War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [560]
“Lord Jesus Christ!” she said.
Mavra Kuzminishna suggested that the wounded man be taken into the house.
“My masters won’t say anything…” she said. But they had to avoid carrying him upstairs, and therefore the wounded man was taken to the wing and put in Mme Schoss’s former room. This wounded man was Prince Andrei Bolkonsky.
XV
Moscow’s last day came. The weather was clear, cheerful, autumnal. It was Sunday. As on an ordinary Sunday, the bells were ringing for the liturgy in all the churches. No one, it seemed, could yet grasp what was in store for Moscow.
Only two indicators of the condition of society expressed the state Moscow was in: the mob, that is, the estate of the poor, and the prices of products. An enormous crowd of factory workers, servants, and muzhiks, mixed with clerks, seminarians, and noblemen, went out to the Three Hills early in the morning of that day. They stood there and waited in vain for Rastopchin, and, realizing that Moscow would be surrendered, this crowd dispersed to pot-houses and taverns all over Moscow. The prices that day also indicated the state of things. The prices of weapons, gold, carts, and horses kept going up, while the prices of paper money and city things kept going down, so that by the middle of the day there were occasions when cabbies drove off with expensive goods, like broadcloth, for half the price, while a peasant horse was sold for five hundred roubles. Furniture, mirrors, bronze objects were given away for nothing.
In the sedate old household of the Rostovs, the breakdown of the former conditions of life expressed itself very faintly. In regard to the servants, the only thing was that three persons from the enormous staff disappeared during the night; but nothing was stolen; and in regard to the prices of things, it turned out that the thirty carts that had come from their country estates amounted to enormous wealth, which was envied by many and for which the Rostovs were offered enormous sums. Not only were enormous sums offered for these carts, but in the evening and early in the morning of the first of September, orderlies and servants sent by wounded officers kept coming to the Rostovs’ courtyard, and wounded men placed with the Rostovs and neighbors came dragging themselves, imploring the Rostovs’ servants to intercede for them to be given carts in order to leave Moscow. The butler, to whom these requests were addressed, though he pitied the wounded, resolutely refused, saying he would not dare even inform the count of it. However pitiful these abandoned wounded were, it was obvious that if they were to give them one cart, there would be no reason not to give them more, all—and their own carriages as well. Thirty carts would not save all the wounded, and amidst the general disaster, it was impossible not to think of oneself and one’s own family. So the butler thought for his master.
Waking up on the morning of the first, Count Ilya Andreich quietly left the bedroom, trying not to wake the countess, who had fallen asleep only towards morning, and in his purple silk dressing gown went out to the porch. The tied-down carts stood in the courtyard. By the porch stood the carriages. The butler stood by the entrance, talking with an old orderly and a pale young officer with his arm in a sling. The butler, seeing the count, gave the officer and the orderly a meaningful and stern sign to withdraw.
“Well, is everything ready, Vassilyich?” said the count, rubbing his bald pate, glancing good-naturedly at the officer and the orderly and nodding to them. (The count liked new faces.)
“We can hitch up at once, Your Excellency.”
“Well, that’s nice, the countess will wake up, and God speed us! What about you, gentlemen?” he turned to the officer. “Are you staying in my house?” The officer moved closer. His pale face suddenly flushed with bright color.
“Do me a favor, Count, allow me…for God’s sake…to take refuge somewhere on one of your carts. I’ve got nothing with me. I’ll get on top…it