War and Peace (16 page)

As they passed him—Anna Mihalovna among them—the young man caught a glimpse over people’s backs and necks of the great muscular open chest, the grey, curly, leonine head, and the massive shoulders of the sick man, which were pushed up, as he was supported under the armpits. His head, with its extraordinarily broad brow and cheek-bones,
its beautiful sensual mouth, and haughty, cold eyes, was not disfigured by the proximity of death. It was just the same as Pierre had seen it three months before, when his father had been sending him off to Petersburg. But the head swayed helplessly with the jerky steps of the bearers, and the cold, apathetic eyes did not know on what to rest.

They were busy for several minutes round the high bed; then the people, who had moved the count, dispersed. Anna Mihalovna touched Pierre’s arm and said, “Come along.” With her Pierre approached the bed, on which the sick man had been laid in a ceremonial position in keeping with the sacred rite that had just been performed. He was lying with his head propped high on the pillows. His hands were laid symmetrically on the green silk quilt with the palms turned downwards. When Pierre came up, the count looked straight at him, but he looked at him with a gaze the intent and significance of which no man could fathom. Either these eyes said nothing, but simply looked because as eyes they must look at something, or they said too much. Pierre stopped, not knowing what he was to do, and looked inquiringly at his monitress. Anna Mihalovna gave him a hurried glance, with a gesture indicating the sick man’s hand and with her lips wafting towards it a phantom kiss. Pierre did as he was bid, and carefully craning his neck to avoid entanglement with the quilt, kissed the broad-boned, muscular hand. There was not the faintest stir in the hand, nor in any muscle of the count’s face. Pierre again looked inquiringly at Anna Mihalovna to learn what he was to do now. Anna Mihalovna glanced towards the armchair that stood beside the bed. Pierre proceeded obediently to sit down there, his eyes still inquiring whether he had done the right thing. Anna Mihalovna nodded approvingly. Again Pierre fell into the naïvely symmetrical pose of an Egyptian statue, obviously distressed that his ungainly person took up so much room, and doing his utmost to look as small as possible. He looked at the count. The count still gazed at the spot where Pierre’s face had been, when he was standing up. Anna Mihalovna’s attitude evinced her consciousness of the touching gravity of this last meeting between father and son. It lasted for two minutes, which seemed to Pierre an hour. Suddenly a shudder passed over the thick muscles and furrows of the count’s face. The shudder grew more intense; the beautiful mouth was contorted (it was only then that Pierre grasped how near death his father was) and from the contorted mouth there came a husky, muffled sound. Anna Mihalovna looked intently at the sick man’s mouth, and trying to guess what he wanted, pointed first
to Pierre, then to some drink, then in an inquiring whisper she mentioned the name of Prince Vassily, then pointed to the quilt. The eyes and face of the sick man showed impatience. He made an effort to glance at the servant, who never moved away from the head of his bed.

“His excellency wants to be turned over on the other side,” whispered the servant, and he got up to turn the heavy body of the count facing the wall.

Pierre stood up to help the servant.

While the count was being turned over, one of his arms dragged helplessly behind, and he made a vain effort to pull it after him. Whether the count noticed the face of horror with which Pierre looked at that lifeless arm, or whether some other idea passed through his dying brain, he looked at the refractory arm, at the expression of horror on Pierre’s face, again at his arm, and a smile came on his face, strangely out of keeping with its features; a weak, suffering smile, which seemed mocking at his own helplessness. Suddenly, at the sight of that smile, Pierre felt a lump in his throat and a tickling in his nose, and tears dimmed his eyes. The sick man was turned towards the wall. He sighed.

“He has fallen into a doze,” said Anna Mihalovna, noticing the princess coming to take her turn by the bedside. “Let us go.”

Pierre went out.

There was by now no one in the reception-room except Prince Vassily and the eldest princess, who were in eager conversation together, sitting under the portrait of Catherine. They were mute at once on seeing Pierre and his companion, and the princess concealed something as Pierre fancied and murmured: “I can’t stand the sight of that woman.”

“Katish has had tea served in the little drawing-room,” Prince Vassily said to Anna Mihalovna. “Go, my poor Anna Mihalovna, take something or you will not hold out.”

To Pierre he said nothing; he simply pressed his arm sympathetically. Pierre and Anna Mihalovna went on into the little drawing-room.

“There is nothing so reviving as a cup of this excellent Russian tea, after a sleepless night,” said Lorrain with an air of restrained briskness, sipping it out of a delicate china cup without a handle, as he stood in the little circular drawing-room close to a table laid with tea-things and
cold supper-dishes. All who were in Count Bezuhov’s house on that night had, with a view to fortifying themselves, gathered around the table. Pierre remembered well that little circular drawing-room with its mirrors and little tables. When there had been balls in the count’s house, Pierre, who could not dance, had liked sitting in that little room full of mirrors, watching the ladies in ball-dresses with pearls and diamonds on their bare shoulders, as they crossed that room and looked at themselves in the brightly lighted mirrors that repeated their reflections several times. Now the same room was dimly lighted with two candles, and in the middle of the night the tea-set and supper-dishes stood in disorder on one of the little tables, and heterogeneous, plainly dressed persons were sitting at it, whispering together, and showing in every word that no one could forget what was passing at that moment and what was still to come in the bedroom. Pierre did not eat anything, though he felt very much inclined to. He looked round inquiringly towards his monitress, and perceived that she had gone out again on tiptoe into the reception-room where Prince Vassily had remained with the eldest princess. Pierre supposed that this too was an inevitable part of the proceedings, and, after a little delay, he followed her. Anna Mihalovna was standing beside the princess, and they were both talking at once in excited tones.

“Allow me, madam, to know what is and what is not to be done,” said the princess, who was apparently in the same exasperated temper as she had been when she slammed the door of her room.

“But, dear princess,” Anna Mihalovna was saying mildly and persuasively, blocking up the way towards the bedroom and not letting the princess pass. “Would that not be too great a tax on poor uncle at such a moment, when he needs repose? At such moments to talk of worldly matters when his soul is already prepared …”

Prince Vassily was sitting in a low chair in his habitual attitude, with one leg crossed high above the other. His cheeks were twitching violently, and when they relaxed, they looked heavier below; but he wore the air of a man little interested in the two ladies’ discussion.

“No, my dear Anna Mihalovna, let Katish act on her own discretion. You know how the count loves her.”

“I don’t even know what is in this document,” said the princess, addressing Prince Vassily, and pointing to the inlaid portfolio which she held in her hand. “All I know is that the real will is in the bureau, and this is a paper that has been forgotten.…”

She tried to get round Anna Mihalovna, but the latter, with another little skip, barred her way again.

“I know, dear, sweet princess,” said Anna Mihalovna, taking hold of the portfolio, and so firmly that it was clear she would not readily let go of it again. “Dear princess, I beg you, I beseech you, spare him. I entreat you.”

The princess did not speak. All that was heard was the sound of a scuffle over the portfolio. There could be no doubt that if she were to speak, she would say nothing complimentary to Anna Mihalovna. The latter kept a tight grip, but in spite of that her voice retained all its sweet gravity and softness.

“Pierre, come here, my dear boy. He will not be one too many, I should imagine, in a family council; eh, prince?”

“Why don’t you speak,
mon cousin
?” the princess shrieked all of a sudden, so loudly that they heard her voice, and were alarmed by it in the drawing-room. “Why don’t you speak when here a meddling outsider takes upon herself to interfere, and make a scene on the very threshold of a dying man’s room? Scheming creature,” she muttered viciously, and tugged at the portfolio with all her might, but Anna Mihalovna took a few steps forward so as not to lose her grasp of it and changed hands.

“Ah,” said Prince Vassily, in reproachful wonder. He got up. “It is ridiculous. Come, let go. I tell you.” The princess let go.

“And you.”

Anna Mihalovna did not heed him.

“Let go, I tell you. I will take it all upon myself. I will go and ask him. I … you let it alone.”

“But, prince,” said Anna Mihalovna, “after this solemn sacrament, let him have a moment’s peace. Here, Pierre, tell me your opinion,” she turned to the young man, who going up to them was staring in surprise at the exasperated face of the princess, which had thrown off all appearance of decorum, and the twitching cheeks of Prince Vassily.

“Remember that you will have to answer for all the consequences,” said Prince Vassily sternly; “you don’t know what you are doing.”

“Infamous woman,” shrieked the princess, suddenly pouncing on Anna Mihalovna and tearing the portfolio from her. Prince Vassily bowed his head and flung up his hands.

At that instant the door, the dreadful door at which Pierre had gazed so long, and which had opened so softly, was flung rapidly, noisily open,
banging against the wall, and the second princess ran out wringing her hands.

“What are you about?” she said, in despair. “He is passing away, and you leave me alone.”

The eldest princess dropped the portfolio. Swiftly Anna Mihalovna stooped and, snatching up the object of dispute, ran into the bedroom. The eldest princess and Prince Vassily recovering themselves followed her. A few minutes later the eldest princess came out again with a pale, dry face, biting her underlip. At the sight of Pierre her face expressed irrepressible hatred.

“Yes, now you can give yourself airs,” she said, “you have got what you wanted.” And breaking into sobs, she hid her face in her handkerchief and ran out of the room.

The next to emerge was Prince Vassily. He staggered to the sofa, on which Pierre was sitting, and sank on to it, covering his eyes with his hand. Pierre noticed that he was pale, and that his lower jaw was quivering and working as though in ague.

“Ah, my dear boy,” he said, taking Pierre by the elbow—and there was a sincerity and a weakness in his voice that Pierre had never observed in him before—“what sins, what frauds we commit, and all for what? I’m over fifty, my dear boy.… I too.… It all ends in death, all. Death is awful.” He burst into tears.

Anna Mihalovna was the last to come out. She approached Pierre with soft, deliberate steps. “Pierre,” she said. Pierre looked inquiringly at her. She kissed the young man on the forehead, wetting him with her tears. She did not speak for a while.

“He is no more.…”

Pierre gazed at her over his spectacles.

“Come. I will take you back. Try to cry. Nothing relieves like tears.”

She led him into the dark drawing-room, and Pierre was glad that no one could see his face. Anna Mihalovna left him, and when she came back he was fast asleep with his arm under his head.

The next morning Anna Mihalovna said to Pierre: “Yes, my dear boy, it is a great loss for us all. I do not speak of you. But God will uphold you; you are young, and now you are at the head of an immense fortune, I hope. The will has not been opened yet. I know you well enough to know that this will not turn your head, but it will impose duties upon you and you must be a man.”

Pierre did not speak.

“Perhaps, later, I may tell you, my dear boy, that if I had not been there God knows what would have happened. You know, my uncle promised me, only the day before yesterday, not to forget Boris. But he had no time. I hope, dear friend, that you will fulfil your father’s desire.”

Pierre did not understand a word, and colouring shyly, looked dumbly at Anna Mihalovna. After talking to him, Anna Mihalovna drove to the Rostovs’, and went to bed. On waking in the morning, she told the Rostovs and all her acquaintances the details of Count Bezuhov’s death. She said that the count had died, as she would wish to die herself, that his end had been not simply touching, but edifying; that the last interview of the father and son had been so touching that she could not recall it without tears; and that she did not know which had behaved more nobly in those terrible moments: the father, who had remembered everything and every one so well at the last, and had said such moving words to his son; or Pierre, whom it was heartbreaking to see, so utterly crushed was he, though he yet tried to conceal his grief, so as not to distress his dying father. “It is painful, but it does one good; it uplifts the soul to see such men as the old count and his worthy son,” she said. She told them about the action of the princess and Prince Vassily too, but in great secrecy, in whispers, and with disapproval.

At Bleak Hills, the estate of Prince Nikolay Andreivitch Bolkonsky, the arrival of young Prince Andrey and his wife was daily expected. But this expectation did not disturb the regular routine in which life moved in the old prince’s household. Prince Nikolay Andreivitch, once a commander-in-chief, known in the fashionable world by the nickname of “the Prussian king,” had been exiled to his estate in the reign of Paul, and had remained at Bleak Hills ever since with his daughter, Princess Marya, and her companion, Mademoiselle Bourienne. Even in the new reign, though he had received permission to return to the capital, he had never left his home in the country, saying that if any one wanted to see him, he could travel the hundred and fifty versts from Moscow to Bleak Hills, and, for his part, he wanted nobody and nothing. He used to maintain that human vices all sprang from only two sources—idleness and superstition, and that there were but two virtues—energy and intelligence.
He had himself undertaken the education of his daughter; and to develop in her these important qualities, he continued giving her lessons in algebra and geometry up to her twentieth year, and mapped out her whole life in uninterrupted occupation. He was himself always occupied in writing his memoirs, working out problems in higher mathematics, turning snuff-boxes on his lathe, working in his garden, or looking after the erection of farm buildings which were always being built on his estate. Since the great thing for enabling one to get through work is regularity, he had carried regularity in his manner of life to the highest point of exactitude. His meals were served in a fixed and invariable manner, and not only at a certain hour, but at a certain minute. With those about him, from his daughter to his servants, the count was sharp and invariably exacting, and so, without being cruel, he inspired a degree of respect and awe that the most cruel man could not readily have commanded. In spite of the fact that he was now on the retired list, and had no influence whatever in political circles, every high official in the province in which was the prince’s estate felt obliged to call upon him, and had, just like the architect, the gardener, or Princess Marya, to wait till the regular hour at which the prince always made his appearance in the lofty waiting-room. And every one in the waiting-room felt the same veneration, and even awe, when the immensely high door of the study opened and showed the small figure of the old man in a powdered wig, with his little withered hands and grey, overhanging eyebrows, that, at times when he scowled, hid the gleam in his shrewd, youthful-looking eyes.