His train took fourteen
hours to cover the distance normally made in two. It was made up of
freight cars filled with provisions and cartridges, with the doors
stamped and sealed. A third-class car was occupied by the train escort,
a detachment of provincial guards. He was installed in a second-class
compartment with the lieutenant in command of this guard and certain
officials on their way to join their regiments after having completed
the business of mobilization in the small towns in which they were
stationed before the war. The crowd, habituated to long detentions,
was accustomed to getting out and settling down before the motionless
locomotive, or scattering through the nearby fields.
In the stations of any importance all the tracks were occupied by rows
of cars. High-pressure engines were whistling, impatient to be off.
Groups of soldiers were hesitating before the different trains, making
mistakes, getting out of one coach to enter others. The employees, calm
but weary-looking, were going from side to side, giving explanations
about mountains of all sorts of freight and arranging them for
transport. In the convoy in which Desnoyers was placed the Territorials
were sleeping, accustomed to the monotony of acting as guard. Those in
charge of the horses had opened the sliding doors, seating themselves
on the floor with their legs hanging over the edge.
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