Book Five: 1806-07 - Chapter VII

by Leo Tolstoy

　　When Boris and Anna Pavlovna returned to the others Prince Hippolytehad the ear of the company.

　　Bending forward in his armchair he said: "Le Roi de Prusse!" andhaving said this laughed. Everyone turned toward him.

　　"Le Roi de Prusse?" Hippolyte said interrogatively, againlaughing, and then calmly and seriously sat back in his chair. AnnaPavlovna waited for him to go on, but as he seemed quite decided tosay no more she began to tell of how at Potsdam the impiousBonaparte had stolen the sword of Frederick the Great.

　　"It is the sword of Frederick the Great which I..." she began, butHippolyte interrupted her with the words: "Le Roi de Prusse..." andagain, as soon as soon as all turned toward him, excused himself andsaid no more.

　　Anna Pavlovna frowned. Mortemart, Hippolyte's friend, addressedhim firmly.

　　"Come now, what about your Roi de Prusse?"

　　Hippolyte laughed as if ashamed of laughing.

　　"Oh, it's nothing. I only wished to say..." (he wanted to repeat ajoke he had heard in Vienna and which he had been trying all thatevening to get in) "I only wished to say that we are wrong to fightpour le Roi de Prusse!"

　　Boris smiled circumspectly, so that it might be taken as ironical orappreciative according to the way the joke was received. Everybodylaughed.

　　"Your joke is too bad, it's witty but unjust," said Anna Pavlovna,shaking her little shriveled finger at him.

　　"We are not fighting pour le Roi de Prusse, but for rightprinciples. Oh, that wicked Prince Hippolyte!" she said.

　　The conversation did not flag all evening and turned chiefly onthe political news. It became particularly animated toward the endof the evening when the rewards bestowed by the Emperor werementioned.

　　"You know N- N- received a snuffbox with the portrait last year?"said "the man of profound intellect." "Why shouldn't S- S- get thesame distinction?"

　　"Pardon me! A snuffbox with the Emperor's portrait is a reward butnot a distinction," said the diplomatist- "a gift, rather."

　　"There are precedents, I may mention Schwarzenberg."

　　"It's impossible," replied another.

　　"Will you bet? The ribbon of the order is a different matter...."

　　When everybody rose to go, Helene who had spoken very little all theevening again turned to Boris, asking him in a tone of caressingsignificant command to come to her on Tuesday.

　　"It is of great importance to me," she said, turning with a smiletoward Anna Pavlovna, and Anna Pavlovna, with the same sad smilewith which she spoke of her exalted patroness, supported Helene'swish.

　　It seemed as if from some words Boris had spoken that eveningabout the Prussian army, Helene had suddenly found it necessary to seehim. She seemed to promise to explain that necessity to him when hecame on Tuesday.

　　But on Tuesday evening, having come to Helene's splendid salon,Boris received no clear explanation of why it had been necessary forhim to come. There were other guests and the countess talked little tohim, and only as he kissed her hand on taking leave saidunexpectedly and in a whisper, with a strangely unsmiling face:"Come to dinner tomorrow... in the evening. You must come.... Come!"

　　During that stay in Petersburg, Boris became an intimate in thecountess' house.