Evil in a Mask by Dennis Wheatley Read Free Book Online Page B

‘It’s your duty, and I’ll see to it that you do it.’
    â€˜Duty be damned,’ the Corporal declared. ‘If it were to defend France, I’d fight again, as you did at Jemappes and Wattignies. But here, in this outlandish place, why the hell should I?’
    â€˜Them Prussians would be across the Rhine again if we hadn’t given them a licking at Jena; and the Russians with them. Only a fool would rather wait till he had to fight battles in his own country, instead of in the enemy’s.’
    â€˜Nonsense! Neither of them would have attacked us. What had they to gain by going to war? Nothing! Not since ’99 has France been in the least danger. We have been the victims of Bonaparte’s crazy ambitions ever since. He’s dragged us from our homes to march, starve and fight all over Europe, solely for his own glory, and I’ve had enough of it.’
    Roger knew that the Corporal was expressing the views of a great part of the rank and file of the Army; but, as a senior officer, he could not let such remarks pass, so he said, ‘That’s quite enough, Corporal. Prussia and Russia are both monarchies. They would impose a King on us again if they could. If we are to retain our liberties, they have got to be defeated.’
    â€˜Liberties!’ sneered Vitu. ‘You must have been asleep for the past ten years, Colonel. The days of “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” are as far behind us as the Dark Ages. Every law the Convention made has been annulled or altered, and the new Constitution of the Year XII, that Bonaparte gave us soon after he crowned himself in Notre Dame, has turned us into a race of slaves. As for Equality, if the men who won it for us in ’93 could see things as they are now, they’d turn in their graves. The people’s representative has made himself an Emperor and his brothers Kings. His hangers-on aregrand dignitaries, Princes, Dukes and the like. They doll themselves up in gold braid, jewels and feathers, eat off the fat of the land, and get themselves fortunes by looting every country they invade; while we poor devils are paid only a few francs a day and driven to risk our lives so that they can further enrich themselves.’
    â€˜You’ve got something there,’ the Sergeant acknowledged. ‘Nevertheless, I’m for the Emperor body and soul. He knows what’s best for France, and never lets his men down.’
    â€˜All the same,’ young Hoffman put in, ‘I don’t think it’s fair that he should force men from other countries to fight his battles. Where I come from we had no quarrel with anyone; neither had the Dutch, the Italians and the Bavarians, yet there are thousands of us here who have been marching and fighting for years, when we might have been working happily in our farms or vineyards, with a good wife and bringing up a family.’
    â€˜Yes, that’s hard luck,’ Roger agreed. ‘But remember, France has liberated you from the old feudal system by which all but your nobility were virtually chattels of your hereditary Princes. France has paid dearly for that in the loss, for over fifteen years, of a great part of her young manpower. To make good these losses, the Emperor has no alternative but to draw upon his allies.’
    â€˜That was fair enough in the old days,’ Vitu argued. ‘Then we needed every man we could get to fight in Italy and on the Moselle. But that is so no longer. What has the Rhineland or the Netherlands to gain by helping to conquer Poland? And what a campaign it’s been! Staggering about in the mud, our uniforms worn to tatters, losing our way in blizzards. It’s all very well for you, Colonel, and the rest of the gilded staff. You billet yourselves in the best houses in the towns, keep for yourselves the pick of every convoy of food and wine that comes up from the rear, attend splendid balls, then play chase me round the