III
It was four in the morning when he came out of the Prison of the Condemnedwith the Secretary of the American Legation. A knot of people had gatheredaround the American Minister's carriage, which stood in front of theprison, the horses stamping and pawing in the icy street, the coachmanhuddled on the box, wrapped in furs. Southwark helped the Secretary intothe carriage, and shook hands with Trent, thanking him for coming.
"How the scoundrel did stare," he said; "your evidence was worse than akick, but it saved his skin for the moment at least,--and preventedcomplications."
The Secretary sighed. "We have done our part. Now let them prove him a spyand we wash our hands of him. Jump in, Captain! Come along, Trent!"
"I have a word to say to Captain Southwark, I won't detain him," saidTrent hastily, and dropping his voice, "Southwark, help _me_ now. You knowthe story from the blackguard. You know the--the child is at his rooms.Get it, and take it to my own apartment, and if he is shot, I will providea home for it."
"I understand," said the Captain gravely.
"Will you do this at once?"
"At once," he replied.
Their hands met in a warm clasp, and then Captain Southwark climbed intothe carriage, motioning Trent to follow; but he shook his head saying,"Good-bye!" and the carriage rolled away.
He watched the carriage to the end of the street, then started toward hisown quarter, but after a step or two hesitated, stopped, and finallyturned away in the opposite direction. Something--perhaps it was the sightof the prisoner he had so recently confronted nauseated him. He felt theneed of solitude and quiet to collect his thoughts. The events of theevening had shaken him terribly, but he would walk it off, forget, buryeverything, and then go back to Sylvia. He started on swiftly, and for atime the bitter thoughts seemed to fade, but when he paused at last,breathless, under the Arc de Triomphe, the bitterness and the wretchednessof the whole thing--yes, of his whole misspent life came back with a pang.Then the face of the prisoner, stamped with the horrible grimace of fear,grew in the shadows before his eyes.
Sick at heart he wandered up and down under the great Arc, striving tooccupy his mind, peering up at the sculptured cornices to read the namesof the heroes and battles which he knew were engraved there, but alwaysthe ashen face of Hartman followed him, grinning with terror!--or was itterror?--was it not triumph?--At the thought he leaped like a man whofeels a knife at his throat, but after a savage tramp around the square,came back again and sat down to battle with his misery.
The air was cold, but his cheeks were burning with angry shame. Shame?Why? Was it because he had married a girl whom chance had made a mother?_Did_ he love her? Was this miserable bohemian existence, then, his endand aim in life? He turned his eyes upon the secrets of his heart, andread an evil story,--the story of the past, and he covered his face forshame, while, keeping time to the dull pain throbbing in his head, hisheart beat out the story for the future. Shame and disgrace.
Roused at last from a lethargy which had begun to numb the bitterness ofhis thoughts, he raised his head and looked about. A sudden fog hadsettled in the streets; the arches of the Arc were choked with it. Hewould go home. A great horror of being alone seized him. _But he was notalone._ The fog was peopled with phantoms. All around him in the mist theymoved, drifting through the arches in lengthening lines, and vanished,while from the fog others rose up, swept past and were engulfed. He wasnot alone, for even at his side they crowded, touched him, swarmed beforehim, beside him, behind him, pressed him back, seized, and bore him withthem through the mist. Down a dim avenue, through lanes and alleys whitewith fog, they moved, and if they spoke their voices were dull as thevapour which shrouded them. At last in front, a bank of masonry and earthcut by a massive iron barred gate towered up in the fog. Slowly and moreslowly they glided, shoulder to shoulder and thigh to thigh. Then allmovement ceased. A sudden breeze stirred the fog. It wavered and eddied.Objects became more distinct. A pallor crept above the horizon, touchingthe edges of the watery clouds, and drew dull sparks from a thousandbayonets. Bayonets--they were everywhere, cleaving the fog or flowingbeneath it in rivers of steel. High on the wall of masonry and earth agreat gun loomed, and around it figures moved in silhouettes. Below, abroad torrent of bayonets swept through the iron barred gateway, out intothe shadowy plain. It became lighter. Faces grew more distinct among themarching masses and he recognized one.
"You, Philippe!"
The figure turned its head.
Trent cried, "Is there room for me?" but the other only waved his arm in avague adieu and was gone with the rest. Presently the cavalry began topass, squadron on squadron, crowding out into the darkness; then manycannon, then an ambulance, then again the endless lines of bayonets.Beside him a cuirassier sat on his steaming horse, and in front, among agroup of mounted officers he saw a general, with the astrakan collar ofhis dolman turned up about his bloodless face.
Some women were weeping near him and one was struggling to force a loaf ofblack bread into a soldier's haversack. The soldier tried to aid her, butthe sack was fastened, and his rifle bothered him, so Trent held it, whilethe woman unbuttoned the sack and forced in the bread, now all wet withher tears. The rifle was not heavy. Trent found it wonderfully manageable.Was the bayonet sharp? He tried it. Then a sudden longing, a fierce,imperative desire took possession of him.
"_Chouette!_" cried a gamin, clinging to the barred gate, "_encore toi monvieux_?"
Trent looked up, and the rat-killer laughed in his face. But when thesoldier had taken the rifle again, and thanking him, ran hard to catch hisbattalion, he plunged into the throng about the gateway.
"Are you going?" he cried to a marine who sat in the gutter bandaging hisfoot.
"Yes."
Then a girl--a mere child--caught him by the hand and led him into thecafe which faced the gate. The room was crowded with soldiers, some, whiteand silent, sitting on the floor, others groaning on the leather-coveredsettees. The air was sour and suffocating.
"Choose!" said the girl with a little gesture of pity; "they can't go!"
In a heap of clothing on the floor he found a capote and kepi.
She helped him buckle his knapsack, cartridge-box, and belt, and showedhim how to load the chasse-pot rifle, holding it on her knees.
When he thanked her she started to her feet.
"You are a foreigner!"
"American," he said, moving toward the door, but the child barred his way.
"I am a Bretonne. My father is up there with the cannon of the marine. Hewill shoot you if you are a spy."
They faced each other for a moment. Then sighing, he bent over and kissedthe child. "Pray for France, little one," he murmured, and she repeatedwith a pale smile: "For France and you, beau Monsieur."
He ran across the street and through the gateway. Once outside, he edgedinto line and shouldered his way along the road. A corporal passed, lookedat him, repassed, and finally called an officer. "You belong to the 60th,"growled the corporal looking at the number on his kepi.
"We have no use for Franc-tireurs," added the officer, catching sight ofhis black trousers.
"I wish to volunteer in place of a comrade," said Trent, and the officershrugged his shoulders and passed on.
Nobody paid much attention to him, one or two merely glancing at histrousers. The road was deep with slush and mud-ploughed and torn by wheelsand hoofs. A soldier in front of him wrenched his foot in an icy rut anddragged himself to the edge of the embankment groaning. The plain oneither side of them was grey with melting snow. Here and there behinddismantled hedge-rows stood wagons, bearing white flags with red crosses.Sometimes the driver was a priest in rusty hat and gown, sometimes acrippled Mobile. Once they passed a wagon driven by a Sister of Charity.Silent empty houses with great rents in their walls, and every windowblank, huddled along the road. Further on, within the zone of danger,nothing of human habitation remained except here and there a pile offrozen bricks or a blackened cellar choked with snow.
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bsp; For some time Trent had been annoyed by the man behind him, who kepttreading on his heels. Convinced at last that it was intentional, heturned to remonstrate and found himself face to face with a fellow-studentfrom the Beaux Arts. Trent stared.
"I thought you were in the hospital!"
The other shook his head, pointing to his bandaged jaw.
"I see, you can't speak. Can I do anything?"
The wounded man rummaged in his haversack and produced a crust of blackbread.
"He can't eat it, his jaw is smashed, and he wants you to chew it forhim," said the soldier next to him.
Trent took the crust, and grinding it in his teeth morsel by morsel,passed it back to the starving man.
From time to time mounted orderlies sped to the front, covering them withslush. It was a chilly, silent march through sodden meadows wreathed infog. Along the railroad embankment across the ditch, another column movedparallel to their own. Trent watched it, a sombre mass, now distinct, nowvague, now blotted out in a puff of fog. Once for half-an-hour he lost it,but when again it came into view, he noticed a thin line detach itselffrom the flank, and, bellying in the middle, swing rapidly to the west. Atthe same moment a prolonged crackling broke out in the fog in front. Otherlines began to slough off from the column, swinging east and west, and thecrackling became continuous. A battery passed at full gallop, and he drewback with his comrades to give it way. It went into action a little to theright of his battalion, and as the shot from the first rifled piece boomedthrough the mist, the cannon from the fortifications opened with a mightyroar. An officer galloped by shouting something which Trent did not catch,but he saw the ranks in front suddenly part company with his own, anddisappear in the twilight. More officers rode up and stood beside himpeering into the fog. Away in front the crackling had become one prolongedcrash. It was dreary waiting. Trent chewed some bread for the man behind,who tried to swallow it, and after a while shook his head, motioning Trentto eat the rest himself. A corporal offered him a little brandy and hedrank it, but when he turned around to return the flask, the corporal waslying on the ground. Alarmed, he looked at the soldier next to him, whoshrugged his shoulders and opened his mouth to speak, but something struckhim and he rolled over and over into the ditch below. At that moment thehorse of one of the officers gave a bound and backed into the battalion,lashing out with his heels. One man was ridden down; another was kicked inthe chest and hurled through the ranks. The officer sank his spurs intothe horse and forced him to the front again, where he stood trembling. Thecannonade seemed to draw nearer. A staff-officer, riding slowly up anddown the battalion suddenly collapsed in his saddle and clung to hishorse's mane. One of his boots dangled, crimsoned and dripping, from thestirrup. Then out of the mist in front men came running. The roads, thefields, the ditches were full of them, and many of them fell. For aninstant he imagined he saw horsemen riding about like ghosts in thevapours beyond, and a man behind him cursed horribly, declaring he too hadseen them, and that they were Uhlans; but the battalion stood inactive,and the mist fell again over the meadows.
The colonel sat heavily upon his horse, his bullet-shaped head buried inthe astrakan collar of his dolman, his fat legs sticking straight out inthe stirrups.
The buglers clustered about him with bugles poised, and behind him astaff-officer in a pale blue jacket smoked a cigarette and chatted with acaptain of hussars. From the road in front came the sound of furiousgalloping and an orderly reined up beside the colonel, who motioned him tothe rear without turning his head. Then on the left a confused murmurarose which ended in a shout. A hussar passed like the wind, followed byanother and another, and then squadron after squadron whirled by them intothe sheeted mists. At that instant the colonel reared in his saddle, thebugles clanged, and the whole battalion scrambled down the embankment,over the ditch and started across the soggy meadow. Almost at once Trentlost his cap. Something snatched it from his head, he thought it was atree branch. A good many of his comrades rolled over in the slush and ice,and he imagined that they had slipped. One pitched right across his pathand he stopped to help him up, but the man screamed when he touched himand an officer shouted, "Forward! Forward!" so he ran on again. It was along jog through the mist, and he was often obliged to shift his rifle.When at last they lay panting behind the railroad embankment, he lookedabout him. He had felt the need of action, of a desperate physicalstruggle, of killing and crushing. He had been seized with a desire tofling himself among masses and tear right and left. He longed to fire, touse the thin sharp bayonet on his chassepot. He had not expected this. Hewished to become exhausted, to struggle and cut until incapable of liftinghis arm. Then he had intended to go home. He heard a man say that half thebattalion had gone down in the charge, and he saw another examining acorpse under the embankment. The body, still warm, was clothed in astrange uniform, but even when he noticed the spiked helmet lying a fewinches further away, he did not realize what had happened.
The colonel sat on his horse a few feet to the left, his eyes sparklingunder the crimson kepi. Trent heard him reply to an officer: "I can holdit, but another charge, and I won't have enough men left to sound abugle."
"Were the Prussians here?" Trent asked of a soldier who sat wiping theblood trickling from his hair.
"Yes. The hussars cleaned them out. We caught their cross fire."
"We are supporting a battery on the embankment," said another.
Then the battalion crawled over the embankment and moved along the linesof twisted rails. Trent rolled up his trousers and tucked them into hiswoollen socks: but they halted again, and some of the men sat down on thedismantled railroad track. Trent looked for his wounded comrade from theBeaux Arts. He was standing in his place, very pale. The cannonade hadbecome terrific. For a moment the mist lifted. He caught a glimpse of thefirst battalion motionless on the railroad track in front, of regiments oneither flank, and then, as the fog settled again, the drums beat and themusic of the bugles began away on the extreme left. A restless movementpassed among the troops, the colonel threw up his arm, the drums rolled,and the battalion moved off through the fog. They were near the front nowfor the battalion was firing as it advanced. Ambulances galloped along thebase of the embankment to the rear, and the hussars passed and repassedlike phantoms. They were in the front at last, for all about them wasmovement and turmoil, while from the fog, close at hand, came cries andgroans and crashing volleys. Shells fell everywhere, bursting along theembankment, splashing them with frozen slush. Trent was frightened. Hebegan to dread the unknown, which lay there crackling and flaming inobscurity. The shock of the cannon sickened him. He could even see the foglight up with a dull orange as the thunder shook the earth. It was near,he felt certain, for the colonel shouted "Forward!" and the firstbattalion was hastening into it. He felt its breath, he trembled, buthurried on. A fearful discharge in front terrified him. Somewhere in thefog men were cheering, and the colonel's horse, streaming with bloodplunged about in the smoke.
Another blast and shock, right in his face, almost stunned him, and hefaltered. All the men to the right were down. His head swam; the fog andsmoke stupefied him. He put out his hand for a support and caughtsomething. It was the wheel of a gun-carriage, and a man sprang frombehind it, aiming a blow at his head with a rammer, but stumbled backshrieking with a bayonet through his neck, and Trent knew that he hadkilled. Mechanically he stooped to pick up his rifle, but the bayonet wasstill in the man, who lay, beating with red hands against the sod. Itsickened him and he leaned on the cannon. Men were fighting all around himnow, and the air was foul with smoke and sweat. Somebody seized him frombehind and another in front, but others in turn seized them or struck themsolid blows. The click! click! click! of bayonets infuriated him, and hegrasped the rammer and struck out blindly until it was shivered to pieces.
A man threw his arm around his neck and bore him to the ground, but hethrottled him and raised himself on his knees. He saw a comrade seize thecannon, and fall across it with his skull crushed in; he saw the colo
neltumble clean out of his saddle into the mud; then consciousness fled.
When he came to himself, he was lying on the embankment among the twistedrails. On every side huddled men who cried out and cursed and fled awayinto the fog, and he staggered to his feet and followed them. Once hestopped to help a comrade with a bandaged jaw, who could not speak butclung to his arm for a time and then fell dead in the freezing mire; andagain he aided another, who groaned: "Trent, c'est moi--Philippe," until asudden volley in the midst relieved him of his charge.
An icy wind swept down from the heights, cutting the fog into shreds. Foran instant, with an evil leer the sun peered through the naked woods ofVincennes, sank like a blood-clot in the battery smoke, lower, lower, intothe blood-soaked plain.
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