Anna Karenina

onsky and Anna had been traveling for three months together in
Europe. They had visited Venice, Rome, and Naples, and had just arrived
at a small Italian town where they meant to stay some time. A handsome
head waiter, with thick pomaded hair parted from the neck upwards, an
evening coat, a broad white cambric shirt front, and a bunch of
trinkets hanging above his rounded stomach, stood with his hands in the
full curve of his pockets, looking contemptuously from under his
eyelids while he gave some frigid reply to a gentleman who had stopped
him. Catching the sound of footsteps coming from the other side of the
entry towards the staircase, the head waiter turned round, and seeing
the Russian count, who had taken their best rooms, he took his hands
out of his pockets deferentially, and with a bow informed him that a
courier had been, and that the business about the palazzo had been
arranged. The steward was prepared to sign the agreement.

“Ah! I’m glad to hear it,” said Vronsky. “Is madame at home or not?”

“Madame has been out for a walk but has returned now,” answered the
waiter.

Vronsky took off his soft, wide-brimmed hat and passed his handkerchief
over his heated brow and hair, which had grown half over his ears, and
was brushed back covering the bald patch on his head. And glancing
casually at the gentleman, who still stood there gazing intently at
him, he would have gone on.

“This gentleman is a Russian, and was inquiring after you,” said the
head waiter.

With mingled feelings of annoyance at never being able to get away from
acquaintances anywhere, and longing to find some sort of diversion from
the monotony of his life, Vronsky looked once more at the gentleman,
who had retreated and stood still again, and at the same moment a light
came into the eyes of both.

“Golenishtchev!”

“Vronsky!”

It really was Golenishtchev, a comrade of Vronsky’s in the Corps of
Pages. In the corps Golenishtchev had belonged to the liberal party; he
left the corps without entering the army, and had never taken office
under the government. Vronsky and he had gone completely different ways
on leaving the corps, and had only met once since.

At that meeting Vronsky perceived that Golenishtchev had taken up a
sort of lofty, intellectually liberal line, and was consequently
disposed to look down upon Vronsky’s interests and calling in life.
Hence Vronsky had met him with the chilling and haughty manner he so
well knew how to assume, the meaning of which was: “You may like or
dislike my way of life, that’s a matter of the most perfect
indifference to me; you will have to treat me with respect if you want
to know me.” Golenishtchev had been contemptuously indifferent to the
tone taken by Vronsky. This second meeting might have been expected,
one would have supposed, to estrange them still more. But now they
beamed and exclaimed with delight on recognizing one another. Vronsky
would never have expected to be so pleased to see Golenishtchev, but
probably he was not himself aware how bored he was. He forgot the
disagreeable impression of their last meeting, and with a face of frank
delight held out his hand to his old comrade. The same expression of
delight replaced the look of uneasiness on Golenishtchev’s face.

“How glad I am to meet you!” said Vronsky, showing his strong white
teeth in a friendly smile.

“I heard the name Vronsky, but I didn’t know which one. I’m very, very
glad!”

“Let’s go in. Come, tell me what you’re doing.”

“I’ve been living here for two years. I’m working.”

“Ah!” said Vronsky, with sympathy; “let’s go in.” And with the habit
common with Russians, instead of saying in Russian what he wanted to
keep from the servants, he began to speak in French.

“Do you know Madame Karenina? We are traveling together. I am going to
see her now,” he said in French, carefully scrutinizing Golenishtchev’s
face.

“Ah! I did not know” (though he did know), Golenishtchev answered
carelessly. “Have you been here long?” he added.

“Four days,” Vronsky answered, once more scrutinizing his friend’s face
intently.

“Yes, he’s a decent fellow, and will look at the thing properly,”
Vronsky said to himself, catching the significance of Golenishtchev’s
face and the change of subject. “I can introduce him to Anna, he looks
at it properly.”

During those three months that Vronsky had spent abroad with Anna, he
had always on meeting new people asked himself how the new person would
look at his relations with Anna, and for the most part, in men, he had
met with the “proper” way of looking at it. But if he had been asked,
and those who looked at it “properly” had been asked, exactly how they
did look at it, both he and they would have been greatly puzzled to
answer.

In reality, those who in Vronsky’s opinion had the “proper” view had no
sort of view at all, but behaved in general as well-bred persons do
behave in regard to all the complex and insoluble problems with which
life is encompassed on all sides; they behaved with propriety, avoiding
allusions and unpleasant questions. They assumed an air of fully
comprehending the import and force of the situation, of accepting and
even approving of it, but of considering it superfluous and uncalled
for to put all this into words.

Vronsky at once divined that Golenishtchev was of this class, and
therefore was doubly pleased to see him. And in fact, Golenishtchev’s
manner to Madame Karenina, when he was taken to call on her, was all
that Vronsky could have desired. Obviously without the slightest effort
he steered clear of all subjects which might lead to embarrassment.

He had never met Anna before, and was struck by her beauty, and still
more by the frankness with which she accepted her position. She blushed
when Vronsky brought in Golenishtchev, and he was extremely charmed by
this childish blush overspreading her candid and handsome face. But
what he liked particularly was the way in which at once, as though on
purpose that there might be no misunderstanding with an outsider, she
called Vronsky simply Alexey, and said they were moving into a house
they had just taken, what was here called a palazzo. Golenishtchev
liked this direct and simple attitude to her own position. Looking at
Anna’s manner of simple-hearted, spirited gaiety, and knowing Alexey
Alexandrovitch and Vronsky, Golenishtchev fancied that he understood
her perfectly. He fancied that he understood what she was utterly
unable to understand: how it was that, having made her husband
wretched, having abandoned him and her son and lost her good name, she
yet felt full of spirits, gaiety, and happiness.

“It’s in the guide-book,” said Golenishtchev, referring to the palazzo
Vronsky had taken. “There’s a first-rate Tintoretto there. One of his
latest period.”

“I tell you what: it’s a lovely day, let’s go and have another look at
it,” said Vronsky, addressing Anna.

“I shall be very glad to; I’ll go and put on my hat. Would you say it’s
hot?” she said, stopping short in the doorway and looking inquiringly
at Vronsky. And again a vivid flush overspread her face.

Vronsky saw from her eyes that she did not know on what terms he cared
to be with Golenishtchev, and so was afraid of not behaving as he would
wish.

He looked a long, tender look at her.

“No, not very,” he said.

And it seemed to her that she understood everything, most of all, that
he was pleased with her; and smiling to him, she walked with her rapid
step out at the door.

The friends glanced at one another, and a look of hesitation came into
both faces, as though Golenishtchev, unmistakably admiring her, would
have liked to say something about her, and could not find the right
thing to say, while Vronsky desired and dreaded his doing so.

“Well then,” Vronsky began to start a conversation of some sort; “so
you’re settled here? You’re still at the same work, then?” he went on,
recalling that he had been told Golenishtchev was writing something.

“Yes, I’m writing the second part of the Two Elements,” said
Golenishtchev, coloring with pleasure at the question—“that is, to be
exact, I am not writing it yet; I am preparing, collecting materials.
It will be of far wider scope, and will touch on almost all questions.
We in Russia refuse to see that we are the heirs of Byzantium,” and he
launched into a long and heated explanation of his views.

Vronsky at the first moment felt embarrassed at not even knowing of the
first part of the Two Elements, of which the author spoke as
something well known. But as Golenishtchev began to lay down his
opinions and Vronsky was able to follow them even without knowing the
Two Elements, he listened to him with some interest, for
Golenishtchev spoke well. But Vronsky was startled and annoyed by the
nervous irascibility with which Golenishtchev talked of the subject
that engrossed him. As he went on talking, his eyes glittered more and
more angrily; he was more and more hurried in his replies to imaginary
opponents, and his face grew more and more excited and worried.
Remembering Golenishtchev, a thin, lively, good-natured and well-bred
boy, always at the head of the class, Vronsky could not make out the
reason of his irritability, and he did not like it. What he
particularly disliked was that Golenishtchev, a man belonging to a good
set, should put himself on a level with some scribbling fellows, with
whom he was irritated and angry. Was it worth it? Vronsky disliked it,
yet he felt that Golenishtchev was unhappy, and was sorry for him.
Unhappiness, almost mental derangement, was visible on his mobile,
rather handsome face, while without even noticing Anna’s coming in, he
went on hurriedly and hotly expressing his views.

When Anna came in in her hat and cape, and her lovely hand rapidly
swinging her parasol, and stood beside him, it was with a feeling of
relief that Vronsky broke away from the plaintive eyes of Golenishtchev
which fastened persistently upon him, and with a fresh rush of love
looked at his charming companion, full of life and happiness.
Golenishtchev recovered himself with an effort, and at first was
dejected and gloomy, but Anna, disposed to feel friendly with everyone
as she was at that time, soon revived his spirits by her direct and
lively manner. After trying various subjects of conversation, she got
him upon painting, of which he talked very well, and she listened to
him attentively. They walked to the house they had taken, and looked
over it.

“I am very glad of one thing,” said Anna to Golenishtchev when they
were on their way back, “Alexey will have a capital atelier. You must
certainly take that room,” she said to Vronsky in Russian, using the
affectionately familiar form as though she saw that Golenishtchev would
become intimate with them in their isolation, and that there was no
need of reserve before him.

“Do you paint?” said Golenishtchev, turning round quickly to Vronsky.

“Yes, I used to study long ago, and now I have begun to do a little,”
said Vronsky, reddening.

“He has great talent,” said Anna with a delighted smile. “I’m no judge,
of course. But good judges have said the same.”