ANNA KARENINA (Collector's Edition). Leo Tolstoy

whatever,’ said Vronsky, laughing and showing his close-set teeth. ‘Excuse me!’ he added, taking from her hand the opera-glasses, and he set to work to scan across her bare shoulder the row of boxes opposite. ‘I am afraid I am becoming ridiculous.’

      He knew very well that he ran no risk of appearing ridiculous either in Betsy’s eyes or in the eyes of Society people generally. He knew very well that in their eyes, the rôle of the disappointed lover of a maiden or of any single woman might be ridiculous; but the rôle of a man who was pursuing a married woman, and who made it the purpose of his life at all cost to draw her into adultery, was one which had in it something beautiful and dignified and could never be ridiculous; so it was with a proud glad smile lurking under his moustache that he put down the opera-glasses and looked at his cousin.

      ‘And why did you not come to dinner?’ she said admiringly.

      ‘I must tell you about that. I was engaged, and with what do you think? I’ll give you a hundred or a thousand guesses — and you won’t find out! I was making peace between a husband and a fellow who had insulted his wife. Yes, really!’

      ‘Well, and did you succeed?’

      ‘Nearly.’

      ‘You must tell me all about it,’ she said, rising. ‘Come back in the next interval.’

      ‘I can’t: I am going to the French Theatre.’

      ‘What? From Nilsson?’ asked Betsy, quite horrified, though she could not have distinguished Nilsson’s voice from that of a chorus girl.

      ‘It can’t be helped, I have an appointment there in connection with this same peacemaking of mine.’

      ‘ “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be saved!” ’ said Betsy, remembering that she had heard some one say something like that. ‘Well, then, sit down and tell me about it.’

      And she sat down again.

      Chapter 5

      ‘IT’S rather improper but so charming that I long to tell it,’ said Vronsky, gazing at her with laughing eyes. ‘I shan’t mention names.’

      ‘So much the better. I shall guess them.’

      ‘Well then, listen: two gay young fellows were out driving …’

      ‘Officers of your regiment, of course?’

      ‘I didn’t say officers, but just two young men who had been lunching …’

      ‘Translate that “not wisely but too well.” ’

      ‘It may be. They were on their way to dine with a comrade, and in the highest spirits. They see that a pretty woman in a hired sledge is passing them, looking at them, and laughing and nodding to them — at any rate they think so. Of course off they go after her, galloping full speed. To their surprise the lovely one stops at the door of the very house they are going to. She runs up to the top flat. They only manage to see a pair of red lips beneath a short veil, and lovely little feet …’

      ‘You tell it with so much feeling that I think you yourself must have been one of the two.’

      ‘And what did you say to me just now? Well, the young men go into their comrade’s flat. He was giving a farewell dinner. There they may really have drunk rather too much, as always happens at farewell dinners. At dinner they inquire who lives in the top flat. No one knows; but their host’s footman, in answer to their question whether “girls” lived there, replies that there are a lot of them thereabouts. After dinner the young men go into the host’s study to compose a letter to the fair stranger, and, having written one full of passion and containing a declaration, they carry it upstairs themselves, in order to explain anything that might not be quite clear in the letter.’

      ‘Why do you tell me such horrors? Well?’

      ‘They ring. A maid opens the door; they give her the letter and assure her that they are both so much in love that they will die at once on the doorstep. The maid, quite bewildered, carries on the negotiations. Suddenly a gentleman with sausage-shaped whiskers, and as red as a lobster, appears, announces that no one but his wife lives in that flat and turns them both out… .’

      ‘How do you know he had “sausage-shaped whiskers,” as you say?’

      ‘You just listen! To-day I went to reconcile them.’

      ‘Well, what happened?’

      ‘This is the most interesting part. It turns out that the happy couple are a Titular Councillor [a modest rank in the Civil Service] and a Titular Councilloress! The Titular Councillor lodges a complaint, and I turn into a peacemaker — and what a peacemaker! … I assure you Talleyrand was nothing to me!’

      ‘What was the difficulty?’

      ‘You shall hear. We duly apologized: “We are in despair; we beg to be forgiven for our unfortunate mistake.” The Titular Councillor with his sausages begins to thaw, but also wishes to express his feelings, and as soon as he begins to express them he begins to get excited and grows insulting, and again I have to set all my diplomatic talents in motion. “I agree that they acted badly, but beg you to consider that it was a mistake; consider their youth; besides which the young men had just dined. You understand! They repent from the bottom of their hearts, and ask you to forgive their fault.” The Titular Councillor again softens. “I am willing to forgive them, Count, but you must understand that my wife, a respectable woman, has been subjected to the rudeness and insults of these hobbledehoys, these scound …” And you must remember that one of the hobbledehoys is standing there, and I have to reconcile them! Again I set my diplomacy going, and again, just as the whole business should be concluded, my Titular Councillor flies into a rage, gets red, his sausages stick out, and again I dissolve into diplomatic subtlety.’

      ‘Oh, you must hear this!’ cried Betsy, laughing and turning to a lady who was just entering the box. ‘He has made me laugh so!’

      ‘Well, bonne chance! [good luck!]’ she added, giving Vronsky a finger that was not engaged in holding her fan, and with a movement of her shoulders making the bodice of her dress, that had risen a little, slip down again that she might be befittingly nude on returning to the front of the box into the glare of gaslight and the gaze of all eyes.

      Vronsky went to the French Theatre, where he really had to see the Commander of his regiment (who never omitted a single performance there) to talk over this reconciliation business which had occupied and amused him for the last three days. Petritsky, whom Vronsky was fond of, was mixed up in the affair, and so was young Prince Kedrov, a first-rate fellow and a capital comrade, who had lately joined the regiment. Above all, the interests of the regiment were involved.

      Both officers belonged to Vronsky’s squadron. Titular Councillor Wenden had been to see the Commander and had lodged a complaint against the officers who had insulted his wife. His young wife, so Wenden declared (he had been married six months), had been to church with her mother, and suddenly feeling unwell as a result of her interesting condition, was unable to stand any longer and took the first good sledge she could find. These officers, in their sledge, raced after her; she became frightened, and feeling still more unwell ran up the stairs to her flat. Wenden himself having returned from his office and hearing the front-door bell and voices, went out, saw the tipsy officers with the letter, and hustled them out. He requested that they should be severely punished.

      ‘No, say what you like,’ the Commander remarked to Vronsky, whom he had invited to his house, ‘Petritsky is becoming impossible. Not a week passes without some scandal. That Councillor will not let the matter rest: he will go further with it.’

      Vronsky realized how ungrateful a task it was — that a duel was out of the question, and that