PRINCE ANDREY'S DUTIES as trustee of his son's Ryazan estates necessitated an interview with the marshal of the district. This marshal was Count Ilya Andreivitch Rostov, and in the middle of May Prince Andrey went to see him.

It was by now the hot period of spring. The forest was already in full leaf. It was dusty, and so hot that at the sight of water one longed to bathe.

Prince Andrey drove along the avenue leading to the Rostovs' house at Otradnoe, depressed and absorbed in considering what questions he must ask the marshal about his business. Behind some trees on the right he heard merry girlish cries, and caught sight of a party of girls running across the avenue along which his coach was driving. In front of all the rest there ran towards the coach a black-haired, very slender, strangely slender, black-eyed girl in a yellow cotton gown. On her head was a white pocket-handkerchief, from under which strayed locks of her loose hair. The girl was shouting something, but perceiving a stranger, she ran back laughing, without glancing at him.

Prince Andrey for some reason felt a sudden pang. The day was so lovely, the sun so bright, everything around him so gay, and that slim and pretty girl knew nothing of his existence, and cared to know nothing, and was content and happy in her own life—foolish doubtless—but gay and happy and remote from him. What was she so glad about? What was she thinking of? Not of army regulations; not of the organisation of the Ryazan rent-paying peasants. “What is she thinking about, and why is she so happy?” Prince Andrey could not help wondering with interest.

Count Ilya Andreivitch was living in the year 1809 at Otradnoe, exactly as he had always done in previous years; that is to say, entertaining almost the whole province with hunts, theatricals, dinner parties and concerts. He was delighted to see Prince Andrey, as he always was to see any new guest, and quite forced him to stay the night.

Prince Andrey spent a tedious day, entertained by his elderly host and hostess and the more honoured among the guests, of whom the count's house was full in honour of an approaching name-day. Several times in the course of it, Bolkonsky glanced at Natasha, continually laughing and full of gaiety among the younger members of the company, and asked himself each time, “What is she thinking of? What is she so glad about?”

In the evening, alone in a new place, he was for a long while unable to sleep. He read for a time, then put out his candle, and afterwards lighted it again. It was hot in the bedroom with the shutters closed on the inside. He felt irritated with this foolish old gentleman (so he mentally called Count Rostov) who had detained him, declaring that the necessary deeds had not yet come from the town, and he was vexed with himself for staying.

Prince Andrey got up and went to the window to open it. As soon as he opened the shutter, the moonlight broke into the room as though it had been waiting a long while outside on the watch for this chance. He opened the window. The night was fresh ............