Part Three: Chapter 22

by Leo Tolstoy

　　It was six o'clock already, and so, in order to be there quickly,and at the same time not to drive with his own horses, known toeveryone, Vronsky got into Yashvin's hired fly, and told thedriver to drive as quickly as possible. It was a roomy,old-fashioned fly, with seats for four. He sat in one corner,stretched his legs out on the front seat, and sank intomeditation.

　　A vague sense of the order into which his affairs had beenbrought, a vague recollection of the friendliness and flattery ofSerpuhovskoy, who had considered him a man that was needed, andmost of all, the anticipation of the interview before him--allblended into a general, joyous sense of life. This feeling wasso strong that he could not help smiling. He dropped his legs,crossed one leg over the other knee, and taking it in his hand,felt the springy muscle of the calf, where it had been grazed theday before by his fall, and leaning back he drew several deepbreaths.

　　"I'm happy, very happy!" he said to himself. He had often beforehad this sense of physical joy in his own body, but he had neverfelt so fond of himself, of his own body, as at that moment. Heenjoyed the slight ache in his strong leg, he enjoyed themuscular sensation of movement in his chest as he breathed. Thebright, cold August day, which had made Anna feel so hopeless,seemed to him keenly stimulating, and refreshed his face and neckthat still tingled from the cold water. The scent ofbrilliantine on his whiskers struck him as particularly pleasantin the fresh air. Everything he saw from the carriage window,everything in that cold pure air, in the pale light of thesunset, was as fresh, and gay, and strong as he was himself: theroofs of the houses shining in the rays of the setting sun, thesharp outlines of fences and angles of buildings, the figures ofpassers-by, the carriages that met him now and then, themotionless green of the trees and grass, the fields with evenlydrawn furrows of potatoes, and the slanting shadows that fellfrom the houses, and trees, and bushes, and even from the rows ofpotatoes--everything was bright like a pretty landscape justfinished and freshly varnished.

　　"Get on, get on!" he said to the driver, putting his head out ofthe window, and pulling a three-rouble note out of his pocket hehanded it to the man as he looked round. The driver's handfumbled with something at the lamp, the whip cracked, and thecarriage rolled rapidly along the smooth highroad.

　　"I want nothing, nothing but this happiness," he thought,staring at the bone button of the bell in the space between thewindows, and picturing to himself Anna just as he had seen herlast time. "And as I go on, I love her more and more. Here'sthe garden of the Vrede Villa. Whereabouts will she be? Where?How? Why did she fix on this place to meet me, and why does shewrite in Betsy's letter?" he thought, wondering now for the firsttime at it. But there was now no time for wonder. He called tothe driver to stop before reaching the avenue, and opening thedoor, jumped out of the carriage as it was moving, and went intothe avenue that led up to the house. There was no one in theavenue; but looking round to the right he caught sight of her.Her face was hidden by a veil, but he drank in with glad eyes thespecial movement in walking, peculiar to her alone, the slope ofthe shoulders, and the setting of the head, and at once a sort ofelectric shock ran all over him. With fresh force, he feltconscious of himself from the springy motions of his legs to themovements of his lungs as he breathed, and something set his lipstwitching.

　　Joining him, she pressed his hand tightly.

　　"You're not angry that I sent for you? I absolutely had to seeyou," she said; and the serious and set line of her lips, whichhe saw under the veil, transformed his mood at once.

　　"I angry! But how have you come, where from?"

　　"Never mind," she said, laying her hand on his, "come along, Imust talk to you."

　　He saw that something had happened, and that the interview wouldnot be a joyous one. In her presence he had no will of his own:without knowing the grounds of her distress, he already felt thesame distress unconsciously passing over him.

　　"What is it? what?" he asked her, squeezing her hand with hiselbow, and trying to read her thoughts in her face.

　　She walked on a few steps in silence, gathering up her courage;then suddenly she stopped.

　　"I did not tell you yesterday," she began, breathing quickly andpainfully, "that coming home with Alexey Alexandrovitch I toldhim everything...told him I could not be his wife, that...andtold him everything."

　　He heard her, unconsciously bending his whole figure down to heras though hoping in this way to soften the hardness of herposition for her. But directly she had said this he suddenlydrew himself up, and a proud and hard expression came over hisface.

　　"Yes, yes, that's better, a thousand times better! I know howpainful it was," he said. But she was not listening to hiswords, she was reading his thoughts from the expression of hisface. She could not guess that that expression arose from thefirst idea that presented itself to Vronsky--that a duel was nowinevitable. The idea of a duel had never crossed her mind, andso she put a different interpretation on this passing expressionof hardness.

　　When she got her husband's letter, she knew then at the bottom ofher heart that everything would go on in the old way, that shewould not have the strength of will to forego her position, toabandon her son, and to join her lover. The morning spent atPrincess Tverskaya's had confirmed her still more in this. Butthis interview was still of the utmost gravity for her. Shehoped that this interview would transform her position, and saveher. If on hearing this news he were to say to her resolutely,passionately, without an instant's wavering: "Throw up everythingand come with me!" she would give up her son and go away withhim. But this news had not produced what she had expected inhim; he simply seemed as though he were resenting some affront.

　　"It was not in the least painful to me. It happened of itself,"she said irritably; "and see..." she pulled her husband's letterout of her glove.

　　"I understand, I understand," he interrupted her, taking theletter, but not reading it, and trying to soothe her. "The onething I longed for, the one thing I prayed for, was to cutshort this position, so as to devote my life to your happiness."

　　"Why do you tell me that?" she said. "Do you suppose I can doubtit? If I doubted..."

　　"Who's that coming?" said Vronsky suddenly, pointing to twoladies walking towards them. "Perhaps they know us!" and hehurriedly turned off, drawing her after him into a side path.

　　"Oh, I don't care!" she said. Her lips were quivering. And hefancied that her eyes looked with strange fury at him from underthe veil. "I tell you that's not the point--I can't doubt that;but see what he writes to me. Read it." She stood still again.

　　Again, just as at the first moment of hearing of her rupture withher husband, Vronsky, on reading the letter, was unconsciouslycarried away by the natural sensation aroused in him by his ownrelation to the betrayed husband. Now while he held his letterin his hands, he could not help picturing the challenge, which hewould most likely find at home today or tomorrow, and the duelitself in which, with the same cold and haughty expression thathis face was assuming at this moment he would await the injuredhusband's shot, after having himself fired into the air. And atthat instant there flashed across his mind the thought of whatSerpuhovskoy had just said to him, and what he had himself beenthinking in the morning--that it was better not to bind himself--and he knew that this thought he could not tell her.

　　Having read the letter, he raised his eyes to her, and there wasno determination in them. She saw at once that he had beenthinking about it before by himself. She knew that whatever hemight say to her, he would not say all he thought. And she knewthat her last hope had failed her. This was not what she hadbeen reckoning on.

　　"You see the sort of man he is," she said, with a shaking voice;"he..."

　　"Forgive me, but I rejoice at it," Vronsky interrupted. "ForGod's sake, let me finish!" he added, his eyes imploring her togive him time to explain his words. "I rejoice, because thingscannot, cannot possibly remain as he supposes."

　　"Why can't they?" Anna said, restraining her tears, and obviouslyattaching no sort of consequence to what he said. She felt thather fate was sealed.

　　Vronsky meant that after the duel--inevitable, he thought--things could not go on as before, but he said somethingdifferent.

　　"It can't go on. I hope that now you will leave him. I hope"--he was confused, and reddened--"that you will let me arrange andplan our life. Tomorrow..." he was beginning.

　　She did not let him go on.

　　"But my child!" she shrieked. "You see what he writes! I shouldhave to leave him, and I can't and won't do that."

　　"But, for God's sake, which is better?--leave your child, orkeep up this degrading position?"

　　"To whom is it degrading?"

　　"To all, and most of all to you."

　　"You say degrading...don't say that. Those words have no meaningfor me," she said in a shaking voice. She did not want him nowto say what was untrue. She had nothing left her but his love,and she wanted to love him. "Don't you understand that from theday I loved you everything has changed for me? For me there isone thing, and one thing only--your love. If that's mine, Ifeel so exalted, so strong, that nothing can be humiliating tome. I am proud of my position, because...proud of being...proud...." She could not say what she was proud of. Tears ofshame and despair choked her utterance. She stood still andsobbed.

　　He felt, too, something swelling in his throat and twitching inhis nose, and for the first time in his life he felt on the pointof weeping. He could not have said exactly what it was touchedhim so. He felt sorry for her, and he felt he could not helpher, and with that he knew that he was to blame for herwretchedness, and that he had done something wrong.

　　"Is not a divorce possible?" he said feebly. She shook her head,not answering. "Couldn't you take your son, and still leavehim?"

　　"Yes; but it all depends on him. Now I must go to him," shesaid shortly. Her presentiment that all would again go on in theold way had not deceived her.

　　"On Tuesday I shall be in Petersburg, and everything can besettled."

　　"Yes," she said. "But don't let us talk any more of it."

　　Anna's carriage, which she had sent away, and ordered to comeback to the little gate of the Vrede garden, drove up. Anna saidgood-bye to Vronsky, and drove home.