Page 79 of 470

“I saw the Pvlograd hussars attack there, your excellency,” chimed in Zherkv, looking uneasily around. He had not seen the hussars all that day, but had heard about them from an infantry officer. “They broke up two squares, your excellency.”

Several of those present smiled at Zherkv’s words, expecting one of his usual jokes, but noticing that what he was saying redounded to the glory of our arms and of the day’s work, they assumed a serious expression, though many of them knew that what he was saying was a lie devoid of any foundation. Prince Bagratin turned to the old colonel:

“Gentlemen, I thank you all; all arms have behaved heroically: infantry, cavalry, and artillery. How was it that two guns were abandoned in the center?” he inquired, searching with his eyes for someone. (Prince Bagratin did not ask about the guns on the left flank; he knew that all the guns there had been abandoned at the very beginning of the action.) “I think I sent you?” he added, turning to the staff officer on duty.

“One was damaged,” answered the staff officer, “and the other I can’t understand. I was there all the time giving orders and had only just left.... It is true that it was hot there,” he added, modestly.

Someone mentioned that Captain Tshin was bivouacking close to the village and had already been sent for.

“Oh, but you were there?” said Prince Bagratin, addressing Prince Andrew.

“Of course, we only just missed one another,” said the staff officer, with a smile to Bolknski.

“I had not the pleasure of seeing you,” said Prince Andrew, coldly and abruptly.

All were silent. Tshin appeared at the threshold and made his way timidly from behind the backs of the generals. As he stepped past the generals in the crowded hut, feeling embarrassed as he always was by the sight of his superiors, he did not notice the staff of the banner and stumbled over it. Several of those present laughed.

“How was it a gun was abandoned?” asked Bagratin, frowning, not so much at the captain as at those who were laughing, among whom Zherkv laughed loudest.

Only now, when he was confronted by the stern authorities, did his guilt and the disgrace of having lost two guns and yet remaining alive present themselves to Tshin in all their horror. He had been so excited that he had not thought about it until that moment. The officers’ laughter confused him still more. He stood before Bagratin with his lower jaw trembling and was hardly able to mutter: “I don’t know... your excellency... I had no men... your excellency.”

“You might have taken some from the covering troops.”

Tshin did not say that there were no covering troops, though that was perfectly true. He was afraid of getting some other officer into trouble, and silently fixed his eyes on Bagratin as a schoolboy who has blundered looks at an examiner.

The silence lasted some time. Prince Bagratin, apparently not wishing to be severe, found nothing to say; the others did not venture to intervene. Prince Andrew looked at Tshin from under his brows and his fingers twitched nervously.

“Your excellency!” Prince Andrew broke the silence with his abrupt voice, “you were pleased to send me to Captain Tshin’s battery. I went there and found two thirds of the men and horses knocked out, two guns smashed, and no supports at all.”

Prince Bagratin and Tshin looked with equal intentness at Bolknski, who spoke with suppressed agitation.

“And, if your excellency will allow me to express my opinion,” he continued, “we owe today’s success chiefly to the action of that battery and the heroic endurance of Captain Tshin and his company,” and without awaiting a reply, Prince Andrew rose and left the table.

Prince Bagratin looked at Tshin, evidently reluctant to show distrust in Bolknski’s emphatic opinion yet not feeling able fully to credit it, bent his head, and told Tshin that he could go. Prince Andrew went out with him.

“Thank you; you saved me, my dear fellow!” said Tshin.

Prince Andrew gave him a look, but said nothing and went away. He felt sad and depressed. It was all so strange, so unlike what he had hoped.

“Who are they? Why are they here? What do they want? And when will all this end?” thought Rostv, looking at the changing shadows before him. The pain in his arm became more and more intense. Irresistible drowsiness overpowered him, red rings danced before his eyes, and the impression of those voices and faces and a sense of loneliness merged with the physical pain. It was they, these soldiers—wounded and unwounded—it was they who were crushing, weighing down, and twisting the sinews and scorching the flesh of his sprained arm and shoulder. To rid himself of them he closed his eyes.

For a moment he dozed, but in that short interval innumerable things appeared to him in a dream: his mother and her large white hand, Snya’s thin little shoulders, Natsha’s eyes and laughter, Densov with his voice and mustache, and Telynin and all that affair with Telynin and Bogdnich. That affair was the same thing as this soldier with the harsh voice, and it was that affair and this soldier that were so agonizingly, incessantly pulling and pressing his arm and always dragging it in one direction. He tried to get away from them, but they would not for an instant let his shoulder move a hair’s breadth. It would not ache—it would be well—if only they did not pull it, but it was impossible to get rid of them.

He opened his eyes and looked up. The black canopy of night hung less than a yard above the glow of the charcoal. Flakes of falling snow were fluttering in that light. Tshin had not returned, the doctor had not come. He was alone now, except for a soldier who was sitting naked at the other side of the fire, warming his thin yellow body.

“Nobody wants me!” thought Rostv. “There is no one to help me or pity me. Yet I was once at home, strong, happy, and loved.” He sighed and, doing so, groaned involuntarily.

“Eh, is anything hurting you?” asked the soldier, shaking his shirt out over the fire, and not waiting for an answer he gave a grunt and added: “What a lot of men have been crippled today—frightful!”

Rostv did not listen to the soldier. He looked at the snowflakes fluttering above the fire and remembered a Russian winter at his warm, bright home, his fluffy fur coat, his quickly gliding sleigh, his healthy body, and all the affection and care of his family. “And why did I come here?” he wondered.

Next day the French army did not renew their attack, and the remnant of Bagratin’s detachment was reunited to Kutzov’s army.