The farmhouse was the scene of enormous activity: officers rushing in with reports on the number of troops, the losses; the activity observed among the French by the Cossacks on their light dragons and horses. Bonaparte’s army had certainly been reinforced by more than twenty thousand men: now identified as the Sixth Corps, which had last been sighted in Petersburg not a week before. General Saint-Cyr had managed to bring them south so quickly they had outdistanced even the reports of their travel, which uselessly had trickled in that very day. Three separate witnesses had glimpsed him upon the field, that evening, as Napoleon had embraced him and bestowed on him a Marshal’s baton, which he had won by the enterprise.
The initial goal of those troops had likely been Moscow itself: a neat pincer-trap for the Russian Army, which would have cut off their supply and likely secured for the French the great magazines of the city, full of food and munitions, which they themselves so desperately required. Napoleon had sacrificed that ambition for the rescue of his army.
In the dining chamber of the house, Kutuzov and his senior generals had gathered about the table; Barclay was speaking impassionedly of the necessity of retreating, and therefore of sacrificing Moscow. “We cannot take the wholly unjustified risk of the destruction of the army—the only way in which this war can now be lost. We know Bonaparte’s numbers have already been diminished by half during this campaign; he has lost more cavalry even than that. He can take Moscow, but he cannot hold it; he cannot hold St. Petersburg. He has overreached—”
“Overreached!” Another general, Bennigsen, was already roaring at him, before he had finished. “You would let him walk through the gates of Moscow without giving battle, without challenge—” He broke here into a torrent of Russian, savage, which made Barclay’s cheeks flush hot with color, before he returned to French. “Listen to me, General,” Bennigsen said, turning towards Kutuzov, “it will not be so simple a matter to get Bonaparte out again, once we have let him in. He may be diminished in numbers, but those who remain to him are the best of his army, seasoned men. If we give him so splendid a resting place as Moscow, his stragglers will gather in to him, he will secure his supply with all the stores laid up for the use of our own army—dear God! If any of us had ever thought there should be danger of them falling into the enemy’s hands!”
The argument could not fail but be impassioned, in such circumstances as these: the Chinese legions were still enough advantage to make the Russian Army seem the superior, though on the ground they were as yet perilously outnumbered, and the losses on the previous day had been immense. The French had known they fought a holding action; Bonaparte at every turn had conserved his men, and yielded ground judiciously to preserve them: ground which the Russians had bought dearly in blood while exposing themselves to the withering French artillery.
But no man could easily have borne sacrificing, even in worse circumstances, the very heart of the nation; though the government had been seated in St. Petersburg some years now, Moscow remained to nearly all of them its foremost city. “To have lost Petersburg was bad enough; if we lose Moscow as well, without a shot fired, you may as well send a courier to ask Napoleon which of his brothers we shall see upon the throne, by the New Year!” General Docturov said bitterly: his infantry had borne the brunt of the day’s hot work; his own arm was bandaged, and his face spattered with powder-burns.
Another officer, a younger man named Raevsky who had led the assault upon the French fences, said quietly to Kutuzov directly, “We must cover the southern provinces to permit General Chichagov and General Tormassov to unite their forces. Without Saint-Cyr’s forces at Petersburg, Wittgenstein has sufficient numbers to drive back the French there—”
“Before we are subjected to more of these counsels of—let us say retreat, instead of surrender,” Bennigsen said to him, with acid bite, “perhaps we might first ascertain if the retreat can be accomplished. If Bonaparte were to overwhelm the rear-guard—”
Kutuzov sat impassively while they argued it out, his heavy-lidded bad eye giving him an appearance almost half-slumbering and his face resting upon his fist, elbow propped against the arm of his chair; the fingers of his other hand touched gently the many reports which had gathered up before him, and now and again he lifted one of these to his eyes. But Laurence did not think he read them; and when at last the voices fell silent, he did not answer them, but looked to Laurence. “What is the state of your legions?” he said.
“Sir,” Laurence said, “we remain at your service, constrained only by supply. General Chu’s injuries are grievous, but I have every confidence in Colonel Zhao Lien, and our losses otherwise were slight: ten fighting-beasts and seven supply wounded past flying.”
“Will they carry infantry?” Kutuzov asked; Bennigsen made a small jerk, a half-abortive movement.
“Certainly, for a short distance,” Laurence said. “For any longer march, sir, that may materially alter the requirements of supply.”