War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [104]
Bilibin and “ours” burst out laughing, looking Ippolit in the eye. Prince Andrei saw that this Ippolit, of whom he (it had to be admitted) had almost been jealous over his wife, was the buffoon of the company.
“No, I must treat you to Kuragin,” Bilibin said softly to Bolkonsky. “He’s charming when he argues about politics, you should see such gravity.”
He sat beside Ippolit and, gathering the folds of his forehead, began a conversation about politics with him. Prince Andrei and the others stood around them.
“Le cabinet de Berlin ne peut pas exprimer un sentiment d’alliance,” Ippolit began, looking around significantly at them all, “sans exprimer…comme dans sa dernière note…vous comprenez…vous comprenez…et puis si sa Majesté l’Empereur ne déroge pas au principe de notre alliance…”
“Attendez, je n’ai pas fini…” he said to Prince Andrei, seizing him by the arm. “Je suppose que l’intervention sera plus forte que la non-intervention. Et…” He paused. “On ne pourra pas imputer à la fin de nonrecevoir notre dépêche du 28 novembre. Voilà comment tout cela finira.”†205
And he let go of Bolkonsky’s arm, thus indicating that he was quite finished.
“Démosthène, je te reconnais au caillou que tu as caché dans ta bouche d’or!”‡206 13 said Bilibin, whose shock of hair moved on his head with pleasure.
They all laughed. Ippolit laughed more than anyone else. He obviously suffered, choked, but was unable to hold back the wild laughter that distended his ever immobile face.
“Well, I tell you what, gentlemen,” said Bilibin, “Bolkonsky is a guest in my house and here in Brünn, and I want to treat him, as far as I can, to all the joys of life here. If we were in Vienna, that would be easy; but here, dans ce vilain trou morave it’s harder, and I ask you all to help. Il faut lui faire les honneurs de Brünn.*207 You’ll take the theater upon yourselves, I’ll take society, and you, Ippolit, naturally, the women.”
“We must show him Amélie—charming!” said one of “ours,” kissing the tips of his fingers.
“Generally, this bloodthirsty soldier,” said Bilibin, “needs to be converted to more humane views.”
“It’s unlikely that I’ll take advantage of your hospitality, gentlemen, and it’s now time for me to go,” Bolkonsky said, glancing at his watch.
“Where?”
“To the emperor.”
“Oh! oh! oh!”
“Well, good-bye, Bolkonsky! Good-bye, Prince; come early to dinner,” said several voices. “We’ll take good care of you.”
“Try to praise the order for the delivery of provisions and the itineraries as much as possible to the emperor,” said Bilibin, seeing Bolkonsky off to the front hall.
“I wish I could, but I can’t, as far as I know,” Bolkonsky replied, smiling.
“Well, generally, talk as much as possible. Audiences are his passion; but he neither likes nor is able to talk himself, as you’ll see.”
XII
At the levee, the emperor Franz merely looked intently into the face of Prince Andrei, who was standing in the place assigned to him among the Austrian officers, and nodded his long head at him. But after the levee, yesterday’s imperial adjutant courteously conveyed to Bolkonsky the emperor’s wish to grant him an audience. The emperor Franz received him standing in the middle of the room. Before the conversation began, it struck Prince Andrei that the emperor was as if confused, did not know what to say, and blushed.
“Tell me, when did the battle begin?” he asked hastily.
Prince Andrei replied. After that question, other equally simple questions followed: “Was Kutuzov in good health? How long ago had he left Krems?” and so on. The emperor spoke with such an expression as if his whole goal consisted in asking a certain number of questions. The replies to these questions, as was only too clear, were of no interest to him.
“At what time did the battle begin?” asked the emperor.
“I am unable to tell Your Majesty at what time the battle at the front began, but in Dürenstein, where I was, the troops went into attack between five and six o’clock in the evening,” said Bolkonsky, livening up and supposing on this occasion that he would