"Yes, what did I stop at? That I couldn't conceive a position in

which life would not be a misery, that we are all created to be

miserable, and that we all know it, and all invent means of

deceiving each other. And when one sees the truth, what is one

to do?"

"That's what reason is given man for, to escape from what worries

him," said the lady in French, lisping affectedly, and obviously

pleased with her phrase.

The words seemed an answer to Anna's thoughts.

"To escape from what worries him," repeated Anna. And glancing

Advertisement..

at the red-cheeked husband and the thin wife, she saw that the

sickly wife considered herself misunderstood, and the husband

deceived her and encouraged her in that idea of herself. Anna

seemed to see all their history and all the crannies of their

souls, as it were turning a light upon them. But there was

nothing interesting in them, and she pursued her thought.

"Yes, I'm very much worried, and that's what reason was given me

for, to escape; so then one must escape: why not put out the

light when there's nothing more to look at, when it's sickening

to look at it all? But how? Why did the conductor run along the

footboard, why are they shrieking, those young men in that train?

why are they talking, why are they laughing? It's all falsehood,

all lying, all humbug, all cruelty!..."

When the train came into the station, Anna got out into the crowd

of passengers, and moving apart from them as if they were lepers,

she stood on the platform, trying to think what she had come here

for, and what she meant to do. Everything that had seemed to her

possible before was now so difficult to consider, especially in

this noisy crowd of hideous people who would not leave her alone.

One moment porters ran up to her proffering their services, then

young men, clacking their heels on the planks of the platform and

talking loudly, stared at her; people meeting her dodged past on

the wrong side. Remembering that she had meant to go on further

if there were no answer, she stopped a porter and asked if her

coachman were not here with a note from Count Vronsky.

"Count Vronsky? They sent up here from the Vronskys just this

minute, to meet Princess Sorokina and her daughter. And what is

the coachman like?"

Just as she was talking to the porter, the coachman Mihail, red

and cheerful in his smart blue coat and chain, evidently proud of

having so successfully performed his commission, came up to her

and gave her a letter. She broke it open, and her heart ached

before she had read it.




Most Popular