“What an extraordinary genius!” Prince Andréy suddenly exclaimed, clenching his small hand and striking the table with it, “and what luck the man has!”
“Buonaparte?” said Bilíbin inquiringly, puckering up his forehead to indicate that he was about to say something witty. “Buonaparte?” he repeated, accentuating the u : “I think, however, now that he lays down laws for Austria at Schönbrunn, il faut lui faire grâce de l’u ! I shall certainly adopt an innovation and call him simply Bonaparte!”
“But joking apart,” said Prince Andréy, “do you really think the campaign is over?”
“This is what I think. Austria has been made a fool of, and she is not used to it. She will retaliate. And she has been fooled in the first place because her provinces have been pillaged—they say the Holy Russian army loots terribly—her army is destroyed, her capital taken, and all this for the beaux yeux of His Sardinian Majesty. And therefore—this is between ourselves—I instinctively feel that we are being deceived, my instinct tells me of negotiations with France and projects for peace, a secret peace concluded separately.”
“Impossible!” cried Prince Andréy. “That would be too base.”
“If we live we shall see,” replied Bilíbin, his face again becoming smooth as a sign that the conversation was at an end.
When Prince Andréy reached the room prepared for him and lay down in a clean shirt on the feather bed with its warmed and fragrant pillows, he felt that the battle of which he had brought tidings was far, far away from him. The alliance with Prussia, Austria’s treachery, Bonaparte’s new triumph, tomorrow’s levee and parade, and the audience with the Emperor Francis occupied his thoughts.