Anna Karenina (Dole)/Part One/Chapter 14
CHAPTER XIV
At this instant the princess entered. Apprehension was pictured on her face when she saw their agitated faces and that they had been alone. Levin bowed low, and did not speak. Kitty was silent, and did not raise her eyes. "Thank God, she has refused him!" thought the mother; and her face lighted up with the smile with which she always received her Thursday guests. She sat down, and began to ask Levin questions about his life in the country. He also sat down, hoping to escape unobserved when the guests began to arrive.
Five minutes later, one of Kitty's friends, who had been married the winter before, was announced,—the Countess Nordstone. She was a dried-up, sallow, nervous, sickly woman, with brilliant black eyes. She was fond of Kitty, and her affection, like that of every married woman for a young girl, was expressed by a keen desire to have her married in accordance with her own ideal of conjugal happiness. She wanted to marry her to Vronsky. Levin, whom she had often met at the Shcherbatskys' the first of the winter, was always distasteful to her, and her favorite occupation, after she had met him in society, was to make sport of him.
"I am enchanted," she said, "when he looks down on me from his loftiness; either he fails to honor me with his learned conversation because I am too silly for him, or else he treats me condescendingly. I like this; condescending to me! I am very glad that he cannot endure me."
She was right, because the fact was that Levin could not endure her, and he despised her for being proud of what she regarded as a merit,—her nervous temperament, her indifference and delicate scorn for all that seemed to her gross and material.
The relationship between Levin and the Countess Nordstone was such as is often met with in society where two persons, friends in outward appearance, despise each other to such a degree that they cannot hold a serious conversation, or even clash with each other.
The Countess Nordstone instantly addressed herself to Levin:—
"Ah, Konstantin Dmitrievitch! are you back again in our abominable Babylon?" said she, giving him her little yellow hand, and recalling his own words at the beginning of the winter when he said Moscow was a Babylon. "Is Babylon converted, or have you been corrupted?" she added, with a mocking smile in Kitty's direction.
"I am greatly flattered, countess, that you remember my words so well," replied Levin, who, having had time to collect his thoughts, instantly entered into the facetiously hostile tone peculiar to his relations with the Countess Nordstone. "It seems that they have made a very deep impression on you."
"Akh! how so? But I always make notes. Well! how is it, Kitty, have you been skating to-day?" ....
And she began to talk with her young friend.
Awkward as it was in him to take his departure now, Levin preferred to commit this breach of etiquette rather than remain through the evening, and to see Kitty, who occasionally looked at him, though she avoided his eyes. He attempted to get up; but the princess, noticing that he had nothing to say, addressed him directly:—
"Do you intend to remain long in Moscow? You are justice of the peace in your district, are you not? and I suppose that will prevent you from making a long stay."
"No, princess, I have resigned that office," he said. "I have come to stay several days."
"Something has happened to him," thought the Countess Nordstone, as she saw Levin's stern and serious face, "because he does not launch out into his usual tirades; but I'll soon draw him out. Nothing amuses me more than to make him ridiculous before Kitty, and I'll do it."
"Konstantin Dmitritch," she said to him, "explain to me, please, what this means, for you know all about it: at our estate in Kaluga all the muzhiks and their wives have drunk up everything they had, and don't pay what they owe us. You are always praising the muzhiks; what does this mean?"
At this moment another lady came in, and Levin arose.
"Excuse me, countess, I know nothing at all about it, and I cannot answer your question," said he, looking at an officer who entered at the same time with the lady.
"That must be Vronsky," he thought, and to confirm his surmise he glanced at Kitty. She had already had time to perceive Vronsky, and she was looking at Levin. When he saw the young girl's involuntarily brightening eyes, Levin saw that she loved that man, he saw it as clearly as if she herself had confessed it to him. But what sort of a man was he?
Now—whether it was wise or foolish—Levin could not help remaining; he must find out for himself what sort of a man it was that she loved.
There are men who, on meeting a fortunate rival, are immediately disposed to deny that there is any good in him and see only evil in him; others, on the contrary, endeavor to discover nothing but the merits that have won him his success, and with sore hearts to attribute to him nothing but good. Levin belonged to the latter class. It was not hard for him to discover what amiable and attractive qualities Vronsky possessed. They were apparent at a glance. He was dark, of medium stature, and well proportioned; his face was handsome, calm, and friendly; everything about his person, from his black, short-cut hair, and his freshly shaven chin, to his new, well-fitting uniform, was simple and perfectly elegant. Vronsky allowed the lady to pass before him, then he approached the princess, and finally came to Kitty. As he drew near her, his beautiful eyes shone with deeper tenderness, and with a smile expressive of joy mingled with triumph,—so it seemed to Levin,—he bowed respectfully and with dignity and offered her his small, wide hand. After greeting them all and speaking a few words, he sat down without having seen Levin, who never once took his eyes from him.
"Allow me to make you acquainted," said the princess, turning to Levin: "Konstantin Dmitrievitch Levin, Count Alekseï Kirillovitch Vronsky."
Vronsky arose, and, with a friendly look into Levin's eyes, shook hands with him.
"It seems," said he, with his frank and pleasant smile, "that I was to have had the honor of dining with you this winter; but you went off unexpectedly to the country."
"Konstantin Dmitritch despises and shuns the city, and us, its denizens," said the Countess Nordstone.
"It must be that my words impress you deeply, since you remember them so well," said Levin; and, perceiving that he had already made this remark, he grew red in the face.
Vronsky looked at Levin and the countess, and smiled.
"So, then, you always live in the country?" he asked. "I should think it would be tiresome in winter."
"Not if one has enough to do; besides, one does not get tired of himself," said Levin, sharply.
"I like the country," said Vronsky, noticing Levin's tone and appearing not to notice it.
"But, count, I hope you would not consent to live always in the country," said the Countess Nordstone.
"I don't know; I never made a long stay, but I once felt a strange sensation," he added. "Never have I so eagerly longed for the country, the real Russian country with its bast shoes and its muzhiks, as during the winter that I spent at Nice with my mother. Nice, you know, is melancholy anyway; and Naples, Sorrento, are pleasant only for a short time. There it is that one remembers Russia most tenderly, and especially the country. They are almost as .... "
He spoke, now addressing Kitty, now Levin, turning his calm and friendly eyes from one to the other, and he evidently said whatever came into his head.
Noticing that the Countess Nordstone wanted to say something, he stopped, without finishing his phrase, and began to listen to her attentively.
The conversation did not languish a single instant, so that the old princess, who always had in reserve two heavy guns, in case there needed to be a change in the conversation,—namely, classic and scientific education, and the general compulsory conscription,—had no need to bring them out, and the Countess Nordstone did not even have a chance to rally Levin.
Levin wanted to join in the general conversation, but was unable. He kept saying to himself, "Now, I'll go;" and still he waited as if he expected something.
The conversation turned on table-tipping and spirits; and the Countess Nordstone, who was a believer in spiritism, began to relate the marvels that she had seen.
"Akh, countess! in the name of Heaven, take me to see them. I never yet saw anything extraordinary, anxious as I have always been," said Vronsky, smiling.
"Good; next Saturday," replied the countess. "But you, Konstantin Dmitritch, do you believe in it?" she asked of Levin.
"Why do you ask me? You know perfectly well what I shall say."
"Because I wanted to hear your opinion."
"My opinion is simply this," replied Levin: "that table-tipping proves that so-called cultivated society is scarcely more advanced than the muzhiks; they believe in the evil eye, in casting lots, in sorceries, while we .... "
"That means that you don't believe in it?"
"I cannot believe in it, countess."
"But if I myself have seen these things?"
"The peasant women also say that they have seen the Domovoï.[1]
"Then, you think that I do not tell the truth?"
And she broke into an unpleasant laugh.
"But no, Masha. Konstantin Dmitritch simply says that he cannot believe in spiritism," said Kitty, blushing for Levin; and Levin understood her, and, growing still more irritated, was about to reply; but Vronsky instantly came to the rescue, and with a gentle smile brought back the conversation, which threatened to go beyond the bounds of politeness.
"Do not you admit at all the possibility of its being true?" he asked. "Why not? We willingly admit the existence of electricity, which we do not understand. Why should there not exist a new force, as yet unknown, which .... "
"When electricity was discovered," interrupted Levin, eagerly, "only its phenomena had been seen, and it was not known what produced them, or whence they arose; and centuries passed before people dreamed of making application of it. Spiritualists, on the other hand, have begun by making tables write, and by summoning spirits to them, and it is only afterward they began to say it is an unknown force."
Vronsky listened attentively, as he always listened, and was evidently interested in Levin's words.
"Yes; but the spiritualists say, 'We do not yet know what this force is, but it is a force, and acts under certain conditions.' Let the scientists find out what it is. I don't see why it may not be a new force if it .... "
"Because," interrupted Levin again, "every time you rub resin with wool, you produce a certain and invariable electrical phenomenon; while spiritism brings no such invariable result, and so it cannot be a natural phenomenon."
Vronsky, evidently perceiving that the conversation was growing too serious for a reception, made no reply; and, in order to make a diversion, smiled gayly, and addressing the ladies said:—
"Countess, let us make the experiment now?"
But Levin wanted to finish saying what was in his mind:—
"I think," he continued, "that the attempts made by spiritual mediums to explain their miracles by a new medium is most abortive. They claim that it is a supernatural force, and yet they want to submit it to a material test."
All were waiting for him to come to an end, and he felt it.
"And I think that you would be a capital medium," said the Countess Nordstone. "There is something so enthusiastic about you!"
Levin opened his mouth to speak, but he said nothing, and turned red.
"Come, let us give the tables a trial," said Vronsky; "with your permission, princess." And Vronsky rose, and looked for a small table.
Kitty was standing by a table, and her eyes met Levin's. Her whole soul pitied him, because she felt that she was the cause of his pain. Her look said, "Forgive me, if you can, I am so happy."
And his look replied, "I hate the whole world,—you and myself." And he took up his hat.
But it was not his fate to go. The guests were just taking their places around the table, and he was on the point of starting, when the old prince entered, and, after greeting the ladies, went straight to Levin.
"Ah!" he cried joyfully. "What a stranger! I did not know that you were here. Very glad to see you!"
In speaking to Levin the prince sometimes used the familiar tui, thou, and sometimes the formal vui, you. He took him by the arm, and, while conversing with him, gave no notice to Vronsky, who stood waiting patiently for the prince to speak to him.
Kitty felt that her father's friendliness must be hard for Levin after what had happened. She also noticed how coldly her father at last acknowledged Vronsky's bow, and how Vronsky looked at her father, with good-humored perplexity striving in vain to make out what this icy reception meant, and she blushed.
"Prince, let us have Konstantin Dmitritch," said the Countess Nordstone. "We want to try an experiment."
"What sort of an experiment? table-tipping? Well! excuse me, ladies and gentlemen, but, in my opinion, grace-hoops[2] would be a better game," said the prince, looking at Vronsky, whom he took to be the originator of this sport. "At least there's some sense in grace-hoops."
Vronsky, astonished, turned his steady eyes upon the old prince, and, slightly smiling, began to talk with the Countess Nordstone about the arrangements for a great ball to be given the following week.
"I hope that you will be there," said he, turning to Kitty.
As soon as the old prince turned from him Levin made his escape; and the last impression which he bore away from this reception was Kitty's happy, smiling face, answering Vronsky's question in regard to the ball.