SOON AFTER THIS the children came in to say good-night. The children kissed every one, the tutors and governesses said good-night and went away. Dessalle alone remained with his pupil. The tutor whispered to his young charge to come downstairs.
“No, M. Dessalle, I will ask my aunt for leave to stay,” Nikolinka Bolkonsky answered, also in a whisper.
“Ma tante, will you let me stay?” said Nikolinka, going up to his aunt. His face was full of entreaty, excitement, and enthusiasm. Countess Marya looked at him and turned to Pierre
“When you are here, there is no tearing him away …” she said.
“I will bring him directly, M. Dessalle. Good-night,” said Pierre, giving his hand to the Swiss tutor, and he turned smiling to Nikolinka. “We have not seen each other at all yet. Marie, how like he is growing,” he added, turning to Countess Marya.
“Like my father?” said the boy, flushing crimson and looking up at Pierre with rapturous, shining eyes.
Pierre nodded to him, and went on with the conversation that had been interrupted by the children. Countess Marya had some canvas embroidery in her hands; Natasha sat with her eyes fixed on her husband. Nikolay and Denisov got up, asked for pipes, smoked, and took cups of tea from Sonya, still sitting with weary pertinacity at the samovar, and asked questions of Pierre. The curly-headed, delicate boy, with his shining eyes, sat unnoticed by any one in a corner. Turning the curly head and the slender neck above his laydown collar to follow Pierre's movements, he trembled now and then, and murmured something to himself, evidently thrilled by some new and violent emotion.
The conversation turned on the scandals of the day in the higher government circles, a subject in which the majority of people usually find the chief interest of home politics. Denisov, who was dissatisfied with the government on account of his own disappointments in the service, heard with glee of all the follies, as he considered them, that were going on now in Petersburg, and made his comments on Pierre's words in harsh and in cutting phrases.
“In old days you had to be a German to be anybody, nowadays you have to dance with the Tatarinov woman and Madame Krüdner, to read …Eckartshausen, and the rest of that crew. Ugh! I would let good old Bonaparte loose again! He would knock all the nonsense out of them. Why, isn't it beyond everything to have given that fellow Schwartz the Semyonovsky regiment?” he shouted.
Though Nikolay had not Denisov's disposition to find everything amiss, he too thought it dignified and becoming to criticise the government, and he believed that the fact, that A. had been appointed minister of such a department, and B. had been made governor of such a province, and the Tsar had said this, and the minister had said that, were all matters of the greatest importance. And he thought it incumbent upon him to take an interest in the subject and to question Pierre about it. So the questions put by Nikolay and Denisov kept the conversation on the usual lines of gossip about the higher government circles.
But Natasha, who knew every thought and expression in her husband, saw that Pierre all the while wanted to lead the conversation into another channel, and to open his heart on his own idea, the idea which he had gone to Petersburg to consult his new friend Prince Fyodor about. She saw too that he could not lead up to this, and she came to the rescue with a question: How had he settled things with Prince Fyodor?
“What was that?” asked Nikolay.
“All the same thing over and over again,” said Pierre, looking about him. “Every one sees that things are all going so wrong that they can't be endured, and that it's the duty of all honest men to oppose it to the utmost of their power.”
“Why, what can honest men do?” said Nikolay, frowning slightly. “What can be done?”
“Why, this…”
“Let us go into the study,” said Nikolay.
Natasha, who had a long while been expecting to be fetched to her baby, heard the nurse calling her, and went off to the nursery. Countess Marya went with her. The men went to the study, and Nikolinka Bolkonsky stole in, unnoticed by his uncle, and sat down at the writing table, in the dark by the window.
“Well, what are you going to do?” said Denisov.
“Everlastingly these fantastic schemes,” said Nikolay.
“Well,” Pierre began, not sitting down, but pacing the room, and coming to an occasional standstill, lisping and gesticulating rapidly as he talked. “This is the position of things in Petersburg: the Tsar lets everything go. He is entirely wrapped up in this mysticism” (mysticism Pierre could not forgive in anybody now). “All he asks for is peace; and he can only get peace through these men of no faith and no conscience, who are stifling and destroying everything, Magnitsky and Araktcheev, and tutti quanti…You will admit that if you did not look after your property yourself, and only asked for peace and quiet, the crueller your bailiff were, the more readily you would attain your object,” he said, turning to Nikolay.
“Well, but what is the drift of all this?” said Nikolay.
“Why, everything is going to ruin. Bribery in the law-courts, in the army nothing but coercion and drill: exile—people are being tortured, and enlightenment is suppressed. Everything youthful and honourable—they are crushing! Everybody sees that it can't go on like this. The strain is too great, and the string must snap,” said Pierre (as men always do say, looking into the working of any government so long as governments have existed). “I told them one thing in Petersburg.”
“Told whom?” asked Denisov.
“Oh, you know whom,” said Pierre, with a meaning look from under his brows, “Prince Fyodor and all of them. Zeal in educational and philanthropic work is all very good of course. Their object is excellent and all the rest of it; but in present circumstances what is wanted is something else.”
At that moment Nikolay noticed the presence of his nephew. His face fell; he went up to him.
“Why are you here?”
“Oh, let him be,” said Pierre, taking hold of Nikolay's arm; and he went on. “That's not enough, I told them; something else is wanted now. While you stand waiting for the string to snap every moment; while every one is expecting the inevitable revolution, as many people as possible should join hands as closely as they can to withstand the general catastrophe. All the youth and energy is being drawn away and dissipated. One lured by women, another by honours, a third by display or money—they are all going over to the wrong side. As for independent, honest men, like you and me—there are none of them left. I say: enlarge the scope of the society: let the mot d'ordre be not loyalty only, but independence and action.”
Nikolay, leaving his nephew, had angrily moved out a chair, and sat down in it. As he listened to Pierre, he coughed in a dissatisfied way, and frowned more and more.
“But action with what object?” he cried. “And what attitude do you take up to the government?”
“Why, the attitude of supporters! The society will perhaps not even be a secret one, if the government will allow it. So far from being hostile to the government, we are the real conservatives. It is a society of gentlemen, in the full significance of the word. It is simply to prevent Pugatchov from coming to massacre my children and yours, to prevent Araktcheev from transporting me to a military settlement, that we are joining hands, with the sole object of the common welfare and security.”
“Yes; but it's a secret society, and consequently a hostile and mischievous society, which can only lead to evil.”
“Why so? Did the Tugend-bund which saved Europe” (people did not yet venture to believe that Russia had saved Europe) “lead to evil? A Tugend-bund it is, an alliance of virtue; it is love and mutual help; it is what Christ preached on the cross…”
Natasha, coming into the room in the middle of the conversation, looked joyfully at her husband. She was not rejoicing in what he was saying. It did not interest her indeed, because it seemed to her that it was all so excessively simple, and that she had known it long ago. She fancied this, because she knew all that it sprang from—all Pierre's soul. But she was glad looking at his eager, enthusiastic figure.
Pierre was watched with even more rapturous gladness by the boy with the slender neck in the laydown collar, who had been forgotten by all of them. Every word Pierre uttered set his heart in a glow, and his fingers moving nervously, he unconsciously picked up and broke to pieces the sticks of sealing-wax and pens on his uncle's table.
“It's not at all what you imagine, but just such a society as the German Tugend-bund is what I propose.”
“Well, my boy, that's all very well for the sausage-eaters—a Tugend-bund—but I don't understand it, and I can't even pronounce it,” Denisov's loud, positive voice broke in. “Everything's rotten and corrupt; I agree there; only your Tugend-bund I don't understand, but if one is dissatisfied,—a bunt now” (i.e. riot or mutiny), “je suis votre homme!”
Pierre smiled, Natasha laughed; but Nikolay knitted his brows more than ever, and began arguing with Pierre that no revolution was to be expected, and that the danger he talked of had no existence but in his imagination. Pierre maintained his view, and as his intellectual faculties were keener and more resourceful, Nikolay was soon at a loss for an answer. This angered him still more, as in his heart he felt convinced, not by reasoning, but by something stronger than reasoning, of the indubitable truth of his own view.
“Well, let me tell you,” he said, getting up and nervously setting his pipe down in the corner, and then flinging it away; “I can't prove it you. You say everything is all rotten, and there will be a revolution; I don't see it; but you say our oath of allegiance is a conditional thing, and as to that, let me tell you, you are my greatest friend, you know that, but you make a secret society, you begin working against the government—whatever it may be, I know it's my duty to obey it. And if Araktcheev bids me march against you with a squadron and cut you down, I shan't hesitate for a second, I shall go. And then you may think what you like about it.”
An awkward silence followed these words. Natasha was the first to break it by defending her husband and attacking her brother. Her defence was weak and clumsy. But it attained her object. The conversation was taken up again, and no longer in the unpleasantly hostile tone in which Nikolay's last words had been spoken.
When they all got up to go in to supper, Nikolinka Bolkonsky went up to Pierre with a pale face and shining, luminous eyes.
“Uncle Pierre…you…no…If papa had been alive…he would have been on your side?” he asked.
Pierre saw in a flash all the original, complicated and violent travail of thought and feeling that must have been going on independently in this boy during the conversation. And recalling all he had been saying, he felt vexed that the boy should have heard him. He had to answer him, however.
“I believe he would,” he said reluctantly, and he went out of the study.
The boy looked down, and then for the first time seemed to become aware of the havoc he had been making on the writing-table. He flushed hotly and went up to Nikolay.
“Uncle, forgive me; I did it—not on purpose,” he said, pointing to the fragments of sealing-wax and pens.
Nikolay bounded up angrily. “Very good, very good,” he said, throwing the bits of pens and sealing-wax under the table. And with evident effort mastering his fury, he turned away from him.
“You ought not to have been here at all,” he said.
过了不久，孩子们来道晚安。孩子们同所有在座的人一一吻别，男女家庭教师也行过礼，然后就出去了。只有德萨尔和他的学生小尼古拉留了下来。德萨尔低声叫小尼古拉下楼去。
“不，德萨尔先生，我要求姑妈让我留在这儿。①”
小尼古拉同样小声回答说。
①此处字下打黑点表示，原文直接用法语，此处译成汉语。
“姑妈，让我留在这儿吧。”小尼古拉走到姑母面前说。他又兴奋，又激动，脸上露出恳求的神色。玛丽亚伯爵夫人看了他一眼，对皮埃尔说：
“只要您在这儿，他就不乐意走了……”
“德萨尔先生，过一会我就把他送到您那儿去，晚安。”①皮埃尔把手伸给那位瑞士教师，接着含笑转向小尼古拉说：“我们没见过面呢。玛丽亚，他长得真像……”他转身对玛丽亚伯爵夫人说。
“是像爸爸吗？”孩子的脸红了，他用敬慕的、明亮的眼睛从上到下打量着皮埃尔。皮埃尔向他点点头，又接着谈被孩子打断的话题。玛丽亚伯爵夫人在十字布上绣花，娜塔莎目不转睛地望着丈夫。尼古拉和杰尼索夫站起来要烟斗抽烟，他又向一直守着茶炊无精打采的索尼娅接过茶，又询问皮埃尔有关这次外出了解到的消息，小尼古拉，这个长着一头卷发的孱弱的孩子，坐在没人注意的一个角落里，双眼闪闪发光，从衣领里伸出细脖子，他的满头卷发的头向着皮埃尔，在偶而体验到某种新的强烈的感情时，他会不由自主地哆嗦一下。
接着，众人的话题转到当时对最高当局的一些流言，其中包含了大多数人通常最感兴趣的国内政治问题。杰尼索夫因在军界失意而对政府不满，现在听说彼得堡出了丑闻十分高兴，于是对皮埃尔所述情况发表了一通尖刻的评论。
“过去不得不作德意志人，现在就得陪塔塔利诺娃和克律德涅夫人②团团转跳舞，还得捧读艾加特豪森之流的著作。哎，要是把波拿巴那个宝贝放出来就好了，他就会把一切胡涂思想扫除掉，把谢苗诺夫团交给施瓦茨这样的大兵来指挥，成何体统？”他大喊大叫地说。
①此处用法语。“德萨尔先生……晚安。”
②朱丽安·克律德涅夫人（1766～1824），女作家，出生在里加，神秘主义者，亚历山大一世曾一度受过她的影响。
尼古拉虽然不像杰尼索夫那样专门挑毛病，但他仍然认为议论政府可是一件大事情，而甲出任大臣，乙担任总督，皇帝说什么话，大臣说什么话，都是很重大的事。他认为国家大事，匹夫有责，所以也向皮埃尔询问各种问题。只是他们俩人问到的不外乎一些有关政府高级部门的轶闻。
娜塔莎十分了解丈夫的心思和脾气，她看出皮埃尔早想转换话题，看出他早就想倾吐他内心深处的一些想法。他这次要去彼得堡，就是想同他的新友费奥多尔公爵一起商量此事。于是她问皮埃尔，他跟费奥多尔①的事怎么样了。
①指十二月党人的革命活动。
“什么事？”尼古拉问。
“也就是那些事，”皮埃尔向四周看了一下，说，“大家都看到，情况已经糟到不能再糟的地步，一切正直的人们都有责任来尽力挽救局势。”
“那么正直的人们该做些什么呢？”尼古拉微微皱起眉头说。“他们能做些什么呢？”
“应该做的是……”
“我们到书斋里去吧，”尼古拉说。
娜塔莎早就想到该喂孩子了，听见保姆叫唤她，就到育儿室去了。玛丽亚伯爵夫人也跟着她去了。男人们走进书斋去，小尼古拉趁姑父不注意，也跟着溜了进去，躲在靠窗的写字台的幽暗角落里。
“你说该怎么办？”杰尼索夫说。
“都是些空想。”尼古拉说。
“情况是这样。”皮埃尔没有坐下就开始讲了。他在房间里踱来踱去，有时又停下，一边含混不清地说着，一边很快地打着手势。“彼得堡目前的情况就是这样，皇帝不过问任何国家大事。他已完全陷入了神秘主义之中（而无论何人迷信神秘主义，皮埃尔都是无法容忍的）。他只图清静。而只有那些丧尽天良、寡廉鲜耻的人，如马格尼茨基、阿拉克切耶夫之流，尽干伤天害理的事，乱砍乱杀，祸国殃民，才能使他得到清静……如果你不亲自来抓经济，只贪图安宁，那么你的管家越厉害，你的目的就更容易达到，你同意吗？”他问尼古拉。
“你说这话是什么意思？”尼古拉说。
“咳，整个国家要崩溃了。法庭里盗窃案数不胜数，军队里只有鞭笞，出操，屯垦，人民在遭受苦难，教育遭到扼杀。新生的事物，正统的事物都遭到摧残和压制。大家都明白，不能再这样继续下去了。弦绷得太紧就会绷断的。”皮埃尔说（自有政府以来，人们在观察政府行为时都这么说）。“我在彼得堡只给他们说了一点。”
“对谁说？”杰尼索夫问。
“这您知道，”皮埃尔皱着眉头，意味深长地望着他说。
“就是对费奥多尔公爵和他们那一帮人说。奖励教育事业，热心支持慈善事业，这固然很好，但也只是用心良好而已，从目前的情况来看，更需要另外的东西。”
尼古拉这时才发现他的小侄儿在场，就沉下脸朝他走去。
“你在这儿干什么？”
“什么？让他待在这里吧！”皮埃尔抓住尼古拉的手臂，又说：“我对他们说，那样是不够的，现在需要另外的东西。大家都在等待着，弦绷得太紧，随时可能断。当大家都在等待着那不可避免的变革时，就需要更多的人，更加加强团结，紧密携手，共同努力，来抗御那将要来临的灾难。年富力强的人都已经被拉过去了，蜕化变质了，腐化堕落了。有的沉湎于女色，有的醉心于名位，有的追求金钱和权势，都投奔到那个阵营去了。像你我这样有独立人格的人，自有主见的人就根本找不到了。我说，要扩大我们的社会圈子。我们的口号是：不能光停留在口头上的道德，而应要独立和行动。”
尼古拉从侄儿身边走开，忿忿不平地挪过一把椅子坐下，听皮埃尔谈着，他不以为然地干咳着，眉头越皱越紧。
“那么，这些行动又要达到什么目的呢？”他喊叫道。“你对政府又是抱什么态度呢？”
“抱这样的态度！协助的态度。如果政府允许我们的组织也无需保密。我们的组织不仅不同政府作对，而且是一个真正的保皇派。这是一个地地道道的绅士组织。我们的目的是不让普加乔夫来杀害你我的子孙，不让阿拉克切耶夫把我送到屯垦区去。我们是为了公众的利益，为了大众的安全才携起手来为了共同的目的而奋斗。”
“是的，但是秘密组织总是敌对的、有害的，只能产生恶果。”尼古拉说。
“为什么？难道拯救欧洲的道德联盟①（当时还不敢妄想俄国能拯救欧洲）有什么害处吗？道德联盟是一种美德的联盟，那就是爱，那就是互助，就是耶稣基督在十字架上所宣扬的东西。”
娜塔莎在谈话中间走了进来，愉快地看着她丈夫。并不是丈夫的谈话本身使她高兴。她对丈夫所谈的事不感兴趣，他讲的这些，她早就知道了（并且她知道皮埃尔所讲的都是他内心里的想法），但是当她看到他兴高采烈、神采奕奕的样子她心里就特别高兴。
这里还有一个被众人所遗忘从翻领里伸出细脖子的孩子，他也是那么兴高采烈、十分激动地望着皮埃尔。皮埃尔的每一句话却深深地印在他的心上，他的手指在不安地动着，以致于不知不觉把姑父桌上的火漆和鹅毛笔都捏断了。
“完全不是像你所想的那样，这就是所谓的德意志的道德联盟，这也就是我所建议的东西。”
“哦，老弟，道德联盟只对吃腊肠的人（德国人）有好处，但是我对它不了解，说也说不清楚。”杰尼索夫大声地断言道。
“到处都很腐败，很糟糕，这个事实我承认，不过对道德联盟我不了解，也不喜欢。什么暴动②，什么联盟！无非是要我，完全听你的指挥。”③
①道德联盟是一八○八年在普鲁士成立的一个秘密政治团体，其宗旨是反对拿破仑的法国，于一八一○年被法国政府下令解散。
②原文为俄语DyEF（暴动）一词与德语bund（联盟）音同。
③原文中用法语：直译为到时候我就是你的人了。
皮埃尔微笑了一下，娜塔莎则放声大笑，尼古拉却把眉头皱得更紧，他开始尽力向皮埃尔说明，不会发生任何变革，他所说的危险是他自己想象出来的。对此，皮埃尔作出了相反的论证，由于他的思维能力更强些，思想更敏捷，因而使尼古拉陷于窘境。这就使他更感到气恼，因为他不是凭推理，而是凭比推理更有力的直觉认为自己的看法是完全正确的。
“我要向你说明白，”他站起来说，神经质地把烟斗移到嘴角，又把烟斗干脆扔开。“我无法向你证明。你说我们的一切都腐败了，必须进行一次改革，我看没有这个必要。你说，宣誓是有条件的，关于这个问题我要向你说清楚，你是我最好的朋友，这一点你也知道，但是你们要是组织秘密团体反对政府，不管是什么样的政府，我的职责是维护政府，如果阿拉克切耶夫现在下命令，要我带领一个骑兵连讨伐你们，我就毫不犹豫，立即出动。至于你爱怎么说，就怎么说吧。”
他说完这一番话后，接着是一阵难堪的沉默。娜塔莎终于打破沉默率先开口。当然，她的发言是替丈夫辩护，而对哥哥则是攻击。她的辩解虽然笨拙无力，但她却达到了目的。于是，交谈又开始了，但已没有尼古拉刚才说完话时那种舌战的敌对气氛了。
当大家都站起来，准备去吃晚饭的时候，小尼古拉·博尔孔斯基走到皮埃尔面前，他脸色苍白，但明亮的眼睛炯炯有神。
“皮埃尔叔叔…您……不……要是爸爸活着，他会同意您的看法吗？”他问。
皮埃尔突然明白了，当他在谈话时，这孩子头脑里一定展开过一场特殊的、强烈的感情波澜和复杂的、独立思考的活动。他回想了他所说过的话，后悔不该让孩子听见。但不管如何，他还得回答他。
“我想他会赞成的。”他勉强地答了一句，就走出了书斋。
孩子低下头去，似乎这时他才突然发现，他把桌上的东西弄坏了。他涨红了脸，向尼古拉走过去。
“姑父，原谅我，我不是故意的。”他指着折断的火漆和鹅毛笔说。
尼古拉气得哆嗦了一下。
“算了，算了。”他把折断的火漆和鹅毛笔扔到桌子下面去。显然，他在强压着自己不发脾气，把脸转过去了。
“你根本就不该到这里来。”他又加了一句。
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