by Leo Tolstoy
When she came into the bedroom, Vronsky looked at her attentively. He sought traces of the conversation which he knew she must have had with Dolly, since she had stayed so long in her room. But in her expression, excitedly restrained and concealing something, he found only that beauty which, familiar as it was, still captivated him, and her awareness of that beauty and her desire that it affect him. He did not want to ask her what they had talked about, but hoped she would say something herself. But all she said was:
'I'm glad you like Dolly. You do, don't you?'
'But I've known her for a long time. She's very kind, I think, mais excessivement terre-a-terre.* But still, I'm very glad of her visit.'
He took Anna's hand and looked questioningly into her eyes.
She, understanding that look differently, smiled at him.
The next morning, despite her hosts' entreaties, Darya Alexandrovna made ready to leave. Levin's driver, in his none-too-new caftan and something half resembling a post-boy's hat, with his ill-matched horses, gloomily and resolutely drove the carriage with patched splash-boards under the covered, sand-strewn portico.
Taking leave of Princess Varvara and the men was unpleasant for Darya Alexandrovna. After a day together, both she and her hosts clearly
* But excessively down-to-earth.
felt that they were unsuited to each other and that it was better for them not to get together. Only Anna felt sad. She knew that now, with Dolly's departure, there would be no one to stir up in her soul those feelings that had been aroused in her at this meeting. To stir up those feelings was painful for her; but she knew all the same that that was the best part of her soul and that it was quickly being overgrown in the life she led.
Driving out into the fields, Dolly felt pleasantly relieved, and she was about to ask the servants how they had liked it at Vronsky's when the driver, Filipp, suddenly spoke himself:
'Maybe they're rich, but they only gave the horses three measures of oats. They cleaned the bottom before cockcrow. What's three measures? Just a snack. Nowadays innkeepers sell oats for forty-five kopecks. At home we give visitors as much as they can eat.'
'A miserly master,' the clerk agreed.
'Well, and did you like their horses?' asked Dolly.
'Horses is the word. And the food's good. Found it a bit boring otherwise, Darya Alexandrovna, I don't know about you,' he said, turning his handsome and kindly face to her.
'I thought so, too. Well, will we get there by evening?'
'Ought to.'
On returning home and finding everyone quite well and especially nice, Darya Alexandrovna told them about her trip with great animation, about how well she had been received, the luxury and good taste of the Vronskys' life, their amusements, and would not let anyone say a word against them.
'You have to know Anna and Vronsky - I've come to know him better now - to understand how sweet and touching they are,' she said, now with perfect sincerity, forgetting the vague sense of dissatisfaction and discomfort that she had experienced there.
XXV
Vronsky and Anna spent the whole summer and part of the autumn in the country, in the same conditions, without taking any measures towards a divorce. It was decided between them that they would not go anywhere; but they both sensed, the longer they lived alone, especially in the autumn and without guests, that they would not be able to endure that life and would have to change it.
Life, it seemed, was such that it was impossible to wish for better: there was abundance, there was health, there was the child, and they both had their occupations. Anna paid attention to herself in the same way without guests, and was also very much taken up with reading - of novels and the serious books that were in vogue. She ordered all the books that were mentioned with praise in the foreign newspapers and magazines she received, and read them with that concentration that one only finds in solitude. Moreover, by means of books and special journals, she studied all the subjects that interested Vronsky, so that he often turned directly to her with questions of agronomy, architecture and, occasionally, even horse-breeding and sports. He was amazed at her knowledge, her memory, and, being doubtful at first, wanted corroboration; and she would find what he had asked about in her books and show it to him.
The setting up of the hospital also occupied her. She not only helped but also arranged and devised many things herself. But her chief concern was still her own self - herself, in so far as she was dear to Vronsky, in so far as she was able to replace for him all that he had abandoned. Vronsky appreciated this desire, which had become the only goal of her life, not only to be liked by him but to serve him, yet at the same time he found those amorous nets in which she tried to ensnare him a burden. The more time that passed, the more often he saw himself ensnared in those nets, and the more he wanted not so much to get out of them as to test whether they hampered his freedom. Had it not been for this ever strengthening desire to be free, not to have a scene every time he had to go to town for a meeting or a race, Vronsky would have been quite content with his life. The role he had chosen, the role of the rich landowner, of whom the nucleus of the Russian aristocracy ought to consist, not only proved entirely to his taste, but now, after living that way for half a year, gave him an ever increasing pleasure. And his affairs, which occupied and engaged him more and more, went splendidly. Despite the enormous amount of money that the hospital, the machines, the cows ordered from Switzerland and many other things had cost him, he was certain that he was not wasting but increasing his fortune. Wherever it was a matter of income, of selling timber, grain, wool, of leasing land, Vronsky was hard as flint and knew how to stick to his price. In matters of large-scale farming, on this and other estates, he kept to the simplest, least risky ways, and was shrewd and frugal to the highest degree in small household matters. Despite all the cleverness and cunning of the German, who tried to get him involved in buying and presented every estimate in such a way that it was necessary to begin by investing more, but then calculated that he could do the same thing for less and have an immediate profit, Vronsky never yielded to him. He listened to the steward, asked questions, and agreed with him only when the things he ordered and set up were of the newest sort, still unknown in Russia and capable of causing amazement. Besides that, he would decide upon a major expenditure only when he had some extra money and, in making this expenditure, went into all the details and insisted on getting the best for his money. So that, by the way he conducted his affairs, it was clear that he had not wasted but increased his fortune.
In the month of October, there were elections among the nobility of Kashin province, where the estates of Vronsky, Sviyazhsky, Koznyshev, Oblonsky, and a small part of Levin's estate, were located.
These elections, owing to many circumstances, including the people taking part in them, attracted public attention. They were much talked about and prepared for. People from Moscow, Petersburg and abroad, who never attended elections, came for them.
Vronsky had long ago promised Sviyazhsky that he would attend.
Before the elections Sviyazhsky, who often visited Vozdvizhenskoe, drove over for Vronsky.
On the eve of that day Vronsky and Anna had almost quarrelled over this proposed trip. It was the most boring, difficult autumn time in the country, and therefore Vronsky, preparing for a fight, announced his departure with a stern and cold expression on his face which he had never had before when talking to her. But, to his surprise, Anna took the news very calmly and only asked when he would come back. He looked at her attentively, not understanding this calm. She smiled at his look. He knew this ability she had of withdrawing into herself, and he knew that it happened only when she had decided on something in herself without telling him her plans. He feared it, but he wished so much to avoid a scene that he pretended to believe, and in part sincerely believed, in what he would have liked to believe in - her reasonableness.
'You won't be bored, I hope?'
'I hope,' said Anna. 'Yesterday I received a box of books fr
om Gautier.[7] No, I won't be bored.' 'She wants to take this tone, and so much the better,' he thought, 'otherwise it would be the same thing all over again.'
And so, without challenging her to a frank explanation, he went off to the elections. It was the first time since the start of their liaison that he had parted from her without talking it all through. On the one hand, this troubled him; on the other, he found it better this way. 'At first it will be like now, something vague, hidden, but then she'll get used to it. In any case, I can give her everything, but not my male independence,' he thought.
XXVI
In September Levin moved to Moscow for Kitty's confinement. He had already spent a whole month in Moscow doing nothing, when Sergei Ivanovich, who owned an estate in Kashin province and took great interest in the question of the forthcoming elections, got ready to attend them. He invited his brother, who had a ballot for the Seleznev district, to go with him. Besides that, Levin had business in Kashin, of the utmost importance for his sister, who lived abroad, to do with settling the matter with the trusteeship and obtaining a quittance.
Levin was still undecided, but Kitty, who saw that he was bored in Moscow, advised him to go and, without asking, ordered him a nobleman's uniform that cost eighty roubles. And the eighty roubles spent on the uniform were the main thing that made Levin go. He went to Kashin.
Levin had been in Kashin for six days already, attending the meetings every day and busying himself with his sister's affairs, which did not go well. The marshals were all occupied with the elections and it was impossible to settle the very simple matter which depended on the trusteeship. The other business - obtaining the money - met with obstacles in the same way. After long efforts to have the freeze lifted, the money was ready to be paid; but the notary, a most obliging man, could not issue the cheque because the chairman's signature was needed, and the chairman, without handing over his duties, was attending the session. All this bustling, going about from place to place, talking with very kind, good people, who well understood the unpleasantness of the petitioner's position but were unable to help him - all this tension, while producing no results, gave Levin a painful feeling similar to that vexing impotence one experiences in dreams when one tries to use physical force. He felt it often, speaking with his good-natured attorney. This attorney did everything possible, it seemed, and strained all his mental powers to get Levin out of the quandary. 'Try this,' he said more than once, 'go to this place and that place,' and the attorney would make a whole plan for getting round the fatal principle that was hindering everything. Then he would add at once, 'They'll hold it up anyway, but try it.' And Levin tried, visited, went. Everybody was kind and courteous, but it always turned out that what had been got round re-emerged in the end and again barred the way. In particular it was offensive that Levin simply could not understand with whom he was struggling, who profited from the fact that his case never came to an end. This no one seemed to know; the attorney did not know either. If Levin could have understood it, as he understood why he could not get to the ticket window at the station otherwise than by waiting in line, he would not have felt offended and vexed; but no one could explain to him why the obstacles he encountered in his case existed.
However, Levin had changed greatly since his marriage; he was patient, and if he did not understand why it was all arranged that way, he said to himself that he could not judge without knowing everything, that it probably had to be that way, and he tried not to be indignant.
Now, being present at the elections and taking part in them, he tried in the same way not to condemn, not to argue, but to understand as well as he could this business, which honest and good people, whom he respected, took up with such seriousness and enthusiasm. Since marrying, so many new, serious aspects had been revealed to him, which formerly, because of his light-minded attitude towards them, had seemed insignificant, that he assumed and sought a serious meaning in the business of the elections as well.
Sergei Ivanovich explained to him the meaning and importance of the revolution that was supposed to take place at the elections. The provincial marshal of nobility, in whose hands the law placed so many important social matters - trusteeships (the same from which Levin was now suffering), the huge funds of the nobility, high schools for girls and boys, the military school, public education as prescribed by the new legislation and, finally, the zemstvo - the provincial marshal, Snetkov, was a man of the old noble cast, who had run through a huge fortune, a good man, honest in his way, but who failed completely to understand the demands of the new time. He always took the side of the nobility in everything, directly opposed the spread of public education, and to the zemstvo, which was supposed to have such enormous significance, attributed a class character. It was necessary that he be replaced by a fresh, modern, practical man, completely new, and that things be conducted in such a way as to gain from the rights granted to the nobility, not as nobility but as an element of the zemstvo, every possible benefit of self-government. In the rich Kashin province, which always led the others in everything, such forces had now accumulated that, if matters were conducted properly, it could serve as an example for other provinces, for the whole of Russia. And therefore the whole matter was of great significance. The plan was that Snetkov be replaced as marshal of nobility either by Sviyazhsky or, better still, by Nevedovsky, a former professor, a remarkably intelligent man and a great friend of Sergei Ivanovich's.
The assembly was opened by the governor, who delivered a speech to the noblemen, saying that they should elect people to posts not out of partiality, but by merit and for the good of the fatherland, and that he hoped the honourable nobility of Kashin would fulfil their duty religiously, as they had done in previous elections, thus justifying the high trust of the monarch.
Having finished his speech, the governor left the room, and the noblemen noisily and animatedly, some even rapturously, followed him and surrounded him just as he was putting on his coat and talking amicably with the provincial marshal. Levin, wishing to understand everything and not miss anything, stood there in the crowd and heard the governor say: 'Please tell Marya Ivanovna that my wife is very sorry but she must go to the orphanage.' And after that the gentlemen cheerfully took their coats and went to the cathedral.
In the cathedral Levin, lifting his hand and repeating the words of the archpriest along with the others, swore with the most terrible oaths to fulfil all the governor's hopes. Church services always had an effect on him, and when he uttered the words, 'I kiss the cross,'[8] and turned to look at the crowd of young and old people repeating the same thing, he felt himself moved.
On the second and third days the discussions concerned the matters of the funds raised by the nobility and of the girls' school, which, as Sergei Ivanovich explained, were of no importance, and Levin, occupied with his business, did not follow them. On the fourth day, the auditing of the provincial accounts lay on the provincial table. And here for the first time a confrontation took place between the new party and the old. The commission entrusted with verifying the accounts reported to the assembly that all was in order. The provincial marshal rose to thank the gentlemen for their trust and waxed tearful. The nobility loudly cheered him and shook his hand. But at that moment one of the gentlemen from Sergei Ivanovich's party said he had heard that the commission had not audited the accounts, considering auditing an insult to the provincial marshal. One of the members of the commission imprudently confirmed it. Then one small, very young-looking, but very venomous gentleman started to say that it would probably be a pleasure for the provincial marshal to give a report of the accounts and that the excessive delicacy of the members of the commission deprived him of that moral satisfaction. Then the members of the commission withdrew their statement, and Sergei Ivanovich began to demonstrate logically that the accounts must be acknowledged as either audited or not audited, and developed this dilemma in detail. Some speaker from the opposing party objected to Sergei Ivanovich. Then Sviyazhsky spoke, and then again the venomo
us gentleman. The debate went on for a long time and ended with nothing. Levin was surprised that they argued about it for so long, especially since, when he asked Sergei Ivanovich if he thought the money had been embezzled, Sergei Ivanovich answered:
'Oh, no! He's an honest man. But this old-fashioned, patriarchal, family-like way of running the affairs of the nobility has to be shaken up.'
On the fifth day came the election of district marshals. In some districts this was a very stormy day. For the Seleznev district Sviyazhsky was elected unanimously without a vote, and there was a dinner that day at his house.
XXVII
On the sixth day the provincial elections were to be held. The rooms, big and small, were filled with noblemen in various uniforms. Many had come for that day only. Acquaintances who had not seen each other for a long time, some from the Crimea, some from Petersburg, some from abroad, met in those rooms. By the governor's table, beneath the portrait of the emperor, a debate was under way.
The noblemen in both big and small rooms grouped themselves by camps, and from the hostility and mistrustfulness of the glances, from the hushing of talk whenever an outsider approached, from the fact that people went off to a far corridor to whisper, one could see that each side had secrets from the other. In outward appearance, the noblemen were sharply divided into two sorts: the old and the new. The old were for the most part either in the old-style buttoned-up uniforms of the nobility, with swords and hats, or in their particular navy, cavalry, or infantry uniforms. The uniforms of the old noblemen were of an outmoded cut, with the sleeves puffed up at the shoulders; they were obviously too small, short at the waist and tight, as if their wearers had outgrown them. The young were in unbuttoned noblemen's uniforms, low-waisted and wide at the shoulders, with white waistcoats, or in uniforms with the black collars and embroidered laurels of the Ministry of Justice. To the young also belonged the court uniforms that adorned the crowd here and there.