“Bastards! Bastards!” He killed a Prussian soldier, slicing the sword hard into the man’s neck above the stiff black collar. The remaining infantrymen were running. There had not been many Prussians at the bridge, for at best they had only been supposed to delay the French advance. Flames stabbed across the furniture from the French side, and the General shouted at his men to hold their damned fire and to pull the barricade down instead.
The Prussian infantry was running north. The cavalry, seeing that the French had captured the bridge with an insolent ease, turned to follow the foot soldiers. The French General, knowing he had earned his pat on the head from the Emperor, shouted derision at their retreat. “You lily-livered bastards! You boy-lovers! You lap-dogs! Stay and fight, you scum!” He spat, then sheathed his sword. Blood from his torn ear was soaking his left epaulette with its tarnished chains and gilded eagle.
French infantry began to dismantle the barricade. The single dead Prussian infantryman, his uniform already looted of food and coins, lay by the bridge. A Dragoon sergeant hauled the body aside as more cavalrymen poured across the bridge. A woman ran from one of the houses on the northern bank and was almost knocked down by a clattering troop of Dragoons. The woman carried a bouquet of dried violets, their petals faded almost to lilac. She went to the French General’s stirrup and held the pathetic bouquet up to the grim-faced man. “Is he coming?” she asked.