"I agree to anything," said Sviazhsky.
"I imagine that what Dolly would like best would be a stroll--
wouldn't you? And then the boat, perhaps," said Anna.
So it was decided. Veslovsky and Tushkevitch went off to the
bathing place, promising to get the boat ready and to wait there
for them.
They walked along the path in two couples, Anna with Sviazhsky,
and Dolly with Vronsky. Dolly was a little embarrassed and
anxious in the new surroundings in which she found herself.
Abstractly, theoretically, she did not merely justify, she
positively approved of Anna's conduct. As is indeed not
unfrequent with women of unimpeachable virtue, weary of the
monotony of respectable existence, at a distance she not only
excused illicit love, she positively envied it. Besides, she
loved Anna with all her heart. But seeing Anna in actual life
among these strangers, with this fashionable tone that was so new
to Darya Alexandrovna, she felt ill at ease. What she disliked
particularly was seeing Princess Varvara ready to overlook
everything for the sake of the comforts she enjoyed.
As a general principle, abstractly, Dolly approved of Anna's
action; but to see the man for whose sake her action had been
taken was disagreeable to her. Moreover, she had never liked
Vronsky. She thought him very proud, and saw nothing in him of
which he could be proud except his wealth. But against her own
will, here in his own house, he overawed her more than ever, and
she could not be at ease with him. She felt with him the same
feeling she had had with the maid about her dressing jacket.
Just as with the maid she had felt not exactly ashamed, but
embarrassed at her darns, so she felt with him not exactly
ashamed, but embarrassed at herself.
Dolly was ill at ease, and tried to find a subject of
conversation. Even though she supposed that, through his pride,
praise of his house and garden would be sure to be disagreeable
to him, she did all the same tell him how much she liked his
house.
"Yes, it's a very fine building, and in the good old-fashioned
style," he said.
"I like so much the court in front of the steps. Was that
always so?"
"Oh, no!" he said, and his face beamed with pleasure. "If you
could only have seen that court last spring!"
And he began, at first rather diffidently, but more and more
carried away by the subject as he went on, to draw her attention
to the various details of the decoration of his house and garden.
It was evident that, having devoted a great deal of trouble to
improve and beautify his home, Vronsky felt a need to show off
the improvements to a new person, and was genuinely delighted at
Darya Alexandrovna's praise.