“Pétrusha has come with papers from your father,” whispered the maid.
Prince Andréy went out.
“Devil take them!” he muttered, and after listening to the verbal instructions his father had sent and taking the correspondence and his father’s letter, he returned to the nursery.
“Well?” he asked.
“Still the same. Wait, for heaven’s sake. Karl Ivánich always says that sleep is more important than anything,” whispered Princess Márya with a sigh.
Prince Andréy went up to the child and felt him. He was burning hot.
“Confound you and your Karl Ivánich!” He took the glass with the drops and again went up to the cot.
“André, don’t!” said Princess Márya.
But he scowled at her angrily though also with suffering in his eyes, and stooped glass in hand over the infant.
“But I wish it,” he said. “I beg you—give it him!”
Princess Márya shrugged her shoulders but took the glass submissively and calling the nurse began giving the medicine. The child screamed hoarsely. Prince Andréy winced and, clutching his head, went out and sat down on a sofa in the next room.
He still had all the letters in his hand. Opening them mechanically he began reading. The old prince, now and then using abbreviations, wrote in his large elongated hand on blue paper as follows:
Have just this moment received by special messenger very joyful news—if it’s not false. Bennigsen seems to have