War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy [8]
SCHÉRER, ÁNNA PÁVLOVNA (Annette), hostess of an aristocratic salon in Petersburg
TÍKHON (no patronymic or family name) (Tíshka), old Prince Bolkonsky’s personal manservant
TÚSHIN (no first name or patronymic), captain of Russian artillery at the battle of Schöngraben
WILLÁRSKI (no first name or patronymic), Polish count and Mason
Part One
I
“Eh bien, mon prince, Gênes et Lucques ne sont plus que des apanages, des estates, de la famille Buonaparte.1 Non, je vous préviens, que si vous ne me dites pas que nous avons la guerre, si vous vous permettez encore de pallier toutes les infamies, toutes les atrocités de cet Antichrist (ma parole, j’y crois)—je ne vous connais plus, vous n’êtes plus mon ami, vous n’êtes plus my faithful slave, comme vous dites. Well, good evening, good evening. Je vois que je vous fais peur, sit down and tell me about it.”*2
So spoke, in July 1805, the renowned Anna Pavlovna Scherer, maid of honor and intimate of the empress Maria Feodorovna, greeting the important and high-ranking Prince Vassily, the first to arrive at her soirée. Anna Pavlovna had been coughing for several days. She had the grippe, as she put it (grippe was a new word then, used only by rare people). Little notes had been sent out that morning with a red-liveried footman, and on all of them without distinction there was written:
Si vous n’avez rien de mieux à faire, Monsieur le comte (or mon prince), et si la perspective de passer la soirée chez une pauvre malade ne vous effraye pas trop, je serai charmée de vous voir chez moi entre 7 et 10 heures.†3
Annette Scherer.
“Dieu, quelle virulente sortie!”‡4 the entering prince replied, not ruffled in the least by such a reception. He was wearing an embroidered court uniform, stockings, shoes, and stars, and had a bright expression on his flat face.
He spoke that refined French in which our grandparents not only spoke but thought, and with those quiet, patronizing intonations which are proper to a significant man who has grown old in society and at court. He went over to Anna Pavlovna, kissed her hand, presenting her with his perfumed and shining bald pate, and settled comfortably on the sofa.
“Avant tout dites-moi, comment vous allez, chère amie.*5 Set me at ease,” he said, without changing his voice and in a tone in which, through propriety and sympathy, one could discern indifference and even mockery.
“How can one be well…when one suffers morally? Is it possible to remain at ease in our time, if one has any feeling?” said Anna Pavlovna. “You’ll stay the whole evening, I hope?”
“And the fête at the British ambassador’s? Today is Wednesday. I must put in an appearance,” said the prince. “My daughter will come to fetch me and take me there.”
“I thought today’s fête was cancelled. Je vous avoue que toutes ces fêtes et tous ces feux d’artifice commencent à devenir insipides.”†6
“If they had known that you wished it, the fête would have been cancelled,” said the prince, uttering out of habit, like a wound-up clock, things that he did not even wish people to believe.
“Ne me tourmentez pas. Eh bien, qu’a-t-on décidé par rapport à la dépêche de Novosilzoff?2 Vous savez tout.”‡7
“What can I tell you?” said the prince, in a cold, bored tone. “Qu’a-t-on décidé? On a décidé que Buonaparte a brûlé ses vaisseaux, et je crois que nous sommes en train de brûler les nôtres.”§8
Prince Vassily always spoke lazily, the way an actor speaks a role in an old play. Anna Pavlovna Scherer, on the contrary, despite her forty years, was brimming with animation and impulses.
Being an enthusiast had become her social position, and she sometimes became enthusiastic even when she had no wish to, so as not to deceive the expectations of people who knew her. The restrained smile that constantly played on Anna Pavlovna’s face, though it did not suit her outworn features, expressed, as it does in spoiled children, a constant awareness of her dear shortcoming, which she did not wish, could not, and found no need to correct.
In the midst of a conversation about political doings, Anna Pavlovna