War and Peace

ostóv, with his keen sportsman’s eye, was one of the first to catch
sight of these blue French dragoons pursuing our Uhlans. Nearer and
nearer in disorderly crowds came the Uhlans and the French dragoons
pursuing them. He could already see how these men, who looked so small
at the foot of the hill, jostled and overtook one another, waving their
arms and their sabers in the air.

Rostóv gazed at what was happening before him as at a hunt. He felt
instinctively that if the hussars struck at the French dragoons now, the
latter could not withstand them, but if a charge was to be made it must
be done now, at that very moment, or it would be too late. He looked
around. A captain, standing beside him, was gazing like himself with
eyes fixed on the cavalry below them.

“Andrew Sevastyánych!” said Rostóv. “You know, we could crush them....”

“A fine thing too!” replied the captain, “and really...”

Rostóv, without waiting to hear him out, touched his horse, galloped to
the front of his squadron, and before he had time to finish giving the
word of command, the whole squadron, sharing his feeling, was following
him. Rostóv himself did not know how or why he did it. He acted as he
did when hunting, without reflecting or considering. He saw the dragoons
near and that they were galloping in disorder; he knew they could not
withstand an attack—knew there was only that moment and that if he let
it slip it would not return. The bullets were whining and whistling so
stimulatingly around him and his horse was so eager to go that he could
not restrain himself. He touched his horse, gave the word of command,
and immediately, hearing behind him the tramp of the horses of his
deployed squadron, rode at full trot downhill toward the dragoons.
Hardly had they reached the bottom of the hill before their pace
instinctively changed to a gallop, which grew faster and faster as they
drew nearer to our Uhlans and the French dragoons who galloped after
them. The dragoons were now close at hand. On seeing the hussars, the
foremost began to turn, while those behind began to halt. With the same
feeling with which he had galloped across the path of a wolf, Rostóv
gave rein to his Donéts horse and galloped to intersect the path of the
dragoons’ disordered lines. One Uhlan stopped, another who was on foot
flung himself to the ground to avoid being knocked over, and a riderless
horse fell in among the hussars. Nearly all the French dragoons were
galloping back. Rostóv, picking out one on a gray horse, dashed after
him. On the way he came upon a bush, his gallant horse cleared it, and
almost before he had righted himself in his saddle he saw that he would
immediately overtake the enemy he had selected. That Frenchman, by his
uniform an officer, was going at a gallop, crouching on his gray horse
and urging it on with his saber. In another moment Rostóv’s horse dashed
its breast against the hindquarters of the officer’s horse, almost
knocking it over, and at the same instant Rostóv, without knowing why,
raised his saber and struck the Frenchman with it.

The instant he had done this, all Rostóv’s animation vanished. The
officer fell, not so much from the blow—which had but slightly cut his
arm above the elbow—as from the shock to his horse and from fright.
Rostóv reined in his horse, and his eyes sought his foe to see whom he
had vanquished. The French dragoon officer was hopping with one foot on
the ground, the other being caught in the stirrup. His eyes, screwed
up with fear as if he every moment expected another blow, gazed up at
Rostóv with shrinking terror. His pale and mud-stained face—fair and
young, with a dimple in the chin and light-blue eyes—was not an enemy’s
face at all suited to a battlefield, but a most ordinary, homelike face.
Before Rostóv had decided what to do with him, the officer cried, “I
surrender!” He hurriedly but vainly tried to get his foot out of the
stirrup and did not remove his frightened blue eyes from Rostóv’s face.
Some hussars who galloped up disengaged his foot and helped him into the
saddle. On all sides, the hussars were busy with the dragoons; one was
wounded, but though his face was bleeding, he would not give up his
horse; another was perched up behind an hussar with his arms round him;
a third was being helped by an hussar to mount his horse. In front, the
French infantry were firing as they ran. The hussars galloped hastily
back with their prisoners. Rostóv galloped back with the rest, aware of
an unpleasant feeling of depression in his heart. Something vague and
confused, which he could not at all account for, had come over him with
the capture of that officer and the blow he had dealt him.

Count Ostermann-Tolstóy met the returning hussars, sent for Rostóv,
thanked him, and said he would report his gallant deed to the Emperor
and would recommend him for a St. George’s Cross. When sent for by Count
Ostermann, Rostóv, remembering that he had charged without orders,
felt sure his commander was sending for him to punish him for breach of
discipline. Ostermann’s flattering words and promise of a reward should
therefore have struck him all the more pleasantly, but he still felt
that same vaguely disagreeable feeling of moral nausea. “But what
on earth is worrying me?” he asked himself as he rode back from the
general. “Ilyín? No, he’s safe. Have I disgraced myself in any way? No,
that’s not it.” Something else, resembling remorse, tormented him. “Yes,
oh yes, that French officer with the dimple. And I remember how my arm
paused when I raised it.”

Rostóv saw the prisoners being led away and galloped after them to have
a look at his Frenchman with the dimple on his chin. He was sitting in
his foreign uniform on an hussar packhorse and looked anxiously about
him. The sword cut on his arm could scarcely be called a wound. He
glanced at Rostóv with a feigned smile and waved his hand in greeting.
Rostóv still had the same indefinite feeling, as of shame.

All that day and the next his friends and comrades noticed that Rostóv,
without being dull or angry, was silent, thoughtful, and preoccupied.
He drank reluctantly, tried to remain alone, and kept turning something
over in his mind.

Rostóv was always thinking about that brilliant exploit of his, which to
his amazement had gained him the St. George’s Cross and even given him
a reputation for bravery, and there was something he could not at all
understand. “So others are even more afraid than I am!” he thought. “So
that’s all there is in what is called heroism! And did I do it for my
country’s sake? And how was he to blame, with his dimple and blue eyes?
And how frightened he was! He thought that I should kill him. Why should
I kill him? My hand trembled. And they have given me a St. George’s
Cross.... I can’t make it out at all.”

But while Nicholas was considering these questions and still could reach
no clear solution of what puzzled him so, the wheel of fortune in the
service, as often happens, turned in his favor. After the affair at
Ostróvna he was brought into notice, received command of an hussar
battalion, and when a brave officer was needed he was chosen.