《War And Peace》　Book1 　CHAPTER XVIII
　　　　by Leo Tolstoy

WHILE IN THE ROSTOVS' HALL they were dancing the sixth anglaise, while the
weary orchestra played wrong notes, and the tired footmen and cooks were getting
the supper, Count Bezuhov had just had his sixth stroke. The doctors declared
that there was no hope of recovery; the sick man received absolution and the
sacrament while unconscious. Preparations were being made for administering
extreme unction, and the house was full of the bustle and thrill of suspense
usual at such moments. Outside the house undertakers were crowding beyond the
gates, trying to escape the notice of the carriages that drove up, but eagerly
anticipating a good order for the count's funeral. The governor of Moscow, who
had been constantly sending his adjutants to inquire after the count's
condition, came himself that evening to say good-bye to the renowned grandee of
Catherine's court, Count Bezuhov.

The magnificent reception-room was full. Every one stood up respectfully when
the governor, after being half an hour alone with the sick man, came out of the
sick-room. Bestowing scanty recognition on the bows with which he was received,
he tried to escape as quickly as possible from the gaze of the doctors,
ecclesiastical personages, and relations. Prince Vassily, who had grown paler
and thinner during the last few days, escorted the governor out, and softly
repeated something to him several times over.

After seeing the governor, Prince Vassily sat down on a chair in the hall
alone, crossing one leg high over the other, leaning his elbow on his knee, and
covering his eyes with his hand. After sitting so for some time he got up, and
with steps more hurried than his wont, he crossed the long corridor, looking
round him with frightened eyes, and went to the back part of the house to the
apartments of the eldest princess.

The persons he had left in the dimly lighted reception-room, next to the
sick-room, talked in broken whispers among themselves, pausing, and looking
round with eyes full of suspense and inquiry whenever the door that led into the
dying man's room creaked as some one went in or came out.

"Man's limitation," said a little man, an ecclesiastic of some sort, to a
lady, who was sitting near him listening naïvely to his words-"his limitation is
fixed, there is no overstepping it."

"I wonder if it won't be late for extreme unction?" inquired the lady, using
his clerical title, and apparently having no opinion of her own on the
matter.

"It is a great mystery, ma'am," answered the clerk, passing his hands over
his bald head, on which lay a few tresses of carefully combed, half grey
hair.

"Who was that? was it the governor himself?" they were asking at the other
end of the room. "What a young-looking man!"

"And he's over sixty!. ... What, do they say, the count does not know any one?
Do they mean to give extreme unction?"

"I knew a man who received extreme unction seven times."

The second princess came out of the sick-room with tearful eyes, and sat down
beside Doctor Lorrain, who was sitting in a graceful pose under the portrait of
Catherine, with his elbow on the table.

"Very fine," said the doctor in reply to a question about the weather; "very
fine, princess, and besides, at Moscow, one might suppose oneself in the
country."

"Might one not?" said the princess, sighing. "So may he have something to
drink?" Lorrain thought a moment.

"He has taken his medicine?"

"Yes."

The doctor looked at his memoranda.

"Take a glass of boiled water and put in a pinch" (he showed with his
delicate fingers what was meant by a pinch) "of cream of tartar."

"There has never been a case," said the German doctor to the adjutant,
speaking broken Russian, "of recovery after having a third stroke."

"And what a vigorous man he was!" said the adjutant. "And to whom will his
great wealth go?" he added in a whisper.

"Candidates will be found," the German replied, smiling. Every one looked
round again at the door; it creaked, and the second princess having made the
drink according to Lorrain's direction, carried it into the sick-room. The
German doctor went up to Lorrain.

"Can it drag on till to-morrow morning?" asked the German, with a vile French
accent.

Lorrain, with compressed lips and a stern face, moved his finger before his
nose to express a negative.

"To-night, not later," he said softly, and with a decorous smile of
satisfaction at being able to understand and to express the exact position of
the sick man, he walked away.

Meanwhile Prince Vassily had opened the door of the princess's room.

It was half dark in the room; there were only two lamps burning before the
holy pictures, and there was a sweet perfume of incense and flowers. The whole
room was furnished with miniature furniture, little sideboards, small bookcases,
and small tables. Behind a screen could be seen the white coverings of a high
feather-bed. A little dog barked.

"Ah, is that you, mon cousin?"

She got up and smoothed her hair, which was always, even now, so
extraordinarily smooth that it seemed as though made out of one piece with her
head and covered with varnish.

"Has anything happened?" she asked. "I am in continual dread."

"Nothing, everything is unchanged. I have only come to have a little talk
with you, Katish, about business," said the prince, sitting down wearily in the
low chair from which she had just risen. "How warm it is here, though," he said.
"Come, sit here; let us talk."

"I wondered whether anything had happened," said the princess, and with her
stonily severe expression unchanged, she sat down opposite the prince, preparing
herself to listen. "I have been trying to get some sleep, mon cousin, but
I can't."

"Well, my dear?" said Prince Vassily, taking the princess's hand, and bending
it downwards as his habit was.

It was plain that this "well?" referred to much that they both comprehended
without mentioning it in words.

The princess, with her spare, upright figure, so disproportionately long in
the body, looked straight at the prince with no sign of emotion in her prominent
grey eyes. She shook her head, and sighing looked towards the holy pictures. Her
gesture might have been interpreted as an expression of grief and devotion, or
as an expression of weariness and the hope of a speedy release. Prince Vassily
took it as an expression of weariness.

"And do you suppose it's any easier for me?" he said. "I am as worn out as a
post horse. I must have a little talk with you, Katish, and a very serious
one."

Prince Vassily paused. and his cheeks began twitching nervously, first on one
side, then on the other, giving his face an unpleasant expression such as was
never seen on his countenance when he was in drawing-rooms. His eyes, too, were
different from usual: at one moment they stared with a sort of insolent
jocoseness, at the next they looked round furtively.

The princess, pulling her dog on her lap with her thin, dry hands, gazed
intently at the eyes of Prince Vassily, but it was evident that she would not
break the silence, if she had to sit silent till morning.

"You see, my dear princess and cousin, Katerina Semyonovna," pursued Prince
Vassily, obviously with some inner conflict bracing himself to go on with what
he wanted to say, "at such moments as the present, one has to think of
everything. One must think of the future, of you ... I care for all of you as if
you were my own children; you know that."

The princess looked at him with the same dull immovable gaze.

"Finally, we have to think of my family too," continued Prince Vassily,
angrily pushing away a little table and not looking at her: "you know, Katish,
that you three Mamontov sisters and my wife,-we are the only direct heirs of the
count. I know, I know how painful it is for you to speak and think of such
things. And it's as hard for me; but, my dear, I am a man over fifty, I must be
ready for anything. Do you know that I have sent for Pierre, and that the count,
pointing straight at his portrait, has asked for him?"

Prince Vassily looked inquiringly at the princess, but he could not make out
whether she was considering what he had said, or was simply staring at
him.

"I pray to God for one thing only continually, mon cousin," she
replied, "that He may have mercy upon him, and allow his noble soul to leave
this ..."

"Yes, quite so," Prince Vassily continued impatiently, rubbing his bald head
and again wrathfully moving the table towards him that he had just moved away,
"but in fact ... in fact the point is, as you are yourself aware, that last winter
the count made a will by which, passing over his direct heirs and us, he
bequeathed all his property to Pierre."

"He may have made ever so many wills!" the princess said placidly; "but he
can't leave it to Pierre. Pierre is illegitimate."

"Ma chère," said Prince Vassily suddenly, pushing the table against
him, growing more earnest and beginning to speak more rapidly: "but what if a
letter has been written to the Emperor, and the count has petitioned him to
legitimise Pierre? You understand, that the count's services would make his
petition carry weight ..."

The princess smiled, as people smile who believe that they know much more
about the subject than those with whom they are talking.

"I can say more," Prince Vassily went on, clasping her hand; "that letter has
been written, though it has not been sent off, and the Emperor has heard about
it. The question only is whether it has been destroyed or not. If not, as soon
as all is over," Prince Vassily sighed, giving her thereby to understand what he
meant precisely by the words "all is over," "and they open the count's papers,
the will with the letter will be given to the Emperor, and his petition will
certainly be granted. Pierre, as the legitimate son, will receive
everything."

"What about our share?" the princess inquired, smiling ironically as though
anything but that might happen.

"Why, my poor Katish, it is as clear as daylight. He will then be the only
legal heir of all, and you won't receive as much as this, see. You ought to
know, my dear, whether the will and the petition were written, and whether they
have been destroyed, and if they have somehow been overlooked, then you ought to
know where they are and to find them, because ..."

"That would be rather too much!" the princess interrupted him, smiling
sardonically, with no change in the expression of her eyes. "I am a woman, and
you think we are all silly; but I do know so much, that an illegitimate son
can't inherit ... Un bâtard," she added, supposing that by this translation
of the word she was conclusively proving to the prince the groundlessness of his
contention.

"How can you not understand, Katish, really! You are so intelligent; how is
it you don't understand that if the count has written a letter to the Emperor,
begging him to recognise his son as legitimate, then Pierre will not be Pierre
but Count Bezuhov, and then he will inherit everything under the will? And if
the will and the letter have not been destroyed, then except the consolation of
having been dutiful and of all that results from having done your duty, nothing
is left for you. That's the fact."

"I know that the will was made, but I know, too, that it is invalid, and you
seem to take me for a perfect fool, mon cousin," said the princess, with
the air with which women speak when they imagine they are saying something witty
and biting.

"My dear princess, Katerina Semyonovna!" Prince Vassily began impatiently, "I
have come to you not to provoke you, but to talk to you as a kinswoman, a good,
kind-hearted, true kinswoman, of your own interests. I tell you for the tenth
time that if the letter to the Emperor and the will in Pierre's favour are among
the count's papers, you, my dear girl, and your sisters are not heiresses. If
you don't believe me, believe people who know; I have just been talking to
Dmitry Onufritch" (this was the family solicitor); "he said the same."

There was obviously some sudden change in the princess's ideas; her thin lips
turned white (her eyes did not change), and when she began to speak, her voice
passed through transitions, which she clearly did not herself anticipate.

"That would be a pretty thing," she said. "I wanted nothing, and I want
nothing." She flung her dog off her lap and smoothed out the folds of her
skirt.

"That's the gratitude, that's the recognition people get who have sacrificed
everything for him," she said. "Very nice! Excellent! I don't want anything,
prince."

"Yes, but you are not alone, you have sisters," answered Prince Vassily. But
the princess did not heed him.

"Yes, I knew it long ago, but I'd forgotten that I could expect nothing in
this house but baseness, deceit, envy, scheming, nothing but ingratitude, the
blackest ingratitude ..."

"Do you or do you not know where that will is?" asked Prince Vassily, the
twitching of his cheeks more marked than ever.

"Yes, I have been foolish; I still kept faith in people, and cared for them
and sacrificed myself. But no one succeeds except those who are base and vile. I
know whose plotting this is."

The princess would have risen, but the prince held her by the arm. The
princess had the air of a person who has suddenly lost faith in the whole human
race. She looked viciously at her companion.

"There is still time, my dear. Remember, Katish, that all this was done
heedlessly, in a moment of anger, of illness, and then forgotten. Our duty, my
dear girl, is to correct his mistake, to soften his last moments by not letting
him commit this injustice, not letting him die with the thought that he has made
miserable those ..."

"Those who have sacrificed everything for him," the princess caught him up;
and she made an impulsive effort again to stand up, but the prince would not let
her, "a sacrifice he has never known how to appreciate. No, mon cousin,"
she added, with a sigh, "I will remember that one can expect no reward in this
world, that in this world there is no honour, no justice. Cunning and wickedness
is what one wants in this world."

"Come, voyons, calm yourself; I know your noble heart."

"No, I have a wicked heart."

"I know your heart," repeated the prince. "I value your affection, and I
could wish you had the same opinion of me. Calm yourself and let us talk
sensibly while there is time-perhaps twenty-four hours, perhaps one. Tell me all
you know about the will, and what's of most consequence, where it is; you must
know. We will take it now at once and show it to the count. He has no doubt
forgotten about it and would wish to destroy it. You understand that my desire
is to carry out his wishes religiously. That is what I came here for. I am only
here to be of use to him and to you."

"Now I see it all. I know whose plotting this is. I know," the princess was
saying.

"That's not the point, my dear."

"It's all your precious Anna Mihalovna, your protégée whom I wouldn't
take as a housemaid, the nasty creature."

"Do not let us waste time."

"Oh, don't talk to me! Last winter she forced her way in here and told such a
pack of vile, mean tales to the count about all of us, especially Sophie-I can't
repeat them-that it made the count ill, and he wouldn't see us for a fortnight.
It was at that time, I know, he wrote that hateful, infamousdocument, but I
thought it was of no consequence."

"There we are. Why didn't you tell us about it before?"

"It's in the inlaid portfolio that he keeps under his pillow. Now I know,"
said the princess, making no reply. "Yes, if I have a sin to my account, a great
sin, it's my hatred of that infamous woman," almost shrieked the princess,
utterly transformed. "And why does she force herself in here? But I'll have it
out with her. The time will come!"