War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [221]
“He does know what this loss means to me,” he said to himself. “Can he really wish for my ruin? He used to be my friend. I loved him…But it’s not his fault either; what can he do if he’s in luck? Nor is it my fault,” he said to himself. “I’ve done nothing wrong. Did I kill anyone, insult or wish evil to anyone? Why, then, such a terrible misfortune? And when did it start? Just now, when I came to this table, wishing to win a hundred roubles to buy that sewing box for mama’s birthday and go home, I was so happy, so free, so cheerful! And I didn’t realize then how happy I was! When did it end, and when did this new, terrible condition begin? What marked the change? I kept sitting in the same way in this place, at this table, choosing cards and playing them, and watching those broad-boned, deft hands. When did it happen, and what has happened? I’m healthy, strong, I’m the same and in the same place. No, it can’t be! Surely it will all come to nothing.”
He was red, all in a sweat, though it was not hot in the room. And his face was frightful and pitiful, especially in its impotent desire to seem calm.
The score reached the fateful number of forty-three thousand. Rostov prepared a card which was to go corners on the three thousand just given him, when Dolokhov tapped the deck on the table, set it aside, and, taking the chalk, quickly began in his clear, strong hand, breaking the piece of chalk, to add up Rostov’s score.
“Supper, time for supper! The Gypsies are here!” Indeed, some dark-haired men and women, saying something with a Gypsy accent, were already coming in from the cold. Nikolai knew it was all over, but he said in an indifferent voice:
“So you won’t go on? And I had a nice card ready.” As if he was most interested in the amusement of the game itself.
“It’s all over, I’m lost!” he thought. “A bullet in the head is all that’s left to me,” and at the same time he said in a cheerful voice:
“Well, one more little card.”
“All right,” said Dolokhov, having finished reckoning, “all right! I’ll go twenty-one roubles,” he said, pointing to the difference of twenty-one roubles over the exact sum of forty-three thousand, and, taking the deck, prepared to deal. Rostov obediently unbent the corner and, instead of the six thousand he had prepared, carefully wrote twenty-one.
“It’s all the same to me,” he said. “I’m just curious to know whether you’ll kill this ten or let me win it.”
Dolokhov gravely began to deal. Oh, how Rostov hated at that moment those reddish hands, with their short fingers and the hair sticking out from the cuffs, which had him in their power…He won the ten.
“You owe me forty-three thousand, Count,” said Dolokhov, and he stood up from the table and stretched. “It’s tiring, though, to sit so long,” he said.
“Yes, I’m tired, too,” said Rostov.
Dolokhov, as if to remind him that it was unsuitable for him to joke, interrupted him:
“When will I get the money, Count, if you please?”
Rostov flushed and invited Dolokhov to another room.
“I can’t pay it all, I suppose you’ll accept a promissory note,” he said.
“Listen, Rostov,” said Dolokhov, smiling brightly and looking into Nikolai’s eyes, “you know the saying, ‘Lucky in love, unlucky at cards.’ Your cousin’s in love with you. I know it.”
“Oh! it’s terrible to feel myself so much in this man’s power,” thought Rostov. Rostov knew what a blow he would deal to his father, to his mother, in announcing this loss; he knew what happiness it would be to be delivered