Great French Short Stories by Paul Negri

Author:Paul Negri
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780486115412
Publisher: Dover Publications
Published: 2012-10-11T04:00:00+00:00

V

It was three o’clock. Big black clouds had slowly filled the sky, the tip of some nearby storm. That yellow sky, those coppery shreds, changed the valley of Rocreuse, so cheerful in the sunlight, into a lair of assassins filled with suspicious shadows. The Prussian officer had simply had Dominique locked up, without making a declaration about the fate he had in store for him. Since noon, Françoise had felt the agonies of an unspeakable anguish. She didn’t want to leave the courtyard in spite of her father’s urging. She was waiting for the French to come. But the hours went by, night was on the way, and she was suffering all the more because it didn’t seem as if all that time gained could change the awful ending.

Meanwhile, about three, the Prussians made their preparations to withdraw. For a while, as on the day before, the officer had closeted himself with Dominique. Françoise had understood that the young man’s future was being decided. Then she joined her hands in prayer. Old Merlier, beside her, maintained his wordless, rigid bearing, that of an old peasant who doesn’t fight against the inevitability of facts.

“Oh, God! Oh, God!” Françoise stammered. “They’re going to kill him . . .”

The miller drew her near him and took her on his knees like a child.

At that moment the officer came out, while, behind him, two men were bringing Dominique.

“Never! Never!” the young man was shouting. “I’m ready to die.”

“Think it over carefully,” the officer replied. “This service you refuse to do for me will be done for us by someone else. I offer you your life, I’m generous . . . All you need to do is guide us to Montredon across the woods. There must be paths there.”

Dominique no longer answered.

“So you remain obstinate?”

“Kill me and get it over with,” he replied.

Françoise, her hands joined, was beseeching him from a distance. She forgot everything else, she would have advised him to be a coward. But old Merlier took hold of her hands, so that the Prussians wouldn’t see her gesture, like that of a maddened woman.

“He’s right,” he murmured, “it’s better to die.”

The firing squad was there. The officer was waiting for Dominique to weaken. He still expected to convince him. There was a silence. Far off violent thunderclaps were heard. An oppressive heat crushed the countryside. It was during that silence that a shout resounded:

“The French! The French!”

It was, in fact, they. On the Sauval road, at the edge of the forest, the line of red trousers could be discerned. There was an unusual bustle in the mill. The Prussian soldiers were running, with guttural exclamations. Still, not a shot had yet been fired.

“The French! The French!” cried Françoise, clapping her hands.

She acted like a lunatic. She had wrenched herself from her father’s grasp, and she laughed, arms in the air. So they had finally come, and had come in time, because Dominique was still there, standing!

A terrible volley of shots, which exploded in her ears like a thunderclap, made her turn around.

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