`He's not a man, not a human being - he's a mannikin! No one knows him; but I know him. Oh, if I'd been in his place, I'd long ago have killed, have torn to pieces a wife like me. I wouldn't have said, ``Anna, ma chère '! He's not a man, he's a ministerial machine. He doesn't understand that I'm your wife, that he's outside, that he's superfluous....
Don't let's talk of him!...'
`You're unfair, very unfair, dearest,' said Vronsky, trying to soothe her. `But never mind, don't let's talk of him. Tell me what you've been doing. What is the matter? Why are you unwell, and what did the doctor say?'
She looked at him with mocking amusement. Evidently she had hit on other absurd and grotesque aspects in her husband and was awaiting the moment to give expression to them.
But he went on:
`I imagine that it's not illness, but your condition. When will it be?'
The ironical light died away in her eyes, but a different smile, a consciousness of something, he did not know what, and of quiet melancholy, came over her face.
`Soon, soon. You say that our position is miserable, that we must put an end to it. If you knew how terrible it is to me - what I would give to be able to love you freely and unafraid! I should not torture myself and torture you with my jealousy.... And it will come soon, but not as we expect.'
And at the thought of how it would come, she seemed so pitiable to herself that tears came into her eyes, and she could not go on. She laid on his sleeve her hand, shining with its whiteness and its rings in the lamplight.
`It won't come as we suppose. I didn't mean to say this to you, but you've made me. Soon, soon, all will be over, and we shall all, all be at peace, and suffer no more.'
`I don't understand,' he said, understanding her.
`You asked when? Soon. And I shan't live through it. Don't interrupt me!' and she made haste to speak. `I know it; I know for certain. I shall die; and I'm very glad I shall die, and release myself and you.'
Tears dropped from her eyes; he bent down over her hand and began kissing it, trying to hide his emotion, which, he knew, had no sort of grounds, though he could not control it.
`Yes, it's better so,' she said, tightly gripping his hand. `That's the only way - the only way left us.'
He had recovered himself, and lifted his head.
`How absurd! What absurd nonsense you are talking!'
`No, it's the truth.'
`What - what's the truth?'
`That I shall die. I have had a dream.'
`A dream?' repeated Vronsky, and instantly he recalled the peasant of his dream.
`Yes, a dream,' she said. `It's a long while since I dreamed it.
I dreamed that I ran into my bedroom, that I had to get something there, to find out something; you know how it is in dreams,' she said, her eyes wide with horror; `and in the bedroom, in the corner, stood something.'
`Oh, what nonsense! How can you believe...'
But she would not let him interrupt her. What she was saying was too important to her.
`And the something turned round, and I saw it was a peasant with a disheveled beard - a little man, and dreadful. I wanted to run away, but he bent down over a sack, and was fumbling there with his hands...'
She showed how he had moved his hands. There was terror in her face. And Vronsky, remembering his dream, felt the same terror filling his soul.
`He was fumbling and kept talking quickly, quickly in French, and, you know, he burred: Il faut le battre, le fer, le broyer, le pétrir. ...
And in my horror I tried to wake up, and woke up... but woke up in the dream. And I began asking myself what it meant. And Kornei said to me:
``In childbirth you'll die, ma'am, you'll die....' And I woke up.'
`What nonsense, what nonsense!' said Vronsky; but he felt himself that there was no conviction in his voice.
`But don't let's talk of it. Ring the bell, I'll have tea. And stay a little, now; it's not long I shall...'
But all at once she stopped. The expression of her face instantaneously changed. Horror and excitement were suddenly replaced by a look of soft, solemn, blissful attention. He could not comprehend the meaning of the change. She was listening to the stirring of the new life within her.
[Next Chapter] [Table of Contents]TOLSTOY: Anna Karenina Part 4, Chapter 04[Previous Chapter] [Table of Contents] Chapter 4 Alexei Alexandrovich, after meeting Vronsky on his own steps, drove, as he had intended, to the Italian opera. He sat through two acts there, and saw everyone he wanted to see. On returning home, he carefully scrutinized the hatstand, and noticing that there was not a military overcoat there, he went, as usual, to his own room. But, contrary to his usual habit, he did not go to bed; he walked up and down his study till three o'clock in the morning. The feeling of furious anger with his wife, who would not observe the proprieties and keep to the one stipulation he had laid on her - not to receive her lover in her own house - gave him no peace. She had not complied with his request, and he was bound to punish her and carry out his threat - obtain a divorce and take away his son. He knew all the difficulties connected with this course, but he had said he would do it, and now he must carry out his threat. Countess Lidia Ivanovna had hinted that this was the best way out of his position, and of late the obtaining of divorces had been brought to such a pitch of perfection that Alexei Alexandrovich saw a possibility of overcoming the formal difficulties.
Misfortunes never come singly, and the affairs of the reorganization of the native tribes, and of the irrigation of the lands of the Zaraisky province, had brought such official worries upon Alexei Alexandrovich that he had been of late in a continual state of extreme irritability.
He did not sleep the whole night, and his fury growing in a sort of vast, arithmetical progression, reached its highest limits in the morning.
He dressed in haste, and, as though carrying his cup full of wrath, and fearing to spill any over, fearing to lose with his wrath the energy necessary for the interview with his wife, he went into her room directly he heard she was up.