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Volume II, Part Three, Chapter XI

One evening, when the old countess, sighing and groaning, in her nightcap and bed jacket, without her false curls and with one poor little knot of hair protruding from under her white calico cap, was making earthly bows on the rug at her evening prayers, her door creaked, and in slippers on her bare feet, also in a bed jacket and curl-papers, Natasha came running in. The countess looked round and frowned. She was finishing reading her last prayer: "Can it be that this couch will be my coffin?" Her prayerful mood was destroyed. Natasha, flushed and animated, seeing her mother at prayer, suddenly stopped short in her run, sank down, and involuntarily put out her tongue, threatening herself. Noticing that her mother went on with her prayer, she ran on tiptoe to the bed, swiftly sliding one little foot against the other, kicked off her slippers, and sprang onto that couch which the countess feared might become her coffin. This couch was high, a feather bed, with five ever-diminishing pillows. Natasha jumped up, sank into the feather bed, rolled over to the wall, and began to fuss about under the quilt, settling herself, drawing her knees up to her chin, kicking her legs, and laughing almost inaudibly, now covering herself head and all, now glancing at her mother. The countess finished her prayer and came to the bed with a stern face; but, seeing that Natasha was covered head and all, she smiled her kind, weak smile.

— Well, well, well, — said the mother.

— Mamma, may we have a talk, yes? — said Natasha. — Come, one little kiss on the throat, and another, and that will do. — And she clasped her mother's neck and kissed her under the chin. In her treatment of her mother Natasha displayed an outward roughness of manner, but she was so sensitive and deft that however she clasped her mother in her arms, she always managed to do it so that her mother felt neither pain, nor discomfort, nor awkwardness.

— Well, what is it to be tonight? — said the mother, having settled herself on the pillows and waited until Natasha, after rolling over a couple of times too, lay down beside her under one quilt, freed her arms, and assumed a serious expression.

These nocturnal visits of Natasha's, which took place before the count returned from the club, were one of the favorite delights of mother and daughter.

— What is it to be tonight, then? But I have something to tell you...

Natasha covered her mother's mouth with her hand.

— About Boris... I know, — she said seriously, — that is just what I came for. Don't say it, I know. No, do say it! — She let go of her hand. — Tell me, Mamma. He is nice?

— Natasha, you are sixteen; at your age I was married. You say that Borya is nice. He is very nice, and I love him like a son, but what do you want?... What are you thinking? You have quite turned his head, I see it...

Saying this, the countess looked round at her daughter. Natasha lay gazing straight and motionless before her at one of the mahogany sphinxes carved on the corners of the bed, so that the countess saw only her daughter's face in profile. This face struck the countess by its peculiarity of serious and concentrated expression.

Natasha listened and considered.

— Well, what of it? — she said.

— You have quite turned his head — what for? What do you want of him? You know you cannot marry him.

— Why? — said Natasha, without changing her position.

— Because he is young, because he is poor, because he is a relative... because you yourself do not love him.

— And how do you know?

— I know. It is not right, my little dear.

— But if I want to... — said Natasha.

— Stop talking nonsense, — said the countess.

— But if I want to...

— Natasha, I am serious...

Natasha did not let her finish, drew the countess's large hand to her and kissed it on the back, then on the palm, then turned it over again and began to kiss it on the knuckle of the upper joint of the finger, then in the space between, then on the knuckle again, whispering: "January, February, March, April, May."

— Speak, Mamma, why are you silent? Speak, — she said, glancing round at her mother, who was looking at her daughter with a tender gaze and, lost in that contemplation, seemed to have forgotten all she had meant to say.

— It won't do, my soul. Not everyone will understand your childhood tie, and to see him so intimate with you may harm you in the eyes of the other young men who come to us, and, above all, it torments him for nothing. He may already have found a match to suit him, a wealthy one; and now he is losing his mind.

— Losing it? — repeated Natasha.

— I'll tell you about myself. I had a cousin...

— I know — Kirila Matveich, but he is an old man, isn't he?

— He was not always old. But here is the thing, Natasha: I'll have a talk with Borya. He must not come so often...

— Why must he not, if he wants to?

— Because I know that it will come to nothing.

— How do you know? No, Mamma, don't speak to him. What nonsense! — said Natasha in the tone of a person from whom they want to take away her property. — Well, I shan't marry him, then let him come, if it amuses him and amuses me. — Natasha looked at her mother, smiling.

— Not to marry, but just so, — she repeated.

— How is that, my dear?

— Why, just so. Well, it matters a great deal that I shan't marry him, but... just so.

— So, so, — repeated the countess and, shaking all over, broke into a kind, unexpected old woman's laugh.

— Stop laughing, do stop, — cried Natasha, — you are shaking the whole bed. You are dreadfully like me, just such another giggler... Wait... — She seized both the countess's hands, kissed on one the knuckle of the little finger — June, and went on kissing — July, August — on the other hand. — Mamma, and is he very much in love? How does it seem to you? Was anyone ever so much in love with you? And he is very nice, very, very nice! Only not quite to my taste — he is narrow, like the dining-room clock... Don't you understand?... Narrow, you know, gray, light...

— What rubbish you talk! — said the countess.

Natasha went on:

— Can it be you don't understand? Nikolenka would understand... Bezukhov — he is blue, dark blue with red, and he is rectangular.

— You flirt with him too, — said the countess, laughing.

— No, he is a Freemason, I've found out. He is splendid, dark blue with red — how am I to make it clear to you...

— Little countess, — came the count's voice from behind the door. — You aren't asleep? — Natasha jumped up barefoot, snatched up her slippers, and ran off to her own room.

For a long time she could not fall asleep. She kept thinking that no one could ever understand all that she understood and all that was in her.

"Sonya?" she thought, looking at the sleeping, curled-up little kitten with her enormous braid. "No, how could she! She is virtuous. She has fallen in love with Nikolenka and wishes to know nothing more. Mamma, even she does not understand. It is astonishing how clever I am and how... she is charming," she went on, speaking of herself in the third person and imagining that this was said of her by some very clever man, the cleverest and best of men... "Everything, everything is in her," this man went on, "she is uncommonly clever, charming, and then handsome, uncommonly handsome, deft — she swims and rides splendidly, and her voice! One may say, an astonishing voice!" She sang her favorite musical phrase from a Cherubini opera, threw herself onto the bed, laughed from the joyful thought that she would fall asleep at once, called to Dunyasha to put out the candle, and before Dunyasha had managed to leave the room she had already passed into another, still happier world of dreams, where everything was as easy and beautiful as in reality, only it was still better, because it was different. —————

The next day the countess, having invited Boris to her, had a talk with him, and from that day he ceased to visit the Rostovs.