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Chapter 8 - The Rostóvs at the Opera
That evening the Rostovs went to the Opera, for which Marya Dmitrievna had taken a box.
Natasha did not want to go, but could not refuse Marya Dmitrievna’s kind offer which was intended expressly for her. When she came ready dressed into the ballroom1 to await her father, and looking in the large mirror there saw that she was pretty, very pretty, she felt even more sad, but it was a sweet, tender sadness.
“O God, if he were here now I would not behave as I did then, but differently. I would not be silly and afraid of things, I would simply embrace him, cling to him, and make him look at me with those searching inquiring eyes with which he has so often looked at me, and then I would make him laugh as he used to laugh. And his eyes — how I see those eyes!” thought Natasha. “And what do his father and sister matter to me? I love him alone, him, him, with that face and those eyes, with his smile, manly2 and yet childlike. . . . No, I had better not think of him; not think of him but forget him, quite forget him for the present. I can’t bear this waiting and I shall cry in a minute!” and she turned away from the glass, making an effort not to cry. “And how can Sonya love Nikolai so calmly and quietly and wait so long and so patiently?” thought she, looking at Sonya, who also came in quite ready, with a fan in her hand. “No, she’s altogether different. I can’t!”
Natasha at that moment felt so softened3 and tender that it was not enough for her to love and know she was beloved, she wanted now, at once, to embrace the man she loved, to speak and hear from him words of love such as filled her heart. While she sat in the carriage beside her father, pensively4 watching the lights of the street lamps flickering5 on the frozen window, she felt still sadder and more in love, and forgot where she was going and with whom. Having fallen into the line of carriages, the Rostovs’ carriage drove up to the theater, its wheels squeaking6 over the snow. Natasha and Sonya, holding up their dresses, jumped out quickly. The count got out helped by the footmen, and, passing among men and women who were entering and the program sellers, they all three went along the corridor to the first row of boxes. Through the closed doors the music was already audible.
“Natasha, your hair! . . . ” whispered Sonya.
An attendant deferentially7 and quickly slipped before the ladies and opened the door of their box. The music sounded louder and through the door rows of brightly lit boxes in which ladies sat with bare arms and shoulders, and noisy stalls brilliant with uniforms, glittered before their eyes. A lady entering the next box shot a glance of feminine envy at Natasha. The curtain had not yet risen and the overture8 was being played. Natasha, smoothing her gown, went in with Sonya and sat down, scanning the brilliant tiers of boxes opposite. A sensation she had not experienced for a long time — that of hundreds of eyes looking at her bare arms and neck — suddenly affected9 her both agreeably and disagreeably and called up a whole crowd of memories, desires and emotions associated with that feeling.
The two remarkably10 pretty girls, Natasha and Sonya, with Count Rostov who had not been seen in Moscow for a long time, attracted general attention. Moreover, everybody knew vaguely11 of Natasha’s engagement to Prince Andrey, and knew that the Rostovs had lived in the country ever since, and all looked with curiosity at a fiancee who was making one of the best matches in Russia.
Natasha’s looks, as everyone told her, had improved in the country, and that evening thanks to her agitation12 she was particularly pretty. She struck those who saw her by her fullness of life and beauty, combined with her indifference13 to everything about her. Her black eyes looked at the crowd without seeking anyone, and her delicate arm, bare to above the elbow, lay on the velvet14 edge of the box, while, evidently unconsciously, she opened and closed her hand in time to the music, crumpling15 her program. “Look, there’s Alenina,” said Sonya, “with her mother, isn’t it?”
“Look at our Anna Mikhaylovna — what a headdress she has on!”
“The Karagins, Julie — and Boris with them. One can see at once that they’re engaged. . . . ”
“Drubetskoy has proposed?”
“Oh yes, I heard it today,” said Shinshin, coming into the Rostovs’ box.
Natasha looked in the direction in which her father’s eyes were turned and saw Julie sitting beside her mother with a happy look on her face and a string of pearls round her thick red neck — which Natasha knew was covered with powder. Behind them, wearing a smile and leaning over with an ear to Julie’s mouth, was Boris’ handsome smoothly17 brushed head. He looked the Rostovs from under his brows and said something, smiling, to his betrothed18.
“They are talking about us, about me and him!” thought Natasha. “And he no doubt is calming her jealousy19 of me. They needn’t trouble themselves! If only they knew how little I am concerned about any of them.”
Behind them sat Anna Mikhaylovna wearing a green headdress and with a happy look of resignation to the will of God on her face. Their box was pervaded20 by that atmosphere of an affianced couple which Natasha knew so well and liked so much. She turned away and suddenly remembered all that had been so humiliating in her morning’s visit.
“What right has he not to wish to receive me into his family? Oh, better not think of it — not till he comes back!” she told herself, and began looking at the faces, some strange and some familiar, in the stalls. In the front, in the very center, leaning back against the orchestra rail, stood Dolokhov in a Persian dress, his curly hair brushed up into a huge shock. He stood in full view of the audience, well aware that he was attracting everyone’s attention, yet as much at ease as though he were in his own room. Around him thronged22 Moscow’s most brilliant young men, whom he evidently dominated.
“Do you recognize him?” said he. “And where has he sprung from?” he asked, turning to Shinshin. “Didn’t he vanish somewhere?”
“He did,” replied Shinshin. “He was in the Caucasus and ran away from there. They say he has been acting21 as minister to some ruling prince in Persia, where he killed the Shah’s brother. Now all the Moscow ladies are mad about him! It’s ‘Dolokhov the Persian’ that does it! We never hear a word but Dolokhov is mentioned. They swear by him, they offer him to you as they would a dish of choice sterlet. Dolokhov and Anatole Kuragin have turned all our ladies’ heads.”
A tall, beautiful woman with a mass of plaited hair and much exposed plump white shoulders and neck, round which she wore a double string of large pearls, entered the adjoining box rustling24 her heavy silk dress and took a long time settling into her place.
Natasha involuntarily gazed at that neck, those shoulders, and pearls and coiffure, and admired the beauty of the shoulders and the pearls. While Natasha was fixing her gaze on her for the second time the lady looked round and, meeting the count’s eyes, nodded to him and smiled. She was the Countess Bezukhova, Pierre’s wife, and the count, who knew everyone in society, leaned over and spoke25 to her.
“Have you been here long, Countess?” he inquired. “I’ll call, I’ll call to kiss your hand. I’m here on business and have brought my girls with me. They say Semenova acts marvelously. Count Pierre never used to forget us. Is he here?”
“Yes, he meant to look in,” answered Helene, and glanced attentively26 at Natasha.
Count Rostov resumed his seat.
“Handsome, isn’t she?” he whispered to Natasha.
“Wonderful!” answered Natasha. “She’s a woman one could easily fall in love with.”
Just then the last chords of the overture were heard and the conductor tapped with his stick. Some latecomers took their seats in the stalls, and the curtain rose.
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1
ballroom
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| n.舞厅 | |
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2
manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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3
softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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4
pensively
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| adv.沉思地，焦虑地 | |
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flickering
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| adj.闪烁的，摇曳的，一闪一闪的 | |
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6
squeaking
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| v.短促地尖叫( squeak的现在分词 )；吱吱叫；告密；充当告密者 | |
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7
deferentially
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| adv.表示敬意地，谦恭地 | |
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8
overture
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| n.前奏曲、序曲，提议，提案，初步交涉 | |
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9
affected
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| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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10
remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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11
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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12
agitation
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| n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动 | |
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13
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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14
velvet
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| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
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15
crumpling
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| 压皱，弄皱( crumple的现在分词 )； 变皱 | |
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16
stouter
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| 粗壮的( stout的比较级 )； 结实的； 坚固的； 坚定的 | |
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17
smoothly
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| adv.平滑地，顺利地，流利地，流畅地 | |
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18
betrothed
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| n. 已订婚者 动词betroth的过去式和过去分词 | |
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19
jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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20
pervaded
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| v.遍及，弥漫( pervade的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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21
acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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22
thronged
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| v.成群，挤满( throng的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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23
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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24
rustling
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| n. 瑟瑟声，沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的 | |
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25
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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26
attentively
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| adv.聚精会神地；周到地；谛；凝神 | |
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27
gems
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| growth； economy； management； and customer satisfaction 增长 | |
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