The Little Soldier
Every Sunday, as soon as they were off duty, the two little soldiers set out for a walk.
On leaving the barracks, they turned to the right, crossed Courbevoie with quick strides as if they were marching on parade; then, as soon as they had left the houses behind, they walked at a quieter pace down the bare dusty high road to Bezons.
They were small, thin, lost in army coats that were too large and too long, with sleeves falling over their hands, and embarrassed by red trousers so uncomfortably baggy that they were compelled to stretch their legs wide apart in order to walk at a good pace. And under the tall stiff shakos, hardly a glimpse was visible of their faces, two humble sunken Breton faces, innocent like the faces of animals, with gentle placid blue eyes.
They spoke no word during the whole journey, walking straight on, with the same thought in both their heads, which did instead of conversation, for on the edge of the little wood of Champioux they had found a spot that reminded them of their own country, and they felt happy nowhere else.
At the crossroads from Colombes to Chatou, where the trees begin, they took off the hats that crushed their heads, and mopped their brows.
They always stopped for a short while on Bezons bridge to look at the Seine. They lingered there two or three minutes, bent double, hanging over the parapet; they looked long at the wide reaches of Argenteuil, where the white leaning sails of the clippers raced over the water, bringing to their minds perhaps the Breton sea, the port of Vannes near their own homes, and the fishing-boats sailing across the Morbihan to the open sea.
As soon as they had crossed the Seine, they bought their provisions from the pork butcher, the baker, and the man who sold the light wine of the district. A piece of black pudding, four ha’p’orth of bread, and a pint of cheap claret made up their rations and were carried in their handkerchiefs. But, once beyond the village, they sauntered very slowly on and began at last to talk.
In front of them a stretch of poor land, dotted with clumps of trees, led to the wood, to the little wood which they had thought like Kermarivan wood. Corn and oats bordered the narrow path lost under the green shoots of the crops, and every time they came, Jean Kerderen said to Luc Le Ganidec:
“It is just like Plounivon.”
“Yes, it’s just like it.”
They wandered on, side by side, their minds filled with vague memories of their own place, filled with new-awakened pictures, crude and simple pictures like those on cheap picture postcards. They saw in thought a corner of a field, a hedge, an edge of moor, a crossroads, a granite cross.
Each time they came, they stopped beside the stone marking the boundaries of an estate, because it had a look of the dolmen at Locneuven.
Every Sunday, when they reached the first clump of trees, Luc Le Ganidec cut himself a switch, a hazel switch; he began carefully peeling off the thin bark, thinking all the time of people at home.
Jean Kerderen carried the provisions.
Now and then Luc mentioned a name, recalled an incident of their childhood, in words that, few as they were, woke long thoughts. And by slow degrees their country, their beloved far-off country, took them back to herself, filled their thoughts and senses, sent them across the space between, her shapes, her sounds, her known horizons, her scents, the scent of green plains swept by the salt sea air.
No longer did they feel the smoky breath of Paris that feeds the trees of her suburbs, but the scent of gorse drawn up on the salt breeze and carried out to the wide sea. And the sails of the pleasure boats, seen above the banks, looked to them like the sails of the small coasting-boats, seen beyond the wide plain that stretched from their doorstep to the very edge of the waves.
They walked slowly on, Luc Le Ganidec and Jean Kerderen, happy and sad, filled with a sweet melancholy, the dull, deep-seated melancholy of a caged beast that remembers.
And by the time Luc had finished stripping the slender switch of its skin, they reached the corner of the wood where every Sunday they ate their lunch.
They found again the two bricks they had hidden in a coppice, and they lit a little fire of branches to cook their black puddings on the point of their knife.
And when they had lunched, eaten their bread to the last crumb, and drunk their wine to the last drop, they remained sitting side by side in the grass, silent, gazing absently into space, eyes drowsily half closed, stretched out beside the field poppies; the leather of their shakos and the leather of their buttons gleamed under the burning sun and fascinated the larks that hovered singing above their heads.
As it drew towards noon, they began to throw occasional glances in the direction of Bezons village, for it was nearly time for the cowgirl to come.
She came past them every Sunday, on her way to milk her cow and take it back to its shed; it was the only cow in the district that was out at grass; it was pastured in a narrow meadow further along, on the fringe of the wood.
Very soon they caught sight of the servant-girl, the only human being walking across the fields, and they were filled with joy by the dazzling flashes of light reflected from the tin pail in the blazing sunshine. They never talked about her. They were content just to see her, without understanding why.
She was a tall lusty wench, auburn-haired and burnt by the heat of days spent in the open air, a tall bold wench of the Parisian countryside.
Once, seeing them always sitting in the same spot, she said to them:
“Good morning; d’you always come here?”
Luc Le Ganidec, the more daring, stammered:
“Yes, we come for a rest.”
That was all. But next Sunday she laughed when she saw them, she laughed in the protective, good-humoured fashion of an experienced woman fully conscious of their timidity, and she cried:
“What d’you sit there for? Are you watching the grass grow?”
Luc smiled joyously back:
“Maybe so.”
She retorted:
“Well, it’s slow enough.”
He replied, laughing all the time:
“It is that.”
She went on. But when she came back with her pail full of milk, she stopped again in front of them, and said:
“Would you like a drop? It’ll remind you of your home.”
With the instinctive understanding of a woman of their own class, herself far from her native place perhaps, she had put into words their deepest emotions.
They were both touched. Then, not without difficulty, she poured a little milk down the narrow neck of the pint bottle in which they carried their wine; and Luc drank first, in little gulps, stopping every moment to see whether he was taking more than his share. Then he gave the bottle to Jean.
She remained standing in front of them, hands on hips, her pail resting on the ground at her feet, happy in the pleasure she was giving them.
Then she went off, crying:
“Well, goodbye! See you next Sunday.”
And as long as they could see it, their eyes followed her tall figure getting farther away and smaller, as if it were merging itself in the green shadows of the trees.
When they left the barracks on the Sunday after that, Jean said to Luc:
“Oughtn’t we to buy her something nice?”
They could not make up their minds in this exceedingly awkward matter of choosing a delicacy for the cowgirl.
Luc was in favour of a scrap of chitterlings, but Jean preferred caramels, for he loved sweets. His advice carried the day, and they bought a pennyworth of red and white sweets at the grocer’s.
They ate their lunch faster than usual, excited by the thought of what was coming.
Jean saw her first.
“There she is,” he said.
Luc added:
“Yes, there she is.”
She began laughing a long way off, as soon as she saw them, and cried:
“And how are you? All right?”
They answered in one breath:
“How’s yourself?”
Then she chatted away, she talked of the simple things that interested them, of the weather, the crops, of her employers.
They dared not offer their sweets, which were melting nicely in Jean’s pocket.
At last Luc plucked up heart and murmured:
“We’ve brought something.”
She demanded:
“What is’t, then?”
So Jean, red to the ears, drew out the tiny twist paper and offered it to her.
She began eating the little bits of sugar, rolling them from one cheek to the other and forming little swollen lumps under the flesh. The two soldiers sat in front of her and watched her, excited and very pleased.
Then she went on to milk her cow, and, as she came back, gave them some milk again.
They thought of her all week and spoke of her more than once. Next Sunday she sat down beside them for a longer chat, and the three of them, sitting side by side, stared absently into space, hugging their knees with clasped hands, and told each other little tales and little details of the villages where they were born, while farther off the cow, seeing the servant-girl pausing on her way, stretched towards her its clumsy head with its moist nostrils, and lowed patiently to attract her attention.
Before long the girl consented to eat a bite with them and drink a mouthful of wine. Often she brought them plums in her pocket, for the plum season had begun. Her presence set the two little Breton soldiers very much at their ease, and they chattered away like two birds.
Then one Wednesday, Luc Le Ganidec applied for a pass out of barracks, a thing which he had never done before, and he did not come in until ten o’clock at night.
Thoroughly disturbed, Jean racked his brains to imagine why his comrade had dared to go out like that.
On the following Friday, Luc borrowed ten sous from the man who slept next him, and again asked and got leave to absent himself for some hours.
And when he set out with Jean for their Sunday walk, he wore a very sly preoccupied, and altogether different air. Kerderen did not understand it, but he was vaguely suspicious of something, without guessing what it might be.
They never said a word until they reached their accustomed resting-place, where they had worn away the grass by sitting always in the same spot; and they ate their lunch slowly. Neither of them was hungry.
Very soon the girl came into sight. They watched her coming as they did every Sunday. When she was quite near them, Luc got up and took two steps. She placed her pail on the ground and hugged him. She hugged him violently, throwing her arms round his neck, quite regardless of Jean, not dreaming he was there, not even seeing him.
Poor Jean sat there bewildered, so bewildered that he did not understand it at all, his mind in a turmoil, his heart broken, still unable to realise it.
Then the girl sat down beside Luc, and they began to chatter.
Jean did not look at them; he guessed now why his comrade had gone out twice during the week, and he felt within himself a burning anguish, a sort of wound, the dreadful tearing agony of betrayal.
Luc and the girl got up and went off together to see to the cow.
Jean followed them with his eyes. He saw them getting farther and farther away, side by side. His comrade’s scarlet trousers formed a dazzling patch on the road. It was he who took up the mallet and hammered in the stake to which the beast was fastened.
The girl squatted down to do the milking, while he caressed the animal’s bony spine with a careless hand. Then they left the pail on the grass and withdrew into the wood.
Jean saw nothing but the leafy wall through which they had gone; and he felt so distressed that if he had tried to get up, he would certainly have dropped where he stood.
He sat perfectly still, quite senseless with amazement and misery, a profound unreasoning misery. He longed to cry, to run away, to hide himself, never to see anyone again.
Suddenly he saw them coming out of the coppice. They walked back happily, hand in hand, like village sweethearts. It was Luc who carried the pail.
They embraced again before they parted, and the girl went off, throwing Jean a friendly good night and a knowing smile. Today she never remembered to give him any milk.
The two little soldiers remained there side by side, motionless as always, silent and calm, their placid faces revealing nothing of the emotions that raged in their hearts. The sun went down on them. Now and then the cow lowed, watching them from far off.
They got up to go back at the usual hour.
Luc peeled a switch. Jean carried the empty bottle. He left it with the wine-seller in Bezons. Then they made for the bridge, and, as they did every Sunday, halted halfway across to watch the water slip past a while.
Jean leaned over, leaned farther and farther over the iron railing, as if he had seen something in the rushing stream that fascinated him. Luc said to him:
“Do you want to drink a mouthful?”
As the last word left his mouth, the rest of Jean followed his head, his lifted legs described a circle in the air, and the little blue and red soldier dropped like a stone, struck the water, and disappeared in it.
Luc’s throat contracted with agony and he tried vainly to shout. Farther downstream he saw something move; then his comrade’s head rose to the surface of the river to sink again.
Farther down still he caught one more glimpse, a hand, only a hand thrust out of the water and sucked down again. Then nothing more.
The watermen who came running up did not find the body that day.
Luc returned to barracks alone, running, completely distracted, and related the accident, eyes and voice full of tears, and blowing his nose furiously. “He leaned over … he … he leaned over … so far … so far that his head did a somersault … and … and … there he was fallen over … fallen over …”
Emotion choked him and he could not say any more. If he had only known. …