Page:The Czar, A Tale of the Time of the First Napleon.djvu/226

 CHAPTER XXII.

THE AIDE-DE-CAMP OF ST. PRIEST.

HE miserable fugitives who succeeded, at the cost of so much suffering, in crossing the icy waters of the Beresina, found no "promised land" on the other side. Better had it been if with one accord they had laid down their arms on the banks of that fatal river, and surrendered to the mercy of the enemy. The horrors that awaited them well-nigh cast into oblivion those they had already passed through, and filled to absolute overflowing the cup of trembling put into their hands. Until then the cold had not exceeded that of the ordinary winter of those regions; but during that terrible month of December it grew ever more and more intense, until it reached a pitch of severity almost beyond precedent. A silent, invisible, invincible enemy, it mowed down the ranks of strong men with a pitiless scythe, sparing neither the young recruit nor the hardened veteran who had passed unscathed through all the sufferings of the preceding campaign.

Henri de Talmont was at first only conscious of one definite purpose, that of keeping his little charge from perishing with cold. If he could but bring him alive to Vilna, perhaps he might find Madame Leone there and restore him to her. Seeing that a crowd had gathered about a carriage which had been