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reason considered unseemly; it was ridiculed by every one, and by the
princess herself. But how girls were to be married, and how parents
were to marry them, no one knew. Everyone with whom the princess
had chanced to discuss the matter said the same thing: “Mercy on us,
it’s high time in our day to cast off all that old-fashioned business. It’s
the young people have to marry; and not their parents; and so we
ought to leave the young people to arrange it as they choose.” It was
very easy for anyone to say that who had no daughters, but the prin-
cess realized that in the process of getting to know each other, her
daughter might fall in love, and fall in love with someone who did not
care to marry her or who was quite unfit to be her husband. And,
however much it was instilled into the princess that in our times young
people ought to arrange their lives for themselves, she was unable to
believe it, just as she would have been unable to believe that, at any
time whatever, the most suitable playthings for children five years old
ought to be loaded pistols. And so the princess was more uneasy over
Kitty than she had been over her elder sisters.
Now she was afraid that Vronsky might confine himself to simply
flirting with her daughter. She saw that her daughter was in love with
him, but tried to comfort herself with the thought that he was an
honorable man, and would not do this. But at the same time she knew
how easy it is, with the freedom of manners of today, to turn a girl’s
head, and how lightly men generally regard such a crime. The week
before, Kitty had told her mother of a conversation she had with Vronsky
during a mazurka. This conversation had partly reassured the prin-
cess; but perfectly at ease she could not be. Vronsky had told Kitty that
both he and his brother were so used to obeying their mother that they
never made up their minds to any important undertaking without
consulting her. “And just now, I am impatiently awaiting my mother’s
arrival from Petersburg, as peculiarly fortunate,” he told her.
Kitty had repeated this without attaching any significance to the
words. But her mother saw them in a different light. She knew that
the old lady was expected from day to day, that she would be pleased
at her son’s choice, and she felt it strange that he should not make his
offer through fear of vexing his mother. However, she was so anxious
for the marriage itself, and still more for relief from her fears, that she
believed it was so. Bitter as it was for the princess to see the unhappi-
ness of her eldest daughter, Dolly, on the point of leaving her husband,
her anxiety over the decision of her youngest daughter’s fate engrossed
all her feelings. Today, with Levin’s reappearance, a fresh source of
anxiety arose. She was afraid that her daughter, who had at one time,
as she fancied, a feeling for Levin, might, from extreme sense of honor,
refuse Vronsky, and that Levin’s arrival might generally complicate and
delay the affair so near being concluded.
“Why, has be been here long?” the princess asked about Levin, as
they returned home.
“He came today, mamma.”
“There’s one thing I want to say...” began the princess, and from
her serious and alert face, Kitty guessed what it would be.
“Mamma,” she said, flushing hotly and turning quickly to her,
“please, please don’t say anything about that. I know, I know all about
it.”
She wished for what her mother wished for, but the motives of her
mother’s wishes wounded her.
“I only want to say that to raise hopes...”
“Mamma, darling, for goodness’ sake, don’t talk about it. It’s so
horrible to talk about it.”
“I won’t,” said her mother, seeing the tears in her daughter’s eyes;