Natasha's wedding to Bezukhov in 1813 is the last happy event in the family of the old Rostovs. Count Ilya dies that same year, and after the father's death the family group breaks up. The burning of Moscow, the flight, Andrew's death, Natasha's despair, Petya's death, and the old countess's grief fall blow after blow on the old count's head. He cannot understand their meaning. He bows his head as if inviting further blows that will finish him, now frightened and distraught, now unnaturally animated. Natasha's marriage occupies him for a while. He orders dinners and tries to appear cheerful, but the cheerfulness is not infectious; it evokes compassion. When Pierre and his wife have left, he grows quiet, complains of depression, takes to his bed, and knows from the first that he will not get up. The countess spends a fortnight in an armchair by his pillow without undressing. Every time she gives him medicine he sobs and kisses her hand. On his last day he asks her and his absent son to forgive him for having dissipated their property, the chief fault of which he is conscious. After communion and unction he dies quietly. Acquaintances who had dined and danced and laughed at him now say, with self-reproach, that whatever he may have been he was a most worthy man. You do not meet such men nowadays. Which of us has not weaknesses of his own?
It is just when his affairs have become so involved that no one can say what would happen if he lived that Nicholas, the young heir, voluntarily undertakes the debts. Not one of his plans succeeds. The estate is sold at auction for half its value, and half the debts remain unpaid. He accepts thirty thousand rubles from Pierre for debts he regards as genuinely due, and to avoid prison re-enters government service. He cannot rejoin the army, where he would have been made colonel, because his mother clings to him as her one hold on life. Despite reluctance to remain among people who knew him before, and despite abhorrence of civil service, he doffs the uniform he loves and moves with his mother and Sonya to a small house on Sivtsev Vrazhok. Natasha and Pierre, in Petersburg, have no clear idea of his circumstances. With a salary of twelve hundred rubles he must keep three people and shield his mother from knowledge of their poverty. She cannot conceive of life without luxury, and keeps demanding a carriage they do not keep, expensive food, wine, presents.
Sonya keeps house. Nicholas feels he has taken her at her word when she wrote giving him his freedom. She has all that people are valued for, and little that could make him love her. The more he values her, the less he loves her. He cannot save. He incurs small debts to comply with his mother. Marrying some rich woman, suggested by female relations, is repugnant. His mother's death never enters his head. He wishes for nothing, hopes for nothing, and deep in his heart finds a gloomy satisfaction in uncomplaining endurance. He avoids old acquaintances and their offers of assistance, plays cards with his mother, paces the room, and smokes one pipe after another, cherishing the gloomy mood that alone enables him to endure.
Coming Up in Chapter 343
At the beginning of winter Princess Mary comes to Moscow. From reports in town she learns how the Rostovs are situated, and how "the son has sacrificed himself for his mother." She goes to call, and Nicholas is the first to meet her, but his face assumes a cold, stiff, proud expression she has not seen before.
