Empires of Sand

by Empires of Sand (retail) (epub)

  As the boy talked Jules fought off a sense of acute discomfort. This man-child of sixteen, this surrogate soldier with no education and three weeks of training, had found the war Jules had missed. He had sought it out and faced it bravely and paid a heavy price. Yet he looked up to Jules, venerated him and felt awed in his presence, and that made Jules miserable with deceit. He felt humbled before this child. He felt like a fraud.

  “I’m proud of you, Private. You have served with honor and done your duty. It is all a man can do. You’re a good soldier.”

  Etienne swelled with pride. “They said I’ll be getting a medal, Colonel. A ribbon or something. They didn’t have enough while I was there, but the captain said I’d get one in Paris.”

  “That’s right. You’ll get a ribbon.”

  “I’ll bet you have lots of them, Colonel,” he said. “Do you suppose I could touch one, just to… just to feel?”

  Jules looked down at the tatters of his uniform blouse. His medals, his ribbons, all the symbols of his life, all the marks of his achievements and his honor, even his gun and sword, had been stripped from him by Delescluze and his men. Now he had only shreds. So for the third time that day he found himself telling Etienne a part-truth – no, it was a lie, he knew, telling the youth something that was more convenient than true.

  “I’m not wearing any just now.”

  Etienne nodded in understanding. “It’s all right, Colonel. I don’t guess they’ll give a private the same kind, anyway.”

  He finished his cigar and threw it over the side of the cart. Jules pulled the rest of his cigars out of his pocket and pressed them into the boy’s hands.

  “Here. These will help you pass the time.”

  Toward noon they left the path they had been following along the banks of the Marne and joined the main road to Paris. The road was crowded and noisy, a dusty stream of wagons carrying supplies and refugees. It was a bright, beautiful day of late summer, the sky clear and blue, a pleasant breeze rustling through the trees, nature belying the worried stream of humanity passing by. Horsemen raced by, and at last they began to bring news. Wave after wave of revelation washed over them, one report after another. Soon they were drowning in it, for there was too much, and it was all the same, all bad.

  Capitulation at Sedan… deadly trap….Surrender, complete defeat…

  Through the dust and the heat of the day the riders kept appearing, their grim faces broadcasting the story even before they said anything. With each new report Jules closed his eyes as though he’d been hit in the stomach with a mighty blow.

  Thirty thousand casualties… hand-to-hand combat, every road and garden a battlefield… Bazeilles burned, women and children shot down like dogs…

  “They got to be wrong, Colonel,” said Etienne, frowning after one of the riders had left. “It couldn’t be. Couldn’t be what they say.” His face had grown pale with concern. He was looking for reassurance from the colonel, from the highest authority he could imagine, that it was not true, that it was a damnable lie. But there was no such certainty within Jules. In the incessant recital of disaster Jules heard the ring of truth.

  The emperor’s been taken captive… MacMahon wounded… it rained artillery shells… nowhere to hide… The entire Army of Châlons taken prisoner and sent to Belgium…

  Jules asked each rider for news of the 220th, of Major Dupree and his men. But the men didn’t know or, seeing him in chains, simply ignored him.

  Margueritte’s cavalry… massed in a heroic charge… The general dead… all thrown to the slaughter at Flöing… Two-thirds of the men dead, the rest wounded or captured… no one left, nothing…

  Margueritte! The 220th might well have fought under his command in a major battle. He kept trying.

  “Have you news of the Two Hundred Twentieth?” he asked one last rider, and the man pulled up next to the cart and walked his horse alongside. He was a surly hussar wearing a blue tunic whose white trim was stained with blood. The blood was apparently not his own. From the look of him and his horse Jules guessed he’d seen much and ridden hard for days. The hussar looked disdainfully at Jules’s uniform, and then at his leg irons.

  “And what are you, pray tell, asking me of a fighting unit?”

  One of the guards of the procession drew up next to him. “Fucking coward, that’s what he is,” the guard scowled. “Why should you care for news of the Two Hundred Twentieth?”

  Etienne stiffened. “What?” he said, straightening himself up. “What? How dare you address the colonel that way!”

  “Colonel?” The guard gave a derisive laugh. “You mean coward! I address all deserters that way! He’s a prisoner!”

  The color drained from Etienne’s face as he struggled to digest what he was hearing.

  “What do you mean? How can you say that?”

  “You’re blind, sonny, you can’t see! I suppose he’s been entertaining you with war stories, eh? Well, your colonel here is a prisoner! His legs are in chains! He’s under arrest for desertion. And if that wasn’t enough for him, he tried to escape, and nearly killed a guard. More like a Prussian colonel, by God!”

  Etienne recoiled in horror. Jules groped for words, wanting to explain, wanting to unload his terrible story, but the words were not there, would not come, and he said nothing. Each moment of silence made it all seem more horrible in Etienne’s mind. “Colonel?” he asked, pleading. “Colonel?”

  “It… it is true that I am under arrest, Private,” Jules said at last, his voice cracking, “but I did not do what they—”

  “You go to hell! You bastard!” Etienne spat it out, shrieked it at the top of his voice. “You lied to me! All this time, you’re nothing but a coward, a quitter! Have you been laughing at me? You swine! How could you lead me on so?”

  “Private, listen to me! It’s a lie!” But Etienne was shaking his head, trembling all over, moaning and talking to himself and rocking his head left and right. If they had arrested a full colonel, he knew it must all be true.

  “You’re the lie! They don’t arrest colonels by mistake! You bastard! You cheated me!” With tremendous effort the boy drew himself up to a sitting position, and from there, using his one leg, pushed himself up the side of the cart. He did it quickly, with great strength, placing a hand on the side of the cart to steady himself as they bounced along. He reached into his pocket to grab the cigars Jules had given him. He wanted nothing to do with Jules, nothing to do with his cigars, nothing to do with sharing the cart they were in. Tears of rage and anguish spread beneath his bandage, staining the cloth and running down his cheek. The tears were pink, tinged with blood. Etienne cried as he struggled with the cigars. He spat out the words.

  “I… will… not… ride… with… a… coward!”

  Jules’s head was pounding. Each word ripped him to the quick of his soul. He sought the words to help the boy understand, to get his attention, to calm him so they could talk. And then it happened, so suddenly that it was over before Jules could react. As he leaned forward to help steady the boy, the cart hit another pothole and gave a great lurch upward. Without a sound Etienne toppled over backward out of the cart, waving his arms wildly, too late to catch himself. There was nothing Jules could do. Etienne rolled out of sight on the opposite side from Jules, who because of his leg chain couldn’t get over to see what had happened.

  “Arrêtez!” he roared to the sergeant. “Stop now! Quickly!”

  The sergeant looked around, not sure what was happening. He pulled on the reins of his horse, but for a moment the mule behind him kept on. It was all too late anyway. There was a terrible bump as the cart jolted up and down.

  “Arrêtez!” Jules raged again. He pulled furiously on the chain holding his leg. The metal clanked on the wood slats of the cart. The sharp iron edge cut into his ankle, but it would not budge. He strained toward the edge but couldn’t get a clear view. He saw just one leg, twisted and still. Around it were scattered a half-dozen cigars.

  Horrified, the sergea
nt rushed to the boy’s still form. He knelt down and Jules could see him grimace and shake his head. The wheel of the cart had run over Etienne’s shoulder and neck, nearly cutting him in two.

  “No!” Jules cried softly. “It isn’t true! None of it! No, no!” And he collapsed on his knees in the bottom of the cart, taking a big splinter in one of them, but he didn’t feel it. He could only cry out again and again, crushed, broken, horrified. He had seen a thousand men die. It had never hurt so much before.

  For the first time in his memory, Colonel Jules deVries of the Imperial Guard of the Empire of France felt like crying.

  “It isn’t true,” he whispered. “Don’t believe them, Private! It isn’t true, isn’t true…”

  * * *

  “Vive la république! Down with the empire! Death to the emperor!”

  The roar grew in intensity in the Place de la Concorde. It was Sunday noon. Paul and Moussa watched wide-eyed from their perch atop a stone wall as the throng surged through the square. The boys had been coming into town every Sunday, but never to a scene like this. This day everything was upside down and chaotic. Men were everywhere on ladders, perching them precariously against statues and symbols of the empire. Saws cut through marble necks and decapitated the hated heads that toppled down and were tossed along on the hands of the jubilant crowd like balls until at last they reached the Pont Neuf over the Seine, where to great roars of approval they were hurled into the water.

  Steel bayonets of the National Guard glittered everywhere. Golden eagles were torn from fences and columns or were covered with paper if they couldn’t be removed. Statues were overturned. Stone lions of the empire smashed to the pavement. Top hats flew in the air and men waved the tricolor in exuberance. At the Hôtel de Ville portraits of the emperor were ripped from their frames and thrown out the windows into the streets, where they were stomped and danced upon by people drunk on the glorious spirits of the republic.

  “Did we win the war last night?” Moussa asked, watching the party.

  “We must have,” said Paul, “except that your father said we lost.”

  “I know. So what is everyone so happy about?”

  “I don’t know. A republic, I guess.”

  “What’s a republic?”

  Paul shrugged. Moussa was asking too many questions. They could see over the gates into the Garden of the Tuileries, where Zouaves were nervously patrolling. The imperial flag still flew above the palace, which meant that somewhere behind the ancient walls was the Empress Eugénie, regent of France in the absence of the emperor. Only she wasn’t regent anymore, or empress, or anything but in trouble from the crowds around the palace, crowds who would have their republic.

  “To the guillotine with the witch!” cried a reveler.

  “Shoot them all!” shouted another, waving a musket high overhead.

  A part of Moussa and Paul wanted to stay, but they saw the weapons and felt the menace beneath the outward gaiety of the crowd. Despite the jubilation, they were afraid. Neither wanted to admit it first, but when a rifle shot went off just below them Paul spoke up. “I think we’re supposed to be home.”

  “I think so too,” Moussa said, and together the boys slipped off the wall and disappeared into the milling crowd.

  * * *

  Across Paris at that moment a grim procession was entering the city along the Cours de Vincennes. The little caravan drew attention to itself by the scraping of the leg chains of the men who trudged along behind the little wooden cart. The chains bit deeply into their legs, leaving a trail of blood. The prisoners were hot and sullen, their mood further blackened by the reception they had been accorded since arriving on the outskirts of the city. The air crackled with passion, all Paris in agony over the destruction of her distant armies, yet in ecstasy over the new republic. No matter the mood of the surrounding masses, however, the prisoners were reviled. Crowds of hooting onlookers tormented them as they passed. The mounted guards made no attempt to protect their charges. They would permit no murder, but made no move to stop the humiliation. The ripe contents of a chamber pot flew from a second-story window, barely missing Jules and splattering to the ground beside his cart. Children threw rocks that drew blood. Someone hastily scribbled signs that were hung around the necks of some of the prisoners. Jules was one of them. He struggled against them as they climbed into the cart, but one of the sentries cuffed him savagely with the butt of his rifle. Gasping, Jules sat back as they draped the sign around his neck.

  “I Ran from the Enemy,” proclaimed the sign for all the world to see.

  “Deserter!” shouted an old woman who saw it. “Shame!” Her husband stepped forward and spit at Jules. “Swine!” he shouted. “My grandson is at the front fighting for the likes of you!” Someone found an egg. “Something to eat, coward!” Jules saw it coming and turned his head, but the egg caught him on the forehead. It ran down his face and stung his eyes and dripped from his chin.

  Jules endured the ignominy with his gaze fixed straight ahead, his eyes unseeing. The noise of the crowd, the jeers and scorn and spit and contempt that were heaped onto him became like a dream, a slow surreal dance of loathing in the background. He looked down at his bound hands. Since the death of the boy Etienne, Jules had been holding the toy soldier Paul made him. It seemed so long ago that he had stood on the platform in the train station, saying good-bye to his wife and son and nephew, people who expected him to go whip the Prussians all by himself; and now he was returning to them like this… He shook his head, disgusted with himself, determined to pull himself from his grotesque reverie.

  You are Jules deVries. You are a colonel in the Imperial army. You will conduct yourself in that manner. You have done nothing wrong! You have served your country in two wars. You will stop this pathetic self-pity and act like an officer!

  He held the toy soldier that had a crooked grin on its face and a twig where its arm should have been and said the words again.

  You have done nothing wrong!

  The procession made its way across the Pont d’Austerlitz, down the Boulevard St.-Marcel, and along the Boulevard Montparnasse as it clanked and scraped its way toward the École Militaire, which had been pressed into service as a stockade, both for Prussian prisoners of war and for French military prisoners. Everywhere was a city giddy with the notion of republic, but everywhere the procession passed, the revelry stopped for stares and jeers and the curiosity of revulsion.

  It was at the Avenue de Breteuil where it happened.

  * * *

  Moussa and Paul were making their way home when Moussa saw the commotion. He almost didn’t bother looking, for it had been a day of such excitement as few men had ever seen, and another demonstration hardly seemed worth the effort to look. But he felt bolder and safer now that he was away from the Place de la Concorde, so he climbed up onto the base of an iron lamppost where he could see over the heads of the throngs of people and into the street beyond. There were horsemen and a cart, and a long line of men trudging behind.

  “What is it?” asked Paul.

  “I don’t know. Soldiers. Prisoners, I think.” “Prussians?” Paul’s voice was excited. He wanted to see Prussian prisoners. He wondered if they were human, or had two heads and ate children. He had heard stories of both. He ran to the pole and looked for a place to pull himself up.

  “No, not Prussians. It looks like French prisoners!”

  “French? Why would there be French prisoners?” And then Moussa saw the man in the cart. At first he didn’t recognize him for the filth, and he certainly never expected to see him in such a setting. He thought he was away at the front. But no, he looked carefully again, and his heart froze. It was Uncle Jules.

  “Paul, look!” It was almost a whisper, full of dread. Paul finally hoisted himself up and wriggled into position where he could see. He looked where Moussa was pointing, to the cart.

  For a moment there was silence. And then the sound that came from the boy was one that no one who heard it ever forgot.


  CHAPTER 8

  “Ah, the count comes to gloat.”

  General Raspail looked up from the desk in his study at Count Henri deVries. It had been less than two months since the party at the château, where the two men had argued about the readiness of France to fight a war with Prussia. On that day Raspail’s uniform had been woven from the pure silk of arrogance. He had boasted and bragged and strutted France’s might. He had scorned Henri’s warnings and nearly fought with him. Now the little general looked frail, weary, his eyes bloodshot, his posture and mustache slumped, his shoulders sagging under the combined weight of defeat and disbelief. Henri saw the agony in his eyes. Raspail’s voice was bitter as he confronted the memory of his unsupported vanity.

  “You can save your breath, deVries. You were right. I admit it.”

  “I would not come to gloat, General,” Henri said. “The war is a tragedy for all France. I deeply wish it was I who had been wrong, and not you. But that is not what brings me. I have come about Jules.”

  Raspail motioned him to a chair. “Of course. Sit down.”