Weiss, in the obscurity of his little room at Bazeilles, was aroused by
a commotion that caused him to leap from his bed. It was the roar of
artillery. Groping about in the darkness he found and lit a candle to
enable him to consult his watch: it was four o’clock, just beginning to
be light. He adjusted his double eyeglass upon his nose and looked out
into the main street of the village, the road that leads to Douzy, but
it was filled with a thick cloud of something that resembled dust,
which made it impossible to distinguish anything. He passed into the
other room, the windows of which commanded a view of the Meuse and the
intervening meadows, and saw that the cause of his obstructed vision
was the morning mist arising from the river. In the distance, behind
the veil of fog, the guns were barking more fiercely across the stream.
All at once a French battery, close at hand, opened in reply, with such
a tremendous crash that the walls of the little house were shaken.
Weiss’s house was situated near the middle of the village, on the right
of the road and not far from the Place de l’Église. Its front, standing
back a little from the street, displayed a single story with three
windows, surmounted by an attic; in the rear was a garden of some
extent that sloped gently downward toward the meadows and commanded a
wide panoramic view of the encircling hills, from Remilly to Frenois.
Weiss, with the sense of responsibility of his new proprietorship
strong upon him, had spent the night in burying his provisions in the
cellar and protecting his furniture, as far as possible, against shot
and shell by applying mattresses to the windows, so that it was nearly
two o’clock before he got to bed. His blood boiled at the idea that the
Prussians might come and plunder the house, for which he had toiled so
long and which had as yet afforded him so little enjoyment.
He heard a voice summoning him from the street.
“I say, Weiss, are you awake?”
He descended and found it was Delaherche, who had passed the night at
his dyehouse, a large brick structure, next door to the accountant’s
abode. The operatives had all fled, taking to the woods and making for
the Belgian frontier, and there was no one left to guard the property
but the woman concierge, Françoise Quittard by name, the widow of a
mason; and she also, beside herself with terror, would have gone with
the others had it not been for her ten-year-old boy Charles, who was so
ill with typhoid fever that he could not be moved.
“I say,” Delaherche continued, “do you hear that? It is a promising
beginning. Our best course is to get back to Sedan as soon as
possible.”
Weiss’s promise to his wife, that he would leave Bazeilles at the first
sign of danger, had been given in perfect good faith, and he had fully
intended to keep it; but as yet there was only an artillery duel at
long range, and the aim could not be accurate enough to do much damage
in the uncertain, misty light of early morning.
“Wait a bit, confound it!” he replied. “There is no hurry.”
Delaherche, too, was curious to see what would happen; his curiosity
made him valiant. He had been so interested in the preparations for
defending the place that he had not slept a wink. General Lebrun,
commanding the 12th corps, had received notice that he would be
attacked at daybreak, and had kept his men occupied during the night in
strengthening the defenses of Bazeilles, which he had instructions to
hold in spite of everything. Barricades had been thrown up across the
Douzy road, and all the smaller streets; small parties of soldiers had
been thrown into the houses by way of garrison; every narrow lane,
every garden had become a fortress, and since three o’clock the troops,
awakened from their slumbers without beat of drum or call of bugle in
the inky blackness, had been at their posts, their chassepots freshly
greased and cartridge boxes filled with the obligatory ninety rounds of
ammunition. It followed that when the enemy opened their fire no one
was taken unprepared, and the French batteries, posted to the rear
between Balan and Bazeilles, immediately commenced to answer, rather
with the idea of showing they were awake than for any other purpose,
for in the dense fog that enveloped everything the practice was of the
wildest.
“The dyehouse will be well defended,” said Delaherche. “I have a whole
section in it. Come and see.”
It was true; forty and odd men of the infanterie de marine had been
posted there under the command of a lieutenant, a tall, light-haired
young fellow, scarcely more than a boy, but with an expression of
energy and determination on his face. His men had already taken full
possession of the building, some of them being engaged in loopholing
the shutters of the ground-floor windows that commanded the street,
while others, in the courtyard that overlooked the meadows in the rear,
were breaching the wall for musketry. It was in this courtyard that
Delaherche and Weiss found the young officer, straining his eyes to
discover what was hidden behind the impenetrable mist.
“Confound this fog!” he murmured. “We can’t fight when we don’t know
where the enemy is.” Presently he asked, with no apparent change of
voice or manner: “What day of the week is this?”
“Thursday,” Weiss replied.
“Thursday, that’s so. Hanged if I don’t think the world might come to
an end and we not know it!”
But just at that moment the uninterrupted roar of the artillery was
diversified by a brisk rattle of musketry proceeding from the edge of
the meadows, at a distance of two or three hundred yards. And at the
same time there was a transformation, as rapid and startling, almost,
as the stage effect in a fairy spectacle: the sun rose, the exhalations
of the Meuse were whirled away like bits of finest, filmiest gauze, and
the blue sky was revealed, in serene limpidity, undimmed by a single
cloud. It was the exquisite morning of a faultless summer day.
“Ah!” exclaimed Delaherche, “they are crossing the railway bridge. See,
they are making their way along the track. How stupid of us not to have
blown up the bridge!”
The officer’s face bore an expression of dumb rage. The mines had been
prepared and charged, he averred, but they had fought four hours the
day before to regain possession of the bridge and then had forgot to
touch them off.
“It is just our luck,” he curtly said.
Weiss was silent, watching the course of events and endeavoring to form
some idea of the true state of affairs. The position of the French in
Bazeilles was a very strong one. The village commanded the meadows, and
was bisected by the Douzy road, which, turning sharp to the left,
passed under the walls of the Château, while another road, the one that
led to the railway bridge, bent around to the right and forked at the
Place de l’Église. There was no cover for any force advancing by these
two approaches; the Germans would be obliged to traverse the meadows
and the wide, bare level that lay between the outskirts of the village
and the Meuse and the railway. Their prudence in avoiding unnecessary
risks was notorious, hence it seemed improbable that the real attack
would come from that quarter. They kept coming across the bridge,
however, in deep masses, and that notwithstanding the slaughter that a
battery of mitrailleuses, posted at the edge of the village, effected
in their ranks, and all at once those who had crossed rushed forward in
open order, under cover of the straggling willows, the columns were
re-formed and began to advance. It was from there that the musketry
fire, which was growing hotter, had proceeded.
“Oh, those are Bavarians,” Weiss remarked. “I recognize them by the
braid on their helmets.”
But there were other columns, moving to the right and partially
concealed by the railway embankment, whose object, it seemed to him,
was to gain the cover of some trees in the distance, whence they might
descend and take Bazeilles in flank and rear. Should they succeed in
effecting a lodgment in the park of Montivilliers, the village might
become untenable. This was no more than a vague, half-formed idea, that
flitted through his mind for a moment and faded as rapidly as it had
come; the attack in front was becoming more determined, and his every
faculty was concentrated on the struggle that was assuming, with every
moment, larger dimensions.
Suddenly he turned his head and looked away to the north, over the city
of Sedan, where the heights of Floing were visible in the distance. A
battery had just commenced firing from that quarter; the smoke rose in
the bright sunshine in little curls and wreaths, and the reports came
to his ears very distinctly. It was in the neighborhood of five
o’clock.
“Well, well,” he murmured, “they are all going to have a hand in the
business, it seems.”
The lieutenant of marines, who had turned his eyes in the same
direction, spoke up confidently:
“Oh! Bazeilles is the key of the position. This is the spot where the
battle will be won or lost.”
“Do you think so?” Weiss exclaimed.
“There is not the slightest doubt of it. It is certainly the marshal’s
opinion, for he was here last night and told us that we must hold the
village if it cost the life of every man of us.”
Weiss slowly shook his head, and swept the horizon with a glance; then
in a low, faltering voice, as if speaking to himself, he said:
“No—no! I am sure that is a mistake. I fear the danger lies in another
quarter—where, or what it is, I dare not say—”
He said no more. He simply opened wide his arms, like the jaws of a
vise, then, turning to the north, brought his hands together, as if the
vise had closed suddenly upon some object there.
This was the fear that had filled his mind for the last twenty-four
hours, for he was thoroughly acquainted with the country and had
watched narrowly every movement of the troops during the previous day,
and now, again, while the broad valley before him lay basking in the
radiant sunlight, his gaze reverted to the hills of the left bank,
where, for the space of all one day and all one night, his eyes had
beheld the black swarm of the Prussian hosts moving steadily onward to
some appointed end. A battery had opened fire from Remilly, over to the
left, but the one from which the shells were now beginning to reach the
French position was posted at Pont-Maugis, on the river bank. He
adjusted his binocle by folding the glasses over, the one upon the
other, to lengthen its range and enable him to discern what was hidden
among the recesses of the wooded slopes, but could distinguish nothing
save the white smoke-wreaths that rose momentarily on the tranquil air
and floated lazily away over the crests. That human torrent that he had
seen so lately streaming over those hills, where was it now—where were
massed those innumerable hosts? At last, at the corner of a pine wood,
above Noyers and Frenois, he succeeded in making out a little cluster
of mounted men in uniform—some general, doubtless, and his staff. And
off there to the west the Meuse curved in a great loop, and in that
direction lay their sole line of retreat on Mézières, a narrow road
that traversed the pass of Saint-Albert, between that loop and the dark
forest of Ardennes. While reconnoitering the day before he had met a
general officer who, he afterward learned, was Ducrot, commanding the
1st corps, on a by-road in the valley of Givonne, and had made bold to
call his attention to the importance of that, their only line of
retreat. If the army did not retire at once by that road while it was
still open to them, if it waited until the Prussians should have
crossed the Meuse at Donchery and come up in force to occupy the pass,
it would be hemmed in and driven back on the Belgian frontier. As early
even as the evening of that day the movement would have been too late.
It was asserted that the uhlans had possession of the bridge, another
bridge that had not been destroyed, for the reason, this time, that
some one had neglected to provide the necessary powder. And Weiss
sorrowfully acknowledged to himself that the human torrent, the
invading horde, could now be nowhere else than on the plain of
Donchery, invisible to him, pressing onward to occupy Saint-Albert
pass, pushing forward its advanced guards to Saint-Menges and Floing,
whither, the day previous, he had conducted Jean and Maurice. In the
brilliant sunshine the steeple of Floing church appeared like a slender
needle of dazzling whiteness.
And off to the eastward the other arm of the powerful vise was slowly
closing in on them. Casting his eyes to the north, where there was a
stretch of level ground between the plateaus of Illy and of Floing, he
could make out the line of battle of the 7th corps, feebly supported by
the 5th, which was posted in reserve under the ramparts of the city;
but he could not discern what was occurring to the east, along the
valley of the Givonne, where the 1st corps was stationed, its line
stretching from the wood of la Garenne to Daigny village. Now, however,
the guns were beginning to thunder in that direction also; the conflict
seemed to be raging in Chevalier’s wood, in front of Daigny. His
uneasiness was owing to reports that had been brought in by peasants
the day previous, that the Prussian advance had reached Francheval, so
that the movement which was being conducted at the west, by way of
Donchery, was also in process of execution at the east, by way of
Francheval, and the two jaws of the vise would come together up there
at the north, near the Calvary of Illy, unless the two-fold flanking
movement could be promptly checked. He knew nothing of tactics or
strategy, had nothing but his common sense to guide him; but he looked
with fear and trembling on that great triangle that had the Meuse for
one of its sides, and for the other two the 7th and 1st corps on the
north and east respectively, while the extreme angle at the south was
occupied by the 12th at Bazeilles—all the three corps facing outward on
the periphery of a semicircle, awaiting the appearance of an enemy who
was to deliver his attack at some one point, where or when no one could
say, but who, instead, fell on them from every direction at once. And
at the very center of all, as at the bottom of a pit, lay the city of
Sedan, her ramparts furnished with antiquated guns, destitute of
ammunition and provisions.
“Understand,” said Weiss, with a repetition of his previous gesture,
extending his arms and bringing his hands slowly together, “that is how
it will be unless your generals keep their eyes open. The movement at
Bazeilles is only a feint—”
But his explanation was confused and unintelligible to the lieutenant,
who knew nothing of the country, and the young man shrugged his
shoulders with an expression of impatience and disdain for the
bourgeois in spectacles and frock coat who presumed to set his opinion
against the marshal’s. Irritated to hear Weiss reiterate his view that
the attack on Bazeilles was intended only to mask other and more
important movements, he finally shouted:
“Hold your tongue, will you! We shall drive them all into the Meuse,
those Bavarian friends of yours, and that is all they will get by their
precious feint.”
While they were talking the enemy’s skirmishers seemed to have come up
closer; every now and then their bullets were heard thudding against
the dyehouse wall, and our men, kneeling behind the low parapet of the
courtyard, were beginning to reply. Every second the report of a
chassepot rang out, sharp and clear, upon the air.
“Oh, of course! drive them into the Meuse, by all means,” muttered
Weiss, “and while we are about it we might as well ride them down and
regain possession of the Carignan road.” Then addressing himself to
Delaherche, who had stationed himself behind the pump where he might be
out of the way of the bullets: “All the same, it would have been their
wisest course to make tracks last night for Mézières, and if I were in
their place I would much rather be there than here. As it is, however,
they have got to show fight, since retreat is out of the question now.”
“Are you coming?” asked Delaherche, who, notwithstanding his eager
curiosity, was beginning to look pale in the face. “We shall be unable
to get into the city if we remain here longer.”
“Yes, in one minute I will be with you.”
In spite of the danger that attended the movement he raised himself on
tiptoe, possessed by an irresistible desire to see how things were
shaping. On the right lay the meadows that had been flooded by order of
the governor for the protection of the city, now a broad lake
stretching from Torcy to Balan, its unruffled bosom glimmering in the
morning sunlight with a delicate azure luster. The water did not extend
as far as Bazeilles, however, and the Prussians had worked their way
forward across the fields, availing themselves of the shelter of every
ditch, of every little shrub and tree. They were now distant some five
hundred yards, and Weiss was impressed by the caution with which they
moved, the dogged resolution and patience with which they advanced,
gaining ground inch by inch and exposing themselves as little as
possible. They had a powerful artillery fire, moreover, to sustain
them; the pure, cool air was vocal with the shrieking of shells.
Raising his eyes he saw that the Pont-Maugis battery was not the only
one that was playing on Bazeilles; two others, posted half way up the
hill of Liry, had opened fire, and their projectiles not only reached
the village, but swept the naked plain of la Moncelle beyond, where the
reserves of the 12th corps were, and even the wooded slopes of Daigny,
held by a division of the 1st corps, were not beyond their range. There
was not a summit, moreover, on the left bank of the stream that was not
tipped with flame. The guns seemed to spring spontaneously from the
soil, like some noxious growth; it was a zone of fire that grew hotter
and fiercer every moment; there were batteries at Noyers shelling
Balan, batteries at Wadelincourt shelling Sedan, and at Frenois, down
under la Marfée, there was a battery whose guns, heavier than the rest,
sent their missiles hurtling over the city to burst among the troops of
the 7th corps on the plateau of Floing. Those hills that he had always
loved so well, that he had supposed were planted there solely to
delight the eye, encircling with their verdurous slopes the pretty,
peaceful valley that lay beneath, were now become a gigantic, frowning
fortress, vomiting ruin and destruction on the feeble defenses of
Sedan, and Weiss looked on them with terror and detestation. Why had
steps not been taken to defend them the day before, if their leaders
had suspected this, or why, rather, had they insisted on holding the
position?
A sound of falling plaster caused him to raise his head; a shot had
grazed his house, the front of which was visible to him above the party
wall. It angered him excessively, and he growled:
“Are they going to knock it about my ears, the brigands!”
Then close behind him there was a little dull, strange sound that he
had never heard before, and turning quickly he saw a soldier, shot
through the heart, in the act of falling backward. There was a brief
convulsive movement of the legs; the youthful, tranquil expression of
the face remained, stamped there unalterably by the hand of death. It
was the first casualty, and the accountant was startled by the crash of
the musket falling and rebounding from the stone pavement of the
courtyard.
“Ah, I have seen enough, I am going,” stammered Delaherche. “Come, if
you are coming; if not, I shall go without you.”
The lieutenant, whom their presence made uneasy, spoke up:
“It will certainly be best for you to go, gentlemen. The enemy may
attempt to carry the place at any moment.”
Then at last, casting a parting glance at the meadows, where the
Bavarians were still gaining ground, Weiss gave in and followed
Delaherche, but when they had gained the street he insisted upon going
to see if the fastening of his door was secure, and when he came back
to his companion there was a fresh spectacle, which brought them both
to a halt.
At the end of the street, some three hundred yards from where they
stood, a strong Bavarian column had debouched from the Douzy road and
was charging up the Place de l’Église. The square was held by a
regiment of sailor-boys, who appeared to slacken their fire for a
moment as if with the intention of drawing their assailants on; then,
when the close-massed column was directly opposite their front, a most
surprising maneuver was swiftly executed: the men abandoned their
formation, some of them stepping from the ranks and flattening
themselves against the house fronts, others casting themselves prone
upon the ground, and down the vacant space thus suddenly formed the
mitrailleuses that had been placed in battery at the farther end poured
a perfect hailstorm of bullets. The column disappeared as if it had
been swept bodily from off the face of the earth. The recumbent men
sprang to their feet with a bound and charged the scattered Bavarians
with the bayonet, driving them and making the rout complete. Twice the
maneuver was repeated, each time with the same success. Two women,
unwilling to abandon their home, a small house at the corner of an
intersecting lane, were sitting at their window; they laughed
approvingly and clapped their hands, apparently glad to have an
opportunity to behold such a spectacle.
“There, confound it!” Weiss suddenly said, “I forgot to lock the cellar
door! I must go back. Wait for me; I won’t be a minute.”
There was no indication that the enemy contemplated a renewal of their
attack, and Delaherche, whose curiosity was reviving after the shock it
had sustained, was less eager to get away. He had halted in front of
his dyehouse and was conversing with the concierge, who had come for a
moment to the door of the room she occupied in the _rez-de-chaussée_.
“My poor Françoise, you had better come along with us. A lone woman
among such dreadful sights—I can’t bear to think of it!”
She raised her trembling hands. “Ah, sir, I would have gone when the
others went, indeed I would, if it had not been for my poor sick boy.
Come in, sir, and look at him.”
He did not enter, but glanced into the apartment from the threshold,
and shook his head sorrowfully at sight of the little fellow in his
clean, white bed, his face exhibiting the scarlet hue of the disease,
and his glassy, burning eyes bent wistfully on his mother.
“But why can’t you take him with you?” he urged. “I will find quarters
for you in Sedan. Wrap him up warmly in a blanket, and come along with
us.”
“Oh, no, sir, I cannot. The doctor told me it would kill him. If only
his poor father were alive! but we two are all that are left, and we
must live for each other. And then, perhaps the Prussians will be
merciful; perhaps they won’t harm a lone woman and a sick boy.”
Just then Weiss reappeared, having secured his premises to his
satisfaction. “There, I think it will trouble them some to get in now.
Come on! And it is not going to be a very pleasant journey, either;
keep close to the houses, unless you want to come to grief.”
There were indications, indeed, that the enemy were making ready for
another assault. The infantry fire was spluttering away more furiously
than ever, and the screaming of the shells was incessant. Two had
already fallen in the street a hundred yards away, and a third had
imbedded itself, without bursting, in the soft ground of the adjacent
garden.
“Ah, here is Françoise,” continued the accountant. “I must have a look
at your little Charles. Come, come, you have no cause for alarm; he
will be all right in a couple of days. Keep your courage up, and the
first thing you do go inside, and don’t put your nose outside the
door.” And the two men at last started to go.
“_Au revoir_, Françoise.”
“_Au revoir_, sirs.”
And as they spoke, there came an appalling crash. It was a shell,
which, having first wrecked the chimney of Weiss’s house, fell upon the
sidewalk, where it exploded with such terrific force as to break every
window in the vicinity. At first it was impossible to distinguish
anything in the dense cloud of dust and smoke that rose in the air, but
presently this drifted away, disclosing the ruined facade of the
dyehouse, and there, stretched across the threshold, Françoise, a
corpse, horribly torn and mangled, her skull crushed in, a fearful
spectacle.
Weiss sprang to her side. Language failed him; he could only express
his feelings by oaths and imprecations.
“_Nom de Dieu!_ _Nom de Dieu!_”
Yes, she was dead. He had stooped to feel her pulse, and as he arose he
saw before him the scarlet face of little Charles, who had raised
himself in bed to look at his mother. He spoke no word, he uttered no
cry; he gazed with blazing, tearless eyes, distended as if they would
start from their sockets, upon the shapeless mass that was strange,
unknown to him; and nothing more.
Weiss found words at last: “_Nom de Dieu!_ they have taken to killing
women!”
He had risen to his feet; he shook his fist at the Bavarians, whose
braid-trimmed helmets were commencing to appear again in the direction
of the church. The chimney, in falling, had crushed a great hole in the
roof of his house, and the sight of the havoc made him furious.
“Dirty loafers! You murder women, you have destroyed my house. No, no!
I will not go now, I cannot; I shall stay here.”
He darted away and came running back with the dead soldier’s rifle and
ammunition. He was accustomed to carry a pair of spectacles on his
person for use on occasions of emergency, when he wished to see with
great distinctness, but did not wear them habitually out of respect for
the wishes of his young wife. He now impatiently tore off his double
eyeglass and substituted the spectacles, and the big, burly bourgeois,
his overcoat flapping about his legs, his honest, kindly, round face
ablaze with wrath, who would have been ridiculous had he not been so
superbly heroic, proceeded to open fire, peppering away at the
Bavarians at the bottom of the street. It was in his blood, he said; he
had been hankering for something of the kind ever since the days of his
boyhood, down there in Alsace, when he had been told all those tales of
1814. “Ah! you dirty loafers! you dirty loafers!” And he kept firing
away with such eagerness that, finally, the barrel of his musket became
so hot it burned his fingers.
The assault was made with great vigor and determination. There was no
longer any sound of musketry in the direction of the meadows. The
Bavarians had gained possession of a narrow stream, fringed with
willows and poplars, and were making preparations for storming the
houses, or rather fortresses, in the Place de l’Église. Their
skirmishers had fallen back with the same caution that characterized
their advance, and the wide grassy plain, dotted here and there with a
black form where some poor fellow had laid down his life, lay spread in
the mellow, slumbrous sunshine like a great cloth of gold. The
lieutenant, knowing that the street was now to be the scene of action,
had evacuated the courtyard of the dyehouse, leaving there only one man
as guard. He rapidly posted his men along the sidewalk with
instructions, should the enemy carry the position, to withdraw into the
building, barricade the first floor, and defend themselves there as
long as they had a cartridge left. The men fired at will, lying prone
upon the ground, and sheltering themselves as best they might behind
posts and every little projection of the walls, and the storm of lead,
interspersed with tongues of flame and puffs of smoke, that tore
through that broad, deserted, sunny avenue was like a downpour of hail
beaten level by the fierce blast of winter. A woman was seen to cross
the roadway, running with wild, uncertain steps, and she escaped
uninjured. Next, an old man, a peasant, in his blouse, who would not be
satisfied until he saw his worthless nag stabled, received a bullet
square in his forehead, and the violence of the impact was such that it
hurled him into the middle of the street. A shell had gone crashing
through the roof of the church; two others fell and set fire to houses,
which burned with a pale flame in the intense daylight, with a loud
snapping and crackling of their timbers. And that poor woman, who lay
crushed and bleeding in the doorway of the house where her sick boy
was, that old man with a bullet in his brain, all that work of ruin and
devastation, maddened the few inhabitants who had chosen to end their
days in their native village rather than seek safety in Belgium. Other
bourgeois, and workingmen as well, the neatly attired citizen alongside
the man in overalls, had possessed themselves of the weapons of dead
soldiers, and were in the street defending their firesides or firing
vengefully from the windows.
“Ah!” suddenly said Weiss, “the scoundrels have got around to our rear.
I saw them sneaking along the railroad track. Hark! don’t you hear them
off there to the left?”
The heavy fire of musketry that was now audible behind the park of
Montivilliers, the trees of which overhung the road, made it evident
that something of importance was occurring in that direction. Should
the enemy gain possession of the park Bazeilles would be at their
mercy, but the briskness of the firing was in itself proof that the
general commanding the 12th corps had anticipated the movement and that
the position was adequately defended.
“Look out, there, you blockhead!” exclaimed the lieutenant, violently
forcing Weiss up against the wall; “do you want to get yourself blown
to pieces?”
He could not help laughing a little at the queer figure of the big
gentleman in spectacles, but his bravery had inspired him with a very
genuine feeling of respect, so, when his practiced ear detected a shell
coming their way, he had acted the part of a friend and placed the
civilian in a safer position. The missile landed some ten paces from
where they were and exploded, covering them both with earth and debris.
The citizen kept his feet and received not so much as a scratch, while
the officer had both legs broken.
“It is well!” was all he said; “they have sent me my reckoning!”
He caused his men to take him across the sidewalk and place him with
his back to the wall, near where the dead woman lay, stretched across
her doorstep. His boyish face had lost nothing of its energy and
determination.
“It don’t matter, my children; listen to what I say. Don’t fire too
hurriedly; take your time. When the time comes for you to charge, I
will tell you.”
And he continued to command them still, with head erect, watchful of
the movements of the distant enemy. Another house was burning, directly
across the street. The crash and rattle of musketry, the roar of
bursting shells, rent the air, thick with dust and sulphurous smoke.
Men dropped at the corner of every lane and alley; corpses scattered
here and there upon the pavement, singly or in little groups, made
splotches of dark color, hideously splashed with red. And over the
doomed village a frightful uproar rose and swelled, the vindictive
shouts of thousands, devoting to destruction a few hundred brave men,
resolute to die.
Then Delaherche, who all this time had been frantically shouting to
Weiss without intermission, addressed him one last appeal:
“You won’t come? Very well! then I shall leave you to your fate.
Adieu!”
It was seven o’clock, and he had delayed his departure too long. So
long as the houses were there to afford him shelter he took advantage
of every doorway, of every bit of projecting wall, shrinking at every
volley into cavities that were ridiculously small in comparison with
his bulk. He turned and twisted in and out with the sinuous dexterity
of the serpent; he would never have supposed that there was so much of
his youthful agility left in him. When he reached the end of the
village, however, and had to make his way for a space of some three
hundred yards along the deserted, empty road, swept by the batteries on
Liry hill, although the perspiration was streaming from his face and
body, he shivered and his teeth chattered. For a minute or so he
advanced cautiously along the bed of a dry ditch, bent almost double,
then, suddenly forsaking the protecting shelter, burst into the open
and ran for it with might and main, wildly, aimlessly, his ears ringing
with detonations that sounded to him like thunder-claps. His eyes
burned like coals of fire; it seemed to him that he was wrapt in flame.
It was an eternity of torture. Then he suddenly caught sight of a
little house to his left, and he rushed for the friendly refuge, gained
it, with a sensation as if an immense load had been lifted from his
breast. The place was tenanted, there were men and horses there. At
first he could distinguish nothing. What he beheld subsequently filled
him with amazement.
Was not that the Emperor, attended by his brilliant staff? He
hesitated, although for the last two days he had been boasting of his
acquaintance with him, then stood staring, open-mouthed. It was indeed
Napoleon III.; he appeared larger, somehow, and more imposing on
horseback, and his mustache was so stiffly waxed, there was such a
brilliant color on his cheeks, that Delaherche saw at once he had been
“made up” and painted like an actor. He had had recourse to cosmetics
to conceal from his army the ravages that anxiety and illness had
wrought in his countenance, the ghastly pallor of his face, his pinched
nose, his dull, sunken eyes, and having been notified at five o’clock
that there was fighting at Bazeilles, had come forth to see, sadly and
silently, like a phantom with rouged cheeks.
There was a brick-kiln near by, behind which there was safety from the
rain of bullets that kept pattering incessantly on its other front and
the shells that burst at every second on the road. The mounted group
had halted.
“Sire,” someone murmured, “you are in danger—”
But the Emperor turned and motioned to his staff to take refuge in the
narrow road that skirted the kiln, where men and horses would be
sheltered from the fire.
“Really, Sire, this is madness. Sire, we entreat you—”
His only answer was to repeat his gesture; probably he thought that the
appearance of a group of brilliant uniforms on that deserted road would
draw the fire of the batteries on the left bank. Entirely unattended he
rode forward into the midst of the storm of shot and shell, calmly,
unhurriedly, with his unvarying air of resigned indifference, the air
of one who goes to meet his appointed fate. Could it be that he heard
behind him the implacable voice that was urging him onward, that voice
from Paris: “March! march! die the hero’s death on the piled corpses of
thy countrymen, let the whole world look on in awe-struck admiration,
so that thy son may reign!”—could that be what he heard? He rode
forward, controlling his charger to a slow walk. For the space of a
hundred yards he thus rode forward, then halted, awaiting the death he
had come there to seek. The bullets sang in concert with a music like
the fierce autumnal blast; a shell burst in front of him and covered
him with earth. He maintained his attitude of patient waiting. His
steed, with distended eyes and quivering frame, instinctively recoiled
before the grim presence who was so close at hand and yet refused to
smite horse or rider. At last the trying experience came to an end, and
the Emperor, with his stoic fatalism, understanding that his time was
not yet come, tranquilly retraced his steps, as if his only object had
been to reconnoiter the position of the German batteries.
“What courage, Sire! We beseech you, do not expose yourself further—”
But, unmindful of their solicitations, he beckoned to his staff to
follow him, not offering at present to consult their safety more than
he did his own, and turned his horse’s head toward la Moncelle,
quitting the road and taking the abandoned fields of la Ripaille. A
captain was mortally wounded, two horses were killed. As he passed
along the line of the 12th corps, appearing and vanishing like a
specter, the men eyed him with curiosity, but did not cheer.
To all these events had Delaherche been witness, and now he trembled at
the thought that he, too, as soon as he should have left the brick
works, would have to run the gauntlet of those terrible projectiles. He
lingered, listening to the conversation of some dismounted officers who
had remained there.
“I tell you he was killed on the spot; cut in two by a shell.”
“You are wrong, I saw him carried off the field. His wound was not
severe; a splinter struck him on the hip.”
“What time was it?”
“Why, about an hour ago—say half-past six. It was up there around la
Moncelle, in a sunken road.”
“I know he is dead.”
“But I tell you he is not! He even sat his horse for a moment after he
was hit, then he fainted and they carried him into a cottage to attend
to his wound.”
“And then returned to Sedan?”
“Certainly; he is in Sedan now.”
Of whom could they be speaking? Delaherche quickly learned that it was
of Marshal MacMahon, who had been wounded while paying a visit of
inspection to his advanced posts. The marshal wounded! it was “just our
luck,” as the lieutenant of marines had put it. He was reflecting on
what the consequences of the mishap were likely to be when an
_estafette_ dashed by at top speed, shouting to a comrade, whom he
recognized:
“General Ducrot is made commander-in-chief! The army is ordered to
concentrate at Illy in order to retreat on Mézières!”
The courier was already far away, galloping into Bazeilles under the
constantly increasing fire, when Delaherche, startled by the strange
tidings that came to him in such quick succession and not relishing the
prospect of being involved in the confusion of the retreating troops,
plucked up courage and started on a run for Balan, whence he regained
Sedan without much difficulty.
The _estafette_ tore through Bazeilles on a gallop, disseminating the
news, hunting up the commanders to give them their instructions, and as
he sped swiftly on the intelligence spread among the troops: Marshal
MacMahon wounded, General Ducrot in command, the army falling back on
Illy!
“What is that they are saying?” cried Weiss, whose face by this time
was grimy with powder. “Retreat on Mézières at this late hour! but it
is absurd, they will never get through!”
And his conscience pricked him, he repented bitterly having given that
counsel the day before to that very general who was now invested with
the supreme command. Yes, certainly, that was yesterday the best, the
only plan, to retreat, without loss of a minute’s time, by the
Saint-Albert pass, but now the way could be no longer open to them, the
black swarms of Prussians had certainly anticipated them and were on
the plain of Donchery. There were two courses left for them to pursue,
both desperate; and the most promising, as well as the bravest, of them
was to drive the Bavarians into the Meuse, and cut their way through
and regain possession of the Carignan road.
Weiss, whose spectacles were constantly slipping down upon his nose,
adjusted them nervously and proceeded to explain matters to the
lieutenant, who was still seated against the wall with his two stumps
of legs, very pale and slowly bleeding to death.
“Lieutenant, I assure you I am right. Tell your men to stand their
ground. You can see for yourself that we are doing well. One more
effort like the last, and we shall drive them into the river.”
It was true that the Bavarians’ second attack had been repulsed. The
mitrailleuses had again swept the Place de l’Église, the heaps of
corpses in the square resembled barricades, and our troops, emerging
from every cross street, had driven the enemy at the point of the
bayonet through the meadows toward the river in headlong flight, which
might easily have been converted into a general rout had there been
fresh troops to support the sailor-boys, who had suffered severely and
were by this time much distressed. And in Montivilliers Park, again,
the firing did not seem to advance, which was a sign that in that
quarter, also, reinforcements, could they have been had, would have
cleared the wood.
“Order your men to charge them with the bayonet, lieutenant.”
The waxen pallor of death was on the poor boy-officer’s face; yet he
had strength to murmur in feeble accents:
“You hear, my children; give them the bayonet!”
It was his last utterance; his spirit passed, his ingenuous, resolute
face and his wide open eyes still turned on the battle. The flies
already were beginning to buzz about Françoise’s head and settle there,
while lying on his bed little Charles, in an access of delirium, was
calling on his mother in pitiful, beseeching tones to give him
something to quench his thirst.
“Mother, mother, awake; get up—I am thirsty, I am so thirsty.”
But the instructions of the new chief were imperative, and the
officers, vexed and grieved to see the successes they had achieved thus
rendered nugatory, had nothing for it but to give orders for the
retreat. It was plain that the commander-in-chief, possessed by a
haunting dread of the enemy’s turning movement, was determined to
sacrifice everything in order to escape from the toils. The Place de
l’Église was evacuated, the troops fell back from street to street;
soon the broad avenue was emptied of its defenders. Women shrieked and
sobbed, men swore and shook their fists at the retiring troops, furious
to see themselves abandoned thus. Many shut themselves in their houses,
resolved to die in their defense.
“Well, _I_ am not going to give up the ship!” shouted Weiss, beside
himself with rage. “No! I will leave my skin here first. Let them come
on! let them come and smash my furniture and drink my wine!”
Wrath filled his mind to the exclusion of all else, a wild, fierce
desire to fight, to kill, at the thought that the hated foreigner
should enter his house, sit in his chair, drink from his glass. It
wrought a change in all his nature; everything that went to make up his
daily life—wife, business, the methodical prudence of the small
bourgeois—seemed suddenly to become unstable and drift away from him.
And he shut himself up in his house and barricaded it, he paced the
empty apartments with the restless impatience of a caged wild beast,
going from room to room to make sure that all the doors and windows
were securely fastened. He counted his cartridges and found he had
forty left, then, as he was about to give a final look to the meadows
to see whether any attack was to be apprehended from that quarter, the
sight of the hills on the left bank arrested his attention for a
moment. The smoke-wreaths indicated distinctly the position of the
Prussian batteries, and at the corner of a little wood on la Marfée,
over the powerful battery at Frenois, he again beheld the group of
uniforms, more numerous than before, and so distinct in the bright
sunlight that by supplementing his spectacles with his binocle he could
make out the gold of their epaulettes and helmets.
“You dirty scoundrels, you dirty scoundrels!” he twice repeated,
extending his clenched fist in impotent menace.
Those who were up there on la Marfée were King William and his staff.
As early as seven o’clock he had ridden up from Vendresse, where he had
had quarters for the night, and now was up there on the heights, out of
reach of danger, while at his feet lay the valley of the Meuse and the
vast panorama of the field of battle. Far as the eye could reach, from
north to south, the bird’s-eye view extended, and standing on the
summit of the hill, as from his throne in some colossal opera box, the
monarch surveyed the scene.
In the central foreground of the picture, and standing out in bold
relief against the venerable forests of the Ardennes, that stretched
away on either hand from right to left, filling the northern horizon
like a curtain of dark verdure, was the city of Sedan, with the
geometrical lines and angles of its fortifications, protected on the
south and west by the flooded meadows and the river. In Bazeilles
houses were already burning, and the dark cloud of war hung heavy over
the pretty village. Turning his eyes eastward he might discover,
holding the line between la Moncelle and Givonne, some regiments of the
12th and 1st corps, looking like diminutive insects at that distance
and lost to sight at intervals in the dip of the narrow valley in which
the hamlets lay concealed; and beyond that valley rose the further
slope, an uninhabited, uncultivated heath, of which the pale tints made
the dark green of Chevalier’s Wood look black by contrast. To the north
the 7th corps was more distinctly visible in its position on the
plateau of Floing, a broad belt of sere, dun fields, that sloped
downward from the little wood of la Garenne to the verdant border of
the stream. Further still were Floing, Saint-Menges, Fleigneux, Illy,
small villages that lay nestled in the hollows of that billowing region
where the landscape was a succession of hill and dale. And there, too,
to the left was the great bend of the Meuse, where the sluggish stream,
shimmering like molten silver in the bright sunlight, swept lazily in a
great horseshoe around the peninsula of Iges and barred the road to
Mézières, leaving between its further bank and the impassable forest
but one single gateway, the defile of Saint-Albert.
It was in that triangular space that the hundred thousand men and five
hundred guns of the French army had now been crowded and brought to
bay, and when His Prussian Majesty condescended to turn his gaze still
further to the westward he might perceive another plain, the plain of
Donchery, a succession of bare fields stretching away toward
Briancourt, Marancourt, and Vrigne-aux-Bois, a desolate expanse of gray
waste beneath the clear blue sky; and did he turn him to the east, he
again had before his eyes, facing the lines in which the French were so
closely hemmed, a vast level stretch of country in which were numerous
villages, first Douzy and Carignan, then more to the north Rubecourt,
Pourru-aux-Bois, Francheval, Villers-Cernay, and last of all, near the
frontier, Chapelle. All about him, far as he could see, the land was
his; he could direct the movements of the quarter of a million of men
and the eight hundred guns that constituted his army, could master at a
glance every detail of the operations of his invading host. Even then
the XIth corps was pressing forward toward Saint-Menges, while the Vth
was at Vrigne-aux-Bois, and the Wurtemburg division was near Donchery,
awaiting orders. This was what he beheld to the west, and if, turning
to the east, he found his view obstructed in that quarter by tree-clad
hills, he could picture to himself what was passing, for he had seen
the XIIth corps entering the wood of Chevalier, he knew that by that
time the Guards were at Villers-Cernay. There were the two arms of the
gigantic vise, the army of the Crown Prince of Prussia on the left, the
Saxon Prince’s army on the right, slowly, irresistibly closing on each
other, while the two Bavarian corps were hammering away at Bazeilles.
Underneath the King’s position the long line of batteries, stretching
with hardly an interval from Remilly to Frenois, kept up an
unintermittent fire, pouring their shells into Daigny and la Moncelle,
sending them hurtling over Sedan city to sweep the northern plateaus.
It was barely eight o’clock, and with eyes fixed on the gigantic board
he directed the movements of the game, awaiting the inevitable end,
calmly controlling the black cloud of men that beneath him swept, an
array of pigmies, athwart the smiling landscape.