THE CULMINATION
"Up you get, sir!"
"What, what!"
Guillaumin was in front of me, smiling and swinging a lantern.
Half-joking, he repeated: "I think we're in for it, sir!"
I got up. Shadows were moving round us. The sharp air stung. The night
was clear but moonless. I asked what time it was. Three o'clock.
I immediately had a pleasant surprise. That form on the road--"Humel!"
I dashed at him. "Hulloa, my boy! So you got through!"
"By jove! It was a bit of luck," he acknowledged.
I hungrily clamoured for details.
He explained: "You see, as long as we stayed in the trench, things went
all right. We managed to hold the Bosches. They weren't particularly
keen to face the bayonet. But at night we had no more ammunition. The
men got unstrung and wanted to do a bunk. Delafosse opposed it--as you
may imagine. Some of them began to slope off. The lieutenant made up
his mind to it, and we followed them. But the Bosches got wind of it
and opened fire at us. That's when we got cut up--not one out of four
got away."
"The lieutenant?"
"Knocked out, disappeared."
Another name was on the tip of my tongue.
Humel understood, and lowered his voice! "Descroix? He stayed behind,
too."
I, in my turn, told him of Henriot's death, and about Playoust. I saw
his forehead wrinkle. He said nothing. I took his arm.
"Well, we're here!"
"Not for long," he murmured, downheartedly.
"Yes! Yes! I swear that you, you, you understand, will get through!"
What did I know of it? But I had said it with such assurance that I
felt it had given him new heart.
There was a short whistle--the captain calling up the N.C. O's.
"Well, my friends," he said, "we have been complimented on our
resistance the other night, and up till four o'clock yesterday in front
of the Montrolle woods. Apparently we did not do badly!" He waited for
a minute. "That is not all. We are asked, or I should say commanded, to
intervene again. A great honour for the regiment!"
We were all hanging on his lips.
"Mind you remember this date," he said, "in case we come back. This
is the night, the 9th to the 10th, that the battle is to be won. We
are attacking all along the line, and I think I may be allowed to
tell you, in confidence, that some of our comrades alongside have
just entered Silly-le-Long. At the other extremity the Zouaves have
taken Lizy-sur-Ourcq. The enemy is apparently still in possession of a
little hill near here. What we've got to do is to oust them from it."
His voice trembled. He must have been trying to find a last word of
encouragement. Not succeeding, he added: "We start in five minutes!"
A remark not lacking in eloquence.
I joined De Valpic in the darkness. His cough had made me aware of his
presence.
Guillaumin, who ran against us, said, in a joking tone: "Well, if we
aren't polished off this time!" And then, a little more gravely: "If
only it's of some use."
"Do you doubt it?"
"I? What do you think? I wouldn't change places. Those who have missed
this----"
He rummaged in his pocket, pulled out a sou, and threw it into the air!
"Heads we win!"
"And if it's the reverse?"
"A reverse for the Bosches!"
He hunted about in the dark.
"Can't you find it?"
"It never fell. It went straight up into the sky! The best sign of all."
We did not touch upon any more serious topics. We assembled, and
started off. De Valpic left us to join his platoon.
"Good-bye."
We shook hands. We were never to see him again.
The most complete human friendship had drawn us together during the
last fortnight.
* * * * *
We marched along a road in silence for half an hour. Then we extended
into the fields, like mute armed phantoms, the noise of our footsteps
absorbed by the ground.
For the first time I had taken my place at the head of my platoon. My
eyes searched the darkness. I regulated our pace by the captain's,
whose tall silhouette stood out against the blackness. I formed only
one wish which was this: that our intervention might have a decisive
quality. A wish which resembled a prayer. I implored, I don't know what
God, to grant me the good fortune to be a hero.
The ground was rising in a gentle slope. We were guided towards the
east by a pale transparency, herald of the day. In that direction lay
the enemy; the enemy whose sentries no doubt had orders to fire upon
all suspicious objects. The first bullets would be for me. I did not
think of them or fear them. The fifty men behind me, who would act as I
acted, were a miraculous incentive.
There was a hollow exclamation close by on our left. A sentry! A shot
rang out, followed by a second. I quickened the pace, my men remaining
close at my heels.
In front of us, at a distance which was difficult to estimate, we
could make out a noise and what seemed like confusion. On the left an
already heavy fusillade was crackling. The absurd idea crossed my mind
of giving orders for a volley. But the captain contented himself with
raising his sword. Advance!
Our speed increased. Charging pace, fix bayonets! Some of the men were
inclined to pass me. I restrained them below my breath.
There was a sudden volley of bullets, meant for us, but distinctly
too high. We advanced bent double. There was a new _rafale_. This
I felt was bearing to the right, where De Valpic's platoon was. A
mysterious shock warned me that at that second my friend--my friend
had succumbed.... Mown down, this fine life. But this destiny held no
terror for him. And what other awaited us!
The balls continued to mew fiercely in our ears like terrible cats.
It felt like the blows of wooden hammers which would pound and crush
everything to dust--("would bash our heads in"; the popular expression
just fitted it).
I was thinking of that when I became aware of a sort of fluctuation
behind me. Somebody shouted: "Kneel!"
It was amazing. My line had instantly given way, and thrown themselves
down. There was an immediate clash of steel, followed by feverish
firing. A bullet whistled past my nose. I threw myself on to the ground
and turned round and cursed Henry, the clumsy lout, who was firing and
firing.
What was to be done. The captain yonder was bellowing in an infuriated
voice: "Advance! Advance!"
I got up, waving my rifle, and shouted: "Come along, No. 3 platoon.
Show them what you're made of!"
A few of them got up and followed me. The majority hesitated. There was
no time to wait. We took about twenty steps at the double. I had to
stop. There were only six _poilus_ with me!
I shouted again. I yelled. The bullets were still cracking. They passed
us coming from both sides. I recoiled. The confusion was terrible. I
bumped into Humel. Guillaumin turned up bringing us a handful of men. I
remember that I asked him coldly: "How far off are they?"
"A hundred yards."
"Good. We've got 'em!"
Then I don't quite know what happened after that. It hardly lasted a
minute. It seemed like a hundred years! I believe I rushed back in
search of my men, shouting:
"This way! Come along! Follow me!"
I flew. I furrowed the ground, sowing the sacred fire in my tracks.
"Look, they can't touch us!"
They were no longer firing on our left. Hand-to-hand fighting must be
going on--a cacophony. Noises which had nothing human left about them.
No doubt the enemy was giving ground. I stumbled near a long ditch, a
first-line trench, which they had already abandoned.
I felt sure that I was going to be killed, but oddly enough I cared
very little. To-day or to-morrow, what did it matter! A thousand
thoughts thronged each other in my mind. The dominant one, simple and
sublime, was that Victory was leaning towards us. We should carry this
hill, for I could see our men wriggling along the ground to rejoin us,
and grouping themselves again.
The light and serenity, the frenzy of it! I swear that at that instant
France was really something other than an abstract entity for me: the
whole in which I participated, which was me and more than me. Of my own
free will I was sacrificing my paltry individuality. I was melting a
wan unit into the collective consciousness of the beings of my country.
Surprise may be caused by the fact that I found time to revolve all
these thoughts in my mind during these brief moments, among this
chaos, where I might be seen dashing about madly, expending myself in
exhortations and reproaches.
Well, I did find time for them, and for a thousand others! I myself,
lucid and multiplied, marvelled at it.
My resources were increased tenfold. I burst into blossom. I attained
the apogee of my power. The instant in which I raised myself to the
conception of the immense national soul was also that in which my own
spirit was expanded most largely. Nothing escaped me. I was twenty
beings. I had a tender thought for the memory of my mother; one for my
brother who had fallen; for those of my people who remained. And you,
Jeannine, my betrothed, I evoked your face and let my lips caress it
lightly. I descried all that life we should have lived together, and
tasted all its happiness to the full. I adored you, oh my well beloved!
I was certain, that at that instant you knew that I was being killed
for your sake, that you were proud of it, and sobbed for it.
My men were collected there, lying with their eyes fixed on me, already
half raised, ready to dart forward.
As I looked at them and counted them over, a fantastic idea struck me.
Fifty living men. In a minute, half of them would be dead, at a sign
from me.
Gloomily determined, I enjoyed my fatal power. Did I spare myself?
No. I remained on my feet, and the bullets made a nimbus round me.
Preserved by a constant miracle, I moved among these fiery trajectories
like a salamander.
And then, ruminating on a vague hope of living, I dreamt that a fate
protected me; that death was overawed by my temerity.
The hour struck in the depths of my consciousness.
I included all my men, body and soul, in a comprehensive gesture to
advance.
Their undulating line moved as one man. Bouillon was just behind me. In
getting up he seemed to stumble, and fell like a stone, with a bullet
in his forehead.
Then I began to run quickly, straight ahead. There was no longer any
need to turn round. Behind me I could hear that breathing, and the
heavy trot regulated by mine. We formed an inseparable block, they and
I. If any fell, their places were filled up. Twenty yards away I saw
phantoms scattering.
"They're bolting!"
My own voice seemed to swell in the deep-throated roars which it tore
from my companions. Living, rolling thunder! The enemy overcome and
swept away! Full of a prodigious reserve of breath, life, and pride I
was going to--
A-a-h!