ected break in the uniform hardness of Bennett's character. Ferriss
knew him well by now. Bennett was not a man to ask concessions, to catch
at small favours. What he wanted he took with an iron hand, without ruth
and without scruple. But in the unspeakable dissolution in which they
were now involved did anything make a difference? The dreadful mill in
which they had been ground had crushed from them all petty distinctions
of personality, individuality. Humanity--the elements of character
common to all men--only remained.

But Ferriss was puzzled as to how he should answer Bennett. On the one
hand was the woman he loved, and on the other Bennett, his best friend,
his chief, his hero. They, too, had lived together for so long, had
fought out the fight with the Enemy shoulder to shoulder, had battled
with the same dangers, had dared the same sufferings, had undergone the
same defeats and disappointments.

Ferriss felt himself in grievous straits. Must he tell Bennett the
truth? Must this final disillusion be added to that long train of
others, the disasters, the failures, the disappointments, and deferred
hopes of all those past months? Must Bennett die hugging to his heart
this bitterness as well?

"I sometimes thought," observed Bennett with a weak smile, "that she did
care a little. I've surely seen something like that in her eyes at
certain moments. I wish I had spoken. Did she ever say anything to you?
Do you think she would have married me if I had asked her?" He paused,
waiting for an answer.

"Oh--yes," hazarded Ferriss, driven to make some sort of response,
hoping to end the conversation; "yes, I think she would."

"You do?" said Bennett quickly. "You think she would? What did she say?
Did she ever say anything to you?"

The thing was too cruel; Ferriss shrank from it. But suddenly an idea
occurred to him. Did anything make any difference now? Why not tell his
friend that which he wanted to hear, even if it were not the truth?
After all that Bennett had suffered why could he not die content at
least in this? What did it matter if he spoke? Did anything matter at
such a time when they were all to die within the next twenty-four hours?
Bennett was looking straight into his eyes; there was no time to think
of consequences. Consequences? But there were to be _no_ consequences.
This was the end. Yet could Ferriss make Bennett receive such an
untruth? Ferriss did not believe that Lloyd cared for Bennett; knew tha