Chapter 12

And with the air of a Petersburg lady, used to business, and knowing how to make use of every moment, Anna Mihalovna sent for her son, and with him went out into the hall.

“Good-bye, my dear,” she said to the countess, who accompanied her to the door. “Wish me good-luck,” she added in a whisper unheard by her son.

“You’re going to Prince Kirill Vladimirovich’s, ma chère?” said the count, coming out of the dining-room into the hall. “If he’s better, invite Pierre to dine with us. He has been here; used to dance with the children. Be sure you invite him, ma chère. Now do come and look how Taras has surpassed himself to-day. He says Count Orlov never had such a dinner as we’re going to have to-day.”

Chapter 12

“Mon cher Boris,” said Anna Mihalovna as the Countess Rostov’s carriage drove along the street strewn with straw and into the wide courtyard of Count Kirill Vladimirovitch Bezuhov’s house. “Mon cher Boris,” said the mother, putting her hand out from under her old mantle, and laying it on her son’s hand with a timid, caressing movement, “be nice, be attentive. Count Kirill Vladimirovitch is after all your godfather, and your future depends on him. Remember that, mon cher, be charming, as you know so well how to be.…”

“If I knew anything would come of it but humiliation,” her son answered coldly. “But I have promised, and I will do it for your sake.”

Although the carriage was standing at the entrance, the hall-porter, scanning the mother and son (they had not sent in their names, but had walked straight in through the glass doors between two rows of statues in niches), and looking significantly at the old mantle, inquired whom they wanted, the princesses or the count; and hearing that they wanted to see the count, said that his excellency was worse to-day, and his excellency could see no one.

“We may as well go away,” the son said in French.