Philippe's legs seemed on the point of giving way beneath him, so much so that Le Corbier asked him to sit down. He obeyed and, mastering himself, said: "Yes, I have. I have a revelation to make in this respect which is very painful to me. My father evidently attached no importance to it; but it seems to me ..." "What do you mean?" cried Morestal. "Oh, father, I beseech you!" entreated Philippe, folding his hands together. "We are not here to quarrel, nor to judge each other, but to do our duty. Mine is horrible. Do not discourage me. You shall condemn me afterwards, if you see cause." "I condemn you as it is, Philippe." Le Corbier made an imperious gesture and repeated, in a yet more peremptory tone: "Speak, M. Philippe Morestal." Philippe said, bringing the words out very quickly: "Monsieur le ministre, Private Baufeld had relations on this side of the frontier. His desertion was prepared, backed up. He knew the safe road which he was to take." "Through whom did he know it?" Philippe lowered his head and, with half-closed eyes, whispered: "Through my father!" "That's not true!" shouted old Morestal, purple with rage. "That's not true! I prepare ... I!..." "Here is the paper which I found in Private Baufeld's pocket," said Philippe, handing a sheet of note-paper to Le Corbier. "It gives a sort of plan of escape, the road which the fugitive is to follow, the exact spot at which he is to cross the frontier so as to avoid the watchers." "What are you saying? What are you daring to say? A correspondence between me and that wretch!" "The two words, 'Albern Path,' are in your hand-writing, father, and it was through the Albern Path that the deserter entered France. The sheet is a sheet of your own note-paper." Morestal gave a bound: "And you took it from the waste-paper basket, where it lay torn and crumpled! You did a thing like that, you, my son! You had the infamy ..." "Oh, father!" "Then what? Answer!" "Private Baufeld gave it me before his death." Morestal was standing opposite Philippe, with his arms crossed over his chest, and, so far from defending himself against his son's accusations, seemed rather to be addressing a culprit. And Philippe looked at him with eyes of anguish. At each blow that he struck, at each sentence that he uttered, he detected the mark of a wound on his father's face. A vein swelling on the old man's temples distressed him beyond measure. He was terrified to see streaks of blood mingle with the whites of his eyes. And he feared, at every moment, that his father would fall like a tree which the axe has struck to the heart. The under-secretary, after examining the sheet of paper which Philippe had given him, resumed: "In any case, M. Morestal, these lines were written by you?" "Yes, monsieur le ministre. I have already stated what the man Dourlowski tried to get out of me and the answer which I gave him." "Was it the first time that the fellow made the attempt?..."