The Erckmann-Chatrian Megapack: 20 Classic Novels and Short Stories

by Émile Erckmann

  “At, it is thou, Jean-Claude.”

  “Yes, I have come to shake your hand.”

  “In good time. But why are they so slow in coming—tell me that? Are they going to march off in another direction?”

  “Don’t be afraid: they need the road for their artillery and baggage. Hark! they are sounding ‘to horse.’”

  “Yes, I have seen already that they are preparing.” Then, chuckling to himself: “Thou dost not know, Jean-Claude, what a funny thing I saw, a few minutes ago, as I was looking toward Grandfontaine.”

  “What was it, my old friend?”

  “I saw four Germans lay hold of big Dubreuil, the friend of the allies: they stretched him on the stone bench by his door, and one great lanky fellow gave him I know not how many cuts with a stick across his back. Ha, ha, ha, he must have yelled, the old rascal! I will wager that he refused something to his good friends,—his wine of the year XI. for instance.”

  Hullin heard no more: for, casting his eyes accidentally down the valley, he caught sight of an infantry regiment coming up the road. Farther back in the street, cavalry were seen coming, five or six officers galloping in front of them.

  “Ah, ah! there they come!” cried the old soldier, whose face glowed suddenly with an expression of strange energy and enthusiasm. “At last they have made up their minds!” Then he rushed out of the trench, shouting: “Attention, my children!”

  Passing by, he saw Riffi, the little tailor of Charmes, bending over a long musket: the little man had been piling up the snow to give him a better position for aiming. Farther up, he saw the old wood-cutter Rochart, his great shoes trimmed with sheepskin: he had taken a gulp at his gourd, and was rising deliberately, having his carbine under his arm and his cotton cap over his ears.

  That was all: for in order to command the whole of the action, he had to climb almost to the summit of the Donon, where there is a rock.

  Lagarmitte followed, striding till his long legs looked like stilts. Ten minutes after, when they had reached the top of the rock, half-breathless, they perceived, fifteen hundred mètres below them, the enemy’s column, three thousand strong, with white great-coats, leather belts, cloth gaiters, tall shakos, and red mustaches; and in the spaces formed by the companies, the young officers, with flat caps, waving their swords, and shouting in shrill voices: “Forward! forward!”

  These troops were bristling with bayonets, and advancing at the charge toward the breastworks.

  Old Materne, his beaked nose rising above a juniper branch and his brow erect, was also watching the arrival of the Germans; and as he was very clear-sighted, he could distinguish even faces among the crowd, and choose the man he wished to knock over.

  In the centre of the column, on a large bay horse, an old officer was advancing right ahead, with a white wig, a three-cornered hat trimmed with gold, his waist encircled with a yellow scarf, and his breast decorated with ribbons. When this personage raised his head, the peak of his hat, surmounted by a tuft of black plumes, formed a vizor. He had great wrinkles along his cheeks, and looked sufficiently stern.

  “There is my man!” thought the old hunter, deliberately taking aim.

  He fired, and when he looked again the old officer had disappeared.

  Immediately the whole hill-side became enveloped in fire all along the intrenchment; but the Germans, without replying, continued to advance toward the breastworks, their guns on their shoulders, and as steadily as though on parade.

  To tell the truth, more than one brave mountaineer, father of a family, seeing this forest of bayonets coming up, and notwithstanding the excitement of battle, felt that he would have done better had he remained in his village, than to have mixed himself up in such an affair. But, as the proverb says, “The wine was drawn, and it had to be drunk.”

  Riffi, the little tailor, recalled the words of his wife Sapience: “Riffi, you will get yourself crippled, and it will serve you right.”

  He vowed a costly offering to St. Leon’s Chapel should he return from the war; but at the same time he resolved to make good use of his musket.

  When they were about two hundred feet from the breastworks, the Germans halted and began a rolling fire, such as had never been heard in the mountain before. It was a regular storm of shot: the balls in hundreds tore away the branches, sent bits of broken ice flying in all directions, or flattened themselves on the rocks on every side, leaping up with a strange hissing noise, and passing by like flocks of pigeons.

  All this did not stop the mountaineers from continuing their fire, but it could no longer be heard. The whole hill-side was wrapped in blue smoke, which prevented their taking any aim.

  About ten minutes later, there was the rolling of a drum, and all this mass of men made a rush at the breastworks, their officers shouting, “Forward!”

  The earth shook with them.

  Materne, springing up in the trench, with quivering lips and in a terrible voice, cried out, “To your feet! to your feet!”

  It was time: for a good number of these Germans,—nearly all students in philosophy, law, and medicine, heroes of the taverns of Munich, Jena, and other places—who fought against us, because they had been promised great things after Napoleon’s fall—all these intrepid fellows were climbing the icy slope, and endeavoring to jump into the intrenchment.

  But they were received with the butt-end of the musket, and fell back in disorder.

  It was then that the gallant conduct of the old wood-cutter Rochart was observable, knocking over, as he did, more than ten “kaiserlichs,” whom he took by the shoulder and hurled down the incline. Old Materne’s bayonet was red with blood; and little Riffi never ceased loading his musket and firing into the mass of Germans with great spirit. Joseph Larnette, who unluckily received a bullet in his eye; Hans Baumgarten, who had his shoulder smashed; Daniel Spitz, who lost two fingers by a sabre-cut, and many others, whose names should be honored and revered for ages—all these never once left off firing and reloading their guns.

  Below the slope fearful cries were heard, while above nothing but bristling bayonets and men on horseback were to be seen.

  This lasted a good quarter of an hour. No one knew what the Germans would do, since there was no passage; when they suddenly decided on going away. Most of the students had fallen, and the others—old campaigners used to honorable retreats—no longer fought with the same steadiness.

  At first they retreated slowly, then more quickly. Their officers struck them from behind with the flat end of their swords; the musketry-fire pursued them; and, finally, they ran away with as much precipitation as they had been orderly in advancing.

  Materne, and fifty others, rose upon the barricades, the old hunter brandishing his carbine, and bursting into hearty roars of laughter.

  At the foot of the bank were heaps of wounded dragging themselves along the ground. The trodden-down snow was red with blood. In the midst of the piles of dead were two young officers, still alive, but unable to disengage themselves from their dead horses.

  It was horrible! But men are, in fact, savages: there was not one among the mountaineers who pitied those poor wretches; but, on the contrary, they seemed to rejoice at the sight.

  Little Riffi, transported with a noble enthusiasm, just then glided out along the bank. To the left, underneath the breastworks, he had caught sight of. a superb horse, which had belonged to the colonel killed by Materne, and had retired unhurt into his nook.

  “Thou shalt be mine,” said he to himself. “Sapience will be astonished!”

  All the others envied him. He seized the horse by the bridle and sprang upon him; but judge of the general stupefaction, and of Riffi’s in particular, when this noble animal began to shape his course toward the Germans in full gallop.

  The little tailor lifted his hands to heaven, imploring God and all the saints.

  Materne would have liked much to fire; but he dared not, the horse went so fast.

  At last Riffi disappeared amid the bayonets of the e
nemy.

  Everybody thought he had been killed. However, an hour later, he was to be seen passing along the main street of Grandfontaine, his hands tied behind him, and Corporal Knout at his back, bearing his emblem of office.

  Poor Riffi! He alone did not partake of the triumph, and his comrades laughed at his misfortune, as though he had been but a “kaiserlich.”

  Such is the character of men; so long as they are happy themselves, the misery of others grieves them but little.

  CHAPTER XV

  THE BATTLE RENEWED

  The mountaineers were almost beside themselves with enthusiasm: they lifted their hands and bepraised one another, as if they were the cream of mankind.

  Catherine, Louise, Doctor Lorquin and all the others came out of the farm, cheering and congratulating each other, gazing at the marks of the bullets and at the bank blackened with powder; then at Joseph Larnette stretched in his hole, having his head smashed; at Baumgarten, who, with his arm hanging down, walked in great pallor toward the ambulance; and then at Daniel Spitz, who, in spite of his sabre-cut, wanted to stay and fight; but the doctor would not hear of it, and forced him to enter the farm.

  Louise came up with the little cart, and poured out brandy for the combatants; while Catherine Lefèvre, standing at the edge of the sloping bank, watched the dead and wounded scattered over the road, and led up to by long lines of blood. There were both young and old among them, with faces white as wax, wide-opened eyes, and outstretched arms. Some few tried to raise themselves, but no sooner had they done so than they fell back again; others looked up as though they were afraid of receiving some more bullets, and dragged themselves along the bank in order to get under shelter.

  Many of them seemed resigned to their fate, and were looking for a place to die, or else watching their retreating regiment on its way to Framont—that regiment with which they had quitted their homes, with which they had made a long campaign, and which was now abandoning them! “It will see old Germany again!” they thought. “And when some one asks the captain or the sergeant, ‘Did you know such a one—Hans, Kasper, Nickel, of the 1st or of the 2d company?’ they will reply, ‘Ah! I think so. Had he not a scar on the ear, or on the cheek? fair or dark hair? five feet six in height? Yes, I know him. He was buried in France, near a little village whose name I do not remember. Some mountaineers killed him the same day big Major Yéri-Peter was killed. He was a fine fellow!’ And then it is, ‘Good-day to you.’”

  Perhaps, too, there were some of them who dreamed of their mother, or of a pretty girl left behind them, Gretchen or Lotchen, who had given, them a ribbon, and shed hot tears when they left: “I will await thy return, Kasper. I will only marry thee! Yes, yes, thou wilt have to wait long!”

  It was not pleasant to think of.

  Madame Lefèvre, seeing this, thought of Gaspard. Hullin, who came up with Lagarmitte, cried out in a joyous tone, “Well, my boys, you have been under fire. Bravo! everything goes well. The Germans will have no occasion to boast of this day.”

  Then he embraced Louise, and hurried up to Catherine.

  “Are you satisfied, Catherine? There! our success is certain. But what is the matter? You do not smile.”

  “Yes, Jean-Claude, all goes well. I am satisfied. But look down at the road. What a butchery!”

  “It is only what happens in war,” replied Hullin, gravely.

  “Could we not go and help that little fellow down there, who watches us with his large blue eyes? He makes me feel so sad. Or that tall, dark man, who is binding his leg with his handkerchief?”

  “Impossible, Catherine. I am very sorry. We should have to cut steps in the ice to get down, and the Germans, who will be back in an hour or two, would take advantage of them. Let us go. The victory must be announced in all the villages—to Labarbe, Jérome, and Piorette. Ho! Simon, Niklo, Marchal, come here. You will have to set out immediately, and carry the great tidings to our comrades. Materne, keep thy eyes open, and warn me at the slightest movement.”

  They approached the farm, and, as he passed, Jean-Claude took a look at the reserve, Marc Divès being on horseback surrounded by his men. The smuggler complained bitterly of being left with nothing to do, as if his honor were tarnished thereby.

  “Bah!” said Hullin, “so much the better! Besides, thou keepest guard over our right. Look at that flat ground down there. If we are attacked from that point, thou wilt have to march!”

  Divès made no answer; he looked both sad and indignant, nor did his stalwart smugglers, wrapped in their cloaks, their long swords hanging by their sides, seem at all in a better humor; one might have said that they were meditating some revenge.

  Hullin, not succeeding in consoling them, entered the farm-house. Doctor Lorquin was extracting the ball from Baumgarten’s wound, who was making terrible cries.

  Pelsly, on the doorstep, was trembling all over. Jean-Claude asked him for paper and ink, in order to transmit his orders through the mountain; but the poor anabaptist could hardly give them to him, so great was his trouble. However, he succeeded at last, and the messengers departed, proud of being charged to announce the first battle and victory.

  A few mountaineers were in the large room, warming themselves at the oven and talking animatedly. Daniel Spitz had already undergone amputation of his two fingers, and sat behind the stove with his hand bound up.

  Those who had been posted behind the abatis before daybreak, not having breakfasted, were now eating a crust of bread and drinking a glass of wine, shouting, gesticulating, and making great bravado meanwhile. Then they went out, looked at the intrenchments, came back to warm themselves again, and laughed fit to split their sides when they spoke of Riffi, and his wails and cries on horseback.

  It was eleven o’clock. These incomings and outgoings lasted till twelve, when Marc Divès suddenly came into the room, calling out: “Hullin! Where is Hullin?”

  “Here I am.”

  “Well, then, come!”

  The smuggler’s tone had something remarkable about it: from being a moment before furious at having taken no part in the fight, he had now become triumphant. Jean-Claude followed him, feeling very uneasy: and the large room was immediately deserted, everybody being convinced, from Marc’s manner, that there was something serious the matter.

  To the right of the Donon extends the ravine of Minières, through which runs a foaming torrent when the snows melt—descending from the summit of the mountain to the valley.

  Exactly in front of the plateau defended by the partisans, and on the other side of this ravine, at a distance of five or six hundred mètres, projects a sort of open terrace with rugged sides, which Hullin had considered unnecessary to occupy for the time, wishing not to divide his forces, and seeing, besides, that it would be easy for him to turn this position by the pine-clumps, and to establish himself there, if the enemy showed any intention to take it.

  Now imagine the consternation of the worthy man when, on reaching the door of the farm-house, he saw two companies of Germans climbing this ascent, among the gardens of Grandfontaine, having two field-pieces yoked to powerful horses, which appeared to hang over the precipice. A troop was pushing at the wheels, and in a few seconds the guns would have reached the plateau.

  It was like a thunder-bolt for Jean-Claude; he turned pale, and then into a great passion with Divès.

  “Couldst thou not have warned me sooner?” he cried. “Did I not command thee to watch over the ravine? Our position is turned. They will hem us in, and cut us off from the road farther on. Everything is going to the deuce.”

  The people present, and old Materne himself, who had come up in great haste, were startled by the glance he darted at the smuggler; who, notwithstanding his usual audacity, was quite confused, not knowing what to reply.

  “Come, come, Jean-Claude,” said he at last, “be calm. It is not so serious as thou sayest. We have not fought yet—we others; and besides, we have no cannons—so it will be the very thing for us.”

  “Yes,
the very thing for us, imbecile! Thy self-love made thee wait till the last minute, did it not? Thou wert too eager to fight, and have an opportunity for boasting and making bravado; and for that thou didst not hesitate to risk all our lives. Look! there are other troops being got ready at Framont.”

  In fact, another column, much stronger than the first, was just then marching out of Framont at the charge, and advancing against the breastworks. Divès did not say a word. Hullin controlled his anger, and became suddenly calm in the presence of danger.

  “Go back to your posts,” he said briefly to those around him. “Let all be ready for the coming attack. Materne, listen!”

  The old hunter inclined his head. Meanwhile, Marc Divès had recovered his self-possession.

  “Instead of screaming like a woman,” said he, “thou wouldst do better to give me orders to attack down there, by turning the ravine at the pine-clumps.”

  “Then do it!” replied Jean-Claude; and in a calmer tone: “Listen, Marc! I am very angry with thee. We were conquerors; and by thy fault the battle has to be fought over again. If thou failest in thy attack, all is lost for us.”

  “Good! good! The affair is altogether mine: I will answer for it.”

  Then, springing on his horse, and throwing the end of his mantle over his shoulder, he drew his long blade with a defiant air. His men did the same.

  He then turned to the reserve, composed of five hundred mountaineers, and showing the plateau to them with the point of his sword, said, “Look there, my men! we must carry that position. The men of Dagsburg must not say that they are braver than the men of the Sarre. Forward!” And, full of ardor, they advanced, skirting the ravine. Hullin shouted to them—“At the point of your bayonets!”

  The big smuggler, on his great sleek roan, turned round, laughing out of the corners of his mustache, and waved his sword in a significant way; then the whole body dashed into the pine-wood.

  At the same time the Germans, with their eight-pounders, had gained the plateau, and were putting them in position, while the column from Framont was ascending the hill-side. Thus everything was in the same condition as before the battle,—with this difference, that the enemies’ bullets would now come into play and take the mountaineers in the rear.