Part Six: Chapter 14

by Leo Tolstoy

　　Next day at ten o'clock Levin, who had already gone his rounds,knocked at the room where Vassenka had been put for the night.

　　"Entrez!" Veslovsky called to him. "Excuse me, I've only justfinished my ablutions," he said, smiling, standing before him inhis underclothes only.

　　"Don't mind me, please." Levin sat down in the window. "Haveyou slept well?"

　　"Like the dead. What sort of day is it for shooting?"

　　"What will you take, tea or coffee?"

　　"Neither. I'll wait till lunch. I'm really ashamed. I supposethe ladies are down? A walk now would be capital. You show meyour horses."

　　After walking about the garden, visiting the stable, and evendoing some gymnastic exercises together on the parallel bars,Levin returned to the house with his guest, and went with himinto the drawing room.

　　"We had splendid shooting, and so many delightful experiences!"said Veslovsky, going up to Kitty, who was sitting at thesamovar. "What a pity ladies are cut off from these delights!"

　　"Well, I suppose he must say something to the lady of the house,"Levin said to himself. Again he fancied something in the smile,in the all-conquering air with which their guest addressedKitty....

　　The princess, sitting on the other side of the table with MaryaVlasyevna and Stepan Arkadyevitch, called Levin to her side, andbegan to talk to him about moving to Moscow for Kitty'sconfinement, and getting ready rooms for them. Just as Levinhad disliked all the trivial preparations for his wedding, asderogatory to the grandeur of the event, now he felt still moreoffensive the preparations for the approaching birth, the date ofwhich they reckoned, it seemed, on their fingers. He tried toturn a deaf ear to these discussions of the best patterns of longclothes for the coming baby; tried to turn away and avoid seeingthe mysterious, endless strips of knitting, the triangles oflinen, and so on, to which Dolly attached special importance.The birth of a son (he was certain it would be a son) which waspromised him, but which he still could not believe in--somarvelous it seemed--presented itself to his mind, on one hand,as a happiness so immense, and therefore so incredible; on theother, as an event so mysterious, that this assumption of adefinite knowledge of what would be, and consequent preparationfor it, as for something ordinary that did happen to people,jarred on him as confusing and humiliating.

　　But the princess did not understand his feelings, and put downhis reluctance to think and talk about it to carelessness andindifference, and so she gave him no peace. She had commissionedStepan Arkadyevitch to look at a fiat, and now she called Levinup.

　　"I know nothing about it, princess. Do as you think fit," hesaid.

　　"You must decide when you will move."

　　"I really don't know. I know millions of children are born awayfrom Moscow, and doctors...why..."

　　"But if so..."

　　"Oh, no, as Kitty wishes."

　　"We can't talk to Kitty about it! Do you want me to frightenher? Why, this spring Natalia Golitzina died from having anignorant doctor."

　　"I will do just what you say," he said gloomily.

　　The princess began talking to him, but he did not hear her.Though the conversation with the princess had indeed jarred uponhim, he was gloomy, not on account of that conversation, but fromwhat he saw at the samovar.

　　"No, it's impossible," he thought, glancing now and then atVassenka bending over Kitty, telling her something with hischarming smile, and at her, flushed and disturbed.

　　There was something not nice in Vassenka's attitude, in his eyes,in his smile. Levin even saw something not nice in Kitty'sattitude and look. And again the light died away in his eyes.Again, as before, all of a sudden, without the slightesttransition, he felt cast down from a pinnacle of happiness,peace, and dignity, into an abyss of despair, rage, andhumiliation. Again everything and everyone had become hateful tohim.

　　"You do just as you think best, princess," he said again, lookinground.

　　"Heavy is the cap of Monomach," Stepan Arkadyevitch saidplayfully, hinting, evidently, not simply at the princess'sconversation, but at the cause of Levin's agitation, which he hadnoticed.

　　"How late you are today, Dolly!"

　　Everyone got up to greet Darya Alexandrovna. Vassenka only rosefor an instant, and with the lack of courtesy to ladiescharacteristic of the modern young man, he scarcely bowed, andresumed his conversation again, laughing at something.

　　"I've been worried about Masha. She did not sleep well, and isdreadfully tiresome today," said Dolly.

　　The conversation Vassenka had started with Kitty was running onthe same lines as on the previous evening, discussing Anna, andwhether love is to be put higher than worldly considerations.Kitty disliked the conversation, and she was disturbed both bythe subject and the tone in which it was conducted, and also bythe knowledge of the effect it would have on her husband. Butshe was too simple and innocent to know how to cut short thisconversation, or even to conceal the superficial pleasureafforded her by the young man's very obvious admiration. Shewanted to stop it, but she did not know what to do. Whatever shedid she knew would be observed by her husband, and the worstinterpretation put on it. And, in fact, when she asked Dollywhat was wrong with Masha, and Vassenka, waiting till thisuninteresting conversation was over, began to gaze indifferentlyat Dolly, the question struck Levin as an unnatural anddisgusting piece of hypocrisy.

　　"What do you say, shall we go and look for mushrooms today?" saidDolly.

　　"By all means, please, and I shall come too," said Kitty, and sheblushed. She wanted from politeness to ask Vassenka whether hewould come, and she did not ask him. "Where are you going,Kostya?" she asked her husband with a guilty face, as he passedby her with a resolute step. This guilty air confirmed all hissuspicions.

　　"The mechanician came when I was away; I haven't seen him yet,"he said, not looking at her.

　　He went downstairs, but before he had time to leave his study heheard his wife's familiar footsteps running with reckless speedto him.

　　"What do you want?" he said to her shortly. "We are busy."

　　"I beg your pardon," she said to the German mechanician; "I wanta few words with my husband."

　　The German would have left the room, but Levin said to him:

　　"Don't disturb yourself."

　　"The train is at three?" queried the German. "I mustn't belate."

　　Levin did not answer him, but walked out himself with his wife.

　　"Well, what have you to say to me?" he said to her in French.

　　He did not look her in the face, and did not care to see that shein her condition was trembling all over, and had a piteous,crushed look.

　　"I...I want to say that we can't go on like this; that thisis misery..." she said.

　　"The servants are here at the sideboard," he said angrily; "don'tmake a scene."

　　"Well, let's go in here!"

　　They were standing in the passage. Kitty would have gone intothe next room, but there the English governess was giving Tanya alesson.

　　"Well, come into the garden."

　　In the garden they came upon a peasant weeding the path. And nolonger considering that the peasant could see her tear-stainedand his agitated face, that they looked like people fleeing fromsome disaster, they went on with rapid steps, feeling that theymust speak out and clear up misunderstandings, must be alonetogether, and so get rid of the misery they were both feeling.

　　"We can't go on like this! It's misery! I am wretched; you arewretched. What for?" she said, when they had at last reached asolitary garden seat at a turn in the lime tree avenue.

　　"But tell me one thing: was there in his tone anything unseemly,not nice, humiliatingly horrible?" he said, standing before heragain in the same position with his clenched fists on his chest,as he had stood before her that night.

　　"Yes," she said in a shaking voice; "but, Kostya, surely you seeI'm not to blame? All the morning I've been trying to take atone...but such people ...Why did he come? How happy we were!"she said, breathless with the sobs that shook her.

　　Although nothing had been pursuing them, and there was nothing torun away from, and they could not possibly have found anythingvery delightful on that garden seat, the gardener saw withastonishment that they passed him on their way home withcomforted and radiant faces.