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Updated: June 26, 2025
Dimmler had no sooner begun his nocturne than Natacha, crossing the room on tiptoe, seized the wax-light that was burning on the table and carried it into the next room; then she stole back to her seat, it was now quite dark in the larger room, especially in their corner, but the silvery moonbeams came in at the wide windows and lay in broad sheets on the floor.
"Yes, we're philosophizing," said Natasha, glancing round for a moment and then continuing the conversation. They were now discussing dreams. Dimmler began to play; Natasha went on tiptoe noiselessly to the table, took up a candle, carried it out, and returned, seating herself quietly in her former place.
"Not lower, who said we were lower?... How do I know what I was before?" Natasha rejoined with conviction. "The soul is immortal well then, if I shall always live I must have lived before, lived for a whole eternity." "Yes, but it is hard for us to imagine eternity," remarked Dimmler, who had joined the young folk with a mildly condescending smile but now spoke as quietly and seriously as they.
Dimmler, the clown, and Nicolas, the marquise, performed a dance, while the others stood close along the wall, the children shouting and jumping about them with glee. "It is impossible to know who is who can that really be Natacha? Look at her; does not she remind you of some one? Edward, before Karlovitch, how fine you are! and how beautifully you dance!
Their answer was a shout of laughter. Dimmler was talking himself hoarse, and he must be saying very funny things, for the party in his sleigh were in fits of laughing. "Better and better," said Nicolas to himself; "now we are in an enchanted forest the black shadows lie across a flooring of diamonds and mix with the sparkling of gems.
It was dark in the room especially where they were sitting on the sofa, but through the big windows the silvery light of the full moon fell on the floor. Dimmler had finished the piece but still sat softly running his fingers over the strings, evidently uncertain whether to stop or to play something else.
He took off its cloth covering, and the harp gave out a jarring sound. "Mr. Dimmler, please play my favorite nocturne by Field," came the old countess' voice from the drawing room. Dimmler struck a chord and, turning to Natasha, Nicholas, and Sonya, remarked: "How quiet you young people are!"
A door opened, and a woman put in her head, exclaiming, "Mademoiselle, mademoiselle, they have fetched the cock!" "I do not want it now; send it away again, Polia." said Natacha. Dimmler, who had meanwhile come into the room, went up to the harp, which stood in a corner, and in taking off the cover made the strings ring discordantly.
The young people had all vanished; but half an hour later an old marquise with patches appeared on the scene none other than Nicolas; Pétia as a Turk; a clown Dimmler; a hussar Natacha; and a Circassian Sonia. Both the girls had blackened their eyebrows and given themselves mustaches with burned cork.
They ran to the barn and then back again, re-entering, he by the front and she by the back porch. When they all drove back from Pelageya Danilovna's, Natasha, who always saw and noticed everything, arranged that she and Madame Schoss should go back in the sleigh with Dimmler, and Sonya with Nicholas and the maids.
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