my
during its first eleven days after leaving Moscow: a stampede which made
possible what Kutuzov had not yet even dared to think of--the complete
extermination of the French. Dorokhov's report about Broussier's
division, the guerrillas' reports of distress in Napoleon's army, rumors
of preparations for leaving Moscow, all confirmed the supposition that
the French army was beaten and preparing for flight. But these were
only suppositions, which seemed important to the younger men but not to
Kutuzov. With his sixty years' experience he knew what value to attach
to rumors, knew how apt people who desire anything are to group all news
so that it appears to confirm what they desire, and he knew how readily
in such cases they omit all that makes for the contrary. And the more
he desired it the less he allowed himself to believe it. This question
absorbed all his mental powers. All else was to him only life's
customary routine. To such customary routine belonged his conversations
with the staff, the letters he wrote from Tarutino to Madame de Stael,
the reading of novels, the distribution of awards, his correspondence
with Petersburg, and so on. But the destruction of the French, which he
alone foresaw, was his heart's one desire.

On the night of the eleventh of October he lay leaning on his arm and
thinking of that.

There was a stir in the next room and he heard the steps of Toll,
Konovnitsyn, and Bolkhovitinov.

"Eh, who's there? Come in, come in! What news?" the field marshal called
out to them.

While a footman was lighting a candle, Toll communicated the substance
of the news.

"Who brought it?" asked Kutuzov with a look which, when the candle was
lit, struck Toll by its cold severity.

"There can be no doubt about it, your Highness."

"Call him in, call him here."

Kutuzov sat up with one leg hanging down from the bed and his big paunch
resting against the other which was doubled under him. He screwed up his
seeing eye to scrutinize the messenger more carefully, as if wishing to
read in his face what preoccupied his own mind.

"Tell me, tell me, friend," said he to Bolkhovitinov in his low, aged
voice, as he pulled together the shirt which gaped open on his chest,
"come nearer--nearer. What news have you brought me? Eh? That Napoleon
has left Moscow? Are you sure? Eh?"

Bolkhovitinov gave a detailed account from the beginning of all he had
been told to report.

"Speak quicker, quicker! Don't torture me!