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NEXT DAY, by the advice of Marya Dmitryevna, Count Ilya Andreitch went with
Natasha to call on Prince Nikolay Andreitch. The count prepared for the visit by
no means in a cheerful spirit: in his heart he was afraid. Count Ilya Andreitch
had a vivid recollection of his last interview with the old prince at the time
of the levying of the militia, when, in reply to his invitation to dinner, he
had had to listen to a heated reprimand for furnishing less than the required
number of men. Natasha in her best dress was, on the contrary, in the most
cheerful frame of mind. “They can't help liking me,” she thought; “every one
always does like me. And I'm so ready to do anything they please for them, so
readily to love them—him for being his father, and her for being his sister—they
can have no reason for not loving me!”
They drove to the gloomy old house in Vosdvizhenka, and went into the
vestibule.
“Well now, with God's blessing,” said the count, half in jest, half in
earnest. But Natasha noticed that her father was in a nervous fidget as he went
into the entry, and asked timidly and softly whether the prince and the princess
were at home. After their arrival had been announced, there was some
perturbation visible among the prince's servants. The footman, who was running
to announce them, was stopped by another footman in the big hall, and they
whispered together. A maid-servant ran into the hall, and hurriedly said
something, mentioning the princess. At last one old footman came out with a
wrathful air, and announced to the Rostovs that the prince was not receiving,
but the princess begged them to walk up. The first person to meet the visitors
was Mademoiselle Bourienne. She greeted the father and daughter with marked
courtesy, and conducted them to the princess's apartment. The princess, with a
frightened and agitated face, flushed in patches, ran in, treading heavily, to
meet her visitors, doing her best to seem cordial and at ease. From the first
glance Princess Marya disliked Natasha. She thought her too fashionably dressed,
too frivolously gay and vain. Princess Marya had no idea that before she had
seen her future sister-in-law she had been unfavourably disposed to her, through
unconscious envy of her beauty, her youth, and her happiness, and through
jealousy of her brother's love for her. Apart from this insuperable feeling of
antipathy to her, Princess Marya was at that moment agitated by the fact that on
the Rostovs' having been announced the old prince had shouted that he didn't
want to see them, that Princess Marya could see them if she chose, but they were
not to be allowed in to see him. Princess Marya resolved to see the Rostovs, but
she was every instant in dread of some freak on the part of the old prince, as
he had appeared greatly excited by the arrival of the Rostovs.
“Well, here I have brought you my songstress, princess,” said the count,
bowing and scraping, while he looked round uneasily as though he were afraid the
old prince might come in. “How glad I am that you should make friends.…Sorry,
very sorry, the prince is still unwell”; and uttering a few more stock phrases,
he got up. “If you'll allow me, princess, to leave you my Natasha for a quarter
of an hour, I will drive round—only a few steps from here—to Dogs' Square to see
Anna Semyonovna, and then come back for her.”
Count Ilya Andreitch bethought himself of this diplomatic stratagem to give
the future sisters-in-law greater freedom to express their feelings to one
another (so he told his daughter afterwards), but also to avoid the possibility
of meeting the prince, of whom he was afraid. He did not tell his daughter this;
but Natasha perceived this dread and uneasiness of her father's, and felt
mortified by it. She blushed for her father, felt still angrier at having
blushed, and glanced at the princess with a bold, challenging air, meant to
express that she was not afraid of any one. The princess told the count that she
would be delighted, and only begged him to stay a little longer at Anna
Semyonovna's, and Ilya Andreitch departed.
In spite of the uneasy glances flung at her by Princess Marya, who wanted to
talk to Natasha by herself, Mademoiselle Bourienne would not leave the room, and
persisted in keeping up a conversation about Moscow entertainments and theatres.
Natasha felt offended by the delay in the entry, by her father's nervousness,
and by the constrained manner of the princess, who seemed to her to be making a
favour of receiving her. And then everything displeased her. She did not like
Princess Marya. She seemed to her very ugly, affected, and frigid. Natasha
suddenly, as it were, shrank into herself, and unconsciously assumed a
non-chalant air, which repelled Princess Marya more and more. After five minutes
of irksome and constrained conversation, they heard the sound of slippered feet
approaching rapidly. Princess Marya's face expressed terror: the door of the
room opened, and the prince came in, in a white night-cap and
dressing-gown.
“Ah, madam,” he began, “madam, countess.…Countess Rostov… if I'm not
mistaken…I beg you to excuse me, to excuse me…I didn't know, madam. As God's
above, I didn't know that you were deigning to visit us, and came in to my
daughter in this costume. I beg you to excuse me…as God's above, I didn't know,”
he repeated so unnaturally, with emphasis on the word “God,” and so
unpleasantly, that Princess Marya rose to her feet with her eyes on the ground,
not daring to look either at her father or at Natasha. Natasha, getting up and
curtseying, did not know either what she was to do. Only Mademoiselle Bourienne
smiled agreeably.
“I beg you to excuse me, I beg you to excuse me! As God's above, I didn't
know,” muttered the old man, and looking Natasha over from head to foot, he went
out.
Mademoiselle Bourienne was the first to recover herself after this
apparition, and began talking about the prince's ill-health. Natasha and
Princess Marya gazed dumbly at one another, and the longer they gazed dumbly at
one another without saying what they wanted to say, the more unfavourably each
felt disposed to the other.
When the count returned, Natasha showed a discourteous relief at seeing him,
and made haste to get away. At that moment she almost hated that stiff, oldish
princess, who could put her in such an awkward position, and spend half an hour
with her without saying a word about Prince Andrey. “I couldn't be the first to
speak of him before that Frenchwoman,” thought Natasha. Princess Marya meanwhile
was tortured by the very same feeling. She knew what she had to say to Natasha,
but she could not do it, both because Mademoiselle Bourienne prevented her, and
because she did not know herself why—it was difficult for her to begin to speak
of the marriage. The count was already going out of the room when Princess Marya
moved rapidly up to Natasha, took her hand, and, with a heavy sigh, said: “Wait
a moment, I want…” Natasha's expression as she looked at Princess Marya was
ironical, though she did not know why.
“Dear Natalie,” said Princess Marya, “do believe how glad I am that my
brother has found such happiness…” She paused, feeling she was telling a lie.
Natasha noticed the pause, and guessed the reason of it.
“I imagine, princess, that it is not now suitable to speak of that,” said
Natasha, with external dignity and coldness, though she felt the tears rising in
her throat.
“What have I said, what have I done?” she thought as soon as she had gone out
of the room.
They had to wait a long while for Natasha to come to dinner that day. She was
sitting in her room, crying like a child, choking, and sobbing. Sonya stood over
her, and kept kissing her on the head.
“Natasha, what is it?” she kept saying. “Why need you mind about them? It
will pass, Natasha.”
“No, if only you knew how insulting it was…as though I…”
“Don't talk of it, Natasha; it's not your fault, you see, so what does it
matter to you! Kiss me,” said Sonya.
Natasha raised her head, and kissing her friend on the lips, pressed her wet
face against her.
“I can't say; I don't know. It's no one's fault,” said Natasha; “it's my
fault. But it's all awfully painful. Oh, why doesn't he come?…”
She went down to dinner with red eyes. Marya Dmitryevna, who had heard how
the old prince had received the Rostovs, pretended not to notice Natasha's
troubled face, and kept up a loud, jesting conversation at table with the count
and the other guests.
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