was lying beside me, but I was sure he was not asleep. The open door of the dug-out showed a blue patch of sky with a silvery star hanging like a tear in its depths. An hour, perhaps, passed thus. Vignerte had not moved. He ought to have been asleep, this mysterious comrade whom the war had sent me. Why was he so moved tonight? What memories had possessed a mind which appeared to be fixed ruthlessly on the thousand details of war as if to avoid straying aimlessly through forbidden worlds?... And suddenly I heard a deep sigh while a hand clasped mine. "Vignerte, what on earth's the trouble?" An even more convulsive clasp of his hand was all my reply. Then I burnt my boats. "Old man, dear old man. I think I've earned the right to call you that. Let me share the trouble that's weighing on you. You are unhappy tonight. Tell me your sorrow. If we were in Paris, or anywhere else, I should not be guilty of this indiscretion. But a confidence which would be absurd elsewhere becomes sacred here. Tomorrow, perhaps, we shall be in action, Vignerte! Tomorrow, perhaps, four men will be digging our graves where that German sleeps now. Won't you speak to me, Vignerte, won't you tell me? ..." I felt the pressure of his hand relax. "It will be a long story, old fellow. And will you understand? I mean, won't you think me a bit mad?" "I'm listening," I said firmly. "You shall hear then. For these memories almost choke me, and indeed there are some which it would be selfish for me to take away alone. So much the worse for you. You will get no sleep tonight! ..." This is the strange story which Lieutenant Vignerte told me that night of October 30th, 1914, at the spot which those who have known it call the "Crossroads of Death." THE SECRET SPRING I YOU are a University man, he began. You must forgive me if the opening of my story is not free from a suggestion of bitterness against the University of which I was never a member. No doubt my feelings are without justification, since to the fact that I was never admitted I owe memories which, after all, I would not exchange for a chair at the Sorbonne.
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