On the eve of severing their friendship René recalled to mind how it had originated. Claude, then very poor, was a tutor in the Ecole Saint-André when René himself was a scholar in the sixth form. A curious legend concerning the eccentric professor was told in this well-conducted and eminently religious institution. Some of the boys declared they had seen him seated in an open carriage next to a very pretty woman dressed in pink. Then one day Claude disappeared from the school, and René did not see him again until he turned up at Fresneau's wedding as best man, and already on the road to fame. After some talk over old times, Claude had asked to see his poems. The writer of thirty had shown as much indulgence as an elder brother in reading these first essays, and had immediately treated the aspiring lad as an equal. With what tact had he submitted these rough sketches to the processes of a higher criticism--a criticism which encourages an artist by pointing out his defects without crushing him beneath their weight. And then had followed the episode of the 'Sigisbée,' in which Claude had displayed unusual devotion for one who was himself a dramatic author. The poet was sufficiently well acquainted with literary life to know that even simple kindness is rarely met with between one generation and the next. His rapid success had already procured him what is perhaps the bitterest experience of the years of apprenticeship--the jealousy of those very masters he admired most, in whose school he had formed his style, and at whose feet he would so gladly have laid his sprig of laurel. Claude Larcher's delight in another's talent was as spontaneous and as sincere as if he had not already wielded the pen for fifteen years. And now this valuable, nay, unique friendship was to be severed. But was it his fault, René asked himself, as he tossed about in his bed, and recalled all these things one after another? Why had Larcher spoken to this wretched girl as he had done? Why had he betrayed his young friend, who looked up to him as a brother? Why?