Anna Karenina

party; "the graces and the muses."
But Princess Betsy could not endure that tone of his-- "sneering," as she
called it, using the English word, and like a skillful hostess she at once
brought him into a serious conversation on the subject of universal
conscription. Alexey Alexandrovitch was immediately interested in the
subject, and began seriously defending the new imperial decree against
Princess Betsy, who had attacked it.
Vronsky and Anna still sat at the little table.
"This is getting indecorous," whispered one lady, with an expressive glance
at Madame Karenina, Vronsky, and her husband.
"What did I tell you?" said Anna's friend.
But not only those ladies, almost everyone in the room, even the Princess
Myakaya and Betsy herself, looked several times in the direction of the two
who had withdrawn from the general circle, as though that were a
disturbing fact. Alexey Alexandrovitch was the only person who did not
once look in that direction, and was not diverted from the interesting
discussion he had entered upon.
Noticing the disagreeable impression that was being made on everyone,
Princess Betsy slipped someone else into her place to listen to Alexey
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Alexandrovitch, and went up to Anna.
"I'm always amazed at the clearness and precision of your husband's
language," she said. "The most transcendental ideas seem to be within my
grasp when he's speaking."
"Oh, yes!" said Anna, radiant with a smile of happiness, and not
understanding a word of what Betsy had said. She crossed over to the big
table and took part in the general conversation.
Alexey Alexandrovitch, after staying half an hour, went up to his wife and
suggested that they should go home together. But she answered, not
looking at him, that she was staying to supper. Alexey Alexandrovitch
made his bows and withdrew.
The fat old Tatar, Madame Karenina's coachman, was with difficulty
holding one of her pair of grays, chilled with the cold and rearing at the
entrance. A footman stood opening the carriage door. The hall porter stood
holding open the great door of the house. Anna Arkadyevna, with her quick
little hand, was unfastening the lace of her sleeve, caught in the hook of her
fur cloak, and with bent head listening to the words Vronsky murmured as
he escorted her down.
"You've said nothing, of course, and I ask nothing," he was saying; "but
you know that friendship's not what I want: that there's only one happiness
in life for me, that word that you dislike so...yes, love!..."
"Love," she repeated slowly, in an inner voice, and suddenly, at the very
instant she unhooked the lace, she added, "Why I don't like the word is that
it means too much to me, far more than you can understand," and she
glanced into his face. "Au revoir!"
She gave him her hand, and with her rapid, springy step she passed by the
porter and vanished into the carriage.
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Her glance, the touch of her hand, set him aflame. He kissed the palm of his
hand where she had touched it, and went home, happy in the sense that he
had got nearer to the attainment of his aims that evening than during the
last two months.
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