War And Peace полностью

The visitor was Bitsky, a man to be found on every commission and at all levels of Petersburg society, a passionate devotee of all the latest ideas, especially Speransky’s, an inveterate disseminator of metropolitan news, and one of those men who choose their opinions the way they choose their clothes – according to fashion – which only serves to make them seem more partisan than anyone else. Looking businesslike and scarcely waiting to remove his hat, he ran over to Prince Andrey and began to blurt out what he had come to say. He had just heard details from the State Council that had sat that morning; the Tsar had opened the session and Bitsky waxed enthusiastic on the subject. The Tsar’s speech had been quite remarkable. It had been the kind of speech that only a constitutional monarch could have delivered. ‘The Emperor said quite bluntly that the Council and Senate are estates of the realm. He said that government must be founded not on arbitrary authority but on solid principles. The Emperor said that the fiscal system must be overhauled and the accounts made public,’ Bitsky announced, emphasizing certain words, and widening his eyes knowingly. ‘Yes, today’s events mark a new epoch, the greatest epoch in our history,’ he concluded.

Prince Andrey listened to this account of the opening of the State Council, which he had been looking forward to so keenly and had valued so much, amazed that now it had happened this event made no impact on him and struck him as less than insignificant. He listened to Bitsky’s eloquent enthusiasm with secret scorn. The simplest idea in the world was taking over his mind. ‘Why should I bother? Why should Bitsky?’ he thought. ‘Why should we bother about what the Emperor was pleased to say to the Council? Can any of that make me happier or better than I am?’

And with this simple reflection all of Prince Andrey’s previous interest in the current reforms was suddenly destroyed. Later that day Prince Andrey was due to dine with Speransky in what the latter had described as ‘a little get-together’ as he issued the invitation. This dinner, in the intimate domestic circle of the man he so much admired, had seemed very enticing to Prince Andrey, especially since he had not yet seen Speransky at home. But now he didn’t feel like going.

At the appointed hour, however, Prince Andrey was to be seen entering Speransky’s house alongside the Tavrichesky Garden. It was a small place, almost monastic in its extraordinary cleanliness, and there in the parquet-floored dining-room Prince Andrey, arriving slightly late at five o’clock, found Speransky’s ‘little get-together’ of close associates already assembled. There were no ladies present, except Speransky’s little daughter (who had a long face like her father) and her governess. The guests were Gervais, Magnitsky and Stolypin. Out in the vestibule Prince Andrey had caught the sound of raised voices and someone with a loud, distinctive guffaw – a sort of stage laugh. Someone’s voice – it sounded like Speransky’s – was ringing with a clear ‘haw-haw-haw!’ Prince Andrey had never heard Speransky laugh before, and this booming, resonant laughter coming from a great statesman struck him as odd.

Prince Andrey went into the dining-room. They were gathered in a group between two windows near to a little table laid with hors d’oeuvres. Speransky was standing by the table, a picture of joviality, wearing a grey swallowtail coat, with a star on his chest, and the same white waistcoat and high white stock that he had worn at the famous session of the State Council. His guests stood around him in a ring. Magnitsky had turned to face him and was half-way through a story. Speransky was listening, and laughing at what Magnitsky was going to say before he said it. As Prince Andrey walked in, Magnitsky’s words were again drowned with laughter. Stolypin issued a deep-bass guffaw as he munched a piece of bread and cheese, Gervais gave a wheezy chuckle and Speransky laughed in his calculated staccato.

Still laughing, Speransky offered Prince Andrey a soft, white hand. ‘So nice to see you, Prince,’ he said. ‘Just a minute . . .’ He turned to Magnitsky, interrupting his story. ‘We have a pact this evening. We’re going to enjoy a good dinner. No talking shop.’ He turned back to the story-teller and gave another laugh.

With a sense of surprise and sad disappointment, Prince Andrey listened to Speransky’s ringing tones and watched him as he laughed. This wasn’t Speransky, it was someone else, he thought to himself. Everything in Speransky that had seemed mysterious and attractive suddenly struck Prince Andrey as patently obvious and unpleasant.