dear invalid?" said she, as though unaware of the cold offensive
look fixed on her.
Prince Vasili stared at her and at Boris questioningly and
perplexed. Boris bowed politely. Prince Vasili without acknowledging
the bow turned to Anna Mikhaylovna, answering her query by a
movement of the head and lips indicating very little hope for the
patient.
"Is it possible?" exclaimed Anna Mikhaylovna. "Oh, how awful! It
is terrible to think.... This is my son," she added, indicating Boris.
"He wanted to thank you himself."
Boris bowed again politely.
"Believe me, Prince, a mother's heart will never forget what you
have done for us."
"I am glad I was able to do you a service, my dear Anna
Mikhaylovna," said Prince Vasili, arranging his lace frill, and in
tone and manner, here in Moscow to Anna Mikhaylovna whom he had placed
under an obligation, assuming an air of much greater importance than
he had done in Petersburg at Anna Scherer's reception.
"Try to serve well and show yourself worthy," added he, addressing
Boris with severity. "I am glad.... Are you here on leave?" he went on
in his usual tone of indifference.
"I am awaiting orders to join my new regiment, your excellency,"
replied Boris, betraying neither annoyance at the prince's brusque
manner nor a desire to enter into conversation, but speaking so
quietly and respectfully that the prince gave him a searching glance.
"Are you living with your mother?"
"I am living at Countess Rostova's," replied Boris, again adding,
"your excellency."
"That is, with Ilya Rostov who married Nataly Shinshina," said
Anna Mikhaylovna.
"I know, I know," answered Prince Vasili in his monotonous voice. "I
never could understand how Nataly made up her mind to marry that
unlicked bear! A perfectly absurd and stupid fellow, and a gambler
too, I am told."
"But a very kind man, Prince," said Anna Mikhaylovna with a pathetic
smile, as though she too knew that Count Rostov deserved this censure,
but asked him not to be too hard on the poor old man. "What do the
doctors say?" asked the princess after a pause, her worn face again
expressing deep sorrow.
"They give little hope," replied the prince.
"And I should so like to thank Uncle once for all his kindness to me
and Boris. He is his godson," she added, her tone suggesting that this
fact ought to give Prince Vasili much satisfaction.
Prince Vasili became thoughtful and frowned. Anna Mikhaylovna saw
that he was afraid of finding in her a rival for Count Bezukhov's
fortune, and hastened to reassure him.
"If it were not for my sincere affection and devotion to Uncle,"
said she, uttering the word with peculiar assurance and unconcern,
"I know his character: noble, upright... but you see he has no one
with him except the young princesses.... They are still young...." She
bent her head and continued in a whisper: "Has he performed his
final duty, Prince? How priceless are those last moments! It can
make things no worse, and it is absolutely necessary to prepare him if
he is so ill. We women, Prince," and she smiled tenderly, "always know
how to say these things. I absolutely must see him, however painful it
may be for me. I am used to suffering."
Evidently the prince understood her, and also understood, as he
had done at Anna Pavlovna's, that it would be difficult to get rid
of Anna Mikhaylovna.
"Would not such a meeting be too trying for him, dear Anna
Mikhaylovna?" said he. "Let us wait until evening. The doctors are
expecting a crisis."
"But one cannot delay, Prince, at such a moment! Consider that the
welfare of his soul is at stake. Ah, it is awful: the duties of a
Christian..."
A door of one of the inner rooms opened and one of the princesses,
the count's niece, entered with a cold, stern face. The length of
her body was strikingly out of proportion to her short legs. Prince
Vasili turned to her.
"Well, how is he?"
"Still the same; but what can you expect, this noise..." said the
princess, looking at Anna Mikhaylovna as at a stranger.
"Ah, my dear, I hardly knew you," said Anna Mikhaylovna with a happy
smile, ambling lightly up to the count's niece. "I have come, and am
at your service to help you nurse my uncle. I imagine what you have
gone through," and she sympathetically turned up her eyes.
The princess gave no reply and did not even smile, but left the room
as Anna Mikhaylovna took off her gloves and, occupying the position
she had conquered, settled down in an armchair, inviting Prince Vasili
to take a seat beside her.
"Boris," she said to her son with a smile, "I shall go in to see the
count, my uncle; but you, my dear, had better go to Pierre meanwhile
and don't forget to give him the Rostovs' invitation. They ask him
to dinner. I suppose he won't go?" she continued, turning to the
prince.
"On the contrary," replied the prince, who had plainly become
depressed, "I shall be only too glad if you relieve me of that young
man.... Here he is, and the count has not once asked for him."
He shrugged his shoulders. A footman conducted Boris down one flight
of stairs and up another, to Pierre's rooms.
CHAPTER XVI
Pierre, after all, had not managed to choose a career for himself in
Petersburg, and had been expelled from there for riotous conduct and
sent to Moscow. The story told about him at Count Rostov's was true.
Pierre had taken part in tying a policeman to a bear. He had now
been for some days in Moscow and was staying as usual at his
father's house. Though he expected that the story of his escapade
would be already known in Moscow and that the ladies about his father-
who were never favorably disposed toward him - would have used it to
turn the count against him, he nevertheless on the day of his
arrival went to his father's part of the house. Entering the drawing
room, where the princesses spent most of their time, he greeted the
ladies, two of whom were sitting at embroidery frames while a third
read aloud. It was the eldest who was reading - the one who had met
Anna Mikhaylovna. The two younger ones were embroidering: both were
rosy and pretty and they differed only in that one had a little mole
on her lip which made her much prettier. Pierre was received as if
he were a corpse or a leper. The eldest princess paused in her reading
and silently stared at him with frightened eyes; the second assumed
precisely the same expression; while the youngest, the one with the
mole, who was of a cheerful and lively disposition, bent over her
frame to hide a smile probably evoked by the amusing scene she
foresaw. She drew her wool down through the canvas and, scarcely
able to refrain from laughing, stooped as if trying to make out the
pattern.
"How do you do, cousin?" said Pierre. "You don't recognize me?"
"I recognize you only too well, too well."
"How is the count? Can I see him?" asked Pierre, awkwardly as usual,
but unabashed.
"The count is suffering physically and mentally, and apparently
you have done your best to increase his mental sufferings."
"Can I see the count?" Pierre again asked.
"Hm.... If you wish to kill him, to kill him outright, you can see
him... Olga, go and see whether Uncle's beef tea is ready - it is
almost time," she added, giving Pierre to understand that they were
busy, and busy making his father comfortable, while evidently he,
Pierre, was only busy causing him annoyance.
Olga went out. Pierre stood looking at the sisters; then he bowed
and said: "Then I will go to my rooms. You will let me know when I can
see him."
And he left the room, followed by the low but ringing laughter of
the sister with the mole.
Next day Prince Vasili had arrived and settled in the count's house.
He sent for Pierre and said to him: "My dear fellow, if you are
going to behave here as you did in Petersburg, you will end very
badly; that is all I have to say to you. The count is very, very
ill, and you must not see him at all."
Since then Pierre had not been disturbed and had spent the whole
time in his rooms upstairs.
When Boris appeared at his door Pierre was pacing up and down his
room, stopping occasionally at a corner to make menacing gestures at
the wall, as if running a sword through an invisible foe, and
glaring savagely over his spectacles, and then again resuming his
walk, muttering indistinct words, shrugging his shoulders and
gesticulating.
"England is done for," said he, scowling and pointing his finger
at someone unseen. "Mr. Pitt, as a traitor to the nation and to the
rights of man, is sentenced to..." But before Pierre - who at that
moment imagined himself to be Napoleon in person and to have just
effected the dangerous crossing of the Straits of Dover and captured
London - could pronounce Pitt's sentence, he saw a well-built and
handsome young officer entering his room. Pierre paused. He had left
Moscow when Boris was a boy of fourteen, and had quite forgotten
him, but in his usual impulsive and hearty way he took Boris by the
hand with a friendly smile.
"Do you remember me?" asked Boris quietly with a pleasant smile.
"I have come with my mother to see the count, but it seems he is not
well."
"Yes, it seems he is ill. People are always disturbing him,"
answered Pierre, trying to remember who this young man was.
Boris felt that Pierre did not recognize him but did not consider it
necessary to introduce himself, and without experiencing the least
embarrassment looked Pierre straight in the face.
"Count Rostov asks you to come to dinner today," said he, after a
considerable pause which made Pierre feel uncomfortable.
"Ah, Count Rostov!" exclaimed Pierre joyfully. "Then you are his
son, Ilya? Only fancy, I didn't know you at first. Do you remember how
we went to the Sparrow Hills with Madame Jacquot?... It's such an
age..."
"You are mistaken," said Boris deliberately, with a bold and
slightly sarcastic smile. "I am Boris, son of Princess Anna
Mikhaylovna Drubetskaya. Rostov, the father, is Ilya, and his son is
Nicholas. I never knew any Madame Jacquot."
Pierre shook his head and arms as if attacked by mosquitoes or bees.
"Oh dear, what am I thinking about? I've mixed everything up. One
has so many relatives in Moscow! So you are Boris? Of course. Well,
now we know where we are. And what do you think of the Boulogne
expedition? The English will come off badly, you know, if Napoleon
gets across the Channel. I think the expedition is quite feasible.
If only Villeneuve doesn't make a mess of things!"
Boris knew nothing about the Boulogne expedition; he did not read
the papers and it was the first time he had heard Villeneuve's name.
"We here in Moscow are more occupied with dinner parties and scandal
than with politics," said he in his quiet ironical tone. "I know
nothing about it and have not thought about it. Moscow is chiefly busy
with gossip," he continued. "Just now they are talking about you and
your father."
Pierre smiled in his good-natured way as if afraid for his
companion's sake that the latter might say something he would
afterwards regret. But Boris spoke distinctly, clearly, and dryly,
looking straight into Pierre's eyes.
"Moscow has nothing else to do but gossip," Boris went on.
"Everybody is wondering to whom the count will leave his fortune,
though he may perhaps outlive us all, as I sincerely hope he will..."
"Yes, it is all very horrid," interrupted Pierre, "very horrid."
Pierre was still afraid that this officer might inadvertently say
something disconcerting to himself.
"And it must seem to you," said Boris flushing slightly, but not
changing his tone or attitude, "it must seem to you that everyone is
trying to get something out of the rich man?"
"So it does," thought Pierre.
"But I just wish to say, to avoid misunderstandings, that you are
quite mistaken if you reckon me or my mother among such people. We are
very poor, but for my own part at any rate, for the very reason that
your father is rich, I don't regard myself as a relation of his, and
neither I nor my mother would ever ask or take anything from him."
For a long time Pierre could not understand, but when he did, he
jumped up from the sofa, seized Boris under the elbow in his quick,
clumsy way, and, blushing far more than Boris, began to speak with a
feeling of mingled shame and vexation.
"Well, this is strange! Do you suppose I... who could think?... I
know very well..."
But Boris again interrupted him.
"I am glad I have spoken out fully. Perhaps you did not like it? You
must excuse me," said he, putting Pierre at ease instead of being
put at ease by him, "but I hope I have not offended you. I always make
it a rule to speak out... Well, what answer am I to take? Will you
come to dinner at the Rostovs'?"
And Boris, having apparently relieved himself of an onerous duty and
extricated himself from an awkward situation and placed another in it,
became quite pleasant again.
"No, but I say," said Pierre, calming down, "you are a wonderful
fellow! What you have just said is good, very good. Of course you
don't know me. We have not met for such a long time... not since we
were children. You might think that I... I understand, quite
understand. I could not have done it myself, I should not have had the
courage, but it's splendid. I am very glad to have made your
acquaintance. It's queer," he added after a pause, "that you should
have suspected me!" He began to laugh. "Well, what of it! I hope we'll
get better acquainted," and he pressed Boris' hand. "Do you know, I
have not once been in to see the count. He has not sent for me.... I
am sorry for him as a man, but what can one do?"
"And so you think Napoleon will manage to get an army across?" asked
Boris with a smile.
Pierre saw that Boris wished to change the subject, and being of the
same mind he began explaining the advantages and disadvantages of
the Boulogne expedition.
A footman came in to summon Boris - the princess was going. Pierre,
in order to make Boris' better acquaintance, promised to come to
dinner, and warmly pressing his hand looked affectionately over his
spectacles into Boris' eyes. After he had gone Pierre continued pacing
up and down the room for a long time, no longer piercing an
imaginary foe with his imaginary sword, but smiling at the remembrance
of that pleasant, intelligent, and resolute young man.
As often happens in early youth, especially to one who leads a
lonely life, he felt an unaccountable tenderness for this young man
and made up his mind that they would be friends.
Prince Vasili saw the princess off. She held a handkerchief to her
eyes and her face was tearful.
"It is dreadful, dreadful!" she was saying, "but cost me what it may
I shall do my duty. I will come and spend the night. He must not be
left like this. Every moment is precious. I can't think why his nieces
put it off. Perhaps God will help me to find a way to prepare
him!... Adieu, Prince! May God support you..."
"Adieu, ma bonne," answered Prince Vasili turning away from her.
"Oh, he is in a dreadful state," said the mother to her son when
they were in the carriage. "He hardly recognizes anybody."
"I don't understand, Mamma - what is his attitude to Pierre?" asked
the son.
"The will will show that, my dear; our fate also depends on it."
"But why do you expect that he will leave us anything?"
"Ah, my dear! He is so rich, and we are so poor!"
"Well, that is hardly a sufficient reason, Mamma..."
"Oh, Heaven! How ill he is!" exclaimed the mother.
CHAPTER XVII
After Anna Mikhaylovna had driven off with her son to visit Count
Cyril Vladimirovich Bezukhov, Countess Rostova sat for a long time all
alone applying her handkerchief to her eyes. At last she rang.
"What is the matter with you, my dear?" she said crossly to the maid
who kept her waiting some minutes. "Don't you wish to serve me? Then
I'll find you another place."
The countess was upset by her friend's sorrow and humiliating
poverty, and was therefore out of sorts, a state of mind which with
her always found expression in calling her maid "my dear" and speaking
to her with exaggerated politeness.
"I am very sorry, ma'am," answered the maid.
"Ask the count to come to me."
The count came waddling in to see his wife with a rather guilty look
as usual.
"Well, little countess? What a saute of game au madere we are to
have, my dear! I tasted it. The thousand rubles I paid for Taras
were not ill-spent. He is worth it!"
He sat down by his wife, his elbows on his knees and his hands
ruffling his gray hair.
"What are your commands, little countess?"
"You see, my dear... What's that mess?" she said, pointing to his
waistcoat. "It's the saute, most likely," she added with a smile.
"Well, you see, Count, I want some money."
Her face became sad.
"Oh, little countess!"... and the count began bustling to get out
his pocketbook.
"I want a great deal, Count! I want five hundred rubles," and taking
out her cambric handkerchief she began wiping her husband's waistcoat.
"Yes, immediately, immediately! Hey, who's there?" he called out
in a tone only used by persons who are certain that those they call
will rush to obey the summons. "Send Dmitri to me!"
Dmitri, a man of good family who had been brought up in the
count's house and now managed all his affairs, stepped softly into the
room.
"This is what I want, my dear fellow," said the count to the
deferential young man who had entered. "Bring me..." he reflected a
moment, "yes, bring me seven hundred rubles, yes! But mind, don't
bring me such tattered and dirty notes as last time, but nice clean
ones for the countess."
"Yes, Dmitri, clean ones, please," said the countess, sighing
deeply.
"When would you like them, your excellency?" asked Dmitri. "Allow me
to inform you... But, don't be uneasy," he added, noticing that the
count was beginning to breathe heavily and quickly which was always
a sign of approaching anger. "I was forgetting... Do you wish it
brought at once?"
"Yes, yes; just so! Bring it. Give it to the countess."
"What a treasure that Dmitri is," added the count with a smile
when the young man had departed. "There is never any 'impossible'
with him. That's a thing I hate! Everything is possible."
"Ah, money, Count, money! How much sorrow it causes in the world,"
said the countess. "But I am in great need of this sum."
"You, my little countess, are a notorious spendthrift," said the
count, and having kissed his wife's hand he went back to his study.
When Anna Mikhaylovna returned from Count Bezukhov's the money,
all in clean notes, was lying ready under a handkerchief on the
countess' little table, and Anna Mikhaylovna noticed that something
was agitating her.
"Well, my dear?" asked the countess.
"Oh, what a terrible state he is in! One would not know him, he is
so ill! I was only there a few moments and hardly said a word..."
"Annette, for heaven's sake don't refuse me," the countess began,
with a blush that looked very strange on her thin, dignified,
elderly face, and she took the money from under the handkerchief.
Anna Mikhaylovna instantly guessed her intention and stooped to be
ready to embrace the countess at the appropriate moment.
"This is for Boris from me, for his outfit."
Anna Mikhaylovna was already embracing her and weeping. The countess
wept too. They wept because they were friends, and because they were
kindhearted, and because they - friends from childhood - had to think
about such a base thing as money, and because their youth was over....
But those tears were pleasant to them both.
CHAPTER XVIII
Countess Rostova, with her daughters and a large number of guests,
was already seated in the drawing room. The count took the gentlemen
into his study and showed them his choice collection of Turkish pipes.
From time to time he went out to ask: "Hasn't she come yet?" They were
expecting Marya Dmitrievna Akhrosimova, known in society as le
terrible dragon, a lady distinguished not for wealth or rank, but
for common sense and frank plainness of speech. Marya Dmitrievna was
known to the Imperial family as well as to all Moscow and
Petersburg, and both cities wondered at her, laughed privately at
her rudenesses, and told good stories about her, while none the less
all without exception respected and feared her.
In the count's room, which was full of tobacco smoke, they talked of
war that had been announced in a manifesto, and about the
recruiting. None of them had yet seen the manifesto, but they all knew
it had appeared. The count sat on the sofa between two guests who were
smoking and talking. He neither smoked nor talked, but bending his
head first to one side and then to the other watched the smokers
with evident pleasure and listened to the conversation of his two
neighbors, whom he egged on against each other.
One of them was a sallow, clean-shaven civilian with a thin and
wrinkled face, already growing old, though he was dressed like a
most fashionable young man. He sat with his legs up on the sofa as
if quite at home and, having stuck an amber mouthpiece far into his
mouth, was inhaling the smoke spasmodically and screwing up his
eyes. This was an old bachelor, Shinshin, a cousin of the countess', a
man with "a sharp tongue" as they said in Moscow society. He seemed to
be condescending to his companion. The latter, a fresh, rosy officer
of the Guards, irreproachably washed, brushed, and buttoned, held
his pipe in the middle of his mouth and with red lips gently inhaled
the smoke, letting it escape from his handsome mouth in rings. This
was Lieutenant Berg, an officer in the Semenov regiment with whom
Boris was to travel to join the army, and about whom Natasha had,
teased her elder sister Vera, speaking of Berg as her "intended."
The count sat between them and listened attentively. His favorite
occupation when not playing boston, a card game he was very fond of,
was that of listener, especially when he succeeded in setting two
loquacious talkers at one another.
"Well, then, old chap, mon tres honorable Alphonse Karlovich,"
said Shinshin, laughing ironically and mixing the most ordinary
Russian expressions with the choicest French phrases - which was a
peculiarity of his speech. "Vous comptez vous faire des rentes sur
l'etat;* you want to make something out of your company?"
*You expect to make an income out of the government.
"No, Peter Nikolaevich; I only want to show that in the cavalry
the advantages are far less than in the infantry. Just consider my own
position now, Peter Nikolaevich..."
Berg always spoke quietly, politely, and with great precision. His
conversation always related entirely to himself; he would remain
calm and silent when the talk related to any topic that had no
direct bearing on himself. He could remain silent for hours without
being at all put out of countenance himself or making others
uncomfortable, but as soon as the conversation concerned himself he
would begin to talk circumstantially and with evident satisfaction.
"Consider my position, Peter Nikolaevich. Were I in the cavalry I
should get not more than two hundred rubles every four months, even
with the rank of lieutenant; but as it is I receive two hundred and
thirty," said he, looking at Shinshin and the count with a joyful,
pleasant smile, as if it were obvious to him that his success must
always be the chief desire of everyone else.
"Besides that, Peter Nikolaevich, by exchanging into the Guards I
shall be in a more prominent position," continued Berg, "and vacancies
occur much more frequently in the Foot Guards. Then just think what
can be done with two hundred and thirty rubles! I even manage to put a
little aside and to send something to my father," he went on, emitting
a smoke ring.
"La balance y est...* A German knows how to skin a flint, as the
proverb says," remarked Shinshin, moving his pipe to the other side of
his mouth and winking at the count.
*So that squares matters.
The count burst out laughing. The other guests seeing that
Shinshin was talking came up to listen. Berg, oblivious of irony or
indifference, continued to explain how by exchanging into the Guards
he had already gained a step on his old comrades of the Cadet Corps;
how in wartime the company commander might get killed and he, as
senior in the company, might easily succeed to the post; how popular
he was with everyone in the regiment, and how satisfied his father was
with him. Berg evidently enjoyed narrating all this, and did not
seem to suspect that others, too, might have their own interests.
But all he said was so prettily sedate, and the naivete of his
youthful egotism was so obvious, that he disarmed his hearers.
"Well, my boy, you'll get along wherever you go - foot or horse - that
I'll warrant," said Shinshin, patting him on the shoulder and taking
his feet off the sofa.
Berg smiled joyously. The count, by his guests, went into the
drawing room.
It was just the moment before a big dinner when the assembled
guests, expecting the summons to zakuska,* avoid engaging in any
long conversation but think it necessary to move about and talk, in
order to show that they are not at all impatient for their food. The
host and hostess look toward the door, and now and then glance at
one another, and the visitors try to guess from these glances who,
or what, they are waiting for - some important relation who has not yet
arrived, or a dish that is not yet ready.
*Hors d'oeuvres.
Pierre had come just at dinnertime and was sitting awkwardly in
the middle of the drawing room on the first chair he had come
across, blocking the way for everyone. The countess tried to make
him talk, but he went on naively looking around through his spectacles
as if in search of somebody and answered all her questions in
monosyllables. He was in the way and was the only one who did not
notice the fact. Most of the guests, knowing of the affair with the
bear, looked with curiosity at this big, stout, quiet man, wondering
how such a clumsy, modest fellow could have played such a prank on a
policeman.
"You have only lately arrived?" the countess asked him.
"Oui, madame," replied he, looking around him.
"You have not yet seen my husband?"
"Non, madame." He smiled quite inappropriately.
"You have been in Paris recently, I believe? I suppose it's very
interesting."
"Very interesting."
The countess exchanged glances with Anna Mikhaylovna. The latter
understood that she was being asked to entertain this young man, and
sitting down beside him she began to speak about his father; but he
answered her, as he had the countess, only in monosyllables. The other
guests were all conversing with one another. "The Razumovskis... It
was charming... You are very kind... Countess Apraksina..." was
heard on all sides. The countess rose and went into the ballroom.
"Marya Dmitrievna?" came her voice from there.
"Herself," came the answer in a rough voice, and Marya Dmitrievna
entered the room.
All the unmarried ladies and even the married ones except the very
oldest rose. Marya Dmitrievna paused at the door. Tall and stout,
holding high her fifty-year-old head with its gray curls, she stood
surveying the guests, and leisurely arranged her wide sleeves as if
rolling them up. Marya Dmitrievna always spoke in Russian.
"Health and happiness to her whose name day we are keeping and to
her children," she said, in her loud, full-toned voice which drowned
all others. "Well, you old sinner," she went on, turning to the
count who was kissing her hand, "you're feeling dull in Moscow, I
daresay? Nowhere to hunt with your dogs? But what is to be done, old
man? Just see how these nestlings are growing up," and she pointed
to the girls. "You must look for husbands for them whether you like it
or not...."
"Well," said she, "how's my Cossack?" (Marya Dmitrievna always called
Natasha a Cossack) and she stroked the child's arm as she came up
fearless and gay to kiss her hand. "I know she's a scamp of a girl,
but I like her."
She took a pair of pear-shaped ruby earrings from her huge
reticule and, having given them to the rosy Natasha, who beamed with
the pleasure of her saint's-day fete, turned away at once and
addressed herself to Pierre.
"Eh, eh, friend! Come here a bit," said she, assuming a soft high
tone of voice. "Come here, my friend..." and she ominously tucked up
her sleeves still higher. Pierre approached, looking at her in a
childlike way through his spectacles.
"Come nearer, come nearer, friend! I used to be the only one to tell
your father the truth when he was in favor, and in your case it's my
evident duty." She paused. All were silent, expectant of what was to
follow, for this was dearly only a prelude.
"A fine lad! My word! A fine lad!... His father lies on his deathbed
and he amuses himself setting a policeman astride a bear! For shame,
sir, for shame! It would be better if you went to the war."
She turned away and gave her hand to the count, who could hardly
keep from laughing.
"Well, I suppose it is time we were at table?" said Marya
Dmitrievna.
The count went in first with Marya Dmitrievna, the countess followed
on the arm of a colonel of hussars, a man of importance to them
because Nicholas was to go with him to the regiment; then came Anna
Mikhaylovna with Shinshin. Berg gave his arm to Vera. The smiling
Julie Karagina went in with Nicholas. After them other couples
followed, filling the whole dining hall, and last of all the children,
tutors, and governesses followed singly. The footmen began moving
about, chairs scraped, the band struck up in the gallery, and the
guests settled down in their places. Then the strains of the count's
household band were replaced by the clatter of knives and forks, the
voices of visitors, and the soft steps of the footmen. At one end of
the table sat the countess with Marya Dmitrievna on her right and Anna
Mikhaylovna on her left, the other lady visitors were farther down. At
the other end sat the count, with the hussar colonel on his left and
Shinshin and the other male visitors on his right. Midway down the
long table on one side sat the grownup young people: Vera beside Berg,
and Pierre beside Boris; and on the other side, the children,
tutors, and governesses. From behind the crystal decanters and fruit
vases the count kept glancing at his wife and her tall cap with its
light-blue ribbons, and busily filled his neighbors' glasses, not
neglecting his own. The countess in turn, without omitting her
duties as hostess, threw significant glances from behind the
pineapples at her husband whose face and bald head seemed by their
redness to contrast more than usual with his gray hair. At the ladies'
end an even chatter of voices was heard all the time, at the men's end
the voices sounded louder and louder, especially that of the colonel
of hussars who, growing more and more flushed, ate and drank so much
that the count held him up as a pattern to the other guests. Berg with
tender smiles was saying to Vera that love is not an earthly but a
heavenly feeling. Boris was telling his new friend Pierre who the
guests were and exchanging glances with Natasha, who was sitting
opposite. Pierre spoke little but examined the new faces, and ate a
great deal. Of the two soups he chose turtle with savory patties and
went on to the game without omitting a single dish or one of the
wines. These latter the butler thrust mysteriously forward, wrapped in
a napkin, from behind the next man's shoulders and whispered: "Dry
Madeira"... "Hungarian"... or "Rhine wine" as the case might be. Of
the four crystal glasses engraved with the count's monogram that stood
before his plate, Pierre held out one at random and drank with
enjoyment, gazing with ever-increasing amiability at the other guests.
Natasha, who sat opposite, was looking at Boris as girls of thirteen
look at the boy they are in love with and have just kissed for the
first time. Sometimes that same look fell on Pierre, and that funny
lively little girl's look made him inclined to laugh without knowing
why.
Nicholas sat at some distance from Sonya, beside Julie Karagina,
to whom he was again talking with the same involuntary smile. Sonya
wore a company smile but was evidently tormented by jealousy; now
she turned pale, now blushed and strained every nerve to overhear what
Nicholas and Julie were saying to one another. The governess kept
looking round uneasily as if preparing to resent any slight that might
be put upon the children. The German tutor was trying to remember
all the dishes, wines, and kinds of dessert, in order to send a full
description of the dinner to his people in Germany; and he felt
greatly offended when the butler with a bottle wrapped in a napkin
passed him by. He frowned, trying to appear as if he did not want
any of that wine, but was mortified because no one would understand
that it was not to quench his thirst or from greediness that he wanted
it, but simply from a conscientious desire for knowledge.
CHAPTER XIX
At the men's end of the table the talk grew more and more
animated. The colonel told them that the declaration of war had
already appeared in Petersburg and that a copy, which he had himself
seen, had that day been forwarded by courier to the commander in
chief.
"And why the deuce are we going to fight Bonaparte?" remarked
Shinshin. "He has stopped Austria's cackle and I fear it will be our
turn next."
The colonel was a stout, tall, plethoric German, evidently devoted
to the service and patriotically Russian. He resented Shinshin's
remark.
"It is for the reasson, my goot sir," said he, speaking with a
German accent, "for the reasson zat ze Emperor knows zat. He
declares in ze manifessto zat he cannot fiew wiz indifference ze
danger vreatening Russia and zat ze safety and dignity of ze Empire as
vell as ze sanctity of its alliances..." he spoke this last word
with particular emphasis as if in it lay the gist of the matter.
Then with the unerring official memory that characterized him he
repeated from the opening words of the manifesto:
... and the wish, which constitutes the Emperor's sole and
absolute aim - to establish peace in Europe on firm foundations - has
now decided him to despatch part of the army abroad and to create a
new condition for the attainment of that purpose.
"Zat, my dear sir, is vy..." he concluded, drinking a tumbler of
wine with dignity and looking to the count for approval.
"Connaissez-vous le Proverbe:* 'Jerome, Jerome, do not roam, but
turn spindles at home!'?" said Shinshin, puckering his brows and
smiling. "Cela nous convient a merveille.*[2] Suvorov now - he knew
what he was about; yet they beat him a plate couture,*[3] and where
are we to find Suvorovs now? Je vous demande un peu,"*[4] said he,
continually changing from French to Russian.
*Do you know the proverb?
*[2] That suits us down to the ground.
*[3] Hollow.
*[4] I just ask you that.
"Ve must vight to the last tr-r-op of our plood!" said the
colonel, thumping the table; "and ve must tie for our Emperor, and zen
all vill pe vell. And ve must discuss it as little as po-o-ossible"...
he dwelt particularly on the word possible... "as po-o-ossible," he
ended, again turning to the count. "Zat is how ve old hussars look
at it, and zere's an end of it! And how do you, a young man and a
young hussar, how do you judge of it?" he added, addressing
Nicholas, who when he heard that the war was being discussed had
turned from his partner with eyes and ears intent on the colonel.
"I am quite of your opinion," replied Nicholas, flaming up,
turning his plate round and moving his wineglasses about with as
much decision and desperation as though he were at that moment
facing some great danger. "I am convinced that we Russians must die or
conquer," he concluded, conscious - as were others - after the words
were uttered that his remarks were too enthusiastic and emphatic for
the occasion and were therefore awkward.
"What you said just now was splendid!" said his partner Julie.
Sonya trembled all over and blushed to her ears and behind them
and down to her neck and shoulders while Nicholas was speaking.
Pierre listened to the colonel's speech and nodded approvingly.
"That's fine," said he.
"The young man's a real hussar!" shouted the colonel, again thumping
the table.
"What are you making such a noise about over there?" Marya
Dmitrievna's deep voice suddenly inquired from the other end of the
table. "What are you thumping the table for?" she demanded of the
hussar, "and why are you exciting yourself? Do you think the French
are here?"
"I am speaking ze truce," replied the hussar with a smile.
"It's all about the war," the count shouted down the table. "You
know my son's going, Marya Dmitrievna? My son is going."
"I have four sons in the army but still I don't fret. It is all in
God's hands. You may die in your bed or God may spare you in a
battle," replied Marya Dmitrievna's deep voice, which easily carried
the whole length of the table.
"That's true!"
Once more the conversations concentrated, the ladies' at the one end
and the men's at the other.
"You won't ask," Natasha's little brother was saying; "I know you
won't ask!"
"I will," replied Natasha.
Her face suddenly flushed with reckless and joyous resolution. She
half rose, by a glance inviting Pierre, who sat opposite, to listen to
what was coming, and turning to her mother:
"Mamma!" rang out the clear contralto notes of her childish voice,
audible the whole length of the table.
"What is it?" asked the countess, startled; but seeing by her
daughter's face that it was only mischief, she shook a finger at her
sternly with a threatening and forbidding movement of her head.
The conversation was hushed.
"Mamma! What sweets are we going to have?" and Natasha's voice
sounded still more firm and resolute.
The countess tried to frown, but could not. Marya Dmitrievna shook
her fat finger.
"Cossack!" she said threateningly.
Most of the guests, uncertain how to regard this sally, looked at
the elders.
"You had better take care!" said the countess.
"Mamma! What sweets are we going to have?" Natasha again cried
boldly, with saucy gaiety, confident that her prank would be taken
in good part.
Sonya and fat little Petya doubled up with laughter.
"You see! I have asked," whispered Natasha to her little brother and
to Pierre, glancing at him again.
"Ice pudding, but you won't get any," said Marya Dmitrievna.
Natasha saw there was nothing to be afraid of and so she braved even
Marya Dmitrievna.
"Marya Dmitrievna! What kind of ice pudding? I don't like ice
cream."
"Carrot ices."
"No! What kind, Marya Dmitrievna? What kind?" she almost screamed;
"I want to know!"
Marya Dmitrievna and the countess burst out laughing, and all the
guests joined in. Everyone laughed, not at Marya Dmitrievna's answer
but at the incredible boldness and smartness of this little girl who
had dared to treat Marya Dmitrievna in this fashion.
Natasha only desisted when she had been told that there would be
pineapple ice. Before the ices, champagne was served round. The band
again struck up, the count and countess kissed, and the guests,
leaving their seats, went up to "congratulate" the countess, and
reached across the table to clink glasses with the count, with the