They were speaking of common acquaintances, keeping up the most

trivial conversation, but to Kitty it seemed that every word they

said was determining their fate and hers. And strange it was

that they were actually talking of how absurd Ivan Ivanovitch was

with his French, and how the Eletsky girl might have made a

better match, yet these words had all the while consequence for

them, and they were feeling just as Kitty did. The whole ball,

the whole world, everything seemed lost in fog in Kitty's soul.

Nothing but the stern discipline of her bringing-up supported her

and forced her to do what was expected of her, that is, to dance,

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to answer questions, to talk, even to smile. But before the

mazurka, when they were beginning to rearrange the chairs and a

few couples moved out of the smaller rooms into the big room, a

moment of despair and horror came for Kitty. She had refused

five partners, and now she was not dancing the mazurka. She had

not even a hope of being asked for it, because she was so

successful in society that the idea would never occur to anyone

that she had remained disengaged till now. She would have to

tell her mother she felt ill and go home, but she had not the

strength to do this. She felt crushed. She went to the furthest

end of the little drawing room and sank into a low chair. Her

light, transparent skirts rose like a cloud about her slender

waist; one bare, thin, soft, girlish arm, hanging listlessly, was

lost in the folds of her pink tunic; in the other she held her

fan, and with rapid, short strokes fanned her burning face. But

while she looked like a butterfly, clinging to a blade of grass,

and just about to open its rainbow wings for fresh flight, her

heart ached with a horrible despair.

"But perhaps I am wrong, perhaps it was not so?" And again she

recalled all she had seen.

"Kitty, what is it?" said Countess Nordston, stepping noiselessly

over the carpet towards her. "I don't understand it."

Kitty's lower lip began to quiver; she got up quickly.

"Kitty, you're not dancing the mazurka?"

"No, no," said Kitty in a voice shaking with tears.

"He asked her for the mazurka before me," said Countess Nordston,

knowing Kitty would understand who were "he" and "her." "She

said: 'Why, aren't you going to dance it with Princess

Shtcherbatskaya?'"

"Oh, I don't care!" answered Kitty.




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