n the
prisoners and the French soldiers, in which Pierre had succeeded in
pacifying his comrades.) Some of the prisoners who had heard Pierre
talking to the corporal immediately asked what the Frenchman had said.
While Pierre was repeating what he had been told about the army leaving
Moscow, a thin, sallow, tattered French soldier came up to the door of
the shed. Rapidly and timidly raising his fingers to his forehead by way
of greeting, he asked Pierre whether the soldier Platoche to whom he had
given a shirt to sew was in that shed.

A week before the French had had boot leather and linen issued to them,
which they had given out to the prisoners to make up into boots and
shirts for them.

"Ready, ready, dear fellow!" said Karataev, coming out with a neatly
folded shirt.

Karataev, on account of the warm weather and for convenience at work,
was wearing only trousers and a tattered shirt as black as soot. His
hair was bound round, workman fashion, with a wisp of lime-tree bast,
and his round face seemed rounder and pleasanter than ever.

"A promise is own brother to performance! I said Friday and here it is,
ready," said Platon, smiling and unfolding the shirt he had sewn.

The Frenchman glanced around uneasily and then, as if overcoming his
hesitation, rapidly threw off his uniform and put on the shirt. He had
a long, greasy, flowered silk waistcoat next to his sallow, thin bare
body, but no shirt. He was evidently afraid the prisoners looking on
would laugh at him, and thrust his head into the shirt hurriedly. None
of the prisoners said a word.

"See, it fits well!" Platon kept repeating, pulling the shirt straight.

The Frenchman, having pushed his head and hands through, without raising
his eyes, looked down at the shirt and examined the seams.

"You see, dear man, this is not a sewing shop, and I had no proper
tools; and, as they say, one needs a tool even to kill a louse," said
Platon with one of his round smiles, obviously pleased with his work.

"It's good, quite good, thank you," said the Frenchman, in French, "but
there must be some linen left over.

"It will fit better still when it sets to your body," said Karataev,
still admiring his handiwork. "You'll be nice and comfortable...."

"Thanks, thanks, old fellow.... But the bits left over?" said the
Frenchman again and smiled. He took out an assignation ruble note and
gave it to Karataev. "But give me the pieces that are over."

Pierre saw that P