On the pale water of the little pool, motionless and fixed like a
silver nail, a star had just been born.

"Shikh-Salah," I murmured, my heart full of an indefinable sadness.
"Patience, we are not there yet."

In truth, we never were to be there.




V

THE INSCRIPTION


With a blow of the tip of his cane Morhange knocked a fragment of rock
from the black flank of the mountain.

"What is it?" he asked, holding it out to me.

"A basaltic peridot," I said.

"It can't be very interesting, you barely glanced at it."

"It is very interesting, on the contrary. But, for the moment, I admit
that I am otherwise preoccupied."

"How?"