"No; what did he say?"

She questioned him about his health and what he had been doing,

and tried to persuade him to take a rest and come out to her.

All this she said brightly, rapidly, and with a peculiar

brilliance in her eyes. But Alexey Alexandrovitch did not now

attach any special significance to this tone of hers. He heard

only her words and gave them only the direct sense they bore.

And he answered simply, though jestingly. There was nothing

remarkable in all this conversation, but never after could Anna

recall this brief scene without an agonizing pang of shame.

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Seryozha came in preceded by his governess. If Alexey

Alexandrovitch had allowed himself to observe he would have

noticed the timid and bewildered eyes with which Seryozha glanced

first at his father and then at his mother. But he would not see

anything, and he did not see it.

"Ah, the young man! He's grown. Really, he's getting quite a

man. How are you, young man?"

And he gave his hand to the scared child. Seryozha had been shy

of his father before, and now, ever since Alexey Alexandrovitch

had taken to calling him young man, and since that insoluble

question had occurred to him whether Vronsky were a friend or a

foe, he avoided his father. He looked round towards his mother

as though seeking shelter. It was only with his mother that he

was at ease. Meanwhile, Alexey Alexandrovitch was holding his

son by the shoulder while he was speaking to the governess, and

Seryozha was so miserably uncomfortable that Anna saw he was on

the point of tears.

Anna, who had flushed a little the instant her son came in,

noticing that Seryozha was uncomfortable, got up hurriedly, took

Alexey Alexandrovitch's hand from her son's shoulder, and kissing

the boy, led him out onto the terrace, and quickly came back.

"It's time to start, though," said she, glancing at her watch.

"How is it Betsy doesn't come?..."

"Yes," said Alexey Alexandrovitch, and getting up, he folded his

hands and cracked his fingers. "I've come to bring you some

money, too, for nightingales, we know, can't live on fairy

tales," he said. "You want it, I expect?"

"No, I don't...yes, I do," she said, not looking at him, and

crimsoning to the roots of her hair. "But you'll come back here

after the races, I suppose?"

"Oh, yes!" answered Alexey Alexandrovitch. "And here's the glory

of Peterhof, Princess Tverskaya," he added, looking out of the

window at the elegant English carriage with the tiny seats placed

extremely high. "What elegance! Charming! Well, let us be

starting too, then."




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