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Natasha was calmer but no happier. She not merely avoided
all external forms of pleasure- balls, promenades, concerts, and
theaters- but she never laughed without a sound of tears in her
laughter. She could not sing. As soon as she began to laugh, or
tried to sing by herself, tears choked her: tears of remorse,
tears at the recollection of those pure times which could never
return, tears of vexation that she should so uselessly have ruined
her young life which might have been so happy. Laughter and singing
in particular seemed to her like a blasphemy, in face of her sorrow.
Without any need of self-restraint, no wish to coquet ever entered
her head. She said and felt at that time that no man was more
to her than Nastasya Ivanovna, the buffoon. Something stood sentinel
within her and forbade her every joy. Besides, she had lost all
the old interests of her carefree girlish life that had been so
full of hope. The previous autumn, the hunting, "Uncle,"
and the Christmas holidays spent with Nicholas at Otradnoe were
what she recalled oftenest and most painfully. What would she
not have given to bring back even a single day of that time! But
it was gone forever. Her presentiment at the time had not deceived
her- that that state of freedom and readiness for any enjoyment
would not return again. Yet it was necessary to live on.
It comforted her to reflect that she was not better as she
had formerly imagined, but worse, much worse, than anybody else
in the world. But this was not enough. She knew that, and asked
herself, "What next?" But there was nothing to come.
There was no joy in life, yet life was passing. Natasha apparently
tried not to be a burden or a hindrance to anyone, but wanted
nothing for herself. She kept away from everyone in the house
and felt at ease only with her brother Petya. She liked to be
with him better than with the others, and when alone with him
she sometimes laughed. She hardly ever left the house and of those
who came to see them was glad to see only one person, Pierre.
It would have been impossible to treat her with more delicacy,
greater care, and at the same time more seriously than did Count
Bezukhov. Natasha unconsciously felt this delicacy and so found
great pleasure in his society. But she was not even grateful to
him for it; nothing good on Pierre's part seemed to her to be
an effort, it seemed so natural for him to be kind to everyone
that there was no merit in his kindness. Sometimes Natasha noticed
embarrassment and awkwardness on his part in her presence, especially
when he wanted to do something to please her, or feared that something
they spoke of would awaken memories distressing to her. She noticed
this and attributed it to his general kindness and shyness, which
she imagined must be the same toward everyone as it was to her.
After those involuntary words- that if he were free he would have
asked on his knees for her hand and her love- uttered at a moment
when she was so strongly agitated, Pierre never spoke to Natasha
of his feelings; and it seemed plain to her that those words,
which had then so comforted her, were spoken as all sorts of meaningless
words are spoken to comfort a crying child. It was not because
Pierre was a married man, but because Natasha felt very strongly
with him that moral barrier the absence of which she had experienced
with Kuragin that it never entered her head that the relations
between him and herself could lead to love on her part, still
less on his, or even to the kind of tender, self-conscious, romantic
friendship between a man and a woman of which she had known several
instances.
Before the end of the fast of St. Peter, Agrafena Ivanovna
Belova, a country neighbor of the Rostovs, came to Moscow to pay
her devotions at the shrines of the Moscow saints. She suggested
that Natasha should fast and prepare for Holy Communion, and Natasha
gladly welcomed the idea. Despite the doctor's orders that she
should not go out early in the morning, Natasha insisted on fasting
and preparing for the sacrament, not as they generally prepared
for it in the Rostov family by attending three services in their
own house, but as Agrafena Ivanovna did, by going to church every
day for a week and not once missing Vespers, Matins, or Mass.
The countess was pleased with Natasha's zeal; after the poor
results of the medical treatment, in the depths of her heart she
hoped that prayer might help her daughter more than medicines
and, though not without fear and concealing it from the doctor,
she agreed to Natasha's wish and entrusted her to Belova. Agrafena
Ivanovna used to come to wake Natasha at three in the morning,
but generally found her already awake. She was afraid of being
late for Matins. Hastily washing, and meekly putting on her shabbiest
dress and an old mantilla, Natasha, shivering in the fresh air,
went out into the deserted streets lit by the clear light of dawn.
By Agrafena Ivanovna's advice Natasha prepared herself not in
their own parish, but at a church where, according to the devout
Agrafena Ivanovna, the priest was a man of very severe and lofty
life. There were never many people in the church; Natasha always
stood beside Belova in the customary place before an icon of the
Blessed Virgin, let into the screen before the choir on the left
side, and a feeling, new to her, of humility before something
great and incomprehensible, seized her when at that unusual morning
hour, gazing at the dark face of the Virgin illuminated by the
candles burning before it and by the morning light falling from
the window, she listened to the words of the service which she
tried to follow with understanding. When she understood them her
personal feeling became interwoven in the prayers with shades
of its own. When she did not understand, it was sweeter still
to think that the wish to understand everything is pride, that
it is impossible to understand all, that it is only necessary
to believe and to commit oneself to God, whom she felt guiding
her soul at those moments. She crossed herself, bowed low, and
when she did not understand, in horror at her own vileness, simply
asked God to forgive her everything, everything, to have mercy
upon her. The prayers to which she surrendered herself most of
all were those of repentance. On her way home at an early hour
when she met no one but bricklayers going to work or men sweeping
the street, and everybody within the houses was still asleep,
Natasha experienced a feeling new to her, a sense of the possibility
of correcting her faults, the possibility of a new, clean life,
and of happiness.
During the whole week she spent in this way, that feeling
grew every day. And the happiness of taking communion, or "communing"
as Agrafena Ivanovna, joyously playing with the word, called it,
seemed to Natasha so great that she felt she should never live
till that blessed Sunday.
But the happy day came, and on that memorable Sunday, when,
dressed in white muslin, she returned home after communion, for
the first time for many months she felt calm and not oppressed
by the thought of the life that lay before her.
The doctor who came to see her that day ordered her to continue
the powders he had prescribed a fortnight previously.
"She must certainly go on taking them morning and evening,"
said he, evidently sincerely satisfied with his success. "Only,
please be particular about it.
"Be quite easy," he continued playfully, as he adroitly
took the gold coin in his palm. "She will soon be singing
and frolicking about. The last medicine has done her a very great
deal of good. She has freshened up very much."
The countess, with a cheerful expression on her face, looked
down at her nails and spat a little for luck as she returned to
the drawing room.
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