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She always addressed him with a radiantly confiding smile meant for him alone, in which there was something more significant than in the general smile that usually brightened her face. Pierre knew that everyone was waiting for him to say a word and cross a certain line, and he knew that sooner or later he would step across it, but an incomprehensible terror seized him at the thought of that dreadful step. A thousand times during that month and a half while he felt himself drawn nearer and nearer to that dreadful abyss, Pierre said to himself: “What am I doing? I need resolution. Can it be that I have none?”

He wished to take a decision, but felt with dismay that in this matter he lacked that strength of will which he had known in himself and really possessed. Pierre was one of those who are only strong when they feel themselves quite innocent, and since that day when he was overpowered by a feeling of desire while stooping over the snuffbox at Anna Pvlovna’s, an unacknowledged sense of the guilt of that desire paralyzed his will.

On Hlne’s name day, a small party of just their own people—as his wife said—met for supper at Prince Vasli’s. All these friends and relations had been given to understand that the fate of the young girl would be decided that evening. The visitors were seated at supper. Princess Kurgina, a portly imposing woman who had once been handsome, was sitting at the head of the table. On either side of her sat the more important guests—an old general and his wife, and Anna Pvlovna Schrer. At the other end sat the younger and less important guests, and there too sat the members of the family, and Pierre and Hlne, side by side. Prince Vasli was not having any supper: he went round the table in a merry mood, sitting down now by one, now by another, of the guests. To each of them he made some careless and agreeable remark except to Pierre and Hlne, whose presence he seemed not to notice. He enlivened the whole party. The wax candles burned brightly, the silver and crystal gleamed, so did the ladies’ toilets and the gold and silver of the men’s epaulets; servants in scarlet liveries moved round the table, the clatter of plates, knives, and glasses mingled with the animated hum of several conversations. At one end of the table, the old chamberlain was heard assuring an old baroness that he loved her passionately, at which she laughed; at the other could be heard the story of the misfortunes of some Mary Vktorovna or other. At the center of the table, Prince Vasli attracted everybody’s attention. With a facetious smile on his face, he was telling the ladies about last Wednesday’s meeting of the Imperial Council, at which Sergy Kuzmch Vyazmtinov, the new military governor general of Petersburg, had received and read the then famous rescript of the Emperor Alexander from the army to Sergy Kuzmch, in which the Emperor said that he was receiving from all sides declarations of the people’s loyalty, that the declaration from Petersburg gave him particular pleasure, and that he was proud to be at the head of such a nation and would endeavor to be worthy of it. This rescript began with the words: “Sergy Kuzmch, From all sides reports reach me,” etc.

“Well, and so he never got farther than: ‘Sergy Kuzmch’?” asked one of the ladies.

“Exactly, not a hair’s breadth farther,” answered Prince Vasli, laughing, “‘Sergy Kuzmch... From all sides... From all sides... Sergy Kuzmch...’ Poor Vyazmtinov could not get any farther! He began the rescript again and again, but as soon as he uttered ‘Sergy’ he sobbed, ‘Kuz-m-ch,’ tears, and ‘From all sides’ was smothered in sobs and he could get no farther. And again his handkerchief, and again: ‘Sergy Kuzmch, From all sides,’... and tears, till at last somebody else was asked to read it.”

“Kuzmch... From all sides... and then tears,” someone repeated laughing.

“Don’t be unkind,” cried Anna Pvlovna from her end of the table holding up a threatening finger. “He is such a worthy and excellent man, our dear Vyazmtinov....”

Everybody laughed a great deal. At the head of the table, where the honored guests sat, everyone seemed to be in high spirits and under the influence of a variety of exciting sensations. Only Pierre and Hlne sat silently side by side almost at the bottom of the table, a suppressed smile brightening both their faces, a smile that had nothing to do with Sergy Kuzmch—a smile of bashfulness at their own feelings. But much as all the rest laughed, talked, and joked, much as they enjoyed their Rhine wine, saut, and ices, and however they avoided looking at the young couple, and heedless and unobservant as they seemed of them, one could feel by the occasional glances they gave that the story about Sergy Kuzmch, the laughter, and the food were all a pretense, and that the whole attention of that company was directed to—Pierre and Hlne. Prince Vasli mimicked the sobbing of Sergy Kuzmch and at the same time his eyes glanced toward his daughter, and while he laughed the expression on his face clearly said: “Yes... it’s getting on, it will all be settled today.” Anna Pvlovna threatened him on behalf of “our dear Vyazmtinov,” and in her eyes, which, for an instant, glanced at Pierre, Prince Vasli read a congratulation on his future son-in-law and on his daughter’s happiness. The old princess sighed sadly as she offered some wine to the old lady next to her and glanced angrily at her daughter, and her sigh seemed to say: “Yes, there’s nothing left for you and me but to sip sweet wine, my dear, now that the time has come for these young ones to be thus boldly, provocatively happy.” “And what nonsense all this is that I am saying!” thought a diplomatist, glancing at the happy faces of the lovers. “That’s happiness!”

Into the insignificant, trifling, and artificial interests uniting that society had entered the simple feeling of the attraction of a healthy and handsome young man and woman for one another. And this human feeling dominated everything else and soared above all their affected chatter. Jests fell flat, news was not interesting, and the animation was evidently forced. Not only the guests but even the footmen waiting at table seemed to feel this, and they forgot their duties as they looked at the beautiful Hlne with her radiant face and at the red, broad, and happy though uneasy face of Pierre. It seemed as if the very light of the candles was focused on those two happy faces alone.

Pierre felt that he was the center of it all, and this both pleased and embarrassed him. He was like a man entirely absorbed in some occupation. He did not see, hear, or understand anything clearly. Only now and then detached ideas and impressions from the world of reality shot unexpectedly through his mind.

“So it is all finished!” he thought. “And how has it all happened? How quickly! Now I know that not because of her alone, nor of myself alone, but because of everyone, it must inevitably come about. They are all expecting it, they are so sure that it will happen that I cannot, I cannot, disappoint them. But how will it be? I do not know, but it will certainly happen!” thought Pierre, glancing at those dazzling shoulders close to his eyes.