Sitting in his old schoolroom on the sofa with little cushions on the arms, and looking into Natasha’s wildly eager eyes, Rostov was carried back into that world of home and childhood which had no meaning for any one else but gave him some of the greatest pleasures in his life. And burning one’s arm with a ruler as a proof of love did not strike him as pointless; he understood it, and was not surprised at it.
“Well, is that all？” he asked.
“Well, we are such friends, such great friends！ That’s nonsense—the ruler; but we are friends for ever. If she once loves any one, it’s for ever; I don’t understand that, I forget so quickly.”
“Well, what then？”
“Yes, so she loves me and you.” Natasha suddenly flushed. “Well, you remember before you went away … She says you are to forget it all… She said, I shall always love him, but let him be free. That really is splendid, noble！ Yes, yes; very noble？ Yes？” Natasha asked with such seriousness and emotion that it was clear that what she was saying now she had talked of before with tears. Rostov thought a little.
“I never take back my word,” he said. “And besides, Sonya’s so charming that who would be such a fool as to renounce his own happiness？”
“No, no,” cried Natasha. “She and I have talked about that already. We knew that you’d say that. But that won’t do, because, don’t you see, if you say that—if you consider yourself bound by your word, then it makes it as though she had said that on purpose. It makes it as though you were, after all, obliged to marry her, and it makes it all wrong.”
Rostov saw that it had all been well thought over by them. On the previous day, Sonya had struck him by her beauty; in the glimpse he had caught of her to-day, she seemed even prettier. She was a charming girl of sixteen, obviously passionately in love with him （of that he could not doubt for an instant）. “Why should he not love her now, even if he did not marry her,” mused Rostov, “but … just now he had so many other joys and interests！”
“Yes, that’s a very good conclusion on their part,” he thought; “I must remain free.”
“Well, that’s all right, then,” he said; “we’ll talk about it later on. Ah, how glad I am to be back with you！” he added. “Come, tell me, you’ve not been false to Boris？”
“That’s nonsense！” cried Natasha, laughing. “I never think of him nor of any one else, and don’t want to.”
“Oh, you don’t, don’t you！ Then what do you want？”
“I？” Natasha queried, and her face beamed with a happy smile. “Have you seen Duport？”
“No.”
“Not seen Duport, the celebrated dancer？ Oh, well then, you won’t understand. I—that’s what I am.” Curving her arms, Natasha held out her skirt, as dancers do, ran back a few steps, whirled round, executed a pirouette, bringing her little feet together and standing on the very tips of her toes, moved a few steps forward.
“You see how I stand？ there, like this,” she kept saying; but she could not keep on her toes. “So that’s what I’m going to be！ I’m never going to be married to any one; I’m going to be a dancer. Only, don’t tell anybody.”
Rostov laughed so loudly and merrily that Denisov in his room felt envious, and Natasha could not help laughing with him.
“No, isn’t it all right？” she kept saying.
“Oh, quite. So you don’t want to marry Boris now？”
Natasha got hot.
“I don’t want to marry any one. I’ll tell him so myself when I see him.”
“Oh, will you？” said Rostov.
“But that’s all nonsense,” Natasha prattled on. “And, I say, is Denisov nice？” she asked.
“Yes, he’s nice.”
“Well, good-bye, go and dress. Is he a dreadful person — Denisov？”
“How, dreadful？” asked Nikolay. “No, Vaska’s jolly.”
“You call him Vaska？ … that’s funny. Well, is he very nice？”
“Very nice.”
“Make haste and come to tea, then. We are all going to have it together.”
And Natasha rose on to her toes and stepped out of the room, as dancers do, but smiling as only happy girls of fifteen can smile. Rostov reddened on meeting Sonya in the drawing-room. He did not know how to behave with her. Yesterday they had kissed in the first moment of joy at meeting, but to-day they felt that out of the question. He felt that every one, his mother and his sisters, were looking inquiringly at him, and wondering how he would behave with her. He kissed her hand, and called her you and Sonya. But their eyes when they met spoke more fondly and kissed tenderly. Her eyes asked his forgiveness for having dared, by Natasha’s mediation, to remind him of his promise, and thanked him for his love. His eyes thanked her for offering him his freedom, and told her that whether so, or otherwise, he should never cease to love her, because it was impossible not to love her.
“How queer it is, though,” said Vera, selecting a moment of general silence, “that Sonya and Nikolenka meet now and speak like strangers.”
Vera’s observation was true, as were all her observations; but like most of her observations it made every one uncomfortable—not Sonya, Nikolay, and Natasha only crimsoned; the countess, too, who was afraid of her son’s love for Sonya as a possible obstacle to his making a brilliant marriage, blushed like a girl.
To Rostov’s surprise, Denisov in his new uniform, pomaded and perfumed, was quite as dashing a figure in a drawing-room as on the field of battle, and was polite to the ladies and gentlemen as Rostov had never expected to see him.
