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“You have killed a bear, I’ve been told!” said Kitty, trying assidu-
ously to catch with her fork a perverse mushroom that would slip away,
and setting the lace quivering over her white arm. “Are there bears on
your place?” she added, turning her charming little head to him and
smiling.
There was apparently nothing extraordinary in what she said, but
what unutterable meaning there was for him in every sound, in every
turn of her lips, her eyes, her hand as she said it! There was entreaty for
forgiveness, and trust in him, and tenderness— soft, timid tender-
ness—and promise and hope and love for him, which he could not but
believe in and which choked him with happiness.
“No, we’ve been hunting in the Tver province. It was coming back
from there that I met your beau-frere in the train, or your beau-frere’s
brother-in-law,” he said with a smile. “It was an amusing meeting.”
And he began telling with droll good-humor how, after not sleep-
ing all night, he had, wearing an old fur-lined, full-skirted coat, got into
Alexey Alexandrovitch’s compartment.
“The conductor, forgetting the proverb, would have chucked me
out on account of my attire; but thereupon I began expressing my
feelings in elevated language, and...you, too,” he said, addressing
Karenin and forgetting his name, “at first would have ejected me on
the ground of the old coat, but afterwards you took my part, for which
I am extremely grateful.”
“The rights of passengers generally to choose their seats are too ill-
defined,” said Alexey Alexandrovitch, rubbing the tips of his fingers
on his handkerchief.
“I saw you were in uncertainty about me,” said Levin, smiling
good-naturedly, “but I made haste to plunge into intellectual conver-
sation to smooth over the defects of my attire.” Sergey Ivanovitch,
while he kept up a conversation with their hostess, had one ear for his
brother, and he glanced askance at him. “What is the matter with him
today? Why such a conquering hero?” he thought. He did not know
that Levin was feeling as though he had grown wings. Levin knew she
was listening to his words and that she was glad to listen to him. And
this was the only thing that interested him. Not in that room only, but
in the whole world, there existed for him only himself, with enormously
increased importance and dignity in his own eyes, and she. He felt
himself on a pinnacle that made him giddy, and far away down below
were all those nice excellent Karenins, Oblonskys, and all the world.
Quite without attracting notice, without glancing at them, as though
there were no other places left, Stepan Arkadyevitch put Levin and
Kitty side by side.
“Oh, you may as well sit there,” he said to Levin.
The dinner was as choice as the china, in which Stepan Arkadyevitch
was a connoisseur. The soupe Marie-Louise was a splendid success;
the tiny pies eaten with it melted in the mouth and were irreproach-
able. The two footmen and Matvey, in white cravats, did their duty
with the dishes and wines unobtrusively, quietly, and swiftly. On the
material side the dinner was a success; it was no less so on the imma-
terial. The conversation, at times general and at times between indi-
viduals, never paused, and towards the end the company was so lively
that the men rose from the table, without stopping speaking, and even
Alexey Alexandrovitch thawed.