บทที่ บทที่ 125 · 第125章

Next day Prince Andrew called at a few houses he had not visited before,

and among them at the Rostóvs’ with whom he had renewed acquaintance

at the ball. Apart from considerations of politeness which demanded the

call, he wanted to see that original, eager girl who had left such a

pleasant impression on his mind, in her own home.

Natásha was one of the first to meet him. She was wearing a dark-blue

house dress in which Prince Andrew thought her even prettier than in

her ball dress. She and all the Rostóv family welcomed him as an old

friend, simply and cordially. The whole family, whom he had formerly

judged severely, now seemed to him to consist of excellent, simple,

and kindly people. The old count’s hospitality and good nature, which

struck one especially in Petersburg as a pleasant surprise, were such

that Prince Andrew could not refuse to stay to dinner. “Yes,”

he thought, “they are capital people, who of course have not the

slightest idea what a treasure they possess in Natásha; but they are

kindly folk and form the best possible setting for this strikingly

poetic, charming girl, overflowing with life!”

In Natásha Prince Andrew was conscious of a strange world completely

alien to him and brimful of joys unknown to him, a different world,

that in the Otrádnoe avenue and at the window that moonlight night

had already begun to disconcert him. Now this world disconcerted him no

longer and was no longer alien to him, but he himself having entered it

found in it a new enjoyment.

After dinner Natásha, at Prince Andrew’s request, went to the

clavichord and began singing. Prince Andrew stood by a window talking

to the ladies and listened to her. In the midst of a phrase he ceased

speaking and suddenly felt tears choking him, a thing he had thought

impossible for him. He looked at Natásha as she sang, and something new

and joyful stirred in his soul. He felt happy and at the same time sad.

He had absolutely nothing to weep about yet he was ready to weep. What

about? His former love? The little princess? His disillusionments?...

His hopes for the future?... Yes and no. The chief reason was a sudden,

vivid sense of the terrible contrast between something infinitely great

and illimitable within him and that limited and material something that

he, and even she, was. This contrast weighed on and yet cheered him

while she sang.

As soon as Natásha had finished she went up to him and asked how he

liked her voice. She asked this and then became confused, feeling that

she ought not to have asked it. He smiled, looking at her, and said he

liked her singing as he liked everything she did.

Prince Andrew left the Rostóvs’ late in the evening. He went to bed

from habit, but soon realized that he could not sleep. Having lit his

candle he sat up in bed, then got up, then lay down again not at all

troubled by his sleeplessness: his soul was as fresh and joyful as if he

had stepped out of a stuffy room into God’s own fresh air. It did not

enter his head that he was in love with Natásha; he was not thinking

about her, but only picturing her to himself, and in consequence all

life appeared in a new light. “Why do I strive, why do I toil in this

narrow, confined frame, when life, all life with all its joys, is open

to me?” said he to himself. And for the first time for a very long

while he began making happy plans for the future. He decided that he

must attend to his son’s education by finding a tutor and putting

the boy in his charge, then he ought to retire from the service and go

abroad, and see England, Switzerland and Italy. “I must use my freedom

while I feel so much strength and youth in me,” he said to himself.

“Pierre was right when he said one must believe in the possibility of

happiness in order to be happy, and now I do believe in it. Let the dead

bury their dead, but while one has life one must live and be happy!”

thought he.