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“Well then, what do you want? You’re all in love nowadays. Well, if you are in love, marry him!” said the countess, with a laugh of annoyance. “Good luck to you!”
“No, Mamma, I’m not in love with him, I suppose I’m not in love with him.”
“Well then, tell him so.”
“Mamma, are you cross? Don’t be cross, dear! Is it my fault?”
“No, but what is it, my dear? Do you want me to go and tell him?” said the countess smiling.
“No, I will do it myself, only tell me what to say. It’s all very well for you,” said Natsha, with a responsive smile. “You should have seen how he said it! I know he did not mean to say it, but it came out accidently.”
“Well, all the same, you must refuse him.”
“No, I mustn’t. I am so sorry for him! He’s so nice.”
“Well then, accept his offer. It’s high time for you to be married,” answered the countess sharply and sarcastically.
“No, Mamma, but I’m so sorry for him. I don’t know how I’m to say it.”
“And there’s nothing for you to say. I shall speak to him myself,” said the countess, indignant that they should have dared to treat this little Natsha as grown up.
“No, not on any account! I will tell him myself, and you’ll listen at the door,” and Natsha ran across the drawing room to the dancing hall, where Densov was sitting on the same chair by the clavichord with his face in his hands.
He jumped up at the sound of her light step.
“Nataly,” he said, moving with rapid steps toward her, “decide my fate. It is in your hands.”
“Vasli Dmtrich, I’m so sorry for you!... No, but you are so nice... but it won’t do...not that... but as a friend, I shall always love you.”
Densov bent over her hand and she heard strange sounds she did not understand. She kissed his rough curly black head. At this instant, they heard the quick rustle of the countess’ dress. She came up to them.
“Vasli Dmtrich, I thank you for the honor,” she said, with an embarrassed voice, though it sounded severe to Densov—“but my daughter is so young, and I thought that, as my son’s friend, you would have addressed yourself first to me. In that case you would not have obliged me to give this refusal.”
“Countess...” said Densov, with downcast eyes and a guilty face. He tried to say more, but faltered.
Natsha could not remain calm, seeing him in such a plight. She began to sob aloud.
“Countess, I have done w’ong,” Densov went on in an unsteady voice, “but believe me, I so adore your daughter and all your family that I would give my life twice over...” He looked at the countess, and seeing her severe face said: “Well, good-by, Countess,” and kissing her hand, he left the room with quick resolute strides, without looking at Natsha.
Next day Rostv saw Densov off. He did not wish to stay another day in Moscow. All Densov’s Moscow friends gave him a farewell entertainment at the gypsies’, with the result that he had no recollection of how he was put in the sleigh or of the first three stages of his journey.
After Densov’s departure, Rostv spent another fortnight in Moscow, without going out of the house, waiting for the money his father could not at once raise, and he spent most of his time in the girls’ room.
Snya was more tender and devoted to him than ever. It was as if she wanted to show him that his losses were an achievement that made her love him all the more, but Nicholas now considered himself unworthy of her.
He filled the girls’ albums with verses and music, and having at last sent Dlokhov the whole forty-three thousand rubles and received his receipt, he left at the end of November, without taking leave of any of his acquaintances, to overtake his regiment which was already in Poland.
After his interview with his wife Pierre left for Petersburg. At the Torzhk post station, either there were no horses or the postmaster would not supply them. Pierre was obliged to wait. Without undressing, he lay down on the leather sofa in front of a round table, put his big feet in their overboots on the table, and began to reflect.
“Will you have the portmanteaus brought in? And a bed got ready, and tea?” asked his valet.
Pierre gave no answer, for he neither heard nor saw anything. He had begun to think of the last station and was still pondering on the same question—one so important that he took no notice of what went on around him. Not only was he indifferent as to whether he got to Petersburg earlier or later, or whether he secured accommodation at this station, but compared to the thoughts that now occupied him it was a matter of indifference whether he remained there for a few hours or for the rest of his life.
The postmaster, his wife, the valet, and a peasant woman selling Torzhk embroidery came into the room offering their services. Without changing his careless attitude, Pierre looked at them over his spectacles unable to understand what they wanted or how they could go on living without having solved the problems that so absorbed him. He had been engrossed by the same thoughts ever since the day he returned from Soklniki after the duel and had spent that first agonizing, sleepless night. But now, in the solitude of the journey, they seized him with special force. No matter what he thought about, he always returned to these same questions which he could not solve and yet could not cease to ask himself. It was as if the thread of the chief screw which held his life together were stripped, so that the screw could not get in or out, but went on turning uselessly in the same place.
The postmaster came in and began obsequiously to beg his excellency to wait only two hours, when, come what might, he would let his excellency have the courier horses. It was plain that he was lying and only wanted to get more money from the traveler.
“Is this good or bad?” Pierre asked himself. “It is good for me, bad for another traveler, and for himself it’s unavoidable, because he needs money for food; the man said an officer had once given him a thrashing for letting a private traveler have the courier horses. But the officer thrashed him because he had to get on as quickly as possible. And I,” continued Pierre, “shot Dlokhov because I considered myself injured, and Louis XVI was executed because they considered him a criminal, and a year later they executed those who executed him—also for some reason. What is bad? What is good? What should one love and what hate? What does one live for? And what am I? What is life, and what is death? What power governs all?”
