significance for him. The presence and remarks of Willarski who
continually deplored the ignorance and poverty of Russia and its
backwardness compared with Europe only heightened Pierre’s pleasure.
Where Willarski saw deadness Pierre saw an extraordinary strength and
vitality - the strength which in that vast space amid the snows maintained
the life of this original, peculiar, and unique people. He did not
contradict Willarski and even seemed to agree with him - an apparent
agreement being the simplest way to avoid discussions that could lead to
nothing - and he smiled joyfully as he listened to him.
CHAPTER XIV
It would be difficult to explain why and whither ants whose heap
has been destroyed are hurrying: some from the heap dragging bits of
rubbish, larvae, and corpses, others back to the heap, or why they
jostle, overtake one another, and fight, and it would be equally
difficult to explain what caused the Russians after the departure of the
French to throng to the place that had formerly been Moscow. But when
we watch the ants round their ruined heap, the tenacity, energy, and
immense number of the delving insects prove that despite the destruction
of the heap, something indestructible, which though intangible is the
real strength of the colony, still exists; and similarly, though in
Moscow in the month of October there was no government and no churches,
shrines, riches, or houses - it was still the Moscow it had been in
August. All was destroyed, except something intangible yet powerful and
indestructible.
The motives of those who thronged from all sides to Moscow after it had
been cleared of the enemy were most diverse and personal, and at first
for the most part savage and brutal. One motive only they all had in
common: a desire to get to the place that had been called Moscow, to
apply their activities there.
Within a week Moscow already had fifteen thousand inhabitants, in a
fortnight twenty-five thousand, and so on. By the autumn of 1813 the
number, ever increasing and increasing, exceeded what it had been in
1812.
The first Russians to enter Moscow were the Cossacks of Wintzingerode’s
detachment, peasants from the adjacent villages, and residents who had
fled from Moscow and had been hiding in its vicinity. The Russians who
entered Moscow, finding it plundered, plundered it in their turn. They
continued what the French had begun. Trains of peasant carts came to
Moscow to carry off to the villages what had been abandoned in the
ruined houses and the streets. The Cossacks carried off what they could
to their camps, and the householders seized all they could find in other
houses and moved it to their own, pretending that it was their property.
But the first plunderers were followed by a second and a third
contingent, and with increasing numbers plundering became more and more
difficult and assumed more definite forms.
The French found Moscow abandoned but with all the organizations of
regular life, with diverse branches of commerce and craftsmanship, with
luxury, and governmental and religious institutions. These forms were
lifeless but still existed. There were bazaars, shops, warehouses,
market stalls, granaries - for the most part still stocked with goods - and
there were factories and workshops, palaces and wealthy houses filled
with luxuries, hospitals, prisons, government offices, churches, and
cathedrals. The longer the French remained the more these forms of town
life perished, until finally all was merged into one confused, lifeless
scene of plunder.
The more the plundering by the French continued, the more both the
wealth of Moscow and the strength of its plunderers was destroyed. But
plundering by the Russians, with which the reoccupation of the city
began, had an opposite effect: the longer it continued and the greater
the number of people taking part in it the more rapidly was the wealth
of the city and its regular life restored.
Besides the plunderers, very various people, some drawn by curiosity,
some by official duties, some by self-interest - house owners, clergy,
officials of all kinds, tradesmen, artisans, and peasants - streamed into
Moscow as blood flows to the heart.
Within a week the peasants who came with empty carts to carry off
plunder were stopped by the authorities and made to cart the corpses
out of the town. Other peasants, having heard of their comrades’
discomfiture, came to town bringing rye, oats, and hay, and beat down
one another’s prices to below what they had been in former days. Gangs
of carpenters hoping for high pay arrived in Moscow every day, and on
all sides logs were being hewn, new houses built, and old, charred ones
repaired. Tradesmen began trading in booths. Cookshops and taverns were
opened in partially burned houses. The clergy resumed the services
in many churches that had not been burned. Donors contributed
Church property that had been stolen. Government clerks set up their
baize-covered tables and their pigeonholes of documents in small rooms.
The higher authorities and the police organized the distribution of
goods left behind by the French. The owners of houses in which much
property had been left, brought there from other houses, complained of
the injustice of taking everything to the Faceted Palace in the Kremlin;
others insisted that as the French had gathered things from different
houses into this or that house, it would be unfair to allow its owner to
keep all that was found there. They abused the police and bribed them,
made out estimates at ten times their value for government stores that
had perished in the fire, and demanded relief. And Count Rostopchin
wrote proclamations.
CHAPTER XV
At the end of January Pierre went to Moscow and stayed in an annex of
his house which had not been burned. He called on Count Rostopchin and
on some acquaintances who were back in Moscow, and he intended to leave
for Petersburg two days later. Everybody was celebrating the victory,
everything was bubbling with life in the ruined but reviving city.
Everyone was pleased to see Pierre, everyone wished to meet him, and
everyone questioned him about what he had seen. Pierre felt particularly
well disposed toward them all, but was now instinctively on his
guard for fear of binding himself in any way. To all questions put to
him - whether important or quite trifling - such as: Where would he live?
Was he going to rebuild? When was he going to Petersburg and would he
mind taking a parcel for someone? - he replied: "Yes, perhaps," or, "I
think so," and so on.
He had heard that the Rostovs were at Kostroma but the thought of
Natasha seldom occurred to him. If it did it was only as a pleasant
memory of the distant past. He felt himself not only free from social
obligations but also from that feeling which, it seemed to him, he had
aroused in himself.
On the third day after his arrival he heard from the Drubetskoys that
Princess Mary was in Moscow. The death, sufferings, and last days of
Prince Andrew had often occupied Pierre’s thoughts and now recurred to
him with fresh vividness. Having heard at dinner that Princess Mary
was in Moscow and living in her house - which had not been burned - in
Vozdvizhenka Street, he drove that same evening to see her.
On his way to the house Pierre kept thinking of Prince Andrew, of their
friendship, of his various meetings with him, and especially of the last
one at Borodino.
"Is it possible that he died in the bitter frame of mind he was then in?
Is it possible that the meaning of life was not disclosed to him
before he died?" thought Pierre. He recalled Karataev and his death and
involuntarily began to compare these two men, so different, and yet so
similar in that they had both lived and both died and in the love he
felt for both of them.
Pierre drove up to the house of the old prince in a most serious mood.
The house had escaped the fire; it showed signs of damage but its
general aspect was unchanged. The old footman, who met Pierre with a
stern face as if wishing to make the visitor feel that the absence
of the old prince had not disturbed the order of things in the house,
informed him that the princess had gone to her own apartments, and that
she received on Sundays.
"Announce me. Perhaps she will see me," said Pierre.
"Yes, sir," said the man. "Please step into the portrait gallery."
A few minutes later the footman returned with Dessalles, who brought
word from the princess that she would be very glad to see Pierre if he
would excuse her want of ceremony and come upstairs to her apartment.
In a rather low room lit by one candle sat the princess and with her
another person dressed in black. Pierre remembered that the princess
always had lady companions, but who they were and what they were like
he never knew or remembered. "This must be one of her companions," he
thought, glancing at the lady in the black dress.
The princess rose quickly to meet him and held out her hand.
"Yes," she said, looking at his altered face after he had kissed her
hand, "so this is how we meet again. He spoke of you even at the very
last," she went on, turning her eyes from Pierre to her companion with a
shyness that surprised him for an instant.
"I was so glad to hear of your safety. It was the first piece of good
news we had received for a long time."
Again the princess glanced round at her companion with even more
uneasiness in her manner and was about to add something, but Pierre
interrupted her.
"Just imagine - I knew nothing about him!" said he. "I thought he had been
killed. All I know I heard at second hand from others. I only know that
he fell in with the Rostovs.... What a strange coincidence!"
Pierre spoke rapidly and with animation. He glanced once at the
companion’s face, saw her attentive and kindly gaze fixed on him, and,
as often happens when one is talking, felt somehow that this companion
in the black dress was a good, kind, excellent creature who would not
hinder his conversing freely with Princess Mary.
But when he mentioned the Rostovs, Princess Mary’s face expressed still
greater embarrassment. She again glanced rapidly from Pierre’s face to
that of the lady in the black dress and said:
"Do you really not recognize her?"
Pierre looked again at the companion’s pale, delicate face with its
black eyes and peculiar mouth, and something near to him, long forgotten
and more than sweet, looked at him from those attentive eyes.
"But no, it can’t be!" he thought. "This stern, thin, pale face that
looks so much older! It cannot be she. It merely reminds me of her."
But at that moment Princess Mary said, "Natasha!" And with difficulty,
effort, and stress, like the opening of a door grown rusty on its
hinges, a smile appeared on the face with the attentive eyes, and from
that opening door came a breath of fragrance which suffused Pierre with
a happiness he had long forgotten and of which he had not even been
thinking - especially at that moment. It suffused him, seized him, and
enveloped him completely. When she smiled doubt was no longer possible,
it was Natasha and he loved her.
At that moment Pierre involuntarily betrayed to her, to Princess Mary,
and above all to himself, a secret of which he himself had been unaware.
He flushed joyfully yet with painful distress. He tried to hide his
agitation. But the more he tried to hide it the more clearly - clearer
than any words could have done - did he betray to himself, to her, and to
Princess Mary that he loved her.
"No, it’s only the unexpectedness of it," thought Pierre. But as soon as
he tried to continue the conversation he had begun with Princess Mary he
again glanced at Natasha, and a still-deeper flush suffused his face and
a still-stronger agitation of mingled joy and fear seized his soul. He
became confused in his speech and stopped in the middle of what he was
saying.
Pierre had failed to notice Natasha because he did not at all expect to
see her there, but he had failed to recognize her because the change in
her since he last saw her was immense. She had grown thin and pale, but
that was not what made her unrecognizable; she was unrecognizable at the
moment he entered because on that face whose eyes had always shone with
a suppressed smile of the joy of life, now when he first entered and
glanced at her there was not the least shadow of a smile: only her eyes
were kindly attentive and sadly interrogative.
Pierre’s confusion was not reflected by any confusion on Natasha’s part,
but only by the pleasure that just perceptibly lit up her whole face.
CHAPTER XVI
"She has come to stay with me," said Princess Mary. "The count and
countess will be here in a few days. The countess is in a dreadful
state; but it was necessary for Natasha herself to see a doctor. They
insisted on her coming with me."
"Yes, is there a family free from sorrow now?" said Pierre, addressing
Natasha. "You know it happened the very day we were rescued. I saw him.
What a delightful boy he was!"
Natasha looked at him, and by way of answer to his words her eyes
widened and lit up.
"What can one say or think of as a consolation?" said Pierre. "Nothing!
Why had such a splendid boy, so full of life, to die?"
"Yes, in these days it would be hard to live without faith..." remarked
Princess Mary.
"Yes, yes, that is really true," Pierre hastily interrupted her.
"Why is it true?" Natasha asked, looking attentively into Pierre’s eyes.
"How can you ask why?" said Princess Mary. "The thought alone of what
awaits..."
Natasha without waiting for Princess Mary to finish again looked
inquiringly at Pierre.
"And because," Pierre continued, "only one who believes that there is a
God ruling us can bear a loss such as hers and... yours."
Natasha had already opened her mouth to speak but suddenly stopped.
Pierre hurriedly turned away from her and again addressed Princess Mary,
asking about his friend’s last days.
Pierre’s confusion had now almost vanished, but at the same time he felt
that his freedom had also completely gone. He felt that there was now a
judge of his every word and action whose judgment mattered more to
him than that of all the rest of the world. As he spoke now he was
considering what impression his words would make on Natasha. He did
not purposely say things to please her, but whatever he was saying he
regarded from her standpoint.
Princess Mary - reluctantly as is usual in such cases - began telling of
the condition in which she had found Prince Andrew. But Pierre’s face
quivering with emotion, his questions and his eager restless expression,
gradually compelled her to go into details which she feared to recall
for her own sake.
"Yes, yes, and so...?" Pierre kept saying as he leaned toward her with
his whole body and eagerly listened to her story. "Yes, yes... so he
grew tranquil and softened? With all his soul he had always sought
one thing - to be perfectly good - so he could not be afraid of death. The
faults he had - if he had any - were not of his making. So he did soften?...
What a happy thing that he saw you again," he added, suddenly turning to
Natasha and looking at her with eyes full of tears.
Natasha’s face twitched. She frowned and lowered her eyes for a moment.
She hesitated for an instant whether to speak or not.
"Yes, that was happiness," she then said in her quiet voice with its
deep chest notes. "For me it certainly was happiness." She paused. "And
he... he... he said he was wishing for it at the very moment I entered
the room...."
Natasha’s voice broke. She blushed, pressed her clasped hands on her
knees, and then controlling herself with an evident effort lifted her
head and began to speak rapidly.
"We knew nothing of it when we started from Moscow. I did not dare to
ask about him. Then suddenly Sonya told me he was traveling with us. I
had no idea and could not imagine what state he was in, all I wanted was
to see him and be with him," she said, trembling, and breathing quickly.
And not letting them interrupt her she went on to tell what she had
never yet mentioned to anyone - all she had lived through during those
three weeks of their journey and life at Yaroslavl.
Pierre listened to her with lips parted and eyes fixed upon her full of
tears. As he listened he did not think of Prince Andrew, nor of death,
nor of what she was telling. He listened to her and felt only pity for
her, for what she was suffering now while she was speaking.
Princess Mary, frowning in her effort to hold back her tears, sat beside
Natasha, and heard for the first time the story of those last days of
her brother’s and Natasha’s love.
Evidently Natasha needed to tell that painful yet joyful tale.
She spoke, mingling most trifling details with the intimate secrets of
her soul, and it seemed as if she could never finish. Several times she
repeated the same thing twice.
Dessalles’ voice was heard outside the door asking whether little
Nicholas might come in to say good night.
"Well, that’s all - everything," said Natasha.
She got up quickly just as Nicholas entered, almost ran to the door
which was hidden by curtains, struck her head against it, and rushed
from the room with a moan either of pain or sorrow.
Pierre gazed at the door through which she had disappeared and did not
understand why he suddenly felt all alone in the world.
Princess Mary roused him from his abstraction by drawing his attention
to her nephew who had entered the room.
At that moment of emotional tenderness young Nicholas’ face, which
resembled his father’s, affected Pierre so much that when he had kissed
the boy he got up quickly, took out his handkerchief, and went to the
window. He wished to take leave of Princess Mary, but she would not let
him go.
"No, Natasha and I sometimes don’t go to sleep till after two, so please
don’t go. I will order supper. Go downstairs, we will come immediately."
Before Pierre left the room Princess Mary told him: "This is the first
time she has talked of him like that."
CHAPTER XVII
Pierre was shown into the large, brightly lit dining room; a few minutes
later he heard footsteps and Princess Mary entered with Natasha. Natasha
was calm, though a severe and grave expression had again settled on her
face. They all three of them now experienced that feeling of awkwardness
which usually follows after a serious and heartfelt talk. It is
impossible to go back to the same conversation, to talk of trifles is
awkward, and yet the desire to speak is there and silence seems like
affectation. They went silently to table. The footmen drew back the
chairs and pushed them up again. Pierre unfolded his cold table napkin
and, resolving to break the silence, looked at Natasha and at Princess
Mary. They had evidently both formed the same resolution; the eyes of
both shone with satisfaction and a confession that besides sorrow life
also has joy.
"Do you take vodka, Count?" asked Princess Mary, and those words
suddenly banished the shadows of the past. "Now tell us about yourself,"
said she. "One hears such improbable wonders about you."
"Yes," replied Pierre with the smile of mild irony now habitual to him.
"They even tell me wonders I myself never dreamed of! Mary Abramovna
invited me to her house and kept telling me what had happened, or ought
to have happened, to me. Stepan Stepanych also instructed me how I ought
to tell of my experiences. In general I have noticed that it is very
easy to be an interesting man (I am an interesting man now); people
invite me out and tell me all about myself."
Natasha smiled and was on the point of speaking.
"We have been told," Princess Mary interrupted her, "that you lost two
millions in Moscow. Is that true?"
"But I am three times as rich as before," returned Pierre.
Though the position was now altered by his decision to pay his wife’s
debts and to rebuild his houses, Pierre still maintained that he had
become three times as rich as before.
"What I have certainly gained is freedom," he began seriously, but did
not continue, noticing that this theme was too egotistic.
"And are you building?"
"Yes. Savelich says I must!"
"Tell me, you did not know of the countess’ death when you decided to
remain in Moscow?" asked Princess Mary and immediately blushed, noticing
that her question, following his mention of freedom, ascribed to his
words a meaning he had perhaps not intended.
"No," answered Pierre, evidently not considering awkward the meaning
Princess Mary had given to his words. "I heard of it in Orel and you
cannot imagine how it shocked me. We were not an exemplary couple," he
added quickly, glancing at Natasha and noticing on her face curiosity as
to how he would speak of his wife, "but her death shocked me terribly.
When two people quarrel they are always both in fault, and one’s own
guilt suddenly becomes terribly serious when the other is no longer
alive. And then such a death... without friends and without consolation!
I am very, very sorry for her," he concluded, and was pleased to notice
a look of glad approval on Natasha’s face.
"Yes, and so you are once more an eligible bachelor," said Princess
Mary.
Pierre suddenly flushed crimson and for a long time tried not to look
at Natasha. When he ventured to glance her way again her face was cold,
stern, and he fancied even contemptuous.
"And did you really see and speak to Napoleon, as we have been told?"
said Princess Mary.
Pierre laughed.
"No, not once! Everybody seems to imagine that being taken prisoner
means being Napoleon’s guest. Not only did I never see him but I heard
nothing about him - I was in much lower company!"
Supper was over, and Pierre who at first declined to speak about his
captivity was gradually led on to do so.
"But it’s true that you remained in Moscow to kill Napoleon?" Natasha
asked with a slight smile. "I guessed it then when we met at the
Sukharev tower, do you remember?"
Pierre admitted that it was true, and from that was gradually led by
Princess Mary’s questions and especially by Natasha’s into giving a
detailed account of his adventures.
At first he spoke with the amused and mild irony now customary with
him toward everybody and especially toward himself, but when he came
to describe the horrors and sufferings he had witnessed he was
unconsciously carried away and began speaking with the suppressed
emotion of a man re-experiencing in recollection strong impressions he
has lived through.
Princess Mary with a gentle smile looked now at Pierre and now at
Natasha. In the whole narrative she saw only Pierre and his goodness.
Natasha, leaning on her elbow, the expression of her face constantly
changing with the narrative, watched Pierre with an attention that never
wandered - evidently herself experiencing all that he described. Not only
her look, but her exclamations and the brief questions she put, showed
Pierre that she understood just what he wished to convey. It was clear
that she understood not only what he said but also what he wished to,
but could not, express in words. The account Pierre gave of the incident
with the child and the woman for protecting whom he was arrested was
this: "It was an awful sight - children abandoned, some in the flames...
One was snatched out before my eyes... and there were women who had
their things snatched off and their earrings torn out..." he flushed and
grew confused. "Then a patrol arrived and all the men - all those who were
not looting, that is - were arrested, and I among them."
"I am sure you’re not telling us everything; I am sure you did
something..." said Natasha and pausing added, "something fine?"
Pierre continued. When he spoke of the execution he wanted to pass
over the horrible details, but Natasha insisted that he should not omit
anything.
Pierre began to tell about Karataev, but paused. By this time he had
risen from the table and was pacing the room, Natasha following him with
her eyes. Then he added:
"No, you can’t understand what I learned from that illiterate man - that
simple fellow."
"Yes, yes, go on!" said Natasha. "Where is he?"
"They killed him almost before my eyes."
And Pierre, his voice trembling continually, went on to tell of the last
days of their retreat, of Karataev’s illness and his death.
He told of his adventures as he had never yet recalled them. He now, as
it were, saw a new meaning in all he had gone through. Now that he was
telling it all to Natasha he experienced that pleasure which a man has
when women listen to him - not clever women who when listening either try
to remember what they hear to enrich their minds and when opportunity
offers to retell it, or who wish to adopt it to some thought of their
own and promptly contribute their own clever comments prepared in their
little mental workshop - but the pleasure given by real women gifted with
a capacity to select and absorb the very best a man shows of himself.
Natasha without knowing it was all attention: she did not lose a word,
no single quiver in Pierre’s voice, no look, no twitch of a muscle in
his face, nor a single gesture. She caught the unfinished word in its
flight and took it straight into her open heart, divining the secret
meaning of all Pierre’s mental travail.
Princess Mary understood his story and sympathized with him, but she
now saw something else that absorbed all her attention. She saw the
possibility of love and happiness between Natasha and Pierre, and the
first thought of this filled her heart with gladness.
It was three o’clock in the morning. The footmen came in with sad and
stern faces to change the candles, but no one noticed them.
Pierre finished his story. Natasha continued to look at him intently
with bright, attentive, and animated eyes, as if trying to understand
something more which he had perhaps left untold. Pierre in shamefaced
and happy confusion glanced occasionally at her, and tried to think what
to say next to introduce a fresh subject. Princess Mary was silent. It
occurred to none of them that it was three o’clock and time to go to
bed.
"People speak of misfortunes and sufferings," remarked Pierre, "but if
at this moment I were asked: ‘Would you rather be what you were before
you were taken prisoner, or go through all this again?’ then for
heaven’s sake let me again have captivity and horseflesh! We imagine
that when we are thrown out of our usual ruts all is lost, but it is
only then that what is new and good begins. While there is life there is
happiness. There is much, much before us. I say this to you," he added,
turning to Natasha.
"Yes, yes," she said, answering something quite different. "I too should
wish nothing but to relive it all from the beginning."
Pierre looked intently at her.
"Yes, and nothing more," said Natasha.
"It’s not true, not true!" cried Pierre. "I am not to blame for being
alive and wishing to live - nor you either."
Suddenly Natasha bent her head, covered her face with her hands, and
began to cry.
"What is it, Natasha?" said Princess Mary.
"Nothing, nothing." She smiled at Pierre through her tears. "Good night!
It is time for bed."
Pierre rose and took his leave.
Princess Mary and Natasha met as usual in the bedroom. They talked of
what Pierre had told them. Princess Mary did not express her opinion of
Pierre nor did Natasha speak of him.
"Well, good night, Mary!" said Natasha. "Do you know, I am often afraid
that by not speaking of him" (she meant Prince Andrew) "for fear of not
doing justice to our feelings, we forget him."
Princess Mary sighed deeply and thereby acknowledged the justice of
Natasha’s remark, but she did not express agreement in words.
"Is it possible to forget?" said she.
"It did me so much good to tell all about it today. It was hard and
painful, but good, very good!" said Natasha. "I am sure he really loved
him. That is why I told him... Was it all right?" she added, suddenly
blushing.
"To tell Pierre? Oh, yes. What a splendid man he is!" said Princess
Mary.
"Do you know, Mary..." Natasha suddenly said with a mischievous smile
such as Princess Mary had not seen on her face for a long time, "he has
somehow grown so clean, smooth, and fresh - as if he had just come out of
a Russian bath; do you understand? Out of a moral bath. Isn’t it true?"
"Yes," replied Princess Mary. "He has greatly improved."
"With a short coat and his hair cropped; just as if, well, just as if he
had come straight from the bath... Papa used to..."
"I understand why he" (Prince Andrew) "liked no one so much as him,"
said Princess Mary.
"Yes, and yet he is quite different. They say men are friends when they
are quite different. That must be true. Really he is quite unlike him - in
everything."
"Yes, but he’s wonderful."
"Well, good night," said Natasha.
And the same mischievous smile lingered for a long time on her face as
if it had been forgotten there.
CHAPTER XVIII
It was a long time before Pierre could fall asleep that night. He paced
up and down his room, now turning his thoughts on a difficult problem
and frowning, now suddenly shrugging his shoulders and wincing, and now
smiling happily.
He was thinking of Prince Andrew, of Natasha, and of their love, at one
moment jealous of her past, then reproaching himself for that feeling.
It was already six in the morning and he still paced up and down the
room.
"Well, what’s to be done if it cannot be avoided? What’s to be done?
Evidently it has to be so," said he to himself, and hastily undressing
he got into bed, happy and agitated but free from hesitation or
indecision.
"Strange and impossible as such happiness seems, I must do everything
that she and I may be man and wife," he told himself.
A few days previously Pierre had decided to go to Petersburg on the
Friday. When he awoke on the Thursday, Savelich came to ask him about
packing for the journey.
"What, to Petersburg? What is Petersburg? Who is there in Petersburg?"
he asked involuntarily, though only to himself. "Oh, yes, long ago
before this happened I did for some reason mean to go to Petersburg,"
he reflected. "Why? But perhaps I shall go. What a good fellow he is and
how attentive, and how he remembers everything," he thought, looking at
Savelich’s old face, "and what a pleasant smile he has!"
"Well, Savelich, do you still not wish to accept your freedom?" Pierre
asked him.
"What’s the good of freedom to me, your excellency? We lived under the
late count - the kingdom of heaven be his! - and we have lived under you
too, without ever being wronged."
"And your children?"
"The children will live just the same. With such masters one can live."
"But what about my heirs?" said Pierre. "Supposing I suddenly marry...
it might happen," he added with an involuntary smile.
"If I may take the liberty, your excellency, it would be a good thing."
"How easy he thinks it," thought Pierre. "He doesn’t know how terrible
it is and how dangerous. Too soon or too late... it is terrible!"
"So what are your orders? Are you starting tomorrow?" asked Savelich.
"No, I’ll put it off for a bit. I’ll tell you later. You must forgive
the trouble I have put you to," said Pierre, and seeing Savelich smile,
he thought: "But how strange it is that he should not know that now
there is no Petersburg for me, and that that must be settled first of
all! But probably he knows it well enough and is only pretending. Shall
I have a talk with him and see what he thinks?" Pierre reflected. "No,
another time."
At breakfast Pierre told the princess, his cousin, that he had been to
see Princess Mary the day before and had there met - "Whom do you think?
Natasha Rostova!"
The princess seemed to see nothing more extraordinary in that than if he
had seen Anna Semenovna.
"Do you know her?" asked Pierre.
"I have seen the princess," she replied. "I heard that they were
arranging a match for her with young Rostov. It would be a very good
thing for the Rostovs, they are said to be utterly ruined."
"No; I mean do you know Natasha Rostova?"
"I heard about that affair of hers at the time. It was a great pity."
"No, she either doesn’t understand or is pretending," thought Pierre.
"Better not say anything to her either."
The princess too had prepared provisions for Pierre’s journey.
"How kind they all are," thought Pierre. "What is surprising is that
they should trouble about these things now when it can no longer be of
interest to them. And all for me!"
On the same day the Chief of Police came to Pierre, inviting him to send
a representative to the Faceted Palace to recover things that were to be
returned to their owners that day.
"And this man too," thought Pierre, looking into the face of the Chief
of Police. "What a fine, good-looking officer and how kind. Fancy
bothering about such trifles now! And they actually say he is not honest
and takes bribes. What nonsense! Besides, why shouldn’t he take bribes?
That’s the way he was brought up, and everybody does it. But what a
kind, pleasant face and how he smiles as he looks at me."
Pierre went to Princess Mary’s to dinner.
As he drove through the streets past the houses that had been burned
down, he was surprised by the beauty of those ruins. The picturesqueness
of the chimney stacks and tumble-down walls of the burned-out quarters
of the town, stretching out and concealing one another, reminded him of
the Rhine and the Colosseum. The cabmen he met and their passengers,
the carpenters cutting the timber for new houses with axes, the women
hawkers, and the shopkeepers, all looked at him with cheerful beaming
eyes that seemed to say: "Ah, there he is! Let’s see what will come of
it!"
At the entrance to Princess Mary’s house Pierre felt doubtful whether
he had really been there the night before and really seen Natasha and
talked to her. "Perhaps I imagined it; perhaps I shall go in and find
no one there." But he had hardly entered the room before he felt her
presence with his whole being by the loss of his sense of freedom. She
was in the same black dress with soft folds and her hair was done the
same way as the day before, yet she was quite different. Had she been
like this when he entered the day before he could not for a moment have
failed to recognize her.
She was as he had known her almost as a child and later on as Prince
Andrew’s fiancee. A bright questioning light shone in her eyes, and on
her face was a friendly and strangely roguish expression.
Pierre dined with them and would have spent the whole evening there, but
Princess Mary was going to vespers and Pierre left the house with her.
Next day he came early, dined, and stayed the whole evening. Though
Princess Mary and Natasha were evidently glad to see their visitor and
though all Pierre’s interest was now centered in that house, by the
evening they had talked over everything and the conversation passed from
one trivial topic to another and repeatedly broke off. He stayed so long
that Princess Mary and Natasha exchanged glances, evidently wondering
when he would go. Pierre noticed this but could not go. He felt uneasy
and embarrassed, but sat on because he simply could not get up and take
his leave.
Princess Mary, foreseeing no end to this, rose first, and complaining of
a headache began to say good night.
"So you are going to Petersburg tomorrow?" she asked.
"No, I am not going," Pierre replied hastily, in a surprised tone and as
though offended. "Yes... no... to Petersburg? Tomorrow - but I won’t say
good-by yet. I will call round in case you have any commissions for me,"
said he, standing before Princess Mary and turning red, but not taking
his departure.
Natasha gave him her hand and went out. Princess Mary on the other hand
instead of going away sank into an armchair, and looked sternly and
intently at him with her deep, radiant eyes. The weariness she
had plainly shown before had now quite passed off. With a deep and
long-drawn sigh she seemed to be prepared for a lengthy talk.
When Natasha left the room Pierre’s confusion and awkwardness
immediately vanished and were replaced by eager excitement. He quickly
moved an armchair toward Princess Mary.
"Yes, I wanted to tell you," said he, answering her look as if she had
spoken. "Princess, help me! What am I to do? Can I hope? Princess, my
dear friend, listen! I know it all. I know I am not worthy of her, I
know it’s impossible to speak of it now. But I want to be a brother to
her. No, not that, I don’t, I can’t..."
He paused and rubbed his face and eyes with his hands.
"Well," he went on with an evident effort at self-control and coherence.
"I don’t know when I began to love her, but I have loved her and her
alone all my life, and I love her so that I cannot imagine life without
her. I cannot propose to her at present, but the thought that
perhaps she might someday be my wife and that I may be missing that
possibility... that possibility... is terrible. Tell me, can I hope?
Tell me what I am to do, dear princess!" he added after a pause, and
touched her hand as she did not reply.
"I am thinking of what you have told me," answered Princess Mary.
"This is what I will say. You are right that to speak to her of love at
present..."
Princess Mary stopped. She was going to say that to speak of love was
impossible, but she stopped because she had seen by the sudden change
in Natasha two days before that she would not only not be hurt if Pierre
spoke of his love, but that it was the very thing she wished for.
"To speak to her now wouldn’t do," said the princess all the same.
"But what am I to do?"
"Leave it to me," said Princess Mary. "I know..."
Pierre was looking into Princess Mary’s eyes.
"Well?... Well?..." he said.
"I know that she loves... will love you," Princess Mary corrected
herself.
Before her words were out, Pierre had sprung up and with a frightened
expression seized Princess Mary’s hand.
"What makes you think so? You think I may hope? You think...?"
"Yes, I think so," said Princess Mary with a smile. "Write to her
parents, and leave it to me. I will tell her when I can. I wish it to
happen and my heart tells me it will."
"No, it cannot be! How happy I am! But it can’t be.... How happy I am!
No, it can’t be!" Pierre kept saying as he kissed Princess Mary’s hands.
"Go to Petersburg, that will be best. And I will write to you," she
said.
"To Petersburg? Go there? Very well, I’ll go. But I may come again
tomorrow?"
Next day Pierre came to say good-by. Natasha was less animated than
she had been the day before; but that day as he looked at her Pierre
sometimes felt as if he was vanishing and that neither he nor she
existed any longer, that nothing existed but happiness. "Is it possible?
No, it can’t be," he told himself at every look, gesture, and word that
filled his soul with joy.
When on saying good-by he took her thin, slender hand, he could not help
holding it a little longer in his own.
"Is it possible that this hand, that face, those eyes, all this treasure
of feminine charm so strange to me now, is it possible that it will one
day be mine forever, as familiar to me as I am to myself?... No, that’s
impossible!..."
"Good-by, Count," she said aloud. "I shall look forward very much to
your return," she added in a whisper.
And these simple words, her look, and the expression on her face which
accompanied them, formed for two months the subject of inexhaustible
memories, interpretations, and happy meditations for Pierre. "‘I shall
look forward very much to your return....’ Yes, yes, how did she say it?
Yes, ‘I shall look forward very much to your return.’ Oh, how happy I
am! What is happening to me? How happy I am!" said Pierre to himself.
CHAPTER XIX
There was nothing in Pierre’s soul now at all like what had troubled it
during his courtship of Helene.
He did not repeat to himself with a sickening feeling of shame the words
he had spoken, or say: "Oh, why did I not say that?" and, "Whatever made
me say ‘Je vous aime’?" On the contrary, he now repeated in imagination
every word that he or Natasha had spoken and pictured every detail of
her face and smile, and did not wish to diminish or add anything, but
only to repeat it again and again. There was now not a shadow of doubt
in his mind as to whether what he had undertaken was right or wrong.
Only one terrible doubt sometimes crossed his mind: "Wasn’t it all
a dream? Isn’t Princess Mary mistaken? Am I not too conceited and
self-confident? I believe all this - and suddenly Princess Mary will tell
her, and she will be sure to smile and say: ‘How strange! He must be
deluding himself. Doesn’t he know that he is a man, just a man, while
I...? I am something altogether different and higher.’"
That was the only doubt often troubling Pierre. He did not now make any
plans. The happiness before him appeared so inconceivable that if only
he could attain it, it would be the end of all things. Everything ended
with that.
A joyful, unexpected frenzy, of which he had thought himself incapable,
possessed him. The whole meaning of life - not for him alone but for the
whole world - seemed to him centered in his love and the possibility of
being loved by her. At times everybody seemed to him to be occupied with
one thing only - his future happiness. Sometimes it seemed to him that
other people were all as pleased as he was himself and merely tried to
hide that pleasure by pretending to be busy with other interests. In
every word and gesture he saw allusions to his happiness. He often
surprised those he met by his significantly happy looks and smiles which
seemed to express a secret understanding between him and them. And when
he realized that people might not be aware of his happiness, he pitied
them with his whole heart and felt a desire somehow to explain to them
that all that occupied them was a mere frivolous trifle unworthy of
attention.
When it was suggested to him that he should enter the civil service,
or when the war or any general political affairs were discussed on the
assumption that everybody’s welfare depended on this or that issue
of events, he would listen with a mild and pitying smile and surprise
people by his strange comments. But at this time he saw everybody - both
those who, as he imagined, understood the real meaning of life (that
is, what he was feeling) and those unfortunates who evidently did not
understand it - in the bright light of the emotion that shone within
himself, and at once without any effort saw in everyone he met
everything that was good and worthy of being loved.
When dealing with the affairs and papers of his dead wife, her memory
aroused in him no feeling but pity that she had not known the bliss he
now knew. Prince Vasili, who having obtained a new post and some
fresh decorations was particularly proud at this time, seemed to him a
pathetic, kindly old man much to be pitied.
Often in afterlife Pierre recalled this period of blissful insanity. All
the views he formed of men and circumstances at this time remained true
for him always. He not only did not renounce them subsequently, but when
he was in doubt or inwardly at variance, he referred to the views he had
held at this time of his madness and they always proved correct.
"I may have appeared strange and queer then," he thought, "but I was
not so mad as I seemed. On the contrary I was then wiser and had
more insight than at any other time, and understood all that is worth
understanding in life, because... because I was happy."
Pierre’s insanity consisted in not waiting, as he used to do, to
discover personal attributes which he termed "good qualities" in people
before loving them; his heart was now overflowing with love, and by
loving people without cause he discovered indubitable causes for loving
them.
CHAPTER XX
After Pierre’s departure that first evening, when Natasha had said to
Princess Mary with a gaily mocking smile: "He looks just, yes, just as
if he had come out of a Russian bath - in a short coat and with his hair
cropped," something hidden and unknown to herself, but irrepressible,
awoke in Natasha’s soul.
Everything: her face, walk, look, and voice, was suddenly altered.
To her own surprise a power of life and hope of happiness rose to the
surface and demanded satisfaction. From that evening she seemed to have
forgotten all that had happened to her. She no longer complained of her
position, did not say a word about the past, and no longer feared to
make happy plans for the future. She spoke little of Pierre, but when
Princess Mary mentioned him a long-extinguished light once more kindled
in her eyes and her lips curved with a strange smile.
The change that took place in Natasha at first surprised Princess Mary;
but when she understood its meaning it grieved her. "Can she have loved
my brother so little as to be able to forget him so soon?" she thought
when she reflected on the change. But when she was with Natasha she was
not vexed with her and did not reproach her. The reawakened power
of life that had seized Natasha was so evidently irrepressible and
unexpected by her that in her presence Princess Mary felt that she had
no right to reproach her even in her heart.
Natasha gave herself up so fully and frankly to this new feeling that
she did not try to hide the fact that she was no longer sad, but bright
and cheerful.
When Princess Mary returned to her room after her nocturnal talk with
Pierre, Natasha met her on the threshold.
"He has spoken? Yes? He has spoken?" she repeated.
And a joyful yet pathetic expression which seemed to beg forgiveness for
her joy settled on Natasha’s face.
"I wanted to listen at the door, but I knew you would tell me."
Understandable and touching as the look with which Natasha gazed at
her seemed to Princess Mary, and sorry as she was to see her agitation,
these words pained her for a moment. She remembered her brother and his
love.
"But what’s to be done? She can’t help it," thought the princess.
And with a sad and rather stern look she told Natasha all that Pierre
had said. On hearing that he was going to Petersburg Natasha was
astounded.
"To Petersburg!" she repeated as if unable to understand.
But noticing the grieved expression on Princess Mary’s face she guessed
the reason of that sadness and suddenly began to cry.
"Mary," said she, "tell me what I should do! I am afraid of being bad.
Whatever you tell me, I will do. Tell me...."
"You love him?"
"Yes," whispered Natasha.
"Then why are you crying? I am happy for your sake," said Princess Mary,
who because of those tears quite forgave Natasha’s joy.
"It won’t be just yet - someday. Think what fun it will be when I am his
wife and you marry Nicholas!"
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