Anna Karenina (tr. Constance Garnett)
by Leo Tolstoy
Hypertext Meanings and Commentaries
from the Encyclopedia of the Self
by Mark Zimmerman
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Alexey Alexandrovitch knit his brows at Betsy's name.

"Oh, I'm not going to separate the inseparables," he said in his
usual bantering tone. "I'm going with Mihail Vassilievitch. I'm
ordered exercise by the doctors too. I'll walk, and fancy myself
at the springs again."

"There's no hurry," said Anna. "Would you like tea?"

She rang.

"Bring in tea, and tell Seryozha that Alexey Alexandrovitch is
here. Well, tell me, how have you been? Mihail Vassilievitch,
you've not been to see me before. Look how lovely it is out on
the terrace," she said, turning first to one and then to the
other.

She spoke very simply and naturally, but too much and too fast.
She was the more aware of this from noticing in the inquisitive
look Mihail Vassilievitch turned on her that he was, as it were,
keeping watch on her.

Mihail Vassilievitch promptly went out on the terrace.

She sat down beside her husband.

"You don't look quite well," she said.

"Yes," he said; "the doctor's been with me to-day and wasted an
hour of my time. I feel that some one of our friends must have
sent him: my health's so precious, it seems."

"No; what did he say?"

She questioned him about his health and what he had been doing,
and tried to persuade him to take a rest and come out to her.

All this she said brightly, rapidly, and with a peculiar
brilliance in her eyes. But Alexey Alexandrovitch did not now
attach any special significance to this tone of hers. He heard
only her words and gave them only the direct sense they bore. And
he answered simply, though jestingly. There was nothing
remarkable in all this conversation, but never after could Anna
recall this brief scene without an agonizing pang of shame.

Seryozha came in preceded by his governess. If Alexey
Alexandrovitch had allowed himself to observe he would have
noticed the timid and bewildered eyes with which Seryozha glanced
first at his father and then at his mother. But he would not see
anything, and he did not see it.

"Ah, the young man! He's grown. Really, he's getting quite a man.
How are you, young man?"

And he gave his hand to the scared child. Seryozha had been shy
of his father before, and now, ever since Alexey Alexandrovitch
had taken to calling him young man, and since that insoluble
question had occurred to him whether Vronsky were a friend or a
foe, he avoided his father. He looked round towards his mother as
though seeking shelter. It was only with his mother that he was
at ease. Meanwhile, Alexey Alexandrovitch was holding his son by
the shoulder while he was speaking to the governess, and Seryozha
was so miserably uncomfortable that Anna saw he was on the point
of tears.

Anna, who had flushed a little the instant her son came in,
noticing that Seryozha was uncomfortable, got up hurriedly, took
Alexey Alexandrovitch's hand from her son's shoulder, and kissing
the boy, led him out onto the terrace, and quickly came back.

"It's time to start, though," said she, glancing at her watch.
"How is it Betsy doesn't come?

"Yes," said Alexey Alexandrovitch, and getting up, he folded his
hands and cracked his fingers. "I've come to bring you some
money, too, for nightingales, we know, can't live on fairy
tales," he said. "You want it, I expect?"

"No, I don't ...yes, I do," she said, not looking at him, and
crimsoning to the roots of her hair. "But you'll come back here
after the races, I suppose?"

"Oh, yes!" answered Alexey Alexandrovitch "And here's the glory
of Peterhof, Princess Tverskaya," he added, looking out of the
window at the elegant English carriage with the tiny seats placed
extremely high. "What elegance! Charming! Well, let us be
starting too, then."

Princess Tverskaya did not get out of her carriage, but her
groom, in high boots, a cape, and block hat, darted out at the
entrance.

"I'm going; good-bye!" said Anna, and kissing her son, she went
up to Alexey Alexandrovitch and held out her hand to him. "It was
ever so nice of you to come."

Alexey Alexandrovitch kissed her hand.

"Well, au revoir, then! You'll come back for some tea; that's
delightful!" she said, and went out, gay and radiant. But as soon
as she no longer saw him, she was aware of the spot on her hand
that his lips had touched, and she shuddered with repulsion.

Chapter 28

When Alexey Alexandrovitch reached the race-course, Anna was
already sitting in the pavilion beside Betsy, in that pavilion
where all the highest society had gathered. She caught sight of
her husband in the distance. Two men, her husband and her lover,
were the two centers of her existence, and unaided by her
external senses she was aware of their nearness. She was aware of
her husband approaching a long way off, and she could not help
following him in the surging crowd in the midst of which he was
moving. She watched his progress towards the pavilion, saw him
now responding condescendingly to an ingratiating bow, now
exchanging friendly, nonchalant greetings with his equals, now
assiduously trying to catch the eye of some great one of this
world, and taking off his big round hat that squeezed the tips of
his ears. All these ways of his she knew, and all were hateful to
her. "Nothing but ambition, nothing but the desire to get on,
that's all there is in his soul," she thought; "as for these
lofty ideals, love of culture, religion, they are only so many
tools for getting on."

From his glances towards the ladies' pavilion (he was staring
straight at her, but did not distinguish his wife in the sea of
muslin, ribbons, feathers, parasols and flowers) she saw that he
was looking for her, but she purposely avoided noticing him.

"Alexey Alexandrovitch!" Princess Betsy called to him; "I'm sure
you don't see your wife: here she is."

He smiled his chilly smile.

"There's so much splendor here that one's eyes are dazzled," he
said, and he went into the pavilion. He smiled to his wife as a
man should smile on meeting his wife after only just parting from
her, and greeted the princess and other acquaintances, giving to
each what was due-- that is to say, jesting with the ladies and
dealing out friendly greetings among the men. Below, near the
pavilion, was standing an adjutantgeneral of whom Alexey
Alexandrovitch had a high opinion, noted for his intelligence and
culture. Alexey Alexandrovitch entered into conversation with
him.

There was an interval between the races, and so nothing hindered
conversation. The adjutant-general expressed his disapproval of
races. Alexey Alexandrovitch replied defending them. Anna heard
his high, measured tones, not losing one word, and every word
struck her as false, and stabbed her ears with pain.

When the three-mile steeplechase was beginning, she bent forward
and gazed with fixed eyes at Vronsky as he went up to his horse
and mounted, and at the same time she heard that loathsome,
never-ceasing voice of her husband. She was in an agony of terror
for Vronsky, but a still greater agony was the never-ceasing, as
it seemed to her, stream of her husband's shrill voice with its
familiar intonations.

"I'm a wicked woman, a lost woman," she thought; "but I don't
like lying, I can't endure falsehood, while as for him (her
husband) it's the breath of his life--falsehood. He knows all
about it, he sees it all; what does he care if he can talk so
calmly? If he were to kill me, if he were to kill Vronsky, I
might respect him. No, all he wants is falsehood and propriety,"
Anna said to herself, not considering exactly what it was she
wanted of her husband, and how she would have liked to see him
behave. She did not understand either that Alexey
Alexandrovitch's peculiar loquacity that day, so exasperating to
her, was merely the expression of his inward distress and
uneasiness. As a child that has been hurt skips about, putting
all his muscles into movement to drown the pain, in the same way
Alexey Alexandrovitch needed mental exercise to drown the
thoughts of his wife that in her presence and in Vronsky's, and
with the continual iteration of his name, would force themselves
on his attention. And it was as natural for him to talk well and
cleverly, as it is natural for a child to skip about. He was
saying:

"Danger in the races of officers, of cavalry men, is an essential
element in the race. If England can point to the most brilliant
feats of cavalry in military history, it is simply owing to the
fact that she has historically developed this force both in
beasts and in men. Sport has, in my opinion, a great value, and
as is always the case, we see nothing but what is most
superficial."

"It's not superficial," said Princess Tverskaya. "One of the
officers, they say, has broken two ribs."

Alexey Alexandrovitch smiled his smile, which uncovered his
teeth, but revealed nothing more.

"We'll admit, princess, that that's not superficial," he said,
"but internal. But that's not the point," and he turned again to
the general with whom he was talking seriously; "we mustn't
forget that those who are taking part in the race are military
men, who have chosen that career, and one must allow that every
calling has its disagreeable side. It forms an integral part of
the duties of an officer. Low sports, such as prizefighting or
Spanish bull-fights, are a sign of barbarity. But specialized
trials of skill are a sign of development."

"No, I shan't come another time; it's too upsetting," said
Princess

Betsy. "Isn't it, Anna?"

"It is upsetting, but one can't tear oneself away," said another
lady. "If I'd been a Roman woman I should never have missed a
single circus."

Anna said nothing, and keeping her opera-glass up, gazed always
at the same spot.

At that moment a tall general walked through the pavilion,.
Breaking off what he was saying, Alexey Alexandrovitch got up
hurriedly, though with dignity, and bowed low to the general.

"You're not racing?" the officer asked, chaffing him.

"My race is a harder one," Alexey Alexandrovitch responded
deferentially.

And though the answer meant nothing, the general looked as though
he had heard a witty remark from a witty man, and fully relished
la pointe de la sauce.

"There are two aspects," Alexey Alexandrovitch resumed: "those
who take part and those who look on; and love for such spectacles
is an unmistakable proof of a low degree of development in the
spectator, I admit, but . . ."

"Princess, bets!" sounded Stepan Arkadyevitch's voice from
below. addressing Betsy. "Who's your favorite?"

"Anna and I are for Kuzovlev," replied Betsy.

"I'm for Vronsky. A pair of gloves?"

"Done!"

"But it is a pretty sight, isn't it?"

Alexey Alexandrovitch paused while there was talking about him,
but he began again directly.

"I admit that manly sports do not . . ." he was continuing.

But at that moment the racers started, and all conversation
ceased. Alexey Alexandrovitch too was silent, and every one stood
up and turned towards the stream. Alexey Alexandrovitch took no
interest in the race, and so he did not watch the racers, but
fell listlessly to scanning the spectators with his weary eyes.
His eyes rested upon Anna.

Her face was white and set. She was obviously seeing nothing and
no one but one man. Her hand had convulsively clutched her fan,
and she held her breath. He looked at her and hastily turned
away, scrutinizing other faces.

"But here's this lady too, and others very much moved as well;
it's very natural," Alexey Alexandrovitch told himself. He tried
not to look at her, but unconsciously his eyes were drawn to her.
He examined that face again, trying not to read what was so
plainly written on it, and against his own will, with horror read
on it what he did not want to know.

The first fall--Kuzovlev's, at the stream--agitated every one,
but Alexey Alexandrovitch saw distinctly on Anna's pale,
triumphant face that the man she was watching had not fallen.
When, after Mahotin and Vronsky had cleared the worst barrier,
the next officer had been thrown straight on his head at it and
fatally injured, and a shudder of horror passed over the whole
public, Alexey Alexandrovitch saw that Anna did not even notice
it, and had some difficulty in realizing what they were talking
of about her. But more and more often, and with greater
persistence, he watched her. Anna, wholly engrossed as she was
with the race, became aware of her husband's cold eyes fixed
upon.her from one side.

She glanced round for an instant, looked inquiringly at him, and
with a slight frown turned away again.

"Ah, I don't care!" she seemed to say to him, and she did not
once glance at him again.

The race was an unlucky one, and of the seventeen officers who
rode in it more than half were thrown and hurt. Towards the end
of the race every one was in a state of agitation, which was
intensified by the fact that the Tsar was displeased.

Chapter 29

Every one was loudly expressing disapprobation, every one was
repeating a phrase some one had uttered--"The lions and
gladiators will be the next thing," and every one was feeling
horrified; so that when Vronsky fell to the ground, and Anna
moaned aloud, there was nothing very out of the way in it. But
afterwards a change came over Anna's face which really was beyond
decorum. She utterly lost her head. She began fluttering like a
caged bird, at one moment would have got up and moved away, at
the next turned to Betsy.

"Let us go, let us go!" she said.

But Betsy did not hear her. She was bending down, talking to a
general who had come up to her.

Alexey Alexandrovitch went up to Anna and courteously offered her
his arm.

"Let us go, if you like," he said in French, but Anna was
listening to the general and did not notice her husband.

"He's broken his leg too, so they say," the general was saying.
"This is beyond everything."

Without answering her husband, Anna lifted her opera-glass and
gazed towards the place where Vronsky had fallen; but it was so
far off,

and there was such a crowd of people about it, that she could
make out nothing. She laid down the opera-glass, and would have
moved away, but at that moment an officer galloped up and made
some announcement to the Tsar. Anna craned forward, listening.

"Stiva! Stiva!" she cried to her brother.

But her brother did not hear her. Again she would have moved
away.

"Once more I offer you my arm if you want to be going," said
Alexey Alexandrovitch, reaching towards her hand.

She drew back from him with aversion, and without looking in his
face answered:

"No, no, let me be, I'll stay."

She saw now that from the place of Vronsky's accident an officer
was running across the course towards the pavilion. Betsy waved
her handkerchief to him. The officer brought the news that the
rider was not killed, but the horse had broken its back.

On hearing this Anna sat down hurriedly, and hid her face in her
fan. Alexey Alexandrovitch saw that she was weeping, and could
not control her tears, nor even the sobs that were shaking her
bosom. Alexey Alexandrovitch stood so as to screen her, giving
her time to recover herself.

"For the third time I offer you my arm," he said to her after a
little time, turning to her. Anna gazed at him and did not know
what to say. Princess Betsy came to her rescue.

"No, Alexey Alexandrovitch; I brought Anna and I promised to take
her home," put in Betsy.

"Excuse me, princess," he said, smiling courteously but looking
her very firmly in the face, "but I see that Anna's not very
well, and I wish her to come home with me."

Anna looked about her in a frightened way, got up submissively,
and laid her hand on her husband's arm.

"I'll send to him and find out, and let you know," Betsy
whispered to her.

As they left the pavilion, Alexey Alexandrovitch, as always,
talked to those he met, and Anna had, as always, to talk and
answer; but she was utterly beside herself, and moved hanging on
her husband's arm as though in a dream.

"Is he killed or not? Is it truer Will he come or not? Shall I
see him to- day?" she was thinking.

She took her seat in her husband's carriage in silence, and in
silence drove out of the crowd of carriages. In spite of all he
had seen, Alexey Alexandrovitch still did not allow himself to
consider his wife's real condition. He merely saw the outward
symptoms. He saw that she was behaving unbecomingly, and
considered it his duty to tell her so. But it was very difficult
for him not to say more, to tell her nothing but that. He opened
his mouth to tell her she had behaved unbecomingly, but he could
not help saying something utterly different.

"What an inclination we all have, though, for these cruel
spectacles," he said. "I observe . . ."

"Eh? I don't understand," said Anna contemptuously.

He was offended, and at once began to say what he had meant to
say.

"I am obliged to tell you," he began.

"So now we are to have it out," she thought, and she felt
frightened.

"I am obliged to tell you that your behavior has been unbecoming
to- day," he said to her in French.

"In what way has my behavior been unbecoming?" she said aloud,
turning her head swiftly and looking him straight in the face,
not with the bright expression that seemed covering something,
but with a look of determination, under which she concealed with
difficulty the dismay she was feeling.

"Mind," he said, pointing to the open window opposite the
coachman.

He got up and pulled up the window.

"What did you consider unbecoming?" she repeated.

"The despair you were unable to conceal at the accident to one of
the riders."

He waited for her to answer, but she was silent, looking straight
before her.

"I have already begged you so to conduct yourself in society that
even malicious tongues can find nothing to say against you. There
was a time when I spoke of your inward attitude, but I am not
speaking of that now. Now I speak only of your external attitude.
You have behaved improperly, and I would wish it not to occur
again."

She did not hear half of what he was saying; she felt
panic-stricken before him, and was thinking whether it was true
that Vronsky was not killed. Was it of him they were speaking
when they said the rider was unhurt, but the horse had broken its
back? She merely smiled with a pretense of irony when he
finished, and made no reply, because she had not heard what he
said. Alexey Alexandrovitch had begun to speak boldly, but as he
realized plainly what he was speaking of, the dismay she was
feeling infected him too. He saw the smile, and a strange
misapprehension came over him.

"She is smiling at my suspicions. Yes, she will tell me directly
what she told me before; that there is no foundation for my
suspicions, that it's absurd."

At that moment, when the revelation of everything was hanging
over him, there was nothing he expected so much as that she would
answer mockingly as before that his suspicions were absurd and
utterly groundless. So terrible to him was that he knew that now
he was ready to believe anything. But the expression of her face,
scared and gloomy, did not now promise even deception.

"Possibly I was mistaken," said he. "If so, I beg your pardon."

"No, you were not mistaken," she said deliberately, looking
desperately into his cold face. "You were not mistaken. I was,
and I could not help being in despair. I hear you, but I am
thinking of him. I love him, I am his mistress; I can't bear you;
I'm afraid of you, and I hate you.... You can do what you like to
me."

And dropping back into the corner of the carriage, she broke into
sobs, hiding her face in her hands. Alexey Alexandrovitch did not
stir, and kept looking straight before him. But his whole face
suddenly bore the solemn rigidity of the dead, and his expression
did not change during the whole time of the drive home On
reaching the house he turned his head to her, still with the same
expression.

"Very well! But I expect a strict observance of the external
forms of propriety till such time"--his voice shook--"as I may
take measures to secure my honor and communicate them to you."

He got out first and helped her to get out. Before the servants
he pressed her hand, took his seat in the carriage, and drove
back to Petersburg. Immediately afterwards a footman came from
Princess Betsy and brought Anna a note.

"I sent to Alexey to find out how he is, and he writes me he is
quite well and unhurt, but in despair."

"So he will be here," she thought. "What a good thing I told him
all!"

She glanced at her watch. She had still three hours to wait, and
the memories of their last meeting set her blood in flame.

"My God, how light it is! It's dreadful, but I do love to see his
face, and I do love this fantastic light.... My husband! Oh! yes
... Well, thank God! everything's over with him."

Chapter 30

In the little German watering-place to which the Shtcherbatskys
had betaken themselves, as in all places indeed where people are
gathered together, the usual process, as it were, of the
crystallization of society went on, assigning to each member of
that society a definite and unalterable place. Just as the
particle of water in frost, definitely and unalterably, takes the
special form of the crystal of snow, so each new person that
arrived at the springs was at once placed in his special place.

First Shtcherbatsky, sammt Gemahlin und Tochter, by the
apartments they took, and from their name and from the friends
they made, were immediately crystallized into a definite place
marked out for them.

There was visiting the watering-place that year a real German
Furstin, in consequence of which the crystallizing process went
on more vigorously than ever. Princess Shtcherbatskaya wished,
above everything, to present her daughter to this German
princess, and the day after their arrival she duly performed this
nte. Kitty made a low and graceful curtsey in the very simple,
that is to say, very elegant frock that had been ordered her from
Paris. The German princess said, "I hope the roses will soon come
back to this pretty little face," and for the Shtcherbatskys
certain definite lines of existence were at once laid down from
which there was no departing. The Shtcherbatskys made the
acquaintance too of the family of an English Lady Somebody, and
of a German countess and her son, wounded in the last war, and of
a learned Swede, and of M. Canut and his sister. But yet
inevitably the Shtcherbatskys were thrown most into the society
of a Moscow lady, Marya Yevgenyevna Rtishtcheva and her daughter,
whom Kitty disliked, because she had fallen ill, like herself,
over a love affair, and a Moscow colonel, whom Kitty had known
from childhood, and always seen in uniform and epaulets, and who
now, with his little eyes and his open neck and flowered cravat,
was uncommonly ridiculous and tedious, because there was no
getting rid of him. When all this was so firmly established,
Kitty began to be very much bored, especially as the prince went
away to Carlsbad and she was left alone with her mother. She took
no interest in the people she knew, feeling that nothing fresh
would come of them. Her chief mental interest in the
watering-place consisted in watching and making theories about
the people she did not know. It was characteristic of Kitty that
she always imagined everything in people in the most favorable
light possible, especially so in those she did not know. And now
as she made surmises as to who people were, what were their
relations to one another, and what they were like, Kitty endowed
them with the most marvelous and noble characters, and found
confirmation of her idea in her observations.

Of these people the one that attracted her most was a Russian
girl who had come to the watering-place with an invalid Russian
lady, Madame Stahl, as every one called her. Madame Stahl
belonged to the highest society, but she was so ill that she
could not walk, and only on exceptionally fine days made her
appearance at the springs in an invalid carriage. But it was not
so much from ill-health as from pride--so Princess
Shtcherbatskaya interpreted it--that Madame Stahl had not made
the acquaintance of any one among the Russians there. The Russian
girl looked after Madame Stahl, and besides that, she was, as
Kitty observed, on friendly terms with all the invalids who were
seriously ill, and there were many of them at the springs, and
looked after them in the most natural way. This Russian girl was
not, as Kitty gathered, related to Madame Stahl, nor was she a
paid attendant. Madame Stahl called her Varenka, and other people
called her "Mademoiselle Varenka." Apart from the interest Kitty
took in this girl's relations with Madame Stahl and with other
unknown persons, Kitty, as often happened, felt an inexplicable
attraction to Mademoiselle Varenka, and was aware when their eyes
met that she too liked her.

Of Mademoiselle Varenka one would not say that she had passed her
first youth, but she was, as it were, a creature without youth;
she might have been taken for nineteen or for thirty. If her
features were criticized separately, she was handsome rather than
plain, in spite of the sickly hue of her face. She would have
been a good figure, too, if it had not been for her extreme
thinness and the size of her head, which was too large for her
medium height. But she was not likely to be attractive to men.
She was like a fine flower, already past its bloom and without
fragrance, though the petals were still unwithered. Moreover, she
would have been unattractive to men also from the lack of just
what Kitty had too much of--of the suppressed fire of vitality,
and the consciousness of her own attractiveness.

She always seemed absorbed in work about which there could be no
doubt, and so it seemed she could not take interest in anything
outside it. It was just this contrast with her own position that
was for Kitty the great attraction of Mademoiselle Varenka. Kitty
felt that in her, in her manner of life, she would find an
example of what she was now so painfully seeking: interest in
life, a dignity in life--apart from the worldly relations of
girls with men, which so revolted Kitty, and appeared to her now
as a shameful hawking about of goods in search of a purchaser.
The more attentively Kitty watched her unknown friend, the more
convinced she was this girl was the perfect creature she fancied
her, and the more eagerly she wished to make her acquaintance.

The two girls used to meet several times a day, and every time
they met, Kitty's eyes said: "Who are you? What are you? Are you
really the exquisite creature I imagine you to be? But for
goodness' sake don't suppose," her eyes added, "that I would
force my acquaintance on you, I simply admire you and like you."
"I like you too, and you're very, very sweet. And I should like
you better still, if I had time," answered the eyes of the
unknown girl. Kitty saw indeed, that she was always busy. Either
she was taking the children of a Russian family home from the
springs, or fetching a shawl for a sick lady, and wrapping her up
in it, or trying to interest an irritable invalid, or selecting
and buying cakes for tea for some one.

Soon after the arrival of the Shtcherbatskys there appeared in
the morning crowd at the springs two persons who attracted
universal and unfavorable attention. These were a tall man with a
stooping figure, and huge hands, in an old coat too short for
him, with black, simple, and yet terrible eyes, and a pockmarked,
kind-looking woman, very badly and tastelessly dressed.
Recognizing these persons as Russians, Kitty had already in her
imagination begun constructing a delightful and touching romance
about them. But the princess, having ascertained from the
visitors' list that this was Nikolay Levin and Marya Nikolaevna,
explained to Kitty what a bad man this Levin was, and all her
fancies about these two people vanished. Not so much from what
her mother told her, as from the fact that it was Konstantin's
brother, this pair suddenly seemed to Kitty intensely unpleasant.
This Levin, with his continual twitching of his head, aroused in
her now an irrepressible feeling of disgust.

It seemed to her that his big, terrible eyes, which persistently
pursued her, expressed a feeling of hatred and contempt, and she
tried to avoid meeting him.

Chapter 31

It was a wet day; it had been raining all the morning, and the
invalids, with their parasols, had flocked into the arcades.

Kitty was walking there with her mother and the Moscow colonel,
smart and jaunty in his European coat, bought ready-made at
Frankfort. They were walking on one side of the arcade, trying to
avoid Levin, who was walking on the other side. Varenka, in her
dark dress, in a black hat with a turndown brim, was walking up
and down the whole length of the arcade with a blind Frenchwoman,
and, every time she met Kitty, they exchanged friendly glances.

"Mamma, couldn't I speak to her?" said Kitty, watching her
unknown friend, and noticing that she was going up to the spring,
and that they might come there together.

"Oh, if you want to so much, I'll find out about her first and
make her acquaintance myself," answered her mother. "What do you
see in her out of the way? A companion, she must be. If you like,
I'll make acquaintance with Madame Stahl; I used to know her
belle-seur," added the princess, lifting her head haughtily.

Kitty knew that the princess was offended that Madame Stahl had
seemed to avoid making her acquaintance. Kitty did not insist.

"How wonderfully sweet she is!" she said, gazing at Varenka just
as she handed a glass to the Frenchwoman. "Look how natural and
sweet it all is."

"It's so funny to see your engouements," said the princess. "No,
we'd better go back," she added, noticing Levin coming towards
them with his companion and a German doctor, to whom he was
talking very noisily and angrily.

They turned to go back, when suddenly they heard, not noisy talk,
but shouting. Levin, stopping short, was shouting at the doctor,
and the doctor, too, was excited. A crowd gathered about them.
The princess and Kitty beat a hasty retreat, while the colonel
joined the crowd to find out what was the matter.

A few minutes later the colonel overtook them.

"What was it?" inquired the princess.

"Scandalous and disgraceful!" answered the colonel. "The one
thing to be dreaded is meeting Russians abroad. That tall
gentleman was abusing the doctor, flinging all sorts of insults
at him because he wasn't treating him quite as he liked, and he
began waving his stick at him. It's simply a scandal!"

"Oh, how unpleasant!" said the princess. "Well, and how did it
end?"

"Luckily at that point that ...the one in the mushroom hat. .
. intervened. A Russian lady, I think she is," said the colonel.

"Mademoiselle Varenka?" asked Kitty.

"Yes, yes. She came to the rescue before any one; she took the
man by the arm and led him away."

"There, mamma," said Kitty; "you wonder that I'm enthusiastic
about her."

The next day, as she watched her unknown friend, Kitty noticed
that Mademoiselle Varenka was already on the same terms with
Levin and his companion as with her other proteges. She went up
to them, entered into conversation with them, and served as
interpreter for the woman, who could not speak any foreign
language.

Kitty began to entreat her mother still more urgently to let her
make friends with Varenka. And, disagreeable as it was to the
princess to seem to take the first step in wishing to make the
acquaintance of Madame Stahl,ùwho thought fit to give herself
airs, she made inquiries about Varenka, and, having ascertained
particulars about her tending to prove that there could be no
harm though little good in the acquaintance, she herself
approached Varenka and made acquaintance with her.

Choosing a time when her daughter had gone to the spring, while
Varenka had stopped outside the baker's, the princess went up to
her.

"Allow me to make your acquaintance," she said, with her
dignified smile. "My daughter has lost her heart to you," she
said. "Possibly you do not know me. I am . . ."

"That feeling is more than reciprocal, princess," Varenka
answered hurriedly.

"What a good deed you did yesterday to our poor compatriot!" said
the princess.

Varenka flushed a little. "I don't remember. I don't think I did
anything," she said.

"Why, you saved that Levin from disagreeable consequences."

"Yes, sa compagne called me, and I tried to pacify him, he's very
ill and was dissatisfied with the doctor. I'm used to looking
after such invalids."'

"Yes, I've heard you live at Mentone with your aunt I
think Madame Stahl: I used to know her belle-seur."

"No, she's not my aunt. I call her mamma, but I am not related to
her; I was brought up by her," answered Varenka, flushing a
little again.

This was so simply said, and so sweet was the truthful and candid
expression of her face, that the princess saw why Kitty had taken
such a fancy to Varenka.

"Well, and what's this Levin going to do?" asked the princess.

"He's gomg away," answered Varenka.

At that instant Kitty came up from the spring beaming with
delight that her mother had become acquainted with her unknown
friend.

"Well, see, Kitty, your intense desire to make friends with
Mademoiselle . . ."

"Varenka," Varenka put in smiling, "that's what every one calls
me."

Kitty blushed with pleasure, and slowly, without speaking,
pressed her new friend's hand, which did not respond to her
pressure, but lay mot~onless m her hand. The hand did not respond
to her pressure, but the face of Mademoiselle Varenka glowed with
a soft, glad, though rather mournful smile, that showed large but
handsome teeth.

"I have long wished for this too," she said.

"But you are so busy."

"Oh, no, I'm not at all busy," answered Varenka, but at that
moment she had to leave her new friends because two little
Russian girls, children of an invalid, ran up to her.

"Varenka, mamma's calling!" they cried. And Varenka went after
them.

Chapter 32

The particulars which the princess had learned in regard to
Varenka's past and her relations with Madame Stahl were as
follows:

Madame Stahl, of whom some people said that she had worried her
husband out of his life, while others said it was he who had made
her wretched by his immoral behavior, had always been a woman of
weak health and enthusiastic temperament. When, after her
separation from her husband, she gave birth to her only child,
the child had died almost immediately, and the family of Madame
Stahl, knowing her sensibility, and fearing the news would kill
her, had substituted another child, a baby born the same night
and in the same house in Petersburg, the daughter of the chief
cook of the Imperial Household. This was Varenka. Madame Stahl
learned later on that Varenka was not her own child, but she went
on bringing her up, especially as very soon afterwards Varenka
had not a relation of her own living. Madame Stahl had now been
living more than ten years continuously abroad, in the south,
never leaving her couch. And some people said that Madame Stahl
had made her social position as a philanthropic, highly religious
woman; other people said she really was at heart the highly
ethical being, living for nothing but the good of her
fellow-creatures, which she represented herself to be. No one
knew what her faith was--Catholic, Protestant, or Orthodox. But
one fact was indubitable--she was in amicable relations with the
highest dignitaries of all the churches and sects.

Varenka lived with her all the while abroad, and every one who
knew Madame Stahl knew and liked Mademoiselle Varenka, as every
one called her.

Having learned all these facts, the princess found nothing to
object to in her daughter's intimacy with Varenka, more
especially as V.arenka's breeding and education were of the
best--she spoke French and English extremely well--and what was
of the most weight, brought a message from Madame Stahl
expressing her regret that she was prevented by her ill-health
from making the acquaintance of the princess.

After getting to know Varenka, Kitty became more and more
fascinated by her friend, and every day she discovered new
virtues in her.

The princess, hearing that Varenka had a good voice, asked her to
come and sing to them in the evening.

"Kitty plays, and we have a piano, not a good one, it's true, but
you will give us so much pleasure?" said the princess with her
affected smile, which Kitty disliked particularly just then,
because she noticed that Varenka had no inclination to sing.
Varenka came, however, in the evening and brought a roll of music
with her. The princess had invited Marya Yevgenyevna and her
daughter and the colonel.

Varenka seemed quite unaffected by there being persons present
she did not know, and she went directly to the piano. She could
not accompany herself, but she could sing music at sight very
well. Kitty, who played well, accompanied her.

"You have an extraordinary talent," the princess said to her
after Varenka had sung the first song extremely well.

Marya Yevgenyevna and her daughter expressed their thanks and
admiration.

"Look," said the colonel, looking out of the window, "what an
audience has collected to listen to you." There actually was
quite a considerable crowd under the windows.

"I am very glad it gives you pleasure," Varenka answered simply.

Kitty looked with pride at her friend. She was enchanted by her
talent, and her voice and her face, but most of all by her
manner, by the way Varenka obviously thought nothing of her
singing and was quite unmoved by their praises. She seemed only
to be asking: "Am I to sing again, or is that enough?"

"If it had been I," thought Kitty, "how proud I should have been,
How delighted I should have been to see that crowd under the
windows) But she's utterly unmoved by it. Her only motive is to
avoid refusing and to please mamma. What is there in her? What is
it gives her the power to look down on everything, to be calm
independently of everything? How I should like to know it and to
learn it of her!" thought Kitty, gazing into her serene face. The
princess asked Varenka to sing again, and Varenka sang another
song, also smoothly, distinctly, and well, standing erect at the
piano and beating time on it with her thin, dark-skinned hand.

The next song in the book was an Italian one. Kitty played the
opening bars, and looked round at Varenka.

"Let's skip that," said Varenka, flushing a little. Kitty let her
eyes rest on Varenka's face, with a look of dismay and inquiry.

"Very well, the next one," she said hurriedly, turning over the
pages, and at once feeling that there was something connected
with the song.

"No," answered Varenka with a smile, laying her hand on the
music, "no, let's have that one." And she sang it just as
quietly, as coolly, and as well as the others.

When she had finished, they all thanked her again, and went off
to tea. Kitty and Varenka went out into the little garden that
adjoined the house.

"Am I right, that you have some reminiscences connected with that
songs" said Kitty. "Don't tell me," she added hastily, "only say
if I'm right."

"No, why not? I'll tell you simply," said Varenka, and, without
waiting for a reply, she went on: "Yes, it brings up memories,
once painful ones. I cared for some one once, and I used to sing
him that song."

Kitty with big, wide-open eyes gazed silently, sympathetically at
Varenka.

"I cared for him, and he cared for me; but his mother did not
wish it, and he married another girl. He's living now not far
from us, and I see him sometimes. You didn't think I had a
love-story too," she said, and there was a faint gleam in her
handsome face of that fire which Kitty felt must once have glowed
all over her.

"I didn't think so? Why, if I were a man, I could never care for
any one else after knowing you. Only I can't understand how he
could, to please his mother, forget you and make you unhappy; he
had no heart."

"Oh, no, he's a very good man, and I'm not unhappy; quite the
contrary, I'm very happy. Well, so we shan't be singing any more
now," she added, turning towards the house.

"How good you are! how good you are!" cried Kitty, and stopping
her, she kissed her. "If I could only be even a little like you!"

"Why should you be like any one? You're nice as you are," said
Varenka, smiling her gentle, weary smile.

"No, I'm not nice at all. Come, tell me ...Stop a minute,
let's sit down," said Kitty, making her sit down again beside
her. "Tell me, isn't it humiliating to think that a man has
disdained your love, that he hasn't cared for it? . . ."

"But he didn't disdain it; I believe he cared for me, but he was
a dutiful son . . ."

"Yes, but if it hadn't been on account of his mother, if it had
been his own doing? . . ." said Kitty, feeling she was giving
away her secret, and that her face, burning with the flush of
shame, had betrayed her already.

"In that case he would have done wrong, and I should not have
regretted him," answered Varenka, evidently realizing that they
were now talking not of her, but of Kitty.

"But the humiliation," said Kitty, "the humiliation one can never
forget, can never forget," she said, remembering her look at the
last ball during the pause in the music.

"Where is the humiliation? Why, you did nothing wrong?"

"Worse than wrong--shameful."

Varenka shook her head and laid her hand on Kitty's hand.

"Why, what is there shameful?" she said. "You didn't tell a man,
who didn't care for you, that you loved him, did you?"

"Of course not, I never said a word, but he knew it. No, no,
there are looks, there are ways; I can't forget it, if I live a
hundred years."

"Why so? I don't understand. The whole point is whether you love
him now or not," said Varenka, who called everything by its name.

"I hate him; I can't forgive myself."

"Why, what for?"

"The shame, the humiliation!"

"Oh! if every one were as sensitive as you are!" said Varenka.
"There isn't a girl who hasn't been through the same. And it's
all so unimportant."

"Why, what is important?" said Kitty, looking into her face with
inquisitive wonder.

"Oh, there's so much that's important," said Varenka, smiling.

"Why, what?"

"Oh, so much that's more important," answered Varenka, not
knowing what to say. But at that instant they heard the
princess's voice from the window. "Kitty, it's cold! Either get a
shawl, or come indoors."

"It really is time to go in!" said Varenka, getting up. "I have
to go on to Madame Berthe's; she asked me to."

Kitty held her by the hand, and with passionate curiosity and
entreaty her eyes asked her: "What is it, what is this of such
importance that gives you such tranquillity? You know, tell me!"
But Varenka did not even know what Kitty's eyes were asking her.
She merely thought that she had to go to see Madame Berthe too
that evening, and to make haste home in time for maman's tea at
twelve o'clock. She went indoors, collected her music, and saying
good-bye to every one, was about to go.

"Allow me to see you home," said the colonel.

"Yes, how can you go alone at night like this?" chimed in the
princess. "Anyway, I'll send Parasha."

Kitty saw that Varenka could hardly restrain a smile at the idea
that she needed an escort.

"No, I always go about alone and nothing ever happens to me," she
said, taking her hat. And kissing Kitty once more, without saying
what was important, she stepped out courageously with the music
under her arm and vanished into the twilight of the summer night,
bearing away with her her secret of what was important and what
gave her the calm and dignity so much to be envied.

Chapter 33

Kitty made the acquaintance of Madame Stahl too, and this
acquaintance, together with her friendship with Varenka, did not
merely exercise a great influence on her, it also comforted her
in her mental distress. She found this comfort through a
completely new world being opened to her by means of this
acquaintance, a world having nothing in common with her past, an
exalted, noble world, from the height of which she could
contemplate her past calmly. It was revealed to her that besides
the instinctive life to which Kitty had given herself up hitherto
there was a spiritual life. This life was disclosed in religion,
but a religion having nothing in common with that one which Kitty
had known from childhood, and which found expression in litanies
and all-night services at the Widow's Home, where one might meet
one's friends, and in learning by heart Slavonic texts with the
priest. This was a lofty, mysterious religion connected with a
whole series of noble thoughts and feelings, which one could do
more than merely believe because one was told to, which one could
love.

Kitty found all this out not from words. Madame Stahl talked to
Kitty as to a charming child that one looks on with pleasure as
on the memory of one's youth, and only once she said in passing
that in all human sorrows nothing gives comfort but love and
faith, and that in the sight of Chnst's compassion for us no
sorrow is trifling--and immediately talked of other things. But
in every gesture of Madame Stahl, in every word, in every
heavenly--as Kitty called it--look, and above all in the whole
story of her life, which she heard from Varenka, Kitty recognized
that something "that was important," of which, till then, she had
known nothing.

Yet, elevated as Madame Stahl's character was, touching as was
her story, and exalted and moving as was her speech, Kitty could
not help detecting in her some traits which perplexed her. She
noticed that when questioning her about her family, Madame Stahl
had smiled contemptuously, which was not in accord with Christian
meekness. She noticed, too, that when she had found a Catholic
priest with her, Madame Stahl had studiously kept her face in the
shadow of the lamp-shade and had smiled in a peculiar way.
Trivial as these two observations were, they perplexed her, and
she had her doubts as to Madame Stahl. But on the other hand
Varenka, alone in the world, without friends or relations, with a
melancholy disappointment in the past, desiring nothing,
regretting nothing, was just that perfection of which Kitty dared
hardly dream. InVarenka she realized that one has but to forget
oneself and love others, and one will be calm, happy, and noble.
And that was what Kitty longed to be. Seeing now clearly what was
the most important, Kitty was not satisfied with being
enthusiastic over it; she at once gave herself up with her whole
soul to the new life that was opening to her. From Varenka's
accounts of the doings of Madame Stahl and other people whom she
mentioned, Kitty had already constructed the plan of her own
future life. She would, like Madame Stahl's niece, Aline, of whom
Varenka had talked to her a great deal, seek out those who were
in trouble, wherever she might be living, help them as far as she
could, give them the Gospel, read the Gospel to the sick, the
criminals, to the dying. The idea of reading the Gospel to
criminals, as Aline did, particularly fascinated Kitty. But all
these were secret dreams, of which Kitty did not talk either to
her mother or to Varenka.

While awaiting the time for carrying out her plans on a large
scale, however, Kitty, even then at the springs, where there were
so many people ill and unhappy, readily found a chance for
practicing her new principles in imitation of Varenka.

At first the princess noticed nothing but that Kitty was much
under the influence of her engouement, as she called it, for
Madame Stahl, and still more for Varenka. She saw that Kitty did
not merely imitate Varenka in her conduct, but unconsciously
imitated her in her manner of walking, of talking, of blinking
her eyes. But later on the princess noticed that, apart from this
adoration, some kind of serious spiritual change was taking place
in her daughter.

The princess saw that in the evenings Kitty read a French
testament that Madame Stahl had given her--a thing she had never
done before; that she avoided society acquaintances and
associated with the sick people who were under Varenka's
protection, and especially one poor family, that of a sick
painter, Petrov. Kitty was unmistakably proud of playing the part
of a sister of mercy in that family. All this was well enough,
and the princess had nothing to say against it, especially as
Petrov's wife was a perfectly nice sort of woman, and that the
German princess, noticing Kitty's devotion, praised her, calling
her an angel of consolation. All this would have been very well,
if there had been no exaggeration. But the princess saw that her
daughter was rushing into extremes, and so indeed she told her.

"Il ne faut jamais rien outrer," she said to her.

Her daughter made her no reply, only in her heart she thought
that one could not talk about exaggeration where Christianity was
concerned. What exaggeration could there be in the practice of a
doctrine wherein one was bidden to turn the other cheek when one
was smitten, and give one's cloak if one's coat were taken? But
the princess disliked this exaggeration, and disliked even more
the fact that she felt her daughter did not care to show her all
her heart. Kitty did in fact conceal her new views and feelings
from her mother. She concealed them not because she did not
respect or did not love her mother, but simply because she was
her mother. She would have revealed them to any one sooner than
to her mother.

"How is it Anna Pavlovna's not been to see us for so long?" the
princess said one day of Madame Petrova. "I've asked her, but she
seems put out about something."

"No, I've not noticed it, maman," said Kitty, flushing hotly.

"Is it long since you went to see them?"

"We're meaning to make an expedition to the mountains to-morrow,"
answered Kitty,

"Well, you can go," answered the princess, gazing at her
daughter's embarrassed face and trying to guess the cause of her
embarrassment.

That day Varenka came to dinner and told them that Anna Pavlovna
had changed her mind and given up the expedition for the morrow.
And the princess noticed again that Kitty reddened.

"Kitty, haven't you had some misunderstanding with the Petrovs?"
said the princess, when they were left alone. "Why has she given
up sending the children and coming to see us?"

Kitty answered that nothing had happened between them, and that
she could not tell why Anna Pavlovna seemed displeased with her.
Kitty answered perfectly truly. She did not know the reason Anna
Pavlovna had changed to her, but she guessed it. She guessed at
something which she could not tell her mother, which she did not
put into words to herself. It was one of those things which one
knows but which one can never speak of even to oneself so
terrible and shameful would it be to be mistaken.

Again and again she went over in her memory all her relations
with the family. She remembered the simple delight expressed on
the round, good- humored face of Anna Pavlovna at their meetings;
she remembered their secret confabulations about the invalid,
their plots to draw him away from the work which was forbidden
him, and to get him outof-doors; the devotion of the youngest
boy, who used to call her "my Kitty," and would not go to bed
without her. How nice it all wasl Then she recalled the thin,
terribly thin figure of Petrov, with his long neck, in his brown
coat, his scant, curly hair, his questioning blue eyes that were
so terrible to Kitty at first, and his painful attempts to seem
hearty and lively in her presence. She recalled the efforts she
had made at first to overcome the repugnance she felt for him, as
for all consumptive people, and the pains it had cost her to
think of things to say to him. She recalled the timid, softened
look with which he gazed at her, and the strange feeling of
compassion and awkwardness, and later of a sense of her own
goodness, which she had felt at it. How nice it all was! But all
that was at first. Now, a few days ago, everything was suddenly
spoiled. Anna Pavlovna had met Kitty with affected cordiality,
and had kept continual watch on her and on her husband.

Could that touching pleasure he showed when she came near be the
cause of Anna Pavlovna's coolness?

"Yes," she mused, "there was something unnatural about Anna
Pavlovna, and utterly unlike her good nature, when she said
angrily the day before yesterday: 'There, he will keep waiting
for you; he wouldn't drink his coffee without you, though he's
grown so dreadfully weak.' "

"Yes, perhaps, too, she didn't like it when I gave him the rug.
It was all so simple, but he took it so awkwardly, and was so
long thanking me, that I felt awkward too. And then that portrait
of me he did so well. And most of all that look of confusion and
tenderness! Yes, yes, that's it!" Kitty repeated to herself with
horror. "No, it can't be, it oughtn't to be! He's so much to be
pitied!" she said to herself directly after.

This doubt poisoned the charm of her new life.

Chapter 34

Before the end of the course of drinking the waters, Prince
Shtcherbatsky, who had gone on from Carlsbad to Baden and
Kissingen to Russian friends--to get a breath of Russian air, as
he said--came back to his wife and daughter.

The views of the prince and of the princess on life abroad were
completely opposed. The princess thought everything delightful,
and in spite of her established position in Russian society, she
tried abroad to be like a European fashionable lady, which she
was not--for the simple reason that she was a typical Russian
gentlewoman; and so she was affected, which did not altogether
suit her. The prince, on the contrary, thought everything foreign
detestable, got sick of European life, kept to his Russian
habits, and purposely tried to show himself abroad less European
than he was in reality.

The prince returned thinner, with the skin hanging in loose bags
on his cheeks, but in the most cheerful frame of mind. His
good-humor was even greater when he saw Kitty completely
recovered. The news of Kitty's friendship with Madame Stahl and
Varenka, and the reports the princess gave him of some kind of
change she had noticed in Kitty, troubled the prince and aroused
his habitual feeling of jealousy of everything that drew his
daughter away from him, and a dread that his daughter might have
got out of the reach of his influence into regions inaccessible
to him. But these unpleasant matters were all drowned in the sea
of kindliness and good-humor which was always within him, and
more so than ever since his course of Carlsbad waters.

The day after his arrival the prince, in his long overcoat, with
his Russian wrinkles and baggy cheeks propped up by a starched
collar, set off with his daughter to the spring in the greatest
good-humor.

It was a lovely morning: the bright, cheerful houses with their
little gardens, the sight of the red-faced, red-armed,
beer-drinking German waitresses, working away merrily, did the
heart good. But the nearer they got to the springs the oftener
they met sick people; and their appearance seemed more pitiable
than ever among the every-day conditions of prosperous German
life. Kitty was no longer struck by this contrast. The bright
sun, the brilliant green of the foliage, the strains of the music
were for her the natural setting of all these familiar faces,
with their changes to greater emaciation or to convalescence, for
which she watched. But to the prince the brightness and gaiety of
the June morning, and the sound of the orchestra playing a gay
waltz then in fashion, and above all, the appearance of the
healthy attendants, seemed something unseemly and monstrous, in
conjunction with these slowly moving, dying figures gathered
together from all parts of Europe. In spite of his feeling of
pride and, as it were, of the return of youth, with his favorite
daughter on his arm, he felt awkward, and almost ashamed of his
vigorous step and his sturdy, stout limbs. He felt almost like a
man not dressed in a crowd.

"Present me to your new friends," he said to his daughter,
squeezing her hand with his elbow. "I like even your horrid Soden
for making you so well again. Only it's melancholy, very
melancholy here. Who's that?"

Kitty mentioned the names of all the people they met, with some
of whom she was acquainted and some not. At the entrance of the
garden they met the blind lady, Madame Berthe, with her guide,
and the prince was delighted to see the old Frenchwoman's face
light up when she heard Kitty's voice. She at once began talking
to him with French exaggerated politeness, applauding him for
having such a delightful daughter, extolling Kitty to the skies
before her face, and calling her a treasure, a pearl, and a
consoling angel.

"Well, she's the second angel, then," said the prince, smiling.
"She calls Mademoiselle Varenka angel number one."

"Oh! Mademoiselle Varenka, she's a real angel, allez," Madame
Berthe assented.

In the arcade they met Varenka herself. She was walking rapidly
towards them carrying an elegant red bag.

"Here is papa come," Kitty said to her.

Varenka made--simply and naturally as she did everything--a
movement between a bow and curtsey, and immediately began talking
to the prince, without shyness, naturally, as she talked to every
one.

"Of course I know you; I know you very well," the prince said to
her with a smile, in which Kitty detected with joy that her
father liked her friend. "Where are you off to in such haste?"

"Maman's here," she said, turning to Kitty. "She has not slept
all night, and the doctor advised her to go out. I'm taking her
her work."

"So that's angel number one?" said the prince when Varenka had
gone on.

Kitty saw that her father had meant to make fun of Varenka, but
that he could not do it because he liked her.

"Come, so we shall see all your friends," he went on, "even
Madame Stahl, if she deigns to recognize me."

"Why, did you know her, papa?" Kitty asked apprehensively,
catching the gleam of irony that kindled in the prince's eyes at
the mention of Madame Stahl.

"I used to know her husband, and her too a little, before she'd
joined the Pietists."

"What is a Pietist, papa?" asked Kitty, dismayed to find that
what she prized so highly in Madame Stahl had a name.

"I don't quite know myself. I only know that she thanks God for
everything, for every misfortune, and thanks God too that her
husband died. And that's rather droll, as they didn't get on
together."

"Who's that? What a piteous face!" he asked, noticing a sick man
of medium height sitting on a bench, wearing a brown overcoat and
white trousers that fell in strange folds about his long,
fleshless legs. This man lifted his straw hat, showed his scanty
curly hair and high forehead, painfully reddened by the pressure
of the hat.

"That's Petrov, an artist," answered Kitty, blushing. "And that's
his wife," she added, indicating Anna Pavlovna, who, as though on
purpose, at the very instant they approached walked away after a
child that had run off along a path.

"Poor fellow! and what a nice face he has!" said the prince. "Why
don't you go up to him? He wanted to speak to you."

"Well, let us go, then," said Kitty, turning round resolutely.
"How are you feeling to-day?" she asked Petrov.

Petrov got up, leaning on his stick, and looked shyly at the
prince.

"This is my daughter," said the prince. "Let me introduce
myself."

The painter bowed and smiled, showing his strangely dazzling
white teeth.

"We expected you yesterday, princess," he said to Kitty. He
staggered as he said this, and then repeated the motion, trying
to make it seem as if it had been intentional.

"I meant to come, but Varenka said that Anna Pavlovna sent word
you were not going."

"Not going!" said Petrov, blushing, and immediately beginning to
cough, and his eyes sought his wife. "Anita! Anita!" he said
loudly, and the swollen veins stood out like cords on his thin
white neck.

Anna Pavlovna came up.

"So you sent word to the princess that we weren't going!" he
whispered to her angrily, losing his voice.

"Good-morning, princess," said Anna Pavlovna, with an assumed
smile utterly unlike her former manner. "Very glad to make your
acquaintance," she said to the prince."You've long been expected,
prince."

"What did you send word to the princess that we weren't going
for?" the artist whispered hoarsely once more, still more
angrily, obviously exasperated that his voice failed him so that
he could not give his words the expression he would have liked
to.

"Oh, mercy on us! I thought we weren't going," his wife answered
crossly.

"What, when . . ." He coughed and waved his hand. The prince took
off his hat and moved away with his daughter.

"Ah! ah!" he sighed deeply. "Oh, poor things!"

"Yes, papa," answered Kitty. "And you must know they've three
children, no servant, and scarcely any means. He gets something
from the Academy," she went on briskly, trying to drown the
distress that the queer change in Anna Pavlovna's manner to her
had aroused in her.

"Oh, here's Madame Stahl," said Kitty, indicating an invalid
carriage, where, propped on pillows, something in gray and blue
was Iying under a sunshade. This was Madame Stahl. Behind her
stood the gloomy healthy- looking German workman who pushed the
carriage. Close by was standing a flaxen-headed Swedish count,
whom Kitty knew by name. Several invalids were lingering near the
low carriage, staring at the lady as though she were some
curiosity.

The prince went up to her, and Kitty detected that disconcerting
gleam of irony in his eyes. He went up to Madame Stahl, and
addressed her with extreme courtesy and affability in that
excellent French that so few speak nowadays.

"I don't know if you remember me, but I must recall myself to
thank you for your kindness to my daughter," he said, taking off
his hat and not putting it on again.

"Prince Alexander Shtcherbatsky," said Madame Stahl, lifting upon
him her heavenly eyes, in which Kitty discerned a look of
annoyance. "Delighted! I have taken a great fancy to your
daughter."

"You are still in weak health?"

"Yes; I'm used to it," said Madame Stahl, and she introduced the
prince to the Swedish count.

"You are scarcely changed at all," the prince said to her. "It's
ten or eleven years since I had the honor of seeing you."

"Yes; God sends the cross and sends the strength to bear it.
Often one wonders what is the goal of this life? ...The other
sidel" she said angrily to Varenka, who had rearranged the rug
over her feet not to her satisfaction.

"To do good, probably," said the prince with a twinkle in his
eye.

"That is not for us to judge," said Madame Stahl, perceiving the
shade of expression on the prince's face. "So you will send me
that book, dear count? I'm very grateful to you," she said to the
young Swede.

"Ahl" cried the prince, catching sight of the Moscow colonel
standing near, and with a bow to Madame Stahl he walked away with
his daughter and the Moscow colonel, who joined them.

"That's our aristocracy, prince!" the Moscow colonel said with
ironical intention. He cherished a grudge against Madame Stahl
for not making his acquaintance.

"She's just the same," replied the prince.

"Did you know her before her illness, prince--that's to say
before she took to her bed?"

"Yes. She took to her bed before my eyes," said the prince.

"They say it's ten years since she has stood on her feet."

"She doesn't stand up because her legs are too short. She's a
very bad figure.',

"Papa, it's not possible!" cried Kitty.

"That's what wicked tongues say, my darling. And your Varenka
catches it too," he added. "Oh, these invalid ladies!"

"Oh, no, papal" Kitty objected warmly. "Varenka worships her. And
then she does so much goodl Ask any onel Every one knows her and
Aline Stahl."

"Perhaps so," said the prince, squeezing her hand with his elbow;
"but it's better when one does good so that you may ask every one
and no one knows."

Kitty did not answer, not because she had nothing to say, but
because she did not care to reveal her secret thoughts even to
her father. But, strange to say, although she had so made up her
mind not to be iniluenced by her father's views, not to let him
into her inmost sanctuary, she felt that the heavenly image of
Madame Stahl, which she had carried for a whole month in her
heart, had vanished, never to return, just as the fantastic
figure made up of some clothes thrown down at random vanishes
when one sees that it is only some garment Iying there. All that

was left was a woman with short legs, who lay down because she
had a bad figure, and worried patient Varenka for not arranging
her rug to her liking. And by no effort of the imagination could
Kitty bring back the former Madame Stahl.

Chapter 35

The prince communicated his good-humor to his own family and his
friends, and even to the German landlord in whose rooms the
Shtcherbatskys were staying.

On coming back with Kitty from the springs, the prince, who had
asked the colonel, and Marya Yevgenyevna, and Varenka all to come
and have coffee with them, gave orders for a table and chairs to
be taken into the garden under the chestnut-tree, and lunch to be
laid there. The landlord and the servants, too, grew brisker
under the influence of his good spirits. They knew his
open-handedness; and half an hour later the invalid doctor from
Hamburg, who lived on the top floor, looked enviously out of the
window at the merry party of healthy Russians assembled under the
chestnut-tree. In the trembling circles of shadow cast by the
leaves, at a table, covered with a white cloth, and set with
coffeepot, bread-and-butter, cheese, and cold game, sat the
princess in a high cap with lilac ribbons, distributing cups and
bread-and-butter. At the other end sat the prince, eating
heartily, and talking loudly and merrily. The prince had spread
out near him his purchases, carved boxes, and knick-knacks,
paper-knives of all sorts, of which he bought a heap at every
watering-place, and bestowed them upon every one, including
Lieschen, the servant girl, and the landlord, with whom he jested
in his comically bad German, assuring him that it was not the
water had cured Kitty, but his splendid cookery, especially his
plum-soup. The princess laughed at her husband for his Russian
ways, but she was more lively and good-humored than she had been
all the while she had been at the waters. The colonel smiled, as
he always did, at the prince's jokes, but as far as regards
Europe, of which he believed himself to be making a careful
study, he took the princess's side. The simple-hearted Marya
Yevgenyevna simply roared with laughter at everything absurd the
prince said, and his jokes made Varenka helpless with feeble but
infectious laughter, which was something Kitty had never seen
before.

Kitty was glad of all this, but she could not be light-hearted.
She could not solve the problem her father had unconsciously set
her by his goodhumored view of her friends, and of the life that
had so attracted her. To this doubt there was joined the change
in her relations with the Petrovs, which had been so
conspicuously and unpleasantly marked that morning. Every one was
good-humored, but Kitty could not feel goodhumored, and this
increased her distress. She felt a feeling such as she had known
in childhood, when she had been shut in her room as a punishment,
and had heard her sisters' merry laughter outside.

"Well, but what did you buy this mass of things for?" said the
princess, smiling, and handing her husband a cup of coffee.

"One goes for a walk, one looks in a shop, and they ask you to
buy. 'Erlaucht, Durchlaucht?' Directly they say 'Durchlaucht,'I
can't hold out. I lose ten thalers."

"It's simply from boredom," said the princess.

"Of course it is. Such boredom, my dear, that one doesn't know
what to do with oneself."

"How can you be bored, prince? There's so much that's interesting
now in Germany," said Marya Yevgenyevna.

"But I know everything that's interesting: the plum-soup I know,
and the pea-sausages I know. I know everything."

"No, you may say what you like, prince, there's the interest of
their institutions," said the colonel.

"But what is there interesting about it? They're all as pleased
as brass halfpence. They've conquered everybody, and why am I to
be pleased at that? I haven't conquered any one; and I'm obliged
to take off my own boots, yes, and put them away too; in the
morning, get up and dress at once, and go to the dining-room to
drink bad tea! How different it is at home! You get up in no
haste, you get cross, grumble a little, and come round again.
You've time to think things over, and no hurry."

"But time's money, you forget that," said the colonel.

"Time, indeed, that depends! Why, there's time one would give a
month of for sixpence, and time you wouldn't give half an hour of
for any money. Isn't that so, Katinka? What is it? why are you so
depressed?"

"I'm not depressed."

"Where are you off to? Stay a little longer," he said to Varenka.

"I must be going home," said Varenka, getting up, and again she
went off into a giggle. When she had recovered, she said
good-bye, and went into the house to get her hat.

Kitty followed her. Even Varenka struck her as different. She was
not worse, but different from what she had fancied her before.

"Oh, dear! it's a long while since I've laughed so much!" said
Varenka, gathering up her parasol and her bag. "How nice he is,
your father!"

Kitty did not speak.

"When shall I see you again?" asked Varenka.

"Mamma meant to go and see the Petrovs. Won't you be there?" said
Kitty, to try Varenka.

"Yes," answered Varenka. "They're getting ready to go away, so I
promised to help them pack."

"Well, I'll come too, then."

"No, why should you?"

"Why not? why not? why not?" said Kitty, opening her eyes wide,
and clutching at Varenka's parasol, so as not to let her go. "No,
wait a minute; why not?"

"Oh, nothing; your father has come, and besides, they will feel
awkward at your helping."

"No, tell me why you don't want me to be often at the Petrovs'.
You don't want me to--why not?"

"I didn't say that," said Varenka quietly.

"No, please tell me!"

"Tell you everything?" asked Varenka.

"Everything, everything!" Kitty assented.

"Well, there's really nothing of any consequence; only that
Mihail Alexeyevitch" (that was the artist's name) "had meant to
leave earlier, and now he doesn't want to go away," said Varenka,
smiling.

"Well, well!" Kitty urged impatiently, looking darkly at Varenka.

"Well, and for some reason Anna Pavlovna told him that he didn't
want to go because you are here. Of course, that was nonsense;
but there was a dispute over it--over you. You know how irritable
these sick people are."

Kitty, scowling more than ever, kept silent, and Varenka went on
speaking alone, trying to soften or soothe her, and seeing a
storm coming--she did not know whether of tears or of words.

"So you'd better not go.... You understand; you won't be
offended? . . ."

"And it serves me rightl And it serves me right!" Kitty cried
quickly, snatching the parasol out of Varenka's hand, and looking
past her friend's face.

Varenka felt inclined to smile, looking at her childish fury, but
she was afraid of wounding her.

"How does it serve you right? I don't understand," she said.

"It serves me right, because it was all sham; because it was all
done on purpose, and not from the heart. What business had I to
interfere with outsiders? And so it's come about that I'm a cause
of quarrel, and that I've done what nobody asked me to do.
Because it was all a sham! a sham! a sham! . . ."

"A sham! with what object!" said Varenka gently.

"Oh, it's so idiotic! so hateful! There was no need whatever for
me.... Nothing but sham!" she said, opening and shutting the
parasol.

"But with what object?"

"To seem better to people, to myself, to God; to deceive every
one. No! now I won't descend to that. I'll be bad; but anyway not
a liar, a cheat."

"But who is a cheat?" said Varenka reproachfully. "You speak as
as if..."

But Kitty was in one of her gusts of fury, and she would not let
her finish.

"I don't talk about you, not about you at all. You're perfection.
Yes, yes, I know you're all perfection; but what am I to do if
I'm bad? This would never have been if I weren't bad. So let me
be what I am. I won't be a sham. What have I to do with Anna
Pavlovna? Let them go their way, and me go mine. I can't be
different.... And yet it's not that, it's not that."

"What is not that?" asked Varenka in bewilderment.

"Everything. I can't act except from the heart, and you act from
principle. I liked you simply, but you most likely only wanted to
save me, to improve me."

"You are unjust," said Varenka.

"But I'm not speaking of other people, I'm speaking of myself."

"Kitty," they heard her mother's voice, "come here, show papa
your necklace."

Kitty, with a haughty air, without making peace with her friend,
took the necklace in a little box from the table and went to her
mother.

"What's the matter? Why are you so red?" her mother and father
said to her with one voice.

"Nothing," she answered. "I'll be back directly," and she ran
back.

"She's still here," she thought. "What am I to say to her? Oh,
dear! what have I done, what have I said? Why was I rude to her?
What am I to do? What am I to say to her?" thought Kitty, and she
stopped in the doorway.

Varenka in her hat and with the parasol in her hands was sitting
at the table examining the spring which Kitty had broken. She
lifted her head.

"Varenka, forgive me, do forgive me," whispered Kitty, going up
to her. "I don't remember what I said. I . . ."

"I really didn't mean to hurt you," said Varenka, smiling.

Peace was made. But with her father's coming all the world in
which she had been living was transformed for Kitty. She did not
give up everything she had learned, but she became aware that she
had deceived herself in supposing she could be what she wanted to
be. Her eyes were, it seemed, opened; she felt all the difficulty
of maintaining herself without hypocrisy and self-conceit on the
pinnacle to which she had wished to mount. Moreover, she became
aware of all the dreariness of the world of sorrow, of sick and
dying people, in which she had been living. The efforts she~had
made to like it seemed to her intolerable, and she felt a longing
to get back quickly into the fresh air, to Russia, to Ergushovo,
where, as she knew from letters, her sister Dolly had already
gone with her children.

But her affection for Varenka did not wane. As she said good-bye,
Kitty begged her to come to them in Russia.

"I'll come when you get married," said Varenka.

"I shall never marry."

"Well, then, I shall never come."

"Well, then, I shall be married simply for that. Mind now,
remember your promise," said Kitty.

The doctor's prediction was fulfilled. Kitty returned home to
Russia cured. She was not so gay and thoughtless as before, but
she was serene. Her Moscow troubles had become a memory to her.

PART THREE

Chapter 1

Sergey Ivanovitch Koznishev wanted a rest from mental work, and
instead of going abroad as he usually did, he came towards the
end of May to stay in the country with his brother. In his
judgment the best sort of life was a country life. He had come
now to enjoy such a life at his brother's. Konstantin Levin was
very glad to have him, especially as he did not expect his
brother Nikolay that summer. But in spite of his affection and
respect for Sergey Ivanovitch, Konstantin Levin was uncomfortable
with his brother in the country. It made him uncomfortable, and
it positively annoyed him to see his brother's attitude to the
country. To Konstantin Levin the country was the background of
life, that is of pleasures, endeavors, labor. To Sergey
Ivanovitch the country meant on one hand rest from work, on the
other a valuable antidote to the corrupt influences of town,
which he took with satisfaction and a sense of its utility. To
Konstantin Levin the country was good first because it afforded a
field for labor, of the usefulness of which there could be no
doubt. To Sergey Ivanovitch the country was particularly good,
because there it was possible and fitting to do nothing.
Moreover, Sergey Ivanovitch's attitude to the peasants rather
piqued Konstantin. Sergey Ivanovitch used to say that he knew and
liked the peasantry, and he often talked to the peasants, which
he knew how to do without affectation or condescension, and from
every such conversation he would deduce general conclusions in
favor of the peasantry and in confirmation of his knowing them.
Konstantin Levin did not like such an attitude to the peasants.
To Konstantin the peasant was simply the chief partner in their
common labor, and in spite of all the respect and the love,
almost like that of kinship, he had for the peasant--sucked in
probably, as he said himself, with the milk of his peasant nurse-
-still as a fellow-worker with him, while sometimes enthusiastic
over the vigor, gentleness, and justice of these men, he was very
often, when their common labors called for other qualities,
exasperated with the peasant for his carelessness, lack of
method, drunkenness, and lying. If he had been asked whether he
liked or didn't like the peasants, Konstantin Levin would have
been absolutely at a loss what to reply. He liked and did not
like the peasants, just as he liked and did not like men in
general. Of course, being a good-hearted man, he liked men rather
than he disliked them, and so too with the peasants. But like or
dislike "the people" as something apart he could not, not only
because he lived with "the people," and all his interests were
bound up with theirs, but also because he regarded himself as a
part of "the people," did not see any special qualities or
failings distinguishing himself and "the people," and could not
contrast himself with them. Moreover, although he had lived so
long in the closest relations with the peasants, as farmer and
arbitrator, and what was more, as adviser (the peasants trusted
him, and for thirty miles round they would come to ask his
advice), he had no definite views of "the people," and would have
been as much at a loss to answer the question whether he knew
"the people" as the question whether he liked them. For him to
say he knew the peasantry would have been the same as to say he
knew men. He was continually watching and getting to know people
of all sorts, and among them peasants, whom he regarded as good
and interesting people, and he was continually observing new
points in them, altering his former views of them and forming new
ones. With Sergey Ivanovitch it was quite the contrary. Just as
he liked and praised a country life in comparison with the life
he did not like, so too he liked the peasantry in
contradistinction to the class of men he did not like, and so too
he knew the peasantry as something distinct from and opposed to
men generally. In his methodical brain there were distinctly
formulated certain aspects of peasant life, deduced partly from
that life itself, but chiefly from contrast with other modes of
life. He never changed his opinion of the peasantry and his
sympathetic attitude towards them.

In the discussions that arose between the brothers on their views
of the peasantry, Sergey Ivanovitch always got the better of his
brother, precisely because Sergey Ivanovitch had definite ideas
about the peasant--his character, his qualities, and his tastes.
Konstantin Levin had no definite and unalterable idea on the
subject, and so in their arguments Konstantin was readily
convicted of contradicting himself.

In Sergey Ivanovitch's eyes his younger brother was a capital
fellow, with his heart in the right place (as he expressed it in
French), but with a mind which, though fairly quick, was too much
influenced by the impressions of the moment, and consequently
filled with contradictions. With all the condescension of an
elder brother he sometimes explained to him the true import of
things, but he derived little satisfaction from arguing with him
because he got the better of him too easily.

Konstantin Levin regarded his brother as a man of immense
intellect and culture, as generous in the highest sense of the
word, and possessed of a special faculty for working for the
public good. But in the depths of his heart, the older he became,
and the more intimately he knew his brother, the more and more
frequently the thought struck him that this faculty of working
for the public good, of which he felt himself utterly devoid, was
possibly not so much a quality as a lack of something--not a lack
of good, honest, noble desires and tastes, but a lack of vital
force, of what is called heart, of that impulse which drives a
man to choose some one out of the innumerable paths of life, and
to care only for that one. The better he knew his brother, the
more he noticed that Sergey Ivanovitch and many other people who
worked for the public welfare were not led by an impulse of the
heart to care for the public good, but reasoned from intellectual
considerations that it was a right thing to take interest in
public-affairs, and consequently took interest in them. Levin was
confirmed in this generalization by observing that his brother
did not take questions affecting the public welfare or the
question of the immortality of the soul a bit more to heart than
he did chess problems, or the ingenious construction of a new
machine.

Besides this, Konstantin Levin was not at his ease with his
brother, because in summer in the country Levin was continually
busy with work on the land, and the long summer day was not long
enough for him to get through all he had to do, while Sergey
Ivanovitch was taking a holiday. But though he was taking a
holiday now, that is to say, he was doing no writing, he was so
used to intellectual activity that he liked to put into concise
and eloquent shape the ideas that occurred to him, and liked to
have some one to listen to him. His most usual and natural
1istener was his brother. And so in spite of the friendliness and
directness of their relations, Konstantin felt an awkwardness in
leaving him alone. Sergey Ivanovitch liked to stretch himself on
the grass in the sun, and to lie so, basking and chatting lazily.

"You wouldn't believe," he would say to his brother, "what a
pleasure this rural laziness is to me. Not an idea in one's
brain, as empty as a drum!"

But Konstantin Levin found it dull sitting and listening to him,
especially when he knew that while he was away they would be
carting dung onto the fields not ploughed ready for it, and
heaping it all up anyhow; and would not screw the shares in the
ploughs, but would let them come off and then say that the new
ploughs were a silly invention, and there was nothing like the
old Andreevna plough, and so on.

"Come, you've done enough trudging about in the heat," Sergey
Ivanovitch would say to him.

"No, I must just run round to the counting-house for a minute,"