‘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 Boristhe 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
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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, Mammawhat 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.
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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.’
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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
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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 theyfriends from childhoodhad to think about such a
base thing as money, and because their youth was over…. But
those tears were pleasant to them both.
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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
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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 phraseswhich 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..’
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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
