The Debacle - Emile Zola [237]
‘The bugger’s eaten half my finger,’ growled Cabasse, whose hand was bleeding. ‘I must break something of his.’
He was already pointing the revolver, which he had picked up, but Sambuc disarmed him.
‘No, no! Don’t act silly! We’re not brigands, we’re judges… Do you hear, you Prussian filth, we’re going to give you a trial, and don’t you fear, we respect the right to a defence… You’re not going to defend yourself, though, because if we took your muzzle off you’d shout the place down. But in a minute I’ll give you an advocate, and a first class one!’
He found three chairs and put them in a row, then arranged what he called the tribunal, with himself in the middle and his two henchmen on his right and left. All three took their seats and then he stood up again and began speaking with a mock dignity which, however, gradually swelled and grew into avenging anger.
‘I am both presiding judge and public prosecutor. That’s not quite in order, but there are not enough of us… So: I accuse you of coming to spy on us in France and thus repaying us for the bread eaten at our tables with the most odious treachery. For you are the prime cause of the disaster, you are the traitor who, after the fight at Nouart, guided the Bavarians to Beaumont by night through the Dieulet woods. To do that it needed a man who had lived a long time in the district and got to know even the smallest paths, and we are quite convinced that you were seen guiding the artillery along some dreadful tracks like rivers of mud, in which they had to harness eight horses to each piece of equipment. When you see these roads again it is unbelievable, and you wonder how an army corps could possibly have gone that way. If it hadn’t been for you and the criminal way you did well for yourself out of us and then betrayed us, the surprise at Beaumont would not have happened, we should never have gone to Sedan and perhaps we might have licked you in the end. And I’m not going into the disgusting job you are still doing, the nerve with which you come back here in triumph, denouncing and terrorizing poor people… You are the lowest of the low, I demand the penalty of death.’
There was a hushed silence. He resumed his seat and then said:
‘I nominate Ducat to defend you… He has been in the law and he would have gone a long way if it hadn’t been for his passions. So you see I’m not refusing you anything and we are being very considerate.’
Goliath, who could not move even a finger, turned his eyes towards his makeshift counsel for the defence. His eyes were the only living part of him left, and they were eyes of burning supplication beneath a livid forehead dripping great drops of anguished sweat in spite of the cold.
‘Gentlemen,’ said Ducat, rising to make his plea, ‘my client is indeed the most stinking of rogues, and I would not undertake to defend him were it not my duty to point out in mitigation that they are all like that in his country…
‘Look at him, you can see by his eyes that he is quite amazed. He doesn’t realize his crime. In France we only touch our spies with tongs, but in his country spying is a very honourable career, a meritorious way of serving one’s country… I will even go so far as to say, gentlemen, that they may not be wrong. Our noble sentiments do us honour, but unfortunately they have led us to defeat. If I may so express it, quos vult perdere Jupiter dementat… You will appreciate the point of that, Gentlemen.’
He resumed his seat, and Sambuc went on:
‘And you, Cabasse, have you anything to say for or against the accused?’
‘What I have to say,’ cried the southerner, ‘is that we don’t need all this lot of balls to settle this bugger’s hash… I’ve had quite a lot of troubles in my time, but I don’t like joking about things to do with justice, it’s unlucky… Death! Death!’
Sambuc solemnly rose to his feet again.
‘So this is the sentence you both pass – death?’
‘Yes, yes,