death. He knew also that many great and manly minds whose thoughts on this subject he had read had tried to fathom this mystery, but they had not seemed to know one hundredth part as much as his wife and his old nurse. Agafya Mikhaïlovna and Katya—as his brother called her, and he also now began to take pleasure in doing—had, in this respect, a perfect sympathy, though otherwise they were entirely opposite.
Both unquestionably knew what life meant and what death meant, and though they were of course incapable of answering or understanding the questions that presented themselves to Levin's mind, they not only had their own way of explaining these great facts of human existence, but they also shared their belief in this regard with millions of human beings. As a proof of their well-grounded knowledge of what death was, they without a second of doubt knew what to do for those who were dying, and felt no fear of them. While Levin and others, who could talk much about death, evidently knew nothing about it because they were afraid of it and actually had no notion what to do when men were dying. If Konstantin Levin had been alone now with his brother Nikolaï, he would have gazed with terror into his face, and with growing terror awaited his end with fear, and been able to think of nothing to do for him.
What was more, he did not know what to say, how to look, how to walk. To speak of indifferent things seemed unworthy, impossible; to speak of melancholy things, of death, was likewise impossible; to be silent was even worse.
"If I look at him, he will think that I am studying him, I fear; if I do not look at him, he will believe that my thoughts are elsewhere. To walk on tiptoe irritates him; to walk as usual seems brutal."
Kitty apparently did not think about herself, and she had not the time. Occupied only with the invalid, she seemed to have a clear idea of what to do; and she succeeded in her endeavor.
She related the circumstances of their marriage; she told about herself; she smiled on him; she caressed
