Complete Works of Emile Zola (1225 page)

“You need have no further fears. M. de Gartlauben, just is he was going away, promised me he would attend to your uncle’s case, and although I shall not be here, my wife will keep an eye to it.”

Since Madame Delaherche had made her appearance in the apartment Gilberte had not once taken her anxious eyes from off her face. Would she speak, would she tell what she had seen, and keep her son from starting on his projected journey? The elder lady, also, soon as she crossed the threshold, had bent her fixed gaze in silence on her daughter-in-law. Doubtless her stern patriotism induced her to view the matter in somewhat the same light that Henriette had viewed it.
Mon Dieu!
since it was that young man, that Frenchman who had fought so bravely, was it not her duty to forgive, even as she had forgiven once before, in Captain Beaudoin’s case? A look of greater softness rose to her eyes; she averted her head. Her son might go; Edmond would be there to protect Gilberte against the Prussian. She even smiled faintly, she whose grim face had never once relaxed since the news of the victory at Coulmiers.

“
Au revoir
,” she said, folding her son in her arms. “Finish up your business quickly as you can and come back to us.”

And she took herself slowly away, returning to the prison-like chamber across the corridor, where the colonel, with his dull gaze, was peering into the shadows that lay outside the disk of bright light which fell from the lamp.

Henriette returned to Remilly that same evening, and one morning, three days afterward, had the pleasure to see Father Fouchard come walking into the house, as calmly as if he had merely stepped out to transact some business in the neighborhood. He took a seat by the table and refreshed himself with some bread and cheese, and to all the questions that were put to him replied with cool deliberation, like a man who had never seen anything to alarm him in his situation. What reason had he to be afraid? He had done nothing wrong; it was not he who had killed the Prussian, was it? So he had just said to the authorities: “Investigate the matter; I know nothing about it.” And they could do nothing but release him, and the mayor as well, seeing they had no proofs against them. But the eyes of the crafty, sly old peasant gleamed with delight at the thought of how nicely he had pulled the wool over the eyes of those dirty blackguards, who were beginning to higgle with him over the quality of the meat he furnished to them.

December was drawing near its end, and Jean insisted on going away. His leg was quite strong again, and the doctor announced that he was fit to go and join the army. This was to Henriette a subject of profoundest sorrow, which she kept locked in her bosom as well as she was able. No tidings from Paris had reached them since the disastrous battle of Champigny; all they knew was that Maurice’s regiment had been exposed to a murderous fire and had suffered severely. Ever that deep, unbroken silence; no letter, never the briefest line for them, when they knew that families in Raucourt and Sedan were receiving intelligence of their loved ones by circuitous ways. Perhaps the pigeon that was bringing them the so eagerly wished-for news had fallen a victim to some hungry bird of prey, perhaps the bullet of a Prussian had brought it to the ground at the margin of a wood. But the fear that haunted them most of all was that Maurice was dead; the silence of the great city off yonder in the distance, uttering no cry in the mortal hug of the investment, was become to them in their agonized suspense the silence of death. They had abandoned all hope of tidings, and when Jean declared his settled purpose to be gone, Henriette only gave utterance to this stifled cry of despair:

“My God! then all is ended, and I am to be left alone!”

It was Jean’s desire to go and serve with the Army of the North, which had recently been re-formed under General Faidherbe. Now that General Manteuffel’s corps had moved forward to Dieppe there were three departments, cut off from the rest of France, that this army had to defend, le Nord, le Pas-de-Calais, and la Somme, and Jean’s plan, not a difficult one to carry into execution, was simply to make for Bouillon and thence complete his journey across Belgian territory. He knew that the 23d corps was being recruited, mainly from such old soldiers of Sedan and Metz as could be gathered to the standards. He had heard it reported that General Faidherbe was about to take the field, and had definitely appointed the next ensuing Sunday as the day of his departure, when news reached him of the battle of Pont-Noyelle, that drawn battle which came so near being a victory for the French.

It was Dr. Dalichamp again in this instance who offered the services of his gig and himself as driver to Bouillon. The good man’s courage and kindness were boundless. At Raucourt, where typhus was raging, communicated by the Bavarians, there was not a house where he had not one or more patients, and this labor was additional to his regular attendance at the two hospitals at Raucourt and Remilly. His ardent patriotism, the impulse that prompted him to protest against unnecessary barbarity, had twice led to his being arrested by the Prussians, only to be released on each occasion. He gave a little laugh of satisfaction, therefore, the morning he came with his vehicle to take up Jean, pleased to be the instrument of assisting the escape of another of the victims of Sedan, those poor, brave fellows, as he called them, to whom he gave his professional services and whom he aided with his purse. Jean, who knew of Henriette’s straitened circumstances and had been suffering from lack of funds since his relapse, accepted gratefully the fifty francs that the doctor offered him for traveling expenses.

Father Fouchard did things handsomely at the leave-taking, sending Silvine to the cellar for two bottles of wine and insisting that everyone should drink a glass to the extermination of the Germans. He was a man of importance in the country nowadays and had his “plum” hidden away somewhere or other; he could sleep in peace now that the francs-tireurs had disappeared, driven like wild beasts from their lair, and his sole wish was for a speedy conclusion of the war. He had even gone so far in one of his generous fits as to pay Prosper his wages in order to retain his services on the farm, which the young man had no thought of leaving. He touched glasses with Prosper, and also with Silvine, whom he at times was half inclined to marry, knowing what a treasure he had in his faithful, hard-working little servant; but what was the use? he knew she would never leave him, that she would still be there when Charlot should be grown and go in turn to serve his country as a soldier. And touching his glass to Henriette’s, Jean’s, and the doctor’s, he exclaimed:

“Here’s to the health of you all! May you all prosper and be no worse off than I am!”

Henriette would not let Jean go away without accompanying him as far as Sedan. He was in citizen’s dress, wearing a frock coat and derby hat that the doctor had loaned him. The day was piercingly cold; the sun’s rays were reflected from a crust of glittering snow. Their intention had been to pass through the city without stopping, but when Jean learned that his old colonel was still at the Delaherches’ he felt an irresistible desire to go and pay his respects to him, and at the same time thank the manufacturer for his many kindnesses. His visit was destined to bring him an additional, a final sorrow, in that city of mournful memories. On reaching the structure in the Rue Maqua they found the household in a condition of the greatest distress and disorder, Gilberte wringing her hands, Madame Delaherche weeping great silent tears, while her son, who had come in from the factory, where work was gradually being resumed, uttered exclamations of surprise. The colonel had just been discovered, stone dead, lying exactly as he had fallen, in a heap on the floor of his chamber. The physician, who was summoned with all haste, could assign no cause for the sudden death; there was no indication of paralysis or heart trouble. The colonel had been stricken down, and no one could tell from what quarter the blow came; but the following morning, when the room was thrown open, a piece of an old newspaper was found, lying on the carpet, that had been wrapped around a book and contained the account of the surrender of Metz.

“My, dear,” said Gilberte to Henriette, “as Captain de Gartlauben was coming downstairs just now he removed his hat as he passed the door of the room where my uncle’s body is lying. Edmond saw it; he’s an extremely well-bred man, don’t you think so?”

In all their intimacy Jean had never yet kissed Henriette. Before resuming his seat in the gig with the doctor he endeavored to thank her for all her devoted kindness, for having nursed and loved him as a brother, but somehow the words would not come at his command; he opened his arms and, with a great sob, clasped her in a long embrace, and she, beside herself with the grief of parting, returned his kiss. Then the horse started, he turned about in his seat, there was a waving of hands, while again and again two sorrowful voices repeated in choking accents:

“Farewell! Farewell!”

On her return to Remilly that evening Henriette reported for duty at the hospital. During the silent watches of the night she was visited by another convulsive attack of sobbing, and wept, wept as if her tears would never cease to flow, clasping her hands before her as if between them to strangle her bitter sorrow.

VII.

On the day succeeding the battle of Sedan the mighty hosts of the two German armies, without the delay of a moment, commenced their march on Paris, the army of the Meuse coming in by the north through the valley of the Marne, while the third army, passing the Seine at Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, turned the city to the south and moved on Versailles; and when, on that bright, warm September morning, General Ducrot, to whom had been assigned the command of the as yet incomplete 14th corps, determined to attack the latter force while it was marching by the flank, Maurice’s new regiment, the 115th, encamped in the woods to the left of Meudon, did not receive its orders to advance until the day was lost. A few shells from the enemy sufficed to do the work; the panic started with a regiment of zouaves made up of raw recruits, and quickly spreading to the other troops, all were swept away in a headlong rout that never ceased until they were safe behind the walls of Paris, where the utmost consternation prevailed. Every position in advance of the southern line of fortifications was lost, and that evening the wires of the Western Railway telegraph, the city’s sole remaining means of communicating with the rest of France, were cut. Paris was cut off from the world.

The condition of their affairs caused Maurice a terrible dejection. Had the Germans been more enterprising they might have pitched their tents that night in the Place du Carrousel, but with the prudence of their race they had determined that the siege should be conducted according to rule and precept, and had already fixed upon the exact lines of investment, the position of the army of the Meuse being at the north, stretching from Croissy to the Marne, through Epinay, the cordon of the third army at the south, from Chennevieres to Chatillon and Bougival, while general headquarters, with King William, Bismarck, and General von Moltke, were established at Versailles. The gigantic blockade, that no one believed could be successfully completed, was an accomplished fact; the city, with its girdle of fortifications eight leagues and a half in length, embracing fifteen forts and six detached redoubts, was henceforth to be transformed into a huge prison-pen. And the army of the defenders comprised only the 13th corps, commanded by General Vinoy, and the 14th, then in process of reconstruction under General Ducrot, the two aggregating an effective strength of eighty thousand men; to which were to be added fourteen thousand sailors, fifteen thousand of the francs corps, and a hundred and fifteen thousand mobiles, not to mention the three hundred thousand National Guards distributed among the sectional divisions of the ramparts. If this seems like a large force it must be remembered that there were few seasoned and trained soldiers among its numbers. Men were constantly being drilled and equipped; Paris was a great intrenched camp. The preparations for the defense went on from hour to hour with feverish haste; roads were built, houses demolished within the military zone; the two hundred siege guns and the twenty-five hundred pieces of lesser caliber were mounted in position, other guns were cast; an arsenal, complete in every detail, seemed to spring from the earth under the tireless efforts of Dorian, the patriotic war minister. When, after the rupture of the negotiations at Ferrieres, Jules Favre acquainted the country with M. von Bismarck’s demands — the cession of Alsace, the garrison of Strasbourg to be surrendered, three milliards of indemnity — a cry of rage went up and the continuation of the war was demanded by acclaim as a condition indispensable to the country’s existence. Even with no hope of victory Paris must defend herself in order that France might live.

On a Sunday toward the end of September Maurice was detailed to carry a message to the further end of the city, and what he witnessed along the streets he passed through filled him with new hope. Ever since the defeat of Chatillon it had seemed to him that the courage of the people was rising to a level with the great task that lay before them. Ah! that Paris that he had known so thoughtless, so wayward, so keen in the pursuit of pleasure; he found it now quite changed, simple, earnest, cheerfully brave, ready for every sacrifice. Everyone was in uniform; there was scarce a head that was not decorated with the
kepi
of the National Guard. Business of every sort had come to a sudden standstill, as the hands of a watch cease to move when the mainspring snaps, and at the public meetings, among the soldiers in the guard-room, or where the crowds collected in the streets, there was but one subject of conversation, inflaming the hearts and minds of all — the determination to conquer. The contagious influence of illusion, scattered broadcast, unbalanced weaker minds; the people were tempted to acts of generous folly by the tension to which they were subjected. Already there was a taint of morbid, nervous excitability in the air, a feverish condition in which men’s hopes and fears alike became distorted and exaggerated, arousing the worst passions of humanity at the slightest breath of suspicion. And Maurice was witness to a scene in the Rue des Martyrs that produced a profound impression on him, the assault made by a band of infuriated men on a house from which, at one of the upper windows, a bright light had been displayed all through the night, a signal, evidently, intended to reach the Prussians at Bellevue over the roofs of Paris. There were jealous citizens who spent all their nights on their house-tops, watching what was going on around them. The day before a poor wretch had had a narrow escape from drowning at the hands of the mob, merely because he had opened a map of the city on a bench in the Tuileries gardens and consulted it.