At Bald Hills, the estate of Prince Nikolay Bolkonsky, the arrival of young Prince Andrey and his wife was expected daily, but this expectation did not disrupt the orderly system according to which life in the old prince’s household was organized. Prince Nikolay, a former commander-in-chief (nicknamed ‘The King of Prussia’ in high society), had been exiled to his estate in the reign of Paul,36 and had remained at Bald Hills ever since with his daughter, Princess Marya, and her companion, Mademoiselle Bourienne. Under the new Tsar, even though he was now allowed to visit the capital cities, he had stayed on resolutely in the country, saying that anyone who needed him could travel the hundred miles from Moscow to Bald Hills, while he himself wanted nobody and needed nothing. He used to claim that there were only two sources of human depravity – idleness and superstition; and only two virtues – hard work and intelligence. He was educating his daughter and in order to inculcate these two cardinal virtues he was still teaching her algebra and geometry when she was nearly twenty, and had organized her whole life around one unending course of study. He himself had many occupations – writing his memoirs, solving mathematical problems, turning snuff-boxes on his lathe, working at his garden or supervising the building work which never stopped on his estate. Since the main prerequisite for hard work is good order, good order dictated his lifestyle to the last degree of exactitude. The details of his appearances at the meal-table were unvarying, timed to the minute rather than the hour. With those around him, from daughter to servant, the prince was brusque and always demanding so that without actually being cruel he inspired the kind of fear and respect that the cruellest of men would have found difficult to achieve. Although he was now retired and without political influence of any kind, every senior figure in the province where he lived felt obliged to call on him, and they were no different from the architect, the gardener or Princess Marya – they had to wait in the lofty antechamber until the precise time set for the prince’s arrival. And in that room everyone felt the same kind of deference bordering on dread as the immensely tall door of the study swung open to reveal the small figure of an old man in a powdered wig, with tiny withered hands and bushy grey eyebrows that were prone to gather in a frown and thus hide the gleam in his shrewd, young man’s eyes.
On the morning of the day when the young people were expected, Princess Marya went to the antechamber as usual at lesson time to wish her father good morning, crossing herself with dread in her heart and saying a silent prayer. Every day she went in like this to her father, and every day she prayed for a happy outcome to their daily encounter. The powdered old manservant rose smoothly from his seat there and whispered, ‘Please go through.’
From the other side of the door came the steady hum of a lathe. The princess eased the door open timidly and stood in the doorway. The prince, busy at the lathe, glanced up once and went on with his work.
It was a vast work-room full of objects evidently in constant use. A huge table with books and plans laid out, tall glass-fronted bookcases with keys in the doors, a high desk for writing standing up, with an open note-book on top, the carpenter’s lathe with a scattering of tools and shavings – all of this betokened constant, continually varied and systematic hard work. The motion of the prince’s tiny foot in its silver-trimmed Tartar bootee and the firm pressure of his lean and sinewy hand spoke of resolute strength and indefatigable energy taken through to old age. A few more turns of the lathe and he took his foot off the pedal, wiped a chisel, dropped it into a leather pouch attached to the lathe, came to the table and called his daughter over. He was not one to bother with blessings for his children, and he simply offered her a bristly unshaven cheek before looking her over in a manner that somehow managed to mix strictness with care and tenderness. Then he spoke. ‘You all right? Very well, sit down!’
He took out a geometry exercise-book with his writing in it, and dragged a chair over with one foot.
‘For tomorrow,’ he said, turning rapidly to a particular page and using his thick nail to mark out two paragraphs together. The princess bent over the table and the exercise-book. ‘Wait, there’s a letter for you,’ said the old man suddenly, taking an envelope with a woman’s handwriting on it from a pouch hanging above the table and tossing it down before her.
The princess coloured up blotchy red at the sight of the letter. She took it hurriedly and bent down to open it.
‘From your Héloïse?’37 asked the prince, with a cold smile, showing teeth that were yellowing but still strong.
‘Yes, it’s from Julie,’ said the princess, with a timid glance and an equally timid smile.
