t Rostov, the general, and the colonel. At the card table he
happened to be directly facing Natasha, and was struck by a curious
change that had come over her since the ball. She was silent, and not
only less pretty than at the ball, but only redeemed from plainness by
her look of gentle indifference to everything around.

"What's the matter with her?" thought Pierre, glancing at her. She was
sitting by her sister at the tea table, and reluctantly, without looking
at him, made some reply to Boris who sat down beside her. After playing
out a whole suit and to his partner's delight taking five tricks,
Pierre, hearing greetings and the steps of someone who had entered the
room while he was picking up his tricks, glanced again at Natasha.

"What has happened to her?" he asked himself with still greater
surprise.

Prince Andrew was standing before her, saying something to her with a
look of tender solicitude. She, having raised her head, was looking up
at him, flushed and evidently trying to master her rapid breathing. And
the bright glow of some inner fire that had been suppressed was again
alight in her. She was completely transformed and from a plain girl had
again become what she had been at the ball.

Prince Andrew went up to Pierre, and the latter noticed a new and
youthful expression in his friend's face.

Pierre changed places several times during the game, sitting now with
his back to Natasha and now facing her, but during the whole of the six
rubbers he watched her and his friend.

"Something very important is happening between them," thought Pierre,
and a feeling that was both joyful and painful agitated him and made him
neglect the game.

After six rubbers the general got up, saying that it was no use playing
like that, and Pierre was released. Natasha on one side was talking with
Sonya and Boris, and Vera with a subtle smile was saying something to
Prince Andrew. Pierre went up to his friend and, asking whether they
were talking secrets, sat down beside them. Vera, having noticed Prince
Andrew's attentions to Natasha, decided that at a party, a real evening
party, subtle allusions to the tender passion were absolutely necessary
and, seizing a moment when Prince Andrew was alone, began a conversation
with him about feelings in general and about her sister. With so
intellectual a guest as she considered Prince Andrew to be, she felt
that she had to employ her diplomatic tact.

When Pierre went up to them