heaven knows whether we expected to have to charge from the beginning to the end of that interminable day. the captain and the subaltern had warned us. the cannonade raged in front of us and all round us. the german fire was concentrated against a village below us, on our right. if we were occupying it, what losses it would mean to us! to begin with we could see each explosion and the resultant crumbling of the buildings. towards midday a thick pall of smoke rose and shrouded everything.
the fusillade and the machine-guns joined in the concert. who would guess what they reminded me of? the mock symphony with which miquel had amused at the globe café.
it will be seen that i was far from feeling the same enervation as i had the other week. i had become a fatalist.... we knew all about being under fire. we had already been through it.
i should certainly have been badly bored without guillaumin's precious and almost continual society. we began by discussing the situation at length. he maintained that it was not serious.
he passed on some of his serenity to me. his eyes shone when he said:
[pg 289]
"and our poilus, what!"
"admirable!"
he added:
"what a fine race they are!"
i wondered whether he was speaking of the french or the beaucerons.
what should he do a little later on, but set about extolling the treasures lying dormant at the heart of these soldiers.
"most of them are married! they nearly all have kids! they never stop thinking of those who have stayed behind—of their family. that supports them. it's a case of morale!"
"steady on! don't exaggerate!"
they were good fellows, the majority, i admitted, and fond of their families, but the chief point about them was their resignation and passivity. a worthy herd!
he insisted.
"i assure you that they have their own personality and feelings, and often a very generous share of them. they are certainly no phrase-makers; it is even very difficult to get them to talk. they mistrust you and themselves. you would think that they realised that they would spoil their feelings by trying to express them in their peasant jargon."
"well?"
"look how they find a way of writing every or almost every day! some of the men in the platoon have asked me to write the addresses, so that they should be readable. others, even, to wield the pen while they dictated the text. oh, just dull commonplace formulas, but what a tender longing in them to reassure and cheer. that all declare, whatever[pg 290] happens, that they are resting, far away from the bosches, that everything is going excellently. 'don't you worry!' is what they say. what philosophy!"
"and i'll quote some examples of delicacy; for instance, your corporal, donnadieu, who was hit...."
i opened my mouth to tell him of the man's trick, a villainy which had remained unknown.
"well," he continued, "i've got a man from his part of the world, from neuville. he wrote a letter to the wife, who is just starting a new baby, to tell her that her husband had been pinked—in case he had not been able to let her know—but that it was nothing serious, and that he would keep her informed!"
guillaumin now described the arrival of the baggage-master, in the farmyard the other day (i had missed this scene), and the distribution of the letters and cards. some of them had wept. others hid themselves to kiss the humble note-paper.
what a singular state of mind! i considered these men around me lying about like a lot of animals, their filthy faces, and obtuse foreheads and dull looks. bouillon, gaudéreaux, judsi, did they dream? yes.... perhaps there were visions of children and wives wandering behind the brute-like masks! for the first time i was drawn to them by a brotherly instinct.
i hazarded: "and yet it must be sad to leave some one behind...."
that started guillaumin off; he was in an eloquent mood. he recognised the agonising character of these wars, which involved in the struggle, not mercenaries, as in olden days, nor even soldiers by profession, volunteers free of all ties, but the living substance of the nations, this youth incapable of breaking the chains of blood and of love at parting. for each[pg 291] man in danger here, how many alarms there would be yonder in the hearts of wives and mothers! what reverberation of despair involved in each agony!
but also what consolation to feel that one was not fighting uniquely for pay or for glory, but for the safety of one's country! for what was one's country but places and people, all that one held dear? woman above everything! woman! all that was contained in that word! the sublime exchange of encouragement. betrothed and wives, they all understood their r?le equally well. this cause was theirs. they had sobbed at the departure of their loved ones, but most of them had made no effort to keep them, but had only prayed heaven to bring them back victorious.
he warmed to his subject. i listened, and approved. what a noble character he was, and what an hour in which to work upon these thoughts! the din of the battle redoubled. we caught sight of some wounded not very far away dragging themselves to the high road. henriot signed to us. shells were falling on a little wood less than a kilometre away from us. we were going to be engaged. i paid homage to a dear vision within me....
guillaumin cited some examples: poor little frémont. he had talked to him a long time, the day before mangiennes, about fran?oise, his sweet fran?oise. it was to her that he offered all the privation and weariness, for her sake that he gave proof of such a confident, charming spirit. and de valpic! guillaumin suspected him of holding out even when ill, in the touching and feverish longing to prove his valiance to someone....
he suddenly lowered his voice:
[pg 292]
"and you, michel ... whom are you fighting for?"
my heart melted. how tactfully and ingeniously my friend had led round to the subject. i burned to reply to this chaste invitation by an avowal, to confess to him that for me too, toil and suffering were alleviated ... to tell him a tale of some romance or other with this girl as heroine. alas! i restrained myself in time. it would have been a tale indeed—to lie just at the moment when the need of candour was devouring me. could i tell him what there was to tell? unhappy wretch! there was nothing! what was there between her and me? nothing. good god, nothing! the pity of it! a holiday friendship, an exchange of post-cards, that was all.... it was true that for the last few days my imagination had been indulging in dangerous flights of fancy.... what an awakening i was preparing for myself. by what right did i think ... that someone else was being inebriated at the same time by a twin exaltation. it would have needed a miracle and there was nothing to suggest that! had my letter arrived? if so would she not have been astonished, and indeed shocked—not to mention the people with her—at my having written in a closed envelope? should i ever receive a reply?
so i could do nothing but murmur in an offhand tone:
"bah! a flirt here and there!"
i suddenly wondered whether guillaumin had not asked me, as it often happens, solely in order to be asked himself. did he want to open his heart to me about some secret fondness? at the sight of his ugliness i thought: "could any one possibly love him?" but i was annoyed with myself for this reflection....
[pg 293]
"and what about you?" i said.
he smiled, without a trace of sadness or forced merriment.
"oh, with a mug like mine! no, there's only one woman with whom i count for anything, and that's my sister. but for her sake, it would annoy me to go under!"
it was the second time that i had heard him allude to his sister. i questioned him, and he told me she was called louise, and was twenty-five years old. they had lived together since their mother's death. she gave piano lessons.
"you'll have to get her married," i said.
he shook his head gently:
"she is as ugly ... as i am!"
hour after hour went by, without bringing anything worse than our inaction. we were inclined to become pessimistic. a sinister rumour spread, at one point—ought we to believe it?—yes, laraque the connecting file, who had taken refuge with us for a minute, confirmed the frightful mistake. our divisional cavalry had ventured outside our lines, and got into the line of fire from our batteries. a captain in the observation post had tried distractedly to telephone but just then the line had been cut and communications interrupted. pandemonium. our batteries had the troopers marked, found their range, and soon decimated them. they had been seen galloping madly in every direction, forming into bunches, and ending by flying towards the enemy's trenches, where they were met by grape-shot. the captain had gone off his head, the signaller who was responsible had been executed—not that it undid the damage!
[pg 294]
laraque left us. we were crushed by his recital. that was a most gloomy part of the proceedings. the big "coal-boxes" (quite recently christened) were beginning to pour down on all sides of our line raising heavy black clouds. a fusillade crackled, a little way off. some of our companies were engaged, so they said. our turn seemed to have come—we should bring only deadened wills to the impact....
and then suddenly, just as at mangiennes, the falling dusk took us by surprise. the call to "cease fire" went. the extraordinary thing was that both sides appeared to obey it. the uproar suddenly decreased.
laraque passed again bearing better news. first of all—he laughed—the horrible tale of our cavalry having been annihilated by our 75's ... well, it had been entirely contradicted! our guns had fired on the uhlans all right, the plain was strewn with their bodies! then that village, houdclancourt, which i have described as having been battered by the german artillery ever since the morning—an officer who had come from there had given the exact total of casualties: six wounded, not one more than that! pure waste of powder!
we hastened to pass on the good news to the men. the day ended, on the whole, on a more favourable note. our comrades had held out, and we had not been needed. nothing to eat? we were accustomed to that ... the usual thing on evenings after a battle. lamalou tasted some raw beetroot, pulled up in a neighbouring field. everyone was convinced that we should sleep where we were. but we were to have a surprise. when it got dark, the order came to abandon the trench, and fall back on the high road.
[pg 295]
that was a gloomy crossing. all the wounded were gathering on this side in the hope of getting first-aid. many of them fell on the way, some dead, others exhausted, begging for a drink. there were sobs, and calls of "mother!" we brushed past these unfortunates, strongly tempted to stop and help them, but we were forbidden to break ranks! there was growing indignation, for after all, where in thunder had our stretcher-bearers got to?
from the high road, we could see endless dots of light moving about and crossing each other in the dusk of the plain. the bosches collecting their wounded, de valpic informed me.
"there's organisation for you!" i said, not without bitterness.
"their qualities against our qualities!"
