Complete Maupassant Original Short Stories | Page 8

henceforth "indifferent to all
unhappiness," had entered into eternal darkness.
He was taken back to Paris and placed in Dr. Meuriot's sanatorium,
where, after eighteen months of mechanical existence, the "meteor"
quietly passed away.

BOULE DE SUIF
For several days in succession fragments of a defeated army had passed
through the town. They were mere disorganized bands, not disciplined
forces. The men wore long, dirty beards and tattered uniforms; they
advanced in listless fashion, without a flag, without a leader. All
seemed exhausted, worn out, incapable of thought or resolve, marching
onward merely by force of habit, and dropping to the ground with
fatigue the moment they halted. One saw, in particular, many enlisted
men, peaceful citizens, men who lived quietly on their income, bending
beneath the weight of their rifles; and little active volunteers, easily
frightened but full of enthusiasm, as eager to attack as they were ready
to take to flight; and amid these, a sprinkling of red-breeched soldiers,
the pitiful remnant of a division cut down in a great battle; somber

artillerymen, side by side with nondescript foot-soldiers; and, here and
there, the gleaming helmet of a heavy-footed dragoon who had
difficulty in keeping up with the quicker pace of the soldiers of the line.
Legions of irregulars with high-sounding names "Avengers of Defeat,"
"Citizens of the Tomb," "Brethren in Death"--passed in their turn,
looking like banditti. Their leaders, former drapers or grain merchants,
or tallow or soap chandlers--warriors by force of circumstances,
officers by reason of their mustachios or their money--covered with
weapons, flannel and gold lace, spoke in an impressive manner,
discussed plans of campaign, and behaved as though they alone bore
the fortunes of dying France on their braggart shoulders; though, in
truth, they frequently were afraid of their own men--scoundrels often
brave beyond measure, but pillagers and debauchees.
Rumor had it that the Prussians were about to enter Rouen.
The members of the National Guard, who for the past two months had
been reconnoitering with the utmost caution in the neighboring woods,
occasionally shooting their own sentinels, and making ready for fight
whenever a rabbit rustled in the undergrowth, had now returned to their
homes. Their arms, their uniforms, all the death-dealing paraphernalia
with which they had terrified all the milestones along the highroad for
eight miles round, had suddenly and marvellously disappeared.
The last of the French soldiers had just crossed the Seine on their way
to Pont-Audemer, through Saint-Sever and Bourg-Achard, and in their
rear the vanquished general, powerless to do aught with the forlorn
remnants of his army, himself dismayed at the final overthrow of a
nation accustomed to victory and disastrously beaten despite its
legendary bravery, walked between two orderlies.
Then a profound calm, a shuddering, silent dread, settled on the city.
Many a round-paunched citizen, emasculated by years devoted to
business, anxiously awaited the conquerors, trembling lest his
roasting-jacks or kitchen knives should be looked upon as weapons.
Life seemed to have stopped short; the shops were shut, the streets
deserted. Now and then an inhabitant, awed by the silence, glided

swiftly by in the shadow of the walls. The anguish of suspense made
men even desire the arrival of the enemy.
In the afternoon of the day following the departure of the French troops,
a number of uhlans, coming no one knew whence, passed rapidly
through the town. A little later on, a black mass descended St.
Catherine's Hill, while two other invading bodies appeared respectively
on the Darnetal and the Boisguillaume roads. The advance guards of
the three corps arrived at precisely the same moment at the Square of
the Hotel de Ville, and the German army poured through all the
adjacent streets, its battalions making the pavement ring with their firm,
measured tread.
Orders shouted in an unknown, guttural tongue rose to the windows of
the seemingly dead, deserted houses; while behind the fast-closed
shutters eager eyes peered forth at the victors-masters now of the city,
its fortunes, and its lives, by "right of war." The inhabitants, in their
darkened rooms, were possessed by that terror which follows in the
wake of cataclysms, of deadly upheavals of the earth, against which all
human skill and strength are vain. For the same thing happens
whenever the established order of things is upset, when security no
longer exists, when all those rights usually protected by the law of man
or of Nature are at the mercy of unreasoning, savage force. The
earthquake crushing a whole nation under falling roofs; the flood let
loose, and engulfing in its swirling depths the corpses of drowned
peasants, along with dead oxen and beams torn from shattered houses;
or the army, covered with glory, murdering those who defend
themselves, making prisoners of the rest, pillaging in the name of the
Sword, and