Anna Karenina (Literature Classics Series). Leo Tolstoy

      Chapter 23

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      ON Monday the usual meeting of the Committee of the Second of July took place. Karenin entered the Council room, greeted the members and the president as usual, and took his seat, his hand lying ready on the papers before him. Among these papers were the statistics that he needed and a draft of the statement he was going to make. But he did not really require the figures. He remembered them all and did not even consider it necessary to go over in his mind what he was going to say. He knew that when the time came, and he saw his opponent before him vainly trying to look indifferent, his speech would naturally be far more fluent and better than if he prepared it beforehand. He felt that the contents of his speech would be so important that every word would be significant. Yet as he listened to the general reports his face wore a most innocent and artless look. Looking at his white hands with the thick veins and the delicate long fingers toying with, the two edges of a white sheet of paper before him, and at his head wearily bent to one side, no one would have expected that words would flow from his lips which would raise a terrible storm and make the members shout each other down, forcing the president to call them to order. When the Reports had been heard, Karenin in his quiet thin voice informed the meeting that he wished to bring to their notice some considerations of his own on the question of the settlement of the native races, and the attention of the meeting turned to him. Karenin cleared his throat, and, as was his wont when making a speech, without looking at his opponent he fixed his eyes on the first man opposite him — a quiet little old man who never had any views in connection with the Special Committee — and began to explain his considerations. When he came to the Fundamental and Organic Law his opponent jumped up and began to raise objections. Stremov (who was also on the Special Committee), stung to the quick, began justifying himself, and the meeting became quite a stormy one. But Karenin triumphed and his motion was carried; three new Special Committees were formed, and the next day nothing was talked about in a certain Petersburg set but that meeting. Karenin’s success was even greater than he had expected.

      When he woke on the Tuesday morning he recalled with pleasure his victory of the previous day, and could not help smiling, even while wishing to appear indifferent, when the secretary, with a desire to flatter him, reported the rumours that had reached him concerning what had happened at the meeting.

      Busy with the secretary, Karenin quite forgot that it was Tuesday, the day fixed for Anna’s return, and was surprised and unpleasantly startled when the footman came in to inform him of her arrival.

      Anna returned to Petersburg early in the morning, and as she had wired that the carriage should be sent for her he might have expected her. But he did not come out to meet her when she arrived. She was told that he had not yet come out of his study, where he was busy with his secretary. She sent word to her husband that she had arrived and went to her boudoir, where she set to work sorting her things, expecting that he would come in to see her. But an hour passed and he did not come. She went down into the dining-room on a plea of giving orders and purposely spoke in a loud voice, thinking that he would come; but although she heard him go out of the study door to take leave of the secretary, he did not come to her. She knew that according to his habit he would soon go away to his work and she wished to see him first.

      She passed through the ballroom to his study and resolutely went in. When she entered he was sitting in his official uniform evidently ready to start, with his elbows on a little table, looking wearily in front of him. She saw him before he saw her and knew that he was thinking about her.

      When he saw her he was about to rise, but changed his mind as his face flushed — a thing Anna had never seen it do before. However, he quickly rose and came toward her looking not at her eyes but at her forehead and hair. He came up, took her hand, and asked her to sit down.

      ‘I am very glad you have come,’ he said, sitting down beside her. He evidently wished to say something, but faltered. Several times he tried to speak, but stopped. Although while preparing for this interview she had been teaching herself to despise and blame him, she did not know what to say, and pitied him. There was silence for some time.

      ‘Is Serezha well?’ he asked; and without waiting for a reply, he added, ‘I am not dining at home to-day and must be going at once.’

      ‘I meant to go away to Moscow,’ she said.

      ‘Oh no, you were quite right to come,’ he replied, and again became silent. Seeing that he had not the strength to begin, she began for him.

      ‘Alexis Alexandrovich!’ she said, studying his face and without dropping her eyes under his gaze fixed on her hair, ‘I am a guilty woman and a bad one, but I am what I was before, as I then told you. I have come to tell you now I cannot make any change.’

      ‘I am not questioning you about it,’ he replied suddenly in a firm tone and looking with hatred straight into her eyes. ‘I had expected it.’ Under the influence of anger he had evidently regained perfect self-possession. ‘But I repeat again what I then told you and subsequently wrote,’ he went on in a shrill thin voice, ‘I again repeat that I will not know it; I ignore it as long as it is not known to the rest of the world, as long as my name is not dishonoured. Therefore I warn you that our relations must remain what they have been, and that if you let yourself be compromised I shall be obliged to take measures to safeguard my honour.’

      ‘But our relations cannot be what they were before,’ Anna began in a timid voice, looking at him with frightened eyes.

      When she saw his quiet gestures, heard his shrill, childish, and sarcastic voice, her repulsion toward him destroyed the pity she had felt for him, and she now experienced nothing but fear and anxiety to clear up the situation at any cost.

      ‘I cannot be your wife, since I …’ she began.

      He laughed in a cruel, cold manner. ‘I suppose the kind of life you have chosen has affected your principles. I respect or despise both so much — I respect your past and despise your present — that the interpretation you give to my words was far from my thoughts!’

      Anna sighed and hung her head.

      ‘I cannot understand, however, that with your independent mind,’ he went on, getting heated, ‘informing your husband of your infidelity and appearing to see nothing unseemly in it, you should consider it unseemly to continue to fulfil a wife’s duties to your husband!’

      ‘Alexis Alexandrovich, what do you want of me?’

      ‘What I want, is not to meet that person here, and for you to behave in such a way that neither Society nor the servants shall be able to accuse you, — for you not to see that man. I think that is not much to ask! And in return you will enjoy all the advantages of a wife without fulfilling her duties. That is all I have to say! Now I must be going… . And I shan’t be back to dinner.’ He rose and went toward the door. Anna too rose. He stopped and let her pass first.