War and Peace Volume 2, Part 3, Chapter 21 Summary

  • At Vera and Berg's party, Pierre is forced to play cards with the old general, which is supposed to be a treat for him.
  • Instead, he’s people watching and sees that Natasha suddenly looks kind of bad. He’s shocked, and then even more shocked when, right before his eyes, Andrei comes up, says something to Natasha, and she again looks beautiful – glowing even, lit up from inside. Master detective Pierre watches them flirt some more and figures out that something is going on here.
  • Pierre finishes the game and goes over to Andrei and Natasha, just as Andrei is collared by Vera-bot. Her party program has moved on to subroutine 2.3: conversation about feelings. She starts prying into Andrei’s feelings with some really tacky hints about Natasha. She also fills him in on the whole Boris-Natasha connection.
  • Andrei tries to be polite for a little while and then finally just walks away.
  • Just as he is about to talk to Pierre about the whole thing, Pierre falls into the grip of Berg-bot, who has moved on to the final phase of Generic Party: loud argument about politics. He’s roped in the general and is now trying to hook Pierre.  All in all, Berg is pleased. His party is exactly like every other party he’s ever been to. Success.