelled by the pessimism of the
alarmists, and the manipulation of the enemy's spies who were
remaining hidden in Paris.  The fatal news was being passed along in
whispers.  "They have already crossed the frontier. . . ."  "They
are already in Lille." . . .  They were advancing at the rate of
thirty-five miles a day.  The name of von Kluck was beginning to
have a familiar ring.  English and French were retreating before the
enveloping progression of the invaders.  Some were expecting another
Sedan.  Desnoyers was following the advance of the Germans, going
daily to the Gare du Nord.  Every twenty-four hours was lessening
the radius of travel.  Bulletins announcing that tickets would not
be sold for the Northern districts served to indicate how these
places were falling, one after the other, into the power of the
invader.  The shrinkage of national territory was going on with such
methodical regularity that, with watch in hand, and allowing an
advance of thirty-five miles daily, one might gauge the hour when
the lances of the first Uhlans would salute the Eiffel tower.  The
trains were running full, great bunches of people overflowing from
their coaches.

In this time of greatest anxiety, Desnoyers again visited his
friend, Senator Lacour, in order to astound him with the most
unheard-of petitions.  He wished to go immediately to his castle.
While everybody else was fleeing toward Paris he earnestly desired
to go in the opposite direction.  The senator couldn't believe his
ears.

"You are beside yourself!" he exclaimed.  "It is necessary to leave
Paris, but toward the South.  I will tell you confidentially, and
you must not tell because it is a secret--we are leaving at any
minute; we are all going, the President, the Government, the
Chambers.  We are going to establish ourselves at Bordeaux as in
1870.  The enemy is surely approaching; it is only a matter of
days . . . of hours.  We know little of just what is happening,
but all the news is bad.  The army still holds firm, is yet intact,
but retreating . . . retreating, all the time yielding ground. . . .
Believe me, it will be better for you to leave Paris.  Gallieni will
defend it, but the defense is going to be hard and horrible. . . .
Although Paris may surrender, France will not necessarily surrender.
The war will go on if necessary even to the frontiers of Spain . . .
but it is sad . . . very sad!"

And he offered to take his friend with him in that flight to
Bordeaux of which so few yet knew.  Desnoyers shook his head.  No;
be wanted to go the castle of Villeblanche.  His furniture . . . his
riches . . . his parks.

"But you will be taken prisoner!" protested the senator.  "Perhaps
they will kill you!"

A shrug of indifference was the only response.  He considered
himself energetic enough to struggle against the entire German army
in the defense of his property.  The important thing was to get
there, and then--just let anybody dare to touch his things! . . .
The senator looked with astonishment at this civilian infuriated by
the lust of possession.  It reminded him of some Arab merchants that
he had once known, ordinarily mild and pacific, who quarrelled and
killed like wild beasts when Bedouin thieves seized their wares.
This was not the moment for discussion, and each must map out his
own course.  So the influential senator finally yielded to the
desire of his friend.  If such was his pleasure, let him carry it
through!  So he arranged that his mad petitioner should depart that
very night on a military train that was going to meet the army.

That journey put Don Marcelo in touch with the extraordinary
movement which the war had developed on the railroads.  His train
took fourteen hours to cover the distance normally made in two.  It
was made up of freight cars filled with provisions and cartridges,
with the doors stamped and sealed.  A third-class car was occupied
by the train escort, a detachment of provincial guards.  He was
installed in a second-class compartment with the lieutenant in
command of this guard and certain officials on their way to join
their regiments after having completed the business of mobilization
in the small towns in which they were stationed before the war.  The
crowd, habituated to long detentions, was accustomed to getting out
and settling down before the motionless locomotive, or scattering
through the nearby fields.

In the stations of any importance all the tracks were occupied by
rows of cars.  High-pressure engines were whistling, impatient to be
off.  Groups of soldiers were hesitating before the different
trains, making mistakes, getting out of one coach to enter others.
The employees, calm but weary-looking, were going from side to side,
giving explanations about mountains of all sorts of freight and
arranging them for transport.  In the convoy in which Desnoyers was
placed the Territorials were sleeping, accustomed to the monotony of
acting as guard.  Those in charge of the horses had opened the
sliding doors, seating themselves on the floor with their legs
hanging over the edge.  The train went very slowly during the night,
across shadowy fields, stopping here and there before red lanterns
and announcing its presence by prolonged whistling.

In some stations appeared young girls clad in white with cockades
and pennants on their breasts.  Day and night they were there, in
relays, so that no train should pass through without a visit.  They
offered, in baskets and trays, their gifts to the soldiers--bread,
chocolate, fruit.  Many, already surfeited, tried to resist, but had
to yield eventually before the pleading countenance of the maidens.
Even Desnoyers was laden down with these gifts of patriotic
enthusiasm.

He passed a great part of the night talking with his travelling
companions.  Only the officers had vague directions as to where they
were to meet their regiments, for the operations of war were daily
changing the situation.  Faithful to duty, they were passing on,
hoping to arrive in time for the decisive combat.  The Chief of the
Guard had been over the ground, and was the only one able to give
any account of the retreat.  After each stop the train made less
progress.  Everybody appeared confused.  Why the retreat? . . .  The
army had undoubtedly suffered reverses, but it was still united and,
in his opinion, ought to seek an engagement where it was.  The
retreat was leaving the advance of the enemy unopposed.  To what
point were they going to retreat? . . .  They who two weeks before
were discussing in their garrisons the place in Belgium where their
adversaries were going to receive their death blow and through what
places their victorious troops would invade Germany! . . .

Their admission of the change of tactics did not reveal the
slightest discouragement.  An indefinite but firm hope was hovering
triumphantly above their vacillations.  The Generalissimo was the
only one who possessed the secret of events.  And Desnoyers approved
with the blind enthusiasm inspired by those in whom we have
confidence.  Joffre! . . .  That serious and calm leader would
finally bring things out all right.  Nobody ought to doubt his
ability; he was the kind of man who always says the decisive word.

At daybreak Don Marcelo left the train.  "Good luck to you!"  And he
clasped the hands of the brave young fellows who were going to die,
perhaps in a very short time.  Finding the road unexpectedly open,
the train started immediately and Desnoyers found himself alone in
the station.  In normal times a branch road would have taken him on
to Villeblanche, but the service was now suspended for lack of a
train crew.  The employees had been transferred to the lines crowded
with the war transportation.

In vain he sought, with most generous offers, a horse, a simple cart
drawn by any kind of old beast, in order to continue his trip.  The
mobilization had appropriated the best, and all other means of
transportation had disappeared with the flight of the terrified.  He
would have to walk the eight miles.  The old man did not hesitate.
Forward March!  And he began his course along the dusty, straight,
white highway running between an endless succession of plains.  Some
groups of trees, some green hedges and the roofs of various farms
broke the monotony of the countryside.  The fields were covered with
stubble from the recent harvest.  The haycocks dotted the ground
with their yellowish cones, now beginning to darken and take on a
tone of oxidized gold.  In the valleys the birds were flitting
about, shaking off the dew of dawn.

The first rays of the sun announced a very hot day.  Around the hay
stacks Desnoyers saw knots of people who were getting up, shaking
out their clothes, and awaking those who were still sleeping.  They
were fugitives camping near the station in the hope that some train
would carry them further on, they knew not where.  Some had come
from far-away districts; they had heard the cannon, had seen war
approaching, and for several days had been going forward, directed
by chance.  Others, infected with the contagion of panic, had fled,
fearing to know the same horrors. . . .  Among them he saw mothers
with their little ones in their arms, and old men who could only
walk with a cane in one hand and the other arm in that of some
member of the family, and a few old women, withered and motionless
as mummies, who were sleeping as they were trundled along in
wheelbarrows.  When the sun awoke this miserable band they gathered
themselves together with heavy step, still stiffened by the night.
Many were going toward the station in the hope of a train which
never came, thinking that, perhaps, they might have better luck
during the day that was just dawning.  Some were continuing their
way down the track, hoping that fate might be more propitious in
some other place.

Don Marcelo walked all the morning long.  The white, rectilinear
ribbon of roadway was spotted with approaching groups that on the
horizon line looked like a file of ants.  He did not see a single
person going in his direction.  All were fleeing toward the South,
and on meeting this city gentleman, well-shod, with walking stick
and straw hat, going on alone toward the country which they were
abandoning in terror, they showed the greatest astonishment.  They
concluded that he must be some functionary, some celebrity from the
Government.

At midday he was able to get a bit of bread, a little cheese and a
bottle of white wine from a tavern near the road.  The proprietor
was at the front, his wife sick and moaning in her bed.  The mother,
a rather deaf old woman surrounded by her grandchildren, was
watching from the doorway the procession of fugitives which had been
filing by for the last three days.  "Monsieur, why do they flee?"
she said to Desnoyers.  "War only concerns the soldiers.  We
countryfolk have done no wrong to anybody, and we ought not to be
afraid."

Four hours later, on descending one of the hills that bounded the
valley of the Marne, he saw afar the roofs of Villeblanche clustered
around the church, and further on, beyond a little grove, the slatey
points of the round towers of his castle.

The streets of the village were deserted.  Only on the outer edges
of the square did he see some old women sitting as in the placid
evenings of bygone summers.  Half of the neighborhood had fled; the
others were staying by their firesides through sedentary routine, or
deceiving themselves with a blind optimism.  If the Prussians should
approach, what could they do to them? . . .  They would obey their
orders without attempting any resistance, and it is impossible to
punish people who obey. . . .  Anything would be preferable to
losing the homes built by their forefathers which they had never
left.

In the square he saw the mayor and the principal inhabitants grouped
together.  Like the women, they all stared in astonishment at the
owner of the castle.  He was the most unexpected of apparitions.
While so many were fleeing toward Paris, this Parisian had come to
join them and share in their fate.  A smile of affection, a look of
sympathy began to appear on the rough, bark-like countenances of the
suspicious rustics.  For a long time Desnoyers had been on bad terms
with the entire village.  He had harshly insisted on his rights,
showing no tolerance in matters touching his property.  He had
spoken many times of bringing suit against the mayor and sending
half of the neighborhood to prison, so his enemies had retaliated by
treacherously invading his lands, poaching in his hunting preserves,
and causing him great trouble with counter-suits and involved
claims.  His hatred of the community had even united him with the
priest because he was on terms of permanent hostility with the
mayor.  But his relations with the Church turned out as fruitless as
his struggles with the State.  The priest was a kindly old soul who
bore a certain resemblance to Renan, and seemed interested only in
getting alms for his poor out of Don Marcelo, even carrying his
good-natured boldness so far as to try to excuse the marauders on
his property.

How remote these struggles of a few months ago now seemed to
him! . . .  The millionaire was greatly surprised to see the
priest, on leaving his house to enter the church, greet the mayor
as he passed, with a friendly smile.

After long years of hostile silence they had met on the evening of
August first at the foot of the church tower.  The bell was ringing
the alarm, announcing the mobilization to the men who were in the
field--and the two enemies had instinctively clasped hands.  All
French!  This affectionate unanimity also came to meet the detested
owner of the castle.  He had to exchange greetings first on one
side, then on the other, grasping many a horny hand.  Behind his
back the people broke out into kindly excuses--"A good man, with no
fault except a little bad temper. . . ."  And in a few minutes
Monsieur Desnoyers was basking in the delightful atmosphere of
popularity.

As the iron-willed old gentleman approached his castle he concluded
that, although the fatigue of the long walk was making his knees
tremble, the trip had been well worth while.  Never had his park
appeared to him so extensive and so majestic as in that summer
twilight, never so glistening white the swans that were gliding
double over the quiet waters, never so imposing the great group of
towers whose inverted images were repeated in the glassy green of
the moats.  He felt eager to see at once the stables with their
herds of animals; then a brief glance showed him that the stalls
were comparatively empty.  Mobilization had carried off his best
work horses; the driving and riding horses also had disappeared.
Those in charge of the grounds and the various stable boys were also
in the army.  The Warden, a man upwards of fifty and consumptive,
was the only one of the personnel left at the castle.  With his wife
and daughter he was keeping the mangers filled, and from time to
time was milking the neglected cows.

Within the noble edifice he again congratulated himself on the
adamantine will which had brought him thither.  How could he ever
give up such riches! . . .  He gloated over the paintings, the
crystals, the draperies, all bathed in gold by the splendor of the
dying day, and he felt more than proud to be their possessor.  This
pride awakened in him an absurd, impossible courage, as though he
were a gigantic being from another planet, and all humanity merely
an ant hill that he could grind under foot.  Just let the enemy
come!  He could hold his own against the whole lot! . . .  Then,
when his common sense brought him out of his heroic delirium, he
tried to calm himself with an equally illogical optimism.  They
would not come.  He did not know why it was, but his heart told him
that they would not get that far.

He passed the following morning reconnoitering the artificial
meadows that he had made behind the park, lamenting their neglected
condition due to the departure of the men, trying himself to open
the sluice gates so as to give some water to the pasture lands which
were beginning to dry up.  The grape vines were extending their
branches the length of their supports, and the full bunches, nearly
ripe, were beginning to show their triangular lusciousness among the
leaves.  Ay, who would gather this abundant fruit! . . .

By afternoon he noted an extraordinary amount of movement in the
village.  Georgette, the Warden's daughter, brought the news that
many enormous automobiles and soldiers, French soldiers, were
beginning to pass through the main street.  In a little while a
procession began filing past on the high road near the castle,
leading to the bridge over the Marne.  This was composed of motor
trucks, open and closed, that still had their old commercial signs
under their covering of dust and spots of mud.  Many of them
displayed the names of business firms in Paris, others the names of
provincial establishments.  With these industrial vehicles
requisitioned by mobilization were others from the public service
which produced in Desnoyers the same effect as a familiar face in a
throng of strangers.  On their upper parts were the names of their
old routes:--"Madeleine-Bastille, Passy-Bourne," etc.  Probably he
had travelled many times in these very vehicles, now shabby and aged
by twenty days of intense activity, with dented planks and twisted
metal, perforated like sieves, but rattling crazily on.

Some of the conveyances displayed white discs with a red cross in
the center; others had certain letters and figures comprehensible
only to those initiates in the secrets of military administration.
Within these vehicles--the only new and strong motors--he saw
soldiers, many soldiers, but all wounded, with head and legs
bandaged, ashy faces made still more tragic by their growing beards,
feverish eyes looking fixedly ahead, mouths so sadly immobile that
they seemed carven by agonizing groans.  Doctors and nurses were
occupying various carriages in this convoy escorted by several
platoons of horsemen.  And mingled with the slowly moving horses and
automobiles were marching groups of foot-soldiers, with cloaks
unbuttoned or hanging from their shoulders like capes--wounded men
who were able to walk and joke and sing, some with arms in splints
across their breasts, others with bandaged heads with clotted blood
showing through the thin white strips.

The millionaire longed to do something for these brave fellows, but
he had hardly begun to distribute some bottles of wine and loaves of
bread before a doctor interposed, upbraiding him as though he had
committed a crime.  His gifts might result fatally.  So he had to
stand beside the road, sad and helpless, looking after the sorrowful
convoy. . . .  By nightfall the vehicles filled with the sick were
no longer filing by.

He now saw hundreds of drays, some hermetically sealed with the
prudence that explosive material requires, others with bundles and
boxes that were sending out a stale odor of provisions.  Then came
great herds of cattle raising thick, whirling clouds of dust in the
narrow parts of the road, prodded on by the sticks and yells of the
shepherds in kepis.

His thoughts kept him wakeful all night.  This, then, was the
retreat of which the people of Paris were talking, but in which many
wished not to believe--the retreat reaching even there and
continuing its indefinite retirement, since nobody knew what its end
might be. . . .  His optimism aroused a ridiculous hope.  Perhaps
this was only the retreat of the hospitals and stores which always
follows an army.  The troops, wishing to be rid of impedimenta, were
sending them forward by railway and highway.  That must be it.  So
all through the night, he interpreted the incessant bustle as the
passing of vehicles filled with the wounded, with munitions and
eatables, like those which had filed by in the afternoon.

Toward morning he fell asleep through sheer weariness, and when he
awoke late in the day his first glance was toward the road.  He saw
it filled with men and horses dragging some rolling objects.  But
these men were carrying guns and were formed in battalions and
regiments.  The animals were pulling the pieces of artillery.  It
was an army. . . .  It was the retreat!

Desnoyers ran to the edge of the road to be more convinced of the
truth.

Alas, they were regiments such as he had seen leaving the stations
of Paris. . . .  But with what a very different aspect!  The blue
cloaks were now ragged and yellowing garments, the trousers faded to
the color of a half-baked brick, the shoes great cakes of mud.  The
faces had a desperate expression, with layers of dust and sweat in
all their grooves and openings, with beards of recent growth, sharp
as spikes, with an air of great weariness showing the longing to
drop down somewhere forever, killing or dying, but without going a
step further.  They were tramping . . . tramping . . . tramping!
Some marches had lasted thirty hours at a stretch.  The enemy was on
their tracks, and the order was to go on and not to fight, freeing
themselves by their fleet-footedness from the involved movements of
the invader.

The chiefs suspected the discouraged exhaustion of their men.  They
might exact of them complete sacrifice of life--but to order them to
march day and night, forever fleeing before the enemy when they did
not consider themselves vanquished, when they were animated by that
ferocious wrath which is the mother of heroism! . . .  Their
despairing expressions mutely sought the nearest officers, the
leaders, even the colonel.  They simply could go no further!  Such a
long, devastating march in such a few days, and what for? . . .  The
superior officers, who knew no more than their men, seemed to be
replying with their eyes, as though they possessed a secret--
"Courage!  One more effort! . . .  This is going to come to an end
very soon."

The vigorous beasts, having no imagination, were resisting less than
the men, but their aspect was deplorable.  How could these be the
same strong horses with glossy coats that he had seen in the Paris
processions at the beginning of the previous month?  A campaign of
twenty days had aged and exhausted them; their dull gaze seemed to
be imploring pity.  They were weak and emaciated, the outline of
their skeletons so plainly apparent that it made their eyes look
larger.  Their harness, as they moved, showed the skin raw and
bleeding.  Yet they were pushing on with a mighty effort,
concentrating their last powers, as though human demands were beyond
their obscure instincts.  Some could go no further and suddenly
collapsed from sheer fatigue.  Desnoyers noticed that the
artillerymen rapidly unharnessed them, pushing them out of the road
so as to leave the way open for the rest.  There lay the skeleton-
like frames with stiffened legs and glassy eyes staring fixedly at
the first flies already attracted by their miserable carrion.

The cannons painted gray, the gun-carriages, the artillery
equipment, all that Don Marcelo had seen clean and shining with the
enthusiastic friction that man has given to arms from remote epochs--
even more persistent than that which woman gives to household
utensils--were now dirty, overlaid with the marks of endless use,
with the wreckage of unavoidable neglect.  The wheels were deformed
with mud, the metal darkened by the smoke of explosion, the gray
paint spotted with mossy dampness.

In the free spaces in this file, in the parentheses opened between
battery and regiment, were sandwiched crowds of civilians--miserable
groups driven on by the invasion, populations of entire towns that
had disintegrated, following the army in its retreat.  The approach
of a new division would make them leave the road temporarily,
continuing their march in the adjoining fields.  Then at the
slightest opening in the troops they would again slip along the
white and even surface of the highway.  They were mothers who were
pushing hand-carts heaped high with pyramids of furniture and tiny
babies, the sick who could hardly drag themselves along, old men
carried on the shoulders of their grandsons, old women with little
children clinging to their skirts--a pitiful, silent brood.

Nobody now opposed the liberality of the owner of the castle.  His
entire vintage seemed to be overflowing on the highway.  Casks from
the last grape-gathering were rolled out to the roadside, and the
soldiers filled the metal ladles hanging from their belts with the
red stream.  Then the bottled wine began making its appearance by
order of date, and was instantly lost in the river of men
continually flowing by.  Desnoyers observed with much satisfaction
the effects of his munificence.  The smiles were reappearing on the
despairing faces, the French jest was leaping from row to row, and
on resuming their march the groups began to sing.

Then he went to see the officers who in the village square were
giving their horses a brief rest before rejoining their columns.
With perplexed countenances and heavy eyes they were talking among
themselves about this retreat, so incomprehensible to them all.
Days before in Guise they had routed their pursuers, and yet now
they were continually withdrawing in obedience to a severe and
endless order.  "We do not understand it," they were saying.  "We do
not understand."  An ordered and methodical tide was dragging back
these men who wanted to fight, yet had to retreat.  All were
suffering the same cruel doubt.  "We do not understand."

And doubt was making still more distressing this day-and-night march
with only the briefest rests--because the heads of the divisions
were in hourly fear of being cut off from the rest of the army.
"One effort more, boys!  Courage!  Soon we shall rest!"  The columns
in their retirement were extending hundreds of miles.  Desnoyers was
seeing only one division.  Others and still others were doing
exactly this same thing at that very hour, their recessional
extending across half of France.  All, with the same disheartened
obedience, were falling back, the men exclaiming the same as the
officials, "We don't understand.  We don't understand!"

Don Marcelo soon felt the same sadness and bewilderment as these
soldiers.  He didn't understand, either.  He saw the obvious thing,
what all were able to see--the territory invaded without the Germans
encountering any stubborn resistance;--entire counties, cities,
villages, hamlets remaining in the power of the enemy, at the back
of an army that was constantly withdrawing.  His enthusiasm suddenly
collapsed like a pricked balloon, and all his former pessimism
returned.  The troops were displaying energy and discipline; but
what did that amount to if they had to keep retreating all the time,
unable on account of strict orders to fight or defend the land?
"Just as it was in the '70's," he sighed.  "Outwardly there is more
order, but the result is going to be the same."

As though a negative reply to his faint-heartedness, he overheard
the voice of a soldier reassuring a farmer: "We are retreating, yes--
only that we may pounce upon the Boches with more strength.
Grandpa Joffre is going to put them in his pocket when and where he
will."

The mere sound of the Marshal's name revived Don Marcelo's hope.
Perhaps this soldier, who was keeping his faith intact in spite of
the interminable and demoralizing marches, was nearer the truth than
the reasoning and studious officers.

He passed the rest of the day making presents to the last
detachments of the column.  His wine cellars were gradually
emptying.  By order of dates, he continued distributing thousands of
bottles stored in the subterranean parts of the castle.  By evening
he was giving to those who appeared weakest bottles covered with the
dust of many years.  As the lines filed by the men seemed weaker and
more exhausted.  Stragglers were now passing, painfully drawing
their raw and bleeding feet from their shoes.  Some had already
freed themselves from these torture cases and were marching
barefoot, with their heavy boots hanging from their shoulders, and
staining the highway with drops of blood.  Although staggering with
deadly fatigue, they kept their arms and outfits, believing that the
enemy was near.

Desnoyers' liberality stupefied many of them.  They were accustomed
to crossing their native soil, having to struggle with the
selfishness of the producer.  Nobody had been offering anything.
Fear of danger had made the country folk hide their eatables and
refuse to lend the slightest aid to their compatriots who were
fighting for them.

The millionaire slept badly this second night in his pompous bed
with columns and plushes that had belonged to Henry IV--according to
the declarations of the salesmen.  The troops no longer were
marching past.  From time to time there straggled by a single
battalion, a battery, a group of horsemen--the last forces of the
rear guard that had taken their position on the outskirts of the
village in order to cover the retreat.  The profound silence that
followed the turmoil of transportation awoke in his mind a sense of
doubt and disquietude.  What was he doing there when the soldiers
had gone?  Was he not crazy to remain there? . . .  But immediately
there came galloping into his mind the great riches which the castle
contained.  If he could only take it all away! . . .  That was
impossible now through want of means and time.  Besides, his
stubborn will looked upon such flight as a shameful concession.  "We
must finish what we have begun!" he said to himself.  He had made
the trip on purpose to guard his own, and he must not flee at the
approach of danger. . . .

The following morning, when he went down into the village, he saw
hardly any soldiers.  Only a single detachment of dragoons was still
in the neighborhood; the horsemen were scouring the woods and
pushing forward the stragglers at the same time that they were
opposing the advance of the enemy.  The troopers had obstructed the
street with a barricade of carts and furniture.  Standing behind
this crude barrier, they were watching the white strip of roadway
which ran between the two hills covered with trees.  Occasionally
there sounded stray shots like the snapping of cords.  "Ours," said
the troopers.  These were the last detachments of sharpshooters
firing at the advancing Uhlans.  The cavalry of the rear guard had
the task of opposing a continual resistance to the enemy, repelling
the squads of Germans who were trying to work their way along to the
retreating columns.

Desnoyers saw approaching along the highroad the last stragglers
from the infantry.  They were not walking, they rather appeared to
be dragging themselves forward, with the firm intention of
advancing, but were betrayed by emaciated legs and bleeding feet.
Some had sunk down for a moment by the roadside, agonized with
weariness, in order to breathe without the weight of their
knapsacks, and draw their swollen feet from their leather prisons,
and wipe off the sweat; but upon trying to renew their march, they
found it impossible to rise.  Their bodies seemed made of stone.
Fatigue had brought them to a condition bordering on catalepsy so,
unable to move, they were seeing dimly the rest of the army passing
on as a fantastic file--battalions, more battalions, batteries,
troops of horses.  Then the silence, the night, the sleep on the
stones and dust, shaken by most terrible nightmare.  At daybreak
they were awakened by bodies of horsemen exploring the ground,
rounding up the remnants of the retreat.  Ay, it was impossible to
move!  The dragoons, revolver in hand, had to resort to threats in
order to rouse them!  Only the certainty that the pursuer was near
and might make them prisoners gave them a momentary vigor.  So they
were forcing themselves up by superhuman effort, staggering,
dragging their legs, and supporting themselves on their guns as
though they were canes.

Many of these were young men who had aged in an hour and changed
into confirmed invalids.  Poor fellows!  They would not go very far!
Their intention was to follow on, to join the column, but on
entering the village they looked at the houses with supplicating
eyes, desiring to enter them, feeling such a craving for immediate
relief that they forgot even the nearness of the enemy.

Villeblanche was now more military than before the arrival of the
troops.  The night before a great part of the inhabitants had fled,
having become infected with the same fear that was driving on the
crowds following the army.  The mayor and the priest remained.
Reconciled with the owner of the castle through his unexpected
presence in their midst, and admiring his liberality, the municipal
official approached to give him some news.  The engineers were
mining the bridge over the Marne.  They were only waiting for the
dragoons to cross before blowing it up.  If he wished to go, there
was still time.

Again Desnoyers hesitated.  Certainly it was foolhardy to remain
there.  But a glance at the woods over whose branches rose the
towers of his castle, settled his doubts.  No, no. . . .  "We must
finish what we have begun!"

The very last band of troopers now made their appearance, coming out
of the woods by different paths.  They were riding their horses
slowly, as though they deplored this retreat.  They kept looking
behind, carbine in hand, ready to halt and shoot.  The others who
had been occupying the barricade were already on their mounts.  The
division reformed, the commands of the officers were heard and a
quick trot, accompanied by the clanking of metal, told Don Marcelo
that the last of the army had left.

He remained near the barricade in a solitude of intense silence, as
though the world were suddenly depopulated.  Two dogs, abandoned by
the flight of their masters, leaped and sniffed around him, coaxing
him for protection.  They were unable to get the desired scent in
that land trodden down and disfigured by the transit of thousands of
men.  A family cat was watching the birds that were beginning to
return to their haunts.  With timid flutterings they were picking at
what the horses had left, and an ownerless hen was disputing the
banquet with the winged band, until then hidden in the trees and
roofs.  The silence intensified the rustling of the leaves, the hum
of the insects, the summer respiration of the sunburnt soil which
appeared to have contracted timorously under the weight of the men
in arms.

Desnoyers was losing exact track of the passing of time.  He was
beginning to believe that all which had gone before must have been a
bad dream.  The calm surrounding him made what had been happening
here seem most improbable.

Suddenly he saw something moving at the far end of the road, at the
very highest point where the white ribbon of the highway touched the
blue of the horizon.  There were two men on horseback, two little
tin soldiers who appeared to have escaped from a box of toys.  He
had brought with him a pair of field glasses that had often
surprised marauders on his property, and by their aid he saw more
clearly the two riders clad in greenish gray!  They were carrying
lances and wearing helmets ending in a horizontal plate . . .  They!
He could not doubt it: before his eyes were the first Uhlans!

For some time they remained motionless, as though exploring the
horizon.  Then, from the obscure masses of vegetation that bordered
the roadside, others and still others came sallying forth in groups.
The little tin soldiers no longer were showing their silhouettes
against the horizon's blue; the whiteness of the highway was now
making their background, ascending behind their heads.  They came
slowly down, like a band that fears ambush, examining carefully
everything around.

The advisability of prompt retirement made Don Marcelo bring his
investigations to a close.  It would be most disastrous for him if
they surprised him here.  But on lowering his glasses something
extraordinary passed across his field of vision.  A short distance
away, so that he could almost touch them with his hand, he saw many
men skulking along in the shadow of the trees on both sides of the
road.  His surprise increased as he became convinced that they were
Frenchmen, wearing kepis.  Where were they coming from? . . .  He
examined more closely with his spy glass.  They were stragglers in a
lamentable state of body and a picturesque variety of uniforms--
infantry, Zouaves, dragoons without their horses.  And with them
were forest guards and officers from the villages that had received
too late the news of the retreat--altogether about fifty.  A few
were fresh and vigorous, others were keeping themselves up by
supernatural effort.  All were carrying arms.

They finally made the barricade, looking continually behind them, in
order to watch, in the shelter of the trees, the slow advance of the
Uhlans.  At the head of this heterogeneous troop was an official of
the police, old and fat, with a revolver in his right hand, his
moustache bristling with excitement, and a murderous glitter in his
heavy-lidded blue eyes.  The band was continuing its advance through
the village, slipping over to the other side of the barricade of
carts without paying much attention to their curious countryman,
when suddenly sounded a loud detonation, making the horizon vibrate
and the houses tremble.

"What is that?" asked the officer, looking at Desnoyers for the
first time.  He explained that it was the bridge which had just been
blown up.  The leader received the news with an oath, but his
confused followers, brought together by chance, remained as
indifferent as though they had lost all contact with reality.

"Might as well die here as anywhere," continued the official.  Many
of the fugitives acknowledged this decision with prompt obedience,
since it saved them the torture of continuing their march.  They
were almost rejoicing at the explosion which had cut off their
progress.  Instinctively they were gathering in the places most
sheltered by the barricade.  Some entered the abandoned houses whose
doors the dragoons had forced in order to utilize the upper floors.
All seemed satisfied to be able to rest, even though they might soon
have to fight.  The officer went from group to group giving his
orders.  They must not fire till he gave the word.

Don Marcelo watched these preparations with the immovability of
surprise.  So rapid and noiseless had been the apparition of the
stragglers that he imagined he must still be dreaming.  There could
be no danger in this unreal situation; it was all a lie.  And he
remained in his place without understanding the deputy who was
ordering his departure with roughest words.  Obstinate civilian! . . .

The reverberation of the explosion had filled the highway with
horsemen.  They were coming from all directions, forming themselves
into the advance group.  The Uhlans were galloping around under the
impression that the village was abandoned.

"Fire!"

Desnoyers was enveloped in a rain of crackling noises, as though the
trunks of all the trees had split before his eyes.

The impetuous band halted suddenly.  Some of their men were rolling
on the ground.  Some were bending themselves double, trying to get
across the road without being seen.  Others remained stretched out
on their backs or face downward with their arms in front.  The
riderless horses were racing wildly across the fields with reins
dragging, urged on by the loose stirrups.

And after this rude shock which had brought them surprise and death,
the band disappeared, instantly swallowed up by the trees.



CHAPTER IV

NEAR THE SACRED GROTTO


Argensola had found a new occupation even more exciting than marking
out on the map the manoeuvres of the armies.

"I am now devoting myself to the taube," he announced.  "It appears
from four to five with the precision a punctilious guest coming to
take tea."

Every afternoon at the appointed hour, a German aeroplane was flying
over Paris dropping bombs.  This would-be intimidation was producing
no terror, the people accepting the visit as an interesting and
extraordinary spectacle.  In vain the aviators were flinging in the
city streets German flags bearing ironic messages, giving accounts
of the defeat of the retreating army and the failures of the Russian
offensive.  Lies, all lies!  In vain they were dropping bombs,
destroying garrets, killing or wounding old men, women and babes.
"Ah, the bandits!"  The crowds would threaten with their fists the
malign mosquito, scarcely visible 6,000 feet above them, and after
this outburst, they would follow it with straining eyes from street
to street, or stand motionless in the square in order to study its
evolutions.

The most punctual of all the spectators was Argensola.  At four
o'clock he was in the place de la Concorde with upturned face and
wide-open eyes, in most cordial good-fellowship with all the
bystanders.  It was as though they were holding season tickets at
the same theatre, becoming acquainted through seeing each other so
often.  "Will it come? . . .  Will it not come to-day?"  The women
appeared to be the most vehement, some of them rushing up, flushed
and breathless, fearing that they might have arrived too late for
the show. . . .  A great cry--"There it comes! . . .  There it is!"
And thousands of hands were pointing to a vague spot on the horizon.
With field glasses and telescopes they were aiding their vision, the
popular venders offering every kind of optical instruments and for
an hour the thrilling spectacle of an aerial hunt was played out,
noisy and useless.

The great insect was trying to reach the Eiffel Tower, and from its
base would come sharp reports, at the same time that the different
platforms spit out a fierce stream of shrapnel.  As it zigzagged
over the city, the discharge of rifles would crackle from roof and
street.  Everyone that had arms in his house was firing--the
soldiers of the guard, and the English and Belgians on their way
through Paris.  They knew that their shots were perfectly useless,
but they were firing for the fun of retorting, hoping at the same
time that one of their chance shots might achieve a miracle; but the
only miracle was that the shooters did not kill each other with
their precipitate and ineffectual fire.  As it was, a few passers-by
did fall, wounded by balls from unknown sources.

Argensola would tear from street to street following the evolutions
of the inimical bird, trying to guess where its projectiles would
fall, anxious to be the first to reach the bombarded house, excited
by the shots that were answering from below.  And to think that he
had no gun like those khaki-clad Englishmen or those Belgians in
barrick cap, with tassel over the front! . . .  Finally the taube
tired of manoeuvering, would disappear.  "Until to-morrow!"
ejaculated the Spaniard.  "Perhaps to-morrow's show may be even more
interesting!"

He employed his free hours between his geographical observations and
his aerial contemplations in making the rounds of the stations,
watching the crowds of travellers making their escape from Paris.
The sudden vision of the truth--after the illusion which the
Government had been creating with its optimistic dispatches, the
certainty that the Germans were actually near when a week before
they had imagined them completely routed, the taubes flying over
Paris, the mysterious threat of the Zeppelins--all these dangerous
signs were filling a part of the community with frenzied
desperation.  The railroad stations, guarded by the soldiery, were
only admitting those who had secured tickets in advance.  Some had
been waiting entire days for their turn to depart.  The most
impatient were starting to walk, eager to get outside of the city as
soon as possible.  The roads were black with the crowds all going in
the same directions.  Toward the South they were fleeing by
automobile, in carriages, in gardeners' carts, on foot.

Argensola surveyed this hegira with serenity.  He would remain
because he had always admired those men who witnessed the Siege of
Paris in 1870.  Now it was going to be his good fortune to observe
an historical drama, perhaps even more interesting.  The wonders
that he would be able to relate in the future! . . .  But the
distraction and indifference of his present audience were annoying
him greatly.  He would hasten back to the studio, in feverish
excitement, to communicate the latest gratifying news to Desnoyers
who would listen as though he did not hear him.  The night that he
informed him that the Government, the Chambers, the Diplomatic
Corps, and even the actors of the Comedie Francaise were going that
very hour on special trains for Bordeaux, his companion merely
replied with a shrug of indifference.

Desnoyers was worrying about other things.  That morning he had
received a note from Marguerite--only two lines scrawled in great
haste.  She was leaving, starting immediately, accompanied by her
mother.  Adieu! . . . and nothing more.  The panic had caused many
love-affairs to be forgotten, had broken off long intimacies, but
Marguerite's temperament was above such incoherencies from mere
flight.  Julio felt that her terseness was very ominous.  Why not
mention the place to which she was going? . . .

In the afternoon, he took a bold step which she had always
forbidden.  He went to her home and talked a long time with the
concierge in order to get some news.  The good woman was delighted
to work off on him the loquacity so brusquely cut short by the
flight of tenants and servants.  The lady on the first floor
(Marguerite's mother) had been the last to abandon the house in
spite of the fact that she was really sick over her son's departure.
They had left the day before without saying where they were going.
The only thing that she knew was that they took the train in the
Gare d'Orsay.  They were going toward the South like all the rest of
the rich.

And she supplemented her revelations with the vague news that the
daughter had seemed very much upset by the information that she had
received from the front.  Someone in the family was wounded.
Perhaps it was the brother, but she really didn't know.  With so
many surprises and strange things happening, it was difficult to
keep track of everything.  Her husband, too, was in the army and she
had her own affairs to worry about.

"Where can she have gone?" Julio asked himself all day long.  "Why
does she wish to keep me in ignorance of her whereabouts?"

When his comrade told him that night about the transfer of the seat
of government, with all the mystery of news not yet made public,
Desnoyers merely replied:

"They are doing the best thing. . . .  I, too, will go tomorrow if I
can."

Why remain longer in Paris?  His family was away.  His father,
according to Argensola's investigations, also had gone off without
saying whither.  Now Marguerite's mysterious flight was leaving him
entirely alone, in a solitude that was filling him with remorse.

That afternoon, when strolling through the boulevards, he had
stumbled across a friend considerably older than himself, an
acquaintance in the fencing club which he used to frequent.  This
was the first time they had met since the beginning of the war, and
they ran over the list of their companions in the army.  Desnoyers'
inquiries were answered by the older man.  So-and-so? . . .  He had
been wounded in Lorraine and was now in a hospital in the South.
Another friend? . . .  Dead in the Vosges.  Another? . . .
Disappeared at Charleroi.  And thus had continued the heroic and
mournful roll-call.  The others were still living, doing brave
things.  The members of foreign birth, young Poles, English
residents in Paris and South Americans, had finally enlisted as
volunteers.  The club might well be proud of its young men who had
practised arms in times of peace, for now they were all jeopardizing
their existence at the front.  Desnoyers turned his face away as
though he feared to meet in the eyes of his friend, an ironical and
questioning expression.  Why had he not gone with the others to
defend the land in which he was living? . . .

"To-morrow I will go," repeated Julio, depressed by this
recollection.

But he went toward the South like all those who were fleeing from
the war.  The following morning Argensola was charged to get him a
railroad ticket for Bordeaux.  The value of money had greatly
increased, but fifty francs, opportunely bestowed, wrought the
miracle and procured a bit of numbered cardboard whose conquest
represented many days of waiting.

"It is good only for to-day," said the Spaniard, "you will have to
take the night train."

Packing was not a very serious matter, as the trains were refusing
to admit anything more than hand-luggage.  Argensola did not wish to
accept the liberality of Julio who tried to leave all his money with
him.  Heroes need very little and the painter of souls was inspired
with heroic resolution, The brief harangue of Gallieni in taking
charge of the defense of Paris, he had adopted as his own.  He
intended to keep up his courage to the last, just like the hardy
general.

"Let them come," he exclaimed with a tragic expression.  "They will
find me at my post!" . . .

His post was the studio from which he could witness the happenings
which he proposed relating to coming generations.  He would entrench
himself there with the eatables and wines.  Besides he had the plan--
just as soon as his partner should disappear--of bringing to live
there with him certain lady-friends who were wandering around in
search of a problematical dinner, and feeling timid in the solitude
of their own quarters.  Danger often gathers congenial folk together
and adds a new attractiveness to the pleasures of a community.  The
tender affections of the prisoners of the Terror, when they were
expecting momentarily to be conducted to the guillotine, flashed
through his mind.  Let us drain Life's goblet at one draught since
we have to die! . . .  The studio of the rue de la Pompe was about
to witness the mad and desperate revels of a castaway bark well-
stocked with provisions.

Desnoyers left the Gare d'Orsay in a first-class compartment,
mentally praising the good order with which the authorities had
arranged everything, so that every traveller could have his own
seat.  At the Austerlitz station, however, a human avalanche
assaulted the train.  The doors were broken open, packages and
children came in through the windows like projectiles.  The people
pushed with the unreason of a crowd fleeing before a fire.  In the
space reserved for eight persons, fourteen installed themselves; the
passageways were heaped with mountains of bags and valises that
served later travellers for seats.  All class distinctions had
disappeared.  The villagers invaded by preference the best coaches,
believing that they would there find more room.  Those holding
first-class tickets hunted up the plainer coaches in the vain hope
of travelling without being crowded.  On the cross roads were
waiting from the day before long trains made up of cattle cars.  All
the stables on wheels were filled with people seated on the wooden
floor or in chairs brought from their homes.  Every train load was
an encampment eager to take up its march; whenever it halted, layers
of greasy papers, hulls and fruit skins collected along its entire
length.

The invaders, pushing their way in, put up with many annoyances and
pardoned one another in a brotherly way.  "In war times, war
measures," they would always say as a last excuse.  And each one was
pressing closer to his neighbor in order to make a few more inches
of room, and helping to wedge his scanty baggage among the other
bundles swaying most precariously above.  Little by little,
Desnoyers was losing all his advantage as a first comer.  These poor
people who had been waiting for the train from four in the morning
till eight at night, awakened his pity.  The women, groaning with
weariness, were standing in the corridors, looking with ferocious
envy at those who had seats.  The children were bleating like hungry
kids.  Julio finally gave up his place, sharing with the needy and
improvident the bountiful supply of eatables with which Argensola
had provided him.  The station restaurants had all been emptied of
food.

During the train's long wait, soldiers only were seen on the
platform, soldiers who were hastening at the call of the trumpet, to
take their places again in the strings of cars which were constantly
steaming toward Paris.  At the signal stations, long war trains were
waiting for the road to be clear that they might continue their
journey.  The cuirassiers, wearing a yellow vest over their steel
breastplate, were seated with hanging legs in the doorways of the
stable cars, from whose interior came repeated neighing.  Upon the
flat cars were rows of gun carriages.  The slender throats of the
cannon of '75 were pointed upwards like telescopes.

Young Desnoyers passed the night in the aisle, seated on a valise,
noting the sodden sleep of those around him, worn out by weariness
and exhaustion.  It was a cruel and endless night of jerks, shrieks
and stops punctuated by snores.  At every station, the trumpets were
sounding precipitously as though the enemy were right upon them.
The soldiers from the South were hurrying to their posts, and at
brief intervals another detachment of men was dragged along the
rails toward Paris.  They all appeared gay, and anxious to reach the
scene of slaughter as soon as possible.  Many were regretting the
delays, fearing that they might arrive too late.  Leaning out of the
window, Julio heard the dialogues and shouts on the platforms
impregnated with the acrid odor of men and mules.  All were evincing
an unquenchable confidence.  "The Boches! very numerous, with huge
cannons, with many mitrailleuse . . . but we only have to charge
with our bayonets to make them run like rabbits!"

The attitude of those going to meet death was in sharp contrast to
the panic and doubt of those who were deserting Paris.  An old and
much-decorated gentleman, type of a jubilee functionary, kept
questioning Desnoyers whenever the train started on again--"Do you
believe that they will get as far as Tours?"  Before receiving his
reply, he would fall asleep.  Brutish sleep was marching down the
aisles with leaden feet.  At every junction, the old man would start
up and suddenly ask, "Do you believe that we will get as far as
Bordeaux?" . . .  And his great desire not to halt until, with his
family, he had reached an absolutely secure refuge, made him accept
as oracles all the vague responses.

At daybreak, they saw the Territorialists guarding the roads.  They
were armed with old muskets, and were wearing the red kepis as their
only military distinction.  They were following the opposite course
of the military trains.

In the station at Bordeaux, the civilian crowds struggling to get
out or to enter other cars, were mingling with the troops.  The
trumpets were incessantly sounding their brazen notes, calling the
soldiers together.  Many were men of darkest coloring, natives with
wide gray breeches and red caps above their black or bronzed faces.

Julio saw a train bearing wounded from the battles of Flanders and
Lorraine.  Their worn and dirty uniforms were enlivened by the
whiteness of the bandages sustaining the wounded limbs or protecting
the broken heads.  All were trying to smile, although with livid
mouths and feverish eyes, at their first glimpse of the land of the
South as it emerged from the mist bathed in the sunlight, and
covered with the regal vestures of its vineyards.  The men from the
North stretched out their hands for the fruit that the women were
offering them, tasting with delight the sweet grapes of the country.

For four days the distracted lover lived in Bordeaux, stunned and
bewildered by the agitation of a provincial city suddenly converted
into a capital.  The hotels were overcrowded, many notables
contenting themselves with servants' quarters.  There was not a
vacant seat in the cafes; the sidewalks could not accommodate the
extraordinary assemblage.  The President was installed in the
Prefecture; the State Departments were established in the schools
and museums; two theatres were fitted up for the future reunions of
the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies.  Julio was lodged in a
filthy, disreputable hotel at the end of a foul-smelling alley.  A
little Cupid adorned the crystals of the door, and the looking-glass
in his room was scratched with names and unspeakable phrases--
souvenirs of the occupants of an hour . . . and yet many grand
ladies, hunting in vain for temporary residence, would have envied
him his good fortune.

All his investigations proved fruitless.  The friends whom he
encountered in the fugitive crowd were thinking only of their own
affairs.  They could talk of nothing but incidents of the
installation, repeating the news gathered from the ministers with
whom they were living on familiar terms, or mentioning with a
mysterious air, the great battle which was going on stretching from
the vicinity of Paris to Verdun.  A pupil of his days of glory,
whose former elegance was now attired in the uniform of a nurse,
gave him some vague information.  "The little Madame Laurier? . . .
I remember hearing that she was living somewhere near here. . . .
Perhaps in Biarritz."  Julio needed no more than this to continue
his journey.  To Biarritz!

The first person that he encountered on his arrival was Chichi.  She
declared that the town was impossible because of the families of
rich Spaniards who were summering there.  "The Boches are in the
majority, and I pass a miserable existence quarrelling with them. . . .
I shall finally have to live alone."  Then he met his mother--
embraces and tears.  Afterwards he saw his Aunt Elena in the hotel
parlors, most enthusiastic over the country and the summer colony.

She could talk at great length with many of them about the decadence
of France.  They were all expecting to receive the news from one
moment to another, that the Kaiser had entered the Capital.
Ponderous men who had never done anything in all their lives, were
criticizing the defects and indolence of the Republic.  Young men
whose aristocracy aroused Dona Elena's enthusiasm, broke forth into
apostrophes against the corruption of Paris, corruption that they
had studied thoroughly, from sunset to sunrise, in the virtuous
schools of Montmartre.  They all adored Germany where they had never
been, or which they knew only through the reels of the moving
picture films.  They criticized events as though they were
witnessing a bull fight.  "The Germans have the snap!  You can't
fool with them!  They are fine brutes!"  And they appeared to admire
this inhumanity as the most admirable characteristic.  "Why will
they not say that in their own home on the other side of the
frontier?" Chichi would protest.  "Why do they come into their
neighbor's country to ridicule his troubles? . . .  Possibly they
consider it a sign of their wonderful good-breeding!"

But Julio had not gone to Biarritz to live with his family. . . .
The very day of his arrival, he saw Marguerite's mother in the
distance.  She was alone.  His inquiries developed the information
that her daughter was living in Pau.  She was a trained nurse taking
care of a wounded member of the family.  "Her brother . . .
undoubtedly it is her brother," thought Julio.  And he again
continued his trip, this time going to Pau.

His visits to the hospitals there were also unavailing.  Nobody
seemed to know Marguerite.  Every day a train was arriving with a
new load of bleeding flesh, but her brother was not among the
wounded.  A Sister of Charity, believing that he was in search of
someone of his family, took pity on him and gave him some helpful
directions.  He ought to go to Lourdes; there were many of the
wounded there and many of the military nurses.  So Desnoyers
immediately took the short cut between Pau and Lourdes.

He had never visited the sacred city whose name was so frequently on
his mother's lips.  For Dona Luisa, the French nation was Lourdes.
In her discussions with her sister and other foreign ladies who were
praying that France might be exterminated for its impiety, the good
senora always summed up her opinions in the same words:--"When the
Virgin wished to make her appearance in our day, she chose France.
This country, therefore, cannot be as bad as you say. . . .  When I
see that she appears in Berlin, we will then re-discuss the matter."

But Desnoyers was not there to confirm his mother's artless
opinions.  Just as soon as he had found a room in a hotel near the
river, he had hastened to the big hostelry, now converted into a
hospital.  The guard told him that he could not speak to the
Director until the afternoon.  In order to curb his impatience he
walked through the street leading to the basilica, past all the
booths and shops with pictures and pious souvenirs which have
converted the place into a big bazaar.  Here and in the gardens
adjoining the church, he saw wounded convalescents with uniforms
stained with traces of the combat.  Their cloaks were greatly soiled
in spite of repeated brushings.  The mud, the blood and the rain had
left indelible spots and made them as stiff as cardboard.  Some of
the wounded had cut their sleeves in order to avoid the cruel
friction on their shattered arms, others still showed on their
trousers the rents made by the devastating shells.

They were fighters of all ranks and of many races--infantry,
cavalry, artillerymen; soldiers from the metropolis and from the
colonies; French farmers and African sharpshooters; red heads, faces
of Mohammedan olive and the black countenances of the Sengalese,
with eyes of fire, and thick, bluish blubber lips; some showing the
good-nature and sedentary obesity of the middle-class man suddenly
converted into a warrior; others sinewy, alert, with the aggressive
profile of men born to fight, and experienced in foreign fields.

The city, formerly visited by the hopeful, Catholic sick, was now
invaded by a crowd no less dolorous but clad in carnival colors.
All, in spite of their physical distress, had a certain air of good
cheer and satisfaction.  They had seen Death very near, slipping out
from his bony claws into a new joy and zest in life.  With their
cloaks adorned with medals, their theatrical Moorish garments, their
kepis and their African headdresses, this heroic band presented,
nevertheless, a lamentable aspect.

Very few still preserved the noble vertical carriage, the pride of
the superior human being.  They were walking along bent almost
double, limping, dragging themselves forward by the help of a staff
or friendly arm.  Others had to let themselves be pushed along,
stretched out on the hand-carts which had so often conducted the
devout sick from the station to the Grotto of the Virgin.  Some were
feeling their way along, blindly, leaning on a child or nurse.  The
first encounters in Belgium and in the East, a mere half-dozen
battles, had been enough to produce these physical wrecks still
showing a manly nobility in spite of the most horrible outrages.
These organisms, struggling so tenaciously to regain their hold on
life, bringing their reviving energies out into the sunlight,
represented but the most minute part of the number mowed down by the
scythe of Death.  Back of them were thousands and thousands of
comrades groaning on hospital beds from which they would probably
never rise.  Thousands and thousands were hidden forever in the
bosom of the Earth moistened by their death agony--fatal land which,
upon receiving a hail of projectiles, brought forth a harvest of
bristling crosses!

War now showed itself to Desnoyers with all its cruel hideousness.
He had been accustomed to speak of it heretofore as those in robust
health speak of death, knowing that it exists and is horrible, but
seeing it afar off . . . so far off that it arouses no real emotion.
The explosion of the shells were accompanying their destructive
brutality with a ferocious mockery, grotesquely disfiguring the
human body.  He saw wounded objects just beginning to recover their
vital force who were but rough skeletons of men, frightful
caricatures, human rags, saved from the tomb by the audacities of
science--trunks with heads which were dragged along on wheeled
platforms; fragments of skulls whose brains were throbbing under an
artificial cap; beings without arms and without legs, resting in the
bottom of little wagons, like bits of plaster models or scraps from
the dissecting room; faces without noses that looked like skulls
with great, black nasal openings.  And these half-men were talking,
smoking, laughing, satisfied to see the sky, to feel the caress of
the sun, to have come back to life, dominated by that sovereign
desire to live which trustingly forgets present misery in the
confident hope of something better.

So strongly was Julio impressed that for a little while he forgot
the purpose which had brought him thither. . . .  If those who
provoke war from diplomatic chambers or from the tables of the
Military Staff could but see it--not in the field of battle fired
with the enthusiasm which prejudices judgments--but in cold blood,
as it is seen in the hospitals and cemeteries, in the wrecks left in
its trail! . . .

To Julio's imagination this terrestrial globe appeared like an
enormous ship sailing through infinity.  Its crews--poor humanity--
had spent century after century in exterminating each other on the
deck.  They did not even know what existed under their feet, in the
hold of the vessel.  To occupy the same portion of the surface in
the sunlight seemed to be the ruling desire of each group.  Men,
considered superior human beings, were pushing these masses to
extermination in order to scale the last bridge and hold the helm,
controlling the course of the boat.  And all those who felt the
overmastering ambition for absolute command knew the same thing . . .
nothing.  Not one of them could say with certainty what lay beyond
the visible horizon, nor whither the ship was drifting.  The sullen
hostility of mystery surrounded them all; their life was precarious,
necessitating incessant care in order to maintain it, yet in spite
of that, the crew for ages and ages, had never known an instant of
agreement, of team work, of clear reason.  Periodically half of them
would clash with the other half.  They killed each other that they
might enslave the vanquished on the rolling deck floating over the
abyss; they fought that they might cast their victims from the
vessel, filling its wake with cadavers.  And from the demented
throng there were still springing up gloomy sophistries to prove
that a state of war was the perfect state, that it ought to go on
forever, that it was a bad dream on the part of the crew to wish to
regard each other as brothers with a common destiny, enveloped in
the same unsteady environment of mystery. . . .  Ah, human misery!

Julio was drawn out of these pessimistic reflections by the childish
glee which many of the convalescents were evincing.  Some were
Mussulmans, sharpshooters from Algeria and Morocco.  In Lourdes, as
they might be anywhere, they were interested only in the gifts which
the people were showering upon them with patriotic affection.  They
all surveyed with indifference the basilica inhabited by "the white
lady," their only preoccupation being to beg for cigars and sweets.

Finding themselves regaled by the dominant race, they became greatly
puffed up, daring everything like mischievous children.  What
pleased them most was the fact that the ladies would take them by
the hand.  Blessed war that permitted them to approach and touch
these white women, perfumed and smiling as they appeared in their
dreams of the paradise of the blest!  "Lady . . . Lady," they would
sigh, looking at them with dark, sparkling eyes.  And not content
with the hand, their dark paws would venture the length of the
entire arm while the ladies laughed at this tremulous adoration.
Others would go through the crowds, offering their right hand to all
the women.  "We touch hands." . . .  And then they would go away
satisfied after receiving the hand clasp.

Desnoyers wandered a long time around the basilica where, in the
shadow of the trees, were long rows of wheeled chairs occupied by
the wounded.  Officers and soldiers rested many hours in the blue
shade, watching their comrades who were able to use their legs.  The
sacred grotto was resplendent with the lights from hundreds of
candles.  Devout crowds were kneeling in the open air, fixing their
eyes in supplication on the sacred stones whilst their thoughts were
flying far away to the fields of battle, making their petitions with
that confidence in divinity which accompanies every distress.  Among
the kneeling mass were many soldiers with bandaged heads, kepis in
hand and tearful eyes.

Up and down the double staircase of the basilica were flitting
women, clad in white, with spotless headdresses that fluttered in
such a way that they appeared like flying doves.  These were the
nurses and Sisters of Charity guiding the steps of the injured.
Desnoyers thought he recognized Marguerite in every one of them, but
the prompt disillusion following each of these discoveries soon made
him doubtful about the outcome of his journey.  She was not in
Lourdes, either.  He would never find her in that France so
immeasurably expanded by the war that it had converted every town
into a hospital.

His afternoon explorations were no more successful.  The employees
listened to his interrogations with a distraught air.  He could come
back again; just now they were taken up with the announcement that
another hospital train was on the way.  The great battle was still
going on near Paris.  They had to improvise lodgings for the new
consignment of mutilated humanity.  In order to pass away the time
until his return, Desnoyers went back to the garden near the grotto.
He was planning to return to Pau that night; there was evidently
nothing more to do at Lourdes.  In what direction should he now
continue his search?

Suddenly he felt a thrill down his back--the same indefinable
sensation which used to warn him of her presence when they were
meeting in the gardens of Paris.  Marguerite was going to present
herself unexpectedly as in the old days without his knowing from
exactly what spot--as though she came up out of the earth or
descended from the clouds.

After a second's thought he smiled bitterly.  Mere tricks of his
desire!  Illusions! . . .  Upon turning his head he recognized the
falsity of his hope.  Nobody was following his footsteps; he was the
only being going down the center of the avenue.  Near him, in the
diaphanous white of a guardian angel, was a nurse.  Poor blind
man! . . .  Desnoyers was passing on when a quick movement on the
part of the white-clad woman, an evident desire to escape notice,
to hide her face by looking at the plants, attracted his attention.
He was slow in recognizing her.  Two little ringlets escaping from
the band of her cap made him guess the hidden head of hair; the
feet shod in white were the signs which enabled him to reconstruct
the person somewhat disfigured by the severe uniform.  Her face
was pale and sad.  There wasn't a trace left in it of the old
vanities that used to give it its childish, doll-like beauty.
In the depths of those great, dark-circled eyes life seemed to
be reflected in new forms. . . .  Marguerite!

They stared at one another for a long while, as though hypnotized
with surprise.  She looked alarmed when Desnoyers advanced a step
toward her.  No . . .  No!  Her eyes, her hands, her entire body
seemed to protest, to repel his approach, to hold him motionless.
Fear that he might come near her, made her go toward him.  She said
a few words to the soldier who remained on the bench, receiving
across the bandage on his face a ray of sunlight which he did not
appear to feel.  Then she rose, going to meet Julio, and continued
forward, indicating by a gesture that they must find some place
further on where the wounded man could not hear them.

She led the way to a side path from which she could see the blind
man confided to her care.  They stood motionless, face to face.
Desnoyers wished to say many things; many . . . but he hesitated,
not knowing how to frame his complaints, his pleadings, his
endearments.  Far above all these thoughts towered one, fatal,
dominant and wrathful.

"Who is that man?"

The spiteful accent, the harsh voice with which he said these words
surprised him as though they came from someone else's mouth.

The nurse looked at him with her great limpid eyes, eyes that seemed
forever freed from contractions of surprise or fear.  Her response
slipped from her with equal directness.

"It is Laurier. . . .  It is my husband."

Laurier! . . .  Julio looked doubtfully and for a long time at the
soldier before he could be convinced.  That blind officer motionless
on the bench, that figure of heroic grief, was Laurier! . . .  At
first glance, he appeared prematurely old with roughened and bronzed
skin so furrowed with lines that they converged like rays around all
the openings of his face.  His hair was beginning to whiten on the
temples and in the beard which covered his cheeks.  He had lived
twenty years in that one month. . . .  At the same time he appeared
younger, with a youthfulness that was radiating an inward vigor,
with the strength of a soul which has suffered the most violent
emotions and, firm and serene in the satisfaction of duty fulfilled,
can no longer know fear.

As Desnoyers contemplated him, he felt both admiration and jealousy.
He was ashamed to admit the aversion inspired by the wounded man, so
sorely wounded that he was unable to see what was going on around
him.  His hatred was a form of cowardice, terrifying in its
persistence.  How pensive were Marguerite's eyes if she took them
off her patient for a few seconds! . . .  She had never looked at
him in that way.  He knew all the amorous gradations of her glance,
but her fixed gaze at this injured man was something entirely
different, something that he had never seen before.

He spoke with the fury of a lover who discovers an infidelity.

"And for this thing you have run away without warning, without a
word! . . .  You have abandoned me in order to go in search of
him. . . .  Tell me, why did you come? . . .  Why did you come?". . .

"I came because it was my duty."

Then she spoke like a mother who takes advantage of a parenthesis of
surprise in an irascible child's temper, in order to counsel self-
control, and explained how it had all happened.  She had received
the news of Laurier's wounding just as she and her mother were
preparing to leave Paris.  She had not hesitated an instant; her
duty was to hasten to the aid of this man.  She had been doing a
great deal of thinking in the last few weeks; the war had made her
ponder much on the values in life.  Her eyes had been getting
glimpses of new horizons; our destiny is not mere pleasure and
selfish satisfaction; we ought to take our part in pain and
sacrifice.

She had wanted to work for her country, to share the general stress,
to serve as other women did; and since she was disposed to devote
herself to strangers, was it not natural that she should prefer to
help this man whom she had so greatly wronged? . . .  There still
lived in her memory the moment in which she had seen him approach
the station, completely alone among so many who had the consolation
of loving arms when departing in search of death.  Her pity had
become still more acute on hearing of his misfortune.  A shell had
exploded near him, killing all those around him.  Of his many
wounds, the only serious one was that on his face.  He had
completely lost the sight of one eye; and the doctors were keeping
the other bound up hoping to save it.  But she was very doubtful
about it; she was almost sure that Laurier would be blind.

Marguerite's voice trembled when saying this as if she were going to
cry, although her eyes were tearless.  They did not now feel the
irresistible necessity for tears.  Weeping had become something
superfluous, like many other luxuries of peaceful days.  Her eyes
had seen so much in so few days! . . .

"How you love him!" exclaimed Julio.

Fearing that they might be overheard and in order to keep him at a
distance, she had been speaking as though to a friend.  But her
lover's sadness broke down her reserve.

"No, I love you. . . .  I shall always love you."

The simplicity with which she said this and her sudden tenderness of
tone revived Desnoyers' hopes.

"And the other one?" he asked anxiously.

Upon receiving her reply, it seemed to him as though something had
just passed across the sun, veiling its light temporarily.  It was
as though a cloud had drifted over the land and over his thoughts,
enveloping them in an unbearable chill.

"I love him, too."

She said it with a look that seemed to implore pardon, with the sad
sincerity of one who has given up lying and weeps in foreseeing the
injury that the truth must inflict.

He felt his hard wrath suddenly dwindling like a crumbling mountain.
Ah, Marguerite!  His voice was tremulous and despairing.  Could it
be possible that everything between these two was going to end thus
simply?  Were her former vows mere lies? . . .  They had been
attracted to each other by an irresistible affinity in order to be
together forever, to be one. . . .  And now, suddenly hardened by
indifference, were they to drift apart like two unfriendly
bodies? . . .  What did this absurdity about loving him at the
same time that she loved her former husband mean, anyway?

Marguerite hung her head, murmuring desperately:

"You are a man, I am a woman.  You would never understand me, no
matter what I might say.  Men are not able to comprehend certain of
our mysteries. . . .  A woman would be better able to appreciate the
complexity."

Desnoyers felt that he must know his fate in all its cruelty.  She
might speak without fear.  He felt strong enough to bear the
blow. . . .  What had Laurier said when he found that he was being
so tenderly cared for by Marguerite? . . .

"He does not know who I am. . . .  He believes me to be a war-nurse,
like the rest, who pities him seeing him alone and blind with no
relatives to write to him or visit him. . . .  At certain times, I
have almost suspected that he guesses the truth.  My voice, the
touch of my hands made him shiver at first, as though with an
unpleasant sensation.  I have told him that I am a Beigian lady who
has lost her loved ones and is alone in the world.  He has told me
his life story very sketchily, as if he desired to forget a hated
past. . . .  Never one disagreeable word about his former wife.
There are nights when I think that he knows me, that he takes
advantage of his blindness in order to prolong his feigned
ignorance, and that distresses me.  I long for him to recover his
sight, for the doctors to save that doubtful eye--and yet at the
same time, I feel afraid.  What will he say when he recognizes
me? . . .  But no; it is better that he should see, no matter
what may result.  You cannot understand my anxiety, you cannot
know what I am suffering."

She was silent for an instant, trying to regain her self-control,
again tortured with the agony of her soul.

"Oh, the war!" she resumed.  "What changes in our life!  Two months
ago, my present situation would have appeared impossible,
unimaginable. . . .  I caring for my husband, fearing that he would
discover my identity and leave me, yet at the same time, wishing
that he would recognize me and pardon me. .  . .  It is only one
week that I have been with him.  I disguise my voice when I can, and
avoid words that may reveal the truth . . . but this cannot keep up
much longer.  It is only in novels that such painful situations turn
out happily."

Doubt suddenly overwhelmed her.

"I believe," she continued, "that he has recognized me from the
first. . . .  He is silent and feigns ignorance because he despises
me . . . because he can never bring himself to pardon me.  I have
been so bad! . . .  I have wronged him so!". . .

She was recalling the long and reflective silences of the wounded
man after she had dropped some imprudent words.  After two days of
submission to her care, he had been somewhat rebellious, avoiding
going out with her for a walk.  Because of his blind helplessness,
and comprehending the uselessness of his resistance, he had finally
yielded in passive silence.

"Let him think what he will!" concluded Marguerite courageously.
"Let him despise me!  I am here where I ought to be.  I need his
forgiveness, but if he does not pardon me, I shall stay with him
just the same. . . .  There are moments when I wish that he may
never recover his sight, so that he may always need me, so that I
may pass my life at his side, sacrificing everything for him."

"And I?" said Desnoyers.

Marguerite looked at him with clouded eyes as though she were just
awaking.  It was true--and the other one? . . .  Kindled by the
proposed sacrifice which was to be her expiation, she had forgotten
the man before her.

"You!" she said after a long pause.  "You must leave me. . . .  Life
is not what we have thought it.  Had it not been for the war, we
might, perhaps, have realized our dream, but now! . . .  Listen
carefully and try to understand.  For the remainder of my life, I
shall carry the heaviest burden, and yet at the same time it will be
sweet, since the more it weighs me down the greater will my
atonement be.  Never will I leave this man whom I have so grievously
wronged, now that he is more alone in the world and will need
protection like a child.  Why do you come to share my fate?  How
could it be possible for you to live with a nurse constantly at the
side of a blind and worthy man whom we would constantly offend with
our passion? . . .  No, it is better for us to part.  Go your way,
alone and untrammelled.  Leave me; you will meet other women who
will make you more happy than I.  Yours is the temperament that
finds new pleasures at every step."

She stood firmly to her decision.  Her voice was calm, but back of
it trembled the emotion of a last farewell to a joy which was going
from her forever.  The man would be loved by others . . . and she
was giving him up! . . .  But the noble sadness of the sacrifice
restored her courage.  Only by this renunciation could she expiate
her sins.

Julio dropped his eyes, vanquished and perplexed.  The picture of
the future outlined by Marguerite terrified him.  To live with her
as a nurse taking advantage of her patient's blindness would be to
offer him fresh insult every day. . . .  Ah, no!  That would be
villainy, indeed!  He was now ashamed to recall the malignity with
which, a little while before, he had regarded this innocent
unfortunate.  He realized that he was powerless to contend with him.
Weak and helpless as he was sitting there on the garden bench, he
was stronger and more deserving of respect than Julio Desnoyers with
all his youth and elegance.  The victim had amounted to something in
his life; he had done what Julio had not dared to do.

This sudden conviction of his inferiority made him cry out like an
abandoned child, "What will become of me?" . . .

Marguerite, too--contemplating the love which was going from her
forever, her vanished hopes, the future illumined by the
satisfaction of duty fulfilled but monotonous and painful--cried
out:

"And I. . . .  What will become of me?" . . .

As though he had suddenly found a solution which was reviving his
courage, Desnoyers said:

"Listen, Marguerite: I can read your soul.  You love this man, and
you do well.  He is superior to me, and women are always attracted
by superiority. . . .  I am a coward.  Yes, do not protest, I am a
coward with all my youth, with all my strength.  Why should you not
have been impressed by the conduct of this man! . . .  But I will
atone for past wrongs.  This country is yours, Marguerite; I will
fight for it.  Do not say no. . . ."

And moved by his hasty heroism, he outlined the plan more
definitely.  He was going to be a soldier.  Soon she would hear him
well spoken of.  His idea was either to be stretched on the
battlefield in his first encounter, or to astound the world by his
bravery.  In this way the impossible situation would settle itself--
either the oblivion of death or glory.

"No, no!" interrupted Marguerite in an anguished tone.  "You, no!
One is enough. . . .  How horrible!  You, too, wounded, mutilated
forever, perhaps dead! . . .  No, you must live.  I want you to
live, even though you might belong to another. . . .  Let me know
that you exist, let me see you sometimes, even though you may have
forgotten me, even though you may pass me with indifference, as if
you did not know me."

In this outburst her deep love for him rang true--her heroic and
inflexible love which would accept all penalties for herself, if
only the beloved one might continue to live.

But then, in order that Julio might not feel any false hopes, she
added:--"Live; you must not die; that would be for me another
torment. . . .  But live without me.  No matter how much we may talk
about it, my destiny beside the other one is marked out forever."

"Ah, how you love him! . . .  How you have deceived me!"

In a last desperate attempt at explanation she again repeated what
she had said at the beginning of their interview.  She loved
Julio . . . and she loved her husband.  They were different kinds
of love.  She could not say which was the stronger, but misfortune
was forcing her to choose between the two, and she was accepting
the most difficult, the one demanding the greatest sacrifices.

"You are a man, and you will never be able to understand me. . . .
A woman would comprehend me."

It seemed to Julio, as he looked around him, as though the afternoon
were undergoing some celestial phenomenon.  The garden was still
illuminated by the sun, but the green of the trees, the yellow of
the ground, the blue of the sky, all appeared to him as dark and
shadowy as though a rain of ashes were falling.

"Then . . . all is over between us?"

His pleading, trembling voice charged with tears made her turn her
head to hide her emotion.  Then in the painful silence the two
despairs formed one and the same question, as if interrogating the
shades of the future: "What will become of me? murmured the man.
And like an echo her lips repeated, "What will become of me?"

All had been said.  Hopeless words came between the two like an
obstacle momentarily increasing in size, impelling them in opposite
directions.  Why prolong the painful interview? . . .  Marguerite
showed the ready and energetic decision of a woman who wishes to
bring a scene to a close.  "Good-bye!"  Her face had assumed a
yellowish cast, her pupils had become dull and clouded like the
glass of a lantern when the light dies out.  "Good-bye!"  She must
go to her patient.

She went away without looking at him, and Desnoyers instinctively
went in the opposite direction.  As he became more self-controlled
and turned to look at her again, he saw her moving on and giving her
arm to the blind man, without once turning her head.

He now felt convinced that he should never see her again, and became
oppressed by an almost suffocating agony.  And could two beings, who
had formerly considered the universe concentrated in their persons,
thus easily be separated forever? . . .

His desperation at finding himself alone made him accuse himself of
stupidity.  Now his thoughts came tumbling over each other in a
tumultuous throng, and each one of them seemed to him sufficient to
have convinced Marguerite.  He certainly had not known how to
express himself.  He would have to talk with her again . . . and he
decided to remain in Lourdes.

He passed a night of torture in the hotel, listening to the ripple
of the river among its stones.  Insomnia had him in his fierce jaws,
gnawing him with interminable agony.  He turned on the light several
times, but was not able to read.  His eyes looked with stupid fixity
at the patterns of the wall paper and the pious pictures around the
room which had evidently served as the lodging place of some rich
traveller.  He remained motionless and as abstracted as an Oriental
who thinks himself into an absolute lack of thought.  One idea only
was dancing in the vacuum in his skull--"I shall never see her
again. . . .  Can such a thing be possible?"

He drowsed for a few seconds, only to be awakened with the sensation
that some horrible explosion was sending him through the air.  And
so, with sweats of anguish, he wakefully passed the hours until in
the gloom of his room the dawn showed a milky rectangle of light,
and began to be reflected on the window curtains.

The velvet-like caress of day finally closed his eyes.  Upon awaking
he found that the morning was well advanced, and he hurried to the
garden of the grotto. . . .  Oh, the hours of tremulous and
unavailing waiting, believing that he recognized Marguerite in every
white-clad lady that came along, guiding a wounded patient!

By afternoon, after a lunch whose dishes filed past him untouched,
he returned to the garden in search of her.  Beholding her in the
distance with the blind man leaning on her arm, a feeling of
faintness came over him.  She looked to him taller, thinner, her
face sharper, with two dark hollows in her cheeks and her eyes
bright with fever, the lids drawn with weariness.  He suspected that
she, too, had passed an anguished night of tenacious, self-centred
thought, of grievous stupefaction like his own, in the room of her
hotel.  Suddenly he felt all the weight of insomnia and
listlessness, all the depressing emotion of the cruel sensations
experienced in the last few hours.  Oh, how miserable they both
were! . . .

She was walking warily, looking from one side to the other, as
though foreseeing danger.  Upon discovering him she clung to her
charge, casting upon her former lover a look of entreaty, of
desperation, imploring pity. . .  Ay, that look!

He felt ashamed of himself; his personality appeared to be unrolling
itself before him, and he surveyed himself with the eyes of a judge.
What was this seduced and useless man, called Julio Desnoyers, doing
there, tormenting with his presence a poor woman, trying to turn her
from her righteous repentance, insisting on his selfish and petty
desires when all humanity was thinking of other things? . . .  His
cowardice angered him.  Like a thief taking advantage of the sleep
of his victim, he was stalking around this brave and true man who
could not see him, who could not defend himself, in order to rob him
of the only affection that he had in the world which had so
miraculously returned to him!  Very well, Gentleman Desnoyers! . . .
Ah, what a scoundrel he was!

Such subconscious insults made him draw himself erect, in haughty,
cruel and inexorable defiance against that other I who so richly
deserved the judge's scorn.

He turned his head away; he could not meet Marguerite's piteous
eyes; he feared their mute reproach.  Neither did he dare to look at
the blind man in his