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Chapter 8.
Alexey Alexandrovitch, on coming back from church service, had
spent the whole morning indoors. He had two pieces of business
before him that morning; first, to receive and send on a deputation
from the native tribes which was on its way to Petersburg, and now at
Moscow; secondly, to write the promised letter to the lawyer. The
deputation, though it had been summoned at Alexey Alexandrovitch’s
instigation, was not without its discomforting and even dangerous as-
pect, and he was glad he had found it in Moscow. The members of this
deputation had not the slightest conception of their duty and the part
they were to play. They naively believed that it was their business to
lay before the commission their needs and the actual condition of
things, and to ask assistance of the government, and utterly failed to
grasp that some of their statements and requests supported the con-
tention of the enemy’s side, and so spoiled the whole business. Alexey
Alexandrovitch was busily engaged with them for a long while, drew
up a program for them from which they were not to depart, and on
dismissing them wrote a letter to Petersburg for the guidance of the
deputation. He had his chief support in this affair in the Countess
Lidia Ivanovna. She was a specialist in the matter of deputations, and
no one knew better than she how to manage them, and put them in the
way they should go. Having completed this task, Alexey Alexandrovitch
wrote the letter to the lawyer. Without the slightest hesitation he gave
him permission to act as he might judge best. In the letter he enclosed
three of Vronsky’s notes to Anna, which were in the portfolio he had
taken away.
Since Alexey Alexandrovitch had left home with the intention of
not returning to his family again, and since he had been at the lawyer’s
and had spoken, though only to one man, of his intention, since espe-
cially he had translated the matter from the world of real life to the
world of ink and paper, he had grown more and more used to his own
intention, and by now distinctly perceived the feasibility of its execu-
tion.
He was sealing the envelope to the lawyer, when he heard the loud
tones of Stepan Arkadyevitch’s voice. Stepan Arkadyevitch was dis-
puting with Alexey Alexandrovitch’s servant, and insisting on being
announced.
“No matter,” thought Alexey Alexandrovitch, “so much the better.
I will inform him at once of my position in regard to his sister, and
explain why it is I can’t dine with him.”
“Come in!” he said aloud, collecting his papers, and putting them
in the blotting-paper.
“There, you see, you’re talking nonsense, and he’s at home!” re-
sponded Stepan Arkadyevitch’s voice, addressing the servant, who
had refused to let him in, and taking off his coat as he went, Oblonsky
walked into the room. “Well, I’m awfully glad I’ve found you! So I
hope...” Stepan Arkadyevitch began cheerfully.
“I cannot come,” Alexey Alexandrovitch said coldly, standing and
not asking his visitor to sit down.
Alexey Alexandrovitch had thought to pass at once into those
frigid relations in which he ought to stand with the brother of a wife