War and Peace
“Oh, it’s wetched! Well, what are you standing there for, you
sca’cwow? Call the quahtehmasteh,” he shouted to Lavrúshka.
“Please, Denísov, let me lend you some: I have some, you know,”
said Rostóv, blushing.
“Don’t like bowwowing from my own fellows, I don’t,” growled
Denísov.
“But if you won’t accept money from me like a comrade, you will
offend me. Really I have some,” Rostóv repeated.
“No, I tell you.”
And Denísov went to the bed to get the purse from under the pillow.
“Where have you put it, Wostóv?”
“Under the lower pillow.”
“It’s not there.”
Denísov threw both pillows on the floor. The purse was not there.
“That’s a miwacle.”
“Wait, haven’t you dropped it?” said Rostóv, picking up the
pillows one at a time and shaking them.
He pulled off the quilt and shook it. The purse was not there.
“Dear me, can I have forgotten? No, I remember thinking that you kept
it under your head like a treasure,” said Rostóv. “I put it just
here. Where is it?” he asked, turning to Lavrúshka.
“I haven’t been in the room. It must be where you put it.”
“But it isn’t?...”
“You’re always like that; you thwow a thing down anywhere and forget
it. Feel in your pockets.”
“No, if I hadn’t thought of it being a treasure,” said Rostóv,
“but I remember putting it there.”
Lavrúshka turned all the bedding over, looked under the bed and under
the table, searched everywhere, and stood still in the middle of the
room. Denísov silently watched Lavrúshka’s movements, and when the
latter threw up his arms in surprise saying it was nowhere to be found
Denísov glanced at Rostóv.
“Wostóv, you’ve not been playing schoolboy twicks...”
Rostóv felt Denísov’s gaze fixed on him, raised his eyes, and
instantly dropped them again. All the blood which had seemed congested
somewhere below his throat rushed to his face and eyes. He could not
draw breath.
“And there hasn’t been anyone in the room except the lieutenant and
yourselves. It must be here somewhere,” said Lavrúshka.
“Now then, you devil’s puppet, look alive and hunt for it!”
shouted Denísov, suddenly, turning purple and rushing at the man with
a threatening gesture. “If the purse isn’t found I’ll flog you,
I’ll flog you all.”
Rostóv, his eyes avoiding Denísov, began buttoning his coat, buckled
on his saber, and put on his cap.
“I must have that purse, I tell you,” shouted Denísov, shaking his
orderly by the shoulders and knocking him against the wall.
“Denísov, let him alone, I know who has taken it,” said Rostóv,
going toward the door without raising his eyes. Denísov paused, thought
a moment, and, evidently understanding what Rostóv hinted at, seized
his arm.
“Nonsense!” he cried, and the veins on his forehead and neck stood
out like cords. “You are mad, I tell you. I won’t allow it.
The purse is here! I’ll flay this scoundwel alive, and it will be
found.”
“I know who has taken it,” repeated Rostóv in an unsteady voice,
and went to the door.
“And I tell you, don’t you dahe to do it!” shouted Denísov,
rushing at the cadet to restrain him.
But Rostóv pulled away his arm and, with as much anger as though
Denísov were his worst enemy, firmly fixed his eyes directly on his
face.
“Do you understand what you’re saying?” he said in a trembling
voice. “There was no one else in the room except myself. So that if it
is not so, then...”
He could not finish, and ran out of the room.
“Ah, may the devil take you and evewybody,” were the last words
Rostóv heard.
Rostóv went to Telyánin’s quarters.
“The master is not in, he’s gone to headquarters,” said
Telyánin’s orderly. “Has something happened?” he added, surprised
at the cadet’s troubled face.
“No, nothing.”
“You’ve only just missed him,” said the orderly.
The headquarters were situated two miles away from Salzeneck, and
Rostóv, without returning home, took a horse and rode there. There was
an inn in the village which the officers frequented. Rostóv rode up to
it and saw Telyánin’s horse at the porch.
In the second room of the inn the lieutenant was sitting over a dish of
sausages and a bottle of wine.
“Ah, you’ve come here too, young man!” he said, smiling and
raising his eyebrows.
“Yes,” said Rostóv as if it cost him a great deal to utter the
word; and he sat down at the nearest table.
Both were silent. There were two Germans and a Russian officer in the
room. No one spoke and the only sounds heard were the clatter of knives
and the munching of the lieutenant.
When Telyánin had finished his lunch he took out of his pocket a double
purse and, drawing its rings aside with his small, white, turned-up
fingers, drew out a gold imperial, and lifting his eyebrows gave it to
the waiter.
“Please be quick,” he said.
The coin was a new one. Rostóv rose and went up to Telyánin.
“Allow me to look at your purse,” he said in a low, almost
inaudible, voice.
With shifting eyes but eyebrows still raised, Telyánin handed him the
purse.
“Yes, it’s a nice purse. Yes, yes,” he said, growing suddenly
pale, and added, “Look at it, young man.”
Rostóv took the purse in his hand, examined it and the money in it, and
looked at Telyánin. The lieutenant was looking about in his usual way
and suddenly seemed to grow very merry.
“If we get to Vienna I’ll get rid of it there but in these wretched
little towns there’s nowhere to spend it,” said he. “Well, let me
have it, young man, I’m going.”
Rostóv did not speak.
“And you? Are you going to have lunch too? They feed you quite
decently here,” continued Telyánin. “Now then, let me have it.”
He stretched out his hand to take hold of the purse. Rostóv let go of
it. Telyánin took the purse and began carelessly slipping it into the
pocket of his riding breeches, with his eyebrows lifted and his mouth
slightly open, as if to say, “Yes, yes, I am putting my purse in my
pocket and that’s quite simple and is no one else’s business.”
“Well, young man?” he said with a sigh, and from under his lifted
brows he glanced into Rostóv’s eyes.
Some flash as of an electric spark shot from Telyánin’s eyes to
Rostóv’s and back, and back again and again in an instant.
“Come here,” said Rostóv, catching hold of Telyánin’s arm and
almost dragging him to the window. “That money is Denísov’s; you
took it...” he whispered just above Telyánin’s ear.
“What? What? How dare you? What?” said Telyánin.
But these words came like a piteous, despairing cry and an entreaty for
pardon. As soon as Rostóv heard them, an enormous load of doubt
fell from him. He was glad, and at the same instant began to pity the
miserable man who stood before him, but the task he had begun had to be
completed.
“Heaven only knows what the people here may imagine,” muttered
Telyánin, taking up his cap and moving toward a small empty room. “We
must have an explanation...”
“I know it and shall prove it,” said Rostóv.
“I...”
Every muscle of Telyánin’s pale, terrified face began to quiver, his
eyes still shifted from side to side but with a downward look not rising
to Rostóv’s face, and his sobs were audible.
“Count!... Don’t ruin a young fellow... here is this wretched money,
take it...” He threw it on the table. “I have an old father and
mother!...”
Rostóv took the money, avoiding Telyánin’s eyes, and went out of the
room without a word. But at the door he stopped and then retraced his
steps. “O God,” he said with tears in his eyes, “how could you do
it?”
“Count...” said Telyánin drawing nearer to him.
“Don’t touch me,” said Rostóv, drawing back. “If you need it,
take the money,” and he threw the purse to him and ran out of the inn.
CHAPTER V
That same evening there was an animated discussion among the
squadron’s officers in Denísov’s quarters.
“And I tell you, Rostóv, that you must apologize to the colonel!”
said a tall, grizzly-haired staff captain, with enormous mustaches and
many wrinkles on his large features, to Rostóv who was crimson with
excitement.
The staff captain, Kírsten, had twice been reduced to the ranks for
affairs of honor and had twice regained his commission.
“I will allow no one to call me a liar!” cried Rostóv. “He told
me I lied, and I told him he lied. And there it rests. He may keep me
on duty every day, or may place me under arrest, but no one can make
me apologize, because if he, as commander of this regiment, thinks it
beneath his dignity to give me satisfaction, then...”
“You just wait a moment, my dear fellow, and listen,” interrupted
the staff captain in his deep bass, calmly stroking his long mustache.
“You tell the colonel in the presence of other officers that an
officer has stolen...”
“I’m not to blame that the conversation began in the presence of
other officers. Perhaps I ought not to have spoken before them, but I am
not a diplomatist. That’s why I joined the hussars, thinking that here
one would not need finesse; and he tells me that I am lying—so let him
give me satisfaction...”
“That’s all right. No one thinks you a coward, but that’s not the
point. Ask Denísov whether it is not out of the question for a cadet to
demand satisfaction of his regimental commander?”
Denísov sat gloomily biting his mustache and listening to the
conversation, evidently with no wish to take part in it. He answered the
staff captain’s question by a disapproving shake of his head.
“You speak to the colonel about this nasty business before other
officers,” continued the staff captain, “and Bogdánich” (the
colonel was called Bogdánich) “shuts you up.”
“He did not shut me up, he said I was telling an untruth.”
“Well, have it so, and you talked a lot of nonsense to him and must
apologize.”
“Not on any account!” exclaimed Rostóv.
“I did not expect this of you,” said the staff captain seriously and
severely. “You don’t wish to apologize, but, man, it’s not only to
him but to the whole regiment—all of us—you’re to blame all round.
The case is this: you ought to have thought the matter over and
taken advice; but no, you go and blurt it all straight out before the
officers. Now what was the colonel to do? Have the officer tried and
disgrace the whole regiment? Disgrace the whole regiment because of one
scoundrel? Is that how you look at it? We don’t see it like that. And
Bogdánich was a brick: he told you you were saying what was not true.
It’s not pleasant, but what’s to be done, my dear fellow? You landed
yourself in it. And now, when one wants to smooth the thing over, some
conceit prevents your apologizing, and you wish to make the whole
affair public. You are offended at being put on duty a bit, but why not
apologize to an old and honorable officer? Whatever Bogdánich may
be, anyway he is an honorable and brave old colonel! You’re quick at
taking offense, but you don’t mind disgracing the whole regiment!”
The staff captain’s voice began to tremble. “You have been in the
regiment next to no time, my lad, you’re here today and tomorrow
you’ll be appointed adjutant somewhere and can snap your fingers when
it is said ‘There are thieves among the Pávlograd officers!’ But
it’s not all the same to us! Am I not right, Denísov? It’s not the
same!”
Denísov remained silent and did not move, but occasionally looked with
his glittering black eyes at Rostóv.
“You value your own pride and don’t wish to apologize,” continued
the staff captain, “but we old fellows, who have grown up in and, God
willing, are going to die in the regiment, we prize the honor of the
regiment, and Bogdánich knows it. Oh, we do prize it, old fellow! And
all this is not right, it’s not right! You may take offense or not but
I always stick to mother truth. It’s not right!”
And the staff captain rose and turned away from Rostóv.
“That’s twue, devil take it!” shouted Denísov, jumping up. “Now
then, Wostóv, now then!”