The Debacle - Emile Zola [87]
The day before, in the morning, Delaherche, learning that the army was to pass through Mouzon, had been out with Weiss, his book-keeper, for the drive that old Fouchard had mentioned to Maurice. Tall and heavily built, with a high colour, strong nose and thick lips, he was an outgoing kind of man with the middle-class Frenchman’s enjoyment and interest in watching fine parades of troops. Having been told by the chemist at Mouzon that the Emperor was at Baybel farmhouse, he had gone up as far as there, had seen him, and even almost spoken to him – quite a thrilling adventure that he had never stopped narrating since his return. But what a terrible return it was, through the panic at Beaumont and on the roads blocked with fugitives! A score of times the carriage had nearly capsized in ditches, and it was dark before the two men had made their way back through ever recurring obstacles. This pleasure jaunt, the army that Delaherche had travelled two leagues to see go by and which carried him brutally back in the stampede of its retreat, this whole unforeseen and tragic tale had made him say ten times over on the way back:
‘And to think that I thought it was marching to Verdun and didn’t want to miss the chance of seeing it! Well, I’ve seen it now, and I think we’re going to see it at Sedan, and more of it than we want!’
That morning he was awakened at five by the 7th corps going through the town with the loud noise of open sluice-gates. He had dressed with all speed, and the first person he saw in the Place Turenne proved to be Captain Beaudoin. The year before, in Charleville, the captain had been one of pretty Madame Maginot’s group of intimates, and Gilberte had introduced him before their marriage. A story had formerly gone the whispered rounds that the captain, having no favour left to desire, had withdrawn with tactful delicacy in favour of the cloth manufacturer, not wanting to stand between his mistress and the very great fortune which was coming her way.
‘What, you!’ exclaimed Delaherche. ‘Good Lord, what a state you’re in!’
Beaudoin, normally so correct and well groomed, was in fact in a lamentable condition, with dirty uniform and black hands and face. He was exasperated at having fallen in with some Turcos and couldn’t understand how he had lost his own company. Like everybody else, he was dropping with hunger and fatigue, but that was not what caused his most acute misery; what put him out most of all was not having changed his shirt since Rheims.
‘Just think of it!’ he at once began moaning. ‘They lost my luggage at Vouziers. Fools and rogues, I’d break their necks if I got hold of them!… Nothing left, not even a handkerchief or a pair of socks! It’s enough to drive you mad, it really is!’
Delaherche at once insisted on taking him to his own home, but he demurred: oh no, he didn’t even look human, he didn’t want to give everybody a fright. Delaherche had to swear that neither his wife nor his mother would be up yet. And besides, he would give him soap and water, clean underclothes, in fact anything he needed.
It was striking seven when Captain Beaudoin, all washed and brushed up, wearing one of the husband’s shirts under his uniform, appeared in the grey-panelled dining-room with its lofty ceiling. Madame Delaherche senior was there already, for she always rose at dawn in spite of her seventy-eight years. She was quite white, and her nose had got even more pointed and her mouth never laughed now in her long, thin face. She rose to her feet and was exceedingly polite, inviting the captain to sit down in front of one of the cups of coffee and milk already poured out.
‘But perhaps, sir, you would rather have some meat and wine after such a tiring time?’
He protested.
‘No, thank you very much indeed, Madame, just some milk and bread and butter, that would suit me best.