War And Peace: Book 10 - CHAPTER XVIII

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WHEN PIERRE returned home, he was handed two new placards of Rastoptchin's

that had just appeared.

The first declared that the rumour, that it was forbidden to leave Moscow by

Count Rastoptchin's order, was false, and that, on the contrary, he was glad

that ladies and merchants' wives were leaving the town. “There will be less

panic and less false news,” said the notice; “but I will stake my life on it

that the miscreant will never enter Moscow.”

These words first showed Pierre clearly that the French certainly would enter

Moscow. In the second placard it was announced that our headquarters were at

Vyazma, that Count Wittgenstein had defeated the French, but that since many of

the inhabitants of Moscow were desirous of arming themselves, weapons had been

provided to meet their wishes in the arsenal; swords, pistols, and guns could

all be procured there at a low rate.

The tone of this notice was not as jocose as the former supposed discourses

of Tchigirin. The two placards made Pierre ponder. It was evident to him that

the menacing storm cloud, for the advent of which his whole soul longed, though

it roused an involuntary thrill of horror, it was evident that that cloud was

coming closer.

“Shall I enter the service and join the army or wait here?” Pierre thought, a

question he had put to himself a hundred times already. He took up a pack of

cards that lay on the table to deal them for a game of patience.

“If I succeed in this game of patience,” he said to himself, shuffling the

pack as he held it in his hand and looked upwards; “if I succeed, it means …

what does it mean?” … He had not time to decide this question when he heard at

the door of his study the voice of the eldest princess, asking whether she might

come in. “Then it will mean that I must set off to join the army,” Pierre told

himself. “Come, come in,” he said to the princess.

The eldest of his cousins, the one with the long waist and the stony face,

was the only one still living in Pierre's house; the two younger sisters had

both married.

“Excuse my coming to you, cousin,” she said in a tone of reproach and

excitement. “Some decision really must be come to, you know. What is going to

happen? Every one has left Moscow, and the populace are becoming unruly. Why are

we staying on?”

“On the contrary, everything seems going on satisfactorily, ma

cousine,” said Pierre in the habitually playful tone he had adopted with his

cousin, to carry off the embarrassment he always felt at being in the position

of a benefactor to her.

“Oh, yes, satisfactorily … highly satisfactory, I dare say. Varvara Ivanovna

told me to-day how our troops are distinguishing themselves. It is certainly a

credit to them. And the populace, too, is in complete revolt, they won't obey

any one now; even my maid has begun to be insolent. If it goes on like this,

they will soon begin killing us. One can't walk about the streets. And the worst

of it is, in another day or two the French will be here. Why are we waiting for

them? One favour I beg of you, mon cousin,” said the princess, “give

orders for me to be taken to Petersburg; whatever I may be, any way I can't live

under Bonaparte's rule.”

“But what nonsense, ma cousine! where do you get your information

from? On the contrary …”

“I'm not going to submit to your Napoleon. Other people may do as they like.…

If you won't do this for me …”

“But I will, I'll give orders for it at once.”

The princess was obviously annoyed at having no one to be angry with.

Muttering something, she sat down on the edge of the chair.

“But you have been incorrectly informed,” said Pierre. “All's quiet in the

town, and there's no sort of danger. See I have just read …” Pierre showed the

princess the placards. “The count writes that he will stake his life on it that

the enemy will never be in Moscow.”

“Ah, your count,” the princess began spitefully, “he's a hypocrite, a

miscreant who has himself stirred the mob on to disorder. Didn't he write in his

idiotic placards that they were to take anybody whoever it might be and drag by

the hair to the lock-up (and how silly it is!). Honour our and glory, says he,

to the man who does so. And this is what he has brought us to. Varvara Ivanovna

told me the mob almost killed her for speaking French.”

“Oh, well, well … You take everything too much to heart,” said Pierre, and he

began dealing out the patience.

Although he did succeed in the game, Pierre did not set off to join the army,

but stayed on in Moscow, now rapidly emptying, and was still in the same

agitation, uncertainty and alarm, and, at the same time, joyful expectation of

something awful.

Next day the princess set off in the evening, and Pierre's head-steward came

to inform him that it was impossible to raise the money he required for the

equipment of his regiment unless he sold one of his estates. The head-steward

impressed on Pierre generally that all this regimental craze would infallibly

bring him to ruin. Pierre could hardly conceal a smile as he listened to the

head-steward.

“Well, sell it then,” he said. “There's no help for it, I can't draw back

now!”

The worse the position of affairs, and especially of his own affairs, the

better pleased Pierre felt, and the more obvious it was to him that the

catastrophe he expected was near at hand. Scarcely any of Pierre's acquaintances

were left in the town. Julie had gone, Princess Marya had gone. Of his more

intimate acquaintances the Rostovs were the only people left; but Pierre did not

go to see them.

To divert his mind that day, Pierre drove out to the village of Vorontsovo,

to look at a great air balloon which was being constructed by Leppich to use

against the enemy, and the test balloon which was to be sent up the following

day. The balloon was not yet ready; but as Pierre learned, it was being

constructed by the Tsar's desire. The Tsar had written to Count Rastoptchin

about it in the following terms:

“As soon as Leppich is ready, get together a crew for his car consisting of

thoroughly trustworthy and intelligent men, and send a courier to General

Kutuzov to prepare him for it. I have mentioned it to him. Impress upon Leppich,

please, to take careful note where he descends the first time, that he may not

go astray and fall into the hands of the enemy. It is essential that he should

regulate his movements in accordance with the movements of the

commander-in-chief.”

On his way home from Vorontsovo, Pierre drove through Bolotny Square, and

seeing a crowd at Lobnoye Place, stopped and got out of his chaise. The crowd

were watching the flogging of a French cook, accused of being a spy. The

flogging was just over, and the man who had administered it was untying from the

whipping-post a stout, red-whiskered man in blue stockings and a green tunic,

who was groaning piteously. Another victim, a thin, pale man, was standing by.

Both, to judge by their faces, were Frenchmen. With a face of sick dread like

that of the thin Frenchman, Pierre pushed his way in among the crowd.

“What is it? Who are they? What for?” he kept asking. But the attention of

the crowd—clerks, artisans, shopkeepers, peasants, women in pelisses and

jackets—was so intently riveted on what was taking place on the Lobnoye Place

that no one answered. The stout man got up, shrugged his shoulders frowning, and

evidently trying to show fortitude, began putting on his tunic without looking

about him. But all at once his lips quivered and to his own rage he began to

cry, as grown-up men of sanguine temperament do cry. The crowd began talking

loudly, to drown a feeling of pity in themselves, as it seemed to Pierre.

“Some prince's cook. …”

“Eh, monsieur, Russian sauce is a bit strong for a French stomach … sets the

teeth on edge,” said a wrinkled clerk standing near Pierre, just when the

Frenchman burst into tears. The clerk looked about him for signs of appreciation

of his jest. Several persons laughed, but some were still gazing in dismay at

the man who was undressing the second Frenchman and about to flog him.

Pierre choked, scowled, and turning quickly, went back to his chaise, still

muttering something to himself as he went, and took his seat in it. During the

rest of the way he several times started, and cried out so loudly that the

coachman at last asked him what he desired.

“Where are you driving?” Pierre shouted to the coachman as he drove to

Lubyanka.

“You told me to drive to the governor's,” answered the coachman.

“Fool! dolt!” shouted Pierre, abusing his coachman, a thing he very rarely

did. “I told you home; and make haste, blockhead! This very day I must set off,”

Pierre said to himself.

At the sight of the tortured Frenchman and the crowd round the Lobnoye Place,

Pierre had so unhesitatingly decided that he could stay no longer in Moscow, and

must that very day set off to join the army, that it seemed to him either that

he had told the coachman so, or that the coachman ought to know it of

himself.

On reaching home Pierre told his omniscient and omnipotent head-coachman,

Yevstafitch, who was known to all Moscow, that he was going to drive that night

to Mozhaisk to the army, and gave orders for his saddle horses to be sent on

there. All this could not be arranged in one day, and therefore by Yevstafitch's

representations Pierre was induced to defer his departure till next day to allow

time for relays of horses to be sent on ahead.

The 24th was a bright day after a spell of bad weather, and after dinner on

that day Pierre set out from Moscow. Changing horses in the night at

Perhushkovo, Pierre learned that a great battle had been fought that evening. He

was told that the earth had been vibrating there at Perhushkovo from the cannon.

No one could answer Pierre's question whether the battle was a victory or a

defeat. This was the battle of the 24th at Shevardino. Towards dawn Pierre

approached Mozhaisk.

Troops were quartered in all the houses in Mozhaisk, and at the inn, where

Pierre was met by his coachman and postillion, there was not a room to spare;

the whole place was full of officers.

From Mozhaisk onwards troops were halting or marching everywhere. Cossacks,

foot soldiers, horse soldiers, waggons, gun-carriages, and cannons were

everywhere.

Pierre pushed on as fast as possible, and the further he got and the more

deeply he plunged into this ocean of soldiers, the stronger became the thrill of

uneasiness and of a new pleasurable sensation. It was a feeling akin to what he

had felt at the Slobodsky Palace on the Tsar's visit, a sense of the urgent

necessity of taking some step and making some sacrifice. He was conscious now of

a glad sense that all that constitutes the happiness of life, comfort, wealth,

even life itself, were all dust and ashes, which it was a joy to fling away in

comparison with something else. … What that something else was Pierre could not

have said, and indeed he did not seek to get a clear idea, for whose sake and

for what object he found such peculiar joy in sacrificing all. He was not

interested in knowing the object of the sacrifice, but the sacrifice itself

afforded him a new joyful sensation.

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