War And Peace

On the 10th of October, by the time Dokhturov had marched half-way to Fominsk and halted at the village of Aristovo, making careful preparations for carrying out his orders to the letter, the whole of the French army had made its way in fits and starts to the position occupied by Murat, ostensibly to give battle, but suddenly and for no apparent reason it then lunged off left down the new Kaluga road, and began marching into Fominsk, where until now Broussier had been standing alone. At this time Dokhturov had at his disposal nothing more than Dorokhov’s troops and the two small detachments of Figner and Seslavin.

On the evening of the 11th of October Seslavin brought a captured French guardsman to the headquarters at Aristovo. The prisoner said that the troops that had entered Fominsk that day were the advance guard of the whole army, Napoleon was with them, and the whole army had marched out of Moscow five days before. That same evening a house serf coming in from Borovsk brought word that he had seen a huge army entering the town. Some of Dorokhov’s Cossacks reported that they had seen French guardsmen marching along the road to Borovsk. All of this intelligence made one thing clear: in the place where they had been expecting to encounter a single division they were faced with the entire French army, marching away from Moscow in an unexpected direction – down the old Kaluga road. Dokhturov insisted on holding back since it was not clear now where his duty lay. He had been ordered to attack Fominsk, but at that time only Broussier had been in Fominsk, and now the whole French army was there. Yermolov wanted to take the initiative, but Dokhturov kept on insisting that he must have instructions from his Serene Highness, General Kutuzov. They decided to report back to staff headquarters.

For this purpose they chose a capable officer, Bolkhovitinov, who was given the task of delivering a written report and explaining the whole thing in words. It was just before midnight when Bolkhovitinov received his dispatch and verbal instructions, and galloped off to headquarters, accompanied by a Cossack with spare horses.

CHAPTER 16

The autumn night was dark and warm. It had been drizzling for the last four days. With two changes of horses Bolkhovitinov covered twenty miles in an hour and a half on a muddy, sticky road and got to Letashovko not much after one in the morning. Dismounting at a peasant’s hut with a wattle fence bearing the inscription General Staff, he dropped the reins and walked into the dark entry.

‘Quick. The duty general! Very important!’ he cried as someone jumped to his feet, snorting in the darkness.

‘His Honour has been ill since yesterday evening. He hasn’t slept for three nights,’ an orderly’s voice pleaded in a whisper. ‘You’ll have to wake the captain first.’

‘It’s urgent. I’m from General Dokhturov,’ said Bolkhovitinov, groping his way in through an open door.

The orderly was ahead of him, waking somebody up. ‘Your Honour, your Honour, there’s a cullier.’

‘You what? What? Who from?’ said a sleepy voice.

‘From Dokhturov and Alexey Petrovich. Napoleon is at Fominsk,’ said Bolkhovitinov. He couldn’t see the speaker in the darkness, but he could tell from the voice that it wasn’t Konovnitsyn.

The man who had been woken up was yawning and stretching. ‘I’m not keen on waking him up,’ he said, fumbling with something. ‘He’s not at all well. Could be a rumour, couldn’t it?’

‘Here’s the report,’ said Bolkhovitinov. ‘My instructions are to hand it straight to the duty general.’

‘Hang on. Let me strike a light. Why do you keep hiding things away, damn your eyes?’ said the man who had been doing all the stretching, to his orderly. It was Shcherbinin, one of Konovnitsyn’s adjutants. ‘Oh, here we are. I’ve got it,’ he added.

The orderly struck a light, and Shcherbinin felt for a candlestick.

‘Oh, the swine!’ he said with disgust. By the light of the sparks Bolkhovitinov caught a glimpse of Shcherbinin’s youthful face as he held the candle, and there was another man there asleep in a corner. It was Konovnitsyn.

When the sulphur splinters kindled by the tinder had flared up into a blue flame, then a red one, Shcherbinin lit a tallow candle, which sent the cockroaches that had been gnawing at it scurrying away, and looked at the messenger. Bolkhovitinov was spattered all over with mud, and his face was smeared where he had wiped it with his sleeve.

‘Who is it from?’ asked Shcherbinin, taking the packet.

‘It’s true all right,’ said Bolkhovitinov. ‘Prisoners, Cossacks, spies, they all tell the same story.’