Thinking he has killed Dólokhov, Pierre wonders how he has reached this point. He regrets marrying Hélène, she criticizes him, and they separate.
Thinking he has killed Dólokhov, Pierre wonders how he has reached this point. He regrets marrying Hélène, she criticizes him, and they separate.
Book 4, Chapter 6
Thinking he has killed Dólokhov, Pierre wonders how he has reached this point. He regrets marrying Hélène, she criticizes him, and they separate.
Summary:
The night after the duel Pierre did not go to his bedroom but, as he often did, remained in his father’s room. There he ruminates about the duel and his marriage to Hélène. He thinks Dólokhov may be dead and he asks himself how this ever could have happened. Pierre realizes he was wrong to marry Hélène, who he never loved. He was attracted by her beauty and manner, but he realizes he should never have married her. He thinks Hélène is “a depraved woman” who must have welcomed Dólokhov’s affections. He decides to separate permanently from Hélène. Then Hélène comes into the room and begins to berate Pierre. She says Dólokhov was not her lover, but that Dólokhov is in every way a better man than Pierre. Pierre mutters that he wants to separate from her. Hélène says this is ok with her, but that she wants a fortune in settlement. Overcome with anger, Pierre grabs a marble slab and lurches towards Hélène. Pierre screams get out! Hélène runs out of the room. A week later Pierre gave his wife full power to control all his estates in Great Russia, which formed the larger part of his property, and left for Petersburg alone.
quote from the chapter:
Pierre wished to say something, looked at her with eyes whose strange expression she did not understand, and lay down again. He was suffering physically at that moment, there was a weight on his chest and he could not breathe. He knew that he must do something to put an end to this suffering, but what he wanted to do was too terrible.
We had better separate, he muttered in a broken voice.
Separate? Very well, but only if you give me a fortune, said Hélène. Separate! That’s a thing to frighten me with!
Pierre leaped up from the sofa and rushed staggering toward her.
I’ll kill you! he shouted, and seizing the marble top of a table with a strength he had never before felt, he made a step toward her brandishing the slab.
Hélène’s face became terrible, she shrieked and sprang aside. His father’s nature showed itself in Pierre. He felt the fascination and delight of frenzy. He flung down the slab, broke it, and swooping down on her with outstretched hands shouted, Get out! in such a terrible voice that the whole house heard it with horror. God knows what he would have done at that moment had Hélène not fled from the room.
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