There is nothing now but to sit down and recline one's back as conveniently as possible. We stay there and breathe and live a little; we are calm, thanks to that faculty we have of never seeing either the past or the future.
* * * * * *
CHAPTER XIII
WHITHER GOEST THOU?
But soon a shiver has seized all of us.
"Listen! It's stopped! Listen!"
The whistle of bullets has completely ceased, and the artillery also. The lull is fantastic. The longer it lasts the more it pierces us with the uneasiness of beasts. We lived in eternal noise; and now that it is hiding, it shakes and rouses us, and would drive us mad.
"What's that?"
We rub our eyelids and open wide our eyes. We hoist our heads with no precaution above the crumbled parapet. We question each other—"D'you see?"
No doubt about it; the shadows are moving along the ground wherever one looks. There is no point in the distance where they are not moving.