‘Paulin!’ said the captain. ‘We know him, he’s from Rouen.’
‘Who, sir?’
‘That whippersnapper, thin as a lath, who’s getting out of the secretaries’ berline.’
‘It looks like the Roques’ son.’
‘He is, I am almost certain. I thought he was a solicitor’s clerk in rue du Gros-Horloge.’
‘It’s been so long since we’ve seen Rouen,’ the manservant remarked plaintively.
As the cavalry of the Old Guard was taking the Moscow road, d’Herbigny didn’t have time to confirm his impression. But it was indeed Sebastian Roque who was stepping out of the secretaries’ berline behind Barons Ménéval and Fain, both of whom were now inseparable from their recently acquired, embroidered rapporteurs’ uniforms. He was twenty years old, with blue, almost purple eyes, a black hat with a broad brim and cockade, and an ample cape of equal blackness with a plethora of collars, piled atop one another. His father owned a cotton mill in Rouen, but after the English maritime blockade, merchandise couldn’t travel any more, and like the other manufacturers of the region he had been forced to cut his output by half. With no immediate future in his father’s business, Sebastian had started working for Maître Molin, a solicitor, instead. He would gladly have settled for that life, peaceful as it was to the point of boredom, since he had very little ambition of any kind: a young man ill cut to the cloth of his age, with no passion for soldiering, he knew he had little talent for war; he preferred a civilian life without glory, but with both his arms and legs and no shell splinters in his stomach. The only people still living in the country were widows, cripples and little boys; battles were devouring all the men. To Sebastian, the world was a chaos that had to be shunned.
He had shown considerable perseverance in his attempts to avoid being called up. Thanks to the offices of a cousin, a porter at the Ministry of War in Paris, he had become first a supernumerary, then a titular, clerk under the little-liked General Clarke, who ran central administration a long way from hostilities. Unlike most people, Sebastian was fond of this curly-haired general, with his round head perched on a stovepipe collar, who protected him from the fighting. For a year his life had been one of irresponsible, comfortable routine until one day the previous spring – a Wednesday he vividly remembered – when his fine handwriting had played him a nasty trick. One of the assistants to Baron Fain, the Emperor’s secretary, had fallen ill. A replacement had to be found urgently. The Ministry’s clerks were assembled, given a passage of dictation and the results were collected. Since he formed his letters so elegantly, Sebastian Roque was chosen. And that is how, by trying to avoid war, he’d ended up in the heart of it … He was looking at Moscow’s gleaming domes when a voice called him.
‘Monsieur Roque! This is no time for daydreaming.’
Baron Fain took him by the arm and pushed him into an open barouche. He squeezed in between a lugubrious major-domo and the chef Masquelet. His Majesty was making arrangements; he would spend the night in the suburb, but he was sending members of his household ahead to prepare for his occupation of the Kremlin. Baron Fain, therefore, was dispatching his clerk with the job of setting up a secretariat as close as possible to the Emperor’s apartments, within range of his voice. Several barouches filled up with staff with similar tasks. A detachment of elite gendarmes opened the road for them.
*
The Kalitzin mansion, with its colonnade, was modelled on a Greek temple, like the English Club on the Stratsnoi Boulevard. At its magnificent entrance, two vast dogs with spiked iron collars were barking; muscles bulging, they strained at the chains attaching them to wall-rings and threw vicious looks with their yellow eyes, slavering and baring their fangs. D’Herbigny, arm outstretched, was aiming his pistol at the first one’s mouth when one of the double doors opened on a bewigged major-domo. He wore livery and held a whip: ‘No, no! Don’t kill them!’
‘You speak French?’ the captain asked in amazement.
‘As is customary in polite society.’
‘Let us in and get these wild beasts of yours under control !’
‘I have been waiting for you.’
‘You’re joking?’
‘These are not the most conducive circumstances.’
He cracked his leather strap. The mastiffs sank into sphinx-like poses, but continued growling quietly at the back of their throats. D’Herbigny, Paulin and a group of dragoons mistrustfully followed the major-domo into a stone-flagged hall. His master, Count Kalitzin, had left that morning with the family and servants, entrusting him with the task of handing the house over to an officer to prevent it being looted. The same arrangement existed in most of the large residences that had been abandoned; the owners hoped to recover them unharmed as soon as the two Emperors came to an agreement. It seemed self-evident that the French and their allies couldn’t stay in the city for ever.
‘Which is why, General, I place myself, wholly and without reserve, at your service,’ the major-domo explained.
The captain threw out his chest like a bantam, neither correcting the flattery, nor even suspecting a trace of irony in the fulsome declaration. From a glance at the lighter patches of different sizes on the wallpaper, he knew that the paintings had been taken away, along, no doubt, with the main valuables. There wasn’t much to loot in the hall, apart from an unwieldy chandelier and some tapestries. The dragoons were waiting in the gloom for permission to inspect the pantry and cellars, since their throats were as dry as dust, when they heard dogs’ howling and roars of laughter. The captain went back out under the colonnade, the major-domo at his heels. Keeping well back, some chasseurs were goading the mastiffs with a piece of broken glass stuck on the end of a pike; the animals were choking on their chains, snapping, biting on nothing but glass, blood dripping from their lips; they were becoming crazed, pawing the air.
‘Stop those idiots!’ d’Herbigny bellowed at a pock-marked sergeant.
‘They’re as high as uhlans, sir!’
Shouting, d’Herbigny laid into the guffawing chasseurs with the flat of his sabre to chase them off, but they were very drunk and one of them, still laughing, fell flat on his backside. The major-domo tried to quieten the dogs with his whip, but the pain in their mouths and the general commotion only made them more agitated.
The avenue was filling with soldiers of the Guard looking for alcohol, fresh meat, loot and the girl of their fantasies. A drum-major in full uniform gave directions to his musicians who were carrying sofas. Brandy flowed in a stream from the staved-in door of a shop; a squad of gendarmes with their peaked caps were bringing out barrels and rolling them over to a handcart. Another gendarme, whose yellow cross-belt could be seen under a stolen coat lined with bear fur, was clasping in his arms a ham, a big vase, a pair of silver chandeliers and a jar of crystallized fruit; the jar slipped from his unsteady grasp and shattered on the ground, the soldier skidded on the crystallized fruit and went sprawling; some grenadiers instantly grabbed the ham and ran off amid a hail of abuse.
The captain wasn’t in a position to put a stop to these unruly removals operations – in fact, he rather fancied a piece of them himself. As he was smiling at the thought, the major-domo asked very anxiously, ‘You are going to protect our house, aren’t you?’
‘You mean my quarters, I trust?’
‘Exactly, your and your men’s residence.’
‘Very well, but first we’ll go over it from top to bottom.’ Turning to the sergeant, he ordered, ‘Post sentries at the gates.’
‘That won’t be easy.’ He gestured to the dragoons already scattered about the neighbourhood; a chain of them were passing tables, armchairs and bottles out of the windows of a little pale-green pine lodge.
‘What now?’ exclaimed the captain, his sabre hanging by its sword knot from his left wrist.
Shadow like figures with wild hair and beards and rags flapping at their legs were coming onto the avenue; they were carrying pitchforks. D’Herbigny turned towards the major-domo
, who was wringing his hands. ‘And they are, in your opinion?’
‘Yes …’
‘Convicts? Madmen?’
‘Something of both.’
*
In the streets of Moscow, Sebastian Roque had already encountered similar mobs, which the gendarmes had broken up with musket butts, but when his barouche entered a narrower thoroughfare, a moujik with a bristling black beard, long locks and glaring eyes, ran up and violently grabbed his arm. Masquelet and the other passengers tried to make the brute let go by hitting him on the head, but the gendarmes had to beat him almost senseless before he toppled over backwards, blood matting his hair. He got to his feet instantly, leaping at the horses as the coachmen whipped them; the horses knocked him back down, he rolled under the barouche; they heard his bellows, bones cracking; the carriage jolted heavily. Huddled together on the ground, packs of vagabonds considered this spectacle impassively, a look of dazed stupor on their faces. They were a frightening sight, these savage-looking moujiks, but as well as finding their freedom, they had also discovered sizeable stores of brandy and it had sapped them of all their strength. They didn’t even move as their maimed comrade writhed on the cobbles. Sebastian was as white as a Pierrot, he felt hot and cold, he looked at the ground, his teeth chattered and he rubbed his aching arm.
‘A genuine cannibal, your attacker,’ joked the chef. ‘He’d have gladly devoured your whole arm!’
‘They’re bears, not humans,’ the major-domo pronounced with a learned air, a single finger raised.
What seemed a banal, everyday event to the other servants terrified the young man. From the moment Baron Fain had given him a mission, and he had had to leave the Imperial entourage, he mistrusted everything. Danger prowled around armies. Die young? What sort of glory was it that did not allow one to enjoy its benefits? The Opera – ah, now that was brilliant, and if he had had a voice … Dash it! Sebastian wanted to experience the seasons of his life consecutively; youth he saw as a winter, he was hoping for spring, when, with age, one’s energies could be deployed. Heroism held little fascination for him: in any case, where were the heroes? The officers thought only of their promotion; the men hadn’t come to Russia of their own accord, many had joined up simply to eat. In France, wheat was becoming scarce and the poor were given rice thrown into water-gruel, which satisfied no one. Robbery was on the increase. Unemployed labourers were dying of starvation. In Rouen, the only bread to be found was made from pease-meal flour, and in Paris the Emperor spent extravagant sums to keep the price down to sixteen sous for four pounds to avoid unrest; financiers speculated on grain, exacerbating the famine to make themselves rich. The most confirmed optimists had believed it would be a quick war and that the Grande Armée would enter St Petersburg in July, but it hadn’t turned out that way, and at times the weary men had longed for defeat so that they could be done with it all. Now they were taking their revenge on Moscow.
The cortège of Imperial staff finally passed through the fortress’s pseudo-gothic gate, amidst a tide of soldiers lugging furniture to set up their quarters. Behind its high red walls, the Kremlin was an amalgam of monumental styles: cathedrals with minarets and bulbous towers, monasteries, palaces, barracks and an arsenal where they had just discovered forty thousand English, Austrian and Russian muskets, a hundred-odd cannon, and lances, sabres, medieval armour and other trophies recently seized from the Turks and Persians in which the soldiers were dressing up around their bivouacs on the great esplanade.
Prefect Bausset, hands on hips, face as pale as if it was powdered, had started up the stone staircase that stretched the length of the palace’s facade ahead of his staff: ‘Those gentlemen in His Majesty’s personal service, follow me.’ He climbed the Venetian-style staircase to a vast terrace over-looking all of Moscow, onto which the Tsars’ apartments opened their shutterless and curtainless French windows. Sebastian Roque, Masquelet the chef and sundry valets and upholsterers entered what were to be the Emperor’s quarters as if paying a visit, removing their hats. They walked through an interminable reception room, which was divided in two by pillars and three-legged braziers, before reaching the bedchamber, a long rectangle with windows directly over the Moskova, tarnished gilt mouldings, a baldachin and French and Italian paintings from previous centuries. There were logs in the fireplaces. The clocks were working.
‘The valets will take the next-door room, there, to the left. The dividing wall is very thin, His Majesty will not have to raise his voice to call you.’
‘The secretaries?’ asked Sebastian.
‘They could set up their office in the adjoining reception room, but the Tsar’s apartments are the only ones that are furnished – everyone must shift for themselves.’
It was the same old story. They often slept on the floor, in the open, on stairs, in antechambers, barns, anywhere, always fully dressed and ready to respond immediately.
‘The kitchens?’
‘In the basement, I think.’
‘The Emperor loathes his dinner being cold,’ the chef complained. ‘If I have to climb three flights of stairs, then walk three leagues of corridors, he’ll throw his fricassée in my face!’
‘You’ll find a solution, Monsieur Masquelet, Tsar Alexander doesn’t exist on cold food either.’
Everyone set to. Sebastian asked about a desk, Masquelet a stove; one bright spark brought in wolf skins he’d purchased from a corporal to make up a bed on the parquet floor; on Bausset’s orders, a valet took down the portraits of the Tsar and his family, which would have irritated the Emperor. A small, silent group on the terrace were casting an eye over the city and the white marble statues of the Pascov Palace by the ramparts.
‘There’s a whole stack of furniture in the cellars,’ a valet said to the Intendant. ‘A grenadier has just passed it on.’
‘Well, what are you waiting for?’ said Bausset.
‘Coming?’ Masquelet suggested to Sebastian. ‘You’re bound to find your desk down there.’
Striding briskly along the corridors so as not to waste time, the expeditionary party of Roque, the chef and a number of valets enlisted several grenadiers who were guarding empty rooms or playing cards on a drum. The most heavily moustachioed fellow had put his bearskin on a plaster goddess, which he had taken down from its plinth; he was pawing the statue and declaring, ‘My pay to anyone who finds me a real Russian beauty!’ The presence of these veterans, Napoleon’s old ‘grumblers’ who’d seen hell a hundred times, comforted Sebastian, but where was the entrance to these cellars? They hurried down a grand staircase, wandered through deserted reception rooms and along passageways, pushed open doors, asked other soldiers who had no idea and eventually found another, worn stone staircase, narrower and cruder, that led to enormous rooms with vaulted ceilings, like chapels, that were so dark that one of the grenadiers went back upstairs to look for torches. They waited. The walls and floor smelled of damp. From one torch they lit several more and started to explore. Openings in the walls appeared in the darkness; they ventured through them, even if it meant not being able to find the way back. The torches smoked, their eyes stung; their misshapen shadows stretched across the pillars and vaults, flickered over the ceilings; with his cape with all its collars, Sebastian’s silhouette looked like a vampire’s (alone in that situation, he would have scared himself).
‘There’s something at the back,’ said a grenadier.
‘Crates …’
‘Give us some light, but not too close,’ ordered Masquelet, ‘What if it’s munitions, eh? You there! Come and open this with your bayonet.’
The lid of a crate sprang open with a splintering sound; the chef fearlessly plunged in his fist and brought up a handful of powder.
‘Hold your torch up, here, over my palm, so we can see what we’ve got …’
‘No need,’ answered the grenadier. ‘You can smell it.’
‘I can’t smell anything.’
‘You haven’t got a nose, sir. It’s snuff.’
&n
bsp; ‘Well, well,’ said a lackey coming over.
‘You’re right,’ agreed the chef and took a large pinch, which made him sneeze and the torchlight flicker.
There was a mountain of other crates like it; Roque and Masquelet had to chivvy the grenadiers and lackeys as they filled their pockets with snuff. Next they found a stack of bales and rows of barrels, the former containing wool, the latter star anise, which disgusted the chef.
‘I can’t do anything with those spices; they’re only fit for their barbarian’s food. If I used aniseed in his macaroni, His Majesty would be furious!’
‘Here it is, your furniture’s this way,’ interrupted a grenadier who’d ventured into an adjoining room.
The torches lit up a collection of chests of drawers, armchairs and bed frames; they just had to help themselves from the hoard. Sebastian spotted a little roll-top desk, which would be ideal for taking down the Emperor’s correspondence in full flow, but to get it, a massive cupboard had to be pushed aside and a path cleared between a tangle of sideboards and footstools.
‘These cushions are mouldy,’ a valet declared disconsolately.
‘Come and give me a hand over here instead,’ asked Sebastian.
‘Hold my torch,’ said a grenadier. ‘I’ll see to your desk.’
Just as Sebastian took the torch and held it up at arm’s length, a man stood up behind a wooden sideboard that glinted red where the light caught it; the apparition wore a Roman centurion’s helmet and a toga thrown over one shoulder. Everyone stopped their foraging. One of the grenadiers drew the bayonet he had tucked into his sword-belt.
‘Ah! Gentlemen! I could hear that you are French,’ said the apparition, ‘and now I can see your glorious uniforms!’
The Retreat Page 3