“So it never went further than ‘Sergei Kuzmich’?” one lady asked.
“No, no, not a hair’s breadth,” Prince Vassily replied, laughing. “‘Sergei Kuzmich…from all sides. From all sides, Sergei Kuzmich.’ Poor Vyazmitinov just couldn’t get any further. He took up the letter several more times, but as soon as he said ‘Sergei’…sobs…‘Ku…zmi…ch’—tears…and ‘from all sides’ was drowned in weeping, and he couldn’t go on. And again his handkerchief, and again ‘Sergei Kuzmich, from all sides,’ and tears…so that they finally asked someone else to read it.”
“‘Kuzmich…from all sides…’ and tears,” someone repeated, laughing.
“Don’t be wicked,” Anna Pavlovna said from the other end of the table, shaking her finger, “c’est un si brave et excellent homme notre bon Viasmitinoff…”*234
Everyone laughed a lot. At the upper, honored end of the table, everyone seemed to be merry and under the influence of the most varied, lively moods; only Pierre and Hélène silently sat next to each other almost at the lowest end of the table; on both their faces there was a restrained, radiant smile that had nothing to do with Sergei Kuzmich—a smile of bashfulness about their own feelings. Whatever the others said, however they laughed and joked together, whatever the appetite with which they savored the Rhein wine, the sauté, the ice cream, however they avoided glancing at this couple, however indifferent or inattentive to them they seemed, the feeling for some reason was, from the occasional glances cast at them, that the anecdote about Sergei Kuzmich, and the laughter, and the food were all a pretense, and all the power of attention of the entire company was directed only at this couple—Pierre and Hélène. Prince Vassily imitated Sergei Kuzmich’s sobbing, and at the same time shot a glance at his daughter; and all the while he laughed, the expression on his face said: “Yes, yes, it’s all going well; tonight it will all be decided.” Anna Pavlovna shook her finger at him for notre bon Viasmitinoff, but in her eyes, which flashed momentarily at Pierre, Prince Vassily read congratulations on his future son-in-law and his daughter’s happiness. The old princess, offering wine with a sad sigh to the lady next to her and glancing angrily at her daughter, seemed to be saying with that sigh: “Yes, now you and I have nothing left but to drink sweet wine, my dear; now it’s time for these young ones to be so boldly and defiantly happy.” “And what stupidity all this that I’m going on about is, as if it interests me,” thought the diplomat, glancing at the happy faces of the lovers. “That is happiness!”
Amidst the insignificant trifles, the artificial interests, that bound this company together, there turned up the simple feeling of attraction of a handsome and healthy young man and woman for each other. And this human feeling overwhelmed everything and soared above all this artifical babble. The jokes were not funny, the news was not interesting, the animation was obviously feigned. Not only they, but the footmen serving at the table seemed to feel the same and forgot the order of the service, gazing at the beauty Hélène with her radiant face, and at the red, fat, happy, and uneasy face of Pierre. It seemed that even the light of the candles was concentrated only on those two happy faces.
Pierre felt that he was the center of everything, and this position delighted and embarrassed him. He found himself in the state of a man immersed in some occupation. He neither saw, nor understood, nor heard anything clearly. Only rarely, unexpectedly, did fragmentary thoughts and impressions of reality flash in his soul.
“So it’s all over!” he thought. “And how did it all happen? So quickly! Now I know that, not for her alone, not for me alone, but for all of them, this inevitably had to come about. They all expect this so much, they’re so certain it will be, that I simply cannot disappoint them. But how will it be? I don’t know; but it will be, it will be without fail!” thought Pierre, glancing at those shoulders gleaming just near his eyes.
Then he suddenly became ashamed of something. He felt embarrassed that he alone was taking up everyone’s attention, that he was a lucky fellow in the eyes of others—he, with his unattractive face, some sort of Paris taking possession of Helen. “But surely it always happens that way and must be so,” he comforted himself. “And, anyhow, what did I do for it? When did it begin? I left Moscow along with Prince Vassily. There wasn’t anything yet. And then, why shouldn’t I have stayed with him? Then I played cards with her, picked up her reticule, went for a ride with her. When did it begin, when did it all happen?” And here he is sitting next to her, a fiancé he hears, sees, feels her closeness, her breathing, her movements, her beauty. Now it suddenly seems to him that it is not she but he himself who is so extraordinarily beautiful, that that is why they are looking at him that way, and he, happy in the general astonishment, draws himself up, raises his head, and rejoices at his happiness. Suddenly some voice, someone’s familiar voice, is heard and says something to him yet again. But Pierre is so taken up that he does not understand what is said to him.
“I’m asking you when you got a letter from Bolkonsky,” Prince Vassily repeats for the third time. “You’re so distracted, my dear.”
Prince Vassily smiles, and Pierre sees that everyone, everyone is smiling at him and at Hélène. “Well, so what if you all know,” Pierre says to himself. “Well, so what? it’s true,” and he smiles his meek, childlike smile, and Hélène smiles, too.
“When did you get it? From Olmütz?” Prince Vassily repeats, as if he needs to know in order to settle an argument.
“Can one really speak and think about such trifles?” thinks Pierre.
“Yes, from Olmütz,” he answers with a sigh.
After supper Pierre led his lady after the others to the drawing room. The guests began to depart, and some left without saying good-bye to Hélène. As if not wishing to tear her away from her serious occupation, some approached for a moment and left quickly, forbidding her to see them off. The diplomat was sadly silent as he left the drawing room. He was thinking about all the vanity of his diplomatic career compared with Pierre’s happiness. The old general grumbled angrily at his wife when she asked him how his foot was. “Ah, you old fool,” he thought. “Elena Sergeevna, now, she’ll be the same beauty even when she’s fifty.”