Émile Zola

“ Françoise, shaken with a fit of trembling, put her hands up to her ears, in spite of herself. Dominique, behind the soldiers, looked on; and, when the smoke had blown away a little, he saw three Prussians stretched on their backs in the middle of the field. The rest had thrown themselves down behind the willows and poplars; and the siege began.
For over an hour the mill was riddled with bullets. They whipped its old walls like hail. When they struck stone, you heard them flatten out and fall back into the water. Into wood they penetrated with a hollow sound. ”

“ Françoise, too, was very grave. What bothered old Merlier was to make out how in the world that rascal of a poacher could have bewitched his daughter. Dominique had never come to the mill. The miller began to watch him, and espied the gallant on the other side of the Morelle, lying in the grass and pretending to be asleep. The thing was clear: they must have fallen in love, making sheep's-eyes at each other across the mill-wheel. ”

“ She plainly saw their shadows, ranged like the rungs of a ladder along the Morelle. Only a single one stood opposite the mill, on the other side of the river near a willow whose branches dipped into the water. Françoise saw him distinctly; he was a big fellow, standing motionless, his face turned toward the sky with the dreamy look of a shepherd.
Then, when she had carefully inspected the ground, she went back and sat down upon her bed. She stayed there an hour deeply absorbed. Then she listened again; in the house not a breath stirred. She went back to the window, and looked out ”

“ There is nothing like love for putting heart into young people.
In the midst of all this hard work Françoise and Dominique adored each other. They hardly ever spoke, but they looked at each other with smiling tenderness. So far, old Merlier had not said a single word about the marriage; and they both respected this silence, awaiting the old man's pleasure. At last, one day about the middle of July, he had three tables set out in the courtyard under the big elm, inviting his friends in Rocreuse to come and take a drink with him in the evening. ”

“ And it is not the only source of coolness: all sorts of running water babble beneath the trees; at every step springs gush forth; you feel, while following the narrow paths, as if subterranean lakes were forcing their way through the moss, and taking advantage of the smallest fissures, at the foot of trees, between rocks, to overflow in crystalline fountains. The whispering voices of these brooks rise so multitudinous and high that they drown the bulfinches' song. You would think yourself in some enchanted park, with waterfalls on every hand.
Below, the meadows are soaking wet. ”

“ From there they threw themselves into a ditch, they reached the Sauval forest. Before going, the captain saluted old Merlier very politely, excusing himself. And he even added,—
——"Make them lose time. . . . We shall be back again."
Meanwhile Dominique stayed on in the hall. He still kept firing, hearing nothing, understanding nothing. He only felt that he must defend Françoise. The soldiers were gone, without his suspecting it the least in the world. He took aim and killed his man at every shot. Suddenly there was a loud noise. The Prussians, from the rear, had just overrun the courtyard. ”

“ Luckily the Prussians had fired too high. Dominique dragged, almost carried Françoise away, while old Merlier followed them, crying out,—
——"Go down to the little cellar; the walls are solid."
But they did not mind him, they went into the great hall, where ten soldiers, or so, were waiting in silence, with shutters closed, peeping through the cracks. The captain had stayed alone in the courtyard, crouched down behind the little wall, while the furious volleys continued. The soldiers he had stationed outside yielded ground only foot by foot. ”

“ It had just been whitened, and dazzled the village when the sun lighted it up in the middle of the day.
For twenty years old Merlier had been mayor of Rocreuse. He was esteemed for the fortune he had managed to make. He was supposed to be worth something like eighty thousand francs, laid up sou by sou. When he married Madeleine Guillard, who brought him the mill as her dowry, he hardly possessed anything but his two arms; but Madeleine never repented her choice, so well did he manage the affairs of the household. Now that his wife was dead, he remained a widower with his daughter Françoise. ”

“ Françoise," Dominique went on, in a caressing voice, "to-day is Saint-Louis's day, our wedding day, that we have waited for so long. Nothing has been able to separate us, since we are here, all alone, faithful to our tryst. ”

“ Rapidly the officer stationed his men, recognizing that he could not beat a retreat without being overpowered. It was as well to sell his life dearly. Now it was the Prussians who defended the mill and the French that made the attack. The firing began with unheard-of violence. For half an hour it did not stop. Then a dull explosion was heard, and a shot broke off one of the main branches of the hundred-year-old elm. The French had cannon. A battery, drawn up just above the ditch in which Dominique had hidden, swept the main street of Rocreuse. ”

“ Nevertheless, at about three, the Prussians made preparations to go. A minute before, the officer had closeted himself with Dominique, as on the preceding day. Françoise saw that the young man's life was being decided on. Then she clasped her hands and prayed. Old Merlier, beside her, maintained his mute and rigid attitude of an old peasant who does not struggle with the fatality of facts. ”

“ It was a principle of his that women were no good, and that they made a mess of it whenever they undertook anything serious. But Françoise did not go to bed; she stayed a long time sitting on her bed, listening to the noises in the house. The German soldiers, encamped in the courtyard, were singing and laughing: they must have been eating and drinking up to eleven, for the noise did not stop for an instant. In the mill itself heavy steps sounded every now and then ”

“ Half of it dipped into the Morelle, which, at this point, widens out into a clear, rounded basin. A dam was contrived to let the water fall from a height of several metres upon the mill-wheel, which turned creaking, with the asthmatic cough of a faithful servant, grown old in the household. When people advised old Merlier to change it for a new one, he would shake his head, saying that a young wheel would be lazier and not so well up in its business ”

“ If she was always laughing, it was to give others pleasure. At bottom, she was serious.
Naturally all the countryside courted her, still more for her dollars than for her niceness. And at last, she made a choice that had just scandalized the country. On the other side of the Morelle lived a young fellow, named Dominique Penquer. He did not belong in Rocreuse. Ten years before, he had come there from Belgium, to take possession of a legacy from an uncle of his who owned a little piece of property on the very outskirts of the Gagny forest, just opposite the mill, within a few gunshots. ”

“ Although puny for the neighborhood, she was not thin, far from it; people only meant that she could not shoulder a sack of grain; but she grew very plump with time, and stood a good chance of ending by being round and dainty as a quail. ”

“ Four men held him. Others shouted round him in a frightful language. They all but cut his throat off-hand. Françoise threw herself before him in supplication; but an officer came in and took charge of the prisoner. After a few sentences exchanged in German with the soldiers, he turned to Dominique and said roughly, and in very good French,—
——"You will be shot in two hours."
III.
It was a rule made by the German staff: every Frenchman not belonging to the regular army, and taken with arms in his hands, should be shot. Even the guerilla companies were not recognized as belligerents. ”