War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [608]
“Qu’est-ce qu’elle veut cette femme?”‡‡632 asked the officer.
Pierre was like a drunk man. His ecstatic state increased still more at the sight of the girl he had saved.
“Ce qu’elle dit?” he said. “Elle m’apporte ma fille que je viens de sauver des flammes,”§§633 he said. “Adieu!” and, not knowing himself how this pointless lie had escaped him, he walked with resolute, solemn steps between the Frenchmen.
The French patrol was one of those that had been sent out on Durosnel’s orders to various streets in Moscow, to stop looting and especially to catch the incendiaries, who, in the general opinion for that day among the French higher command, were the cause of the fires. Having gone around a few streets, the patrol had picked up some five more suspicious Russians—one shopkeeper, two seminarians, a muzhik, a servant—and a few looters. But of all the suspicious people, Pierre seemed the most suspicious. When they were all taken to spend the night in a big house on the Zubovsky rampart, where a guardhouse had been set up, Pierre was placed separately under strict guard.
Part One
I
In Petersburg, in the highest circles, a complex struggle was going on with greater heat than ever between the parties of Rumyantsev, the French, Maria Feodorovna, the grand duke, and others, drowned as always by the humming of the court drones. But the calm, luxurious life of Petersburg, concerned only with phantoms, with reflections of life, went on as of old; and beyond this course of life it took great effort to realize the danger and the difficult situation the Russian people were in. There were the same levees and balls, the same French theater, the same interests of the courts, the same interests of the service and intrigues. Only in the very highest circles were efforts made to keep in mind the difficulty of the present situation. It was recounted in whispers how differently from each other the two empresses1 behaved in these difficult circumstances. The empress Maria Feodorovna, concerned with the welfare of the almshouses and orphanages in her charge, made arrangements to move all the institutions to Kazan, and the belongings of these establishments had already been packed. The empress Elizaveta Alexeevna, however, to the question of what orders she would be pleased to give, kindly replied, with characteristic Russian patriotism, that she could give no orders about state institutions, since that was the sovereign’s concern; as for what depended on her personally, she kindly replied that she would be the last to leave Petersburg.
On the twenty-sixth of August, the very day of the battle of Borodino, Anna Pavlovna had a soirée, the centerpiece of which was to be the reading of a letter from the metropolitan, written on the occasion of sending the sovereign an icon of St. Sergius.2 This letter was considered a model of patriotic, spiritual eloquence. It was to be read by Prince Vassily, famous for his artistic recitations. (He also used to read at the empress’s.) Artistic recitation consisted in pouring out words loudly, melodiously, alternating between a desperate howl and a tender murmur, quite regardless of their meaning, so that it was quite by chance that one word fell in with the howling and others with the murmuring. This reading, like all of Anna Pavlovna’s soirées, had a political significance. Several important persons were to be there, who had to be shamed for going to the French theater and inspired with patriotic sentiments. A good many people had already gathered, but Anna Pavlovna still did not see everyone she needed in her drawing room, and therefore would not let the reading begin, but initiated a general conversation.
The news of the day for that day in Petersburg was the illness of Countess Bezukhov. Several days earlier the countess had unexpectedly fallen ill, had missed several gatherings of which she was the adornment, and rumor had it that she was not receiving anyone, and that, instead of the famous Petersburg doctors