The Debacle - Emile Zola [22]
‘Well, what the hell,’ Loubet shouted at the top of his voice with his Cockney laugh, ‘but all the same we aren’t marching to Berlin!’
To Berlin! To Berlin! Maurice could still hear that cry yelled by the milling crowds on the boulevards during that night of wild excitement which had made him decide to enlist. The wind had changed in a violent storm and here was a terrible about-turn: the whole temperament of the race showed itself in this sublime confidence suddenly crashing down at the very first reverse into the despair which galloped away with these lost soldiers, defeated and scattered before ever striking a blow.
‘Oh this rifle’s sawing off my paws!’ Loubet went on, once again changing shoulders, ‘and there’s a bleeding tin whistle that can go for a walk!’
Then, referring to the sum he had been paid as a replacement:
‘All the same, fifteen hundred francs for this job is daylight robbery! That rich bloke I’m going to get killed for must be enjoying some lovely pipes at his fireside!’
‘What about me,’ Chouteau groused. ‘I had served my time and was just getting out. Well, ’struth, no luck at all to fall into the shit like this!’
He swung his rifle impatiently, then he too flung it violently over the hedge.
‘There, off you go, you fucking tool!’
The rifle turned two somersaults and landed in a furrow where it lay at full length, still as a corpse. Others were already flying to join it. Soon the field was full of weapons lying there stiff and forlorn beneath the sweltering sun. An infectious madness spread, hunger was twisting their guts, boots were hurting their feet, this march was a torture, with unforeseen defeat growling threateningly in their rear. Nothing good left to expect, their leaders losing their grip, the commissariat not even feeding them, anger, frustration, desire to have done with it at once, before even beginning. So what! Let their guns join their packs. In a silly burst of temper and amid the gigglings of a lot of grinning idiots, the guns flew away all down the long, long tail of stragglers stretching back over the countryside.
Before getting rid of his, Loubet made it twirl round beautifully, like a drum-major’s stick. Lapoulle, seeing all his mates chucking theirs away, must have thought it was part of the drill, so he imitated their movements. But Pache, in a confused sense of duty to his religious upbringing, refused to do the same and had insults heaped on him by Chouteau, who called him a priest’s baby.
‘Look at that creep! All because his old cow of a mother made him swallow Our Father every Sunday! Why don’t you go and serve Mass, you’re too scared to be with your mates!’
Maurice marched on in sullen silence, head down under the scorching sky. All that was left was to go on in a nightmare of atrocious weariness, haunted by phantoms, as though he were going on into an abyss straight in front of him. His whole upbringing as an educated man was collapsing and he was sinking to the low level of these creatures round him.
‘Yes,’ he suddenly said to Chouteau, ‘you’re right!’
He had already put his rifle down on a heap of stones when Jean, who was vainly trying to check this disgraceful abandoning of arms, saw him. He went straight for him:
‘Pick up that gun of yours at once, at once, do you hear?’
A flood of terrible rage surged up into Jean’s face. Usually so placid, always for conciliation, he now had eyes blazing and spoke with the voice of thunderous authority. His men had never seen him like this, and they stood still in amazement.
‘Pick up that gun at once or you’ll have me to deal with!’
Shaken, Maurice uttered only one word, which he meant to sound insulting:
‘Clodhopper!’
‘Clodhopper! Yes, a clodhopper is what I am, and you are a grand gent! And that’s why you’re a swine, yes, a filthy swine!