ful under the moon! I let myself be carried farther and
farther...."

"I have no reproaches to make, dear fellow, you are free, and the
chief here. Only allow me to recall to you certain warnings concerning
the Chaamba brigands, and the misfortunes that might arise from a
Commandant of a post absenting himself too long."

He smiled.

"I don't dislike such evidence of a good memory," he said simply.

He was in excellent, too excellent spirits.

"Don't blame me. I set out for a short ride as usual. Then, the moon
rose. And then, I recognized the country. It is just where, twenty
years ago next November, Flatters followed the way to his destiny in
an exaltation which the certainty of not returning made keener and
more intense."

"Strange state of mind for a chief of an expedition," I murmured.

"Say nothing against Flatters. No man ever loved the desert as he
did ... even to dying of it."

"Palat and Douls, among many others, have loved it as much," I
answered. "But they were alone when they exposed themselves to it.
Responsible only for their own lives, they were free. Flatters, on the
other hand, was responsible for sixty lives. And you cannot deny that
he allowed his whole party to be massacred."

The words were hardly out of my lips before I regretted them, I
thought of Chatelain's story, of the officers' club at Sfax, where
they avoided like the plague any kind of conversation which might lead
their thoughts toward a certain Morhange-Saint-Avit mission.

Happily I observed that my companion was not listening. His brilliant
eyes were far away.

"What was your first garrison?" he asked suddenly.

"Auxonne."

He gave an unnatural laugh.

"Auxonne. Province of the Cote d'Or. District of Dijon. Six thousand
inhabitants. P.L.M. Railway. Drill school and review. The Colonel's
wife receives Thursdays, and the Major's on Saturdays. Leaves every
Sunday,--the first of the month to Paris, the three others to Dijon.
That explains your Judgment of Flatters.

"For my part, my dear fellow, my first garrison was at Boghar. I
arrived there one morning in October, a second lieutenant, aged
twenty, of the First African Batallion, the white chevron on my black
sleeve.... Sun stripe, as the _bagnards_ say in speaking of their
grades. Boghar! Two days before, from the bridge of the steamer, I had
begun to see the shores of Africa. I pity all those who, when they see
those pale cliffs for the first time, do not feel a gre