The Dance That Changes Everything — War and Peace

Suddenly everybody stirs, begins talking, presses forward and then back, and between the two rows, which separate, the Emperor enters to music that has immediately struck up. Behind him walk host and hostess. He walks in rapidly, bowing to right and left as if anxious to get the first moments of the reception over. The band plays the polonaise in vogue on account of the words set to it, beginning Alexander, Elisaveta, all our hearts you ravish quite. The Emperor passes on to the drawing room; the crowd rushes the doors; persons with excited faces hurry there and back. Then the crowd hastily retires and the Emperor reappears talking to the hostess. A young man, looking distraught, pounces on the ladies, asking them to move aside. Some ladies, faces betraying complete forgetfulness of all the rules of decorum, push forward to the detriment of their toilets. The men begin to choose partners and take their places for the polonaise.

Everyone moves back. The Emperor comes smiling out of the drawing room leading his hostess by the hand but not keeping time to the music. The host follows with Márya Antónovna Narýshkina; then come ambassadors, ministers, and various generals, whom Perónskaya diligently names. More than half the ladies already have partners. Natásha feels that she will be left with her mother and Sónya among a minority of women crowded near the wall, not having been invited to dance. She stands with slender arms hanging down, her scarcely defined bosom rising and falling regularly, bated breath, glittering frightened eyes gazing straight before her, prepared for the height of joy or misery. She is not concerned about the Emperor or any of those great people Perónskaya is pointing out. She has but one thought: is it possible no one will ask me, that I shall not be among the first to dance, that not one of all these men will notice me? They do not even seem to see me, or if they do they look as if they were saying, Ah, she's not the one I'm after. No, it's impossible. They must know how I long to dance, how splendidly I dance, and how they would enjoy dancing with me. The strains of the polonaise, which have continued for a considerable time, begin to sound like a sad reminiscence. She wants to cry. Perónskaya has left them. The count is at the other end of the room. She and the countess and Sónya stand by themselves as in the depths of a forest amid that crowd of strangers.

Pierre spots her face braced for despair or rapture and nudges Andrew to ask the young Rostóva to waltz. Andrew remembers their window talk. He likes dancing, and wishing to escape as quickly as possible from the political and clever talk everyone addresses to him, wishing also to break up the circle of restraint he dislikes, caused by the Emperor's presence, he dances, and has chosen Natásha because Pierre pointed her out and because she was the first pretty girl who caught his eye. Hélène, by contrast, seems hardened by a varnish left by the thousands of looks that have scanned her person, while Natásha is like a girl exposed for the first time. Scarcely has he embraced that slender supple figure and felt her stirring so close to him and smiling so near him than the wine of her charm rises to his head. She becomes radiant; they are the second couple in the circle; her feet move as if on their own. When after leaving her he stands breathing deeply and watching the other dancers, he feels himself revived and rejuvenated.