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The crowd round the icon suddenly parted and pressed against Pierre. Someone, a very important personage judging by the haste with which way was made for him, was approaching the icon.
It was Kutzov, who had been riding round the position and on his way back to Tatrinova had stopped where the service was being held. Pierre recognized him at once by his peculiar figure, which distinguished him from everybody else.
With a long overcoat on his exceedingly stout, round-shouldered body, with uncovered white head and puffy face showing the white ball of the eye he had lost, Kutzov walked with plunging, swaying gait into the crowd and stopped behind the priest. He crossed himself with an accustomed movement, bent till he touched the ground with his hand, and bowed his white head with a deep sigh. Behind Kutzov was Bennigsen and the suite. Despite the presence of the commander in chief, who attracted the attention of all the superior officers, the militiamen and soldiers continued their prayers without looking at him.
When the service was over, Kutzov stepped up to the icon, sank heavily to his knees, bowed to the ground, and for a long time tried vainly to rise, but could not do so on account of his weakness and weight. His white head twitched with the effort. At last he rose, kissed the icon as a child does with navely pouting lips, and again bowed till he touched the ground with his hand. The other generals followed his example, then the officers, and after them with excited faces, pressing on one another, crowding, panting, and pushing, scrambled the soldiers and militiamen.
Staggering amid the crush, Pierre looked about him.
“Count Peter Kirlovich! How did you get here?” said a voice.
Pierre looked round. Bors Drubetsky, brushing his knees with his hand (he had probably soiled them when he, too, had knelt before the icon), came up to him smiling. Bors was elegantly dressed, with a slightly martial touch appropriate to a campaign. He wore a long coat and like Kutzov had a whip slung across his shoulder.
Meanwhile Kutzov had reached the village and seated himself in the shade of the nearest house, on a bench which one Cossack had run to fetch and another had hastily covered with a rug. An immense and brilliant suite surrounded him.
The icon was carried further, accompanied by the throng. Pierre stopped some thirty paces from Kutzov, talking to Bors.
He explained his wish to be present at the battle and to see the position.
“This is what you must do,” said Bors. “I will do the honors of the camp to you. You will see everything best from where Count Bennigsen will be. I am in attendance on him, you know; I’ll mention it to him. But if you want to ride round the position, come along with us. We are just going to the left flank. Then when we get back, do spend the night with me and we’ll arrange a game of cards. Of course you know Dmtri Sergevich? Those are his quarters,” and he pointed to the third house in the village of Grki.
“But I should like to see the right flank. They say it’s very strong,” said Pierre. “I should like to start from the Moskv River and ride round the whole position.”
“Well, you can do that later, but the chief thing is the left flank.”
“Yes, yes. But where is Prince Bolknski’s regiment? Can you point it out to me?”
“Prince Andrew’s? We shall pass it and I’ll take you to him.”
“What about the left flank?” asked Pierre
“To tell you the truth, between ourselves, God only knows what state our left flank is in,” said Bors confidentially lowering his voice. “It is not at all what Count Bennigsen intended. He meant to fortify that knoll quite differently, but...” Bors shrugged his shoulders, “his Serene Highness would not have it, or someone persuaded him. You see...” but Bors did not finish, for at that moment Kaysrov, Kutzov’s adjutant, came up to Pierre. “Ah, Kaysrov!” said Bors, addressing him with an unembarrassed smile, “I was just trying to explain our position to the count. It is amazing how his Serene Highness could so foresee the intentions of the French!”
“You mean the left flank?” asked Kaysrov.
“Yes, exactly; the left flank is now extremely strong.”
Though Kutzov had dismissed all unnecessary men from the staff, Bors had contrived to remain at headquarters after the changes. He had established himself with Count Bennigsen, who, like all on whom Bors had been in attendance, considered young Prince Drubetsky an invaluable man.
In the higher command there were two sharply defined parties: Kutzov’s party and that of Bennigsen, the chief of staff. Bors belonged to the latter and no one else, while showing servile respect to Kutzov, could so create an impression that the old fellow was not much good and that Bennigsen managed everything. Now the decisive moment of battle had come when Kutzov would be destroyed and the power pass to Bennigsen, or even if Kutzov won the battle it would be felt that everything was done by Bennigsen. In any case many great rewards would have to be given for tomorrow’s action, and new men would come to the front. So Bors was full of nervous vivacity all day.
After Kaysrov, others whom Pierre knew came up to him, and he had not time to reply to all the questions about Moscow that were showered upon him, or to listen to all that was told him. The faces all expressed animation and apprehension, but it seemed to Pierre that the cause of the excitement shown in some of these faces lay chiefly in questions of personal success; his mind, however, was occupied by the different expression he saw on other faces—an expression that spoke not of personal matters but of the universal questions of life and death. Kutzov noticed Pierre’s figure and the group gathered round him.
“Call him to me,” said Kutzov.
An adjutant told Pierre of his Serene Highness’ wish, and Pierre went toward Kutzov’s bench. But a militiaman got there before him. It was Dlokhov.
“How did that fellow get here?” asked Pierre.
“He’s a creature that wriggles in anywhere!” was the answer. “He has been degraded, you know. Now he wants to bob up again. He’s been proposing some scheme or other and has crawled into the enemy’s picket line at night.... He’s a brave fellow.”
Pierre took off his hat and bowed respectfully to Kutzov.
“I concluded that if I reported to your Serene Highness you might send me away or say that you knew what I was reporting, but then I shouldn’t lose anything...” Dlokhov was saying.
