cast a stone at Anna, but would come simply and naturally to see her.
On the next day he called on her, and, finding her alone, he openly expressed his desire.
"You know, Alekseï, how fond I am of you," replied Varia, after hearing what he had to say, "and how willing I am to do anything for you; but if I kept silent, it is because I know that I cannot be of the least use to you and Anna Arkadyevna." She took special pains to use the two names. "Please don't think that I judge her—not at all; perhaps I should have done the same thing in her place. I cannot enter into details," she added, glancing timidly up at his clouded face; "but we must call things by their right name. You would like me to go and see her, and then have her visit me, in order to restore her to society. But you must know I cannot do it. My daughters are growing up; I am obliged, on my husband's account, to go into society. Now, I will go and call on Anna Arkadyevna; but she knows that I cannot invite her here lest she should meet in my drawing-room people who do not think as I do, and that would wound her. I cannot receive her." ....
"But I do not admit that she has fallen lower than hundreds of women whom you receive," interrupted Vronsky, rising, and seeing that his sister-in-law's decision was irrevocable.
"Alekseï, don't be angry with me; please understand, it is not my fault," said Varia, looking at him with a timid smile.
"I am not angry with you, but I suffer doubly," said he, growing more and more gloomy. "I suffer because this breaks our friendship, or, at least, seriously impairs it; for you must know that for me this could not be otherwise."
He left her with these words.
Vronsky understood that further experiments would be idle, and that, during the few days he would still have to spend in Petersburg, he must act as if he were in a foreign city, avoiding all dealings with his former
