ding; Stepan Arkadyevitch advised him to go abroad. He consented to everything.
"Make whatever plans you please," he thought, "I am happy; and whatever you may decide on, my joy will be neither greater nor less."
But when he told Kitty of Stepan Arkadyevitch's suggestion about going abroad, he was surprised to see that she did not approve of it, and that she had her own very decided plans for the future. She knew that Levin's heart was at home in his work, and although she neither understood his affairs, nor tried to understand them, still they seemed to her very important; as their home would be in the country, she did not wish to go abroad where they were not going to live, but insisted on settling down in the country where their home was to be. This very firm determination surprised Levin; but as it seemed to him all right, he begged Stepan Arkadyevitch, who had excellent taste, to go to Pokrovsky and take charge of the improvements in his house. It seemed to him that that belonged to his friend's province.
"By the way," said Stepan Arkadyevitch one day, after his return from the country, where he had arranged everything for the young couple's reception, "have you your certificate of confession?"
"No; why?"
"You can't be married without it."
"Aï, aiï, aï!" cried Levin; "but it is nine years since I have been to confession! I hadn't even thought of it!"
"That is good!" said Stepan Arkadyevitch, laughing, "and you call me a nihilist! But that can't be allowed to go on; you must prepare for the sacrament!"
"When? there are only four days more!"
Stepan Arkadyevitch arranged this matter also, and Levin prepared for his devotions. For Levin as for any man who is an unbeliever, yet respects the faith of others, it was very hard to attend and participate in all religious ceremonies. Now in his tender and sentimental frame of mind, the necessity of dissimulating was not
