Anna Karenina (Dole)/Part Five/Chapter 24
CHAPTER XXIV
The congratulations were over. As the visitors who had met at court went away, they talked about the latest news of the day, the rewards that had been bestowed, and the changed positions of some high functionaries.
"What should you say if the Countess Marya Borisovna was made minister of war, and the Princess Vatkovskaya, chief of staff?" asked a little, gray-haired old man, in a gold-embroidered uniform, who was talking with a tall, handsome maid of honor about the recent changes.
"In that case, I should be made one of the emperor's aides," replied the freïlina.
"Your place is already settled. You are to have charge of the department of religions, and Karenin is to be your assistant."
"How do you do, prince?" said the little old man, shaking hands with some one who came along.
"Were you speaking of Karenin?" asked the prince.
"Yes; he and Putyatof have been decorated with the order of Alexander Nevsky."
"I thought he had it already."
"No; look at him," said the little old man, pointing with his gold-laced hat toward Karenin, who was standing in the doorway, talking with one of the influential members of the Imperial Council; he wore the court uniform, with his new red ribbon across his shoulder. "Happy and contented as a copper kopek!" he added, pausing to press the hand of a handsome, athletic chamberlain passing by.
"No; he has grown old," said the chamberlain.
"With cares. He spends all his time writing projects. He, the unfortunate man, will not let go until he has explained everything point by point."
"What, grown old? Il fait des passions. I think the Countess Lidia is jealous now of his wife."
"There! I beg of you not to speak ill of the Countess Lidia."
"Is there any harm in her being in love with Karenin?"
"Is it true that Madame Karenin is here?"
"Not here at the Palace, but in Petersburg. I met her yesterday with Alekseï Vronsky dras dessus, bras dessous, on the Morskaya."
"C'est un homme qui n'a pas"—began the chamberlain; but he broke short off to salute and make way for a member of the imperial family who was passing.
Thus they were talking about Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, criticizing and ridiculing him, while he himself was barring the way of the imperial counselor, and, without pausing in his explanations lest he should lose him, was giving a detailed exposition of a financial scheme.
Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, about the time his wife left him, had reached a situation painful for an official,—the culmination of his upward career. This culmination had been reached, and all clearly saw it, but Alekseï Aleksandrovitch himself was not yet aware that his career was ended. Either his collision with Stremof, or his trouble with his wife, or the simple fact that Alekseï Aleksiandrovitch had reached the limit that he had been destined to attain, the fact remained that every one saw clearly that his official race was run. He still held an important place; he was a member of many important committees and commissions: but he was one of those men of whom nothing more is expected; his day was over. Whatever he said, whatever he proposed seemed antiquated and useless. But Alekseï Aleksandrovitch himself did not realize this; on the contrary, now that he had ceased to have an active participation in the business of the administration, he saw more clearly than before the faults and mistakes that others were making, and considered it his duty to indicate certain reforms which should be introduced.
Shortly after his separation from his wife, he began to write his first pamphlet about the new tribunals, and proposed to follow it up with an endless series of similar pamphlets, of no earthly use, on all the different branches of the administration.
He not only did not realize his hopeless situation in the offcial world, and therefore did not lose heart, but more than ever he took dehght in his activity.
"He that is unmarried is careful for the things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord; but he that is married is careful for the things of the world, how he may please his wife," said the Apostle Paul. And Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, who now directed his life in all respects according to the Epistle, often quoted this text. It seemed to him that, since he had been deprived of his wife, he served the Lord more faithfully than ever by devotion to these projects.
The imperial counselor's very manifest impatience and desire to get away from him in no way abashed Karenin, but he stopped a moment as a prince of the imperial family was passing, and his victim seized his opportunity to escape.
Left to himself, Alekseï Aleksandrovitch bowed his head, tried to collect his thoughts, and, with an absent-minded glance about him, stepped toward the door, hoping to meet the countess there.
"How strong and healthy they look physically!" he said to himself, as he looked at the vigorous neck of the prince, who wore a close-fitting uniform, and the handsome chamberlain with his well-combed and perfumed side-whiskers. "It is only too true that all is evil in this world," he thought, as he looked at the chamberlain's sturdy legs. Moving slowly along, Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, with his customary appearance of weariness and dignity, came up to the gentlemen who had been talking about him, and, glancing through the door, he looked for the Countess Lidia Ivanovna.
"Ah! Alekseï Aleksandrovitch!" cried the little old man, with a wicked light glowing in his eyes, as Karenin passed him with a cold bow. "I have not yet congratulated you," and he pointed to the newly received ribbon.
"I thank you. This is fine day!" replied Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, accentuating the adjective prekrasny, as was his habit.
He knew that these gentlemen were making sport of him; but he expected nothing but hostile feelings, and he was accustomed to it.
Catching sight of the countess's yellow shoulders rising from her corsage, as she appeared at the door, and her beautiful pensive eyes, inviting him to join her, Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, with a smile which showed his even white teeth, went to her.
Lidia Ivanovna's toilet had cost her much labor, like all her recent efforts in this direction; for the object of her toilet was now entirely the reverse of that which she had followed thirty years before. Formerly she had thought only of adorning herself, and the more the better; now, on the contrary, she had to be adorned so unsuitably for her figure and her years that she simply endeavored to render the contrast between her person and her toilet not too frightful, and in Alekseï Aleksandrovitch's eyes she succeeded; he thought her fascinating. For him she, with her friendliness and even love for him, was the only island amid the sea of animosity and ridicule that surrounded him. As he was the gantlet of scornful glances, he was naturally drawn to her loving eyes like a plant toward the light.
"I congratulate you," she said, looking at his decoration.
Repressing a smile of satisfaction, Karenin shrugged his shoulders and half closed his eyes, as if to say that this was nothing to him.
The Countess Lidia Ivanovna knew well that these distinctions, even though he would not confess it, caused him the keenest pleasure.
"How is our angel?" she asked, referring to Serozha.
"I cannot say that I very am well satisfied with him," replied Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, lifting his eyebrows and opening his eyes. "And Sitnikof" (a pedagogue who had been intrusted with Serozha's childish education) "does not please him. As I told you, I find in him a certain apathy toward the chief questions which ought to move the soul of every man and of every child."
And Alekseï Aleksandrovitch began to discourse on a subject which, next to the questions of administration, gave him the most concern—his son's education.
When Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, with Lidia Ivanovna's aid, once more resumed his ordinary life and activity again, he felt it his duty to occupy himself with the education of the son who had been left on his hands. Having never before taken any practical interest in the question of education, Alekseï Aleksandrovitch consecrated some time to the practical study of the subject. After having read various works on anthropology, pedagogy, and didactics, he conceived a plan of education which the best tutor in Petersburg was then intrusted to put into practice. And this work constantly occupied him.
"Yes; but his heart? I find in this child his father's heart, and with such a heart he cannot be bad," said the countess, with enthusiasm.
"Well, that may be. So far as in me lies, I perform my duty; it is all that I can do."
"Will you come to my house?" asked the Countess Lidia Ivanovna, after a moment's silence. "I have a very painful matter to talk with you about. I would have given the world to spare you certain memories; others do not think the same. I have had a letter from her. She is here in Petersburg."
Alekseï Aleksandrovitch quivered at the recollection of his wife; but his face instantly assumed that expression of corpselike immobility that showed how absolutely unable he was to treat of such a subject.
"I expected it," he said.
The Countess Lidia Ivanovna looked at him with exaltation, and in the presence of a soul so great, tears of transport sprang to her eyes.