War and Peace
the Thuerassa, he merely saves us a great deal of trouble and all our
arrangements to the minutest detail remain the same.”
“How is that?...” began Prince Andrew, who had for long been waiting
an opportunity to express his doubts.
Kutúzov here woke up, coughed heavily, and looked round at the
generals.
“Gentlemen, the dispositions for tomorrow—or rather for today, for
it is past midnight—cannot now be altered,” said he. “You have
heard them, and we shall all do our duty. But before a battle, there is
nothing more important...” he paused, “than to have a good sleep.”
He moved as if to rise. The generals bowed and retired. It was past
midnight. Prince Andrew went out.
The council of war, at which Prince Andrew had not been able to
express his opinion as he had hoped to, left on him a vague and uneasy
impression. Whether Dolgorúkov and Weyrother, or Kutúzov, Langeron,
and the others who did not approve of the plan of attack, were
right—he did not know. “But was it really not possible for Kutúzov
to state his views plainly to the Emperor? Is it possible that on
account of court and personal considerations tens of thousands of lives,
and my life, my life,” he thought, “must be risked?”
“Yes, it is very likely that I shall be killed tomorrow,” he
thought. And suddenly, at this thought of death, a whole series of most
distant, most intimate, memories rose in his imagination: he remembered
his last parting from his father and his wife; he remembered the days
when he first loved her. He thought of her pregnancy and felt sorry for
her and for himself, and in a nervously emotional and softened mood he
went out of the hut in which he was billeted with Nesvítski and began
to walk up and down before it.
The night was foggy and through the fog the moonlight gleamed
mysteriously. “Yes, tomorrow, tomorrow!” he thought. “Tomorrow
everything may be over for me! All these memories will be no more, none
of them will have any meaning for me. Tomorrow perhaps, even certainly,
I have a presentiment that for the first time I shall have to show all
I can do.” And his fancy pictured the battle, its loss, the
concentration of fighting at one point, and the hesitation of all the
commanders. And then that happy moment, that Toulon for which he had
so long waited, presents itself to him at last. He firmly and clearly
expresses his opinion to Kutúzov, to Weyrother, and to the Emperors.
All are struck by the justness of his views, but no one undertakes to
carry them out, so he takes a regiment, a division—stipulates that no
one is to interfere with his arrangements—leads his division to
the decisive point, and gains the victory alone. “But death and
suffering?” suggested another voice. Prince Andrew, however, did not
answer that voice and went on dreaming of his triumphs. The dispositions
for the next battle are planned by him alone. Nominally he is only an
adjutant on Kutúzov’s staff, but he does everything alone. The next
battle is won by him alone. Kutúzov is removed and he is appointed...
“Well and then?” asked the other voice. “If before that you are
not ten times wounded, killed, or betrayed, well... what then?...”
“Well then,” Prince Andrew answered himself, “I don’t know
what will happen and don’t want to know, and can’t, but if I want
this—want glory, want to be known to men, want to be loved by them, it
is not my fault that I want it and want nothing but that and live only
for that. Yes, for that alone! I shall never tell anyone, but, oh God!
what am I to do if I love nothing but fame and men’s esteem? Death,
wounds, the loss of family—I fear nothing. And precious and dear
as many persons are to me—father, sister, wife—those dearest to
me—yet dreadful and unnatural as it seems, I would give them all at
once for a moment of glory, of triumph over men, of love from men I
don’t know and never shall know, for the love of these men here,” he
thought, as he listened to voices in Kutúzov’s courtyard. The voices
were those of the orderlies who were packing up; one voice, probably a
coachman’s, was teasing Kutúzov’s old cook whom Prince Andrew knew,
and who was called Tit. He was saying, “Tit, I say, Tit!”
“Well?” returned the old man.
“Go, Tit, thresh a bit!” said the wag.
“Oh, go to the devil!” called out a voice, drowned by the laughter
of the orderlies and servants.
“All the same, I love and value nothing but triumph over them all, I
value this mystic power and glory that is floating here above me in this
mist!”
CHAPTER XIII
That same night, Rostóv was with a platoon on skirmishing duty in front
of Bagratión’s detachment. His hussars were placed along the line
in couples and he himself rode along the line trying to master the
sleepiness that kept coming over him. An enormous space, with our
army’s campfires dimly glowing in the fog, could be seen behind him;
in front of him was misty darkness. Rostóv could see nothing, peer as
he would into that foggy distance: now something gleamed gray, now there
was something black, now little lights seemed to glimmer where the enemy
ought to be, now he fancied it was only something in his own eyes. His
eyes kept closing, and in his fancy appeared—now the Emperor, now
Denísov, and now Moscow memories—and he again hurriedly opened his
eyes and saw close before him the head and ears of the horse he was
riding, and sometimes, when he came within six paces of them, the
black figures of hussars, but in the distance was still the same misty
darkness. “Why not?... It might easily happen,” thought Rostóv,
“that the Emperor will meet me and give me an order as he would to any
other officer; he’ll say: ‘Go and find out what’s there.’ There
are many stories of his getting to know an officer in just such a chance
way and attaching him to himself! What if he gave me a place near him?
Oh, how I would guard him, how I would tell him the truth, how I would
unmask his deceivers!” And in order to realize vividly his love
devotion to the sovereign, Rostóv pictured to himself an enemy or a
deceitful German, whom he would not only kill with pleasure but whom
he would slap in the face before the Emperor. Suddenly a distant shout
aroused him. He started and opened his eyes.
“Where am I? Oh yes, in the skirmishing line... pass and
watchword—shaft, Olmütz. What a nuisance that our squadron will be in
reserve tomorrow,” he thought. “I’ll ask leave to go to the front,
this may be my only chance of seeing the Emperor. It won’t be long
now before I am off duty. I’ll take another turn and when I get back
I’ll go to the general and ask him.” He readjusted himself in the
saddle and touched up his horse to ride once more round his hussars. It
seemed to him that it was getting lighter. To the left he saw a sloping
descent lit up, and facing it a black knoll that seemed as steep as a
wall. On this knoll there was a white patch that Rostóv could not at
all make out: was it a glade in the wood lit up by the moon, or some
unmelted snow, or some white houses? He even thought something moved on
that white spot. “I expect it’s snow... that spot... a spot—une
tache,” he thought. “There now... it’s not a tache... Natásha...
sister, black eyes... Na... tasha... (Won’t she be surprised when
I tell her how I’ve seen the Emperor?) Natásha... take my
sabretache...”—“Keep to the right, your honor, there are bushes
here,” came the voice of an hussar, past whom Rostóv was riding in
the act of falling asleep. Rostóv lifted his head that had sunk almost
to his horse’s mane and pulled up beside the hussar. He was succumbing
to irresistible, youthful, childish drowsiness. “But what was I
thinking? I mustn’t forget. How shall I speak to the Emperor? No,
that’s not it—that’s tomorrow. Oh yes! Natásha... sabretache...
saber them... Whom? The hussars... Ah, the hussars with mustaches. Along
the Tverskáya Street rode the hussar with mustaches... I thought about
him too, just opposite Gúryev’s house... Old Gúryev.... Oh, but
Denísov’s a fine fellow. But that’s all nonsense. The chief thing
is that the Emperor is here. How he looked at me and wished to say
something, but dared not.... No, it was I who dared not. But that’s
nonsense, the chief thing is not to forget the important thing I
was thinking of. Yes, Na-tásha, sabretache, oh, yes, yes! That’s
right!” And his head once more sank to his horse’s neck. All at once
it seemed to him that he was being fired at. “What? What? What?... Cut
them down! What?...” said Rostóv, waking up. At the moment he opened
his eyes he heard in front of him, where the enemy was, the long-drawn
shouts of thousands of voices. His horse and the horse of the hussar
near him pricked their ears at these shouts. Over there, where the
shouting came from, a fire flared up and went out again, then another,
and all along the French line on the hill fires flared up and the
shouting grew louder and louder. Rostóv could hear the sound of French
words but could not distinguish them. The din of many voices was too
great; all he could hear was: “ahahah!” and “rrrr!”
“What’s that? What do you make of it?” said Rostóv to the hussar
beside him. “That must be the enemy’s camp!”
The hussar did not reply.
“Why, don’t you hear it?” Rostóv asked again, after waiting for a
reply.
“Who can tell, your honor?” replied the hussar reluctantly.
“From the direction, it must be the enemy,” repeated Rostóv.
“It may be he or it may be nothing,” muttered the hussar. “It’s
dark... Steady!” he cried to his fidgeting horse.
Rostóv’s horse was also getting restive: it pawed the frozen ground,
pricking its ears at the noise and looking at the lights. The shouting
grew still louder and merged into a general roar that only an army
of several thousand men could produce. The lights spread farther and
farther, probably along the line of the French camp. Rostóv no longer
wanted to sleep. The gay triumphant shouting of the enemy army had a
stimulating effect on him. “Vive l’Empereur! l’Empereur!” he now
heard distinctly.
“They can’t be far off, probably just beyond the stream,” he said
to the hussar beside him.
The hussar only sighed without replying and coughed angrily. The sound
of horse’s hoofs approaching at a trot along the line of hussars was
heard, and out of the foggy darkness the figure of a sergeant of hussars
suddenly appeared, looming huge as an elephant.
“Your honor, the generals!” said the sergeant, riding up to Rostóv.
Rostóv, still looking round toward the fires and the shouts, rode with
the sergeant to meet some mounted men who were riding along the line.
One was on a white horse. Prince Bagratión and Prince Dolgorúkov with
their adjutants had come to witness the curious phenomenon of the
lights and shouts in the enemy’s camp. Rostóv rode up to Bagratión,
reported to him, and then joined the adjutants listening to what the
generals were saying.
“Believe me,” said Prince Dolgorúkov, addressing Bagratión, “it
is nothing but a trick! He has retreated and ordered the rearguard to
kindle fires and make a noise to deceive us.”
“Hardly,” said Bagratión. “I saw them this evening on that
knoll; if they had retreated they would have withdrawn from that too....
Officer!” said Bagratión to Rostóv, “are the enemy’s skirmishers
still there?”
“They were there this evening, but now I don’t know, your
excellency. Shall I go with some of my hussars to see?” replied
Rostóv.
Bagratión stopped and, before replying, tried to see Rostóv’s face
in the mist.
“Well, go and see,” he said, after a pause.
“Yes, sir.”
Rostóv spurred his horse, called to Sergeant Fédchenko and two other
hussars, told them to follow him, and trotted downhill in the direction
from which the shouting came. He felt both frightened and pleased to be