CHAPTER XIII
A WARTIME JOURNEY
I decided to set off now as quickly as possible in search of my family. I asked Paul de Rémusat to get me an audience with M. Thiers, in order to obtain from him a passport for leaving Paris. I trusted Mme. Guérard and Mme. Lambquin with disbanding my ambulance.
M. Thiers gave me the passport, and I was ready to go, but I could not start alone. I felt that the journey I was about to undertake was a very dangerous one, and M. Thiers and Paul de Rémusat had also warned me of this. I could see, therefore, that I should be very dependent on my traveling companion all the time, and on this account I decided not to take a servant with me, but a friend. I very naturally went at once to Mme. Guérard. Her husband, gentle though he was, refused absolutely to let her go with me, as he considered this expedition mad and dangerous. Mad it certainly was, and dangerous, too.
I did not insist, but I sent for my son’s governess, Mlle. Soubise. I asked her whether she would go with me, and did not attempt to conceal from her any of the dangers of the journey. She jumped with joy, and said she would be ready within twelve hours. This girl is at present the wife of Commandant Monfils-Chesneau. And how strange life is, for she is now teaching the two daughters of my son, her former pupil.
Mlle. Soubise was then very young, and she looked like a Creole. She had very beautiful, dark eyes, with a gentle, timid expression, and the voice of a child. Her head, however, was full of adventure, romance, and day dreams.
In appearance we might both have been taken for quite young girls, for, although I was older than she was, my slenderness and my face made me look younger. It would have been absurd to try to take a trunk with us, so I took a bag for us both. We had only a change of linen and some stockings. I had my revolver, and I offered one to Mlle. Soubise, but she refused it with horror, and showed me an enormous pair of scissors in an enormous case.
“But what are you going to do with them?” I asked.
“I shall kill myself if we are attacked,” she replied.
I was surprised at the difference in our characters. I was taking a revolver determined to protect myself by killing others; she was determined to protect herself by killing herself.
On the 24th of February, we started on this journey, which was to have lasted three days, and lasted eleven. At the first gate at which I presented myself in leaving Paris, I was sent back in the most brutal fashion! Permissions to go outside the city had to be submitted for signature at the German outposts. I went to another gate, but it was only at the postern gate of Poissonniers that I could get my passport signed.
We were taken into a little shed, which had been transformed into an office. A Prussian general was seated there. He looked me up and down, and then said:
“Are you Sarah Bernhardt?”
“Yes,” I answered.
“And this young lady is with you?”
“Yes.”
“And you think you are going to cross easily?”
“I hope so.”
“Well, then, you are mistaken, and you had better stay inside Paris.”
“No, I want to leave. I see myself what may happen, but I want to leave.”
He shrugged his shoulders, called an officer, said something I did not understand in German, and then went out, leaving us alone without our passports.
We had been there about a quarter of an hour when I suddenly heard a voice I knew. It was one of my friends, René Griffon, who had heard of my departure, and had come after me to try to dissuade me. The trouble he had taken was all in vain, though, as I was determined to leave. The general returned soon after, and Griffon was anxious to know what might happen to us.
“Everything!” answered the officer. “And worse than everything!”
Griffon spoke German, and had a short colloquy with the officer about us. This rather annoyed me, for as I did not understand, I imagined that he was urging the general to prevent our starting. I nevertheless resisted all persuasions, supplications, and even threats. A few minutes later, a well-appointed vehicle drew up at the door of the shed.
“There you are,” said the German officer roughly. “I am sending you to Gonesse, where you will find the provision train which starts in an hour. I am recommending you to the care of the station master, the Commandant—after that may God take care of you!”
I stepped into the general’s carriage, and said farewell to my friend, who was in despair. We arrived at Gonesse, and got out at the station, where we saw a little group of people talking in low voices. The coachman made me a military salute, refused what I wished to give him, and drove away at full speed. I advanced toward the group, wondering to whom I ought to speak, when a friendly voice exclaimed: “What, you here! Where have you come from? Where are you going?” It was Villaret, the tenor in vogue at the Opera. He was going to his young wife, I believe, of whom he had had no news for five months. He introduced one of his friends, who was traveling with him, and whose name I do not remember, General Pelissier’s son, and a very old man, so pale and so sad-looking and woebegone that I felt sorry for him. It was M. Gerson, and he was going to Belgium, to take his grandson to his godmother’s. His two sons had been killed during this pitiful war. One of the sons was married, and his wife had died of sorrow and despair. He was taking the orphan boy to his godmother, and he hoped to die himself as soon as possible afterwards. Ah, the poor fellow, his wish must have been accomplished very quickly, for he was only fifty-nine then, and he was so cruelly ravaged by his grief that I took him for seventy.
Besides these five persons, there was an unbearable chatterer, named Théodore Joussiau, a wine dealer. He did not require any introduction.
“How do you do, madame!” he began. “How lucky we are that you are going to travel with us! Ah! the journey will be a difficult one. Where are you going? Two women alone! It is not at all prudent, especially as all the routes are crowded with German and French sharpshooters, marauders, and thieves. Oh, haven’t I demolished some of those German sharpshooters! Sh—we must speak quietly, though. These sly fellows are very quick of hearing!...” He then pointed to the German officers who were walking up and down. “Ah, the rascals!” he went on. “If I had my military costume and my gun they would not walk so boldly in front of Théodore Joussiau. I have no less than six helmets at home....”
The man got on my nerves, and I turned my back on him and looked to see which of the men before me could be the station master. A tall young man with his arm in a sling, came toward me with an open letter. It was the one which the general’s coachman had handed to him, recommending me to his care. He held out his well arm to me but I refused it. He bowed and led the way, and I followed him, accompanied by Mlle. Soubise.
On arriving in his office he gave us seats at a little table, upon which knives and forks were placed for two persons. It was then three o’clock in the afternoon, and we had had nothing, not even a drop of water, since the evening before. I was very much touched by this thoughtfulness, and we did honor to the very simple but refreshing meal prepared for us by the young officer.
While we lunched I looked at him when he was not noticing. He was very young, and his face bore traces of recent suffering. I felt a compassionate tenderness for this unfortunate man who was crippled for life, and my hatred for war increased still more.
He suddenly said to me, in rather bad French:
“I think I can give you news of one of your friends.”
“What is his name?” I asked.
“Emmanuel Bocher.”
“Oh, yes, he is certainly a great friend of mine. How is he?”
“He is still a prisoner, but he is very well.”
“But I thought he had been released,” I said.
“Some of those who were taken with him were released, on giving their word never to take up arms against us again, but he refused to give his word.”
“Oh, the brave soldier!” I exclaimed, in spite of myself.
The young German looked at me with his clear, sad eyes.
“Yes,” he said simply, “the brave soldier!”
When we had finished our luncheon, I rose to return to the other travelers.
“The compartment reserved for you will not be here for two hours,” said the young officer. “If you would like to rest, ladies, I will come for you at the right time.” He went away, and before long I was sound asleep. I was nearly dead with fatigue. Mlle. Soubise touched me on the shoulder to rouse me. The train was ready to start, and the young officer walked with me to it. I was a little amazed when I saw the carriage in which I was to travel. It had no roof, and was filled with coal. The officer had several sacks put in, one on the top of the other, to make our seats less hard. He sent for his officer’s cloak, begging me to take it with us, and send it back, but I refused this odious disguise most energetically. It was a deadly cold day, but I preferred dying of cold to muffling up in a cloak belonging to the enemy.
The whistle was blown, the wounded officer saluted, and the train started. There were Prussian soldiers in the carriages. The subordinates, the employés, and the soldiers were just as brutish and rude as the German officers were polite and courteous.
The train stopped without any plausible reason; it started again to stop again, and it then stood still for an hour on this icy cold night. On arriving at Creil, the stoker, the engine driver, the soldiers, and everyone else got out. I watched all these men, whistling, bawling to each other, spitting, and bursting into laughter as they pointed to us. Were they not the conquerors and we the conquered?
At Creil we stayed more than two hours. We could hear the distant sound of foreign music, and the hurrahs of Germans who were making merry. All this hubbub came from a white house about five hundred yards away. We could distinguish the outlines of human beings locked in each others’ arms, waltzing, and turning round and round in a giddy revel.
It began to get on my nerves, for it seemed likely to continue until daylight. I got out with Villaret, intending at any rate to stretch my limbs. We went toward the white house, and then, as I did not want to tell him my plan, I asked him to wait there for me.
Very fortunately, though, for me, I had not time to cross the threshold of this vile lodging-house, for an officer, smoking a cigarette, was just coming out of a small door. He spoke to me in German.
“I am French,” I replied, and he then came up to me, speaking my language, for they could all talk French.
He asked me what I was doing there, and my nerves were so overstrung that I burst out sobbing, and told him, through my sobs, of our lamentable odyssey since our departure from Gonesse, and finally of our waiting two hours in an icy cold carriage, while the stokers, engine drivers, and conductors, were all dancing in this house.
“But I had no idea that there were passengers in those carriages, and it was I who gave permission to these men to dance, and drink. The guard of the train told me that he was taking cattle and goods, and that he did not need to arrive before eight in the morning, and I believed him....”
“Well, monsieur,” I said, “the only cattle in the train will be the eight French passengers, and I should be very much obliged if you would give orders that the journey should be continued.”
“Make your mind easy about that, madame,” he replied. “Will you come in and rest? I am here just now on a round of inspection, and am staying for a few days in this inn. You shall have a cup of tea, and that will refresh you.”
I told him that I had a friend waiting for me in the road, and a lady in the railway carriage.
“But that makes no difference,” he said, “let us go and fetch them.”
A few minutes later we found poor Villaret seated on a milestone. His head was on his knees and he was asleep. I asked him to fetch Mlle. Soubise.
“And if your other traveling companions will come and take a cup of tea, they will be welcome,” said the officer. I went back with him, and we entered by the little door through which I had seen him come out. It was a fairly large room which we entered, on a level with the meadow; there were some mats on the floor, a very low bed, and an enormous table, on which were two large maps of France. One of these was studded over with pins and small flags. There was also a portrait of the Emperor William, mounted, and fastened up with four pins, and all this belonged to the officer.
On the chimney-piece, under an enormous glass shade, were a bride’s wreath, a military medal, and a plait of white hair. On each side of the glass shade was a china vase, containing a branch of box. All this, together with the table and the bed, belonged to the landlady, who had given up her room to the officer. There were five cane chairs round the table, a velvet armchair, and a wooden bench covered with books against the wall. A sword and belt were lying on the table, and two horse pistols.
I was philosophizing to myself on all these heterogeneous objects, when the others arrived: Mlle. Soubise, Villaret, young Gerson, and that unbearable Théodore Joussiau. I hope he will forgive me if he is living now, poor man, but the thought of him still irritates me.
The officer had some boiling hot tea brought in for us, and it was a veritable treat, as we were exhausted with hunger and cold.
When the door was opened for the tea to come in, Théodore Joussiau caught a glimpse of the throng of girls, soldiers, and other people.
“Ah, my friends,” he exclaimed, with a burst of laughter, “we are at his majesty William’s; there is a reception on, and it’s chic—I can tell you that!...” With this he smacked his tongue twice. Villaret reminded him that we were the guests of a German, and that it was preferable to be quiet.
“That’s enough, that’s enough!” he replied, lighting a cigarette.
A frightful uproar of oaths and shouts now took the place of the deafening sound of the orchestra, and the incorrigible Southerner half opened the door.
I could see the officer giving orders to two subofficers who, in their turn, separated the groups, seizing the stoker, the engine driver, and the other men belonging to the train, so roughly that I was sorry for them. They were kicked in the back, they received blows with the flat of the sword on the shoulder, and a blow with the butt end of a gun knocked the guard of the train down. He was the ugliest brute, though, that I have ever seen. All these people were sobered in a few seconds, and went back toward our carriage, with a hangdog look and a threatening mien.
We followed them, but I did not feel any too satisfied as to what might happen to us on the way with this queer lot. The officer evidently had a similar idea, for he ordered one of the subofficers to accompany us as far as Amiens. This subofficer got into our carriage and we set off again. We arrived at Amiens at six in the morning. Daylight had not yet succeeded in piercing through the night clouds. A fine rain was falling, which was hardened by the cold. There was no carriage to be had and not even a porter. I wanted to go to the Hotel du Cheval-Blanc, but a man who happened to be there said to me:
“It’s no use, my little young lady, there’s no way of putting up even a lath like you. Go to the house over there with a balcony; they can put some people up.”
With these words he turned his back on me. Villaret had gone off without saying a word. M. Gerson and his grandson had been stowed away silently in a covered country cart, hermetically closed. A stout, ruddy, thick-set matronly woman was waiting for them, but the coachman looked as though he belonged to nice people. General Pelissier’s son, who had not uttered a word since we had left Gonesse, had disappeared like a ball from the hands of a conjurer.
Théodore Joussiau politely offered to accompany us, and I was so weary that I accepted his offer. He picked up our bag, and began to walk at full speed, so that we had difficulty in keeping up with him. He was so breathless with the walk that he could not talk, which was a great relief to me.
Finally, we arrived at the house, and entered, but my horror was great on seeing that the hall of the hotel had been transformed into a dormitory. We could scarcely walk between the mattresses laid down on the ground, and the grumbling of the people was by no means promising.
When once we were in the office, a young girl in mourning told us that there was not a corner vacant. I sank down on a chair, and Mlle. Soubise leaned against the wall, with her arms hanging down, looking most dejected.
The odious Joussiau then yelled out that they could not let two women, as young as we were, be out in the street all night. He went to the proprietress of the hotel and said something quietly about me. I do not know what it was, but I heard my name distinctly. The young woman in mourning then looked at me with misty eyes. “My brother was a poet,” she said. “He wrote a very pretty sonnet about you, after seeing you play ‘Le Passant’ more than ten times. He took me, too, to see you and I enjoyed myself so much that night. It is all over though.” She lifted her hands toward her head and sobbed, trying to stifle her cries.
“It’s all over!” she repeated. “He is dead! They have killed him! It is all over! All over!”
I got up, moved to the depths of my being by this horrible grief. I put my arms round her, and kissed her, crying myself, and whispering to her words that soothe, and hopes that comfort.
Lulled by my words, and touched by my sisterliness, she wiped her eyes, and taking my hand, led me gently away. Soubise followed. I signed to Joussiau in an authoritative way to stay where he was. And we went up the two flights of stairs of the hotel, in silence. At the end of a narrow corridor she opened a door. We found ourselves in rather a large room, reeking with the smell of tobacco. A small night lamp, placed on a little table by the bed, was all the light in this large room. The wheezing respiration of a human breast disturbed the silence. I looked toward the bed, and by the faint light from the little lamp, I saw a man half seated, propped up by a heap of pillows. The man was aged-looking, rather than really old. His beard and hair were white and his face bore traces of suffering. Two large furrows were formed, from the eyes to the corners of the mouth. What tears must have rolled down that poor emaciated face!
The girl went quietly toward the bed, signed to us to come inside the room, and then shut the door. We walked across on tiptoes to the far end of the room, our arms stretched out to maintain our equilibrium. I sat down with precaution on a large Empire couch, and Soubise took a seat beside me. The man in bed half opened his eyes. “What is it, my child?” he asked.
“Nothing, father, nothing serious,” she replied. “I wanted to tell you, so that you should not be surprised when you woke up. I have just given hospitality in our room to two ladies who are here.”
He turned his head in an annoyed way, and tried to look at us at the end of the room.
“The lady with fair hair,” continued the girl, “is Sarah Bernhardt, whom Lucien liked so much, you remember?”
The man sat up and, shading his eyes with his hand, peered at us. I went near to him. He gazed at me silently, and then made a gesture with his hand. His daughter understood the gesture and brought him an envelope from a small bureau. The unhappy father’s hands trembled as he took it. He drew three sheets of paper out, slowly, and a photograph. He fixed his gaze on me and then on the portrait.
“Yes, yes, it certainly is you, it certainly is you,” he murmured.
I recognized my photograph, taken in “Le Passant,” smelling a rose.
“You see,” said the poor man, his eyes veiled by tears, “you were this child’s idol. These are the lines he wrote about you.”
He then read me, in his quavering voice, with a slight Picardian accent, a very pretty sonnet.
He then unfolded a second paper, on which some verses to Sarah Bernhardt were scrawled. The third paper was a sort of triumphant chant, celebrating all our victories over the enemy.
“The poor fellow still hoped, until he was killed,” said the father, “and yet he has only been dead five weeks. He had three shots in his head. The first shattered his jaw, but he did not fall. He continued firing on the scoundrels like a man possessed. The second took his ear off, and the third struck him in his right eye. He fell then, never to rise again. His comrade told us all this. He was twenty-two years old. And now—it’s all over!”
The unhappy man’s head fell back on the heap of pillows. His two inert hands had let the papers fall, and great tears rolled down his pale cheeks, in the furrows formed by grief. A stifled groan burst from his lips. The girl had fallen on her knees and buried her head in the bedclothes, to deaden the sound of her sobs. Soubise and I were completely upset. Ah, those stifled sobs, those deadened groans seemed to buzz in my ears, and I felt everything giving way under me. I stretched my hands out into space and closed my eyes. Soon there was a distant rumbling noise, which increased and came nearer, then yells of pain, bones knocking against each other, horses’ feet making human brains gush out with a dull, flabby sound; men barbed with iron passed by like a destructive whirlwind, shouting: “Vive the war!” And women on their knees, with outstretched arms, crying out: “War is infamous! In the name of our wombs which bore you, of our breasts which suckled you, in the name of our pain in childbirth, in the name of our anguish over your cradles, let this cease!”
But the savage whirlwind passed by, riding over the women. I stretched my arms out in a supreme effort which woke me suddenly. I was lying in the girl’s bed. Mlle. Soubise, who was near me, was holding my hand. A man whom I did not know, but whom some one called “doctor,” laid me gently down again on the bed. I had some difficulty in collecting my thoughts.
“How long have I been here?” I asked.
“Since last night,” replied the gentle voice of Soubise. “You fainted, and the doctor told us that you had an attack of fever. Oh, I have been very frightened!” I turned my face to the doctor.
“Yes, dear lady,” he said, “you must be very prudent still for the next forty-eight hours, and then you can set out again. But you have had a great many shocks for one with such delicate health. You must be careful.” I took the draught that he was holding out to me, apologized to the owner of the house, who had just come in, and then turned round with my face to the wall. I needed rest so very, very much.
Two days later I left our sad but congenial hosts. My traveling companions had all disappeared. When I went downstairs I kept meeting Prussians, for the unfortunate proprietor had been invaded compulsorily by the German army. He looked at each soldier and at each officer, trying to find out whether he were not the one who had killed his poor boy. He did not tell me this, but it was my idea. It seemed to me that such was his thought and such the meaning of his gaze.
In the vehicle in which I drove to the station, the kind man had put a basket of food. He also gave me a copy of the sonnet and a tracing of his son’s photograph.
I left the desolate couple with the deepest emotion, and I kissed the girl on taking our departure. Soubise and I did not exchange a word on our journey to the station; we were both preoccupied with the same distressing thoughts.