A momentary silence that followed seemed to go on for ever.
The debate was resumed, but with more and more breaks in it, until finally they could all sense there was nothing more to be said.
During one of the breaks Kutuzov gave a deep sigh and seemed about to speak. Everybody turned in his direction.
'Well, gentlemen, I can see I'm going to have to pay for the broken pots,' he said. He got slowly to his feet and walked across to the table. 'Gentlemen, I have heard your arguments. Some of you will not agree with me. But I . . .' (he paused) 'by the authority invested in me by my Tsar and country, I hereby order you to retreat.'
Whereupon the generals began to disperse with the solemn and silent wariness of people going their separate ways at the end of a funeral. One or two of the generals spoke to the commander-in-chief, pitching their comments in quite a different tone from the one they had used at the council table.
Malasha, who was late for supper, climbed down from the stove backwards, her bare toes clinging to the knobs and bumps, then she was off, wriggling her way between the generals' legs and skipping out through the door.
Kutuzov dismissed the generals and sat there for some time with his elbows on the table, thinking over one or two dreadful questions. When did it happen? When was it certain that Moscow had to be abandoned? When did something happen that made it inevitable, and whose fault was it?
'Well, I didn't see it coming!' he said to the adjutant, Schneider, who had come in to see him. It was now well into the night. 'I never expected it! I never thought it would come to this!'
'You must get some rest, your Highness,' said Schneider.
'But it's not over yet. They'll end up eating horse-meat like the Turks!' Kutuzov shouted, ignoring Schneider and bringing his podgy fist crashing down on the table. 'They will, you know . . . if only . . .'
CHAPTER 5
Meanwhile, there was something to attend to that was even more important than the retreat of the army without putting up a fight: the evacuation of Moscow and the burning of the city. Count Rostopchin, whom we usually take to be the motive force behind this event, was acting in a very different manner from Kutuzov.
After the battle of Borodino, this event - the evacuation and burning of Moscow - became as inevitable as the retreat of the army without putting up a fight.
Every Russian could have predicted the outcome, not by intellectual effort but from the gut-feeling that lies within us as it lay within our fathers.
What had happened in Moscow was happening now in every town and village on Russian soil from Smolensk onwards, and without the assistance of Count Rostopchin and his posters. The people were waiting philosophically for the enemy to arrive. There was no rioting, no disturbance of the peace, and nobody was torn to pieces; they calmly awaited their fate, sensing within themselves sufficient strength to do what was necessary when the crisis came. And once the enemy began to get near, the wealthier elements of the population went away, leaving their property behind, while the poorer people stayed on, setting fire to all that was left and destroying it.
An awareness that this was the way things were going, and always would go, was, and is, deeply implanted in every Russian heart. This awareness, along with a foreboding that Moscow was going to be taken by the enemy, lay deeply implanted in Russian society in the Moscow of 1812. Those who had started to leave the city in July and early August had shown they were expecting it. Those who left the city taking with them only what they could carry, and leaving their houses and half their property behind, were acting out of patriotism, but the latent kind that does not show itself in fine phrases, in killing one's children for the sake of the fatherland, or any number of unnatural reactions like these, but comes out inconspicuously, in the most simple and natural way, and therefore always gets the best results.
'Shame on you, running away from danger. Only cowards are deserting Moscow,' they were told. In his posters Rostopchin kept drumming it into them that it was disgraceful to leave Moscow. They felt ashamed when they heard themselves described as cowards; they felt ashamed to be going away, but they still went, and they knew they had to. Why did they go? They couldn't possibly have been scared off by Rostopchin's accounts of atrocities carried out by Napoleon in conquered countries. As they streamed away the first to go were the wealthy, educated people, who knew full well that Vienna and Berlin had survived intact, and that throughout the occupation the inhabitants of those cities had enjoyed themselves with all those utterly charming Frenchmen, whom all Russians, and especially the ladies, found so attractive at that time.
They were leaving because for the Russians it wasn't a question of how easy life might or might not be under French rule in Moscow. It was just not possible to live under French rule; this was the worst thing that could possibly happen. They were leaving before Borodino; and after Borodino the movement speeded up, notwithstanding calls to defend the city, notwithstanding any number of proclamations from the governor of Moscow about going into battle with the wonder-working Icon of Iversk and the air-balloons that would finish off the French, and all the other rubbish that Rostopchin splashed all over his posters. They knew it was the army's job to fight, and if the army proved incapable it would be no good marching out with young ladies and house serfs to fight Napoleon on the Three Hills; no, they must get away, however much it hurt to leave their property behind knowing it would be destroyed. Away they went, without a passing thought for the solemn significance of Muscovites abandoning this huge, thriving capital city, and obviously consigning it to the flames. (A large city of wooden buildings, once abandoned, would be certain to burn down.) They went away for personal reasons, yet it was their departure that brought about the splendid achievement that will always redound to the glory of the Russian people. The lady who moved out in June and took her black servants and her entertainers from Moscow down to Saratov, with a vague determination that she would never be a servant of Bonaparte, and a real fear of being stopped by orders from Rostopchin, was actually doing nothing less than partaking of that great action that saved Russia.
As for Count Rostopchin, one day he would pour scorn on those who were leaving, but the next he would evacuate all the government offices; he distributed weapons that wouldn't work to the drunken rabble; one day he would raise aloft the holy icons, the next he would ban the movement of all holy relics and images by Father Augustin; he commandeered all the private vehicles left in Moscow, then used one hundred and thirty-six of them to transport Leppich and his air-balloons; at one time he dropped hints that he might set fire to Moscow and described how he had burnt his own house down, then he wrote a proclamation to the French in which he solemnly accused them of destroying his childhood home; he would sometimes claim the credit for setting fire to Moscow, then later he would disclaim any knowledge of it; he told the people to capture all spies and bring them in, then censured the people for doing just that; he expelled all French residents from the city, but allowed Madame Aubert-Chalme, who formed the centre of French society in Moscow, to stay on; he ordered the arrest and banishment of the old and venerable postmaster Klyucharyov, who had done nothing wrong; he brought people together on the Three Hills to fight the French, and then, to get rid of them, he gave them a man to murder, and slipped away by the back gate. He swore he would perish with Moscow, but he survived to scribble French verses in ladies' albums about his role in the affair. One went roughly as follows: I am by birth Tatarian,
But Rome - I am your man!
The French call me barbarian,
The Russians - George Dandin.
This man had no idea what was happening. He just wanted to be seen doing something, to take people by surprise, to do a heroic deed that was gloriously patriotic, and he behaved like a little boy amusing himself while events of enormous magnitude - the abandonment and burning of Moscow - were inexorably taking shape, and he kept raising his tiny little fist first to urge on, then to turn back the mighty tide of popular will that swept him along as it wen
t.
CHAPTER 6
Helene had returned with the court from Vilna to Petersburg, where she found herself in an embarrassing situation.
Here in Petersburg Helene had enjoyed the special patronage of an important dignitary, who occupied one of the highest positions in the government. Out in Vilna she had formed a liaison with a young foreign prince. When she got back to Petersburg prince and dignitary were both in town, both were asserting their rights, and Helene was faced with a problem she had not previously encountered in her career: how to preserve her intimacy with both, without offending either.
What might have seemed to any other woman a difficult task verging on the impossible Countess Bezukhov took in her stride, and without sacrificing her reputation as a highly intelligent lady. Had she attempted to cover things up, or had she tried to wriggle out of her awkward situation by being shifty and clever, she would have ruined everything by acknowledging that she was in the wrong. But no, Helene behaved like a great personality who can get away with anything; convinced of her innocence, she assumed the moral high ground, and looked down on everybody else as guilty people.
The first time the young foreigner came out with an objection to her behaviour, she tilted back her beautiful head with some pride, half-turned towards him and put him in his place.
'So this is it,' she said. 'The selfishness and cruelty of men! Just what I was expecting. A woman sacrifices herself for you, she suffers, and this is her reward. What right have you to ask me, monseigneur, to account for my friendships and affections? This man has been more than a father to me!'
The prince began to protest, but Helene cut him short.
'Well, yes, maybe his feelings for me do go beyond those of a father, but that's no reason for me to shut the door in his face. Not being a man, I cannot show ingratitude. What you must realize, monseigneur, is that as far as my personal feelings are concerned I am accountable only to God and my own conscience!' she concluded, raising a hand to her sublimely beetling bosom as she glanced up to heaven.
'No, for God's sake listen!'
'Marry me, and I'll be your slave!'
'No, it's impossible.'
'I'm not good enough for you to marry, you . . .' And she broke down in tears.
The prince did his best to soothe her, but Helene had every appearance of being inconsolable. She insisted tearfully that nothing could stop her remarrying, and there were precedents for this. (There were very few at that time, but Helene cited Napoleon and one or two exalted personages.) She had never been a wife to her husband. She had been sacrificed into marriage.
'But what about the law? Religion?' murmured the prince, half won-over.
'Religion, laws . . . what were they invented for if they can't manage something like this?' said Helene.
The prince was amazed that such a simple idea had never occurred to him, and he consulted the holy brethren of the Society of Jesus, with whom he had close contacts.
A few days later, at one of the wonderful parties given by Helene at her summer villa on Stone Island she was introduced to a M. Jobert, a fascinating middle-aged man with snow-white hair and brilliant black eyes, a lay member of the Jesuit brotherhood (a 'short-robed', lay member), who spent a long time in conversation with Helene out in the garden under the illuminations and to the strains of music about the need to love God, and Jesus, and the Sacred Heart, and the consolations afforded by the one true Catholic faith in this life and the next. Helene was deeply moved, and several times both of them found themselves on the verge of tears, with their voices trembling. A dance partner then called Helene away, breaking the thread of the conversation with her future 'director of conscience', but the following evening M. Jobert called on Helene alone, and soon after that he became a regular visitor.
One day he took the countess along to a Catholic church, and there she was led forward to kneel at an altar. The fascinating, middle-aged Frenchman laid his hands on her head, and she experienced a sensation that she later described as something akin to a breath of fresh air wafting into her soul. This, they explained, was the 'grace of God'.
Then a long-robed abbe was brought to her; he heard her confession, and absolved her from her sins. Next day she took delivery of a casket containing the Sacred Host, which was left with her for use in her own home. Some days later Helene learnt with pleasure that she had been admitted into the true Catholic Church, and in a day or two the Pope himself would hear about her and send her some sort of document.
Everything that was done to her, and around her, during this period; all the attention lavished on her by so many clever men, gratifying and refined as it was in all its forms; and the dovelike purity of her present condition (she wore nothing but white dresses and white ribbons throughout) was most enjoyable, but not for a moment did she let the enjoyment distract her from her goal. And since this was a matter of low cunning, in which the stupid person always wins out over the bright one, Helene had soon cottoned on to the main motivation behind all the fine words and splendid ceremonies involved in her conversion to Catholicism, which was to get good money out of her for the Jesuit cause (hints had already been heard), and she now refused to pay up until she had undergone the various formalities necessary to free her from her husband. To her way of thinking, the real purpose of every religion was to preserve the decencies and still satisfy human desire. And with this in mind she took advantage of a consultation with her spiritual adviser to ask how far she was bound by her marriage.
They were sitting together in an alcove by a drawing-room window. It was dusk. The scent of flowers wafted in through the window. Helene was wearing a white dress, transparent over shoulders and bosom. The sleek, well-fed abbe, with his podgy, clean-shaven chin, his good strong mouth and his white hands clasped unthreateningly round his knees, was sitting close to Helene. A subtle smile played on his lips, a discreet admiration of her beauty shone from his eyes, and he looked her in the face once or twice as he outlined his attitude to this problem. Helene grinned warily as she stared back at his curly hair and his clean-shaven, dark-shadowed cheeks, and waited anxiously for the conversation to move in a new direction. But the abbe, even as he made no secret of drinking in the beauty of his companion, was also much enjoying his own skilful handling of the situation.
The director of conscience explained his thinking, which went as follows.
'Without knowing the full significance of what you were undertaking, you took a vow of conjugal fidelity to a man who, for his part, was committing an act of sacrilege when he entered into holy wedlock with no faith in its religious significance. That marriage did not have the dual significance it should have had. Nevertheless, your vow was binding upon you. You have broken it. What kind of sin did you commit? A venial sin or a mortal sin? A venial sin, because you committed it without malice aforethought. If now, with the object of bearing children, you were to marry again, your sin could be forgiven. But still the question has two aspects to it. In the first pl . . .'
'No, the way I see it,' Helene cut in with a smile of bewitching beauty as she wearied of the way things were going, 'once converted to the true religion, I cannot be bound by anything imposed upon me by a false religion.' Her director of conscience was astounded at being presented with a Columbus's egg1 of such stark simplicity. He rejoiced at his pupil's unheralded speed of development, and yet he could not relinquish the towering structure of reasoned argument he had worked on so hard.
'We must come to an understanding,' he smiled, and looked for ways of undermining his spiritual daughter's contention.
CHAPTER 7
Helene had come to the conclusion that in ecclesiastical terms her situation was plain and simple, but her spiritual counsellors kept raising difficulties for the simple reason that they were worried about how things might seem to the worldly authorities. So she decided to go out into society and prepare the ground. She provoked the jealousy of the elderly dignitary by telling him what she had told her other suitor: the issue was straightforward -
the only way of obtaining exclusive rights over her was to marry her. At first the elderly dignitary was just as shocked as his younger counterpart had been to receive a proposal of marriage from a wife with a husband who was still alive. But Helene's absolute certainty that the whole thing was as simple and natural as marrying a young girl had its effect on him too. If she had shown the slightest twinge of hesitation, embarrassment or reticence her case would undoubtedly have been lost, but not only did she avoid showing any such twinge, she spoke openly about this business to her intimate friends (and that meant all Petersburg), informing them with disarming innocence that the prince and the dignitary had proposed to her, and since she loved both men she was afraid of hurting either of them.
A rumour swept the city, not that Helene wanted a divorce from her husband (if the rumour had said that, many people would have come out against any such impropriety), but simply that the ill-starred and ever-fascinating Helene was agonizing over her two suitors, wondering which one to marry. There was no interest in the extent to which this might or might not be feasible; the only questions were who would be the better match, and how would the court look on things. True, there were one or two puritans incapable of rising to the occasion who saw this as a desecration of the sacrament of marriage, but they were few in number, and they kept their own counsel, while most people concentrated on the upturn in Helene's fortunes, and who would be the better choice. Whether it was a good thing or a bad thing for a wife to remarry during her husband's lifetime was not up for discussion, because clearly this question must have been settled once and for all by 'wiser heads than ours' (as the saying went), and to doubt the validity of the decision would be to risk parading one's ignorance and lack of savoir-faire.