War and Peace: Original Version. Лев Толстой

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СКАЧАТЬ commanding officer with an order from the commander of the rearguard.

      “Colonel,” he said with grim seriousness, addressing Nikolai’s enemy and surveying his comrades, “the order is to halt and fire the bridge.”

      “Who the ordered?” the colonel asked morosely.

      “That I do not know, colonel, who the ordered,” the cornet replied naïvely and seriously, “only that the prince told me: ‘Go and tell the colonel that the hussars must go back quickly and fire the bridge.’”

      Following Zherkov, an officer of the retinue rode up to the colonel of hussars with the same order. Following the officer of the retinue, the fat Nesvitsky rode up on a Cossack horse that was scarcely able to carry him at a gallop.

      “What’s this, colonel,” he cried as he was still riding up, “I told you to fire the bridge; and now someone’s garbled it, everyone’s going mad up there and you can’t make sense of anything.”

      The colonel unhurriedly halted the regiment and turned to Nesvitsky:

      “You telled me about the combustible substances,” he said, “but you don’t told me anything about setting fire to them.”

      “Come on now, old man,” Nesvitsky said when he came to a halt, taking off his cap and straightening his sweaty hair with a plump hand, “certainly I told you to fire the bridge when you had put the combustible substances in place.”

      “I’m not your ‘old man’, mister staff officer, and you did not told me fire the bridge! I know military service, and am in the habit of following strictly orders. You telled me they would set fire to the bridge. How by the Holy Spirit know can I …”

      “There, it is always the same,” said Nesvitsky with a wave of his hand.

      “What brings you here?” he asked, addressing Zherkov.

      “Why, the same thing. But you have become all damp, allow me to wring you out.”

      “You said, mister staff officer …” the colonel continued in an offended tone.

      “Colonel,” the officer of the retinue interrupted, “you need to hurry, or the enemy will have moved his guns close enough to fire grapeshot.”

      The colonel looked without speaking at the officer of the retinue, at the fat headquarters staff officer, at Zherkov and frowned.

      “I shall fire the bridge,” he said in a solemn tone of voice as though, despite all the problems they were causing him, this was how he showed his magnanimity.

      Striking his horse with his long, well-muscled legs, as if it were to blame for everything, the colonel rode out in front and commanded the second squadron, the very one in which Rostov was serving under Denisov’s command, to go back to the bridge.

      “So that’s how it is,” thought Rostov, “he wants to test me!” His heart faltered and the blood rushed to his face. “Then let him look and see if I’m a coward,” he thought.

      Again there appeared on all the jolly faces of the men in the squadron the same serious expression that they had worn when they were holding position under fire.

      Nikolai kept his eyes fixed on his enemy, the regimental commander, wishing to discover some confirmation of his guesses in his face, but the colonel did not even glance at Nikolai once and he looked stern and solemn, as he always did at the front. The command rang out.

      “Look lively, lively now!” said several voices around him. Snagging the reins with their sabres, jangling their spurs in their haste, the hussars dismounted, not knowing themselves what they were going to do. The hussars crossed themselves. Rostov was no longer looking at the regimental commander, he had no time for that. He was afraid, his heart was sinking in fear that he might somehow fall behind the hussars. His hand trembled as he handed his horse to the holder, and he could feel the blood pounding as it rushed to his heart. Denisov rode past him, lounging backwards and shouting something. Nikolai could not see anything apart from the hussars running around him, getting their spurs tangled and jangling their sabres.

      “A stretcher!” someone’s voice shouted behind him. Rostov did not think about what the demand for a stretcher meant, he ran, trying only to be ahead of all the others, but just at the bridge, not looking where he was putting his feet, he stepped into the sticky trampled mud, slipped and fell on to his hands. The others ran round him.

      “On both sides, captain,” he heard the regimental commander’s voice say. The commander, having ridden forward, had stopped on his horse not far from the bridge with a triumphant, jolly expression.

      Rostov, wiping his dirty hands on his breeches, glanced round at his enemy and started running further, assuming that the further forward he went, the better it would be. But Bogdanich, even though he had not been looking and did not recognise Rostov, shouted at him:

      “Who’s that running in the middle of the bridge? To the right side! Cadet, come back!” he shouted angrily.

      Even now, however, Karl Bogdanovich did not pay any attention to him: but he did turn to Denisov who, flaunting his courage, had ridden on to the boards of the bridge.

      “Why take a risk, captain! You should dismount,” said the colonel.

      “Eh! It’ll hit whoever it likes,” replied Vaska Denisov, turning round in the saddle.

      Meanwhile Nesvitsky, Zherkov and the officer of the retinue were standing together, out of range, and watching either one or another of the small groups of men in yellow shakos, dark-green jackets decorated with tasselled cords and blue breeches fussing about beside the bridge, or watching the far side, where in the distance the blue coats were drawing nearer, and the groups with horses which could easily be taken for gun crews.

      “Will they fire the bridge or won’t they? Who’ll be first? Will they get there and fire the bridge, or will the French get within grapeshot distance and kill them all?” Every one of the large number of troops who were standing above the bridge had his heart in his mouth and could not help asking himself this question, and in the bright evening light they watched the bridge and the hussars, and the far side where the blue hoods were advancing with bayonets and guns.

      “Oh! The hussars are in for it!” said Nesvitsky. “They’re within grapeshot range now.”

      “He shouldn’t have taken so many men,” said the officer of the suite.

      “No, he really shouldn’t,” said Nesvitsky. “He could have sent two brave lads, it would have been all the same.”

      “Ah, your excellency,” interjected Zherkov, keeping his eyes fixed on the hussars, but still speaking with that naïve manner of his, which made it impossible to guess whether what he said was serious or not. “Ah, your excellency! What a way to think! Send two men, then who’s going to give us an Order of St. Vladimir with a ribbon? But this way, even though they’ll take a drubbing, you can still present the squadron and get a ribbon for yourself. Our Bogdanich knows the ways things are done.”

      “Well,” said the officer of the retinue, “that’s grapeshot.” He pointed to the French artillery pieces which were being uncoupled from their limbers and rapidly moving away.

      “But he’s wrong,” continued Zherkov, “I’ll be presented too, we were СКАЧАТЬ