Chapter 14 Chapter Fourteen

Passing through some alleys in the Khamovnik district, only the prisoners traveled with the convoy and various vehicles belonging to the convoy behind; In the middle of the crowded artillery team. At the end of the bridge, all the people stopped, waiting for the people in front to pass first.From the bridge they could see the endless train of baggage moving ahead and behind them.On the right, where the Kaluzhskaya road turns at Neskuchny, endless rows of troops and vehicles stretch into the distance.These were the advance troops of the Bogarny Corps; behind them, along the embankment and across the Kamenny Bridge, were Ney's troops and convoy.

The Davu troops with the captives crossed the Crimean shoal, and part of them entered Kaluzhskaya Avenue.However, the convoy was so long that Bogarny's convoy had not yet crossed Moscow into Kaluzhskaya Prospekt by the time Ney's vanguard had crossed the Ordenka road. After wading through the Crimean Shoals, the prisoners had to stop every few steps and go again after a while. Vehicles and people coming from all directions became more and more crowded.The captives walked for more than an hour between the bridge and Kaluzhskaya Prospekt, taking hundreds of steps of interdependence, interconnection, interpenetration, interpenetration, etc.It contained, having come to the square at the confluence of Moskva Street and Kaluzhskaya Street, the captives huddled together and stood waiting for hours at the intersection.The sound of rumbling wheels came from all directions, like a tsunami, which was also mixed with footsteps and non-stop reprimands and curses.Pierre leaned against the remnant of a burnt house and listened to the din that mingled with his imaginary drums.

Some of the captured officers climbed to the top of the wall of the burnt house against which Pierre was leaning in order to get a better view. "A lot of people! Hey, what a crowd! . . . Even some of the cannons are covered with stuff! Look: leather clothes..." they said, "Look at the things that the hooligans robbed . . . Stuff...that's from an icon, must be!...those must be germans. And a russian peasant, for real...hey, these bastards!...look what that guy loads himself into Look, I can't even walk! Look, I didn't expect, even this little buggy has been snatched!...Look at that guy sitting on the box, my God!...They're fighting!... ..."

"Yes, slap him in the mouth--slap him in the mouth! As it is, we can't get out before dark. Look, look there, that must be Napoleon. Look and throw it away. Propose "Don't add entities if you don't have to" ". Later generations called Occam, what a horse! There is also a crown with cursive characters. Like a movable house. The guy didn't even know he lost his pocket. Fighting again... a child holding a child You're a beautiful woman, and she's pretty. But no, if you want to be so pretty, you'll be allowed to pass by... Look, there's no end to it. Russian girls, really Russian girls! How comfortable it is to sit in the carriage!"

Just like in front of the church in Khamownik, there was another wave of unanimous curiosity that rushed all the prisoners to the road. Pierre, because of his height, saw over everyone's heads and attracted the curiosity of the prisoners. matter of heart.Three wagons were wedged between ammunition wagons, and in them crowded brightly dressed, painted, chattering women. From the moment Pierre became aware of the presence of that mysterious force, it seemed that anything: whether it was the corpses whose faces had been blackened for fun, whether these women going nowhere, whether it was the fires of Moscow, He cannot be surprised or frightened.Pierre could not make any impression of what he now saw--as though his soul were preparing for a hard struggle and thus refusing impressions that might weaken it.

The wagons of the women passed, and then came the carts; soldiers; wagons, soldiers; carriages, soldiers; ammunition wagons, soldiers.See Aesthetics, Education, Politics, and sometimes women. Pierre could not see individuals, but a stream of people. All these people and horses seem to be driven by an invisible force.Pierre watched continuously for an hour, and all the people poured out of the streets with the desire to pass quickly; Frowning, shouting at each other, all faces showed the desperate rush and ruthless expression that surprised Pierre on the face of the squad leader that morning to the sound of the drums. .

Towards evening, the officers of the convoy assembled their ranks and crowded noisily into the ranks of the ammunition convoy, and the prisoners, surrounded on all sides, walked up the Kaluzhskaya road. They walked quickly, without rest, and stopped only when the sun was setting.The baggage carts were assembled one by one, and people began to prepare for the night.Everyone is angry and dissatisfied.For a long time the sound of cursing, ferocious shouting, and mutual fighting could be heard from all directions.A wagon behind the convoy collided with a wagon of the convoy, knocking a hole in the wagon, and several soldiers ran to the wagon from different directions; some soldiers pulled aside the horses harnessed to the wagon , whipped the horse's head, and other soldiers fought with each other. Pierre saw that a German soldier's head was severely wounded by a knife.

All these people, who only now seemed to wake up a little from the haste and not knowing where they were going, after stopping in the fields on a cold autumn evening, shared the same unpleasant feeling.After stopping, I seemed to understand that I still don't know where I am going and how much hardship is ahead. During this break, the escort's attitude towards the prisoners was worse than when they set off. The first food the captives got was horsemeat. Every soldier, from officer to soldier, seemed to have a personal hatred for every prisoner, which unexpectedly changed the previous friendly attitude.

This hatred was intensified when the number of prisoners was counted and it was discovered that a Russian soldier had fled from Moscow in a flurry of feigned stomach pains.Pierre saw a Frenchman beating a Russian soldier just because he was a little farther from the main road, and he heard the captain, his friend, reprimanding the junior officer and threatening him because a Russian soldier had escaped. , to send him to a military court.The junior officer excused that the Russian soldier was unable to move due to illness, and the officer said that there was an order from his superiors that anyone who stopped and refused to move would be shot.Pierre felt that the force of fate, which had stirred the earth during the execution and which he had no longer felt during his captivity, now dominated his being again.He was terrified; but he felt that, as the force of fate pressed upon him more and more, the life-force in his unbound soul grew and strengthened.

Pierre's supper consisted of rye noodle soup and horsemeat, while he ate and chatted with his companions. Neither Pierre nor any of his companions said anything about what they had seen in Moscow, about the brutality of the French, about the orders announced to them to be shot: for rebellion In the current worsening situation, everyone showed special excitement and happiness. The sun had already set, and there were a few bright stars shining in the sky; a full moon had just risen, and the sky was fiery red, and a huge red ball was shaking amazingly in the gray dusk, gradually brightening up, and the dusk was over. However, the night has not yet come.Pierre got up, left his new companions, and walked across the fires to the other side of the road, where he had heard that there were captured soldiers.He wants to talk to them.On the way a French sentry stopped him and told him to go back.

Pierre went back.But instead of going back to the fire, or to his companions, he walked toward an unhassled carriage, where no one was there.He crossed his legs, bowed his head, and sat on the cold ground next to the wheel. He sat motionless for a long, long time, thinking hard.Been sitting for over an hour.No one bothered him.Suddenly he burst out laughing, his thick, kind laugh so loud that everyone around them turned in amazement at this queer, apparently solitary laugh. "Ha, ha, ha!" laughed Pierre.Then he said aloud to himself: "The soldier won't let me pass. Seize me and lock me up. They have captured me, me?—my immortal soul!" Tears flowed. Someone got up and approached Pierre to see what the big, queer man was laughing by himself.Pierre stopped laughing, got up, and moved away. Moving a little further away from the curious man, he glanced around. Previously, in this huge campsite, countless fires were crackling and burning, people were talking loudly, and there was a lot of noise, but now it has calmed down, and the vigorous bonfires have gradually extinguished, and the color has become pale.A full moon hung high in the clear sky.The woods and fields beyond the bivouac, previously invisible, were now revealed in the distance.Farther away, across forests and fields, the clear, erratic, and endless sky leads people into the distance.Pierre looked up at the sky, at the distant twinkling stars high above. "It's all mine, it's all in me, it's all me!" thought Pierre. "But they caught it all and shut them up in a shed surrounded by boards!" He smiled, and went to lie down with his companions and fell asleep.