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In external ways Pierre had hardly changed at all. In appearance
he was just what he used to be. As before he was absent-minded
and seemed occupied not with what was before his eyes but with
something special of his own. The difference between his former
and present self was that formerly when he did not grasp what
lay before him or was said to him, he had puckered his forehead
painfully as if vainly seeking to distinguish something at a distance.
At present he still forgot what was said to him and still did
not see what was before his eyes, but he now looked with a scarcely
perceptible and seemingly ironic smile at what was before him
and listened to what was said, though evidently seeing and hearing
something quite different. Formerly he had appeared to be a kindhearted
but unhappy man, and so people had been inclined to avoid him.
Now a smile at the joy of life always played round his lips, and
sympathy for others, shone in his eyes with a questioning look
as to whether they were as contented as he was, and people felt
pleased by his presence.
Previously he had talked a great deal, grew excited when he
talked, and seldom listened; now he was seldom carried away in
conversation and knew how to listen so that people readily told
him their most intimate secrets.
The princess, who had never liked Pierre and had been particularly
hostile to him since she had felt herself under obligations to
him after the old count's death, now after staying a short time
in Orel- where she had come intending to show Pierre that in spite
of his ingratitude she considered it her duty to nurse him- felt
to her surprise and vexation that she had become fond of him.
Pierre did not in any way seek her approval, he merely studied
her with interest. Formerly she had felt that he regarded her
with indifference and irony, and so had shrunk into herself as
she did with others and had shown him only the combative side
of her nature; but now he seemed to be trying to understand the
most intimate places of her heart, and, mistrustfully at first
but afterwards gratefully, she let him see the hidden, kindly
sides of her character.
The most cunning man could not have crept into her confidence
more successfully, evoking memories of the best times of her youth
and showing sympathy with them. Yet Pierre's cunning consisted
simply in finding pleasure in drawing out the human qualities
of the embittered, hard, and (in her own way) proud princess.
"Yes, he is a very, very kind man when he is not under
the influence of bad people but of people such as myself,"
thought she.
His servants too- Terenty and Vaska- in their own way noticed
the change that had taken place in Pierre. They considered that
he had become much "simpler." Terenty, when he had helped
him undress and wished him good night, often lingered with his
master's boots in his hands and clothes over his arm, to see whether
he would not start a talk. And Pierre, noticing that Terenty wanted
a chat, generally kept him there.
"Well, tell me... now, how did you get food?" he
would ask.
And Terenty would begin talking of the destruction of Moscow,
and of the old count, and would stand for a long time holding
the clothes and talking, or sometimes listening to Pierre's stories,
and then would go out into the hall with a pleasant sense of intimacy
with his master and affection for him.
The doctor who attended Pierre and visited him every day,
though he considered it his duty as a doctor to pose as a man
whose every moment was of value to suffering humanity, would sit
for hours with Pierre telling him his favorite anecdotes and his
observations on the characters of his patients in general, and
especially of the ladies.
"It's a pleasure to talk to a man like that; he is not
like our provincials," he would say.
There were several prisoners from the French army in Orel,
and the doctor brought one of them, a young Italian, to see Pierre.
This officer began visiting Pierre, and the princess used
to make fun of the tenderness the Italian expressed for him.
The Italian seemed happy only when he could come to see Pierre,
talk with him, tell him about his past, his life at home, and
his love, and pour out to him his indignation against the French
and especially against Napoleon.
"If all Russians are in the least like you, it is sacrilege
to fight such a nation," he said to Pierre. "You, who
have suffered so from the French, do not even feel animosity toward
them."
Pierre had evoked the passionate affection of the Italian
merely by evoking the best side of his nature and taking a pleasure
in so doing.
During the last days of Pierre's stay in Orel his old Masonic
acquaintance Count Willarski, who had introduced him to the lodge
in 1807, came to see him. Willarski was married to a Russian heiress
who had a large estate in Orel province, and he occupied a temporary
post in the commissariat department in that town.
Hearing that Bezukhov was in Orel, Willarski, though they
had never been intimate, came to him with the professions of friendship
and intimacy that people who meet in a desert generally express
for one another. Willarski felt dull in Orel and was pleased to
meet a man of his own circle and, as he supposed, of similar interests.
But to his surprise Willarski soon noticed that Pierre had
lagged much behind the times, and had sunk, as he expressed it
to himself, into apathy and egotism.
"You are letting yourself go, my dear fellow," he
said.
But for all that Willarski found it pleasanter now than it
had been formerly to be with Pierre, and came to see him every
day. To Pierre as he looked at and listened to Willarski, it seemed
strange to think that he had been like that himself but a short
time before.
Willarski was a married man with a family, busy with his family
affairs, his wife's affairs, and his official duties. He regarded
all these occupations as hindrances to life, and considered that
they were all contemptible because their aim was the welfare of
himself and his family. Military, administrative, political, and
Masonic interests continually absorbed his attention. And Pierre,
without trying to change the other's views and without condemning
him, but with the quiet, joyful, and amused smile now habitual
to him, was interested in this strange though very familiar phenomenon.
There was a new feature in Pierre's relations with Willarski,
with the princess, with the doctor, and with all the people he
now met, which gained for him the general good will. This was
his acknowledgment of the impossibility of changing a man's convictions
by words, and his recognition of the possibility of everyone thinking,
feeling, and seeing things each from his own point of view. This
legitimate peculiarity of each individual which used to excite
and irritate Pierre now became a basis of the sympathy he felt
for, and the interest he took in, other people. The difference,
and sometimes complete contradiction, between men's opinions and
their lives, and between one man and another, pleased him and
drew from him an amused and gentle smile.
In practical matters Pierre unexpectedly felt within himself
a center of gravity he had previously lacked. Formerly all pecuniary
questions, especially requests for money to which, as an extremely
wealthy man, he was very exposed, produced in him a state of hopeless
agitation and perplexity. "To give or not to give?"
he had asked himself. "I have it and he needs it. But someone
else needs it still more. Who needs it most? And perhaps they
are both impostors?" In the old days he had been unable to
find a way out of all these surmises and had given to all who
asked as long as he had anything to give. Formerly he had been
in a similar state of perplexity with regard to every question
concerning his property, when one person advised one thing and
another something else.
Now to his surprise he found that he no longer felt either
doubt or perplexity about these questions. There was now within
him a judge who by some rule unknown to him decided what should
or should not be done.
He was as indifferent as heretofore to money matters, but
now he felt certain of what ought and what ought not to be done.
The first time he had recourse to his new judge was when a French
prisoner, a colonel, came to him and, after talking a great deal
about his exploits, concluded by making what amounted to a demand
that Pierre should give him four thousand francs to send to his
wife and children. Pierre refused without the least difficulty
or effort, and was afterwards surprised how simple and easy had
been what used to appear so insurmountably difficult. At the same
time that he refused the colonel's demand he made up his mind
that he must have recourse to artifice when leaving Orel, to induce
the Italian officer to accept some money of which he was evidently
in need. A further proof to Pierre of his own more settled outlook
on practical matters was furnished by his decision with regard
to his wife's debts and to the rebuilding of his houses in and
near Moscow.
His head steward came to him at Orel and Pierre reckoned up
with him his diminished income. The burning of Moscow had cost
him, according to the head steward's calculation, about two million
rubles.
To console Pierre for these losses the head steward gave him
an estimate showing that despite these losses his income would
not be diminished but would even be increased if he refused to
pay his wife's debts which he was under no obligation to meet,
and did not rebuild his Moscow house and the country house on
his Moscow estate, which had cost him eighty thousand rubles a
year and brought in nothing.
"Yes, of course that's true," said Pierre with a
cheerful smile. "I don't need all that at all. By being ruined
I have become much richer."
But in January Savelich came from Moscow and gave him an account
of the state of things there, and spoke of the estimate an architect
had made of the cost of rebuilding the town and country houses,
speaking of this as of a settled matter. About the same time he
received letters from Prince Vasili and other Petersburg acquaintances
speaking of his wife's debts. And Pierre decided that the steward's
proposals which had so pleased him were wrong and that he must
go to Petersburg and settle his wife's affairs and must rebuild
in Moscow. Why this was necessary he did not know, but he knew
for certain that it was necessary. His income would be reduced
by three fourths, but he felt it must be done.
Willarski was going to Moscow and they agreed to travel together.
During the whole time of his convalescence in Orel Pierre
had experienced a feeling of joy, freedom, and life; but when
during his journey he found himself in the open world and saw
hundreds of new faces, that feeling was intensified. Throughout
his journey he felt like a schoolboy on holiday. Everyone- the
stagecoach driver, the post-house overseers, the peasants on the
roads and in the villages- had a new 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.
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