War And Peace

‘But how are you going to get such a balance of power?’ Pierre was gathering himself to say, but at that moment Anna Pavlovna came across, glowered at Pierre and asked the Italian how he was surviving the local climate. His face changed instantly and assumed the sickly sweet, patronizing air which he obviously reserved for conversations with women. ‘I am so enchanted by the delightful wit and culture of the society people – especially the ladies – by whom I have had the good fortune to be received, that I have not yet had time to think about the climate,’ he said. Determined not to let go of the abbé and Pierre, Anna Pavlovna steered them into the larger group, where it would be easier to keep an eye on them.

At this point in walked another guest, the young Prince Andrey Bolkonsky, husband of the little princess. He was quite short, but a very handsome young man, with sharp, clear-cut features. Everything about him, from his languid, bored expression to his slow and steady stride, stood in stark contrast to his vivacious little wife. He made it obvious that he knew everybody in the room, and was so fed up with the whole lot that just looking at them and listening to them drove him to distraction. And of all the wearisome faces it was the face of his own pretty wife that seemed to bore him most. With a snarl distorting his handsome face he turned away from her. He kissed Anna Pavlovna’s hand, screwed up his eyes and scanned the whole company.

‘Are you enlisting for the war, Prince?’ said Anna Pavlovna.

‘General Kutuzov has been kind enough to want me as an aide,’ said Bolkonsky, saying ‘Kutuzóv’, like a Frenchman, rather than ‘Kutúzov’.

‘And what about Lise, your wife?’

‘She’s going into the country.’

‘Shame on you, depriving us of your charming wife!’

‘André!’ said his wife, addressing her husband in the flirtatious tone that she normally reserved for other men. ‘The viscount has just told us a wonderful story about Mlle George and Bonaparte!’

Prince Andrey scowled and turned away. Pierre had been looking at this man with a joyful, affectionate gaze since the moment he walked in, and now he went over and took him by the arm. Before looking round, Prince Andrey gave a pained look of irritation as he felt the touch, but the moment he saw Pierre’s smiling face he smiled back in an unusually sweet and pleasant way.

‘It’s you! . . . Out in society!’ he said to Pierre.

‘I knew you’d be here,’ answered Pierre. ‘I’m coming to dine with you,’ he added in a low voice, so as not to interrupt the viscount, who was going on with his story. ‘Is that all right?’

‘Of course it isn’t!’ laughed Prince Andrey, but his handshake told Pierre he had no need to ask. He was about to go on, but at that moment Prince Vasily and his daughter stood up and the two young men rose to let them go by.

‘Do excuse me, my dear Viscount,’ said Prince Vasily to the Frenchman, gently tugging down on his sleeve to persuade him not to get up. ‘This confounded reception at the Ambassador’s deprives me of a pleasure and interrupts you. I’m so sorry to leave your delightful party,’ he said to Anna Pavlovna.

Delicately holding on to the folds of her gown, his daughter, Princess Hélène, moved off between the chairs, and the smile on her gorgeous face was more radiant than ever. Pierre watched this vision of beauty go past, his eyes brimming with rapture and something not far from terror.

‘Isn’t she lovely?’ said Prince Andrey.

‘Yes, she is,’ said Pierre.

As he went past, Prince Vasily took Pierre by the arm and turned to Anna Pavlovna.

‘Can you please train this bear for me?’ he said. ‘He’s been staying with me for a month and this is the first time I’ve seen him out in society. There’s nothing more important for a young man than the company of intelligent women.’

CHAPTER 4

Anna Pavlovna gave a smile and promised to look after Pierre, knowing he was related to Prince Vasily on his father’s side. The elderly lady, who earlier on had been sitting by the aunt, got up hurriedly and overtook Prince Vasily in the hall. Her look of pretended interest had vanished, and her kindly, careworn face showed nothing but anxiety and alarm.

‘Prince, what can you tell me about my Boris?’ she asked, catching up with him in the hall. (She put a peculiar stress on the ‘o’ in Boris.) ‘I can’t stay on in Petersburg. Tell me please, what news may I take to my poor boy?’

Although Prince Vasily’s reluctance to deal with the elderly lady verged on impoliteness, even impatience, she gave him a sweetly ingratiating smile, and stopped him from going by clutching at his arm. ‘It will cost you very little to put in a good word with the Emperor, and he’ll be transferred straight into the guards,’ she implored.

‘Believe me, Princess, I’ll do anything I can,’ answered Prince Vasily; ‘but it’s not easy for me to petition the Emperor. I would advise you to see Rumyantsev, through Prince Golitsyn. That would be the more sensible thing to do.’