De Ellendigen (Deel 2 van 5)

A lone foot‑traveler leaves the quiet lanes of Nivelles on a bright May morning, winding through shaded rows of trees and rolling hills that rise and fall like gentle waves. He slips past the modest inns of Lillois and Bois‑Seigneur‑Isaac, catches the tiled church tower at Braine‑l’Alleud, and pauses at the rustic Au Quatre Vents, where a fluttering notice hints at a local fair. The road opens onto a small valley with a stone‑arched stream, and a rough path leads him beside a pond of dabbling ducks toward a grand vaulted gate.

The massive gate, framed by the austere architecture of Louis XIV, bears a weathered stone door and a deep circular scar left by a cannonball. As the traveler steps through, a farmer woman emerges, pointing to the dent and explaining that a French shot has barely missed the wooden post. Beyond the gate the landscape opens onto the scarred fields of Hougomont, the ominous ground where the armies of Napoleon and Wellington will soon clash.