The Erckmann-Chatrian Megapack: 20 Classic Novels and Short Stories (108 page)

I stood and looked.

“Here,” I said to the sergeant as I handed him my little bottle, “I have brought you your drop of cherry-brandy; it was such a cold night, you must need it.”

“And you have thought of me, Father Moses!” he exclaimed, taking me by the arm, and looking at me with emotion.

“Yes, sergeant.”

“Well, I am glad of it.”

He raised the flask to his mouth and took a good drink. At that moment there was a distant cry. “Who goes there?” and the guard of the outpost ran to open the gate.

“That is good!” said the sergeant, tapping on the cork, and giving me the bottle; “take it back, Father Moses, and thank you!”

Then he turned toward the half-moon and asked, “News! What is it?”

We both looked and saw a hussar quartermaster, a withered, gray old man, with quantities of chevrons on his arm, arrive in great haste.

All my life I shall have that man before my eyes; his smoking horse, his flying sabretash, his sword clinking against his boots; his cap and jacket covered with frost; his long, bony, wrinkled face, his pointed nose, long chin, and yellow eyes. I shall always see him riding like the wind, then stopping his rearing horse under the arch in front of us, and calling out to us with a voice like a trumpet: “Where is the governor’s house, sergeant?”

“The first house at the right, quartermaster. What is the news?”

“The enemy is in Alsace!”

Those who have never seen such men—men accustomed to long warfare, and hard as iron—can have no idea of them. And then if you had heard the exclamation, “The enemy is in Alsace!” it would have made you tremble.

The veterans had gone away; the sergeant, as he saw the hussar fasten his horse at the governor’s door, said to me: “Ah, well, Father Moses, now we shall see the whites of their eyes!”

He laughed, and the others seemed pleased.

As for myself, I set forth quickly, with my head bent, and in my terror repeating to myself the words of the prophet:

“One post shall run to meet another, and one messenger to meet another, to show the king that his passages are stopped, and the reeds they have burned with fire, and the men of war are affrighted.

“The mighty men have forborne to fight, they have remained in their holds, their might hath failed, and the bars are broken.

“Set ye up a standard in the land, blow the trumpet among the nations, prepare the nations against her, call together against her the kingdoms, appoint a captain against her.

“And the land shall tremble and sorrow; for every purpose of the Lord shall be performed, to make the land a desolation without an inhabitant!”

I saw my ruin at hand—the destruction of my hopes.

“Mercy, Moses!” exclaimed my wife, as she saw me come back, “what is the matter? Your face is all drawn up. Something dreadful has happened.”

“Yes, Sorlé,” I said, as I sat down; “the time of trouble has come of which the prophet spoke: ‘The king of the south shall push at him, and the king of the north shall come against him like a whirlwind; and he shall enter into the countries and shall overflow and pass over.’”

This I said with my hands raised toward heaven. Little Sâfel squeezed himself between my knees, while Sorlé looked on, not knowing what to say; and I told them that the Austrians were in Alsace; that the Bavarians, Swedes, Prussians, and Russians were coming by hundreds of thousands; that a hussar had come to announce all these calamities; that our spirits of wine were lost, and ruin was threatening us.

I shed a few tears, and neither Sorlé nor Sâfel would comfort me.

It was eight o’clock. There was a great commotion in the city. We heard the drum beat, and proclamations read; it seemed as if the enemy were already there.

One thing which I remember especially, for we had opened a window to hear, was that the governor ordered the inhabitants to empty immediately their barns and granaries; and that, while we were listening, a large Alsatian wagon with two horses, with Baruch sitting on the pole, and Zeffen behind on some straw—her infant in her arms, and her other child at her side—turned suddenly into the street.

They were coming to us for safety!

The sight of them upset me, and raising my hands, I exclaimed:

“Lord, take from me all weakness! Thou seest that I need to live for the sake of these little ones. Therefore be thou my strength, and let me not be cast down!”

And I went down at once to receive them, Sorlé and Sâfel following me. I took my daughter in my arms, and helped her to the ground, while Sorlé took the children, and Baruch exclaimed:

“We came at the last minute! The gate was closed as soon as we had come in. There were many others from Quatre-Vents and Saverne who had to stay outside.”

“God be praised, Baruch!” I replied. “You are all welcome, my dear children! I have not much, I am not rich; but what I have, you have—it is all yours. Come in!”

And we went upstairs; Zeffen, Sorlé, and I carrying the children, while Baruch stayed to take their things out of the wagon, and then he came up.

The street was now full of straw and hay, thrown out from the lofts; there was no wind, and the snow had stopped falling. In a little while the shouts and proclamations ceased.

Sorlé hastened to serve up the remains of our breakfast, with a bottle of wine; and Baruch, while he was eating, told us that there was a panic in Alsace, that the Austrians had turned Basle, and were advancing by forced marches upon Schlestadt, Neuf Brisach, and Strasburg, after having surrounded Huninguen.

“Everybody is escaping,” said he. “They are fleeing to the mountain, taking their valuables on their carts, and driving their cattle into the woods. There is a rumor already that bands of Cossacks have been seen at Mutzig, but that is hardly possible, as the army of Marshal Victor is on the Upper Rhine, and dragoons are passing every day to join him. How could they pass his lines without giving battle?”

We were listening very attentively to these things when the sergeant came in. He was just off duty, and stood outside of the door, looking at us with astonishment.

I took Zeffen by the hand, and said: “Sergeant, this is my daughter, this is my son-in-law, and these are my grandchildren, about whom I have told you. They know you, for I have told them in my letters how much we think of you.”

The sergeant looked at Zeffen.—“Father Moses,” said he, “you have a handsome daughter, and your son-in-law looks like a worthy man.”

Then he took little Esdras from Zeffen’s arms, and lifted him up, and made a face at him, at which the child laughed, and everybody was pleased. The other little one opened his eyes wide and looked on.

“My children have come to stay with me,” I said to the sergeant; “you will excuse them if they make a little noise in the house?”

“How! Father Moses,” he exclaimed. “I will excuse everything! Do not be concerned; are we not old friends?”

And at once, in spite of all we could say, he chose another room looking upon the court.

“All the nestful ought to be together,” said he. “I am the friend of the family, the old sergeant, who will not trouble anybody, provided they are willing to see him here.”

I was so much moved that I gave him both my hands.

“It was a happy day when you entered my house,” said I. “The Lord be thanked for it!”

He laughed, and said: “Come now, Father Moses; come! Have I done anything more than was natural? Why do you wonder at it?”

He went at once to get his things and carry them to his new room; and then went away, so as not to disturb us.

How we are mistaken! This sergeant, whom Frichard had sent to plague us, at the end of a fortnight was one of our family; he consulted our comfort in everything—and, notwithstanding all the years that have passed since then, I cannot think of that good man without emotion.

When we were alone, Baruch told us that he could not stay at Phalsburg; that he had come to bring his family, with everything that he could provide for them in the first hurried moments; but that, in the midst of such dangers, when the enemy could not long delay coming, his duty was to guard his house, and prevent, as much as possible, the pillage of his goods.

This seemed right, though it made us none the less grieved to have him go. We thought of the pain of living apart from each other; of hearing no tidings; of being all the time uncertain about the fate of our beloved ones! Meanwhile we were all busy. Sorlé and Zeffen prepared the children’s bed; Baruch took out the provisions which he had brought; Sâfel played with the two little ones, and I went and came, thinking about our troubles.

At last, when the best room was ready for Zeffen and the children, as the German gate was already shut, and the French gate would be open only until two o’clock at the latest, for strangers to leave the city, Baruch exclaimed: “Zeffen, the moment has come!”

He had scarcely said the words when the great agony began—cries, embraces, and tears!

Ah! it is a great joy to be loved, the only true joy of life. But what sorrow to be separated! And how our family loved each other! How Zeffen and Baruch embraced one another! How they leaned over their little ones, how they looked at them, and began to sob again!

What can be said at such a moment? I sat by the window, with my hands before my face, without strength to speak. I thought to myself: “My God, must it be that a single man shall hold in his hands the fate of us all! Must it be that, for his pleasure, for the gratification of his pride, everything shall be confounded, overturned, torn asunder! My God, shall these troubles never end? Hast thou no pity on thy poor creatures?”

I did not raise my eyes, but I heard the lamentations which rent my heart, and which lasted till the moment when Baruch, perceiving that Zeffen was quite exhausted, ran out, exclaiming: “It must be! It must be! Adieu, Zeffen! Adieu, my children! Adieu, all!”

No one followed him.

We heard the carriage roll away, and then was the great sorrow—that sorrow of which it is written:

“By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down; yea, we wept when we remembered Zion.

“We hanged our harps upon the willows.

“For there they that carried us away captive, required of us a song, saying: ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’

“How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?”

CHAPTER X

AN ENGAGEMENT WITH THE COSSACKS

But that day I was to have the greatest fright of all. You remember, Fritz, that Sorlé had told me at supper the night before, that if we did not receive the invoice, our spirits of wine would be at the risk of M. Quataya of Pézenas, and that we need feel no anxiety about it.

I thought so, too, for it seemed to me right; and as the French and German gates were closed at three o’clock, and nothing more could enter the city, I supposed that that was the end of the matter, and felt quite relieved.

“It is a pity, Moses!” I said to myself, as I walked up and down the room; “yes, for if these spirits had been sent a week sooner, we should have made a great profit; but now, at least, thou art relieved of great anxiety. Be content with thine old trade. Let alone for the future such harassing undertakings. Don’t stake thine all again on one throw, and let this be a lesson to thee!”

Such thoughts were in my mind, when, about four o’clock, I heard some one coming up our stairs. It was a heavy step, as of a man trying to find his way in the dark.

Zeffen and Sorlé were in the kitchen, preparing supper. Women always have something to talk about by themselves, for nobody else to hear. So I listened, and then opened the door.

“Who is there?” I asked.

“Does not Mr. Moses, the wine-merchant, live here?” asked the man in a blouse and broad-brimmed felt hat, with his whip on his shoulder—a wagoner’s figure, in short. I turned pale as I heard him, and replied: “Yes, my name is Moses. What do you want?”

He came in, and took out a large leather portfolio from under his blouse. I trembled as I looked on.

“There!” said he, giving me two papers, “my invoice and my bill of lading! Are not the twelve pipes of three-six from Pézenas for you?”

“Yes, where are they?”

“On the Mittelbronn hill, twenty minutes from here,” he quietly answered. “Some Cossacks stopped my wagons, and I had to take off the horses. I hurried into the city by a postern under the bridge.”

My legs failed me as he spoke. I sank into my arm-chair, unable to speak a word.

“You will pay me the portage,” said the man, “and give me a receipt for the delivery.”

“Sorlé! Sorlé!” I cried in a despairing voice. And she and Zeffen ran to me. The wagoner explained it all to them. As for me, I heard nothing. I had strength only to exclaim: “Now all is lost! Now I must pay without receiving the goods.”

“We are willing to pay, sir,” said my wife, “but the letter states that the twelve pipes shall be delivered in the city.”

The wagoner said: “I have just come from the justice of the peace, as I wanted to find out before coming to you what I had a right to claim; he told me that you ought to pay for everything, even my horses and carriages, do you understand? I unharnessed my horses, and escaped, myself, which is so much the less on your account. Will you settle? Yes or no?”