Anna Karenina (Dole)/Part Two/Chapter 27
CHAPTER XXVII
Anna was in her room standing before a mirror and fastening a final bow to her dress, with Annushka's aid, when the noise of wheels on the gravel driveway was heard.
"It is too early for Betsy," she thought; and, looking out of the window, she saw a carriage and in the carriage Alekseï Aleksandrovitch's black hat and well-known ears.
"How provoking! Can he have come for the night?" she thought; and all the consequences of his visit seemed to her so terrible, so horrible, that without taking time for a moment of reflection, she went down-stairs, radiant with gayety, to receive her husband; and, feeling in her the presence of the spirit of falsehood and deception which now ruled her, she gave herself up to it and spoke with her husband, not knowing what she said.
"Ah! how good of you!" said she, extending her hand to Karenin, while she smiled on Sliudin as a household friend.
"You've come for the night, I hope?" were her first words, inspired by the demon of untruth; "and now we will go to the races together. But how sorry I am that I engaged to go with Betsy. She is coming for me."
Alekseï Aleksandrovitch frowned slightly at the name of Betsy.
"Oh! I will not separate the inseparables," said he, in his light jesting tone. "I will walk with Mikhaïl Vasilyevitch. The doctor advised me to take exercise; I will join the pedestrians, and imagine I am still at the Spa."
"There is no hurry," said Anna. "Will you have some tea?"
She rang.
"Serve the tea, and tell Serozha that Alekseï Aleksandrovitch has come.—Well! how is your health?—Mikhaïl Vasilyevitch, you have not been out to see us before; look! how pleasant it is on the balcony!" said she, looking now at her husband, now at her guest.
She spoke very simply and naturally, but too fast and too fluently. She herself felt that it was so, especially when she caught Mikhaïl Vasilyevitch looking at her with curiosity and perceived that he was studying her.
Mikhaïl Vasilyevitch got up and went out on the terrace, and she sat down beside her husband.
"You do not look at all well," said she.
"Oh, yes! The doctor came this morning, and wasted an hour of my time. I am convinced that some one of my friends sent him. My health is so precious ...."
"No, what did he say?"
And she questioned him about his health and his labors, advising him to take rest, and to come out into the country, where she was.
It was all said with gayety and animation, and with brilliant light in her eyes, but Alekseï Aleksandrovitch attached no special importance to her manner; he heard only her words, and took them in their literal signification. And he replied simply, though jestingly. The conversation had no special weight, yet Anna never afterward could remember the whole short scene without the keen agony of shame.
Serozha came in, accompanied by his governess. If Alekseï Aleksandrovitch had allowed himself to notice, he would have been struck by the timid manner in which the lad looked at his parents,—at his father first, and then at his mother. But he was unwilling to see anything, and he saw nothing.
"Ah, young man! He has grown. Indeed, he is getting to be a great fellow! Good-morning, young man!"
And he stretched out his hand to the puzzled child. Serozha had always been a little afraid of his father; but now, since Alekseï Aleksandrovitch had begun to call him "young man," and since he had begun to rack his brains to discover whether Vronsky were a friend or an enemy, he was becoming more timid than ever. He turned to his mother, as if for protection; he felt at ease only when with her. Meantime Alekseï Aleksandrovitch laid his hand on the boy's shoulder, and asked his governess about him; but the child was so painfully shy of him that Anna saw he was going to cry.
Anna, who had flushed at the moment her son came in, now noticing that it was awkward for him, quickly jumped up, raised Alekseï Aleksandrovitch's hand to let the boy go, kissed the little fellow, and took him out on the terrace. Then she came back to her husband again.
"It is getting late," she said, consulting her watch. "Why does n't Betsy come?" ....
"Oh, yes," said Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, and as he got up he joined his fingers and made them crack. "I came also to bring you some money, for nightingales don't live on songs," said he. "You need it, I suppose?"
"No, I don't need it .... yes .... I do," said she, not looking at him and blushing to the roots of her hair. "Well, I suppose you will come back after the races?"
"Oh, yes!" replied Alekseï Aleksandrovitch. "But here is the glory of Peterhof, the Princess Tverskaya," he added, looking out of the window at a magnificent carriage with a short body set very high and with horses harnessed in the English fashion, drawing up to the entrance; "what elegance! splendid! well, let us go too!"
The Princess Tverskaya did not leave her carriage; her lackey, in top-boots and pelerinka, or short cloak, and wearing a tall hat, leaped to the steps.
"I am going, good-by," said Anna, and after she had kissed her son, she went to Alekseï Aleksandrovitch and gave him her hand. "It was very kind of you to come."
Alekseï Aleksandrovitch kissed her hand.
"Well then, da svidanya! You will come back to tea? Excellent!" she said, as she went down the steps, seeming radiant and happy.
But hardly had she passed from his sight before she felt on her hand the place where his lips had kissed it, and she shivered with repugnance.