THE LAST CAMPAIGN OF VIRVILLE

THE LAST CAMPAIGN OF VIRVILLE
A French Military Yarn of the Napoleonic Era
Translated and retold by Sandra Dermark

In the village of Gémeaux, not far from Dijon, there once lived one Monsieur de Virville, whose memory has become quite celebrated throughout the shire and has given origin to the following legend:

Captain de Virville was a gallant officer in the armies of old Bonaparte. After the Battle of Waterloo, he hung up the sword and went to live in his native village of Gémeaux. In the daytime, he was rarely seen in public, and, by night, he was always wide awake.
And nearly every evening, as the rest of the village went to bed, there were heard the hoofbeats of a fiery steed, after which came a carriage, from within which a deep voice was heard:
"Are you sleeping, Virville? Shall you tarry?"
An instant later, the reply was heard: 
"At your service, mon général!"
And the rolling of the wheels was heard loud as thunder, some days in one direction and some days in the opposite direction. At that moment, the valley sank once more into silence.
Some of the villagers, peeking through half-open windows, saw the carriage pass by, without being able to distinguish anything more than the two silhouettes. They had also seen that on some nights, a few minutes before twelve sharp, a horseman remained still, in silent, before the crucifix on the marketplace. It was the visitor of M. de Virville. But what was he doing there?
The villagers had found out that both riders set course for the battlefield on the outskirts of Gémeaux, where, after being called by name, their fallen comrades appeared: first of all, the generals; then, the officers; and, at last, the rank and file. They took up their formation, and, to the voice of command, "Avancez!", they all fought against an imaginary enemy. At the break of day, all of them had disappeared, and every drop of dew had turned to a drop of blood.
And even more details where found out. Jules Bonnot, "un esprit fort" who feared neither god nor beast nor man, assured that he had seen the fantastic horse, all made of cold steel, that many a time came to seek out M. de Virville.
One night, M. Bonnot braced himself to wait for them. In fact, it was not such a long wait. The horse appeared, trotting down the hill. As soon as it saw M. Bonnot, it whinnied loudly for rage. Then, the poor curious fellow, trembling like a leaf, saw how the steed grew... and grew... and grew... until it was the size of a full-grown elephant. And still it kept on growing even more; but poor Jules Bonnot was not able to see it, for the dread and the shock of it made him stumble and fall senseless on the ground.
Thus was he found by some labourers when, at the crack of dawn, they went out into the fields to till their soil.
Then came a night when, to the question of the stranger on horseback, M. de Virville did not answer: "At your service, mon général!" He was sleeping the last sleep, nevermore to awaken.
The night before his funeral, a long file of horsemen in uniform passed in silence through the marketplace of Gémeaux, and, in front of the crucifix, they bowed as low as they could in deep reverence.
Among them was the soul, or ghost, of M. de Virville.