‘I can’t make out what the servants are about,’ said the countess, addressing her husband. ‘They told me just now nothing was ready. Some one really must go and look after them. It’s at such times one misses Mitenka. There will be no end to it.’
The count was about to make some reply; but with a visible effort to restrain himself, got up and went to the door without a word.
Berg, meanwhile, had taken out his handkerchief as though about to blow his nose, and, seeing the knot in it, he pondered a moment, shaking his head with mournful significance.
‘And, do you know, papa, I have a great favour to ask . . .’ he began.
‘H’m?’ said the count, pausing.
‘I was passing by Yusupov’s house just now,’ said Berg, laughing. ‘The steward, a man I know, ran out and asked me whether I wouldn’t care to buy any of their things. I went in, you know, out of curiosity, and there is a little chiffonier and dressing-table. You know, just like what Verushka wanted, and we quarrelled about.’ (Berg unconsciously passed into a tone expressive of his pleasure in his own excellent domestic arrangements.) ‘And such a charming thing!—it moves forward, you know, with a secret English lock. And it’s just what Verushka wanted. So I want to make it a surprise for her. I see what a number of peasants
you have in the yard. Please, spare me one of them. I’ll pay him well, and . . .’
The count frowned and sniffed.
‘Ask the countess; I don’t give the orders.’
‘If it’s troublesome, pray don’t,’ said Berg. ‘Only I should have liked it on Vera’s account.’
‘Ah, go to damnation all of you, damnation! damnation! damnation!’ cried the old count. ‘My head’s going round.’ And he went out of the room.
The countess began to cry.
‘Yes, indeed, these are terrible times, mamma!’ said Berg.
Natasha went out with her father, and as though unable to make up her mind on some difficult question, she followed him at first, then turned and ran downstairs.
Petya was standing at the entrance, engaged in giving out weapons to the servants, who were leaving Moscow. The loaded waggons were still standing in the yards. Two of them had been uncorded, and on to one of these the wounded officer was clambering with the assistance of his orderly.
‘Do you know what it was about?’ Petya asked Natasha. (Natasha knew that he meant, what their father and mother had been quarrelling anout.) She did not answer.
‘It was because papa wanted to give up all the waggons to the wounded,’ said Petya. ‘Vassilitch told me. And what I think . . .’
‘What I think,’ Natasha suddenly almost screamed, turning a furious face on Petya, ‘what I think is, that it’s so vile, so loathsome ... I don’t know. Are we a lot of low Germans? . . Her throat was quivering with sobs, but afraid of being weak, or wasting the force of her anger, she turned and flew headlong up the stairs.
Berg was sitting beside the countess, trying with filial respectfulness to reassure her. The count was walking about the room with a pipe in his hand, when, with a face distorted by passion, Natasha burst like a tempest into the room, and ran with rapid steps up to her mother.
‘It’s vile! It’s loathsome! ’ she screamed. ‘It can’t be true that it’s your order.’
Berg and the countess gazed at her in alarm and bewilderment. The count stood still in the window listening.
‘Mamma, it’s impossible; look what’s being done in the yard!’ she cried; ‘they are being left . . .’
‘What’s the matter? Who are they? What do you want?’
‘The wounded! It’s impossible, mamma, it’s outrageous. . . . No,
! mamma, darling, it’s all wrong; forgive me, please, darling . . . Mamma, what is it to us what we take away; you only look out into the yard. . . . Mamma! ... It can’t be done. . . .’
The count stood in the window, and listened to Natasha without turning him head. All at once he gave a sort of gulp, and put his face closer to the window.
The countess glanced at her daughter, saw her face full of shame for
Si4 WAR AND PEACE
her mother, saw her emotion, felt why her husband would not look at her now, and looked about her with a distracted air.
‘Oh, do as you please. Am 1 doing anything to hinder any one?’ she said, not giving way all at once.
‘Mamma, darling, forgive me.’
But the countess pushed away her daughter, and went up to the count.
‘My dear, you order what is right. ... I don’t understand about it, you know,’ she said, dropping her eyes with a guilty air.
‘The eggs, ... the eggs teaching the hen, . . .’ the count murmured through tears of gladness, and he embraced his wife, who was glad to hide her ashamed face on his breast.
‘Papa, mamma! may I give the order? May I? . . .’ asked Natasha. ‘We’ll take all that’s quite necessary all the same,’ she added.
The count nodded; and Natasha, with the same swiftness with which she used to run at ‘catch-catch,’ flew across the hall into the vestibule, and down the steps into the yard.
