《War And Peace》 Book6 CHAPTER IX
by Leo Tolstoy
AT THAT TIME, as always indeed, the exalted society that met at court and at
the GREat balls was split up into several circles, each of which had its special
tone. The largest among them was the French circle—supporting the Napoleonic
alliance—the circle of Count Rumyantsev and Caulaincourt. In this circle Ellen
took a leading position, as soon as she had established herself in her husband's
house in Petersburg. She received the members of the French embassy, and a great
number of people, noted for their wit and their politeness, and belonging to
that political section.
Ellen had been at Erfurt at the time of the famous meeting of the Emperors;
and had there formed close ties with all the notable figures in Europe belonging
to the Napoleonic circle. In Erfurt she had been brilliantly successful.
Napoleon himself, seeing her at the theatre, had asked who she was, and admired
her beauty. Her triumphs in the character of a beautiful and elegant woman did
not surprise Pierre, for with years she had become even more beautiful than
before. But what did surprise him was that during the last two years his wife
had succeeded in gaining a reputation as “a charming woman, as witty as she is
beautiful,” as was said of her. The distinguished Prince de Ligne wrote her
letters of eight pages. Bilibin treasured up his mots to utter them for
the first time before Countess Bezuhov. To be received in Countess Bezuhov's
salon was looked upon as a certificate of intellect. Young men read up subjects
before one of Ellen's soirées, so as to be able to talk of something in
her salon, and secretaries of the embassy, and even ambassadors, confided
diplomatic secrets to her, so that Ellen was in a way a power. It was with a
strange feeling of perplexity and alarm that Pierre, who knew she was very
stupid, sometimes at her dinners and soirées, listened to conversation
about politics, poetry, and philosophy. At these soirées he experienced a
sensation such as a conjuror must feel who expects every moment that his trick
will be discovered. But either because stupidity was just what was needed for
the successful management of such a salon, or because those who were deceived
took pleasure in the deception, the cheat was not discovered, and the reputation
of “a charming woman” clung so persistently to Elena Vassilyevna Bezuhov, that
she could utter the vulgarest and stupidest speeches, and every one was just as
enthusiastic over every word, and eagerly found in it a profound meaning of
which she did not dream herself.
Pierre was exactly the husband needed by this brilliant society woman. He was
that absent-minded, eccentric, grand seigneur of a husband, who got in nobody's
way and far from spoiling the general impression of the highest tone in her
drawing-room, formed by his contrast with his wife's elegance and tact an
advantageous foil to her. Pierre's continual concentration on immaterial
interests during the last two years, and his genuine contempt for everything
else, gave him in his wife's circle, which did not interest him, that tone of
unconcern, indifference, and benevolence towards all alike, which cannot be
acquired artificially, and for that reason commands involuntary respect. He
entered his wife's drawing-room as though it were a theatre, was acquainted with
every one, equally affable to all, and to all equally indifferent. Sometimes he
took part in conversation on some subject that interested him, and then, without
any consideration whether the “gentlemen of the embassy” were present or not, he
mumbled out his opinions, which were by no means always in harmony with the
received catch-words of the time. But the public estimate of the eccentric
husband of “the most distinguished woman in Petersburg” was now so well
established that no one took his sallies seriously.
Among the numerous young men, who were daily to be seen in Ellen's house,
Boris Drubetskoy, who had by now achieved marked success in the service, was,
after Ellen's return from Erfurt, the most intimate friend of the Bezuhov
household. Ellen used to call him “mon page,” and treated him like a
child. Her smile for him was the same smile she bestowed on all, but it was
sometimes distasteful to Pierre to see that smile. Boris behaved to Pierre with
a marked, dignified, and mournful respectfulness. This shade of respectfulness
too disturbed Pierre. He had suffered so much three years before from the
mortification caused him by his wife, that now he secured himself from all
possibility of similar mortification; in the first place, by being his wife's
husband only in name, and secondly, by not allowing himself to suspect anything.
“No, now she has become a blue-stocking, she has renounced for ever her former
errors,” he said to himself. “There has never been an instance of a
blue-stocking giving way to tender passions,” he repeated to himself; a maxim he
had picked up somewhere and implicitly believed. But, strange to say, the
presence of Boris in his wife's drawing-room (and he was almost always there)
had a physical effect on Pierre; it seemed to make all his limbs contract, and
destroyed the unconsciousness and freedom of his movement.
“Such a strange antipathy,” thought Pierre; “and at one time I really liked
him very much.”
In the eyes of the world, Pierre was a GREat lord, the rather blind and
absurd husband of a distinguished wife; a clever eccentric, who did nothing but
who was no trouble to any one, a good-natured, capital fellow. In Pierre's soul
all this while a complex and laborious process of inner development was going on
that revealed much to him and led him to many spiritual doubts and joys.
