thin Oriental type of face, evidently worn out with childbearingshe had had twelve. A languor of motion and speech,
resulting from weakness, gave her a distinguished air which
inspired respect. Princess Anna Mikhaylovna Drubetskaya,
who as a member of the household was also seated in the
drawing room, helped to receive and entertain the visitors.
The young people were in one of the inner rooms, not considering it necessary to take part in receiving the visitors.
The count met the guests and saw them off, inviting them
all to dinner.
‘I am very, very grateful to you, mon cher,’ or ‘ma
chere’he called everyone without exception and without
the slightest variation in his tone, ‘my dear,’ whether they
were above or below him in rank‘I thank you for myself
and for our two dear ones whose name day we are keeping. But mind you come to dinner or I shall be offended,
ma chere! On behalf of the whole family I beg you to come,
mon cher!’ These words he repeated to everyone without exception or variation, and with the same expression on his
full, cheerful, clean-shaven face, the same firm pressure of
the hand and the same quick, repeated bows. As soon as
he had seen a visitor off he returned to one of those who
were still in the drawing room, drew a chair toward him
or her, and jauntily spreading out his legs and putting his
hands on his knees with the air of a man who enjoys life
and knows how to live, he swayed to and fro with dignity,
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offered surmises about the weather, or touched on questions
of health, sometimes in Russian and sometimes in very bad
but self-confident French; then again, like a man weary but
unflinching in the fulfillment of duty, he rose to see some
visitors off and, stroking his scanty gray hairs over his bald
patch, also asked them to dinner. Sometimes on his way
back from the anteroom he would pass through the conservatory and pantry into the large marble dining hall, where
tables were being set out for eighty people; and looking at
the footmen, who were bringing in silver and china, moving tables, and unfolding damask table linen, he would call
Dmitri Vasilevich, a man of good family and the manager of
all his affairs, and while looking with pleasure at the enormous table would say: ‘Well, Dmitri, you’ll see that things
are all as they should be? That’s right! The great thing is the
serving, that’s it.’ And with a complacent sigh he would return to the drawing room.
‘Marya Lvovna Karagina and her daughter!’ announced
the countess’ gigantic footman in his bass voice, entering
the drawing room. The countess reflected a moment and
took a pinch from a gold snuffbox with her husband’s portrait on it.
‘I’m quite worn out by these callers. However, I’ll see her
and no more. She is so affected. Ask her in,’ she said to the
footman in a sad voice, as if saying: ‘Very well, finish me
off.’
A tall, stout, and proud-looking woman, with a roundfaced smiling daughter, entered the drawing room, their
dresses rustling.
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‘Dear Countess, what an age… She has been laid up, poor
child… at the Razumovski’s ball… and Countess Apraksina… I was so delighted…’ came the sounds of animated
feminine voices, interrupting one another and mingling
with the rustling of dresses and the scraping of chairs. Then
one of those conversations began which last out until, at the
first pause, the guests rise with a rustle of dresses and say, ‘I
am so delighted… Mamma’s health… and Countess Apraksina… and then, again rustling, pass into the anteroom, put
on cloaks or mantles, and drive away. The conversation was
on the chief topic of the day: the illness of the wealthy and
celebrated beau of Catherine’s day, Count Bezukhov, and
about his illegitimate son Pierre, the one who had behaved
so improperly at Anna Pavlovna’s reception.
‘I am so sorry for the poor count,’ said the visitor. ‘He is
in such bad health, and now this vexation about his son is
enough to kill him!’
‘What is that?’ asked the countess as if she did not know
what the visitor alluded to, though she had already heard
about the cause of Count Bezukhov’s distress some fifteen
times.
‘That’s what comes of a modern education,’ exclaimed
the visitor. ‘It seems that while he was abroad this young
man was allowed to do as he liked, now in Petersburg I hear
he has been doing such terrible things that he has been expelled by the police.’
‘You don’t say so!’ replied the countess.
‘He chose his friends badly,’ interposed Anna Mikhaylovna. ‘Prince Vasili’s son, he, and a certain Dolokhov have,
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it is said, been up to heaven only knows what! And they
have had to suffer for it. Dolokhov has been degraded to
the ranks and Bezukhov’s son sent back to Moscow. Anatole
Kuragin’s father managed somehow to get his son’s affair
hushed up, but even he was ordered out of Petersburg.’
‘But what have they been up to?’ asked the countess.
‘They are regular brigands, especially Dolokhov,’ replied
the visitor. ‘He is a son of Marya Ivanovna Dolokhova, such
a worthy woman, but there, just fancy! Those three got hold
of a bear somewhere, put it in a carriage, and set off with
it to visit some actresses! The police tried to interfere, and
what did the young men do? They tied a policeman and the
bear back to back and put the bear into the Moyka Canal.
And there was the bear swimming about with the policeman on his back!’
‘What a nice figure the policeman must have cut, my
dear!’ shouted the count, dying with laughter.
‘Oh, how dreadful! How can you laugh at it, Count?’
Yet the ladies themselves could not help laughing.
‘It was all they could do to rescue the poor man,’ continued the visitor. ‘And to think it is Cyril Vladimirovich
Bezukhov’s son who amuses himself in this sensible manner! And he was said to be so well educated and clever. This
is all that his foreign education has done for him! I hope
that here in Moscow no one will receive him, in spite of his
money. They wanted to introduce him to me, but I quite declined: I have my daughters to consider.’
‘Why do you say this young man is so rich?’ asked the
countess, turning away from the girls, who at once assumed
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an air of inattention. ‘His children are all illegitimate. I
think Pierre also is illegitimate.’
The visitor made a gesture with her hand.
‘I should think he has a score of them.’
Princess Anna Mikhaylovna intervened in the conversation, evidently wishing to show her connections and
knowledge of what went on in society.
‘The fact of the matter is,’ said she significantly, and also
in a half whisper, ‘everyone knows Count Cyril’s reputation…. He has lost count of his children, but this Pierre was
his favorite.’
‘How handsome the old man still was only a year ago!’ remarked the countess. ‘I have never seen a handsomer man.’
‘He is very much altered now,’ said Anna Mikhaylovna.
‘Well, as I was saying, Prince Vasili is the next heir through
his wife, but the count is very fond of Pierre, looked after
his education, and wrote to the Emperor about him; so that
in the case of his deathand he is so ill that he may die at
any moment, and Dr. Lorrain has come from Petersburgno
one knows who will inherit his immense fortune, Pierre or
Prince Vasili. Forty thousand serfs and millions of rubles!
I know it all very well for Prince Vasili told me himself. Besides, Cyril Vladimirovich is my mother’s second cousin.
He’s also my Bory’s godfather,’ she added, as if she attached
no importance at all to the fact.
‘Prince Vasili arrived in Moscow yesterday. I hear he has
come on some inspection business,’ remarked the visitor.
‘Yes, but between ourselves,’ said the princess, that is a
pretext. The fact is he has come to see Count Cyril Vladi66
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mirovich, hearing how ill he is.’
‘But do you know, my dear, that was a capital joke,’ said
the count; and seeing that the elder visitor was not listening, he turned to the young ladies. ‘I can just imagine what
a funny figure that policeman cut!’
And as he waved his arms to impersonate the policeman,
his portly form again shook with a deep ringing laugh, the
laugh of one who always eats well and, in particular, drinks
well. ‘So do come and dine with us!’ he said.
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Chapter XI
Silence ensued. The countess looked at her callers, smiling affably, but not concealing the fact that she would not be
distressed if they now rose and took their leave. The visitor’s
daughter was already smoothing down her dress with an
inquiring look at her mother, when suddenly from the next
room were heard the footsteps of boys and girls running to
the door and the noise of a chair falling over, and a girl of
thirteen, hiding something in the folds of her short muslin frock, darted in and stopped short in the middle of the
room. It was evident that she had not intended her flight to
bring her so far. Behind her in the doorway appeared a student with a crimson coat collar, an officer of the Guards, a
girl of fifteen, and a plump rosy-faced boy in a short jacket.
The count jumped up and, swaying from side to side,
spread his arms wide and threw them round the little girl
who had run in.
‘Ah, here she is!’ he exclaimed laughing. ‘My pet, whose
name day it is. My dear pet!’
‘Ma chere, there is a time for everything,’ said the countess with feigned severity. ‘You spoil her, Ilya,’ she added,
turning to her husband.
‘How do you do, my dear? I wish you many happy returns of your name day,’ said the visitor. ‘What a charming
child,’ she added, addressing the mother.
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This black-eyed, wide-mouthed girl, not pretty but full of
lifewith childish bare shoulders which after her run heaved
and shook her bodice, with black curls tossed backward,
thin bare arms, little legs in lace-frilled drawers, and feet in
low slipperswas just at that charming age when a girl is no
longer a child, though the
