lodging, to find there a messenger who had just come from Kitty, bringing him a letter.
I am perfectly well and happy, and if you fear lest I shall not be sufficiently cared for, you may be reassured. I have a new body-guard in the person of Marya Vlasyevna. [She was a midwife, a new and very important personage in Levin's family.] She came over to see me. She thinks I am wonderfully well, and we shall keep her till you get back. We are all well and happy, and if you are enjoying yourself and the hunting is good you may stay another day.
These two pleasures—his successful hunt and the letter from his wife—were so great, that they effaced from Levin's mind two less agreeable incidents. The first was the fact that his fast horse, who had apparently been overworked the evening before, refused to eat and was out of sorts. The coachman said that she was used up.
"They abused her last evening, Konstantin Dmitritch," said he. "The idea! They drove her ten versts at full speed!"
The second unpleasantness, which for the first moment put an end to his happy frame of mind, but which afterward caused him no end of amusement, arose from the fact that not a thing was left for him from all the abundant store of provisions which Kitty had put up for them, and which it seemed ought to have lasted them a whole week. As he returned from his long and weary tramp. Levin had indulged his imagination in certain tarts, so that when he entered the izba he actually felt the taste of them in his mouth just as Laska scented the game, and he immediately ordered Filipp to serve them to him. It then transpired that not only the tarts, but all the cold chicken, had disappeared.
"There! talk of appetites," said Stepan Arkadyevitch, laughing and nodding at Vasenka Veslovsky; "I cannot complain of mine, but this is marvelous."
"Well! what shall I do?" cried Levin, glowering at Veslovsky. "Filipp, give me some cold beef."
"Beef's all gone and the dogs have got the bones!" replied Filipp.
