Kitabı oku: «Moscow: A Story of the French Invasion of 1812», sayfa 11

CHAPTER XXVII

Napoleon and his Grand Army had been starved out of Moscow; they had made their futile attempt to destroy the Kremlin, they had delivered their last savage onslaught upon the inhabitants, lighted the last fire, desecrated the last church, exploded the last mine, insulted the last woman; they had manœuvred in the direction of St. Petersburg and of the rich Volga provinces in order to cover the movements of the main force, and finally they had thrown to the winds all subterfuge and frankly made off with all speed towards the frontier and France, leaving behind them a city of smoke and of fire, of starvation, of desertion and of the dead. Within the cathedrals was the stench of stabled horses, with all the filth attendant thereon. Dead bodies of men and women, of horses and dogs, lay about the streets unremoved. Scarcely a house within a twelve-mile radius of the centre of the city but was wholly or partially burned, pillaged, and its contents pulled hither and thither and destroyed.

Scarcely had the last Frenchman left the place to its silence and emptiness when back into this city of death and destruction began to creep, cautiously, at first, but presently to crowd into each gate that gave access within the walls, a dense mob of her banished inhabitants, each anxious to make his way to the quarter of the city in which his home had existed a month ago. Would it be found standing now? Of the Lares and Penates left behind in the terror and stress of sudden departure, would anything be left to him?

The great majority found their houses burned. Those whose four walls were still standing found their homes sacked and looted, their possessions ruthlessly destroyed and themselves ruined.

From end to end of Moscow a wail of despair arose and continued day long, for in the city proper, out of 6,000 wooden houses 4,500 were burned down, while of the 2,500 brick dwellings which had existed before the fires, only 500 now remained standing.

But meanwhile the last of the retiring French were leaving the city by the Borovitsky Gate, and here, at the very first opportunity, began the stupendous anguish of their terrible retreat. For from the first they marched from ambush to ambush, from disaster to disaster, through miseries of frost and hunger and sleeplessness and unceasing attack in flank and rear. Truly the avenging of Moscow began from her very gates.

Vera Demidof came with the rest of the returning fugitives into Moscow, came—like thousands of others—to find that the house in the Sloboda had been looted and wrecked, though the fire had not reached it. Vera had hurried back to Moscow, however, not from any anxiety as to the family mansion or its contents, she came because she had ascertained from Sasha Maximof that his regiment was to be one of those which should first engage the retreating French beyond the walls of Moscow.

"Just to hurry them up and see them safely off the premises," Sasha had laughingly expressed it but yesterday, paying her a hurried visit at the village to which she had retired on leaving Moscow.

Indeed, as the crowds of Muscovites entered the city at one side, the roar of cannon from the opposite end of the town, beyond the Borovitsky Gate, gave grim evidence that the Frenchmen were not being permitted to march away in peace and impunity.

"If you should be wounded outside Moscow, send me word," Vera had said at parting. She felt depressed and inclined to expect disaster, though she was not one to indulge weakly and without resistance in presentiments; Vera's healthy intelligence was accustomed to look upon such things as foolishness.

"Why do you expect me to get hurt?" Sasha had laughed. "When my time comes I shall die, but I do not think that is yet, Vera. There is something I am determined to achieve before I finish with life—can you guess what it is?"

Vera did not attempt to guess. "You are always getting hurt," she laughed. "Send me word by a soldier if you are clumsy enough to stand in the way of a French bullet." Vera laughed though she spoke with a full heart.

In consequence of this conversation, Sasha actually wrote Vera's address upon a slip of paper which he gave to a trooper in his regiment, bidding him keep an eye upon him and ride back to Moscow quickly, if he should fall, in order to tell the lady named in the written address of what had occurred. When, later in the day, Sasha's regiment received orders to charge from their cover a body of French foot-guards, the trooper to whose care Sasha had entrusted his slip of paper and who rode close at Sasha's stirrup saw a notable sight.

In the mélée he heard a French officer call gaily to the Count Maximof:—

"Hi," he cried, "mon ami, Maximof, here am I, let us finish that old matter".

Sasha had turned his horse, and with an exclamation made straight for the Frenchman, at whom he lunged and struck with his sabre. But the Frenchman skilfully dodged his blows, and watching his opportunity planted a thrust of his bayonet which entered the Count's body and tumbled him off his horse senseless.

"Aha!" the Frenchman cried, "that was more than I meant; what will the fair Vera say!" Almost at the same moment a Russian trooper rode this French officer down, and the messenger himself dealt him a whack with his sword that half severed his left arm at the shoulder.

After this the stress of battle separated the trooper from these two fallen men, but when the fight was done and the Frenchmen had gone forward, pursued by the Russian mounted men, the trooper, whose name was Markof, returned to the spot to see how the Count fared. Here he found the Frenchman actually giving Maximof a drink from his flask, talking to him the while in French and laughing; Maximof's eyes were open, but he breathed with difficulty.

Markof spoke to him, saying he would now ride back to the address given upon his paper, which name and address he read aloud in order to make sure he had it right.

"Ah, ah!" said the Frenchman, "Vera Demidof—good—go back and tell her, my friend, that there are two who wish to see her before they die. Sapristi, we are in luck, Maximof, both of us!"

At this the Count smiled, but said nothing, being apparently very weak. Presently he shut his eyes and swooned.

"Go, my friend, I will keep him alive till she comes," said the Frenchman, and away went Markof upon his mission.

Vera received the messenger, pale but dry-eyed and resolute.

"He is alive?" she asked. Markof nodded.

"When I left," he said; "but he is bad, lady; do not expect too much. A Frenchman sits by his side, wounded also, who has undertaken to keep him alive with brandy until you come. They seem to know one another."

Vera looked puzzled for a minute, then her face brightened.

"I am ready," she said, "and my droshka is ready, we will go at once."

Markof led the way to the spot in which Sasha had fallen. Amid the dead and dying around they found Paul de Tourelle dozing, but Sasha had disappeared. Paul opened his eyes at the sound of their voices.

"Ah! the fair Vera," he said; "I am glad I have lived long enough to see you; I am desolate, Mademoiselle, by reason of your treatment of me, yet I forgive you. Your friend Maximof has been taken by Russian peasants to the village yonder; me they left, after bestowing a great whack upon my head with a bludgeon—Maximof is alive; he–" Paul's head drooped and he closed his eyes. He had spoken gaily, but his voice came faintly and in gasps.

"Markof, my friend, go to the village and find the Count Maximof," said Vera. "I will come very soon. See that I am shown the right house without delay when I arrive."

Vera took the flask which lay at Paul's feet; she administered a drop or two of its contents to the swooning man. He opened his eyes and smiled.

"This is the irony of fate, Mademoiselle Vera—two splendid lovers, and both to lie dying. I am glad to see you again. Mon Dieu, how I loved you in Paris! I have never yet loved faithfully, but in you I thought I had at length found my destiny."

"Monsieur, can I ease your pain, is there anything I can do for you?" said Vera.

"Ma mie, I am past praying for; tell me, were you near loving me in Paris? Sapristi, but for this war I believe we should have come together. You are lucky, Mademoiselle, to have escaped me. I am not one of the constant ones. Perhaps Maximof is different, he is slow and stolid and perhaps faithful, not like us Frenchmen—we are like the bubbles in champagne—we come and go—I pray that Maximof may live." Paul's head drooped again and his eyes closed. Vera thought he was dead. She bent and kissed his forehead, preparing to depart. De Tourelle opened his eyes again.

"Was that a kiss?" he murmured. "Ah, I was right—you might have loved me, but for my ill-fortune when you overheard me ask for Clotilde—ha ha! do you remember? That was accursed bad luck, indeed! To go to the house of the beautiful, the chaste Vera Demidof, not knowing it was hers, and to ask for Clotilde!"

Paul spoke very faintly; his words came slowly and more slowly.

"Was it a kiss, or did I dream?" he murmured. "Mademoiselle, I—I did my best to protect Maximof as he lay here—it was for your sake—will you reward me with a kiss? I shall not live to tell of you."

Vera bent and put her lips to his forehead. Paul smiled.

"It is paradise," he murmured. "I die content."

They were his last words. Vera waited a moment or two, then she knelt and prayed, made over the dead man the sign of the cross and departed.

In the village she found a peasant awaiting her. "This is the way, lady," he said, in the obsequious manner of the moujik who expects largess. "It was I that found and brought in the gentleman. Lord, he is handsome—and heavy also!"

Vera gave the man money. "Is he alive—is he alive?" she said—"speak quickly!"

"Alive? Lord, yes!" said the moujik, "doing well. We have found a doctor for him and we have not ceased to pray—assuredly he will live, Barishnya!"

The moujik returned to the battlefield, where he spent the night reaping a glorious harvest, with other vultures of his kidney, from the unfortunate dead and dying.

Vera entered the hut.

CHAPTER XXVIII

Marie Havet, née Dupré, was much surprised and somewhat concerned on the evening of the day upon which Louise had found, to her almost uncontrollable joy and relief, that Henri was still alive and in Paris when her sister, looking very grave and with signs of tears and past agitation upon her face, drew her aside for a conversation, which, said Louise, must be held absolutely in private. Marie's conscience instantly smote her. She was going to be scolded for saying nothing about the Baron's visit.

"Marie," Louise began, "you may have observed that I returned from the war depressed, not joyous and elated as one returning home after many perils and who has received certain honours and rewards might be expected to be. Did it never occur to you and to my father that this was so?"

"It occurred to both of us, sister, that you were naturally depressed, that your career of success and glory should be already over and that you must return to the ordinary dull routine of home and of the sex to which you belong."

"You were mistaken in the reason, sister. I am tired to death of my uniform, and of masquerading as a man. I shall thank God to be a woman once more as the Seigneur created me. But that is another matter. My depression was due to reasons very different. You may remember to have seen here a certain Baron Henri d'Estreville."

Marie flushed and sat down. Her scolding was coming, then; Louise had somehow heard of the Baron's visit. This was a matter Louise would not easily forgive.

"Yes, I remember him. He came with Monsieur de Tourelle, the finest fencer in Paris, who nevertheless was unable to have the better of our little Louise."

"Bah!—let that pass. With this D'Estreville I fell in love, Marie—why, there is no reason to look surprised. We are women both, you and I; you were not ashamed to love and to marry, why should not I have loved?"

"It is true—it is true," Marie murmured.

"More strange is the fact that the Baron should have returned my love; the darling of Paris, he had been called, Marie; every woman adored him; yet he condescended to feel for me a different sentiment, a pure and deep affection such as no other woman had hitherto inspired in him; imagine it, Marie!"

"Dear Louise, it does not surprise me," said Marie, touched.

"Me, it surprises—delights—transforms. By this circumstance I have been made to see clearly how poor a thing it is that a woman should desire to masquerade as a man; so clearly that now—even though my love-dream is over—I must return to my own sex. I shall never see Henri again, Marie; he lies buried beneath the snows of Russia; I am widowed before I am a wife."

"Louise, what are you saying? Do you imply that D'Estreville is dead, that he died in the war? that–"

"Alas, there is little doubt. Why look you so, Marie? You have not heard otherwise—alas! that is impossible—can you wonder that I returned dejected from the war?"

"Poor Louise!" said Marie, and stopped to think very earnestly. Here was a very difficult question set for her decision. Louise knew nothing, after all, of Henri's visit; was not even aware that he was alive. Would it be better to leave her in ignorance, for her career's sake, or for her heart's sake tell her the good news? There was no doubt as to which alternative old Dupré would choose were he to be asked for his opinion. Marie was proud of her sister's career as a soldier and honestly sorry that it should end, thus, at its beginning. The Emperor would see to it that a new war should follow quickly upon the disastrous campaign just ended; Louise would have plenty of opportunity to rise.

But Louise seemed to have wearied of "masquerading"; she desired to be a woman once more; she had become transformed by love. Would this phase pass and ambition for a soldier's glory dawn again at the first bugle call?

"You will forget your sorrow, maybe," she ventured, "when the trumpet sounds for a new war, which will be soon enough; you will desire to return where glory awaits you."

"Not so, sister; I have done with glory; it is love that I want. I will tell you a secret; when I became substitute for Karl it was indeed in part for your sake, that you might be spared the pain of separation; but there was another motive besides, for I desired to go where Henri went—ah! I deceived you, Marie; forgive me; it is a devilish thing when sisters deceive one another!"

Marie felt very uncomfortable.

"Sometimes it is not possible—for the sake of others to tell the whole truth," she stammered. "We both have my father to consider, Louise. You could not well have confessed to him this other motive."

"No, you are wrong; it is cowardly to deceive thus; it would have been better if I had braved my father from the first, as you did, sister; you were braver than I and more honest; you made no pretence in the matter of your love for Karl; I think it is not in your nature to deceive. If Henri had lived I should have married him, Marie, and you should have assisted me to persuade my father to forgive me." Louise looked keenly at her sister; Marie felt her eyes penetrate to her very soul.

"Louise, you kill me with these words, say not another one, it is needless. I am on your side, sister. It is true that we withheld the truth from you—oh yes, I perceive that you know all; like my father, I was proud of your success and thought only of your career, also—before Heaven I thought and hoped you had forgotten Henri; if it is not so and you still love him–"

"Yes, I still love him, Marie—what would you have, does one forget love so quickly? I would exchange all the military glory in the world for one kiss from his lips. My father is mad and you were mad, sister; do you think Henri could be alive and in Paris and I not know? You shall help me to prepare my father's mind, Marie, for whether he approves or disapproves, I must go my own way in this matter!"

"But I deceived you, Louise—am I forgiven?" cried Marie, ashamed and distressed to realise how poor a part she had played in this comedy.

Louise took her sister in her arms and kissed her—the first embrace these two had exchanged for many a year. "There," she laughed; "you see how true it is that I am a woman again; as for forgiving—bah!—there is a great deal of my father's madness in you, sister; in your heart of hearts you are as anxious as he for my career and as disappointed as he will be that I have so fallen away from your high ideals as to have fallen in love. Be comforted, Marie—you deceived me with the best motives, no harm has come of it, and you have confessed in time to save your soul and preserve my respect—eh bien! all is well!"

Nevertheless Marie approached her father with considerable trepidation when the moment came to speak of this matter of Louise; for Marie had stipulated that, as punishment for her offence, the task should be left to her.

"Father," she said, "we have been mistaken, you and I. We had hoped and we believed that my sister Louise ceased to exist from the day of conscription, but alas! I have discovered that Louise lives, it is Michel Prevost who has ceased to exist."

"What mean you?" said the old man, frowning.

"It is this Baron d'Estreville, she has seen him, my father; it has been as you feared. She has spoken to me of him. She loves him."

"Sapristi! it is impossible! That any one should love a man more than honour and glory and a career—cent mille diables!—it is impossible!"

"It is true—she is a woman, what would you have? it is better to recognise the fact, father; it is not her fault. I too found that I was a woman, and you forgave me."

"That was different. You were always a fool, Marie; but here was one after my own heart, a woman, by misfortune of birth, but able to put the best of men to shame. And a fine career well begun! We will argue with her, Marie, she shall be wise. Stay—yes, that is better—I will pick a quarrel with this fool, and call him out. Sapristi! my old arm is still strong enough to slice the rogue; let him but show his face here once again—he shall be taught that–"

"It is useless, my father; Louise will have her own way; she is man enough for that! What matters is that we have deceived the Baron and that she will know it."

"Mon Dieu, let her know it—what then? Am I ashamed that I would defend her from that which strikes at her true advantage? God forbid. Let him know also or not know, what care I?"

"They have met and it is certain that she knows we have hidden the truth from him."

"Good! let him know it also. If he is an honourable man he will not sit still under so vile a deception. Sapristi, I have lied to him; let him call me out!" Old Dupré laughed aloud, delighted with his own astuteness. His eyes were aflame with the light of battle. "Thanks be to Heaven!" he said, "I shall fight one more duel before I die!"

From this bellicose attitude Marie found herself quite unable to move her father. On the contrary, he seemed so delighted with the situation in which he now found himself that he would speak to her of little else than this, and Marie found that she had, after all, rendered her sister no more signal a service than to place within the category of possible things that which assuredly neither of them would until this day have contemplated as in any degree likely, a duel between old Dupré and the lover of his daughter. Moreover, to the astonishment of his assistants, old Pierre forthwith arrayed himself for the arena and practised his fencing with each in turn until his limbs were so stiff with the unwonted exercise that he could hold his foil no longer.

"Mais, Monsieur!" exclaimed Havet, perspiring with the exertion to which the old man's unexpected activity had condemned him, "you are as skilful and as nimble as a youth of thirty."

"Aha! you find me so? Sapristi, that is well, mon ami. After a few days you will find me invincible, and that is well also, for, entre nous, there is hope that I shall be called out. Imaginez, mon enfant! another fight before I die! Truly, Heaven is kind to me!"

Old Pierre did not think Heaven quite so kind on the morrow, however, when he discovered that his limbs were so stiff that he was unable to get out of his bed. But this circumstance did not in the least affect his spirit or quench the enthusiasm with which he looked forward to the fight which he had now persuaded himself to regard as inevitable.