Anna Karenina (Dole)/Part Five/Chapter 28
CHAPTER XXVIII
When Vronsky and Anna reached Petersburg, they stopped at one of the best hotels. Vronsky had a room to himself on the ground floor; Anna, up one flight of stairs, with her baby, the nurse, and her maid, occupied a suite of four rooms.
On the day of his return, Vronsky went to see his brother; he there found his mother, who had come down from Moscow on business. His mother and sister-in-law received him as usual, asked him about his travels, spoke of common friends, but not by a word did they make any allusion to Anna. His brother, however, who returned his call the next morning, asked him about her and Alekseï. Vronsky declared in no equivocal terms that he considered the bond which united him to Madame Karenin the same as marriage, that he hoped a divorce would be obtained, and then he should marry her, but till that time, he should regard her the same as his wife; and he asked him to explain this to his mother and sister-in-law.
"The world may not approve of me; that is all one to me," he added; "but if my family wish to remain on good terms with me, they must show proper respect for my wife."
The elder brother, always very respectful of his brother's opinions, was not very certain in his own mind whether he was doing right or not, and resolved to let society settle this question; but, as far as he himself was concerned, he saw nothing objectionable in this, and he went with Alekseï to call on Anna.
Vronsky spoke to Anna with the formal vui, you, as he always did before strangers, and treated her as a mere acquaintance; but it was perfectly understood that the brother knew of their relations, and they spoke freely of Anna's visit to Vronsky's estate.
Notwithstanding his experience in society, Vronsky, in consequence of this new state of things, fell into a strange error. It would seem as if he ought to have understood that society would shut its doors on him and Anna; but now he persuaded himself by a strange freak of imagination that, however it might have been in former days, now, owing to the rapid progress made by society,—and he had himself unconsciously become a strong supporter of progress,—prejudices would have melted away, and the question whether they would be received by society would not trouble them.
"Of course, she would not be received at court," he thought; "but our relatives, our friends, will understand things as they are."
A man may sit for some time with his legs doubled up in one position, provided he knows that he can change it at pleasure; but if he knows that he must sit in such a constrained position, then he will feel cramped, and his legs will twitch and stretch out toward the desired freedom. Vronsky experienced this in regard to society. Though he knew in the bottom of his soul that society was closed to them, he made experiment whether it had changed, and whether it would receive them but he quickly found that, even if it were open to him personally, it was closed to Anna. As in the game of "Cat-and-Mouse,"[1] the hands raised for him immediately fell before Anna.
One of the first ladies of Petersburg society whom he met was his cousin Betsy.
"At last?" she cried joyously, "and Anna!" How glad I am! Where are you stopping? I can easily imagine the hideous effect our Petersburg must have on you after such a charming journey! I can imagine your honeymoon in Rome! And the divorce? is it arranged?"
Vronsky saw that Betsy's enthusiasm - cooled when she learned that there was no divorce as yet.
"I know well that I shall be stoned," said she; "but I am coming to see Anna. Yes, I will certainly come. You won't stay here long, I imagine?"
In fact she called on Anna that very day; but her manner was entirely different from what it used to be. She evidently prided herself on her courage, and wanted Anna to appreciate the genuineness of her friendship. After talking for about ten minutes on the news of the day, she got up, and said as she went away:—
"You have not told me yet when the divorce is to be. Though I may disregard the proprieties,[2] stiff-necked people will give you the cold shoulder as long as you are not married. And it is so easy nowadays. Ça se fait. So you are going Friday? I am sorry we shall not see each other again,"
From Betsy's manner Vronsky might have got an idea of what he might expect from society. But he made still another experiment in his own family. He had no hope of any assistance from his mother. He knew well that, enthusiastic though she had been in Anna's praise at their first meeting, she would be relentless toward her now that she had spoiled her son's career; but Vronsky founded great hopes on Varia, his brother's wife. It seemed to him that she would not be one to 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 society friends so as not to be subjected to vexations and affronts which were so painful to him.
One of the most unpleasant features of his position in Petersburg was the fact that Alekseï Aleksandrovitch and his name seemed to be everywhere. It was impossible for a conversation to begin on any subject without turning on Alekseï Aleksandrovitch; it was impossible to go anywhere without meeting him. So, at least, it seemed to Vronsky; just as it seems to a man with a sore finger, that he is always hitting it against everything.
Their stay in Petersburg seemed to Vronsky still more trying because all the time he saw that Anna was in a strange, incomprehensible moral frame of mind such as he had never seen before. At one time she was more than usually affectionate; then again she would seem cold, irritable, and enigmatical. Something was tormenting her, and she was concealing something from him; and she seemed not to notice the indignities which poisoned his life, and which, in her delicacy of perception, should have been even more painful for her.