The Retreat by Patrick Rambaud

grand and beautiful spectacle, but one needs to be alone to truly enjoy it. What a pity to have to share it with people who’d belittle the Colosseum and the Bay of Naples! And what’s more …’
    â€˜Yes, Monsieur Beyle?’
    â€˜I have an appalling toothache.’
    He held his cheek. Sebastian moved off without a word, heading nowhere in particular except further on, his mind clouded by the punch. Administrators were trying to squeeze into packed berlines, arguments were breaking out, tussles, insults; office colleagues were hurling home truths in one another’s faces. Nerves were fraying through fear. It was all taking too long. In the glow of the fires devastating Moscow, groups of troopers were riding alongside the column of carriages while others set off on reconnaissance to clear a path for the convoy. Sitting on his bag, his chin in his hands, Sebastian Roque closed his eyes; the punch hadn’t affected his memory, words of his dear Seneca came to him:
‘All things must be made light of and borne with good humour; it is more human to laugh at life than bewail it.’
How human I am, he thought to himself, hiccupping. The hiccup became a giggle, then the giggle uncontrollable laughter and the berlines’ passengers looked at this young man overcome by mirth. ‘The poor lad has gone mad,’ sighed a coachman. ‘Lucky blighter,’ like an echo, answered a passenger leaning on his carriage door.
    *
    A tingling sensation made Sebastian jump. His sleeve was on fire. He stood up, slapping his arm. How long had he been asleep, his head on his bag? The carriages had gone, no one had bothered about him, he was alone on the boulevard; he had shooting pains in his head and a stiff neck. He heard hammering – no, it was hooves and wooden wheels echoing on the cobbles. He saw riders outlined against the smoke. The light of the fires accentuated the outlandishness of their headgear. The one leading the way,a strapping great rogue, was wearing an enormous fur hat, the others Tartar hats, Cossack regulars’ caps or brass helmets. They rode closer, their getups becoming clearer. Russians were they, with those boots some of them wore that turned up at the toe? A detachment come to put the finishing touches to the disaster? The one at the front had a long nose, a pale, walrus moustache, a green Guard’s coat; an abbot in a hitched-up soutane followed, then men in long embroidered coats with scimitars at their belts. They were towing a chest on casters; their little long-maned horses were laden with booty. This motley troupe stopped in front of Sebastian, who stood up, thinking that they were going to kill him. ‘And I don’t even care! It must be the punch, or fatigue …’ Two of the troopers were whispering in each other’s ear, and then their leader said, in French, ‘Don’t stay there, Monsieur Roque, you’ll brown like a side of beef.’
    â€˜You know my name?’
    â€˜Rouen, the spinning-mills …’
    â€˜You’re from Normandy?’
    â€˜Herbigny, does that ring any bells? Herbigny, on the way to Canteleu, just before Croisset.’
    â€˜I know the chateau, yes, with the limes, the meadow slopes down to the Seine …’
    â€˜That’s my name, and that’s been my house since the death of my father who knew yours.’
    â€˜So you are d’Herbigny, goodness!’
    â€˜Paulin! Put Monsieur Roque’s bag with my portmanteau and you, Bonet, give him your nag. You’ll walk, that’ll teach you to play the parish priest!’
    â€˜I can walk,’ said Sebastian.
    â€˜So can he. Shall we get on with it, Bonet?’ To Sebastian,he added, ‘I needed to do something to that good-for-nothing, his soutane is putting me to shame.’
    â€˜What about Martinon’s horse?’ said Trooper Bonet.
    â€˜You think it hasn’t got enough already with our cloth and