Bab Bab 24 · 第24章

There was now no one in the reception room except Prince Vasíli and the

eldest princess, who were sitting under the portrait of Catherine the

Great and talking eagerly. As soon as they saw Pierre and his companion

they became silent, and Pierre thought he saw the princess hide

something as she whispered:

“I can’t bear the sight of that woman.”

“Catiche has had tea served in the small drawing room,” said Prince

Vasíli to Anna Mikháylovna. “Go and take something, my poor Anna

Mikháylovna, or you will not hold out.”

To Pierre he said nothing, merely giving his arm a sympathetic squeeze

below the shoulder. Pierre went with Anna Mikháylovna into the small

drawing room.

“There is nothing so refreshing after a sleepless night as a cup

of this delicious Russian tea,” Lorrain was saying with an air of

restrained animation as he stood sipping tea from a delicate Chinese

handleless cup before a table on which tea and a cold supper were laid

in the small circular room. Around the table all who were at Count

Bezúkhov’s house that night had gathered to fortify themselves.

Pierre well remembered this small circular drawing room with its mirrors

and little tables. During balls given at the house Pierre, who did not

know how to dance, had liked sitting in this room to watch the ladies

who, as they passed through in their ball dresses with diamonds and

pearls on their bare shoulders, looked at themselves in the brilliantly

lighted mirrors which repeated their reflections several times. Now

this same room was dimly lighted by two candles. On one small table tea

things and supper dishes stood in disorder, and in the middle of the

night a motley throng of people sat there, not merrymaking, but somberly

whispering, and betraying by every word and movement that they none

of them forgot what was happening and what was about to happen in the

bedroom. Pierre did not eat anything though he would very much have

liked to. He looked inquiringly at his monitress and saw that she was

again going on tiptoe to the reception room where they had left Prince

Vasíli and the eldest princess. Pierre concluded that this also was

essential, and after a short interval followed her. Anna Mikháylovna

was standing beside the princess, and they were both speaking in excited

whispers.

“Permit me, Princess, to know what is necessary and what is not

necessary,” said the younger of the two speakers, evidently in the

same state of excitement as when she had slammed the door of her room.

“But, my dear princess,” answered Anna Mikháylovna blandly but

impressively, blocking the way to the bedroom and preventing the other

from passing, “won’t this be too much for poor Uncle at a moment

when he needs repose? Worldly conversation at a moment when his soul is

already prepared...”

Prince Vasíli was seated in an easy chair in his familiar attitude,

with one leg crossed high above the other. His cheeks, which were so

flabby that they looked heavier below, were twitching violently; but

he wore the air of a man little concerned in what the two ladies were

saying.

“Come, my dear Anna Mikháylovna, let Catiche do as she pleases. You

know how fond the count is of her.”

“I don’t even know what is in this paper,” said the younger of

the two ladies, addressing Prince Vasíli and pointing to an inlaid

portfolio she held in her hand. “All I know is that his real will is

in his writing table, and this is a paper he has forgotten....”

She tried to pass Anna Mikháylovna, but the latter sprang so as to bar

her path.

“I know, my dear, kind princess,” said Anna Mikháylovna, seizing

the portfolio so firmly that it was plain she would not let go easily.

“Dear princess, I beg and implore you, have some pity on him! Je vous

en conjure...”

The princess did not reply. Their efforts in the struggle for the

portfolio were the only sounds audible, but it was evident that if

the princess did speak, her words would not be flattering to Anna

Mikháylovna. Though the latter held on tenaciously, her voice lost none

of its honeyed firmness and softness.

“Pierre, my dear, come here. I think he will not be out of place in a

family consultation; is it not so, Prince?”

“Why don’t you speak, cousin?” suddenly shrieked the princess so

loud that those in the drawing room heard her and were startled. “Why

do you remain silent when heaven knows who permits herself to

interfere, making a scene on the very threshold of a dying man’s room?

Intriguer!” she hissed viciously, and tugged with all her might at the

portfolio.

But Anna Mikháylovna went forward a step or two to keep her hold on the

portfolio, and changed her grip.

Prince Vasíli rose. “Oh!” said he with reproach and surprise,

“this is absurd! Come, let go I tell you.”

The princess let go.

“And you too!”

But Anna Mikháylovna did not obey him.

“Let go, I tell you! I will take the responsibility. I myself will go

and ask him, I!... does that satisfy you?”

“But, Prince,” said Anna Mikháylovna, “after such a solemn

sacrament, allow him a moment’s peace! Here, Pierre, tell them your

opinion,” said she, turning to the young man who, having come quite

close, was gazing with astonishment at the angry face of the princess

which had lost all dignity, and at the twitching cheeks of Prince

Vasíli.

“Remember that you will answer for the consequences,” said Prince

Vasíli severely. “You don’t know what you are doing.”

“Vile woman!” shouted the princess, darting unexpectedly at Anna

Mikháylovna and snatching the portfolio from her.

Prince Vasíli bent his head and spread out his hands.

At this moment that terrible door, which Pierre had watched so long

and which had always opened so quietly, burst noisily open and banged

against the wall, and the second of the three sisters rushed out

wringing her hands.

“What are you doing!” she cried vehemently. “He is dying and you

leave me alone with him!”

Her sister dropped the portfolio. Anna Mikháylovna, stooping, quickly

caught up the object of contention and ran into the bedroom. The eldest

princess and Prince Vasíli, recovering themselves, followed her. A few

minutes later the eldest sister came out with a pale hard face, again

biting her underlip. At sight of Pierre her expression showed an

irrepressible hatred.

“Yes, now you may be glad!” said she; “this is what you have

been waiting for.” And bursting into tears she hid her face in her

handkerchief and rushed from the room.

Prince Vasíli came next. He staggered to the sofa on which Pierre was

sitting and dropped onto it, covering his face with his hand. Pierre

noticed that he was pale and that his jaw quivered and shook as if in an

ague.

“Ah, my friend!” said he, taking Pierre by the elbow; and there was

in his voice a sincerity and weakness Pierre had never observed in it

before. “How often we sin, how much we deceive, and all for what? I am

near sixty, dear friend... I too... All will end in death, all! Death is

awful...” and he burst into tears.

Anna Mikháylovna came out last. She approached Pierre with slow, quiet

steps.

“Pierre!” she said.

Pierre gave her an inquiring look. She kissed the young man on his

forehead, wetting him with her tears. Then after a pause she said:

“He is no more....”

Pierre looked at her over his spectacles.

“Come, I will go with you. Try to weep, nothing gives such relief as

tears.”

She led him into the dark drawing room and Pierre was glad no one could

see his face. Anna Mikháylovna left him, and when she returned he was

fast asleep with his head on his arm.

In the morning Anna Mikháylovna said to Pierre:

“Yes, my dear, this is a great loss for us all, not to speak of you.

But God will support you: you are young, and are now, I hope, in command

of an immense fortune. The will has not yet been opened. I know you

well enough to be sure that this will not turn your head, but it imposes

duties on you, and you must be a man.”

Pierre was silent.

“Perhaps later on I may tell you, my dear boy, that if I had not been

there, God only knows what would have happened! You know, Uncle promised

me only the day before yesterday not to forget Borís. But he had

no time. I hope, my dear friend, you will carry out your father’s

wish?”

Pierre understood nothing of all this and coloring shyly looked in

silence at Princess Anna Mikháylovna. After her talk with Pierre, Anna

Mikháylovna returned to the Rostóvs’ and went to bed. On waking in

the morning she told the Rostóvs and all her acquaintances the details

of Count Bezúkhov’s death. She said the count had died as she would

herself wish to die, that his end was not only touching but edifying. As

to the last meeting between father and son, it was so touching that she

could not think of it without tears, and did not know which had behaved

better during those awful moments—the father who so remembered

everything and everybody at last and had spoken such pathetic words to

the son, or Pierre, whom it had been pitiful to see, so stricken was he

with grief, though he tried hard to hide it in order not to sadden 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,” said she.

Of the behavior of the eldest princess and Prince Vasíli she spoke

disapprovingly, but in whispers and as a great secret.