"No! What kind, Marya Dmitrievna? What kind?" she almost screamed; "I
want to know!"

Marya Dmitrievna and the countess burst out laughing, and all the guests
joined in. Everyone laughed, not at Marya Dmitrievna's answer but at the
incredible boldness and smartness of this little girl who had dared to
treat Marya Dmitrievna in this fashion.

Natasha only desisted when she had been told that there would be
pineapple ice. Before the ices, champagne was served round. The band
again struck up, the count and countess kissed, and the guests, leaving
their seats, went up to "congratulate" the countess, and reached across
the table to clink glasses with the count, with the children, and with
one another. Again the footmen rushed about, chairs scraped, and in the
same order in which they had entered but with redder faces, the guests
returned to the drawing room and to the count's study.

CHAPTER XX

The card tables were drawn out, sets made up for boston, and the count's
visitors settled themselves, some in the two drawing rooms, some in the
sitting room, some in the library.

The count, holding his cards fanwise, kept himself with difficulty from
dropping into his usual after-dinner nap, and laughed at everything.
The young people, at the countess' instigation, gathered round the
clavichord and harp. Julie by general request played first. After she
had played a little air with variations on the harp, she joined the
other young ladies in begging Natasha and Nicholas, who were noted for
their musical talent, to sing something. Natasha, who was treated as
though she were grown up, was evidently very proud of this but at the
same time felt shy.

"What shall we sing?" she said.

"'The Brook,'" suggested Nicholas.

"Well, then, let's be quick. Boris, come here," said Natasha. "But where
is Sonya?"

She looked round and seeing that her friend was not in the room ran to
look for her.

Running into Sonya's room and not finding her there, Natasha ran to the
nursery, but Sonya was not there either. Natasha concluded that she must
be on the chest in the passage. The chest in the passage was the place
of mourning for the younger female generation in the Rostov household.
And there in fact was Sonya lying face downward on Nurse's dirty feather
bed on the top of the chest, crumpling her gauzy pink dress under her,
hiding her face with her slender fingers, and sobbing so convulsively
that her bare little shoulders sh