Leo Tolstoy
Page 56
‘No, stay!’ said Levin, trying to keep him. ‘When are we going to see each other now? I’m leaving tomorrow.’
‘I’m a fine one! That’s what I came for … You must come to dinner with us tonight. Your brother will be there, and my brother–in–law Karenin.’
‘Is he here?’ said Levin, and he wanted to ask about Kitty. He had heard that she had been in Petersburg at the beginning of winter, staying with her sister, the diplomat’s wife, and did not know if she had come back or not, but he changed his mind about asking. ‘She’ll be there or she won’t be – it makes no difference.’
‘So you’ll come?’
‘Well, naturally.’
‘At five o’clock, then, and in a frock coat.’
And Stepan Arkadyich got up and went downstairs to see his new superior. Stepan Arkadyich’s instinct had not deceived him. The terrible new superior turned out to be a very courteous man, and Stepan Arkadyich had lunch with him and stayed so long that it was past three o’clock before he got to Alexei Alexandrovich.
VIII
Alexei Alexandrovich, having come back from church, spent the whole morning at home. He was faced that morning with two tasks: first, to receive and send off to Petersburg a deputation from the racial minorities that was now in Moscow; and second, to write the promised letter to the lawyer. The deputation, though invited on his initiative, presented many inconveniences and even dangers, and Alexei Alexandrovich was very glad to have found it in Moscow. The members of the deputation had not the slightest idea of their role and responsibilities. They were naively convinced that their course consisted in explaining their needs and the true state of things and asking for government assistance, and they decidedly failed to understand that some of their statements and demands supported the hostile party and would therefore ruin the whole thing. Alexei Alexandrovich spent a long time with them, wrote a programme from which they were not to deviate, and, after dismissing them, wrote letters to Petersburg for the guidance of the deputation. His chief assistant in this matter was to be Countess Lydia Ivanovna. She was an expert in dealing with deputations and no one knew so well as she how to handle a deputation and guide it properly. Having finished that, Alexei Alexandrovich also wrote to the lawyer. Without the least hesitation, he gave him permission to act at his own discretion. In the letter he enclosed three notes from Vronsky to Anna which he had found in the portfolio he had taken from her.
Ever since Alexei Alexandrovich had left home with the intention of not returning to his family, and ever since he had seen the lawyer and told at least one person of his intention, especially since he had turned the matter of his life into a matter of papers, he had been growing more and more accustomed to his intention and now saw clearly the possibility of carrying it through.
He was sealing the envelope to his lawyer when he heard the loud sounds of Stepan Arkadyich’s voice. Stepan Arkadyich was arguing with Alexei Alexandrovich’s valet and insisting that he should be announced.
‘It makes no difference,’ thought Alexei Alexandrovich. ‘So much the better: I’ll declare my position regarding his sister now and explain why I cannot dine with them.’
‘Show him in!’ he said loudly, gathering up the papers and putting them into the blotter.
‘You see, you’re lying, he is at home!’ Stepan Arkadyich’s voice said to the lackey who had refused to let him in, and, taking his coat off as he went, Oblonsky entered the room. ‘Well, I’m very glad I found you at home! So, I hope …’ Stepan Arkadyich began merrily.
‘I cannot come,’ Alexei Alexandrovich said coldly, standing and not inviting his visitor to sit down.
Alexei Alexandrovich meant to enter at once into the cold relations he ought to have with the brother of a wife with whom he was beginning divorce proceedings; but he had not taken into account the sea of good–naturedness that overflowed the shores of Stepan Arkadyich’s soul.
Stepan Arkadyich opened his shining, clear eyes wide.
‘Why can’t you? What do you mean to say?’ he said perplexedly in French. ‘No, you promised. And we’re all counting on you.’
‘I mean to say that I cannot come to your house, because the family relations that existed between us must cease.’
‘What? I mean, how? Why?’ Stepan Arkadyich said with a smile.
‘Because I am starting divorce proceedings against your sister, my wife. I have been forced …’
But before Alexei Alexandrovich had time to finish what he was saying, Stepan Arkadyich acted in a way he had not expected at all. Stepan Arkadyich gasped and sank into an armchair.
‘No, Alexei Alexandrovich, what are you saying!’ cried Oblonsky, and suffering showed on his face.
‘It’s so.’
‘Forgive me, but I can’t, I simply can’t believe it…’
Alexei Alexandrovich sat down, feeling that his words had not had the effect he anticipated, that it would be necessary for him to explain himself, and that whatever his explanations might be, his relations with his brother–in–law would remain the same.
‘Yes, I am put under the painful necessity of demanding a divorce,’ he said.
‘I’ll tell you one thing, Alexei Alexandrovich. I know you to be an excellent and just man, I know Anna – forgive me, I can’t change my opinion of her – to be a wonderful, excellent woman, and therefore, forgive me, but I can’t believe it. There’s some misunderstanding here,’ he said.
‘Yes, if only it were a misunderstanding …’
‘Excuse me, I do see,’ Stepan Arkadyich interrupted. ‘But, naturally … One thing: you mustn’t be hasty. You mustn’t, mustn’t be hasty!’ ‘I am not being hasty,’ Alexei Alexandrovich said coldly. ‘And one cannot take anyone else’s advice in such a matter. I am firmly decided.’
‘This is terrible!’ said Stepan Arkadyich with a deep sigh. ‘There’s one thing I’d do, Alexei Alexandrovich. I beg you to do it!’ he said. ‘The proceedings haven’t started yet, as I understand. Before you start them, go and see my wife, talk with her. She loves Anna like a sister, she loves you, and she’s an amazing woman. For God’s sake, talk with her! Do it out of friendship for me, I beg you!’
Alexei Alexandrovich reflected, and Stepan Arkadyich looked at him sympathetically, without breaking his silence.
‘Will you go and see her?’
‘I don’t know. That’s why I didn’t call on you. I suppose our relations must change.’
‘Why so? I don’t see it. Permit me to think that, apart from our family relations, you have for me, at least somewhat, the friendly feelings that I have always had for you … And true respect,’ said Stepan Arkadyich, pressing his hand. ‘Even if your worst suppositions are right, I do not and never will take it upon myself to judge either side, and I see no reason why our relations must change. But do it now, come and see my wife.’
‘Well, we have different views of this matter,’ Alexei Alexandrovich said coldly. ‘However, let’s not talk about it.’
‘No, why shouldn’t you come? Why not tonight for dinner? My wife is expecting you. Please come. And above all, talk it over with her. She’s an amazing woman. For God’s sake, I beg you on my knees!’
‘If you want it so much – I’ll come,’ Alexei Alexandrovich said with a sigh.
And, wishing to change the subject, he asked about something that interested them both – Stepan Arkadyich’s new superior, not yet an old man, who had suddenly been appointed to such a high position.
Alexei Alexandrovich had never liked Count Anichkin even before and had always differed with him in opinion, but now he could not refrain from the hatred, comprehensible among officials, of a man who has suffered a fiasco in the service for a man who has received a promotion.
‘Well, have you seen him?’ Alexei Alexandrovich said with a venomous grin.
‘Of course, he came to our office yesterday. He seems to know his business perfectly and is very energetic’
‘Yes, but at what is his energy directed?’ said Alexei Alexandrovich.<
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‘At getting things done, or at redoing what has already been done? The misfortune of our government is paper administration, of which he is a worthy representative.’
‘I really don’t know what he can be faulted for. I don’t know his tendency, but one thing I do know – he’s an excellent fellow,’ Stepan Arkadyich replied. ‘I’ve just called on him and, really, he’s an excellent fellow. We had lunch, and I taught him to make that drink – you know, wine with oranges. It’s very refreshing. And remarkably enough, he didn’t know it. He liked it very much. No, really, he’s a nice fellow.’
Stepan Arkadyich looked at his watch.
‘Heavens, it’s past four and I still have to see Dolgovushin! So, please do come for dinner. Otherwise you don’t know how upset my wife and I will be.’
Alexei Alexandrovich saw his brother–in–law off quite differently from the way he had met him.
‘I’ve promised and I will come,’ he answered glumly.
‘Believe me, I appreciate it, and I hope you won’t regret it,’ Stepan Arkadyich replied, smiling.
And, putting on his coat as he left, he brushed the valet’s head with his hand, laughed and went out.
‘At five o’clock, and in a frock coat, please!’ he called out once more, coming back to the door.
IX
It was past five and some of the guests had already arrived when the host arrived himself. He came in together with Sergei Ivanovich Koznyshev and Pestsov, who had bumped into each other on the doorstep. These were the two main representatives of the Moscow intelligentsia, as Oblonsky called them. They were both people respected for their character and intelligence. They respected each other but were in complete and hopeless disagreement on almost everything – not because they belonged to opposite tendencies, but precisely because they were from the same camp (their enemies mixed them up), but within that camp each had his own shade. And since there is nothing less conducive to agreement than a difference of thinking in half–abstract things, they not only never agreed in their opinions, but had long grown used to chuckling at each other’s incorrigible error without getting angry.
They were going in the door, talking about the weather, when Stepan Arkadyich overtook them. Prince Alexander Dmitrievich, Oblonsky’s father–in–law, young Shcherbatsky, Turovtsyn, Kitty and Karenin were already sitting in the drawing room.
Stepan Arkadyich saw at once that without him things were going badly in the drawing room. Darya Alexandrovna, in her smart grey silk dress, obviously preoccupied by the children’s having to eat alone in the nursery and by her husband’s absence, had not managed to mix this whole company without him. They all sat like a parson’s daughters on a visit (in the old prince’s expression), obviously perplexed at how they had wound up there, squeezing out words so as not to be silent. The good–natured Turovtsyn obviously felt out of his element, and the thick–lipped smile with which he met Stepan Arkadyich said in all but words: ‘Well, brother, you’ve planted me among some clever ones! A drink at the Château des Fleurs is more in my line!’ The old prince sat silently, glancing sidelong at Karenin with his shining little eyes, and Stepan Arkadyich could see that he had already thought up a little phrase to paste on this statesman, whom one was invited for as if he were a poached sturgeon. Kitty was looking at the door, plucking up her courage so as not to blush when Konstantin Levin came in. Young Shcherbatsky, who had not been introduced to Karenin, was trying to show that this did not embarrass him in the least. Karenin himself, by old Petersburg habit, coming to dinner with ladies, was wearing a tailcoat and white tie, and Stepan Arkadyich could see from his face that he had come only to keep his word and was performing a painful duty by being present in this company. He was the main cause of the chill that had frozen all the guests before Stepan Arkadyich’s arrival.
On entering the drawing room, Stepan Arkadyich excused himself by explaining that he had been delayed by that prince who was the perennial scapegoat each time he was late or absent, and in a moment he got everyone acquainted with everyone else, and, putting Alexei Alexandrovich together with Sergei Koznyshev, slipped them the topic of the russification of Poland,[7] which they both seized upon at once, along with Pestsov. Patting Turovtsyn on the shoulder, he whispered something funny to him and sat him down with his wife and the prince. Then he told Kitty how beautiful she was that evening, and introduced Shcherbatsky to Karenin. In a moment he had kneaded this social dough so well that the drawing room was in fine form and ringing with voices.
Only Konstantin Levin was missing. But that was for the better, because, going out to the dining room, Stepan Arkadyich saw to his horror that the port and sherry had been bought at Deprez’s and not at Levet’s, and gave orders for the coachman to be sent to Levet’s as soon as possible. Then he turned to go back to the drawing room.
In the dining room he met Konstantin Levin.
‘I’m not late?’
‘As if you could be anything else!’ Stepan Arkadyich said, taking him under the arm.
‘You have a lot of people? Who’s here?’ Levin asked, blushing, as he knocked the snow off his hat with his glove.
‘All our own. Kitty’s here. Let’s go, I’ll introduce you to Karenin.’
Despite his liberalism, Stepan Arkadyich knew that acquaintance with Karenin could not but be flattering and therefore treated his best friends to it. But just then Konstantin Levin was unable to feel all the pleasure of this acquaintance. He had not seen Kitty since that evening, so memorable for him, on which he had met Vronsky, unless he were to count the moment when he had seen her on the high road. In the depths of his soul he had known that he would see her here tonight. But, maintaining his inner freedom of thought, he tried to assure himself that he had not known it. Yet now, when he heard that she was there, he suddenly felt such joy, and at the same time such fear, that his breath was taken away and he could not bring out what he wanted to say.
‘How is she? How? The way she was before, or the way she was in the carriage? And what if what Darya Alexandrovna said is true? Why shouldn’t it be true?’ he thought.
‘Ah, do please introduce me to Karenin,’ he barely uttered, and with a desperately determined step he went into the drawing room and saw her.
She was neither the way she had been before, nor the way she had been in the carriage; she was quite different.
She was frightened, timid, shamefaced, and all the more lovely because of it. She saw him the instant he came into the room. She had been waiting for him. She was joyful and so embarrassed by her joy that there was a moment – as he went up to the hostess and glanced at her again –when it seemed to her, and to him, and to Dolly, who saw it all, that she would not be able to stand it and would start to cry. She blushed, paled, blushed again and froze, her lips quivering a little, waiting for him. He came up to her, bowed and silently gave her his hand. Had it not been for the slight trembling of her lips and the moisture that came to her eyes, giving them an added brilliance, her smile would have been almost calm as she said:
‘It’s so long since we’ve seen each other!’ and with desperate resolution pressed his hand with her cold hand.
‘You haven’t seen me, but I saw you,’ said Levin, radiant with a smile of happiness. ‘I saw you when you were driving to Yergushovo from the station.’
‘When?’ she asked with surprise.
‘You were going to Yergushovo,’ said Levin, feeling himself choking with the happiness that flooded his soul. And he thought to himself, ‘How could I connect this touching being with the thought of anything not innocent! And, yes, it seems that what Darya Alexandrovna said is true.’
Stepan Arkadyich took him by the arm and brought him to Karenin.
‘Allow me to introduce you.’ He gave their names.
‘Very pleased to meet you again,’ Alexei Alexandrovich said coldly, shaking Levin’s hand.
‘You’re acquainted?’ Stepan Arkadyich asked in surprise.