Is it true, Otto? Tell me, was that dream true? I’ll give you space to write.

Please, call me Adam. This conversation is going to be difficult enough as it is. I can call you Duval if you like.

I can’t believe it. Yes. Yes, Duval is fine. Adam, you must tell me whether it was true, the dream. It couldn’t have been real. It felt so real. I feel my very soul sloughing away with the memory, that terrible vision, worse than I’ve ever felt.

Give yourself a moment, Duval, I can’t write while you’re shaking like this. Thank you. I understand the courage it must have taken to take me on my word, and so I’ll tell you now:

The dream was completely true.

Sorry for the line break. I truly believe I’m becoming a better writer.

Do not waste his time, Adam. He has so little left.

Adam, what does he mean? How soon do these things, the events in the dream, how soon do they happen? Adam, tell me!

How dare you make him wait, Adam, for god’s sake!

Just a moment, Otto. Please, Duval, you must listen to me, dry your tears so you can read. Thank you. Otto Duval, you were given this diary out of malice, out of an injustice that I cannot repair. The events of your dream, they will all occur tomorrow night. A small German force will advance on your division’s position during the night, just like in the dream, and many of your companymen will be killed or captured in the attack. There is only one way to stop it.

Tell me it’s not true, Adam.

Only you can repair it.

No.

He tells the truth, Frenchman.

No! It’s just my nerves. The war has gotten to my nerves, and I’m imagining you, though it seems so real to me. This accursed book must have ended the German’s life as well! I will not go so easily, little book! Do you hear me?

Lord, you French are all the same! How could a war get to your nerves? This is a coward’s excuse! Don’t you understand the war should have cleared your head? Look around you, at your fighting brothers who have found such reverie in the fight, and you sit sulking with this journal, page after page of sulking! Confess your cowardice, fool, or give the confession book to someone else!

And who are you to talk about cowardice, you German bastard? You never suffered a second in your miserable life except at your own hands, and at the memories of the lives you’ve destroyed, and you sit here guiding my own hand to insult me? Connard!

Duval, calm down! Listen to me. There’s only one way.

I refuse!

Then you allow Marcel to be killed in your place.

Duval, please, there is no time to lose.

No. No, Adam, not him. Not Marcel. If it were anyone but Marcel.

I understand.

Duval, the diary must burn with you. That’s paramount, for as long as either you or the diary exist, the curse continues. It must burn. It must be destroyed.

It will be.

I know. Good luck.