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she so dreaded settled upon his face.
“Well, I’m glad. And are you well?” he said, wiping his damp beard
with his handkerchief and kissing her hand.
“Never mind,” she thought, “only let him be here, and so long as
he’s here he cannot, he dare not, cease to love me.”
The evening was spent happily and gaily in the presence of Prin-
cess Varvara, who complained to him that Anna had been taking mor-
phine in his absence.
“What am I to do? I couldn’t sleep.... My thoughts prevented me.
When he’s here I never take it—hardly ever.”
He told her about the election, and Anna knew how by adroit
questions to bring him to what gave him most pleasure—his own
success. She told him of everything that interested him at home; and
all that she told him was of the most cheerful description.
But late in the evening, when they were alone, Anna, seeing that
she had regained complete possession of him, wanted to erase the
painful impression of the glance he had given her for her letter. She
said:
“Tell me frankly, you were vexed at getting my letter, and you didn’t
believe me?”
As soon as she had said it, she felt that however warm his feelings
were to her, he had not forgiven her for that.
“Yes,” he said, “the letter was so strange. First, Annie ill, and then
you thought of coming yourself.”
“It was all the truth.”
“Oh, I don’t doubt it.”
“Yes, you do doubt it. You are vexed, I see.”
“Not for one moment. I’m only vexed, that’s true, that you seem
somehow unwilling to admit that there are duties...”
“The duty of going to a concert...”
“But we won’t talk about it,” he said.
“Why not talk about it?” she said.
“I only meant to say that matters of real importance may turn up.
Now, for instance, I shall have to go to Moscow to arrange about the
house.... Oh, Anna, why are you so irritable? Don’t you know that I
can’t live without you?”
“If so,” said Anna, her voice suddenly changing, “it means that you
are sick of this life.... Yes, you will come for a day and go away, as men
do...”
“Anna, that’s cruel. I am ready to give up my whole life.”
But she did not hear him.
“If you go to Moscow, I will go too. I will not stay here. Either we
must separate or else live together.”
“Why, you know, that’s my one desire. But for that...”
“We must get a divorce. I will write to him. I see I cannot go on like
this.... But I will come with you to Moscow.”
“You talk as if you were threatening me. But I desire nothing so
much as never to be parted from you,” said Vronsky, smiling.
But as he said these words there gleamed in his eyes not merely a
cold look, but the vindictive look of a man persecuted and made cruel.
She saw the look and correctly divined its meaning.
“If so, it’s a calamity!” that glance told her. It was a moment’s
impression, but she never forgot it.
Anna wrote to her husband asking him about a divorce, and to-
wards the end of November, taking leave of Princess Varvara, who
wanted to go to Petersburg, she went with Vronsky to Moscow. Ex-
pecting every day an answer from Alexey Alexandrovitch, and after
that the divorce, they now established themselves together like mar-
ried people.