One of the rear cannons that had been manhandled up on to the dam was trundled down on to the ice. Crowds of soldiers began running down on to the frozen surface. The ice cracked under one of the leading soldiers, and one leg slipped into the water. He tried to drag himself out but he was in waist-deep. The nearest soldiers tried to stop, the cannon driver reined in his horse, but still the shouts came from behind: ‘Get down on the ice. Don’t stop! Go on! Go on!’ Screams of horror came from the crowd. The soldiers near to the cannon waved furiously at the horses, and lashed at them to make them turn round and go back. But the horses moved on and stepped over the edge. The ice that had been strong enough to hold walking people cracked across in one huge piece and three dozen men standing on it lunged forwards and backwards, shoving one another down into the water.
Meanwhile cannonballs continued to zoom across and crash down everywhere, on the ice, in the water, and more often than not straight into the crowd that had engulfed the dam, the nearby ponds and the bank.
CHAPTER 19
Up on the Pratzen heights Prince Andrey Bolkonsky was lying where he had fallen with the flagstaff in his hands, bleeding from a head-wound and moaning pitifully, without being aware of it, in a soft voice like that of a child. By late afternoon he had stopped moaning and lay there perfectly still. He had no idea how long he had been unconscious, but now suddenly he felt alive again, not least from the burning, lacerating pain in his head.
‘Where’s it gone, that lofty sky that I had never known before until I saw it today?’ was his first thought. ‘And I’ve never known pain like this before either,’ he thought. ‘No, up to now I have known nothing, absolutely nothing. But where am I?’
He listened, and there was the sound of approaching hooves and French-speaking voices. He opened his eyes wide. There was the same lofty sky above him, with clouds floating higher than ever and through them glimpses of a blue infinity. He didn’t turn his head and couldn’t see the men who, if the voices and the hooves were anything to go by, had ridden up near by and stopped.
It was Napoleon himself with two of his adjutants. Bonaparte was going round everywhere, issuing final instructions for reinforcing the batteries firing down at the Augest dam, and inspecting the dead and wounded on the battlefield.
‘Fine men!’ said Napoleon, looking down at a dead Russian grenadier lying on his belly with his face rammed into the soil. The back of his head had gone black and one of his arms, flung out wide, was already stiffening.
‘The field-guns are out of ammunition, your Majesty,’ said an adjutant, arriving that moment from the batteries that were firing at Augest.
‘Bring some more up from the reserves,’ said Napoleon before riding on a few steps and then coming to a halt right above Prince Andrey, who was lying on his back with the flagstaff still where he had dropped it, though the flag itself had been taken by the French as a trophy.
‘A fine death this one!’ said Napoleon, looking down at Bolkonsky. Prince Andrey knew they were talking about him, and Napoleon was doing the talking – he had heard the speaker addressed as ‘your Majesty’. But the words sounded like buzzing flies. They were of no interest to him, he didn’t take them in and he immediately forgot them. He had a burning headache, he could feel himself losing blood, and there above him was the lofty, far-distant, unending sky. He knew it was Napoleon – his hero – but at that moment Napoleon seemed to him such a tiny, inconsequential creature compared with everything that was now transpiring between his spirit and that lofty, sky-blue infinity with its busy clouds. At that moment he could not have cared less who was standing over him, or what they were saying about him. He was just glad that someone had stopped and was standing over him, and his only desire was for these people to help him and bring him back to life, because life was good and he saw it all differently now. He made a huge effort to move and make some kind of noise. He stirred one leg faintly, and produced a feeble, sickly moan that he himself found moving.
‘Oh, he’s alive,’ said Napoleon. ‘Pick him up, this young man and have him taken to a dressing-station!’
This said, Napoleon rode on to meet Marshal Lannes, who had removed his hat and was now advancing, all smiles, to meet his Emperor and congratulate him on his victory.
Prince Andrey remembered nothing more. He had lost consciousness from the terrible pain that shot through him as they laid him on the stretcher and continued with every jolt as they carried him over to the dressing-station and began to explore the extent of his wound. When at last he came round it was late evening and he was being taken to the field-hospital along with some other wounded and captured Russian officers. During the transfer he felt a little stronger and could look around, even speak.
