The artist was very eager to accompany him. Would it not be possible for
him to go, too, as secretary to the senator? . . . Don Marcelo smiled
benevolently. The authorization was only for Lacour and one companion.
He was the one who was going to pose as secretary, valet or utility man
to his future relative-in-law.

At the end of the afternoon, he left the studio, accompanied to the
elevator by the lamentations of Argensola. To think that he could not
join that expedition! . . . He believed that he had lost the opportunity
to paint his masterpiece.

Just outside of his home, he met Tchernoff. Don Marcelo was in high good
humor. The certainty that he was soon going to see his son filled him
with boyish good spirits. He almost embraced the Russian in spite of his
slovenly aspect, his tragic beard and his enormous hat which made every
one turn to look after him.

At the end of the avenue, the Arc de Triomphe stood forth against a sky
crimsoned by the sunset. A red cloud was floating around the monument,
reflected on its whiteness with purpling palpitations.

Desnoyers recalled the four horsemen, and all that Argensola had told
him before presenting him to the Russian.

"Blood!" shouted jubilantly. "All the sky seems to be blood-red. . . .
It is the apocalyptic beast who has received his death-wound. Soon we
shall see him die."

Tchernoff smiled, too, but his was a melancholy smile.

"No; the beast does not die. It is the eternal companion of man. It
hides, spouting blood, forty . . . sixty . . . a hundred years, but
eventually it reappears. All that we can hope is that its wound may be
long and deep, that it may remain hidden so long that the generation
that now remembers it may never see it again."

CHAPTER III

WAR

Don Marcelo was climbing up a mountain covered with woods.

The forest presented a tragic desolation. A silent tempest had installed
itself therein, placing everything in violent unnatural positions. Not a
single tree still preserved its upright form and abundant foliage as in
the days of peace. The groups of pines recalled the columns of ruined
temples. Some were still standing erect, but without their crowns, like
shafts that might have lost their capitals; others were pierced like the
mouthpiece of a flute, or like pillars struck by a thunderbolt. Some had
splintery threads hanging around their cuts like used toothpicks.

A sinister force of destruction had been raging among these beech