Chapter 4
AS THE CARRIAGE DROVE out into the street, Levin felt it jolting over the uneven road, and heard the angry shout of their sledge driver, who had only just learned to drive it, and had nothing like the smooth touch of a II/SledgeDriver/6. Levin saw in the uncertain light the red blind of a tavern and the shops, and began to think over his actions, and to wonder whether he was doing right in going to see Anna. What would Kitty say? But Stepan Arkadyich gave him no time for reflection, and, as though divining his doubts, he scattered them.
“How glad I am,” he said, “that you should know her! You know Dolly has long wished for it. And Lvov’s been to see her, and often goes. Though she is my sister,” Stepan Arkadyich pursued, “I don’t hesitate to say that she’s a remarkable woman. But you will see. Her position is very painful, especially now.”
“Why especially now?”
“Vronsky and Anna have applied to her husband for amnesty and divorce, after their ill-conceived adventure in Vozdvizhenskoe. They have assurances that Karenin has received their request and is considering it, but not a word has yet been heard from that worthy. And so they wait, in rather exquisite agony, for a reply. As soon as the divorce is over, she will marry Vronsky. Well, then their position will be as regular as mine, as yours.
“But the point is she has been for three months in Moscow, where everyone knows her, waiting for some resolution. She goes out nowhere, sees no woman except Dolly, because, do you understand, she doesn’t care to have people come as a favor. But you’ll see how she has arranged her life—how calm, how dignified she is. To the left, in the crescent opposite the church!” shouted Stepan Arkadyich, leaning out of the window.
“I beg of you not to yell at me!” the red-faced sledge driver implored, nearly banking the carriage as he jerked it into the turn.
The carriage drove into the courtyard, and Stepan Arkadyich rang loudly at the entrance where sledges were standing.
And without asking the hapless servant who opened the door whether the lady was at home, Stepan Arkadyich walked into the hall. Levin followed him, more and more doubtful whether he was doing right or wrong.
Looking at himself in the I/Reflector/9 in the hallway, Levin noticed that he was red in the face, but he felt certain he was not drunk, and he followed Stepan Arkadyich up the carpeted stairs to the study.
Passing through the dining room, a room not very large, with dark, paneled walls, Stepan Arkadyich and Levin walked across the soft carpet to the half-dark study, lighted up by a single lumière with a big, dark shade. On the wall above was a big full-length portrait of a woman, which Levin could not help looking at. It was the portrait of Anna, painted on the moon by the doomed Mihailov. Levin gazed at the portrait, which stood out from the frame in the brilliant light thrown on it, and he could not tear himself away from it. He positively forgot where he was, and not even hearing what was said, he could not take his eyes off the marvelous portrait. It was not a picture, but a living, charming woman, with black, curling hair, with bare arms and shoulders, with a pensive smile on the lips, covered with soft down; she stood in a confident pose on the arm of a beloved-companion robot, triumphantly and softly looking at him with eyes that baffled him. She was not living only because she was more beautiful than a living woman can be.
“I am delighted!” He heard suddenly near him a voice, unmistakably addressing him, the voice of the very woman he had been admiring in the portrait. Anna had come from behind the treillage to meet him, and Levin saw in the dim light of the study the very woman of the portrait, in a dark-blue short gown, not in the same position, nor with the same expression, but with the same perfection of beauty which the artist had caught in the portrait. She was less dazzling in reality, but of course in the picture she had the advantage of the radiant backlight cast by a Class III. Now, in person, and in the New Russia, that enhancement was sadly lacking.