Emma Watson Pussy
Books:
Anna Karenina
War And Peace
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ten oclock.
In the room next their bedroom there was a confusion of sabers,
satchels, sabretaches, open portmanteaus, and dirty boots. Two freshly
cleaned pairs with spurs had just been placed by the wall. The
servants were bringing in jugs and basins, hot water for shaving,
and their well-brushed clothes. There was a masculine odor and a smell
of tobacco.
"Hallo, Gwiska--my pipe!" came Vasili Denisovs husky voice.
"Wostov, get up!"
Rostov, rubbing his eyes that seemed glued together, raised his
disheveled head from the hot pillow.
"Why, is it late?"
"Late! Its nearly ten oclock," answered Natashas voice. A
rustle of starched petticoats and the whispering and laughter of
girls voices came from the adjoining room. The door was opened a
crack and there was a glimpse of something blue, of ribbons, black
hair, and merry faces. It was Natasha, Sonya, and Petya, who had
come to see whether they were getting up.
"Nicholas! Get up!" Natashas voice was again heard at the door.
"Directly!"
Meanwhile, Petya, having found and seized the sabers in the outer
room, with the delight boys feel at the sight of a military elder
brother, and forgetting that it was unbecoming for the girls to see
men undressed, opened the bedroom door.
"Is this your saber?" he shouted.
The girls sprang aside. Denisov hid his hairy legs under the
blanket, looking with a scared face at his comrade for help. The door,
having let Petya in, closed again. A sound of laughter came from
behind it.
"Nicholas! Come out in your dressing gown!" said Natashas voice.
"Is this your saber?" asked Petya. "Or is it yours?" he said,
addressing the black-mustached Denisov with servile deference.
Rostov hurriedly put something on his feet, drew on his dressing
gown, and went out. Natasha had put on one spurred boot and was just
getting her foot into the other. Sonya, when he came in, was
twirling round and was about to expand her dresses into a balloon
and sit down. They were dressed alike, in new pale-blue frocks, and
were both fresh, rosy, and bright. Sonya ran away, but Natasha, taking
her brothers arm, led him into the sitting room, where they began
talking. They hardly gave one another time to ask questions and give
replies concerning a thousand little matters which could not
interest anyone but themselves. Natasha laughed at every word he
said or that she said herself, not because what they were saying was
amusing, but because she felt happy and was unable to control her
joy which expressed itself by laughter.
"Oh, how nice, how splendid!" she said to everything.
Rostov felt that, under the influence of the warm rays of love, that
childlike smile which had not once appeared on his face since he
left home now for the first time after eighteen months again
brightened his soul and his face.
"No, but listen," she said, "now you are quite a man, arent you?
Im awfully glad youre my brother." She touched his mustache. "I want
to know what you men are like. Are you the same as we? No?"
"Why did Sonya run away?" asked Rostov.
"Ah, yes! Thats a whole long story! How are you going to speak to
her--thou or you?"
"As may happen," said Rostov.
"No, call her you, please! Ill tell you all about it some other
time. No, Ill tell you now. You know Sonyas my dearest friend.
Such a friend that I burned my arm for her sake. Look here!"
She pulled up her muslin sleeve and showed him a red scar on her
long, slender, delicate arm, high above the elbow on that part that is
covered even by a ball dress.
"I burned this to prove my love for her. I just heated a ruler in
the fire and pressed it there!"
Sitting on the sofa with the little cushions on its arms, in what
used to be his old schoolroom, and looking into Natashas wildly
bright eyes, Rostov re-entered that world of home and childhood
which had no meaning for anyone else, but gave him some of the best
joys of his life; and the burning of an arm with a ruler as a proof of
love did not seem to him senseless, he understood and was not
surprised at it.
"Well, and is that all?" he asked.
"We are such friends, such friends! All that ruler business was just
nonsense, but we are friends forever. She, if she loves anyone, does
it for life, but I dont understand that, I forget quickly."
"Well, what then?"
"Well, she loves me and you like that."
Natasha suddenly flushed.
"Why, you remember before
War And Peace page 173 War And Peace page 175
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