ome from the covering troops."

Tushin did not say that there were no covering troops, though that
was perfectly true. He was afraid of getting some other officer into
trouble, and silently fixed his eyes on Bagration as a schoolboy who has
blundered looks at an examiner.

The silence lasted some time. Prince Bagration, apparently not wishing
to be severe, found nothing to say; the others did not venture to
intervene. Prince Andrew looked at Tushin from under his brows and his
fingers twitched nervously.

"Your excellency!" Prince Andrew broke the silence with his abrupt
voice, "you were pleased to send me to Captain Tushin's battery. I went
there and found two thirds of the men and horses knocked out, two guns
smashed, and no supports at all."

Prince Bagration and Tushin looked with equal intentness at Bolkonski,
who spoke with suppressed agitation.

"And, if your excellency will allow me to express my opinion," he
continued, "we owe today's success chiefly to the action of that battery
and the heroic endurance of Captain Tushin and his company," and without
awaiting a reply, Prince Andrew rose and left the table.

Prince Bagration looked at Tushin, evidently reluctant to show distrust
in Bolkonski's emphatic opinion yet not feeling able fully to credit it,
bent his head, and told Tushin that he could go. Prince Andrew went out
with him.

"Thank you; you saved me, my dear fellow!" said Tushin.

Prince Andrew gave him a look, but said nothing and went away. He felt
sad and depressed. It was all so strange, so unlike what he had hoped.

"Who are they? Why are they here? What do they want? And when will all
this end?" thought Rostov, looking at the changing shadows before
him. The pain in his arm became more and more intense. Irresistible
drowsiness overpowered him, red rings danced before his eyes, and the
impression of those voices and faces and a sense of loneliness merged
with the physical pain. It was they, these soldiers--wounded and
unwounded--it was they who were crushing, weighing down, and twisting
the sinews and scorching the flesh of his sprained arm and shoulder. To
rid himself of them he closed his eyes.

For a moment he dozed, but in that short interval innumerable things
appeared to him in a dream: his mother and her large white hand, Sonya's
thin little shoulders, Natasha's eyes and laughter, Denisov with his
voice and mustache, and Telyanin and all that affair with Telyanin and
Bogdanich.