- Prince Vasili Kuragin: What time did you get home last night?
- Anatole Kuragin: Not late.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: What do you call not late?
- Anatole Kuragin: 2:00.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: How much did you lose?
- Anatole Kuragin: I didn't lose. I won.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: That's a change. Where are you going now? To lose it all again?
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: It's time you were married.
- Anatole Kuragin: Oh, there's no hurry. Why should I get married?
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: Because I can no longer afford to keep you in the style you seem to require. A wife could, if she were foolish enough.
- Pierre Bezukhov: It is getting late.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: Late? Late, he says. This one who comes in all hours of the night and morning.
- Pierre Bezukhov: Well, I didn't want to keep you up.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: Sit down. The night's still young. If Anna Scherer hasn't gone yet, it's not late, no matter what time it is.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: Nothing happens. Whenever she's with him, he looks confused and nervous and knocks something over. It's driving me insane.
- Princess Aline Kuragina: Young girls seem less effective than they were. Their lives are too sheltered these days. I could have brought him to the barn in five minutes.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: She tries. It's him. He never seems able to make up his mind to anything. Something must be done. It's nearly two months. They go out driving, play cards together, takes her now to Anna Scherer's.
- Princess Aline Kuragina: Perhaps he doesn't like her.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: Well, of course he likes her. Who wouldn't like Helene?
- Princess Aline Kuragina: When I was her age, I could have made a deaf mute speak.
- Pierre Bezukhov: Yes. Oh, she's beautiful. Beautiful. And why not be honest, eh? I would like to go to bed with her. And yet she's brainless. Not a brain in her head. And yet does it matter? Didn't Andrei say all women were the same? Why do I feel as if I'm bound to marry her? Why? I don't want to, and yet, it's as if it's already been decided. They all expect me to, and somehow I... I know I shall. Whether I want to or not.
- Pierre Bezukhov: It's going to happen. I know it. They're all expecting it. They're so certain it will happen. I can't disappoint them. I can't. How will it be? I don't know. It's inevitable. The step must be taken. It's gone too far. I don't know how or why, but it has. How on earth did it happen? It's all done so quickly.
- Princess Maria Bolkonskya: Oh God. How can I stifle these feelings I have in me? I want him. I don't know him and yet I want him. To hold and caress. And perhaps, a child to nurse at my breast.
- Pierre Bezukhov: This had to be. It could not be otherwise. So it's no use wondering whether it's good or bad. At least I am no longer tortured by doubt, and that's something. But how did it happen? How exactly did it come to this? All I did was live in his house.
- Anatole Kuragin: Now tell me honestly, Father. Is she really attractive?
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: So I understand. Attractive enough.
- Pierre Bezukhov: Why do people affect me so? That silly woman. She made me cry. And for what? Nothing. I'm like a straw in the wind, blown this way and that by a gust from any quarter.
- Prince Bolkonsky: What have you done to yourself?
- Princess Maria Bolkonskya: Nothing, Papa.
- Prince Bolkonsky: Was it for our guests that you've got yourself up like that?
- Princess Maria Bolkonskya: What do you mean, Papa?
- Prince Bolkonsky: Now you have done your hair in a new style for visitors, and before visitors, I tell you, never to do that again without my consent.
- Amelie Bourienne: It was my fault, mon pere.
- Prince Bolkonsky: You may do as you like, but she doesn't have to make a clown of herself. She's plain enough without that.
- Pierre Bezukhov: How did it happen? All I did was live in his house. I took her out once or twice. Played cards with her. How did it happen? Everyone seemed to expect it, and there it was. It's as if I had nothing at all to do with it. What then is my purpose in life?
- Princess Maria Bolkonskya: My purpose is a different one. My purpose is to be happy in the happiness of others.
- Amelie Bourienne: But we lived quite near then. What a coincidence! How long were you there?
- Anatole Kuragin: Two years. Perhaps we passed each other on the street and didn't know it.
- Amelie Bourienne: Well, Lisa, this is strange, is it not? We lived almost next to each other in Paris and never knew.
- Princess Lisa Bolkonskya: From all I hear of Anatole's activities there, Amelie, you were probably fortunate.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: Oh well, young men, you know. He learned a great deal in Paris.
- Princess Lisa Bolkonskya: And he practiced it in Petersburg. I'm sure the soirees rang with stories about yourself and Count Bezukhov.
- Princess Maria Bolkonskya: No. One must not give way to one's passions. One must not be helplessly borne along by them. The mind must constantly temper the heart. No matter the cost. We know the right, and must cling to it.
- Anna Scherer: We really shouldn't laugh at Sergei Kuzmich. He's a very dear man.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: No. But it was very funny, Anna. Here is a governor general of Petersburg, so overcome at receiving a letter from the tsar, he can't even read it properly.
- Princess Aline Kuragina: He should have got the town cryer.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: There he is, standing before a Wednesday session of the privy council, trying to read the letter, and can't get past his own name without weeping.
- Vasili's guest: Sergei Kuzmich. By God, I wish I'd been there.
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: The letter began: 'Sergei Kuzmich, from all sides reports reach me.'
- Vasili's guest: And he never got further than 'Sergei Kuzmich.'
- Prince Vasili Kuragin: The whole session, 'Sergei Kuzmich, from all sides.' He tried again, starting at the other end. 'From all sides, Sergei Kuzmich.'