rienne, and
even little Nicholas exchanged looks in silence. The old prince returned
with quick steps, accompanied by Michael Ivanovich, bringing the letter
and a plan. These he put down beside him--not letting anyone read them
at dinner.

On moving to the drawing room he handed the letter to Princess Mary and,
spreading out before him the plan of the new building and fixing his
eyes upon it, told her to read the letter aloud. When she had done so
Princess Mary looked inquiringly at her father. He was examining the
plan, evidently engrossed in his own ideas.

"What do you think of it, Prince?" Dessalles ventured to ask.

"I? I?..." said the prince as if unpleasantly awakened, and not taking
his eyes from the plan of the building.

"Very possibly the theater of war will move so near to us that..."

"Ha ha ha! The theater of war!" said the prince. "I have said and still
say that the theater of war is Poland and the enemy will never get
beyond the Niemen."

Dessalles looked in amazement at the prince, who was talking of the
Niemen when the enemy was already at the Dnieper, but Princess Mary,
forgetting the geographical position of the Niemen, thought that what
her father was saying was correct.

"When the snow melts they'll sink in the Polish swamps. Only they
could fail to see it," the prince continued, evidently thinking of the
campaign of 1807 which seemed to him so recent. "Bennigsen should have
advanced into Prussia sooner, then things would have taken a different
turn..."

"But, Prince," Dessalles began timidly, "the letter mentions
Vitebsk...."

"Ah, the letter? Yes..." replied the prince peevishly. "Yes... yes..."
His face suddenly took on a morose expression. He paused. "Yes, he
writes that the French were beaten at... at... what river is it?"

Dessalles dropped his eyes.

"The prince says nothing about that," he remarked gently.

"Doesn't he? But I didn't invent it myself."

No one spoke for a long time.

"Yes... yes... Well, Michael Ivanovich," he suddenly went on, raising
his head and pointing to the plan of the building, "tell me how you mean
to alter it...."

Michael Ivanovich went up to the plan, and the prince after speaking to
him about the building looked angrily at Princess Mary and Dessalles and
went to his own room.

Princess Mary saw Dessalles' embarrassed and astonished look fixed on
her father, noticed his silence, and was struck by the fact that her
father had forgotten his so