The Debacle - Emile Zola [220]
But in the papers brought by Dr Dalichamp Bazaine was still the great man, the gallant soldier by whom France still expected to be saved. Jean made her re-read certain passages in order to grasp how the third German army, with the Crown Prince of Prussia, had been able to pursue them while the first and second were blocking Metz, both of them so strong in men and guns that it had been possible to take some from them and form this fourth army which, under the command of the Crown Prince of Saxony, had made the disaster of Sedan certain. When at last he understood, on this bed of pain to which his wound pinned him down, he forced himself to go on hoping.
‘So that’s it, we weren’t the strongest!… Never mind, they give the figures, Bazaine has got a hundred and fifty thousand men, three hundred thousand rifles and more than five hundred guns, and I bet you he’s got something good for them up his sleeve!’
Henriette nodded and agreed with his opinion so as not to depress him still more. She was all at sea in these vast troop movements, but she had a presentiment that disaster was inevitable. Her voice stayed clear and bright and she could have gone on reading for hours just for the happiness of interesting him. But sometimes in a report about slaughter her voice would falter and her eyes suddenly fill with tears. No doubt it reminded her of her husband shot out there and kicked against the wall by the Bavarian officer.
‘If it upsets you too much,’ said Jean in surprise, ‘don’t go on reading about battles.’
She recovered her gentle kindness at once.
‘No, no, I’m sorry, it really gives me pleasure too.’
One evening at the beginning of October, while a gale was blowing outside, she returned from the hospital and came into the room in great excitement.
‘A letter from Maurice! The doctor has just given it to me.’
Each morning they had both been increasingly worried because he was not showing any sign of life; and especially as for a good week now it had been rumoured that Paris was completely invested, they were giving up hope of getting any news and were anxiously wondering what could have happened to him since he left Rouen. Now there was an explanation of this silence, for the letter he had sent from Paris addressed to Dr Dalichamp on 18 September, the very day when the last trains left for Havre, had gone an enormous way round and only reached its destination by a miracle, having been mislaid a score of times on the way.
‘Oh, good lad!’ beamed Jean. ‘Read it quick.’
The wind redoubled its fury, banging the window like a battering-ram. Henriette stood the lamp on the table by the bed and began to read, so close to Jean that their hair touched. It was so peaceful and happy in that quiet room with the storm roaring outside.
It was a long letter of eight pages in which Maurice first explained how as soon as he had arrived on the 16th he had been fortunate enough to get into a regiment of the line which was being brought up to strength. Then he went on to facts and wrote with extraordinary passion about what he had learned of the happenings of that terrible month – Paris coming back to normality after the painful shock of Wissembourg and Froeschwiller and once again relapsing into self-deception and entertaining hopes of a revenge, the legend of the victorious army, Bazaine in command, a mass rising against the foe, imaginary victories, huge slaughters of Prussians which even ministers reported in the Chamber. And then he went on to say how once again a bombshell had burst in Paris on 3 September, and hopes were dashed, and the city, confident in its ignorance, had been overwhelmed by the relentless blows