"We can do what the cave-man did when the cave-bear invaded his rude home!" thundered the patriot. "We can fight with every weapon we have, yes, if we have to throw ourselves at the enemy's throat with naked hands. Such of our troops as we could mobilize at a moment's notice are ready, but every man who has served his time in training will be needed. I go to-night!" "For the front, sir?" asked Deschamps. "For the cave-bear's throat!" The room buzzed with an excited whispering. "Who will take the school, sir?" the head boy asked. The old reservist looked down at the school, a somber fire glowing in his eyes. His gaze caught those of his pupils, one after the other. Some were bewildered, some eager, but all were alight with the response of enthusiasm. He put both hands on his desk and leaned far forward, impressively. "I wonder if I can trust you?" he said. An expression of wounded pride flashed over the faces of several of the older boys. "Not one of you can realize," the master continued, speaking in a low tense tone which none of the lads had ever heard him use before, "just what war means. It spells horrors such as cannot be imagined. It turns men into beasts, or--" he paused, "into heroes. There is no middle ground. There is patriotism and there is treachery. Either, one deserves trust, which is honor; or one does not deserve trust, which is infamy." He looked at the boys again. "I wonder if I can trust you?" he repeated. "Trust us, sir!" shouted a dozen voices. "Do you dare ask it," he replied, "knowing that any one who fails or breaks his trust will be a traitor?" There was a moment's pause, as the master's solemnity sank deep into the boys' consciousness. Dimly they realized that the issue was something far greater and graver than anything they had known before. Horace broke the silence. "Have we deserved that you should distrust us, sir?" he asked. The old patriot flashed a quick look at him. "You are boys, still," he said, "that is all. It is your youth, not your disloyalty that I fear." He studied the faces one by one. Each boy returned his gaze frankly and unflinchingly. "I will trust you," the master said. He leaned down to his desk and, with all the lads watching him, wrote in heavy letters on a sheet of paper that lay on his desk. "There lack but ten days to the end of the term," the master said, when he had finished writing. "I am to trust you for that length of time. You give me your word of honor?" A chorus of assent greeted him. Not a voice was missing. "Hear me, then," the old patriot declared, straightening up from his desk. "As boys of Belgium, born and reared on Belgian soil; as boys of Belgium, sons of a land that has never known dishonor; as boys of Belgium, who have worked with me in this little village school of Beaufays together, I trust you. If any one of you fails in that trust, let the rest see to it!" "We will, sir," they answered.