Anna Karenina (Dole)/Part Seven/Chapter 20
CHAPTER XX
For Moscow, in spite of its cafés-chantants, and its omnibuses, was still only a stagnant marsh. Stepan Arkadyevitch always felt that this was so. Living in Moscow, especially in proximity to his family, he was conscious that his spirit flagged. When his life in Moscow was long unbroken by a trip to Petersburg, he even began to be annoyed by his wife's bad temper and reproaches, and to worry over his health, the education of his children, and the petty details of the household. He even went so far as to be disturbed about his debts.
As soon as he set foot in Petersburg, and entered that circle where life was really life, and not vegetating, as in Moscow, immediately all such thoughts disappeared like wax in the fire.
His wife? .... He had just been talking with Prince Chetchensky. Prince Chetchensky had a wife and family,—grown-up boys, pages now; and he had another establishment, outside the law, and in this also there were children. But, though the first family was well enough in its way. Prince Chetchensky felt happier with his second family; and he had introduced his oldest legitimate son into his other family; he told Stepan Arkadyevitch he considered it a good way to train him and develop him. What would have been said about that in Moscow?
Children? In Petersburg, fathers did n't trouble themselves with their children. Children were educated in institutions, and there was no sign of that crazy notion in vogue in Moscow—Lvof shared in it—that children should have all the luxuries, and their parents nothing but care and trouble.
The government service? The service, too, was not that tiresome, hopeless treadmill that it was in Moscow. Here there was interest in the service. Meetings with men in authority, mutual services, opportune words spoken, the knowledge of how to take advantage of chances—and a man might suddenly find himself high in his career, like Brianzef, whom Stepan Arkadyevitch met that evening, and who was now a leading dignitary Yes, there was something interesting in the service here.
The Petersburg views about money especially appealed to Stepan Arkadyevitch.
Bartnyansky, who now spent at least fifty thousand rubles, judging by the rate at which he was living, made a remark which deeply impressed him. Just before dinner, as they were talking together, Stepan Arkadyevitch had said:—
"You seem to have some connection with Mordvinsky. You might do me a favor; please say a little word to him in my behalf. It is a place which I should like to have, member of the commission." ....
"Well, I won't forget Only what pleasure can you have in attending to this railroad business with the Jews?.... Of course, if you want it; but still it's a wretched business."
Stepan Arkadyevitch did not say to him that it was "no sinecure." Bartnyansky would not have known what he meant.
"I need money; I must have something to live on."
"But don't you live, then?"
"Yes, but in debt."
"Much?" asked Bartnyansky, sympathetically.
"Yes; twenty thousand rubles."
Bartnyansky broke out into a gay laugh.
"Oh, happy man! I have a million and a half of debts, and not a ruble; and, as you see, I live all the same."
And Stepan Arkadyevitch saw that this was not mere words, but was actually true. Zhivakhof was in debt three hundred thousand, and had not a kopek. Petrovsky had spent five millions, and yet he went on living just as before, and had charge of the finances, and had only twenty thousand salary.
Petersburg had a delightful physical influence on Stepan Arkadyevitch. It made him feel younger. In Moscow he sometimes detected gray hairs, he would fall asleep after dinner, it made him breathe hard to go up-stairs, he was dull in the company of young women, he no longer danced at balls.At Petersburg he experienced what the sixty-year-old Prince Piotr Oblonsky, who had just returned from abroad, told him one evening:—
"We don't know how to live here," said Piotr Oblonsky. "For example, I spent the summer at Baden, and now, honestly, I feel like a new man. I see a young woman, and.... I enjoy my dinner, I can take my wine; I'm well and vigorous. When I come back to Russia, I have to see my wife, have even to go into the country. You wouldn't believe it, but in a couple of weeks I am in my dressing-gown. Good-by to the young beauties. I am old, think only of the salvation of my soul. To make me over, I go to Paris."
Stepan Arkadyevitch felt the same difference as Piotr Oblonsky did. In Moscow he reached such a low ebb of vitality that he felt sure that, if he ever attained the same age, he too should be driven to thinking about the salvation of his soul; in Petersburg he was conscious of being a well-regulated man.
Between the Princess Betsy Tversky and Stepan Arkadyevitch there had been for a long time a very strange relationship. He always jested with her, and he always said very improper things by way of jest, knowing that they pleased her more than anything else. The day after his interview with Karenin, Stepan Arkadyevitch went to see her; and, feeling particularly young, he conducted himself with more than his usual levity; and went so far in his impropriety that he could not retrieve his steps, and, unfortunately, he felt that she was not only displeased, but was even opposed to him. Yet this tone had been established because it generally amused her. So he was glad to have the Princess Miagkaya interrupt their tête-à-tête.
"Ah, here you are!" said she, when she saw him. "Well! and how is your poor sister? Do not look at me so. Since women who are a thousand times worse than she throw stones at her, I think she did quite right. I can't forgive Vronsky for not letting me know that she was in Petersburg. I should have gone to see her, and gone with her everywhere. Give her my love. Now tell me about her." "Well! her position is a very painful one; she...." Stepan Arkadyevitch began, in the simplicity of his heart, taking the princess's words as genuine money, when she said, "Tell me about your sister." But the princess, in her usual way, interrupted him, and began to talk herself. "She did what everybody but myself does and hides. But she was not willing to lie, and she did right; and she has at least bettered herself in having forsaken that imbecile,—I beg your pardon,—your brother-in-law. Everybody said he was a genius. A genius! I was the only one who said he was a goose; and people have come to be of my opinion, now that he has taken up with the Countess Lidia and Landau. I should like not to agree with everybody .... it's stupid; but this time I can't help it."
"Now please explain something to me," said Stepan Arkadyevitch. "What does this mean? Yesterday I was at his house, talking of the divorce, and I asked him for a definite answer; my brother-in-law said to me that he could not give me an answer without reflection; and this morning I received an invitation from Lidia Ivanovna for this evening instead of an answer."
"Now! That's just it!" cried the princess, delighted. "They will consult Landau as to what to say."
"Why Landau? who is Landau?"
"What! you don't know Jules Landau.... le fameux Jules Landau, le clairvoyant? He also in my opinion is an imbecile, but on him depends your sister's fate. That's what comes of living in the provinces. Landau, you must know, was commis of a mercantile house at Paris, and went to see a doctor. He fell asleep in the waiting-room, and, while he was asleep, gave advice to all the sick .... most astonishing advice. Then Yuri Melyedinsky's wife—you know he was sick—called him to see her husband. He treated her husband. In my opinion, he did n't do him any good, for Melyedinsky is just as sick as he was before; but his wife and he believe in Landau. They took him into their house, and they brought him to Russia. Naturally, people here have thrown themselves at him. He treats everybody. He cured the Countess Bezzubof, and she fell so in love with him that she has adopted him."
"How! adopted him?"
"Yes, adopted him. He is n't Landau any more, but Count Bezzubof. But Lidia—and I like her very much, in spite of her crankiness—must needs be smitten with him; and nothing that she and Alekseï Aleksandrovitch take up is decided without consulting him. Your sister's fate is, therefore, in the hands of this Count Bezzubof, alias Landau."