went into her son’s room. He was asleep, his face was pale and smooth. My God, would he come back? My God, if he did come back, would he be happy? What still lay in store for him? He was only twenty-two. To think that it wasn’t enough that she had to worry about the present, but, in spite of herself, the future frightened her as well. What if Bernard began leading a life of debauchery? Blessed Virgin Mary! This horrifying, awful, incomprehensible war. She vaguely sensed that the ‘fire’, as men called it, did not only burn the hearts and bodies of poor children, it also lit up strange, shadowy, confused ideas that once lay dormant, buried deep within them.
‘No, he’s a good lad. He has a good heart,’ she said once more.
She wanted to kiss him but didn’t dare. In the end, she simply pressed her lips softly against Bernard’s hand, just as she used to when he was asleep in his cradle. She went back to bed, thinking:
‘It will pass. ‘We’ll create such a good little life for him. He’ll want to go back to school again and he’ll love being at home. He’ll work hard. He’ll make up for lost time. He’ll get his degrees. He’ll be a good boy …’
10
A station, somewhere in France, one night in June. Bernard was going back to the front. Soldiers were swarming on to the platforms. Some were sleeping in the waiting rooms. Some walked by speaking loudly, laughing, and against the backdrop of the starry sky or the shadowy light of the station café, their silhouettes stood out: strong, thickset, heroic, already popularised a thousand and one times in films and photographs, the image of a soldier in the Great War, with his heavy shoes, his haversack on his back, a pipe in the corner of his mouth, his hard face, his laugh, his piercing eyes. It wasn’t a crowd, it was an army. The war held them together; war crucified man but held him upright as well. Did any of the leaders, more aware than the others, ever imagine the moment when peace would come, when the army would become a mass of people once more? That was the moment they should have been anticipating, preparing for in the midst of war, but it was difficult. Peace was being improvised just as war had been. That had been a success. So everything would be a success. The pride of the soldiers in themselves was immense. Bernard shared this sense of pride, just as he shared all the feelings of the other soldiers when he was with them. His own, unique soul, complex andcontradictory, had been replaced by a collective soul, one that was simple and strong. Like the others, he believed himself to be invincible; he thought he was amazing, and, like the others, he knew that he would hold his own until the very last day of the war, he wouldn’t give an inch, but afterwards … oh, afterwards!
He stretched out his legs, sighed, threw his head back and looked up at the distant sky, daydreaming vaguely of various things. What a long way he had come in the past four years! First, the enthusiasm, the joy of self-sacrifice, the desire to die for your country, for future generations, for future peace … Prepared to die, as long as death was heroic and had purpose, but soon the idea of death terrified him – oh, how he had hated death, how he had feared it, just as he had doubted God and blasphemed as he looked at the little blackish heaps lying between two trenches, dead bodies as numerous and insignificant as dead flies in the first cold snap of winter … And yet, even that moment held a rather tragic beauty. But that time too passed. He got used to the idea of death. He no longer feared it, he thought of such things coldly and with terrifying realism. He was nothing. He no longer believed in God, the immortal soul, the goodness of mankind. He needed to get as much pleasure as he could out of his short time on this earth, that was all there was to it …‘If someone like Raymond Détang comes looking for me again after I’ve done my duty …’ He
‘No, he’s a good lad. He has a good heart,’ she said once more.
She wanted to kiss him but didn’t dare. In the end, she simply pressed her lips softly against Bernard’s hand, just as she used to when he was asleep in his cradle. She went back to bed, thinking:
‘It will pass. ‘We’ll create such a good little life for him. He’ll want to go back to school again and he’ll love being at home. He’ll work hard. He’ll make up for lost time. He’ll get his degrees. He’ll be a good boy …’
10
A station, somewhere in France, one night in June. Bernard was going back to the front. Soldiers were swarming on to the platforms. Some were sleeping in the waiting rooms. Some walked by speaking loudly, laughing, and against the backdrop of the starry sky or the shadowy light of the station café, their silhouettes stood out: strong, thickset, heroic, already popularised a thousand and one times in films and photographs, the image of a soldier in the Great War, with his heavy shoes, his haversack on his back, a pipe in the corner of his mouth, his hard face, his laugh, his piercing eyes. It wasn’t a crowd, it was an army. The war held them together; war crucified man but held him upright as well. Did any of the leaders, more aware than the others, ever imagine the moment when peace would come, when the army would become a mass of people once more? That was the moment they should have been anticipating, preparing for in the midst of war, but it was difficult. Peace was being improvised just as war had been. That had been a success. So everything would be a success. The pride of the soldiers in themselves was immense. Bernard shared this sense of pride, just as he shared all the feelings of the other soldiers when he was with them. His own, unique soul, complex andcontradictory, had been replaced by a collective soul, one that was simple and strong. Like the others, he believed himself to be invincible; he thought he was amazing, and, like the others, he knew that he would hold his own until the very last day of the war, he wouldn’t give an inch, but afterwards … oh, afterwards!
He stretched out his legs, sighed, threw his head back and looked up at the distant sky, daydreaming vaguely of various things. What a long way he had come in the past four years! First, the enthusiasm, the joy of self-sacrifice, the desire to die for your country, for future generations, for future peace … Prepared to die, as long as death was heroic and had purpose, but soon the idea of death terrified him – oh, how he had hated death, how he had feared it, just as he had doubted God and blasphemed as he looked at the little blackish heaps lying between two trenches, dead bodies as numerous and insignificant as dead flies in the first cold snap of winter … And yet, even that moment held a rather tragic beauty. But that time too passed. He got used to the idea of death. He no longer feared it, he thought of such things coldly and with terrifying realism. He was nothing. He no longer believed in God, the immortal soul, the goodness of mankind. He needed to get as much pleasure as he could out of his short time on this earth, that was all there was to it …‘If someone like Raymond Détang comes looking for me again after I’ve done my duty …’ He
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