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Face to face with Pierre the militiaman had lost some of his causticity, and Julie's smile now left him looking nonplussed. For all his good-natured absentmindedness Pierre had the kind of personality that soon put an end to any attempt to make a fool of him.
'Oh no,' Pierre chuckled with a glance down at his huge, bulging figure. 'Too much for the French to aim at here, and I'm afraid I could never get up on a horse.'
Of all the people available as subjects for gossip Julie's guests hit on the Rostovs.
'I hear their finances are in a bad way,' said Julie. 'And the count's not being very sensible. The Razumovskys did want to buy his house and their local estate, but it's going on for ever. He's asking too much.'
'No, I think the sale will go through any day now,' said someone. 'Though you'd have to be crazy to buy anything in Moscow just now.'
'Why do you say that?' asked Julie. 'Do you really think Moscow's in danger?'
'Well, why are you going away?'
'Why am I going away? That's a funny thing to ask. I'm going because . . . well, everybody's going, and I'm not Joan of Arc or an Amazon.'
'Quite so. Would you mind passing me a bit more of that linen?'
'If he plays his cards right he ought to be able to pay off all his debts,' said the militiaman, reverting to the subject of Count Rostov.
'He's a good-hearted old fellow, but a very poor specimen.'
'Anyway, why have they stayed on as long as this? They were meaning to leave for the country quite some time ago. Natalie is her old self now, I imagine?' Julie asked Pierre with a devious smile.
'They're waiting for their younger son,' said Pierre. 'He joined up with Obolensky's Cossacks, and they sent him to Belaya Tserkov. That's where the regiment is being formed. But now they've had him transferred to my regiment, and he's expected any day now. The count's been dying to get away for ages, but nothing would induce the countess to leave Moscow till her son gets back.'
'I saw them the day before yesterday at the Arkharovs. Natalie looks pretty again and she's in much better spirits. She sang for us. Some people get over things so easily!'
'What kind of things?' asked Pierre with a disgruntled look. Julie smiled at him.
'Oh, Count, really, chivalrous knights like you don't exist outside the pages of Madame de Souza's novels.'
'Chivalrous knights? What can you possibly mean?' asked Pierre, colouring up.
'Come now, my dear count. It's all over Moscow. Honestly, I do admire you!'
But her last words had come out in French and they brought cries of 'Fined again! Fined again!' from the militiaman.
'Oh, all right. You can't even talk now. It's such a bore!'
'What's all over Moscow?' said Pierre getting to his feet with some resentment.
'Oh, come on, Count, you know very well!'
'I know absolutely nothing,' said Pierre.
'I know how close you've been to Natalie, so . . . Actually, I was always closer to Vera myself. Such a darling girl, Vera.'
'No, madame,' Pierre persisted, still disgruntled. 'I have certainly not assumed the role of Countess Rostov's knight. I haven't been near the place for nigh on a month. How could you be so cruel? . . .'
'I think you do protest too much,' cried Julie with a smile, brandishing her lint. Determined to have the last word, she promptly changed the subject. 'By the way, I've just heard that poor Marie Bolkonsky arrived in Moscow yesterday. You know she's lost her father?'
'Has she really? Where is she? I'd very much like to see her,' said Pierre.
'I spent yesterday evening with her. Today or tomorrow morning she's taking her nephew down to their Moscow estate.'
'Well, how is she? How's she getting on?' said Pierre.
'Oh, she's all right, just feeling very sad. You'll never guess who came to her rescue! It's so romantic. Nikolay Rostov! She was surrounded, they were trying to kill her and the servants had been wounded. He just rushed in and saved her . . .'
'Another romance,' said the militiaman. 'All this running away has a clear purpose: to get all our old maids married off. There's Katish for one, and now Princess Bolkonsky.'
'You know what I think? She's just a little amoureuse. Just a little in love with that jeune homme.'
'Fined again! Fined again! Fined again!'
'But how can you say things like that in Russian?'
CHAPTER 18
When Pierre got home he was handed two new Rostopchin posters that had been brought in during the day.
The first denied the rumour that Count Rostopchin had stopped people leaving Moscow: on the contrary, he was glad to see that ladies and merchants' wives were going. 'Less panic and less rumour,' said the notice, 'but on one thing I stake my life: that scoundrel will never set foot in Moscow.'
On reading these words Pierre realized for the first time that the French were going to set foot in Moscow. The second poster announced that our headquarters were at Vyazma, and Count Wittgenstein had defeated the French, but also, since many Muscovites wished to arm themselves, weapons had been provided and had only to be collected from the arsenal: swords, pistols and guns were available to all citizens at cut-down prices.
The tone of this poster was noticeably less humorous than the earlier Chigirin discourses. The two posters gave Pierre pause for thought. He could now see clearly that the menacing stormcloud he had been invoking so wholeheartedly, even though he instinctively recoiled from it in horror, was now almost upon him.
'What shall I do: join up and go out to the army, or wait here?' Pierre asked himself for the hundredth time. He picked up a pack of cards which happened to be lying there on the table and settled down to play patience.
'If this deal comes out,' he told himself, holding the pack in one hand and shuffling with the other as he turned his eyes upwards, 'if it comes out that will mean . . . what will it mean? . . .' Before he could decide what it would mean he heard the voice of the eldest princess outside the study door, asking for permission to come in. 'So, it will mean I've got to go off and join the army,' Pierre told himself. 'Yes, do come in,' he said to the princess.
The eldest of his cousins, she of the long thin waist and stony face, was the only one still living in Pierre's house, the two younger sisters having both got married.
'Oh, Cousin, please forgive me for coming in to see you.' She seemed excited and her tone was disparaging. 'But I hope you realize some decisions have to be taken. What on earth is going to happen? Everyone has left Moscow, and the people are up in arms. Why are we staying on?'
'Quite the reverse, dear cousin, everything seems to be most satisfactory, ' said Pierre in the bantering tone he usually adopted with his cousin to dispel the embarrassment he always felt towards her in his role as benefactor.
'Oh yes, satisfactory . . . highly satisfactory, I'm sure. Varvara Ivanovna has been telling me how well our troops are doing. And much credit it does them, I must say. And the people, too, they've taken to the streets and they won't obey any orders. My own maid has turned against me. If things go on as they are they'll soon be after our blood. You can't walk down the street. But what bothers me is that the French will be here in a day or two. Why are we waiting for them? Please, Cousin, just do me one favour,' said the princess, 'give orders for me to be taken to Petersburg. Say what you will about me, I could not live under Bonaparte.'
'My dear cousin, that's quite enough. Where do you get your information from? You've got things the wrong way round . . .'
'I will not submit to your Napoleon. Others may do as they like . . . If you won't do this for me . . .'
'But I will, I'll give the orders straightaway.'
The princess was obviously quite put out by having no one to vent her anger on. Muttering under her breath she perched on the edge of a chair.
'But what you've heard is not right,' said Pierre. 'Everything's quiet down town, and there's no danger. Look what I've just been reading . . .' Pierre showed her the posters. 'The count says here he'll stake his life on it the enemy will never set foot in Moscow.'
'Oh, you and your count,' the princess spat out spitefully. 'He's a hypocrite and a villain. He was the one who brought them out on to the streets. Didn't he write on his stupid posters that they should grab the world and his wife by the scruff of the neck and dump them in the lock-up? Stupid man! Honour and glory, says he, to anyone who does. Look where it's got us, all his fine talk! Varvara Ivanovna told me she was almost strung up by the mob for speaking a few words of French.'
'Well, I know how it is . . . But you do take things too seriously,' said Pierre, dealing out his cards for a game of patience.
That hand did come out, but rather than going off to join the army Pierre stayed on in a Moscow that was getting emptier by the day, and his mood was the same - a mixture of excitement, indecision and delicious dread of impending doom.
By the following evening the princess had gone, and Pierre's head steward came in to report that the money needed for the equipment of his regiment could not be raised without selling one of his estates. He did his best to persuade Pierre that all these silly ideas about a regiment would be the ruin of him. Pierre could hardly conceal a smile as he listened to the steward.
'Well, go on, sell it,' he said. 'It can't be helped. There's no going back on what I said!'
The worse things got, especially things that mattered to him, the happier Pierre was, and the clearer it became that the long-awaited catastrophe was almost upon them. Hardly any of Pierre's acquaintances were still in town. Julie had gone, Princess Marya had gone. Of the people closest to him only the Rostovs were left, but Pierre didn't go to see them.
That day for a little relaxation Pierre drove out to the village of Vorontsovo to have a look at a huge balloon that was being built by Leppich5 for devastating use against the enemy, and the test balloon due for launching the following day. The balloon wasn't quite ready, but Pierre found out it was being built with the Tsar's approval. The Tsar had written to Count Rostopchin (in French) as follows: As soon as Leppich is ready select a crew of good, clever men for his gondola, and dispatch a courier to General Kutuzov to give him due warning. I have told him about this. Please ensure that Leppich is strongly advised to be very careful where he comes down for the first time lest he go off course and fall into the hands of the enemy. It is essential that he co-ordinate his movements with those of the commander-in-chief.
On the way home from Vorontsovo Pierre was driving through Bolotny Square when he saw a crowd at the Place of Execution, so he stopped and got out of his carriage. A French chef accused of espionage was being flogged. The flogging was over, and the executioner was at the flogging-bench untying a stout man with red sideburns, blue stockings and a green jacket stripped off his back, who was moaning grievously. Another criminal, frail, thin and pale, was waiting for his turn. To judge by their faces both of them were Frenchmen. Pierre shoved his way through the crowd looking every bit as terrified and sickly as the skinny Frenchman.
'What's happening? Who are they? What have they done?' he kept asking. But the crowd - clerks, tradesmen, shopkeepers, peasants, women in cloaks and jackets - were so fascinated by what was happening at the Place of Execution that nobody answered. The stout man got to his feet wincing, twisted his shoulders and tried his best with a show of bravery to pull on his jacket without looking round at everybody, but suddenly his lips trembled and he burst into tears, furious with himself, as sometimes happens with grown men, however full-blooded. There were loud comments from the crowd as people stifled their feelings of sympathy - or so Pierre liked to think.
'Some chef belonging to a prince . . .'
'Hey, monsewer, Russian sauce a bit sharp for a Froggy? . . . Makes you wince a bit!' said a wrinkled clerk standing near Pierre at the moment the Frenchman burst into tears. The clerk looked round, obviously expecting applause. Some people did laugh, but others were so dismayed they could not take their eyes off the executioner, who was in the process of stripping the second Frenchman.
Pierre was choking. He screwed up his face, turned away sharply, went back to his carriage and got in, all the time muttering under his breath. As they drove on he got the shudders several times, and yelled out so loud that the coachman asked what he wanted.
'Where are you going?' Pierre shouted to the coachman as he turned into Lubyanka Street.
'You told me to go to the governor general's,' answered the coachman.
'You stupid idiot!' roared Pierre, a man who rarely abused his coachman. 'I told you to drive me home. Get going, you blockhead!' and under his breath he muttered, 'I've got to leave town this very day.'
It was the sight of the tortured Frenchman and the crowd all round the Place of Execution that had brought Pierre to a final decision: he simply could not stay on in Moscow, he must set off that very day to join the army, and as he saw it either he must have told the coachman, or the coachman ought to have known.
When he got home Pierre told his omniscient and omnipotent head coachman, Yevstafyevich, who was famous throughout Moscow, that he was leaving for Mozhaysk that night to join the army and his saddle horses should be sent down there. This was more than could be arranged in a single day, so Pierre yielded to Yevstafyevich's ministrations and delayed his departure till next day so there would be time for relays of horses to be sent on ahead.
The morning of the 24th dawned bright after a spell of bad weather, and that day after dinner Pierre set out from Moscow. Changing horses during the night at Perkhushkovo, Pierre heard that there had been a huge battle that evening (the battle of Shevardino). He was told that even at Perkhushkovo the ground had been shaking from the cannon-fire. No one could answer Pierre when he asked whether the battle had been won or lost. Dawn was breaking when Pierre got to Mozhaysk.
Every house in Mozhaysk had been taken over by the military, and at the inn where Pierre was met by his coachman and groom there wasn't a room to be had. The place was full of officers.
The whole of Mozhaysk and the surrounding area was swarming with soldiers standing around or on the march. Cossacks, infantrymen, cavalrymen, wagons, gun-carriages and cannons were all over the place. Pierre pressed on as fast as he could, and the further he moved away from Moscow and the more deeply he became immersed in this ocean of troops, the stronger he was gripped by a thrilling sense of excitement and a totally new feeling of exhilaration. It was not unlike the sensation he had experienced at the Sloboda palace during the Tsar's visit, a sense of the urgent need to do something positive and make sacrifices. He rejoiced in a new awareness that everything that makes for happiness in life - comfort, wealth, even life itself - was nothing but trash to be thrown away with pleasure when you compare it with . . . well, something else . . . What that something else was Pierre could not have said, and he didn't even try to work out who or what he was taking such exquisite pleasure in honouring by the ultimate sacrifice. He wasn't at all worried about why he wanted to start making sacrifices, but the idea of sacrifice itself was a source of new delight.
CHAPTER 19
On the 24th the battle of the Shevardino redoubt was fought; on the 25th not a shot was fired by either side; on the 26th came the battle of Borodino.
For what reason and in what way was battle offered and accepted at Shevardino and Borodino? Why did they join battle at Borodino? There was no sense in it for the French or the Russians. The immediate outcome was a clear inevitability: we Russians were brought one step closer towards the destruction of Moscow (the thing we dreaded most in all the world), and the French were brought one step closer towards the destruction of their entire army (the thing they dreaded most in all the world). At the time this outcome was as plain as a pikestaff, yet Napoleon offered battle and Kutuzov accepted.
If the military leaders had been guided by principles of reason it ought to have been clear to Napoleon that in marching nearly fifteen hundred miles and offering to fight, with a fair chance of losing a quarter of his men, he was heading for certain destruction, and it ought to have been just as clear to Kutuzov that in accepting the offer, also with a good chance of losing a quarter of his men, he was sure to lose Moscow. For Kutuzov it was a mathematical certainty, as clear as a game of draughts in which I am a piece down and if I go on exchanging pieces I am bound to lose, so I must avoid any exchanges. When my opponent has sixteen pieces and I have fourteen I am only one eighth weaker, but by the time we have exchanged thirteen pieces he will end up three times stronger than I am.
Before the battle of Borodino our forces were about five-sixths the strength of the French, but when it was over they were only half as strong; in other words before the battle a hundred thousand faced a hundred and twenty thousand, and when it was over fifty thousand faced a hundred thousand. Nevertheless, a leader as shrewd and experienced as Kutuzov took on the battle, which had been offered by Napoleon, who is generally described as a military genius, though it lost him a quarter of his men and extended his line of communications even further. It may be said that he thought he could end the campaign by taking Moscow, as he had done by taking Vienna, but there is a lot of evidence against this. Napoleon's own historians tell us he had wanted to call a halt as far back as Smolensk, realizing how dangerously extended he was and knowing full well that the taking of Moscow would not be the end of the campaign, because he could see from Smolensk the dreadful state of the abandoned Russian towns, and he had received not a word of reply to repeated announcements of his desire to open negotiations.
The actions of Kutuzov and Napoleon in offering and accepting battle at Borodino were involuntary and meaningless. But later on, with the battle a fait accompli, historians have come forward with every kind of specious argument to demonstrate the foresight and genius of these generals, who of all the involuntary agents in the history of the world were surely the most enslaved and involuntary.
The ancients have left us examples of epics with all the historical interest focused on particular heroes, and nowadays we cannot get used to the idea that this kind of history is meaningless at the present stage of human development.
In response to the other question, of