having come on tuesday evening to hélène's magnificent salon, boris was not given a clear explanation of why it had been necessary for him to come. there were other guests, the countess spoke little to him, and only as he kissed her hand on taking his leave did she, with a strange absence of smile, unexpectedly, in a whisper, say to him:

' venez demain dîner . . . le soir. il faut que vous veniez . . . venez. '

during this stay in petersburg, boris became an intimate of countess bezukhov's house.

— leo tolstoy, war and peace (volume ii, part two, chapter vii)

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