• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 3438 0

was not going to give in to that feeling, because to marry her—a girl with almost no fortune—would be to ruin his career, and to renew their former relations without aiming at marriage would be an ignoble thing to do. Boris decided in himself to avoid meeting Natasha, but, despite that decision, came a few days later and began to visit often and spend whole days at the Rostovs’. He fancied he had to have a talk with Natasha, to tell her that all the old things must be forgotten, that despite all…she could not be his wife, that he had no fortune, and she would never be allowed to marry him. But he kept failing and felt awkward about starting this talk. He became more and more entangled every day. Natasha, in her mother’s and Sonya’s observation, seemed to be as in love with Boris as before. She sang his favorite songs for him, showed him her album, made him write in it, and did not allow him to talk about old things, giving him to understand how beautiful the new things were; and every day he left in a fog, without having said what he meant to say, not knowing himself what he was doing, or why he came, or how it would end. Boris stopped frequenting Hélène, received reproachful notes from her, and even so spent whole days at the Rostovs’.

XIII

One evening, when the old countess, sighing and groaning, in nightcap and bed jacket, without false curls and with one poor little knot of hair sticking out from under the white cotton cap, was bowing to the ground on the rug as she said her evening prayers, her door creaked and Natasha came running in, her bare feet in slippers, also in her bed jacket and her hair in curling papers. The countess looked at her and frowned. She was just finishing the last prayer: “Will this couch be my grave?” Her prayerful mood was destroyed. Natasha, red, animated, seeing her mother praying, suddenly stopped running, crouched down, and involuntarily stuck out her tongue, chiding herself. Seeing that her mother went on praying, she ran on tiptoe to the bed, quickly rubbed one small foot against the other, shaking off her slippers, and jumped onto the “couch” which the old countess feared might become her grave. This “couch” was high, with a featherbed and five pillows, each smaller than the last. Natasha jumped up, sank into the featherbed, rolled over to the wall, and began fidgeting under the blanket, settling herself, bending her knees towards her chin, kicking her feet, and laughing barely audibly, now covering her head, now peeking out to look at her mother. The countess finished her prayer and went to the bed with a stern look; but, seeing that Natasha had pulled the covers over her head, she smiled her kind, weak smile.

“Well, well, well,” said the mother.

“Mama, can we talk? Say yes,” said Natasha. “Well, so one kiss here, another, and that’s it.” And she embraced her mother’s neck and kissed her under the chin. There was an outward crudeness in Natasha’s treatment of her mother, but she was so sensitive and adroit that, no matter how she embraced her mother, she was always able to do it so that it was neither painful, nor unpleasant, nor awkward for her.

“Well, what is it tonight?” asked her mother, settling on the pillows and waiting until Natasha, having kicked her feet and turned over twice, lay next to her under the same blanket, her arms on top it, her expression serious.

These nightly visits of Natasha, which took place before the count’s return from the club, were one of the favorite pleasures of both mother and daughter.

“What is it tonight? But I’ve got to tell you…”

Natasha covered her mother’s mouth with her hand.

“About Boris…I know,” she said seriously, “that’s what I came for. Don’t tell me, I know. No, tell me!” She took her hand away. “Tell me, mama. Isn’t he sweet?”

“Natasha, you are sixteen years old. At your age I was married. You say Borya is sweet. He’s very sweet, and I love him like a son, but what do you want?…What do you think? You’ve turned his head completely, I can see that…”

Saying this, the countess glanced at her daughter. Natasha lay looking straight