Chapter 4 Chapter Four

Pierre sat opposite Dolokhov and Nikolai Rostov, eating and drinking greedily as usual.But those who knew him well saw some great change in him today.At the banquet, he frowned, squinted his eyes, and remained silent from beginning to end. He looked around with concentrated and dull eyes, and gently rubbed the bridge of his nose with his fingers, showing a careless look.His face became depressed and gloomy.It seemed that he did not see or hear anything that was going on around him, and was always brooding over a heavy unresolved question. The unresolved and tormenting question of the insinuation given to him by the princess living in Moscow that Dolokhov was close to his wife received an anonymous letter this morning containing a very despicable In the irony which is characteristic of all anonymous letters, he stated that he wore spectacles and had poor eyesight; that his wife's relationship with Dolokhov was a secret to him alone.Pierre did not believe at all the hints of the princess, nor the contents of the letter, and at this moment he saw Dolokhov sitting in front of him, which terrified him.Whenever his eyes accidentally met Dolokhov's beautiful, impudent eyes, Pierre felt that something terrible and indescribable was constantly floating in his soul, and he immediately Turn away, ignore him.Pierre could not help thinking of his wife's past, of her relations with Dolokhov, and he saw clearly that if the incident had nothing to do with his wife, the circumstances described in the letter might be true, at least Might be like real.Pierre could not help remembering that after this campaign Dolokhov had been reinstated, and that he had come back to see him in Petersburg.Dolokhov, drawing on his own friendship with Pierre, went straight to his house, and Pierre took him in and lent him money.Pierre recalled how Helene smiled, complained that Dolokhov was staying in their house, and Dolokhov had the audacity to praise his wife's beauty, and from that time until his arrival in Moscow, he He didn't leave them for a moment.

"Yes, he is very handsome," thought Pierre, "and I know all about him. The reason why he finds it extremely amusing to disgrace me and laugh at me is because I work for him." However, because I have raised him and helped him. I know and understand that, if there is any truth, it will add to his deceit. , I have no right to believe, and cannot believe such things.” He recalled the look on Dolokhov’s face when he committed cruel deeds, for example, when he tied the police chief to a bear. When he threw them into the water together; or demanded a duel for no reason; or shot the coachman's stage horse with a pistol, he often wore the same expression on Pierre's face when he looked at Pierre.

"Yes, he is a duelist," thought Pierre. "It seemed to him that killing a man had nothing to do with him. He must have felt that everyone was afraid of his "shadow" or "copies." Knowing the truth was the "memory" of ideas. This must have pleased him. He must have To think that I am afraid of him, too. I am really afraid of him," thought Pierre, and at the same time as these thoughts occurred to him, he felt again that something terrible and indescribable rose up in the depths of his soul.Dolokhov, Denisov, and Rostov, sitting across from Pierre, seemed very happy.Rostov was chatting cheerfully with his two friends, one a gallant hussar, the other a well-known duelist and rake, and he sometimes looked ironically at Pierre, who at this banquet Shangliu Shen Wuzhu, indulging in his own thoughts and feelings, in addition, his tall figure also surprised everyone.Rostov looked at Pierre unkindly, firstly because Pierre seemed to his hussars a rich man without military service, the husband of a beautiful woman, and in short a cowardly man; He was so absent-minded, so absorbed in his own thoughts and feelings, that he did not recognize Rostov and did not bow to him in return.When the crowd began to toast the emperor's health, Pierre fell into a state of thought, and stood up without raising his glass.

"What's the matter with you?" Rostov called to him, casting his cheerful, savage eyes on him. "Didn't you hear: To the health of the emperor!" Pierre sighed, rose meekly, drank a glass of wine, and when they were seated, he turned his head with a kind smile. Go talk to Rostov. "I didn't recognize you," he said.But Rostov couldn't care less, he was shouting "Ulla!" "Why don't you get back together," Dolokhov said to Rostov. "Fuck him, fool!" said Rostov. "The husbands of good women must be cared for," said Denisov.

Pierre did not hear what they said, but he knew that they were talking about him.He blushed and turned away. "Well, here's a toast to the health of the beauties," said Dolokhov, with a stern expression, but with a smile on his lips, and raising his glass, he turned his face to Pierre. "To the beauties and their lovers, Petrusha," he said. Pierre lowered his eyes, was drinking from his glass, and did not look at Dolokhov, nor answer him.The servants were distributing Kutuzov's cantatas to the guests, placing one in front of the more respectable guest of honor, Pierre.He was about to pick it up, but Dolokhov stooped down, snatched it from him, and began reciting the chorus.Pierre glanced at Dolokhov and lowered his eyes again, and during the whole banquet something terrible and indescribable had arisen in his mind and seized him.He bent his fat body over the table.

"How dare you take it!" he shouted. Nesvitsky and the neighbors on the right, startled when they heard the shout and saw him standing in front of someone, turned quickly to Bezukhov and said: "Enough, enough, what are you doing?" Frightened and muffled voices could be heard.Dolokhov glanced at Pierre with bright, cheerful, cruel eyes, and smiled, as if to say: "Oh, that's what I like." "I won't give it." He said firmly. Pierre, pale and with trembling lips, snatched the paper back. "You... you... villain!... I challenge you to a duel," he said, pushing back his chair, and getting up from behind the table.At the very moment he did this and said these words, he felt that the problem of his wife's crime, which had been tormenting him for the past few days, was now definitely and completely settled.He hated her and disowned her forever.Although Denisov asked Rostov not to intervene in the matter, Rostov agreed to act as a witness to Dolokhov's duel. condition.Pierre went home, and Rostov, Dolokhov, and Denisov sat up late into the night in the club, wanting to hear the gypsies and singers.

"Then, let's meet tomorrow at the Sokolnik Forest," said Dolokhov, saying goodbye to Rostov on the steps of the club. "Are you at peace?" asked Rostov. Dolokhov stopped. "You see, I'm telling you the whole secret of the duel in just a few words. If you're going to the duel, write your will, and write some kind letters to your parents, and if you think you're going to be killed , then you're a fool, you're going to die; if you're determined and kill him as quickly and as accurately as you can, you'll be all right. One of our Kostroma bear hunters has repeatedly told I said: The man said, how can you not be afraid of a bear? But when you see a bear, you are no longer afraid of it, just hope that it will not run away! Oh, I am the same way.

Ademain, moncher! ①" -------- ① French: My dear, see you tomorrow. The next day, at eight o'clock in the morning, Pierre and Nesvitsky went to the Sokolnik Forest and found Dolokhov, Denisov and Rostov there.Pierre had the look of someone who is preoccupied with some question that has absolutely nothing to do with what is about to happen.His sunken face turned yellow.It seems he didn't sleep all night.He looked around absently, as if the dazzling sunlight had frowned his forehead.He was only brooding over two questions: the guilt of his wife, which he had no doubts after the sleepless night, and the innocence of Dolokhov, who had no reason to respect the honor of an alien. "If I were in his place, I probably would have done the same thing," thought Pierre, "or indeed I would have done the same thing; why fight, why kill? Or else I kill him, or he shoots me in the head, elbow, knee. He wants to get away from here, run away, hide somewhere. But just when the thought comes to his mind , he assumed a peculiarly composed, insouciant air, which aroused the awe of the onlookers, and he asked: "The time is coming?Are you ready? "

Everything was ready, the sabers were stuck in the snow to mark the line where the two sides met, the pistols were loaded.Nesvitsky came up to Pierre. "Count, if I do not tell you the whole truth at this momentous, very momentous moment, I shall not have done my duty, and I shall have failed the trust and honor which you have placed in me in choosing me to be a witness to the duel. !” he said in a timid voice. "I don't think there is a good reason for the duel, and it's not worth the bloodshed for it... You're wrong, you're too hasty..." "Yes, very confused..." said Pierre.

"Then let me convey your apology, which I am sure our adversaries will agree to accept," Nesvitski said (like others involved in this matter, and like all those involved in such matters. like many of you, who still don't believe that the matter has reached the point where a duel is necessary), "Count, you know, it is far more noble to realize your mistake than to bring the matter to an irreparable point. Either side I will not be wronged. Please allow me to hold negotiations..." "No, what's there to say!" said Pierre. "Anyway... ready?" he added. "Just tell me where to go, where to shoot?" he said, with an unnaturally meek smile.He picked up the pistol and started asking how to use the trigger, since he hadn't held a pistol up until this point, which he didn't want to admit, "Oh yeah, that's how you shoot it, I know, I just forgot It's gone," he said.

"There is no need for any apology, there is no need at all," Dolokhov told Denisov, although Denisov also tried to make peace and went to the prescribed place. The place chosen for the duel was about eighty paces from the main road where the sledges were parked, in a small pine clearing covered by the remaining snow that had begun to melt in the warmer weather of late.Two rivals stood on either side of a pine clearing some forty paces away.The duelist's witnesses measured the distance from where they stood to the point where Nesvitsky's and Denisov's sabers marked the line ten paces away, in a deep, damp Footprints were left in the snow.The snow and ice continued to melt, and the fog kept rising, making it impossible to see anything beyond forty paces.After about three minutes, everything was ready, but they still didn't start.Everyone was silent.