________________________________________________
_ For the last two days, ever since leaving home, Pierre had been
living in the empty house of his deceased benefactor, Bazdeev. This is
how it happened.
When he woke up on the morning after his return to Moscow and his
interview with Count Rostopchin, he could not for some time make out
where he was and what was expected of him. When he was informed that
among others awaiting him in his reception room there was a
Frenchman who had brought a letter from his wife, the Countess Helene,
he felt suddenly overcome by that sense of confusion and
hopelessness to which he was apt to succumb. He felt that everything
was now at an end, all was in confusion and crumbling to pieces,
that nobody was right or wrong, the future held nothing, and there was
no escape from this position. Smiling unnaturally and muttering to
himself, he first sat down on the sofa in an attitude of despair, then
rose, went to the door of the reception room and peeped through the
crack, returned flourishing his arms, and took up a book. His
major-domo came in a second time to say that the Frenchman who had
brought the letter from the countess was very anxious to see him if
only for a minute, and that someone from Bazdeev's widow had called to
ask Pierre to take charge of her husband's books, as she herself was
leaving for the country.
"Oh, yes, in a minute; wait... or no! No, of course... go and say
I will come directly," Pierre replied to the major-domo.
But as soon as the man had left the room Pierre took up his hat
which was lying on the table and went out of his study by the other
door. There was no one in the passage. He went along the whole
length of this passage to the stairs and, frowning and rubbing his
forehead with both hands, went down as far as the first landing. The
hall porter was standing at the front door. From the landing where
Pierre stood there was a second staircase leading to the back
entrance. He went down that staircase and out into the yard. No one
had seen him. But there were some carriages waiting, and as soon as
Pierre stepped out of the gate the coachmen and the yard porter
noticed him and raised their caps to him. When he felt he was being
looked at he behaved like an ostrich which hides its head in a bush in
order not to be seen: he hung his head and quickening his pace went
down the street.
Of all the affairs awaiting Pierre that day the sorting of Joseph
Bazdeev's books and papers appeared to him the most necessary.
He hired the first cab he met and told the driver to go to the
Patriarch's Ponds, where the widow Bazdeev's house was.
Continually turning round to look at the rows of loaded carts that
were making their way from all sides out of Moscow, and balancing
his bulky body so as not to slip out of the ramshackle old vehicle,
Pierre, experiencing the joyful feeling of a boy escaping from school,
began to talk to his driver.
The man told him that arms were being distributed today at the
Kremlin and that tomorrow everyone would be sent out beyond the
Three Hills gates and a great battle would be fought there.
Having reached the Patriarch's Ponds Pierre found the Bazdeevs'
house, where he had not been for a long time past. He went up to the
gate. Gerasim, that sallow beardless old man Pierre had seen at
Torzhok five years before with Joseph Bazdeev, came out in answer to
his knock.
"At home?" asked Pierre.
"Owing to the present state of things Sophia Danilovna has gone to
the Torzhok estate with the children, your excellency."
"I will come in all the same, I have to look through the books,"
said Pierre.
"Be so good as to step in. Makar Alexeevich, the brother of my
late master- may the kingdom of heaven be his- has remained here,
but he is in a weak state as you know," said the old servant.
Pierre knew that Makar Alexeevich was Joseph Bazdeev's half-insane
brother and a hard drinker.
"Yes, yes, I know. Let us go in..." said Pierre and entered the
house.
A tall, bald-headed old man with a red nose, wearing a dressing gown
and with galoshes on his bare feet, stood in the anteroom. On seeing
Pierre he muttered something angrily and went away along the passage.
"He was a very clever man but has now grown quite feeble, as your
honor sees," said Gerasim. "Will you step into the study?" Pierre
nodded. "As it was sealed up so it has remained, but Sophia
Danilovna gave orders that if anyone should come from you they were to
have the books."
Pierre went into that gloomy study which he had entered with such
trepidation in his benefactor's lifetime. The room, dusty and
untouched since the death of Joseph Bazdeev was now even gloomier.
Gerasim opened one of the shutters and left the room on tiptoe.
Pierre went round the study, approached the cupboard in which the
manuscripts were kept, and took out what had once been one of the most
important, the holy of holies of the order. This was the authentic
Scotch Acts with Bazdeev's notes and explanations. He sat down at
the dusty writing table, and, having laid the manuscripts before
him, opened them out, closed them, finally pushed them away, and
resting his head on his hand sank into meditation.
Gerasim looked cautiously into the study several times and saw
Pierre always sitting in the same attitude.
More than two hours passed and Gerasim took the liberty of making
a slight noise at the door to attract his attention, but Pierre did
not hear him.
"Is the cabman to be discharged, your honor?"
"Oh yes!" said Pierre, rousing himself and rising hurriedly. "Look
here," he added, taking Gerasim by a button of his coat and looking
down at the old man with moist, shining, and ecstatic eyes, "I say, do
you know that there is going to be a battle tomorrow?"
"We heard so," replied the man.
"I beg you not to tell anyone who I am, and to do what I ask you."
"Yes, your excellency," replied Gerasim. "Will you have something to
eat?"
"No, but I want something else. I want peasant clothes and a
pistol," said Pierre, unexpectedly blushing.
"Yes, your excellency," said Gerasim after thinking for a moment.
All the rest of that day Pierre spent alone in his benefactor's
study, and Gerasim heard him pacing restlessly from one corner to
another and talking to himself. And he spent the night on a bed made
up for him there.
Gerasim, being a servant who in his time had seen many strange
things, accepted Pierre's taking up his residence in the house without
surprise, and seemed pleased to have someone to wait on. That same
evening- without even asking himself what they were wanted for- he
procured a coachman's coat and cap for Pierre, and promised to get him
the pistol next day. Makar Alexeevich came twice that evening
shuffling along in his galoshes as far as the door and stopped and
looked ingratiatingly at Pierre. But as soon as Pierre turned toward
him he wrapped his dressing gown around him with a shamefaced and
angry look and hurried away. It was when Pierre (wearing the
coachman's coat which Gerasim had procured for him and had disinfected
by steam) was on his way with the old man to buy the pistol at the
Sukharev market that he met the Rostovs. _
Read next: Book Eleven: 1812: Chapter 19
Read previous: Book Eleven: 1812: Chapter 17
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