dining and taking rather too much of the Hungarian wine, Nikoláy—having exchanged kisses with the landowner, with whom he was already on the friendliest terms—galloped back over abominable roads, in the brightest frame of mind, continually urging on the driver so as to be in time for the governor’s party.
When he had changed, poured water over his head, and scented himself, Nikoláy arrived at the governor’s rather late, but with the phrase “better late than never” on his lips.
It was not a ball, nor had dancing been announced, but everyone knew that Katerína Petróvna would play valses and the écossaise on the clavichord and that there would be dancing, and so everyone had come as to a ball.
Provincial life in 1812 went on very much as usual, but with this difference, that it was livelier in the towns in consequence of the arrival of many wealthy families from Moscow, and as in everything that went on in Russia at that time a special recklessness was noticeable, an “in for a penny, in for a pound—who cares?” spirit, and the inevitable small talk, instead of turning on the weather and mutual acquaintances, now turned on Moscow, the army, and Napoleon.
The society gathered together at the governor’s was the best in Vorónezh.
There were a great many ladies and some of Nikoláy’s Moscow acquaintances, but there were no men who could at all vie with the cavalier of St. George, the hussar remount officer, the good-natured and well-bred Count Rostóv. Among the men was an Italian prisoner, an officer of the French army; and Nikoláy felt that the presence of that prisoner enhanced his own importance as a Russian hero. The Italian was, as it were, a war trophy. Nikoláy felt this, it seemed to him that everyone regarded the Italian in the same light, and he treated him cordially though with dignity and restraint.