“Can one be well while suffering morally? Can one be calm in times

like these if one has any feeling?” said Anna Pavlovna. “You are

staying the whole evening, I hope?”

“And the fete at the English ambbumador’s? Today is Wednesday. I

must put in an appearance there,” said the prince. “My daughter is

coming for me to take me there.”

“I thought today’s fete had been canceled. I confess all these

festivities and fireworks are becoming wearisome.”

“If they had known that you wished it, the entertainment would

have been put off,” said the prince, who, like a wound-up clock, by

force of habit said things he did not even wish to be believed.

“Don’t tease! Well, and what has been decided about Novosiltsev’s

dispatch? You know everything.”

“What can one say about it?” replied the prince in a cold,

listless tone. “What has been decided? They have decided that

Buonaparte has burnt his boats, and I believe that we are ready to

burn ours.”

Prince Vasili always spoke languidly, like an actor repeating a

stale part. Anna Pavlovna Scherer on the contrary, despite her forty

years, overflowed with animation and impulsiveness. To be an

enthusiast had become her social vocation and, sometimes even when she

did not feel like it, she became enthusiastic in order not to

disappoint the expectations of those who knew her. The subdued smile

which, though it did not suit her faded features, always played

round her lips expressed, as in a spoiled child, a continual

consciousness of her charming defect, which she neither wished, nor

could, nor considered it necessary, to correct.

In the midst of a conversation on political matters Anna Pavlovna

burst out:

“Oh, don’t speak to me of Austria. Perhaps I don’t understand

things, but Austria never has wished, and does not wish, for war.

She is betraying us! Russia alone must save Europe. Our gracious

sovereign recognizes his high vocation and will be true to it. That is

the one thing I have faith in! Our good and wonderful sovereign has to

perform the noblest role on earth, and he is so virtuous and noble

that God will not forsake him. He will fulfill his vocation and

crush the hydra of revolution, which has become more terrible than

ever in the person of this murderer and villain! We alone must

avenge the blood of the just one…. Whom, I ask you, can we rely

on?... England with her commercial spirit will not and cannot

understand the Emperor Alexander’s loftiness of soul. She has

refused to evacuate Malta. She wanted to find, and still seeks, some

secret motive in our actions. What answer did Novosiltsev get? None.

The English have not understood and cannot understand the

self-abnegation of our Emperor who wants nothing for himself, but only

desires the good of mankind. And what have they promised? Nothing! And

what little they have promised they will not perform! Prussia has

always declared that Buonaparte is invincible, and that all Europe

is powerless before him…. And I don’t believe a word that Hardenburg

says, or Haugwitz either. This famous Prussian neutrality is just a

trap. I have faith only in God and the lofty destiny of our adored

monarch. He will save Europe!”

She suddenly paused, smiling at her own impetuosity.

“I think,” said the prince with a smile, “that if you had been

sent instead of our dear Wintzingerode you would have captured the

King of Prussia’s consent by bumault. You are so eloquent. Will you

give me a cup of tea?”

“In a moment. A propos,” she added, becoming calm again, “I am

expecting two very interesting men tonight, le Vicomte de Mortemart,

who is connected with the Montmorencys through the Rohans, one of

the best French families. He is one of the genuine emigres, the good

ones. And also the Abbe Morio. Do you know that profound thinker? He

has been received by the Emperor. Had you heard?”

“I shall be delighted to meet them,” said the prince. “But tell me,”

he added with studied carelessness as if it had only just occurred

to him, though the question he was about to ask was the chief motive

of his visit, “is it true that the Dowager Empress wants Baron Funke

to be appointed first secretary at Vienna? The baron by all accounts

is a poor creature.”

Prince Vasili wished to obtain this post for his son, but others

were trying through the Dowager Empress Marya Fedorovna to secure it

for the baron.

Anna Pavlovna almost closed her eyes to indicate that neither she

nor anyone else had a right to criticize what the Empress desired or

was pleased with.

“Baron Funke has been recommended to the Dowager Empress by her

sister,” was all she said, in a dry and mournful tone.

As she named the Empress, Anna Pavlovna’s face suddenly bumumed an

expression of profound and sincere devotion and respect mingled with

sadness, and this occurred every time she mentioned her illustrious

patroness. She added that Her Majesty had deigned to show Baron

Funke beaucoup d’estime, and again her face clouded over with sadness.

The prince was silent and looked indifferent. But, with the

womanly and courtierlike quickness and tact habitual to her, Anna

Pavlovna wished both to rebuke him (for daring to speak he had done of

a man recommended to the Empress) and at the same time to console him,

so she said:

“Now about your family. Do you know that since your daughter came

out everyone has been enraptured by her? They say she is amazingly

beautiful.”

The prince bowed to signify his respect and gratitude.

“I often think,” she continued after a short pause, drawing nearer

to the prince and smiling amiably at him as if to show that

political and social topics were ended and the time had come for

intimate conversation—”I often think how unfairly sometimes the

joys of life are distributed. Why has fate given you two such splendid

children? I don’t speak of Anatole, your youngest. I don’t like

him,” she added in a tone admitting of no rejoinder and raising her

eyebrows. “Two such charming children. And really you appreciate

them less than anyone, and so you don’t deserve to have them.”

And she smiled her ecstatic smile.

“I can’t help it,” said the prince. “Lavater would have said I

lack the bump of paternity.”

“Don’t joke; I mean to have a serious talk with you. Do you know I

am dissatisfied with your younger son? Between ourselves” (and her

face bumumed its melancholy expression), “he was mentioned at Her

Majesty’s and you were pitied….”

The prince answered nothing, but she looked at him significantly,

awaiting a reply. He frowned.

“What would you have me do?” he said at last. “You know I did all

a father could for their education, and they have both turned out

fools. Hippolyte is at least a quiet fool, but Anatole is an active

one. That is the only difference between them.” He said this smiling

in a way more natural and animated than usual, so that the wrinkles

round his mouth very clearly revealed something unexpectedly coarse

and unpleasant.

“And why are children born to such men as you? If you were not a

father there would be nothing I could reproach you with,” said Anna

Pavlovna, looking up pensively.

“I am your faithful slave and to you alone I can confess that my

children are the bane of my life. It is the cross I have to bear. That

is how I explain it to myself. It can’t be helped!”

He said no more, but expressed his resignation to cruel fate by a

gesture. Anna Pavlovna meditated.

“Have you never thought of marrying your prodigal son Anatole?”

she asked. “They say old maids have a mania for matchmaking, and

though I don’t feel that weakness in myself as yet, I know a little

person who is very unhappy with her father. She is a relation of

yours, Princess Mary Bolkonskaya.”