The Debacle - Emile Zola [167]
‘Sir,’ a Zouave told Rochas, ‘we found those Prussian sods in the middle of sacking everything. You can see we’ve put paid to their account… Only the buggers always come back ten to one, and it’s not going to be a picnic.’
Three other bodies of Prussian soldiers were laid out on the terrace. As Henriette was staring at them, doubtless thinking of her husband, also lying over there and disfigured with blood and dirt, a bullet hit a tree just behind her. Jean darted forward.
‘Don’t stay there! Quick, quick, hide in the house!’
Now that he had seen her again, looking so changed and overcome with distress, his heart was bursting with pity as he remembered how she had struck him only the day before, a smiling housewife. At first he had not found anything to say to her, not knowing even whether she recognized him. He would have liked to devote himself to her and bring back into her life some peace and joy.
‘Wait for us inside… as soon as there is any danger we’ll find a way of getting you out up that way.’
She made a gesture of indifference.
‘What’s the use?’
But her brother was urging her too, and she had to go up the steps and stay a minute inside the hall, whence she could see right down the avenue. From then on she watched all the fighting.
Maurice and Jean were standing behind one of the nearest elms. The century-old trunks were gigantic and could easily provide cover for two men. Further off bugler Gaude had joined Lieutenant Rochas, who was obstinately hanging on to the flag as there was nobody to entrust it to, and he had set it down next to him against the tree while he fired his rifle. Each tree-trunk had its man, and all along the avenue Zouaves, chasseurs and marines kept behind cover except when they poked out their heads to fire.
In the little wood opposite the number of Prussians must have been steadily building up, for their fire was getting heavier. There was nothing to be seen except an occasional glimpse of a man dashing from one tree to another. A country house with green shutters was also occupied by snipers who were firing out of the open ground-floor windows. It was now about four o’clock, and the sound of gunfire was slackening and gradually stopping, and yet here men were still killing each other as though in some personal feud down in this remote dingle, from which the white flag hoisted on the Keep could not be seen. Right on until it was dark, and despite the armistice, there were pockets of fighting going obstinately on like this, and rifle fire went on in the Fond-de-Givonne district and the gardens of Petit-Pont.
For a long time they went on riddling each other with bullets from one side of the valley to the other. Now and again any man who was unwise enough to emerge from cover went down with a bullet through his body. Three more were killed in the avenue. One wounded man had fallen on his face and was gasping horribly, but nobody dreamed of turning him over to relieve his agony.
Looking up suddenly Jean saw Henriette who had calmly come back and was slipping a sack under the poor devil’s head by way of a pillow after she had turned him over on to his back. He rushed and pulled her roughly back behind the tree where he was sheltering with Maurice.
‘Are you trying to get yourself killed?’
She did not seem to realize how rash she was.
‘No, of course not… But it makes me frightened, being alone in that hall… I’d rather be outside.’
And so she stayed with them. They made her sit down at their feet against the tree while they went on firing their last rounds right and left with such fury that all fear and fatigue had gone. They had reached a state of complete unawareness and were acting automatically, with nothing in their