‘Why run the risk, Captain? You should dismount,’ said the colonel.
‘If the bullet has your number on it . . .’ said Vaska Denisov, turning in the saddle.
Meanwhile Nesvitsky, Zherkov and the officer from the commander’s entourage were standing together out of range, watching the two groups of men, those in yellow shakos, gold-braided dark-green jackets and blue breeches swarming towards the bridge, and those on the other bank in the blue greatcoats and some with horses, easily recognizable as artillerymen approaching in the distance.
‘Will they burn it down or not? Who’ll get there first? Will they get through and set fire to it, or will the French get their grapeshot going and mow them down?’ These were the questions that each man instinctively asked himself with a sinking heart, in the great mass of troops looking down on the bridge. In the bright evening sunlight they were staring down at the bridge and the hussars, and across at the blue greatcoats on the other side, advancing with guns and bayonets.
‘Ugh! The hussars are in for it!’ said Nesvitsky. ‘They’re within range of that grapeshot now.’
‘He shouldn’t have taken so many men,’ said one of the officers of the suite.
‘Quite right,’ said Nesvitsky. ‘Could’ve sent two brave boys. Wouldn’t have made any difference.’
‘Oh no, your Excellency,’ put in Zherkov, his eyes fixed on the hussars, but still with that innocent manner which made it difficult to tell whether he was serious or not. ‘Oh no, sir. The very idea! Send two men? He wouldn’t get the Vladimir medal and ribbon for that, would he? As things stand, if we get wiped out he’ll still be able to recommend the squadron for honours and go and collect a personal ribbon. Our good friend Bogdanych knows how things get done.’
‘Hey!’ exclaimed the first officer, ‘here comes the grapeshot.’
He pointed to the French guns, which had been taken down from the carriages and were being swiftly trundled into position.
On the French side, smoke rose in puffs from the groups with cannons – one, two, three almost simultaneously, and just as the sound of the first shot reached them a fourth puff rose up. Two more bangs, one right after the other, then the fourth.
‘Oh no!’ moaned Nesvitsky, clutching at the officer’s arm as though in intense pain. ‘Look, there’s a man down! He’s down!’
‘Two, I think.’
‘If I were the Tsar, I’d never go to war,’ said Nesvitsky, recoiling.
The French cannons were swiftly reloaded. The blue-coated infantry were sprinting towards the bridge. More puffs of smoke rose at scattered intervals, and the grapeshot sizzled, rattling down on the bridge. But this time Nesvitsky couldn’t see what was happening at the bridge. Dense smoke rose from it. The hussars had done it, they had set fire to the bridge, and the French batteries were firing now not to stop them but just because the guns were there and they had someone to fire at.
The French had managed three rounds of grapeshot before the hussars got back to the men holding their horses. Two were badly directed, and the shot flew over them high and wide, but the last volley fell right in the middle of the group of hussars and three men were felled.
Rostov, preoccupied by his relations with Bogdanych, had stepped on to the bridge without knowing what to do. There was no one to slash at with his sword, which was how he had always imagined a battle would go, and he couldn’t contribute to the bridge-burning because, unlike the other soldiers, he had forgotten to bring any straw. He was just standing there looking around when suddenly there was a great rattling sound on the bridge, like a scattering of nuts, and one of the hussars standing right next to him fell with a groan against the railing. Rostov ran to him along with the others. Again a voice called out, ‘Stretcher here!’ Four men took hold of the hussar and started to lift him. ‘Ooooh! . . . Jesus Christ, leave me alone!’ screamed the wounded man, but they went ahead, lifted him and laid him on a stretcher. Nikolay Rostov turned away and began staring into the distance, at the waters of the Danube, at the sky, at the sun, as if he were looking for something. How lovely that sky looked, how blue and calm and deep! Oh, the brightness and magnificence of that setting sun! The warm glow of the water on the far Danube! Even lovelier were the distant hills that shone so blue beyond the Danube, the convent, the mysterious gorges, the pine woods misted over to their tops . . . everything so calm and happy . . . ‘I would ask for nothing, nothing in the world if only I could be there,’ thought Rostov. ‘In me, only in me and that sunshine, there is so much happiness, and
