‘Well, I’ll put it like this. Here’s the whole secret of duelling. If you get ready for a duel by making a will and writing long tender letters to your parents thinking that you might get killed, you’re a fool – you’re as good as done for. But if you go out with every intention of killing your man stone dead in short order, everything will be all right. As our bear-hunter from Kostroma used to say to me, “A bear,” he’d say, “who’s not afraid of a bear? But once you’ve actually seen one the fear’s all gone and your only thought is to stop him getting away!” So that’s what I feel like. I’ll see you tomorrow, old fellow.’
At eight o’clock next morning Pierre and Nesvitsky reached the woods at Sokolniki and found Dolokhov, Denisov and Rostov already there. Pierre had the air of a man distracted by matters not connected with the business in hand. After a sleepless night he looked haggard and sallow-faced. He peered around vaguely, squinting as if the sun were in his eyes. Two considerations excluded all others: his wife’s guilt, which a sleepless night had confirmed for him beyond a shadow of doubt, and the innocence of Dolokhov, who had no reason to defend the honour of a person who meant nothing to him. ‘Perhaps I’d have done the same thing if I’d been him,’ thought Pierre. ‘In fact I know I would. So what’s this duel all about, this murder? Either I shall kill him, or he will shoot me in the head, in the elbow or the knee. If only I could escape, run away and bury myself somewhere,’ came the persistent thought. But whenever such ideas arose in his mind he would assume a kind of tranquillity and detachment that commanded respect in the onlookers, and simply ask, ‘When is it to be?’ or ‘Is everything ready?’
And when everything was ready sabres were stuck in the snow to show where the barrier was, and the pistols were loaded. Then Nesvitsky went up to Pierre.
‘I should be failing in my duty, Count,’ he ventured timidly, ‘and not worthy of your confidence or the honour you have done me in choosing me for your second, if at this grave moment, this very grave moment, I failed to speak the whole truth to you. I submit to you that this matter is without proper foundation and is not worth shedding blood over . . . You were in the wrong. You got a bit excited . . .’
‘You’re quite right. It was desperately stupid,’ said Pierre.
‘Then allow me to say you are sorry, and I’m sure that our opponents will agree to accept your apology,’ said Nesvitsky, who was like the other participants and everyone else at times like this in refusing to believe that the quarrel would really end in an duel. ‘You know, Count, it is far nobler to acknowledge a mistake than to push things beyond redemption. There was no insult on either side. Why don’t I have a word with . . . ?’
‘No! There’s nothing more to be said,’ Pierre insisted. ‘I don’t care any more . . . Are we ready to proceed?’ he added. ‘Just tell me where to go and what to shoot at,’ he said, forcing a gentle smile. He picked up one of the pistols and asked how to fire it, never having held one before, though he preferred not to admit it. ‘Yes, that’s it. I do know. I just forgot for a moment,’ he said.
‘No apology. Definitely not,’ Dolokhov was reporting to Denisov, who had made his own attempt at reconciliation on the other side, and he too walked forward to the appointed spot.
The duelling ground was situated about eighty paces from the road where the sledges had been left, in a small clearing in a pine-wood, covered with snow that had been thawing in the warmer weather of recent days. The antagonists stood about forty paces apart, one at each edge of the clearing. Measuring out the paces, the seconds left tracks in the deep, wet snow from the spot where they had been standing to the sabres borrowed from Nesvitsky and Denisov, which were stuck in the ground ten paces apart to mark the barrier. The thaw and mist persisted. At forty paces you could hardly see your opponent. All had been ready for a good three minutes, but now they seemed reluctant to start. Nobody spoke.
CHAPTER 5
‘Well, shall we begin?’ said Dolokhov.
‘Why not?’ said Pierre, smiling the same smile.
