War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [172]
“Une leçon de géographie,” he said, as if to himself, but loudly enough to be heard.
Przebyszewski, with deferential but dignified politeness, put his hand to his ear towards Weyrother, having the air of a man whose attention is absorbed. The short Dokhturov sat directly opposite Weyrother with a diligent and modest look, and, bending over the spread-out map, conscientiously studied the disposition and the unfamiliar terrain. He asked Weyrother several times to repeat words he had not heard properly and the difficult names of the villages. Weyrother did as he asked, and Dokhturov wrote them down.
When the reading, which lasted more than an hour, was over, Langeron again stopped the snuffbox and, without looking at Weyrother or anyone in particular, began speaking about the difficulty of following such a disposition, in which the position of the enemy is assumed to be known, when that position may not be known to us, since the enemy is on the move. Langeron’s objections were well-founded, but it was obvious that the purpose of those objections consisted primarily in bringing it home to General Weyrother, who had read his disposition with such self-assurance, as if to schoolboys, that he had to do not with mere fools, but with people who could give him lessons in military matters. When the monotonous sound of Weyrother’s voice fell silent, Kutuzov opened his eyes, like a miller who wakes up at an interruption of the soporific sound of the mill wheels, listened to what Langeron was saying, and—as if to say, “Ah, you’re still going on about these stupidities!”—quickly closed his eyes and lowered his head still more.
Trying to offend Weyrother as stingingly as he could in his amour propre as a military author, Langeron demonstrated that Bonaparte could easily attack, instead of being attacked, and thereby make this disposition totally useless. Weyrother responded to all his objections with a firm, contemptuous smile, obviously prepared beforehand for every objection, regardless of what might be said to him.
“If he could attack us, he would have done so today,” he said.
“You think, then, that he is powerless?” asked Langeron.
“He has forty thousand men, if that,” Weyrother replied, with the smile of a doctor being told by a wise woman how to treat a patient.
“In that case he’s going to his destruction by waiting for our attack,” Langeron said with a subtle, ironic smile, again glancing for support to Miloradovich, who was nearest to him.
But at that moment Miloradovich was obviously thinking least of all of what the generals were arguing about.
“Ma foi,” he said, “tomorrow we’ll see it all on the battlefield.”
Weyrother again smiled that same ironic smile, which said that to him it was ridiculous and strange to meet objections from Russian generals and prove that of which he was not only all too well assured himself, but of which he had assured the two emperors.
“The enemy has put out his fires, and a continual noise is heard from his camp,” he said. “What does that mean? Either he is retreating, which is the one thing we should fear, or he is changing his position” (he smiled). “But even if he takes up a position in Thuerassa, he is only saving us a great deal of trouble, and all orders, to the smallest detail, remain the same.”
“But how is that?…” said Prince Andrei, who had already been waiting a long time for a chance to express his doubts.
Kutuzov woke up, cleared his throat loudly, and glanced around