I stay by him. The sweat no longer stands on his brow. The horrible distress pa.s.ses off. The air flows again into the miserable breast. The gentle eyes have not ceased to smile.

"You will save me after all," he says; "I have had too miserable a life to die yet, Monsieur."

I press his hand to give him confidence, and I feel that his hard hand is happy in mine. My fingers have groped in his flesh, his blood has flowed over them, and this creates strong ties between two men.

Calm seems completely restored. I talk to him of his beautiful native place. He was a baker in a village of Le Cantal. I pa.s.sed through it once as a traveller in peace time. We recall the scent of the juniper-bushes on the green slopes in summer, and the mineral fountains with wonderful flavours that gush forth among the mountains.

"Oh!" he exclaims, "I shall always see you!"

"You will see me, Mercier?"

He is a very simple fellow; he tries to explain, and merely adds:

"In my eyes.... I shall always see you in my eyes."

What else does he see? What other thing is suddenly reflected in his eyes?

"I think... oh, it is beginning again!"

It is true; the spasm is beginning again. It is terrible. In spite of our efforts, it overcomes the victim, and this time we are helpless.

"I feel that I am going to die," he says.

The smiling eyes are still fixed imploringly upon me.

"But you will save me, you will save me!"

Death has already laid a disfiguring hand on Mercier.

"Stay by me."

Yes, I will stay by you, and hold your hand. Is there nothing more I can do for you?

His nostrils quiver. It is hard to have been wretched for forty years, and to have to give up the humble hope of smelling the pungent scent of the juniper-bushes once more....

His lips contract, and then relax gradually, so sadly. It is hard to have suffered for forty years, and to be unable to quench one's last thirst with the wonderful waters of our mountain springs....

Now the dark sweat gathers again on the hollow brow. Oh, it is hard to die after forty years of toil, without ever having had leisure to wipe the sweat from a brow that has always been bent over one's work.

The sacrifice is immense, and we cannot choose our hour; we must make it as soon as we hear the voice that demands it.

The man must lay down his tools and say: "Here I am."

Oh, how hard it is to leave this life of unceasing toil and sorrow!

The eyes still smile feebly. They smile to the last moment.

He speaks no more. He breathes no more. The heart throbs wildly, then stops dead like a foundered horse.

Mercier is dead. The pupils of his eyes are solemnly distended upon a gla.s.sy abyss. All is over. I have not saved him....

Then from those dead eyes great tears ooze slowly and flow upon his cheeks. I see his features contract as if to weep throughout eternity.

I keep the dead hand still clasped in mine for several long minutes.

VERDUN

FEBRUARY-APRIL 1916

We were going northward by forced marches, through a France that was like a mournful garden planted with crosses. We were no longer in doubt as to our appointed destination; every day since we had disembarked at B----our orders had enjoined us to hasten our advance to the fighting units of the Army Corps. This Army Corps was contracting, and drawing itself together hurriedly, its head already in the thick of the fray, its tail still winding along the roads, across the battle-field of the Marne.

February was closing in, damp and icy, with squalls of sleet, under a sullen, hideous sky, lowering furiously down to the level of the ground.

Everywhere there were graves, uniformly decent, or rather according to pattern, showing a shield of tri-colour or black and white, and figures.

Suddenly, we came upon immense flats, whence the crosses stretched out their arms between the poplars like men struggling to save themselves from being engulfed. Many ancient villages, humble, irremediable ruins.

And yet here and there, perched upon these, frail cabins of planks and tiles, sending forth thin threads of smoke, and emitting a timid light, in an attempt to begin life again as before, on the same spot as before.

Now and again we chanced upon a hamlet which the hurricane had pa.s.sed by almost completely, full to overflowing with the afflux of neighbouring populations.

Beyond P----, our advance, though it continued to be rapid, became very difficult, owing to the confluence of convoys and troops. The main roads, reserved for the military ma.s.ses which were under the necessity of moving rapidly, arriving early, and striking suddenly, were barred to us. From every point of the horizon disciplined mult.i.tudes converged, with their a.r.s.enal of formidable implements, rolling along in an atmosphere of benzine and hot oil. Through this ordered ma.s.s, our convoys threaded their way tenaciously and advanced. We could see on the hill sides, crawling like a clan of migrating ants, stretcher-bearers and their dogs drawing handcarts for the wounded, then the columns of orderlies, muddy and exhausted, then the ambulances, which every week of war loads a little more heavily, dragged along by horses in a steam of sweat.

From time to time, the whole train halted at some cross-road, and the ambulances allowed more urgent things to pa.s.s in front of them--things designed to kill, st.u.r.dy grey mortars borne along post haste in a metallic rumble.

A halt, a draught of wine mingled with rain, a few minutes to choke over a mouthful of stale bread, and we were off again, longing for the next halt, for a dry shelter, for an hour of real sleep.

Soon after leaving C----we began to meet fugitives. This complicated matters very much, and the spectacle began to show an odious likeness to the scenes of the beginning of the war, the scenes of the great retreat.

Keeping along the roadsides, the by-roads, the field-paths, they were fleeing from the Verdun district, whence they had been evacuated by order. They were urging on miserable old horses, drawing frail carts, their wheels sunk in the ruts up to the nave, loaded with mattresses and eiderdowns, with appliances for eating and sleeping, and sometimes too, with cages in which birds were twittering. On they went, from village to village, seeking an undiscoverable lodging, but not complaining, saying merely:

"You are going to Verdun? We have just come from X----. We were ordered to leave. It is very difficult to find a place to settle down in."

Women pa.s.sed. Two of them were dragging a little baby-carriage in which an infant lay asleep. One of them was quite young, the other old. They held up their skirts out of the mud. They were wearing little town shoes, and every minute they sank into the slime like ourselves, sometimes above their ankles.

All day long we encountered similar processions. I do not remember seeing one of these women weep; but they seemed terrified, and mortally tired.

Meanwhile, the sound of the guns became fuller and more regular. All the roads we caught sight of in the country seemed to be bearing their load of men and of machines. Here and there a horse which had succ.u.mbed at its task lay rotting at the foot of a hillock. A subdued roar rose to the ear, made up of trampling hoofs, of grinding wheels, of the buzz of motors, and of a mult.i.tude talking and eating on the march.

Suddenly we debouched at the edge of a wood upon a height whence we could see the whole battle-field. It was a vast expanse of plains and slopes, studded with the grey woods of winter. Long trails of smoke from burning buildings settled upon the landscape. And other trails, minute and multi-coloured, rose from the ground wherever projectiles were raining. Nothing more: wisps of smoke, brief flashes visible even in broad daylight, and a string of captive balloons, motionless and observant witnesses of all.

But we were already descending the incline and the various planes of the landscape melted one after the other. As we were pa.s.sing over a bridge, I saw in a group of soldiers a friend I had not met since the beginning of the war. We could not stop, so he walked along with me for a while, and we spent these few minutes recalling the things of the past. Then as he left me we embraced, though we had never done so in times of peace.

Night was falling. Knowing that we were now at our last long lap, we encouraged the worn-out men. At R----I lost touch with my formation. I halted on the roadside, calling aloud into the darkness. An artillery train pa.s.sed, covering me with mud to my eyes. Finally, I picked up my friends, and we marched on through villages illumined by the camp fires which were flickering under a driving rain, through a murky country which the flash of cannon suddenly showed to be covered with a mult.i.tude of men, of horses, and of martial objects.

It was February 27. Between ten and eleven at night we arrived at a hospital installed in some wooden sheds, and feverishly busy. We were at B----, a miserable village on which next day the Germans launched some thirty monster-sh.e.l.ls, yet failed to kill so much as a mouse.