War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [362]
“Everything suddenly comes at once,” the count replied. “Rags to be bought, and now there’s also a buyer for the estate and the house. If you could do me the kindness, I’ll choose a little moment, drive over to Maryinskoe for a day, and leave my girls in your hands.”
“All right, all right, with me they’ll be safe. With me it’s like state custody. I’ll take them out wherever necessary, and scold them, and pet them,” said Marya Dmitrievna, touching the cheek of Natasha, her goddaughter and favorite, with her big hand.
The next morning Marya Dmitrievna took the girls to the Iverskaya Chapel and to Mme Aubert-Chalmet, who was so afraid of Marya Dmitrievna that she always let her have dresses for less, so as to get rid of her quickly. Marya Dmitrievna ordered almost the whole trousseau. On coming home, she drove everyone but Natasha out of the room and called her favorite to her armchair.
“Well, now let’s have a talk. I congratulate you on your fiancé. You’ve hooked a fine one! I’m glad for you. I’ve known him since he was this high,” she indicated some two feet from the ground. Natasha was blushing joyfully. “I love him and his whole family. Now listen. You know, old Prince Nikolai was very much against his son’s getting married. A crotchety old man! Of course, Prince Andrei is not a child and can do without him, but it’s not nice to enter the family against his will. It should be done peacefully, lovingly. You’re a clever girl, you’ll find a way. Go about it nicely and cleverly. And then everything will be all right.”
Natasha said nothing, out of shyness, as Marya Dmitrievna thought, but, in reality, Natasha disliked any interference in the matter of her love for Prince Andrei, which appeared to her so set apart from all human affairs that no one, to her mind, could understand it. She loved and knew only Prince Andrei; he loved her and was to come one day soon and take her. She needed nothing else.
“You see, I’ve known him for a long time, and I love Mashenka, your sister-in-law. A sister-in-law is a sharp claw, but this one wouldn’t hurt a fly. She’s asked me to get you together with her. You’ll go to her tomorrow with your father. Be nice and affectionate with her: you’re younger than she is. So your young man comes, and you’re already acquainted with his sister and father, and they love you. Am I right or not? Won’t it be better?”
“Yes,” Natasha replied reluctantly.
VII
The next day, on Marya Dmitrievna’s advice, Count Ilya Andreich went with Natasha to see Prince Nikolai Andreich. The count set out on this visit in a cheerless mood: deep in his heart he was frightened. Their last meeting, during the recruitment, when the count, in response to his invitation to dinner, had listened to a scathing reprimand for failing to provide men, had remained in Count Ilya Andreich’s memory. Natasha, wearing her best dress, was, on the contrary, in a most cheerful mood. “It can’t be that they won’t come to love me,” she thought, “everyone has always loved me. And I’m so ready to do everything they want for them, so ready to love him, because he’s his father, and her, because she’s his sister, there’s no reason why they shouldn’t love me!”
They drove up to the old, gloomy house on Vzdvizhenka Street and went into the vestibule.
“Well, God bless us,” the count said, half jokingly, half seriously; but Natasha noticed that her father was flustered as he stepped into the front hall and asked timidly and softly whether the prince and princess were at home. The announcement