"How nice you've come in good time," he said to her, embracing

her waist; "such a bad habit to be late." Bending her left hand,

she laid it on his shoulder, and her little feet in their pink

slippers began swiftly, lightly, and rhythmically moving over the

slippery floor in time to the music.

"It's a rest to waltz with you," he said to her, as they fell

into the first slow steps of the waltz. "It's exquisite--such

lightness, precision." He said to her the same thing he said to

almost all his partners whom he knew well.

She smiled at his praise, and continued to look about the room

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over his shoulder. She was not like a girl at her first ball,

for whom all faces in the ballroom melt into one vision of

fairyland. And she was not a girl who had gone the stale round

of balls till every face in the ballroom was familiar and

tiresome. But she was in the middle stage between these two; she

was excited, and at the same time she had sufficient

self-possession to be able to observe. In the left corner of the

ballroom she saw the cream of society gathered together.

There--incredibly naked--was the beauty Lidi, Korsunsky's wife;

there was the lady of the house; there shone the bald head of

Krivin, always to be found where the best people were. In that

direction gazed the young men, not venturing to approach. There,

too, she descried Stiva, and there she saw the exquisite figure

and head of Anna in a black velvet gown. And _he_ was there.

Kitty had not seen him since the evening she refused Levin. With

her long-sighted eyes, she knew him at once, and was even aware

that he was looking at her.

"Another turn, eh? You're not tired?" said Korsunsky, a little

out of breath.

"No, thank you!"

"Where shall I take you?"

"Madame Karenina's here, I think...take me to her."

"Wherever you command."

And Korsunsky began waltzing with measured steps straight towards

the group in the left corner, continually saying, "Pardon,

mesdames, pardon, pardon, mesdames"; and steering his course

through the sea of lace, tulle, and ribbon, and not disarranging

a feather, he turned his partner sharply round, so that her slim

ankles, in light transparent stockings, were exposed to view, and

her train floated out in fan shape and covered Krivin's knees.

Korsunsky bowed, set straight his open shirt front, and gave her

his arm to conduct her to Anna Arkadyevna. Kitty, flushed, took

her train from Krivin's knees, and, a little giddy, looked round,

seeking Anna. Anna was not in lilac, as Kitty had so urgently

wished, but in a black, low-cut, velvet gown, showing her full

throat and shoulders, that looked as though carved in old ivory,

and her rounded arms, with tiny, slender wrists. The whole gown

was trimmed with Venetian guipure. On her head, among her black

hair--her own, with no false additions--was a little wreath of

pansies, and a bouquet of the same in the black ribbon of her

sash among white lace. Her coiffure was not striking. All that

was noticeable was the little wilful tendrils of her curly hair

that would always break free about her neck and temples. Round

her well-cut, strong neck was a thread of pearls.




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