must not be shown before the request was granted.
She looked timidly at her brother.
‘Even if it were a great deal of trouble…’ answered Prince
Andrew, as if guessing what it was about.
‘Think what you please! I know you are just like Father.
Think as you please, but do this for my sake! Please do! Father’s father, our grandfather, wore it in all his wars.’ (She
still did not take out what she was holding in her reticule.)
‘So you promise?’
‘Of course. What is it?’
‘Andrew, I bless you with this icon and you must promise
me you will never take it off. Do you promise?’
‘If it does not weigh a hundredweight and won’t break
my neck… To please you…’ said Prince Andrew. But immediately, noticing the pained expression his joke had brought
to his sister’s face, he repented and added: ‘I am glad; really,
dear, I am very glad.’
‘Against your will He will save and have mercy on you
and bring you to Himself, for in Him alone is truth and
peace,’ said she in a voice trembling with emotion, solemnly
holding up in both hands before her brother a small, oval,
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antique, dark-faced icon of the Saviour in a gold setting, on
a finely wrought silver chain.
She crossed herself, kissed the icon, and handed it to Andrew.
‘Please, Andrew, for my sake!..’
Rays of gentle light shone from her large, timid eyes.
Those eyes lit up the whole of her thin, sickly face and made
it beautiful. Her brother would have taken the icon, but she
stopped him. Andrew understood, crossed himself and
kissed the icon. There was a look of tenderness, for he was
touched, but also a gleam of irony on his face.
‘Thank you, my dear.’ She kissed him on the forehead and
sat down again on the sofa. They were silent for a while.
‘As I was saying to you, Andrew, be kind and generous as
you always used to be. Don’t judge Lise harshly,’ she began.
‘She is so sweet, so good-natured, and her position now is a
very hard one.’
‘I do not think I have complained of my wife to you,
Masha, or blamed her. Why do you say all this to me?’
Red patches appeared on Princess Mary’s face and she
was silent as if she felt guilty.
‘I have said nothing to you, but you have already been
talked to. And I am sorry for that,’ he went on.
The patches grew deeper on her forehead, neck, and
cheeks. She tried to say something but could not. Her brother had guessed right: the little princess had been crying
after dinner and had spoken of her forebodings about her
confinement, and how she dreaded it, and had complained
of her fate, her father-in-law, and her husband. After cry
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ing she had fallen asleep. Prince Andrew felt sorry for his
sister.
‘Know this, Masha: I can’t reproach, have not reproached,
and never shall reproach my wife with anything, and I cannot reproach myself with anything in regard to her; and
that always will be so in whatever circumstances I may be
placed. But if you want to know the truth… if you want to
know whether I am happy? No! Is she happy? No! But why
this is so I don’t know..’
As he said this he rose, went to his sister, and, stooping,
kissed her forehead. His fine eyes lit up with a thoughtful,
kindly, and unaccustomed brightness, but he was looking
not at his sister but over her head toward the darkness of
the open doorway.
‘Let us go to her, I must say good-by. Orgo and wake and
I’ll come in a moment. Petrushka!’ he called to his valet:
‘Come here, take these away. Put this on the seat and this
to the right.’
Princess Mary rose and moved to the door, then stopped
and said: ‘Andrew, if you had faith you would have turned
to God and asked Him to give you the love you do not feel,
and your prayer would have been answered.’
‘Well, may be!’ said Prince Andrew. ‘Go, Masha; I’ll
come immediately.’
On the way to his sister’s room, in the passage which
connected one wing with the other, Prince Andrew met
Mademoiselle Bourienne smiling sweetly. It was the third
time that day that, with an ecstatic and artless smile, she
had met him in secluded passages.
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‘Oh! I thought you were in your room,’ she said, for some
reason blushing and dropping her eyes.
Prince Andrew looked sternly at her and an expression
of anger suddenly came over his face. He said nothing to her
but looked at her forehead and hair, without looking at her
eyes, with such contempt that the Frenchwoman blushed
and went away without a word. When he reached his sister’s
room his wife was already awake and her merry voice, hurrying one word after another, came through the open door.
She was speaking as usual in French, and as if after long selfrestraint she wished to make up for lost time.
‘No, but imagine the old Countess Zubova, with false
curls and her mouth full of false teeth, as if she were trying
to cheat old age…. Ha, ha, ha! Mary!’
This very sentence about Countess Zubova and this same
laugh Prince Andrew had already heard from his wife in
the presence of others some five times. He entered the room
softly. The little princess, plump and rosy, was sitting in an
easy chair with her work in her hands, talking incessantly, repeating Petersburg reminiscences and even phrases.
Prince Andrew came up, stroked her hair, and asked if she
felt rested after their journey. She answered him and continued her chatter.
The coach with six horses was waiting at the porch. It
was an autumn night, so dark that the coachman could
not see the carriage pole. Servants with lanterns were bustling about in the porch. The immense house was brilliant
with lights shining through its lofty windows. The domestic
serfs were crowding in the hall, waiting to bid good-by to
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the young prince. The members of the household were all
gathered in the reception hall: Michael Ivanovich, Mademoiselle Bourienne, Princess Mary, and the little princess.
Prince Andrew had been called to his father’s study as the
latter wished to say good-by to him alone. All were waiting
for them to come out.
When Prince Andrew entered the study the old man in
his old-age spectacles and white dressing gown, in which
he received no one but his son, sat at the table writing. He
glanced round.
‘Going?’ And he went on writing.
‘I’ve come to say good-by.’
‘Kiss me here,’ and he touched his cheek: ‘Thanks,
thanks!’
‘What do you thank me for?’
‘For not dilly-dallying and not hanging to a woman’s
apron strings. The Service before everything. Thanks,
thanks!’ And he went on writing, so that his quill spluttered
and squeaked. ‘If you have anything to say, say it. These two
things can be done together,’ he added.
‘About my wife… I am ashamed as it is to leave her on
your hands..’
‘Why talk nonsense? Say what you want.’
‘When her confinement is due, send to Moscow for an
accoucheur…. Let him be here…’
The old prince stopped writing and, as if not understanding, fixed his stern eyes on his son.
‘I know that no one can help if nature does not do her
work,’ said Prince Andrew, evidently confused. ‘I know that
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out of a million cases only one goes wrong, but it is her fancy and mine. They have been telling her things. She has had
a dream and is frightened.’
‘Hm… Hm…’ muttered the old prince to himself, finishing what he was writing. ‘I’ll do it.’
He signed with a flourish and suddenly turning to his
son began to laugh.
‘It’s a bad business, eh?’
‘What is bad, Father?’
‘The wife!’ said the old prince, briefly and significantly.
‘I don’t understand!’ said Prince Andrew.
‘No, it can’t be helped, lad,’ said the prince. ‘They’re all
like that; one can’t unmarry. Don’t be afraid; I won’t tell
anyone, but you know it yourself.’
He seized his son by the hand with small bony fingers,
shook it, looked straight into his son’s face with keen eyes
which seemed to see through him, and again laughed his
frigid laugh.
The son sighed, thus admitting that his father had understood him. The old man continued to fold and seal his
letter, snatching up and throwing down the wax, the seal,
and the paper, with his accustomed rapidity.
‘What’s to be done? She’s pretty! I will do everything.
Make your mind easy,’ said he in abrupt sentences while
sealing his letter.
Andrew did not speak; he was both pleased and displeased that his father understood him. The old man got up
and gave the letter to his son.
‘Listen!’ said he; ‘don’t worry about your wife: what can
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be done shall be. Now listen! Give this letter to Michael Ilarionovich.* I have written that he should make use of you in
proper places and not keep you long as an adjutant: a bad
position! Tell him I remember and like him. Write and tell
me how he receives you. If he is all rightserve him. Nicholas
Bolkonski’s son need not serve under anyone if he is in disfavor. Now come here.’
*Kutuzov.
He spoke so rapidly that he did not finish half his words,
but his son was accustomed to understand him. He led him
to the desk, raised the lid, drew out a drawer, and took out
an exercise book filled with his bold, tall, close handwriting.
‘I shall probably die before you. So remember, these are
my memoirs; hand them to the Emperor after my death.
Now here is a Lombard bond and a letter; it is a premium for
the man who writes a history of Suvorov’s wars. Send it to
the Academy. Here are some jottings for you to read when I
am gone. You will find them useful.’
Andrew did not tell his father that he would no doubt
live a long time yet. He felt that he must not say it.
‘I will do it all, Father,’ he said.
‘Well, now, good-by!’ He gave his son his hand to kiss,
and embraced him. ‘Remember this, Prince Andrew, if they
kill you it will hurt me, your old father…’ he paused unexpectedly, and then in a querulous voice suddenly shrieked:
‘but if
