War and Peace
figure cut by the new French ambassador.”
“Eh? Yes, I heard something: he said something awkward in His
Majesty’s presence.”
“His Majesty drew attention to the Grenadier division and to the march
past,” continued the general, “and it seems the ambassador took
no notice and allowed himself to reply that: ‘We in France pay no
attention to such trifles!’ The Emperor did not condescend to reply.
At the next review, they say, the Emperor did not once deign to address
him.”
All were silent. On this fact relating to the Emperor personally, it was
impossible to pass any judgment.
“Impudent fellows!” said the prince. “You know Métivier? I turned
him out of my house this morning. He was here; they admitted him in
spite of my request that they should let no one in,” he went on,
glancing angrily at his daughter.
And he narrated his whole conversation with the French doctor and
the reasons that convinced him that Métivier was a spy. Though these
reasons were very insufficient and obscure, no one made any rejoinder.
After the roast, champagne was served. The guests rose to congratulate
the old prince. Princess Mary, too, went round to him.
He gave her a cold, angry look and offered her his wrinkled,
clean-shaven cheek to kiss. The whole expression of his face told
her that he had not forgotten the morning’s talk, that his decision
remained in force, and only the presence of visitors hindered his
speaking of it to her now.
When they went into the drawing room where coffee was served, the old
men sat together.
Prince Nicholas grew more animated and expressed his views on the
impending war.
He said that our wars with Bonaparte would be disastrous so long as we
sought alliances with the Germans and thrust ourselves into European
affairs, into which we had been drawn by the Peace of Tilsit. “We
ought not to fight either for or against Austria. Our political
interests are all in the East, and in regard to Bonaparte the only thing
is to have an armed frontier and a firm policy, and he will never dare
to cross the Russian frontier, as was the case in 1807!”
“How can we fight the French, Prince?” said Count Rostopchín.
“Can we arm ourselves against our teachers and divinities? Look at
our youths, look at our ladies! The French are our Gods: Paris is our
Kingdom of Heaven.”
He began speaking louder, evidently to be heard by everyone.
“French dresses, French ideas, French feelings! There now, you turned
Métivier out by the scruff of his neck because he is a Frenchman and
a scoundrel, but our ladies crawl after him on their knees. I went to
a party last night, and there out of five ladies three were Roman
Catholics and had the Pope’s indulgence for doing woolwork on Sundays.
And they themselves sit there nearly naked, like the signboards at our
Public Baths if I may say so. Ah, when one looks at our young people,
Prince, one would like to take Peter the Great’s old cudgel out of the
museum and belabor them in the Russian way till all the nonsense jumps
out of them.”
All were silent. The old prince looked at Rostopchín with a smile and
wagged his head approvingly.
“Well, good-by, your excellency, keep well!” said Rostopchín,
getting up with characteristic briskness and holding out his hand to the
prince.
“Good-by, my dear fellow.... His words are music, I never tire of
hearing him!” said the old prince, keeping hold of the hand and
offering his cheek to be kissed.
Following Rostopchín’s example the others also rose.
CHAPTER IV
Princess Mary as she sat listening to the old men’s talk and
faultfinding, understood nothing of what she heard; she only wondered
whether the guests had all observed her father’s hostile attitude
toward her. She did not even notice the special attentions and
amiabilities shown her during dinner by Borís Drubetskóy, who was
visiting them for the third time already.
Princess Mary turned with absent-minded questioning look to Pierre, who
hat in hand and with a smile on his face was the last of the guests to
approach her after the old prince had gone out and they were left alone
in the drawing room.
“May I stay a little longer?” he said, letting his stout body sink
into an armchair beside her.
“Oh yes,” she answered. “You noticed nothing?” her look asked.
Pierre was in an agreeable after-dinner mood. He looked straight before
him and smiled quietly.
“Have you known that young man long, Princess?” he asked.
“Who?”
“Drubetskóy.”
“No, not long....”
“Do you like him?”
“Yes, he is an agreeable young man.... Why do you ask me that?” said
Princess Mary, still thinking of that morning’s conversation with her
father.
“Because I have noticed that when a young man comes on leave from
Petersburg to Moscow it is usually with the object of marrying an
heiress.”
“You have observed that?” said Princess Mary.
“Yes,” returned Pierre with a smile, “and this young man now
manages matters so that where there is a wealthy heiress there he is
too. I can read him like a book. At present he is hesitating whom to lay
siege to—you or Mademoiselle Julie Karágina. He is very attentive to
her.”
“He visits them?”
“Yes, very often. And do you know the new way of courting?” said
Pierre with an amused smile, evidently in that cheerful mood of good
humored raillery for which he so often reproached himself in his diary.
“No,” replied Princess Mary.
“To please Moscow girls nowadays one has to be melancholy. He is very
melancholy with Mademoiselle Karágina,” said Pierre.
“Really?” asked Princess Mary, looking into Pierre’s kindly
face and still thinking of her own sorrow. “It would be a relief,”
thought she, “if I ventured to confide what I am feeling to someone.
I should like to tell everything to Pierre. He is kind and generous. It
would be a relief. He would give me advice.”
“Would you marry him?”
“Oh, my God, Count, there are moments when I would marry anybody!”
she cried suddenly to her own surprise and with tears in her voice.
“Ah, how bitter it is to love someone near to you and to feel
that...” she went on in a trembling voice, “that you can do nothing
for him but grieve him, and to know that you cannot alter this. Then
there is only one thing left—to go away, but where could I go?”
“What is wrong? What is it, Princess?”
But without finishing what she was saying, Princess Mary burst into
tears.
“I don’t know what is the matter with me today. Don’t take any
notice—forget what I have said!”
Pierre’s gaiety vanished completely. He anxiously questioned the
princess, asked her to speak out fully and confide her grief to him; but
she only repeated that she begged him to forget what she had said, that
she did not remember what she had said, and that she had no trouble
except the one he knew of—that Prince Andrew’s marriage threatened
to cause a rupture between father and son.
“Have you any news of the Rostóvs?” she asked, to change the
subject. “I was told they are coming soon. I am also expecting Andrew
any day. I should like them to meet here.”
“And how does he now regard the matter?” asked Pierre, referring to
the old prince.
Princess Mary shook her head.
“What is to be done? In a few months the year will be up. The thing
is impossible. I only wish I could spare my brother the first moments.
I wish they would come sooner. I hope to be friends with her. You have
known them a long time,” said Princess Mary. “Tell me honestly
the whole truth: what sort of girl is she, and what do you think of
her?—The real truth, because you know Andrew is risking so much doing
this against his father’s will that I should like to know....”
An undefined instinct told Pierre that these explanations, and
repeated requests to be told the whole truth, expressed ill-will on
the princess’ part toward her future sister-in-law and a wish that
he should disapprove of Andrew’s choice; but in reply he said what he
felt rather than what he thought.
“I don’t know how to answer your question,” he said, blushing
without knowing why. “I really don’t know what sort of girl she is;
I can’t analyze her at all. She is enchanting, but what makes her so I
don’t know. That is all one can say about her.”
Princess Mary sighed, and the expression on her face said: “Yes,
that’s what I expected and feared.”
“Is she clever?” she asked.
Pierre considered.
“I think not,” he said, “and yet—yes. She does not deign to be
clever.... Oh no, she is simply enchanting, and that is all.”
Princess Mary again shook her head disapprovingly.
“Ah, I so long to like her! Tell her so if you see her before I do.”
“I hear they are expected very soon,” said Pierre.
Princess Mary told Pierre of her plan to become intimate with her future
sister-in-law as soon as the Rostóvs arrived and to try to accustom the
old prince to her.
CHAPTER V
Borís had not succeeded in making a wealthy match in Petersburg, so
with the same object in view he came to Moscow. There he wavered between
the two richest heiresses, Julie and Princess Mary. Though Princess
Mary despite her plainness seemed to him more attractive than Julie, he,
without knowing why, felt awkward about paying court to her. When they
had last met on the old prince’s name day, she had answered at random
all his attempts to talk sentimentally, evidently not listening to what
he was saying.
Julie on the contrary accepted his attentions readily, though in a
manner peculiar to herself.
She was twenty-seven. After the death of her brothers she had become
very wealthy. She was by now decidedly plain, but thought herself not
merely as good-looking as before but even far more attractive. She
was confirmed in this delusion by the fact that she had become a very
wealthy heiress and also by the fact that the older she grew the less
dangerous she became to men, and the more freely they could associate
with her and avail themselves of her suppers, soirees, and the animated
company that assembled at her house, without incurring any obligation.
A man who would have been afraid ten years before of going every day
to the house when there was a girl of seventeen there, for fear of
compromising her and committing himself, would now go boldly every day
and treat her not as a marriageable girl but as a sexless acquaintance.
That winter the Karágins’ house was the most agreeable and hospitable
in Moscow. In addition to the formal evening and dinner parties, a large
company, chiefly of men, gathered there every day, supping at midnight
and staying till three in the morning. Julie never missed a ball, a
promenade, or a play. Her dresses were always of the latest fashion.
But in spite of that she seemed to be disillusioned about everything and
told everyone that she did not believe either in friendship or in love,
or any of the joys of life, and expected peace only “yonder.” She
adopted the tone of one who has suffered a great disappointment, like a
girl who has either lost the man she loved or been cruelly deceived by
him. Though nothing of the kind had happened to her she was regarded in
that light, and had even herself come to believe that she had suffered
much in life. This melancholy, which did not prevent her amusing
herself, did not hinder the young people who came to her house from
passing the time pleasantly. Every visitor who came to the house paid
his tribute to the melancholy mood of the hostess, and then amused
himself with society gossip, dancing, intellectual games, and bouts
rimés, which were in vogue at the Karágins’. Only a few of these
young men, among them Borís, entered more deeply into Julie’s
melancholy, and with these she had prolonged conversations in private
on the vanity of all worldly things, and to them she showed her albums
filled with mournful sketches, maxims, and verses.