'Oh my! he doesn't see them! Keep your lamps open, you fool! Why, there comes one—and there's another. Didn't you see that one? It was a green bullet.'
And thereupon Lapoulle opened his eyes as wide as he could, and kept one finger uplifted in front of his nose, whilst Pache, touching the scapular he wore, wished he were able to extend it like a breastplate over his chest.
Rochas, who had remained standing, exclaimed all at once in his bantering way: 'You're not forbidden to salute the shells, my lads, bub never mind about the bullets, there are too many of them.'
At that moment a splinter of a shell shattered the head of a soldier in the front rank. He was not even able to cry out: there was a spurt of blood and brain-matter—that was all.
'Poor devil!' quietly said Sergeant Sapin, who was very calm and very pale; 'whose turn next?'
But they could no longer hear one another; and it was indeed especially the frightful uproar that distressed Maurice. The battery near by was firing without a pause, with a continuous roar which shook the ground; and the mitrailleuses, rending the air asunder, were even more insufferable. How long were they going to lie among those cabbages? There was still nothing to be seen; nothing was known. It was impossible to form the slightest idea of the battle; was it even a real battle, a great one? All that Maurice could distinguish above the smooth line of the fields before him was the round, wooded summit of the Hattoy hill, far away and still deserted. Not a Prussian was to be seen on the horizon. Only some puffs of smoke arose, wafted for a moment in the sunlight. Then, as he turned his head, he was greatly astonished on perceiving in the depths of a sequestered valley, sheltered by rugged slopes, a peasant who was calmly pursuing his avocation—guiding a plough drawn by a big white horse. Why should the man lose a day? Corn would not cease growing, the human race would not cease living, because a few thousand men happened to be fighting.
Consumed by impatience, Maurice rose to his feet, and at a glance he again saw the batteries of St. Menges, which were cannonading them, crowned with tawny smoke; and he also again beheld the road from St. Albert now blocked with Prussians, the indistinct swarming of an invading horde. Jean, however, swiftly caught hold of his legs and dragged him to the ground. 'Are you mad?' said the corporal; 'you'll be potted.'
On his side Rochas began to swear: 'Lie down at once! What the deuce does the fellow mean, trying to get killed when he hasn't been ordered to do so?'
'But you're not lying down, sir,' said Maurice.