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The pretext was never disclosed. I had therefore to invent it;
and I think that, given the character of the two officers which I had to
invent, too, I have made it sufficiently convincing by the mere force of
its absurdity. The truth is that in my mind the story is nothing but a
serious and even earnest attempt at a bit of historical fiction. I had
heard in my boyhood a good deal of the great Napoleonic legend. I had a
genuine feeling that I would find myself at home in it, and The Duel
is the result of that feeling, or, if the reader prefers, of that
presumption. Personally I have no qualms of conscience about this piece
of work. The story might have been better told of course. All one's work
might have been better done; but this is the sort of reflection a
worker must put aside courageously if he doesn't mean every one of his
conceptions to remain for ever a private vision, an evanescent reverie.
How many of those visions have I seen vanish in my time! This one,
however, has remained, a testimony, if you like, to my courage or a
proof of my rashness.


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