Leo Tolstoy: War and Peace

BOOK ELEVEN: 1812 7. CHAPTER VII (continued)

Armed with these arguments, which appeared to her unanswerable, she drove to her daughter's early one morning so as to find her alone.

Having listened to her mother's objections, Helene smiled blandly and ironically.

"But it says plainly: 'Whosoever shall marry her that is divorced...'" said the old princess.

"Ah, Maman, ne dites pas de betises. Vous ne comprenez rein. Dans ma position j'ai des devoirs,"* said Helene changing from Russian, in which language she always felt that her case did not sound quite clear, into French which suited it better.

*"Oh, Mamma, don't talk nonsense! You don't understand anything. In my position I have obligations.

"But, my dear...."

"Oh, Mamma, how is it you don't understand that the Holy Father, who has the right to grant dispensations..."

Just then the lady companion who lived with Helene came in to announce that His Highness was in the ballroom and wished to see her.

"Non, dites-lui que je ne veux pas le voir, que je suis furieuse contre lui, parce qu'il m' a manque parole."*

*"No, tell him I don't wish to see him, I am furious with him for not keeping his word to me."

"Comtesse, a tout peche misericorde,"* said a fair-haired young man with a long face and nose, as he entered the room.

*"Countess, there is mercy for every sin."

The old princess rose respectfully and curtsied. The young man who had entered took no notice of her. The princess nodded to her daughter and sidled out of the room.

"Yes, she is right," thought the old princess, all her convictions dissipated by the appearance of His Highness. "She is right, but how is it that we in our irrecoverable youth did not know it? Yet it is so simple," she thought as she got into her carriage.