Les miserables (Abridged) - Victor Hugo [138]
We have spoken of the catastrophe of the sunken road to Ohain. The heart almost sinks with terror at the thought of such a death for so many brave men.
There, where this terrible death-rattle had been, all was now silent. The cut of the sunken road was filled with horses and riders inextricably heaped together. Terrible entanglement. There were no longer slopes to the road; dead bodies filled it even with the plain and came to the edge of the banks like a well-measured bushel of barley. A mass of dead above, a river of blood below—such was this road on the evening of the 18th of June, 1815. The blood ran as far as the Nivelles road, and oozed through in a large pool in front of the abattis of trees, which barred that road, at a spot which is still shown. It was, it will be remembered, at the opposite point towards the road from Genappe, that the burying of the cuirassiers took place. The thickness of the mass of bodies was proportioned to the depth of the hollow road. Towards the middle, at a spot where it became shallower, over which Delord’s division had passed, this bed of death became thinner.
The night prowler which we have just introduced to the reader went in this direction. He ferreted through this immense grave. He looked about. He passed an indescribably hideous review of the dead. He walked with his feet in blood.
Suddenly he stopped.
A few steps before him, in the sunken road, at a point where the mound of corpses ended, from under this mass of men and horses appeared an open hand, lighted by the moon.
This hand had something upon a finger which sparkled: it was a gold ring. The man stooped down, remained a moment, and when he rose again there was no ring upon that hand.
He did not rise up precisely; he remained in a sinister and startled attitude, turning his back to the pile of dead, scrutinising the horizon, on his knees, all the front of his body being supported on his two fore-fingers, his head raised just enough to peep above the edge of the hollow road. The four paws of the jackal are adapted to certain actions.
Then, deciding upon his course, he arose.
At this moment he experienced a shock. He felt that he was held from behind.
He turned; it was the open hand, which had closed, seizing the lapel of his overcoat.
An honest man would have been frightened. This man began to laugh.
“Oh,” said he, “it’s only the dead man. I like a ghost better than a gendarme.”
However, the hand relaxed and let go its hold. Strength is soon exhausted in the tomb.
“Ah ha!” returned the prowler, “is this dead man alive? Let us see.”
He bent over again, rummaged among the heap, removed whatever impeded him, seized the hand, laid hold of the arm, disengaged the head, drew out the body, and some moments after dragged into the shadow of the hollow road an inanimate man, at least one who was senseless. It was a cavalryman, an officer; an officer, also, of some rank; a great gold epaulet protruded from beneath his cuirass, but he had no helmet. A furious sabre cut had disfigured his face, where nothing but blood was to be seen. It did not seem, however, that he had any limbs broken; and by some happy chance, if the word is possible here, the bodies were arched above him in such a way as to prevent his being crushed. His eyes were closed.
He had on his cuirass the silver cross of the Legion of Honour.
The prowler tore off this cross, which disappeared in one of the gulfs which he had under his coat.
After which he felt the officer’s fob, found a watch there, and took it. Then he rummaged in his vest and found a purse, which he pocketed.
When he had reached this phase of the succour he was lending the dying man, the officer opened his eyes.
“Thanks,” said he feebly.
The rough movements of the man handling him, the coolness