Officer's Prey

‘A skeleton in the cupboard?’

‘According to von Stils, our Saxon Life Guard, it’s his homosexuality. Or else Nedroni has no secret and supports Fidassio in order to further his career. In any case, it’s pointless hoping to find a way of separating them. The only solution would be to kill one of them …’

Lefine chuckled. It was so good to laugh.

‘If we went for that option, Captain, I’d prefer it if we got rid of Nedroni. I fear him more than Fidassio,’ he chipped in.

‘Are you sure? When someone hits his master, even the most placid dog can go wild. The conclusion is that whatever the precise co

‘He was incredible! I give him second prize for foolhardiness, a pass with merit. Delarse receives third prize.’

Margont folded his arms, looking amused. ‘Really? I’m dying to know who won first prize.’

‘General Miloradovich. I have a friend who’s an interpreter in the general staff of our corps. A prisoner told him that Miloradovich wanted to prove that he was the bravest man in the whole Russian army so he sat on the ground where our guns were causing the maximum carnage and a

Margont was full of admiration. ‘How do you always manage to know everything about everything?’

‘Because that’s all I have to sell.’

‘Pirgnon loves Greek and Roman mythology and is astonishingly knowledgeable about it. When he talks about it it’s as if he was alive at the time. It’s as if he thinks he is the reincarnation of a famous classical figure. He must imagine being the hero of an odyssey.’

‘But if this campaign is an odyssey, it’s obvious that Pirgnon is not its Ulysses.’

‘What about Barguelot?’

Lefine became even more joyful. ‘I’ve kept the best until the end! Poor Colonel Barguelot really is unlucky: when the Broussier Division attacked the Great Redoubt … he sprained his ankle again.’

‘Oh! When you’ve sprained them once, these joints do tend to become unsteady … Why didn’t he go into the attack on horseback, then? Had his horse sprained its hoof?’

‘He’d left his horse in the rear.’

‘It’s true that it’s dangerous to go into the attack too quickly.’

‘You sometimes dismount before the assault yourself, Captain.’

‘Yes, but that’s in order to show solidarity with the men of my company. Besides, given how much marching we do in Russia, I wanted to be sure of keeping my mount. And, lastly, I did go to the Great Redoubt. Twice. It almost did for me, as well.’

Lefine wiped his face with a handkerchief in a vain attempt to clean it.

‘Colonel Barguelot also ended up in the redoubt. He just arrived a tiny bit late, when it was all over.’

‘His uniform was sparkling.’

‘He skirted the redoubt and entered via the gorge. It was less dirty that way. He still almost got killed.’

‘Really? Did he catch a bad cold?’

‘He was limping along well behind his regiment, surrounded by a dozen soldiers – including our spy – when a Russian soldier who’d been pretending to be dead got up and attacked him with his sabre. Barguelot parried the attack so badly with his sword that, but for the speed of one of his men who stopped the Russian in his tracks by ru

‘So his title of “fencing master” is just one more piece of deception, is it? Excellent work, Fernand.’

The two men were in no hurry to catch up with their regiment. They knew it was the moment for counting the dead. Men from each regiment were thinking of those they had lost or those hovering between life and death. The 84th had stayed in the second line so had not suffered much, but other regiments had sustained incredible losses.

Of Margont’s acquaintances, Gu

This process lasted all night because they were still receiving reports of so-and-so’s body being found, that so-and-so hadn’t survived his operation or was lying in a cart for the wounded … There had never been so many dead and wounded, and the count was still not over. Even worse, it seemed as if it would never be over. And with each death, everyone had the feeling that a small part of humanity had just been lost for ever.

CHAPTER 26

ON 15 September the Grande Armée reached Moscow. Napoleon had admired it the day before, in the company of the vanguard, from Poklo

Reaching Moscow caused an indescribable outpouring of joy. The regiments could see the columns ahead of them gesticulating on a hilltop and shouting: ‘Moscow! Moscow!’ The soldiers simply could not believe it. They speeded up, muddling their ranks, which the NCOs, with much swearing, then had to attempt to disentangle. The Hill of Salvation was blocking the view; Moscow was still only a dream, a city they had heard so much about but which perhaps did not exist, a sort of Russian Eldorado. But once they had reached the summit, suddenly Moscow stretched out in all its immensity. Everywhere were church cupolas and gilded onion domes, splendid palaces, whole districts built of stone, vast avenues … Moscow, with its Baroque and Byzantine architecture, belonged to a different world from that of Paris, Vie