[CHAPTER VIII]
TRUCE AND SURRENDER
At about half-past five, before the gates were closed, Delaherche, anxious with regard to the consequences, now that he knew the battle to be lost, again returned to the Sub-Prefecture. He remained there during nearly three hours, pacing across the paved courtyard, watching and questioning the officers who passed; and it was thus that he became acquainted with the rapid march of events:—General de Wimpffen's resignation tendered, then withdrawn, full powers conferred upon him by the Emperor to repair to the Prussian headquarters and obtain the least grievous conditions possible for the vanquished army, and finally, the assembling of a council of war, to decide whether they might try to continue the struggle by defending the fortress. During the sitting of this council, which was composed of some twenty commanding officers, and seemed to last an eternity, the manufacturer climbed the house-steps more than a score of times. And all at once, at a quarter past eight, he saw General de Wimpffen come down them, very red and with swollen eyes. He was followed by a colonel and two other generals, and they all leaped into the saddle and went off by the bridge over the Meuse. So capitulation had been resolved upon, had become inevitable!
Tranquillised by this, Delaherche reflected that he was very hungry, and resolved to return home. As soon as he was out of the courtyard, however, he hesitated at sight of the frightful obstruction that had meantime been reaching a climax. The streets, the squares were gorged, crammed, filled with men, horses, and guns to such a point that it seemed as though the compact mass had been forcibly driven into the town by means of some gigantic ram. Whilst the regiments which had fallen back in good order were bivouacking on the ramparts, the scattered remnants of all the various corps, the fugitives of every arm, the whole swarming herd had fairly submerged Sedan, and such was now the accumulation, so dense had this motionless crowd become, that in its midst one could no longer move either arm or leg. The wheels of the guns, of the caissons and other innumerable vehicles were locked together, the horses which had been lashed and urged in every direction, had room neither to advance nor to step back, and the men, deaf to every threat, were invading the houses, devouring whatever they found, lying down wherever they could, both in the rooms and in the cellars. Many too had fallen on the doorsteps, blocking up the vestibules; whilst others, lacking the strength to go any farther, were stretched upon the footways, sound asleep there, not even rising when their limbs were trampled upon, preferring as it were to lie there and be crushed rather than take the trouble of going elsewhere.
Delaherche then understood the necessity of surrender. At some crossways artillery caissons stood so close together, that if a single German shell had fallen upon anyone of them, all would have exploded, and Sedan would then have flared from rampart to rampart. And, besides, what could be done with such a heap of wretches, overwhelmed with hunger and weariness, without cartridges and without food? An entire day would have been needed merely to clear the streets. Then, too, the fortress itself was not armed, the town was not provisioned. All this had been pointed out at the council of war, by those who were of sensible mind, those who retained an accurate perception of the situation in the midst of their deep, patriotic grief; and the boldest officers, those who quivered and exclaimed that it was impossible for an army to surrender in this fashion, had been obliged to bow their heads, unable to devise any practical means of renewing the struggle on the morrow.
Delaherche managed with great difficulty to make his way through the mob on the Place Turenne and the Place du Rivage. As he passed in front of the Golden Cross Hotel he caught sight of its mournful dining-room, where some general officers sat in silence at the bare table. There was nothing left—not even any bread. General Bourgain-Desfeuilles, who could be heard roaring in the kitchen, must, however, have managed to discover a few scraps, for he suddenly became silent, and darted upstairs embarrassed with something wrapped in a greasy paper. There was such a crowd outside, looking through the windows at that lugubrious table d'hôte, swept bare by sudden famine, that Delaherche, stuck fast in its midst, had to use his elbows vigorously, and even then, such was the pushing, that he occasionally lost all the ground he had managed to gain. In the High Street the block appeared so impassable that for a moment he despaired of ever getting home again. All the guns of a battery seemed to have been thrown there, pell-mell, one atop of another. Eventually he made up his mind to climb on to the carriages, whence striding over the pieces he jumped from wheel to wheel, at the risk of breaking his legs. Then the horses barred his way, and he had to stoop, glide between the legs and under the bellies of these wretched animals who were dying of inanition. The obstacles became more and more formidable, and so frightened him at last, that when, after a quarter of an hour of repeated efforts, he had got as far as the Rue St. Michel, he resolved to turn into that street and work his way round by the Rue des Laboureurs, hoping that these out-of-the-way thoroughfares would be less obstructed than the High Street. Unluckily, however, there happened to be there a house of evil repute, which a band of drunken soldiers was besieging; and fearing that he might get some nasty blow in the brawl, he retraced his steps. Thenceforth he became obstinate, and pushed on to the end of the High Street, at times balancing himself on the shafts of vehicles and at others climbing over vans. On the Place du Collège he was passed along on men's shoulders for some thirty steps; then, falling, he narrowly missed having his ribs broken, and only saved himself by catching hold of the iron bars of a railing. And more than an hour had elapsed since his departure from the Sub-Prefecture when he at last reached the Rue Maqua, sweating, in tatters, and quite exhausted. Yet, as a rule, he could walk from one place to the other in less than five minutes.
Desirous of preventing the ambulance and the garden from being invaded, Major Bouroche had taken the precaution to have two sentries placed at the entrance of the premises. This was a great relief to Delaherche, to whom the idea had suddenly occurred that his house was perhaps being pillaged. On reaching the garden the sight of the ambulance, faintly lighted up by a few lanterns, and exhaling the foul breath of fever, again sent a shiver to his heart. Then, on stumbling against a soldier who was lying on the paving-stones, he suddenly remembered the Seventh Corps' treasury-chest which this man had been guarding since the morning, forgotten, no doubt, by his officers, and at last so overcome by fatigue that he had stretched himself there to sleep.
The house itself seemed to be empty, all was black on the ground floor, where the doors were wide open. The servants must have remained in the ambulance, for he found nobody in the kitchen, where a dim little lamp was smoking. Having lighted a candle, he went as softly as he could up the stairs in order not to wake his mother and his wife. Before returning to the Sub-Prefecture he had begged that they would go to bed early, after so laborious a day, fraught with such terrible emotions.
On entering his private room, however, he had a surprise. A soldier was lying upon the sofa where Captain Beaudoin had slept for a few hours the day before, and it was only when he recognised him to be Henriette's brother, Maurice, that he understood his presence there, the more so as, on turning round, he had perceived another soldier—that fellow Jean whom he had seen prior to the battle, and who, wrapped in a blanket, was now lying on a rug. Utterly overcome with weariness, they both looked like dead men. Delaherche did not tarry, but went to his wife's room close by. A lamp, standing on the corner of a table, was burning there amid a quivering silence. Gilberte had simply thrown herself across the bed, in fear, no doubt, of some catastrophe. She was sleeping very calmly, however, whilst Henriette, seated near her on a chair, with merely her head resting on the edge of the mattress, was also slumbering; but her sleep was disturbed by nightmares, and big tears were welling under her eyelids. Delaherche looked at them both for a moment, and was tempted to rouse Henriette to inquire what she had done. Had she been to Bazeilles? Perhaps, if he questioned her, she would be able to give him some news of his dyeworks. However, he took pity on her, and was on the point of leaving the room when his mother appeared on the threshold, and, without a word, signed to him to follow her.