Rostóv threw his cloak over his shoulders, shouted to Lavrúshka to follow with the things, and⁠—now slipping in the mud, now splashing right through it⁠—set off with Ilyín in the lessening rain and the darkness that was occasionally rent by distant lightning.

“Rostóv, where are you?”

“Here. What lightning!” they called to one another.

In the tavern, before which stood the doctor’s covered cart, there were already some five officers. Márya Hendríkhovna, a plump little blonde German, in a dressing jacket and nightcap, was sitting on a broad bench in the front corner. Her husband, the doctor, lay asleep behind her. Rostóv and Ilyín, on entering the room, were welcomed with merry shouts and laughter.

“Dear me, how jolly we are!” said Rostóv laughing.

“And why do you stand there gaping?”

“What swells they are! Why, the water streams from them! Don’t make our drawing room so wet.”