War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [626]
Obviously, the Russian nest was devastated and destroyed; but beyond the destruction of the Russian order of life, Pierre felt unconsciously that the French had established their own quite different but firm order over this devastated nest. He felt it by the look of the soldiers who, marching briskly and cheerfully in regular ranks, escorted him along with the other criminals; he felt it by the look of some important French official in a carriage-and-pair, driven by a soldier, who came in the opposite direction. He felt it by the cheerful sounds of regimental music coming from the left side of the field, and he felt it and realized it especially by the list which, in the roll call of the prisoners, was read out by the French officer who had arrived that morning. Pierre had been arrested by one group of soldiers, had been taken to one place and then another with dozens of other people; it seemed they might have forgotten him or confused him with others. But no: the answers he had given at the interrogation came back to him in the form of his designation: celui qui n’avoue pas son nom. And under this designation, which frightened Pierre, he was now led somewhere by people on whose faces was written the unquestioning certainty that all the other prisoners and he himself were precisely the necessary ones, and were being taken to the necessary place. Pierre felt like an insignificant chip of wood fallen into the wheels of a machine unknown to him but functioning well.
Pierre and the other criminals were taken to the right side of the Devichye field, not far from the convent, to a big white house with a huge garden. This was the house of Prince Shcherbatov, in which Pierre had often visited the owner, and in which, as he learned from the conversation of the soldiers, the marshal, the duke of Eckmühl, was now installed.
They were led up to the porch and brought into the house one by one. Pierre was brought in sixth. Through the glassed-in gallery, the front hall, the anteroom, familiar to Pierre, he was led into a long, low study, at the door to which stood an adjutant.
Davout was sitting at the end of the room, over a table, with spectacles on his nose. Pierre went up close to him. Davout, not raising his eyes, was evidently examining some document that lay before him. Without raising his eyes, he asked softly:
“Qui êtes-vous?”*672
Pierre was silent, because he was unable to utter a word. For Pierre, Davout was not simply a French general; for Pierre, Davout was a man known for his cruelty. Looking at the cold face of Davout, who, like a stern teacher, agreed to be patient for a time and wait for an answer, Pierre felt that every second of delay might cost him his life; but he did not know what to say. He did not dare to say what he had said at the first interrogation; to reveal his title and position was both dangerous and shameful. Pierre was silent. But before he had time to decide on something, Davout raised his head, raised his spectacles to his forehead, narrowed his eyes, and looked fixedly at Pierre.
“I know this man,” he said in a measured and cold voice, obviously calculated to frighten Pierre. The chill that had run down Pierre’s spine earlier, now seized his head as in a vice.
“Mon général, vous ne pouvez pas me connaître, je ne vous ai jamais vu…”†673
“C’est un espion russe,”‡674 Davout interrupted him, addressing another general who was in the room and whom