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After Prince Andrew, Boris came up to ask Natasha for dance,
and then the aide-de-camp who had opened the ball, and several
other young men, so that, flushed and happy, and passing on her
superfluous partners to Sonya, she did not cease dancing all the
evening. She noticed and saw nothing of what occupied everyone
else. Not only did she fail to notice that the Emperor talked
a long time with the French ambassador, and how particularly gracious
he was to a certain lady, or that Prince So-and-so and So-and-so
did and said this and that, and that Helene had great success
and was honored was by the special attention of So-and-so, but
she did not even see the Emperor, and only noticed that he had
gone because the ball became livelier after his departure. For
one of the merry cotillions before supper Prince Andrew was again
her partner. He reminded her of their first encounter in the Otradnoe
avenue, and how she had been unable to sleep that moonlight night,
and told her how he had involuntarily overheard her. Natasha blushed
at that recollection and tried to excuse herself, as if there
had been something to be ashamed of in what Prince Andrew had
overheard.
Like all men who have grown up in society, Prince Andrew liked
meeting someone there not of the conventional society stamp. And
such was Natasha, with her surprise, her delight, her shyness,
and even her mistakes in speaking French. With her he behaved
with special care and tenderness, sitting beside her and talking
of the simplest and most unimportant matters; he admired her shy
grace. In the middle of the cotillion, having completed one of
the figures, Natasha, still out of breath, was returning to her
seat when another dancer chose her. She was tired and panting
and evidently thought of declining, but immediately put her hand
gaily on the man's shoulder, smiling at Prince Andrew.
"I'd be glad to sit beside you and rest: I'm tired; but
you see how they keep asking me, and I'm glad of it, I'm happy
and I love everybody, and you and I understand it all," and
much, much more was said in her smile. When her partner left her
Natasha ran across the room to choose two ladies for the figure.
"If she goes to her cousin first and then to another
lady, she will be my wife," said Prince Andrew to himself
quite to his own surprise, as he watched her. She did go first
to her cousin.
"What rubbish sometimes enters one's head!" thought
Prince Andrew, "but what is certain is that that girl is
so charming, so original, that she won't be dancing here a month
before she will be married.... Such as she are rare here,"
he thought, as Natasha, readjusting a rose that was slipping on
her bodice, settled herself beside him.
When the cotillion was over the old count in his blue coat
came up to the dancers. He invited Prince Andrew to come and see
them, and asked his daughter whether she was enjoying herself.
Natasha did not answer at once but only looked up with a smile
that said reproachfully: "How can you ask such a question?"
"I have never enjoyed myself so much before!" she
said, and Prince Andrew noticed how her thin arms rose quickly
as if to embrace her father and instantly dropped again. Natasha
was happier than she had ever been in her life. She was at that
height of bliss when one becomes completely kind and good and
does not believe in the possibility of evil, unhappiness, or sorrow.
At that ball Pierre for the first time felt humiliated by
the position his wife occupied in court circles. He was gloomy
and absent-minded. A deep furrow ran across his forehead, and
standing by a window he stared over his spectacles seeing no one.
On her way to supper Natasha passed him.
Pierre's gloomy, unhappy look struck her. She stopped in front
of him. She wished to help him, to bestow on him the superabundance
of her own happiness.
"How delightful it is, Count!" said she. "Isn't
it?"
Pierre smiled absent-mindedly, evidently not grasping what
she said.
"Yes, I am very glad," he said.
"How can people be dissatisfied with anything?"
thought Natasha. "Especially such a capital fellow as Bezukhov!"
In Natasha's eyes all the people at the ball alike were good,
kind, and splendid people, loving one another; none of them capable
of injuring another- and so they ought all to be happy.
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