‘Well, if it does come to a battle,’ he said thoughtfully, ‘and pretty soon, then yours will win. That’s a sure thing. But if now, three days and there's a battle after that, well then, I say, that same battle will be a long job.’ This was translated to Napoleon. ‘If a battle is fought within three days the French will win it, but if later, God knows what will come of it,’ Lelorme d’Ideville put it, smiling. Napoleon did not smile, though he was evidently in high good humour, and told him to repeat the words.
Lavarushka noticed that, and to entertain him further, said, pretending not to know who he was:
‘We know, you have got your Bonaparte; he has conquered every one in the world, ay, but with us it will be a different story . . .’ himself hardly aware how and why this bit of bragging patriotism slipped out. The interpreter translated these words without the conclusion’ and Bonaparte smiled. ‘The young Cossack brought a smile on to the lips of his august companion,’ says Thiers. After a few paces in silence, Napoleon turned to Berthier, and said he should like to try the effect ‘sitr cet enfant, du Don’ of learning that the man with whom he was speaking was the Emperor himself, the very Emperor who had carved his immortally victorious name on the Pyramids. The fact was communicated. Lavrushka—discerning that this was done to test him, and that Napoleon expected him to be panic-stricken—tried to gratify his new masters by promptly affecting to be astounded, struck dumb; he opened round eyes, and made the sort of face usual with him when he was being led off to be thrashed. ‘Hardly,’ says Thiers, ‘had Napoleon’s interpreter spoken, than the Cossack was struck dumb with amazement; he did not utter another word, and walked with his eyes constantly fixed on the great conqueror, whose fame had reached him across the steppes of the East. All his loquacity suddenly vanished, and was replaced by a naive and silent awe. Napoleon made the Cossack a present, and ordered him to be set at liberty like un oiseau qu’on rend aux champs qui I’ont vu naitre.’
Napoleon rode on, dreaming of that Moscow that filled his imagination, while the bird returning to the fields that had seen him born, galloped back to the outposts, inventing the tale he would tell his comrades. What had really happened he did not care to relate, simply because it seemed to him not worth telling. He rode back to the Cossacks, inquired where was his regiment, now forming part of Platov’s detachment; and towards evening found his master, Nikolay Rostov, encamped < Yankovo. Rostov was just mounting his horse to ride through tb.e
672 WAR AND PEACE
villages near with Ilyin He gave Lavrushka another horse and took him with them.
VIII
Princess Marya was not in Moscow and out of danger as Prince Andrey supposed.
After Alpatitch’s return from Smolensk, the old prince seemed as though he had suddenly waked out of a sleep. He gave orders for the militiamen to assemble out of the villages, and to be armed; and wrote a letter to the commander-in-chief, in which he informed him of his intention to remain at Bleak Hills to the last and to defend himself, leaving it to his discretion to take steps or not for the defence of Bleak Hills, where he said one of the oldest Russian generals would be taken prisoner or die. He announced to his household that he should remain at Bleak Hills.
But though resolved himself to remain, the prince made arrangements for sending the princess with Dessalle and the little prince to Bogutcha- rovo, and from there on to Moscow. Frightened at her father’s feverish, sleepless energy, following on his previous apathy, Princess Marya could not bring herself to leave him alone, and for the first time in her life ventured not to obey him. She refused to go, and a fearful tempest of wrath burst upon her. The prince reminded her of every previous instance of injustice to her. Trying to find pretexts for reviling her, he said she had done everything to worry him, that she had estranged him from his son, that she harboured the vilest suspicions of him, that she made it the object of her life to poison his existence. He drove her out of his study, telling her that he did not care if she did not go away. He told her that he did not want to hear of her existence, but gave her fair warning not to dare to show herself before him. Princess Marya was relieved that he had not, as she had dreaded, ordered her to be forcibly : removed from Bleak Hills, but had simply commanded her not to show herself. She knew that this meant that in the secret recesses of his soul he was glad she was staying at home.
