War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [674]
The last days of October were the hottest time of the partisan war. The initial period of this war—a time when the partisans, surprised at their own boldness, were afraid every moment of being caught and surrounded by the French, and hid in the forest without unsaddling their horses and hardly ever dismounting, expecting every moment to be pursued—had already passed. Now this war was already defined; it had become clear to everyone what could and could not be undertaken with the French. Now only those leaders of detachments who had staffs, followed rules, and moved about at a distance from the French considered many things impossible. The small partisan groups, who had long been in action and watched the French from close-up, considered things possible that the leaders of large detachments did not dare to think of. The Cossacks and the peasants, who got in among the French, considered that anything was now possible.
On the twenty-second of October, Denisov, being one of the partisans, found himself with his party in the very heat of partisan passion. He and his party had been on the move since morning. All day, from the forest stretching along the high road, he had been watching a large French transport of cavalry supplies and Russian prisoners, which was separated from the rest of the army and, under heavy cover, as was known from scouts and prisoners, was heading for Smolensk. Not only Denisov and Dolokhov (also a partisan with a small party, who moved about close to Denisov), but the leaders of large detachments with staffs as well—all of them knew about this transport and, as Denisov said, were whetting their teeth for it. Two of these large detachment leaders—one a Pole, the other a German—almost simultaneously sent Denisov an invitation to join each of their detachments, in order to attack the transport.
“No, brother, I’ve been around long enough,” said Denisov, having read these papers, and he wrote to the German that, despite his heartfelt wish to serve under the command of such a valiant and famous general, he had to deprive himself of that happiness, because he had already put himself under the command of the Pole. To the Polish general he wrote the same, informing him that he had already put himself under the German’s command.2
Having arranged things in this way, Denisov, together with Dolokhov, intended, without reporting to the higher command, to attack and take this transport with their own small forces. The transport was going, on the twenty-second of October, from the village of Mikulino to the village of Shamshevo. To the left of the road from Mikulino to Shamshevo there were big forests, in some places coming right down to the road, in some moving back from the road to a distance of half a mile or more. Denisov and his party had been moving through these forests all day, now going deep into the middle of them, now riding out into the open, not losing sight of the moving French. In the morning, not far from Mikulino, where the forest came close to the road, Cossacks from Denisov’s party had captured two wagons of cavalry saddles that were bogged down in the mud, and had driven them into the forest. From then on until evening, the party, without attacking, had followed the movement of the French. They had, without frightening them, to let them go peacefully as far as Shamshevo and then, joining up with Dolokhov, who was to arrive by evening for a meeting at a guardhouse (a mile from Shamshevo), to fall upon them at dawn,