The Downfall

“Nom de Dieu! go ahead! smash it in, since there is no one at home!”

All at once the shutter of a window in the garret was thrown back and a tall old man presented himself, bare-headed, wearing the peasant’s blouse, with a candle in one hand and a gun in the other. Beneath the thick shock of bristling white hair was a square face, deeply seamed and wrinkled, with a strong nose, large, pale eyes, and stubborn chin.

“You must be robbers, to smash things as you are doing!” he shouted in an angry tone. “What do you want?”

The soldiers, taken by surprise, drew back a little way.

“We are perishing with hunger; we want something to eat.”

“I have nothing, not a crust. Do you suppose that I keep victuals in my house to fill a hundred thousand mouths? Others were here before you; yes, General Ducrot’s men were here this morning, I tell you, and they cleaned me out of everything.”

The soldiers came forward again, one by one.

“Let us in, all the same; we can rest ourselves, and you can hunt up something – ”

And they were commencing to hammer at the door again, when the old fellow, placing his candle on the window-sill, raised his gun to his shoulder.

“As true as that candle stands there, I’ll put a hole in the first man that touches that door!”

The prospect looked favorable for a row. Oaths and imprecations resounded, and one of the men was heard to shout that they would settle matters with the pig of a peasant, who was like all the rest of them and would throw his bread in the river rather than give a mouthful to a starving soldier. The light of the candle glinted on the barrels of the chassepots as they were brought to an aim; the angry men were about to shoot him where he stood, while he, headstrong and violent, would not yield an inch.

“Nothing, nothing! Not a crust! I tell you they cleaned me out!”

Maurice rushed in in affright, followed by Jean.

“Comrades, comrades – ”

He knocked up the soldiers’ guns, and raising his eyes, said entreatingly:

“Come, be reasonable. Don’t you know me? It is I.”

“Who, I?”

“Maurice Levasseur, your nephew.”

Father Fouchard took up his candle. He recognized his nephew, beyond a doubt, but was firm in his resolve not to give so much as a glass of water.

“How can I tell whether you are my nephew or not in this infernal darkness? Clear out, everyone of you, or I will fire!”

And amid an uproar of execration, and threats to bring him down and burn the shanty, he still had nothing to say but: “Clear out, or I’ll fire!” which he repeated more than twenty times.

Suddenly a loud clear voice was heard rising above the din:

“But not on me, father?”

The others stood aside, and in the flickering light of the candle a man appeared, wearing the chevrons of a quartermaster-sergeant. It was Honore, whose battery was a short two hundred yards from there and who had been struggling for the last two hours against an irresistible longing to come and knock at that door. He had sworn never to set foot in that house again, and in all his four years of army life had not exchanged a single letter with that father whom he now addressed so curtly. The marauders had drawn apart and were conversing excitedly among themselves; what, the old man’s son, and a “non-com.”! it wouldn’t answer; better go and try their luck elsewhere! So they slunk away and vanished in the darkness.

When Fouchard saw that he had nothing more to fear he said in a matter-of-course way, as if he had seen his son only the day before:

“It’s you – All right, I’ll come down.”

His descent was a matter of time. He could be heard inside the house opening locked doors and carefully fastening them again, the maneuvers of a man determined to leave nothing at loose ends. At last the door was opened, but only for a few inches, and the strong grasp that held it would let it go no further.

“Come in, thou! and no one besides!”

He could not turn away his nephew, however, notwithstanding his manifest repugnance.

“Well, thou too!”

He shut the door flat in Jean’s face, in spite of Maurice’s entreaties. But he was obdurate. No, no! he wouldn’t have it; he had no use for strangers and robbers in his house, to smash and destroy his furniture! Finally Honore shoved their comrade inside the door by main strength and the old man had to make the best of it, grumbling and growling vindictively. He had carried his gun with him all this time. When at last he had ushered the three men into the common sitting-room and had stood his gun in a corner and placed the candle on the table, he sank into a mulish silence.

“Say, father, we are perishing with hunger. You will let us have a little bread and cheese, won’t you?”

He made a pretense of not hearing and did not answer, turning his head at every instant toward the window as if listening for some other band that might be coming to lay siege to his house.

“Uncle, Jean has been a brother to me; he deprived himself of food to give it to me. And we have seen such suffering together!”

He turned and looked about the room to assure himself that nothing was missing, not giving the three soldiers so much as a glance, and at last, still without a word spoken, appeared to come to a decision. He suddenly arose, took the candle and went out, leaving them in darkness and carefully closing and locking the door behind him in order that no one might follow him. They could hear his footsteps on the stairs that led to the cellar. There was another long period of waiting, and when he returned, again locking and bolting everything after him, he placed upon the table a big loaf of bread and a cheese, amid a silence which, once his anger had blown over, was merely the result of cautious cunning, for no one can ever tell what may come of too much talking. The three men threw themselves ravenously upon the food, and the only sound to be heard in the room was the fierce grinding of their jaws.

Honore rose, and going to the sideboard brought back a pitcher of water.

“I think you might have given us some wine, father.”

Whereupon Fouchard, now master of himself and no longer fearing that this anger might lead him into unguarded speech, once more found his tongue.

“Wine! I haven’t any, not a drop! The others, those fellows of Ducrot’s, ate and drank all I had, robbed me of everything!”

He was lying, and try to conceal it as he might the shifty expression in his great light eyes showed it. For the past two days he had been driving away his cattle, as well those reserved for work on the farm as those he had purchased to slaughter, and hiding them, no one knew where, in the depths of some wood or in some abandoned quarry, and he had devoted hours to burying all his household stores, wine, bread, and things of the least value, even to the flour and salt, so that anyone might have ransacked his cupboards and been none the richer for it. He had refused to sell anything to the first soldiers who came along; no one knew, he might be able to do better later on; and the patient, sly old curmudgeon indulged himself with vague dreams of wealth.

Maurice, who was first to satisfy his appetite, commenced to talk.

“Have you seen my sister Henriette lately?”

The old man was pacing up and down the room, casting an occasional glance at Jean, who was bolting huge mouthfuls of bread; after apparently giving the subject long consideration he deliberately answered:

“Henriette, yes, I saw her last month when I was in Sedan. But I saw Weiss, her husband, this morning. He was with Monsieur Delaherche, his boss, who had come over in his carriage to see the soldiers at Mouzon – which is the same as saying that they were out for a good time.”

An expression of intense scorn flitted over the old peasant’s impenetrable face.

“Perhaps they saw more of the army than they wanted to, and didn’t have such a very good time after all, for ever since three o’clock the roads have been impassable on account of the crowds of flying soldiers.”

In the same unmoved voice, as if the matter were one of perfect indifference to him, he gave them some tidings of the defeat of the 5th corps, that had been surprised at Beaumont while the men were making their soup and chased by the Bavarians all the way to Mouzon. Some fugitives who had passed through Remilly, mad with terror, had told him that they had been betrayed once more and that de Failly had sold them to Bismarck. Maurice’s thoughts reverted to the aimless, blundering movements of the last two days, to Marshal MacMahon hurrying on their retreat and insisting on getting them across the Meuse at every cost, after wasting so many precious hours in incomprehensible delays. It was too late. Doubtless the marshal, who had stormed so on finding the 7th corps still at Osches when he supposed it to be at la Besace, had felt assured that the 5th corps was safe in camp at Mouzon when, lingering in Beaumont, it had come to grief there. But what could they expect from troops so poorly officered, demoralized by suspense and incessant retreat, dying with hunger and fatigue?

Fouchard had finally come and planted himself behind Jean’s chair, watching with astonishment the inroads he was making on the bread and cheese. In a coldly sarcastic tone he asked:

“Are you beginning to feel better, hein?”

The corporal raised his head and replied with the same peasant-like directness: