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The gray-haired valet was sitting drowsily listening to the
snoring of the prince, who was in his large study. From the far
side of the house through the closed doors came the sound of difficult
passages- twenty times repeated- of a sonata by Dussek.
Just then a closed carriage and another with a hood drove
up to the porch. Prince Andrew got out of the carriage, helped
his little wife to alight, and let her pass into the house before
him. Old Tikhon, wearing a wig, put his head out of the door of
the antechamber, reported in a whisper that the prince was sleeping,
and hastily closed the door. Tikhon knew that neither the son's
arrival nor any other unusual event must be allowed to disturb
the appointed order of the day. Prince Andrew apparently knew
this as well as Tikhon; he looked at his watch as if to ascertain
whether his father's habits had changed since he was at home last,
and, having assured himself that they had not, he turned to his
wife.
"He will get up in twenty minutes. Let us go across to
Mary's room," he said.
The little princess had grown stouter during this time, but
her eyes and her short, downy, smiling lip lifted when she began
to speak just as merrily and prettily as ever.
"Why, this is a palace!" she said to her husband,
looking around with the expression with which people compliment
their host at a ball. "Let's come, quick, quick!" And
with a glance round, she smiled at Tikhon, at her husband, and
at the footman who accompanied them.
"Is that Mary practicing? Let's go quietly and take her
by surprise."
Prince Andrew followed her with a courteous but sad expression.
"You've grown older, Tikhon," he said in passing
to the old man, who kissed his hand.
Before they reached the room from which the sounds of the
clavichord came, the pretty, fair haired Frenchwoman, Mademoiselle
Bourienne, rushed out apparently beside herself with delight.
"Ah! what joy for the princess!" exclaimed she:
"At last! I must let her know."
"No, no, please not... You are Mademoiselle Bourienne,"
said the little princess, kissing her. "I know you already
through my sister-in-law's friendship for you. She was not expecting
us?"
They went up to the door of the sitting room from which came
the sound of the oft-repeated passage of the sonata. Prince Andrew
stopped and made a grimace, as if expecting something unpleasant.
The little princess entered the room. The passage broke off
in the middle, a cry was heard, then Princess Mary's heavy tread
and the sound of kissing. When Prince Andrew went in the two princesses,
who had only met once before for a short time at his wedding,
were in each other's arms warmly pressing their lips to whatever
place they happened to touch. Mademoiselle Bourienne stood near
them pressing her hand to her heart, with a beatific smile and
obviously equally ready to cry or to laugh. Prince Andrew shrugged
his shoulders and frowned, as lovers of music do when they hear
a false note. The two women let go of one another, and then, as
if afraid of being too late, seized each other's hands, kissing
them and pulling them away, and again began kissing each other
on the face, and then to Prince Andrew's surprise both began to
cry and kissed again. Mademoiselle Bourienne also began to cry.
Prince Andrew evidently felt ill at ease, but to the two women
it seemed quite natural that they should cry, and apparently it
never entered their heads that it could have been otherwise at
this meeting.
"Ah! my dear!... Ah! Mary!" they suddenly exclaimed,
and then laughed. "I dreamed last night..."- "You
were not expecting us?..."- "Ah! Mary, you have got
thinner?..." "And you have grown stouter!..."
"I knew the princess at once," put in Mademoiselle
Bourienne.
"And I had no idea!..." exclaimed Princess Mary.
"Ah, Andrew, I did not see you."
Prince Andrew and his sister, hand in hand, kissed one another,
and he told her she was still the same crybaby as ever. Princess
Mary had turned toward her brother, and through her tears the
loving, warm, gentle look of her large luminous eyes, very beautiful
at that moment, rested on Prince Andrew's face.
The little princess talked incessantly, her short, downy upper
lip continually and rapidly touching her rosy nether lip when
necessary and drawing up again next moment when her face broke
into a smile of glittering teeth and sparkling eyes. She told
of an accident they had had on the Spasski Hill which might have
been serious for her in her condition, and immediately after that
informed them that she had left all her clothes in Petersburg
and that heaven knew what she would have to dress in here; and
that Andrew had quite changed, and that Kitty Odyntsova had married
an old man, and that there was a suitor for Mary, a real one,
but that they would talk of that later. Princess Mary was still
looking silently at her brother and her beautiful eyes were full
of love and sadness. It was plain that she was following a train
of thought independent of her sister-in-law's words. In the midst
of a description of the last Petersburg fete she addressed her
brother:
"So you are really going to the war, Andrew?" she
said sighing.
Lise sighed too.
"Yes, and even tomorrow," replied her brother.
"He is leaving me here, God knows why, when he might
have had promotion..."
Princess Mary did not listen to the end, but continuing her
train of thought turned to her sister-in-law with a tender glance
at her figure.
"Is it certain?" she said.
The face of the little princess changed. She sighed and said:
"Yes, quite certain. Ah! it is very dreadful..."
Her lip descended. She brought her face close to her sister-in-law's
and unexpectedly again began to cry.
"She needs rest," said Prince Andrew with a frown.
"Don't you, Lise? Take her to your room and I'll go to Father.
How is he? Just the same?"
"Yes, just the same. Though I don't know what your opinion
will be," answered the princess joyfully.
"And are the hours the same? And the walks in the avenues?
And the lathe?" asked Prince Andrew with a scarcely perceptible
smile which showed that, in spite of all his love and respect
for his father, he was aware of his weaknesses.
"The hours are the same, and the lathe, and also the
mathematics and my geometry lessons," said Princess Mary
gleefully, as if her lessons in geometry were among the greatest
delights of her life.
When the twenty minutes had elapsed and the time had come
for the old prince to get up, Tikhon came to call the young prince
to his father. The old man made a departure from his usual routine
in honor of his son's arrival: he gave orders to admit him to
his apartments while he dressed for dinner. The old prince always
dressed in old-fashioned style, wearing an antique coat and powdered
hair; and when Prince Andrew entered his father's dressing room
(not with the contemptuous look and manner he wore in drawing
rooms, but with the animated face with which he talked to Pierre),
the old man was sitting on a large leather-covered chair, wrapped
in a powdering mantle, entrusting his head to Tikhon.
"Ah! here's the warrior! Wants to vanquish Buonaparte?"
said the old man, shaking his powdered head as much as the tail,
which Tikhon was holding fast to plait, would allow.
"You at least must tackle him properly, or else if he
goes on like this he'll soon have us, too, for his subjects! How
are you?" And he held out his cheek.
The old man was in a good temper after his nap before dinner.
(He used to say that a nap "after dinner was silver- before
dinner, golden.") He cast happy, sidelong glances at his
son from under his thick, bushy eyebrows. Prince Andrew went up
and kissed his father on the spot indicated to him. He made no
reply on his father's favorite topic- making fun of the military
men of the day, and more particularly of Bonaparte.
"Yes, Father, I have come come to you and brought my
wife who is pregnant," said Prince Andrew, following every
movement of his father's face with an eager and respectful look.
"How is your health?"
"Only fools and rakes fall ill, my boy. You know me:
I am busy from morning till night and abstemious, so of course
I am well."
"Thank God," said his son smiling.
"God has nothing to do with it! Well, go on," he
continued, returning to his hobby; "tell me how the Germans
have taught you to fight Bonaparte by this new science you call
'strategy.'"
Prince Andrew smiled.
"Give me time to collect my wits, Father," said
he, with a smile that showed that his father's foibles did not
prevent his son from loving and honoring him. "Why, I have
not yet had time to settle down!"
"Nonsense, nonsense!" cried the old man, shaking
his pigtail to see whether it was firmly plaited, and grasping
his by the hand. "The house for your wife is ready. Princess
Mary will take her there and show her over, and they'll talk nineteen
to the dozen. That's their woman's way! I am glad to have her.
Sit down and talk. About Mikhelson's army I understand- Tolstoy's
too... a simultaneous expedition.... But what's the southern army
to do? Prussia is neutral... I know that. What about Austria?"
said he, rising from his chair and pacing up and down the room
followed by Tikhon, who ran after him, handing him different articles
of clothing. "What of Sweden? How will they cross Pomerania?"
Prince Andrew, seeing that his father insisted, began- at
first reluctantly, but gradually with more and more animation,
and from habit changing unconsciously from Russian to French as
he went on- to explain the plan of operation for the coming campaign.
He explained how an army, ninety thousand strong, was to threaten
Prussia so as to bring her out of her neutrality and draw her
into the war; how part of that army was to join some Swedish forces
at Stralsund; how two hundred and twenty thousand Austrians, with
a hundred thousand Russians, were to operate in Italy and on the
Rhine; how fifty thousand Russians and as many English were to
land at Naples, and how a total force of five hundred thousand
men was to attack the French from different sides. The old prince
did not evince the least interest during this explanation, but
as if he were not listening to it continued to dress while walking
about, and three times unexpectedly interrupted. Once he stopped
it by shouting: "The white one, the white one!"
This meant that Tikhon was not handing him the waistcoat he
wanted. Another time he interrupted, saying:
"And will she soon be confined?" and shaking his
head reproachfully said: "That's bad! Go on, go on."
The third interruption came when Prince Andrew was finishing
his description. The old man began to sing, in the cracked voice
of old age: "Malbrook s'en va-t-en guerre. Dieu sait quand
reviendra."*
*"Marlborough is going to the wars; God knows when he'll
return."
His son only smiled.
"I don't say it's a plan I approve of," said the
son; "I am only telling you what it is. Napoleon has also
formed his plan by now, not worse than this one."
"Well, you've told me nothing new," and the old
man repeated, meditatively and rapidly:
"Dieu sait quand reviendra. Go to the dining room."
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