en--and tossed it off. That night he might have been seen
feeling about the grass in a moon-lit garden. At last he put something
in his pocket with a quick, harsh chuckle of satisfaction. It was a
little black bottle with a well-worn cork.

A FRAGMENT OF LIVES

They met at last, Dubarre, and Villiard, the man who had stolen from him
the woman he loved. Both had wronged the woman, but Villiard most, for
he had let her die because of jealousy.

They were now in a room alone in the forest of St. Sebastian. Both were
quiet, and both knew that the end of their feud was near.

Going to a cupboard Dubarre brought out four glasses and put them on the
table. Then from two bottles he poured out what looked like red wine,
two glasses from each bottle. Putting the bottles back he returned to
the table.

"Do you dare to drink with me?" Dubarre asked, nodding towards the
glasses. "Two of the glasses have poison in them, two have good red wine
only. We will move them about and then drink. Both may die, or only one
of us."

Villiard looked at the other with contracting, questioning eyes.

"You would play that game with me?" he asked, in a mechanical voice.

"It would give me great pleasure." The voice had a strange, ironical
tone. "It is a grand sport--as one would take a run at a crevasse and
clear it, or fall. If we both fall, we are in good company; if you fall,
I have the greater joy of escape; if I fall, you have the same joy."

"I am ready," was the answer. "But let us eat first."

A great fire burned in the chimney, for the night was cool. It filled
the room with a gracious heat and with huge, comfortable shadows. Here
and there on the wall a tin cup flashed back the radiance of the fire,
the barrel of a gun glistened soberly along a rafter, and the long, wiry
hair of an otter-skin in the corner sent out little needles of light.
Upon the fire a pot was simmering, and a good savour came from it. A
wind went lilting by outside the but in tune with the singing of the
kettle. The ticking of a huge, old-fashioned repeating-watch on the wall
was in unison with these.

Dubarre rose from the table, threw himself upon the little pile of
otter-skins, and lay watching Villiard and mechanically studying the
little room.

Villiard took the four glasses filled with the wine and laid them on a
shelf against the wall, then began to put the table in order for their
supper, and to take the pot from the fire.

Dubarre noticed